By Joe Klein

It’s beginning to look a lot like…..ruthless self-promotion. Not my intent here, I promise! I’m just reporting the news as it breaks……So here’s more late-breaking news about Christmas in Malibu.

Former MTV veejay MARTHA QUINN, who worked at the music channel with ADAM CURRY in the eighties and early nineties, is featuring the holiday track on a special holiday edition of her XM/Sirius Satellite Radio show MARTHA QUINN PRESENTS GODS OF THE BIG EIGHTIES.

The special is called “MARTHA QUINN’S LIKE, TOTALLY AWESOME RAD HOLIDAY SPECIAL.” According to a post on HER BLOG, Martha tracked down RAD DUDES lead singer KARMA AUGER by contacting his dad, English keyboard player BRIAN AUGER (who achieved legendary status in the sixties and seventies playing with practically every figure in English pop and rock royalty). Brian, in turn, put Martha in touch with Karma, and she goes on to say in her blog that Karma was heading out to Malibu to record an interview about the song. This was news to me, which I only found out about after receiving a Google email alert about the song a couple of days ago that included a link to MARTHA’S WEBSITE.

Martha (in the lower right of the photo) was one of the original crew of five MTV veejays (that also included J.J. Jackson, Nina Blackwood, Mark Goodman and Alan Hunter) that were on the music channel for the first several years following it’s launch in July of 1981. Martha remained at the music channel for ten years, departing in 1991 to work on commercial endorsements and other television projects. Eventually she relocated from New York to L.A. and, with guitarist Jordan Tarlowe, had two sons. In 2004, Martha and her family settled down on the shores of Malibu and started her satellite radio show on Sirius in 2005. When she was putting her first Christmas show together that year, she came across Christmas In Malibu online and, remembering the video from her days at MTV, played the song on her show.

Martha did contact me that year and we traded a few old stories from the MTV days and talked about getting together on one of my frequent visits to Malibu, but it never happened. Frankly, I’m ashamed to admit I forgot all about her show for the last couple of years and it was a pleasant surprise to learn that she featured the song on her Christmas shows in 2006 and 2007 and had decided to track down Karma for this year’s Christmas show, which just so happens to coincide with the song’s twentieth anniversary! Now, how cool is that?

Martha’s satellite radio shows had been airing on Sirius Satellite Radio. But recently Sirius merged with XM Satellite Radio and her shows now air on the combined network. The holiday special airs on Saturday, December 20 at 9:00 PM EST (6:00 PM PST) and repeats on Sunday, December 21 at 11:00 AM ET (8:00 AM PST) on XM’s “80’s On 8” channel, which is on channel 8 on XM Radio. The music channel can also be heard by DirecTV subscribers on DirecTV channel 805. (Check the program schedules on XM or SIRIUS websites for air times of Martha’s regularly scheduled 80’s show.)

I really don’t know why, but, for whatever reason, I haven’t spoken to Karma Auger (or the other Rad Dude, “The Wolf”) since The Rad Dudes disbanded in 1989. I’ve emailed Karma and hope to hear back from him and reconnect before Christmas (in Malibu). In any event, I hope you’ll check out Martha’s show this weekend. It should be cool to hear Karma’s recollection of  all the madness that surrounded the song twenty years ago!

Check back for updates. Rest assured that any further posts about Christmas In Malibu will be limited to a report on contact with Karma or an audio excerpt from Martha’s show with the song and her Karma Auger interview. Unless, of course, something else happens that may be newsworthy!