25892: Severe: (post) Miami Herald Article on Haitian Radio DJ (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Constantin Severe <csevere@hotmail.com>


This DJ is tuned to different vibe

BY CARA BUCKLEY

cbuckley@herald.com


PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - The 'Haitian Hillbilly' floods the troubled nation's 
airwaves with the unlikeliest of sounds.

His brow slick with sweat, his breath laced with the previous night's excess, 
the disc jockey leaned toward the microphone and let loose an ungodly squawk.

''Ha-looooo! It's the Haitian Hillbilly coming at you for the Haitian! 
Hillbilly! Happy! Hour!'' Alain Maximilien crowed in a wobbly Southern twang, 
delivering each word like a verbal punch. ``Keep it locked, Port-au-Prince, 
we've got a classic here.''

As Port-au-Prince's scraggly rush hour slunk by outside, Maximilien launched 
his assault on Haiti's airwaves. He played The Clash. He played Johnny Cash. He 
played the theme song from The Dating Game, all the while chain-smoking 
Marlboro Reds and jerking his elbows in what might best be described as a Pee 
Wee Herman-inspired dance.

Maximilien, aka the ''Haitian Hillbilly,'' is an unlikely newcomer to Haitian 
radio, which is saturated by traditional Compas and Zouk music along with what 
are arguably the dregs of commercial American pop. His radio show, on 90.1 
Radio One, features a schizophrenic blend of country music, punk rock and 
rockabilly, liberally spiced with Louie Prima, Bobby Darin, mariachi and, 
oftentimes, sarcasm.

MISFIT MUSIC

Maximilien plays the music he loves, and its selection is partly fueled by 
defiance. He spent half his childhood in Port-au-Prince, but always felt like a 
misfit among his fellow, privileged classmates. With this show, he not only has 
carved himself a niche, but he fulfilled a heartfelt belief: that punk rock -- 
all rock -- has a place in this troubled land.

''Haitian society is very conservative, and I was considered eccentric. It 
sucks to be here and feel like you have to be like everybody else all the 
time,'' said Maximilien, 32. ``That's part of what I'm doing. This country is 
so difficult to live in -- try to be yourself and not worry what everybody 
thinks.''

If Maximilien is an unlikely Haitian radio host, he is also an unlikely 
Haitian. Light-skinned and blue-eyed, he speaks in an airtight American accent 
and delivers his show in English. Factor in his trucker hat, grimy shorts and 
mirrored aviator sunglasses, and he looks more the denizen of a dive bar than 
of a perilous, impoverished city.

But Maximilien is Haitian, at least half of him is anyway. He was born in New 
York City to an Irish American mother from Pittsburgh and a biracial Haitian 
father. His father ran a Haitian garment manufacturing business, and Maximilien 
divided his earliest years between Manhattan and Port-au-Prince. He lived full 
time in Haiti from the sixth grade through the end of high school, but with his 
pierced ear and skateboard -- he built his first half-pipe in his parents' 
driveway in Port-au-Prince -- he never really fit in. He still doesn't.

''I feel very American when I'm here and very Haitian when I'm in the U.S.,'' 
Maximilien said. ``I was always very different.''

Still, for all his post-adolescent wanderings and repeated attempts to find his 
way in the United States, Maximilien always found himself back in Haiti, 
through tragedy, folly or chance.

FAMILY TROUBLES

In the early 1990s, he enrolled in Babson College outside Boston, but his 
lackluster tenure was cut short by news from Port-au-Prince: His father, Leslie 
Maximilien, had run in the presidential elections, lost to Jean-Bertrand 
Aristide, been imprisoned and, through trickery, escaped. Maximilien dropped 
out to help his father rekindle the family business in the Dominican Republic. 
He stayed three years before heading back to the United States.

Next he drifted between Pittsburgh and Miami, painting houses, working in bars 
and cultivating a solid drinking habit.

''Drinking's like a muscle. You've got to keep it in shape,'' he said.

He had the word ''denial'' tattooed along the webbing between the thumb and 
forefinger of his right hand -- his drinking hand. This was a little note to 
self, a permanent reminder that alcohol should be consumed to enhance life 
rather than to escape its problems.

Haiti beckoned again. During a 1997 Christmas trip to Port-au-Prince, 
Maximilien met a former Playboy playmate, of all people, named Susan Krabacher, 
who ran a Haitian charity with her husband. Intrigued by both the ex-centerfold 
and her cause, Maximilien helped run their orphanage for a year. He went back 
to bouncing between Pittsburgh and Miami, but never quite landed. Finally, 
during a visit to Port-au-Prince early this year, a radio producer happened to 
overhear Maximilien sounding off in a bar and offered him an on-air job. The 
pay was minimal, but Maximilien could play or say whatever he wanted. 
Maximilien decided instantly he would play the music he yearned for growing up 
and called himself the Haitian Hillbilly, for kicks.

It is uncertain what Haitians exactly make of the Haitian Hillbilly, or how 
many tune in to his late-afternoon broadcasts.

IRREVERENCE IMPRESSES

The show recently moved to Radio One, which has national reach, and Maximilien 
guesses his audience is largely made up of the English-speaking children of 
United Nations employees and stationed U.S. Marines. The station owners, two 
well-to-do men in their 30s, tapped Maximilien because they were impressed by 
his irreverence and the unvarnished, deadpan monologue he sometimes lapses into 
between songs.

''A lot of people hate his music, but they can't wait to hear what he's going 
to say next,'' said a fellow disc jockey, Michael Moscosco, known also as DJ 
Di.

During any given broadcast, Maximilien might sound off on traffic congestion 
(''How does a country that supposedly has 80-percent unemployment have a rush 
hour?'' he once asked) or wryly allude to drug dealers' penchant for pricey 
trucks or reminisce about past loves (``This is the kind of song I used to make 
out to with Italian chicks.'')

Life in Haiti, though, is worsening, and barely a week passes without one of 
Maximilien's friends or acquaintances getting kidnapped or hurt. But Maximilien 
is unlikely to leave soon. His father, who now runs an orphanage, loves having 
his son close by and helps pay his way.

Maximilien was also recently wedded, though his marriage remains a touchy 
issue.

The girl, a Dominican, is far younger than he is, too young, as it turned out. 
Indeed, Maximilien, the unlikely hillbilly, turned out to have more Jerry Lee 
Lewis in him than he ever thought.

Yet Maximilien said even this misstep forced him to finally slow down. With 
this show, he's found a sense of purpose, even if it's in a country that only 
half feels like home.

''Every time I think I get it out of my system, I come back,'' he said.