R&R sent me this year’s ballot for their annual awards. First, congratulations to everyone who has been nominated this go-round.
But here’s an observation about the Alternative awards: To no one’s surprise, KROQ has been nominated as Station of the Year, and Kevin Weatherly is once again on the ballot for Program Director of the Year.
I don’t keep track of such things, but has Kevin or KROQ actually lost either of these awards in the past 15 years? In fact, KROQ should be the Alternative Station of the Century, and Weatherly should be honored similarly.
But the net effect of KROQ and Kevin winning year after year is that it denies awards to some of the stations and programmers in the trenches. These stations aren’t as "world famous" as KROQ, nor perhaps are their PDs as savvy as Weatherly. But somehow in some way, they should be recognized above and beyond just being nominated.
So, here’s my idea: change the name of the awards to the "KROQ Alternative Station of the Year," and the "Kevin Weatherly Programmer of the Year." In this way, the country’s most successful Alternative station and PD will be forever honored by R&R through these awards. After all, wouldn’t that be the highest honor?
And at the same time, R&R could also shine a light on a station in Boston or San Francisco, or a PD who isn’t named Kevin.
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Read the blog about the awards today. Agreed, Kevin and KROQ are legendary and deserve all the accolades and respect. Here’s my point, these awards are silly. Are they based on performance in ratings, revenue, production value, level of competition, years in the format or how many records they add? The majority of the votes from the Records side of Radio & Records will be based on how much, when or what they play. As to the Radio side most of the programmers will vote without hearing most of the stations they’re voting for or much understanding or knowledge of the individuals who are nominated. I know because I’ve been on both sides of the voting coin. I was also on the nominating committee for the Billboard radio awards sometime during the 80’s. Record and radio folks on a conference call going over the possibilities when Tom Owens name came up. Tom was still the PD of WEBN at the time. Huge numbers, innovative and compelling programming, amazing production values and integration in the community. An obvious choice for many of the awards that were up for grabs. The record guys cried no way was he going to get nominated in a large and nasty voice. Why? He wasn’t into their game plan. He added records when he needed to and when the time was right. He could not be manipulated. That phone call has stuck with me since that day. Kind of reminds me of this presidential election year. Voting on top of mind sound bites, partisan politics and little knowledge of the facts. Many of the best in our industry never get what they deserve for quietly winning in their home markets or not playing enough records out of the box. Thanks, Ted