It’s 8 p.m. on Wednesday night and Swami Gone Bananas sits down to the microphone at the WATB 1420am radio station on North Decatur Road in Scottdale. The ambiance is like no other radio show - candles lit, strobe lights on, and blue lighting overhead.

“I just scanned the dial one day and came across 1420am radio and I realized where they were broadcasting from… I’ve passed (the station) 20 million times on North Decatur Road," explains Swami on how he got started as a radio show host.

WATB can be heard world-wide on the Internet at WATB1420.com, but Swami doesn’t consider it global.

“It’s good ole AM terrestrial radio… I’ve always loved the romance of AM nighttime radio. That voice in the air and that music in the air with a little bit of static. That was always cool to me when I was a kid growing up listening to Top 40 hits.”

Each week Swami features local musicians, live jams, phone calls, and of course good old fashioned rock n’ roll.

“What I try to do with the radio show is just draw them in with the music and the attitude," he explains, "They know I’m having a good time behind that mic talking to them, so if I’m having a good time, I know they’re going to have a good time too.”

When asked how it feels to be broadcasting live on the world wide web, Swami says, “I don’t know, but I sure enjoy talking to people from San Diego and New York and Washington. I’m not a web savvy guy, I’m an analog guy in a digital world.”

But this is not the first time Swami’s gone global. For 27 years he’s had a CB radio station either in his car or in his house with an antenna 100 feet up a tree. His handle? Swami Gone Bananas, of course.

“When conditions were right, I was the only voice that Jamaica could hear, the only voice Cuba, and Haiti, and Dominican Republic could hear when I keyed down my little microphone with all that power coming out of that big high antenna. So I actually have broadcast worldwide before, just analog.”

Swami has yet to ever touch a computer mouse. He prefers an air brush instead.

As a t-shirt design artist, Swami has been designing Grateful Dead tour merchandise for the past 18 years. “I used to go to Grateful Dead concerts and would show my art in the parking lot and that got back to Grateful Dead merchandising and it all went from there,” he says.

From art to music to radio, Swami Gone Bananas has yet to slow down with weekly live music gigs and his radio show three nights a week.

At WATB, anyone can do a radio show, as long as they have sponsors.

“I thought that was great, and I’m in the process of getting sponsors, so helllooo out there! Listen to the show, you’ll dig it! You’ll want to sponsor me.” he exclaims with a laugh and a smile.

Swami doesn’t design a music set list. He brings to the station CDs and tapes he wants to hear of mostly well known artists, but songs you would never typically hear on the radio.

His selection is from all genres and eras, from 1920s Louis Armstrong to local talents like Nathan Nelson and the Entertainment Crackers from Atlanta’s Northside Tavern.

“I can create a show that people want to listen to," he explains. "What I do best is create atmosphere, create a space, a place for people to ritualize… where people don’t want to leave. And I can create that over the radio.”

“I want to be that voice that they take under the covers with a flash light to read True Detective by.”

The Swami After Dark radio show is live every Tuesday and Wednesday night from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. and on Thursdays from 10 p.m. until midnight.

If you're interested in hearing the Swami Gone Bananas band live, they play every Monday at The Tin Roof from 10 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. as an open mic, Thursdays at Shorty’s Pizza in Tucker from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. and Fridays at The Parish on Highland Avenue from 6 p.m. until 10 p.m. every week.