OK, I’ll admit it. One of the best things about pre-COVID radio station life was that pretty much the entire staff showed up everyday. Yes, they had to. But yes, they wanted to.
Why? Because radio stations are inherently fun places to work. I understand why people working in insurance, logistics, accounting, and similar fields aren’t thrilled about coming back to the office. Their jobs and their work environment are BORING! It’s why “Dilbert” was created to mock the monotony and hypocrisy of the conventional corporate workplace.
Radio stations – and more to the point, radio people are generally fun people to be around. Whether you’re in engineering, traffic, sales, marketing, or programming, it takes a special person to walk in a radio station and declare, “I want to spend the rest of my working life in a place like this!”
And so today’s #TBT is blog post is an homage to the kinds of weird things that happen in radio buildings, especially air studios, where there’s a live body on the air and a program director somewhere listening to the station. And that’s where the “fun” begins. – FJ
October 2018
You’ve seen the web memes, photos, and videos that show all the devices, gadgets, and services that have gone by the wayside since smartphones have become ubiquitous in our lives. The compass, calculator, flashlight, camera, Rolodex, notepad, and so many other handy items have all but been replaced by the iPhone and similar handsets that have become as important to us as our wallets.
If you’re in radio, just don’t add the “hotline” to that list.
You’d think that as a PD in the digital era, all you’d need to get the attention of a DJ, host, or show on the air to efficiently and effectively send them a text message. But the red phone in the studio – the hotline, the Batphone – that silently sets off a blinking light the person on the air couldn’t possibly miss is still an effective way of trying to avoid a disaster – or quickly finding out if one just occurred.
Unlike the splicing block, the cart machine, and the pager, the hot line is still a go-to communications tool of choice at many radio stations, although a simple text to the jock on the air is becoming a more prevalent way to quickly connect. And that got me thinking about a blog post I’ve had on the shelf for more than a year:
Weird hotline stories.
Many stations had two direct outside phone lines going into the studio – a “warm line” – a number for general communications, but nothing urgent. And then, the hotline, originally named after the red phone that was set up between the U.S. and the Soviet Union in June of 1963, back in the “Cold War” days. It was designed to head off a nuclear war because of a mistake, misunderstanding, or a politician run amok.
In radio parlance, the hotline serves essentially the same purpose, giving a PD the direct line into the studio – and the jock on the air’s attention. It was designed to ward off everything from low-level debacles to the worst case scenario – someone on the air doing something that could jeopardize the station license.
PDs still call in with questions like these:
“What was that?”
“Did you forget about the giveaway?”
“Are you aware your mic’s still open?”
“What format are you running?”
“Holy s*&%!”
The blog post I planned was to collect funny, relatable hotline stories for a whimsical post. I reached out to a couple of old PD friends, but just didn’t feel I had enough good stories to put it together.
Until last week. And that’s when the announcement leaked out on Facebook that Larry Berger had passed away.
Unless you worked in New York Radio or spent some time at ABC Radio, chances are you never got to meet Larry. He was not the most outgoing of PDs, and although the term “networking” had not been invented when Larry did his best programming in the 70s and 80s, he was not especially interested in getting his name “out there.” There were more dynamic, outspoken programmers back in the 70s and 80s. Larry chose to fly under the radar.
Larry Berger is best known for programming ABC Radio’s FM flagship in New York City – WPLJ. It was a juggernaut of a station in the market for years and years. And while WNEW-FM was massively cooler, more influential, and very iconic to music heads, PLJ knocked it out of the park in the Arbitron ratings and subsequent sales for years and years.
That was when Larry was at the helm. Before PLJ, Larry spent time programming WRIF here in Detroit before turning over the controls to Tom Bender. And that’s how I met him. While Tom was a mentor, Larry was something of a patriarch. Early on, he was the most famous, major market PD I knew who would take the time to have a thoughtful conversation with me about programming, music, and philosophy.
When Larry shocked the radio world and decided to take WPLJ to Power 95 – a CHR format – in the early 80s, I was heartbroken. I felt Larry had betrayed “Album Rock” – the format, the culture, and the audience. But Larry saw a future dominated by pop – Michael Jackson, Madonna, and other bigger than life mainstream acts – and he rolled a huge pair of dice to change formats at a time when PLJ was still performing well as a rock station.
Larry wasn’t about the music, a group of artists, or even thousands of fans. He was about coolly and pragmatically assessing the best pathway for PLJ to achieve continued profitability over the long haul. And he concluded it was the Top 40 route.
Larry and I weren’t exactly close friends anyway, and when he marched down this new path in 1983, I was in the throes of rolling out the Classic Rock format. We were officially moving in very different circles, and didn’t have a whole lot to talk about. I was focused on Zeppelin and Floyd, and he was embracing Michael and Madonna.
He transitioned PLJ to CHR, never looked back, and ended up in a battle royale with Scott Shannon and Z100. It was an amazing episode in “radio wars” in the nation’s biggest market. After many ABC execs moved on to different pastures after the company’s sale to Cap Cities, Larry left the market and programmed in the Bay Area.
Aptly described on his Facebook page as “a thinking man’s PD,” this photo and Larry’s caption says it all about his 24/7 mindset. Relaxed? Comfortable? Arrogant? Never.
Larry was a stickler for quality, and in those days, ABC Radio had the resources to deliver a great sounding product in the seven markets where they owned an FM station. (This was pre-consolidation so companies couldn’t even own more than one FM per market – and in only 7 U.S. metros.)
He was especially cognizant of the commercials that ran on PLJ, including the loud, obnoxious Crazy Eddie spots that were all over the station because of its great ratings. If you’re not old enough to remember or you never lived in New York, these were the screaming commercials voiced by the owner himself for his chain of electronic scores. To say they were obnoxious does come close to doing justice to the word. I wrote a post exactly one year ago about Larry’s quest to literally “blow up” these spots – something that has probably never been done since. You can read about Larry’s holy war versus Crazy Eddie here.
As Tom Bender recalls, “(Larry) was a master multitasker. I remember him running out of a meeting to check on his soybean futures, calling the station to solve some crisis, retiring to meditate, and then back to the meeting…all very focused.”
A couple of years ago, we started up a conversation on Facebook Messenger. Larry would read some of my blogs, comment on them, and correct my memory, when necessary.
And as it turned out, he was the guy behind one of the greatest hotline stories I’d ever heard. It involved setting up TWO hotlines, one Larry could use to offer a compliment or share some good news – and the other to ream out the on-air personality for some sort of screw-up. The story was that corresponding illuminated photos of Larry hanging on the studio wall lit up depending on which line he called – one with him smiling and the other with him scowling. It was the perfect tool for an anal PD trying to make his station sound perfect. So, I reached out to him last year to set the story straight.
And here’s what he told me:
“When WPLJ’s studios went combo (the DJ running their own board) and moved from the 8th floor at 1330 (Avenue of the Americas) up to the 9th floor where our offices were, the engineers designed a totally new studio with a view facing west and a window!
The joke was to install TWO HOTLINES which would light up two display different images of my face in appropriate looks. This was never actually done, but it made a great story.”
He went on to give me his favorite hotline stories from those PLJ days:
“I didn’t use the hotline much, and it was often to just chat or compliment as often as it was to critique.
“Three stories: One time I was set to take a week-long vacation with my wife to the Caribbean. Plans were made and a memo was posted in the studio with emergency numbers, etc. But due to some problem with a visa to enter the Caribbean country (I think it was Haiti), we never boarded the plane and came home, disappointed, to our Manhattan apartment. I switch the radio on to WPLJ and there was Pat St. John, playing two versions of ‘Riders On The Storm’ simultaneously and flange-phasing them like ‘The Big Hurt.’ I had heard his younger brother Michael Stevens do this on WRIF and knew what was going on, so I hotlined Pat and probably took a year off his life since he thought I was in Haiti!”
“Another time, I hotlined Tony Pigg about something (don’t remember) and it just set him off enough so he literally ripped the phone off its mounting in the studio.
“Finally, my favorite hotline was at WRIF when the station was still in the trailers. The phone flashed a heat-lamp on the left side of the jock’s face, so it could not be ignored!”
Larry was intensely focused on his mission as a programmer, especially in those high-flying PLJ days. I was in Detroit when Howard Stern struck out on W4. Although he was still finding his voice, I liked Howard’s show a lot, and heard lots of potential. I was happy he was leaving Detroit so we no longer had to compete against him. Knowing Howard was born and raised in the New York City area, I wondered whether Larry might be interested in considering the unproven Stern for PLJ.
As Larry patiently explained to me, PLJ’s incumbent morning guy – Jim Kerr – was doing quite well, and he had no plans to even consider making a change. While Stern, of course, went on to great fame and fortune in New York Radio and beyond, Kerr was the consummate, beloved morning host for PLJ for years to come, and of course, on Q104.3 in the years since. Jim has had great success with Shelli Sonstein, who was also at PLJ back in the Berger days.
Fittingly, Jim Kerr will be honored by the National Radio Hall of Fame next month. So apparently, Larry knew he had a good plan in place.
To those of us blessed to work at ABC Radio during its FM rock radio heyday – Allen Shaw, Rick Sklar, Nick Trigony, Marc Morgan, Willard Lochridge, Larry Divney, Marty Greenberg, Joe Parrish, Lisa Tonacci, Gloria Johnson, Tom Yates, Tommy Hadges, Jim Smith, Corinne Baldassano, Roger Skolnik, Tom Bender, John Gehron, Alan Burns, not to mention the jocks like Carol Miller, Pat St. John, Jimmy Fink, Tony Pigg, Jim Kerr, Shelli Sonstein, and so many others – Larry’s passing is a true moment in time for all of us.
And every time I see a hotline go off or hear a hotline story, I think of Larry Berger’s grinning (or grimacing) face.
A couple of fun facts about WPLJ:
- The call letters were derived from the Mothers of Invention song “W-P-L-J” which stood for white port and lemon juice.
- Elton John’s famous live “11-17-70” album was recorded in front of a small audience at the WABC-FM studios (later WPLJ).
Apologies to any names I left off the ABC FM/WPLJ radio roster.
And oh by the way, congrats to Pat. St. John on his upcoming induction in the Radio Hall of Fame!
WPLJ was sold by Cumulus in 2019 – less than a year after this post was first published – to the Educational Media Foundation and flipped to their K-LOVE Christian format. However, EMF retained the call letters.
And may Larry Berger’s memory be a blessing. – FJ
Jacobs Media has consistently walked the walk in the digital space, providing insights and guidance through its well-read national Techsurveys.
In 2008, jacapps was launched - a mobile apps company that has designed and built more than 1,300 apps for both the Apple and Android platforms. In 2013, the DASH Conference was created - a mashup of radio and automotive, designed to foster better understanding of the "connected car" and its impact.
Along with providing the creative and intellectual direction for the company, Fred consults many of Jacobs Media's commercial and public radio clients, in addition to media brands looking to thrive in the rapidly changing tech environment.
Fred was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2018.
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Great story…stories!
Here’s a sort of cousin to a hotline anecdote, Fred. One night I had my station playing on two different radios as I moved around my house in San Francisco. One of them suddenly went all static, so I grabbed the phone to call our chief engineer. While his phone was ringing, I realized I was still hearing the program on the other radio! WTF?
When the chief engineer, Dave Evans, picked up, he was already aware something had just blown at the transmitter. I told him what was happening at my house, whereupon a second thing blew–Dave’s mind. He asked me what receiver was still playing, and I told him. He said it was a great tuner because it was picking up the tiny signal of the exciter, which was still on.
Two days later he went out and bought himself the same Denon tuner I was using.
This happened to me. I was a jock for forty years and then added chief engineer to my responsibilities. Our 50K sister station’s xmitter site was about 30 miles from studios. Dead air alarms go off one morning, and I get in the truck, and I’m hearing the station just fine at the studio parking lot. What’s going on? Exciter had great reach apparently and factory radios were always better it seems and I guess that’s still true.
Hotline stories? I got a MILLION of ’em. But I’ll only share 2. 1973, I had just scored my “perfect job” at WAXC in Rochester. Union setup, me on one side of the glass, board op/engineer on the other. First time I had a live, in-studio audience (the operator) who would react to everything. You should have seen the look on his face when I cheerily invited calls to the station for requests, shout-outs or whatever..and proudly gave out THE HOTLINE NUMBER instead of the request line. We only got a few calls (it was only one line) but one guy was go happy he had a direct line to the jock -that we had to have that number changed. Here’s another. We had one of the early mobile phones-that would take forever to make the call. I did something on the air that irritated our PD..and I disagreed with him. We had a short conversation on the mobile phone (difficult for each to understand) and then we hung up. I offered up a few choice expletives to no one in particular- and when I turned around I was facing 4 red-faced individuals who had been escorted unseen into the studio by a sales executive. Hotlines were/are great–except when they’re not.
Literally laughing out loud, Dave! Great stories! Thanks for sharing.
Now I want to hear your other 999,998 hotline stories!
Listening to my station in Montgomery, Alabama on a weekend. Part timer airs a phoner with a caller saying “shit.” We did not air live phone calls so I know she had recorded the call and chose to air it with the swearing. I hot lined the jock and asked what she was thinking airing a caller swearing. She said she didn’t realize that it wasn’t allowed. We soon parted ways.
Hot Line Pranked story. Early 90’s, we had a very talented sales guy who did great imitations. Hot line rings and I thinks our local owner, who’s the president of the NAB at the time and never in town, but could be very intimidating. So on the hot line I hear his voice dressing me down for, I think I had competing car dealers going into the weather. “Don’t you know better than to….” Finally, it dawns on me it’s this sales guy. I finished the call with ‘you son of a….” Click.
Dave, you realize your problem with “competing car dealers” in the same stopset has to completely flummox anyone reading this under 40 who’s used to 4 car dealerships in most breaks!
Yes. We had them all on the air back then. As a radio guy It always bugged me when watching live sports, RSNs would have car spots back to back in every stopset. Now most RSNs are barely alive. The next few years will be interesting, especially for the teams and athletes. All this has a house of cards feel to it.
Indeed it does. The business model appears to be severely damaged. Will the leagues have to step in?
Great stories, Fred! I’m sure you could start a “You know you’re a radio geek if…” list with, “You never tire of crazy radio stories even if you don’t personally know the people or stations involved”! These were a delight, as were all the contributions of your readers. Don’t know how I missed this post in 2018–I read it daily and I know I would have remembered this one–but I’m sure glad you dusted It off and ran it again! Thanks!
It was a fun one & spurred some great stories…again! Thanks, David.
Sorry about the belated arrival to the post, but one of my second hand favorites is about the station owner that would have guests at his home on Saturday night when he’d decide to hotline the on air personality to play “requests” for his house party. Since it’s the owner, the weekend jock would obviously do it, followed by another hotline call from the PD asking “WTF?” Jock would explain the owner called, followed by a big sigh from the PD, and “OK…” (click)
If you want the scariest hotline stories ever, talk to anyone who worked for Don Burden. Some were even fired over the hotline by Burden.