The Northern Alliance Radio Network was the first all-blogger talk show in the United States – heck, the whole world – when it went on the air in 2004.

Since then, there have been a few other blogger/activist focused radio shows; there was one in Boston back in 2005, and as I recall one, maybe in Colorado (not sure).

Of course, Jack Tomczak and Ben Kruse have been doing “The Late Debate” for a while now on a small chain of stations in the north ‘burbs and Saint Cloud; it’s an excellent show that you should check out.

The idea went badly off the beam a few years ago, when KTNF, the former Air America affiliate in the Twin Cities, started putting leftybloggers on their afternoon drive show, before discovering that none of them had anything interesting to say.

And now, perhaps, a much better plan; Aaron Brown, one of Minnesota’s better leftybloggers, debuts tonight on KAXE, a community station in northern Minnesota.

And from Brown’s description, it looks a little more like “The Northwoods Home Companion” than “Fast Eddie Schultz Lite”:

I knew things were getting serious when I hired the jug band. Have you ever hired a jug band? There’s a certain feeling after you do a thing like that – neither good nor bad, a sense that you have altered the universe in an unpredictable way. Da’ Elliott Brothers out of Duluth will bring three musicians and a couple dozen instruments.

We’ll have a company of actors – Pete Pellinen, Marty and Michelle Rice, Josh Anderson and Scott Hanson performing an original radio drama written by the up-and-coming writer Matt Nelson, a Hibbing native. There’ll be a couple of original sketches and a set of lumberjack stories by Matt’s dad Ed. And I wouldn’t be a showman if I didn’t promise some surprises and special guests.

I actually share Brown’s fascination with the great tradition of live radio (read the article); I’ve had the odd dream of doing something similar…

…but different.

Anyway, break a leg, Brown.