On March 26, 2026, West Texas A&M University’s (WT) radio station, KWTS, hosted its second Live Lounge of the spring semester featuring the local band, Plemons Bridge. The event hosted a live audience in room 152 of the Fine Arts Complex and aired on 91.1 FM for online listeners.
Established roughly around 2022 and named after a well-known bridge in Borger, Texas, the folk rock band, Plemons Bridge, consists of five members, including Luis Torres on guitar and vocals, Andrew Merrell on drums, Jessica Dotson on vocals, Chris Hawkins on bass and Danny “Freeze” Dobervich on harmonica and guitar.
Founder and vocalist of the group, Luis Torres explained how the band found out about the Live Lounge.
“So I saw a post in ‘All Things Canyon,’” Torres said. “[It said] ‘Calling all musicians, we’re doing a Live Lounge series.’ And so, I think somebody else in the band group chat sent me a photo of it, and everyone else was like, ‘Hey, we should do this.’ So, the guys are always sending me suggestions and gigs and stuff that we could do. So that’s how I found her. But I do live in Canyon, so I listen to that station [KWTS] quite a bit, too.”
Torres and Merrell represented the band at the Live Lounge with a setlist of 14 songs, including both original tracks and covers of artists such as The Black Keys and Bob Dylan. Torres shared the writing process of his songs, “Mary” and “Eating Dirt.”
“We did a song called “Mary” [and] I wrote it based on family members,” Torres said. “There’s a weird situation in my family where I have relatives, but there’s drama, so we don’t really see each other a lot. And so that was the idea behind it. Then we did another song called “Eating Dirt.” And it’s like, when things are going wrong, you don’t really want to tell people about your problems, but people are still optimistic for you. Sometimes when I just write stuff, it comes out random, and then I look back on it, and I’m like, ‘okay, I guess this has some meaning to it.’”
Senior strategic communication and advertising and public relations double major, Javier Rivera Cordero has been involved with KWTS since his freshman year. Since then, Rivera Cordero has hosted five specialty shows and helped produce two Live Lounges. Rivera Cordero explained how these events impact the education of communication students.
“This can benefit them educationally because it actually shows how much their school can actually put in towards the arts,” Rivera Cordero said. “I believe when we focus on the arts, a lot of students can realize how their education can actually expand by attending these Live Lounges, and they can work in a technical aspect… Live Lounge is kind of an all-encompassing thing. A very behemoth type of event, but it could really teach so many people so many different things at the same time. And I believe attending one as a major of the arts or as just a watcher of them, I think, can really benefit someone’s education all around.”
The station is planning the third Live Lounge for the 2026 Spring semester. There is currently no set date for the event, but you can find information and updates about upcoming events on their Instagram page. You can also find Plemons Bridge on Instagram, listen to their music on Spotify, or see them live at events, including Idol Art Studio on April 10 and Smoke and Sounds on April 18.
