PETS SHAKE THEIR TAILS TO INTERNET STATION.

Byline: Brent Hopkins Staff Writer

EAGLE ROCK - Cats groove to disco, dogs dig Elvis, but to really reach your pet's soul, it'll take Dionne Warwick.

That's what Eagle Rock resident Adrian Martinez learned in the past few months watching his bizarre hobby turn into an even more bizarre business.

He started DogCatRadio.com six months ago for the amusement of his six dogs and the pair of cats he looks after, then watched with bewilderment as what was essentially a joke between friends morphed into an enterprise with global proportions.

And now it's really taking off.

Ten days ago a couple of hundred pet owners logged onto the site. Now he's got 50,000 assorted animals from Brazil to Sweden tuning in.

``Everyone says, What a genius idea! and I say, What is?'' the 34-year-old musician mused. ``But I look at these e-mails, where people say, I'm listening to this with my cats, or my bird's singing along to 'YMCA,' so I think, OK, it can't be that weird.''

Martinez put the site up a few months ago to entertain his pets while at his day job running an independent record label.

He told a few friends, who logged on and watched the word spread about the site, which features streaming audio of Martinez's collection of tunes from the 1970s and '80s.

There was no business plan, no idea to make money, no concept that anyone would really want to listen to this crazy notion. But he sent out a few press releases, cruised around to animal events in a Winnebago, his so- called ``mobile studio.'' He figured it would be a fun thing to do in his spare time.

But it was one of those too-cute-to-be-true, only-in-L.A. stories, the kind that people giggle about and e-mail to their friends.

Some media outlets picked up the story and then listeners descended like fleas on a dachshund. Soon Martinez was up in the middle of the night, doing interviews with the BBC, amazed that his humble little site had attracted so much attention.

``I thought it was brilliant from the start,'' enthused Edward Rivera, who's now become operations manager and producer for the nascent business. ``He didn't even realize what he had on his hands. One day, people will come to this site, get their music, buy a mug, then buy their dog food.''

That's still a way off, though - they're still running out of the living room of a friend's house. Broadcast central is a few computers cabled together and the playlist is assembled by Rivera and Martinez running to the local Tower Records to buy requests.

A folding table, covered with books and paperwork next to an empty pool in the backyard, serves as the conference room.

The station has two disc jockeys and a rotation compiled from Martinez's personal library and listener suggestions. While he works in pet-theme songs - the Stray Cats are a big favorite, as are canine-covered classics by Dogs In The Hood - most tunes are no different then those heard on mainstream radio.

The playlist leans heavily toward disco, which listeners swear their animals gravitate to.

Not likely, according to pet expert Matthew Margolis, an author and host of ``Woof! It's a Dog's Life'' on PBS. Even with their superior sense of hearing, he said, animals don't process music in the same way humans do.

``You've got 50,000 crazy people,'' he chuckled. ``As long as it doesn't hurt the animal, you've got the right to do anything you want, but what's the dog going to do when you get home? Sit on the couch and say I like hard rock and heavy metal?

``This isn't about the dog being lonely, it's about people being lonely. At what point do you say, give me a break, but it fills people's emotional needs.''

Scoff if you want, said Deborah Ray, a Sunland music teacher who broadcasts ``The Deb Deb Hour'' from noon to 1 p.m. each day. Her dog Jasmine loves Diana Ross, while Little Bear, a pit bull mix, favors Earth, Wind & Fire and The Gap Band. When Martinez told her about the station, she quickly jumped in.

``I thought, it's about time,'' she said. ``It really does make a difference when animals relate to the same thing their humans like.''

And there's tens of thousands of people out there like her, so many that Martinez has been forced to turn the site professional. He's got his music licenses, paid for added streamcasting space and started accepting advertising.

While running the site has messed with his sleep, forced him to put his record label business to the side and pushed him into a business he didn't even imagine, Martinez finds the only problem is that he can't listen to the same music he used to.

``I used to enjoy Baha Men, but you hear 'Who Let the Dogs Out' 30 times a day and you get pretty sick of it,'' he said. ```Hound Dog,' by Elvis? I never want to hear it again ... but I never get tired of 'That's What Friends are For.' That always gets me.''

Brent Hopkins, [phone]

brent.hopkins(at)dailynews.com

HOWL AT THE MOON

Some of the top-played tunes on DogCatRadio.com include:

--``Copacabana,'' Barry Manilow

--``Hot! Hot! Hot!'' Dogs in the Hood

--``Hound Dog,'' Elvis Presley

--``I'm a Green Chicken,'' Carla Mitchell

--``Le Freak,'' Chic

--'`More Than a Woman,'' The Bee Gees

--``Take Me Home Tonight,'' Eddie Money

--``That's What Friends Are For,'' Dionne Warwick

--``Uptown Girl,'' Billy Joel

--``Who Let the Dogs Out,'' Baha Men

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, box

Photo:

(1) DogCatRadio.com founder Adrian Martinez embraces Stinky Pea, left, and Juna at his Internet radio station's headquarters inside his Eagle Rock home on Thursday.

Gus Ruelas/Staff Photographer

(2 -- color) no caption (dog and cat wearing headphones)

Box:

HOWL AT THE MOON (see text)