Sometimes you wonder how all those TV pilots, shows, and series get “greenlit” when there so many crashing failures. We all have our favorite shows – especially sitcoms – the ones that kept up laughing for years.
But then there are the ones that never should have seen the light of day. In recent years, my favorite sitcom loser was “Alex, Inc.” starring the always entertaining Zach Braff. But not this time. The show was loosely based on the real-life adventures of Alex Blumberg and his podcast, “Start-Up.” It was premised on what happens when the nerdy public radio storyteller leaves the cushy confines of the network to strike out on his own with his podcast company.
It lasted one season, and was probably cancelled by the network after the second episode. Let’s face it – we learned two things from “Alex, Inc.”
First, podcasts had entered the entertainment mainstream. But second, podcasts aren’t very “sitcom funny.” Only Woody Allen could pull that off with regularity. Podcasters may be smart, clever, and wonky, but seldom are they cool.
And to that point, I wouldn’t expect a sitcom anytime soon about the trials, tribulations, and antics of an algorithimist trying to make her way through a big music playlist company, like Spotify or Pandora. They may be fun places to work – free food, ping pong, pinball machines – but they are not especially cool settings where amazing stories are told. Its hard to imagine anything zany happening at Apple Music.
But then there’s radio. And while it’s been some time since a successful TV sitcom revolved around an air studio, “Frazier” is one that many fondly remember. I blogged about its reboot last year, and we’re still waiting for Kelsey Grammer and a new cast to entertain us with craziness from the world of radio, that is, if Frazier is still a talk show host.
The show that radio veterans most lovingly recall, however, is “WKRP In Cincinnati,” a sitcom that charmed and entertained America in the late 70’s.
It aired during the era when I worked as a programmer at a rock station, and I’ve blogged extensively about this show and what it meant to radio. Back in 2018, I wrote about creator Hugh Wilson, and his crazy idea for a sitcom based on a fictitious rock radio station.
And then last year, I blogged about the guy who brilliantly played the sleaziest radio salesman of all time – Herb Tarlek. Veteran actor Frank Bonner was marvelous in this role, always finding new and different flimflam schemes. I think we loved Herb because he reminded so many of us of real-life radio sellers we knew and (mostly) loved. Not to mention his garish taste in clothes.
But yesterday, WKRP’s morning guy and spiritual leader left the planet. Dr. Johnny Fever – played by Howard Hesseman – personified everything about what it meant to be a cool jock. He was the patron saint of jaded DJs. Hesseman passed away yesterday at the age of 81. He dove into the Johnny Fever character with the reckless abandon of a wild and crazy jock, battered by management teams in his past, but ready for one more run at redemption and stardom on the Cincinnati airwaves.
In this segment, the erstwhile Dr. Johnny Fever does a break that would have consultants cringing…and laughing. (At least, it’s short.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMOaJbbaQoI
And watching those old “WKRP” videos reminded me, yet again, that radio has had an amazing run over the last many decades, but in the middle of the “audio renaissance,” the industry is trying to get its mojo back amidst a digital cornucopia of choice.
I took on some of the challenge of addressing this last week with a 2-parter about radio and new music discovery – where it’s gone and how to get it back. Hundreds of you responded to this post with ideas of your own. Most often, the feedback revolved around this notion that radio has lost its fastball, making less of an impact with each passing year.
At the same time, Sean Ross took his best shot at the same theme, and came up with a definition for what he calls “real radio”:
“’Real Radio’ is still defined for me by doing what a playlist cannot do — putting together music in an order that is different each time, but not random; telling me what’s happening in my town, or yours; advocating for the music it introduces to me; being punctuated by people who are funny or thought-provoking. Part of the initial appeal when I began listening, and part of radio’s identifying DNA now, is the shared experience. But I know that AI and voice-tracking have made the day imminent when the deejay wishes you happy birthday over your party playlist.”
Blogger Dick Taylor riffed off Sean’s effort in a new post called “What Purpose Does Radio Serve in 2022?” In his essay, he looked at all the things radio used to do – traffic, school closings, new music discovery, breaking news – most of which have been usurped by Internet brands and platforms. Dick urges radio broadcasters to find their “Why” or else face more aimlessness.
Both guys have the right idea, as did much of the social media strings that followed my posts. But I think the essence of what radio must become is what it used to be:
Cool
When Jeff Smulyan was hawking NextRadio, his mantra was “We have to make radio cool again.” But the “cool factor” rarely comes from technology or a new gadget.
It’s that intangible human factor that defines cool. It’s radio’s personalities. The producers of “WKRP” used the Johnny Fever character to parody legitimately cool, real-life DJs who dominated the American airwaves in the 70’s and 80’s.
When “WKRP” first aired on CBS-TV in 1978, these jocks were everywhere on the radio dial, and not just in the biggest markets. Seemingly every city and town had at least a couple of stellar DJs who were music experts, and knew their way around the backstage areas of concert venues. Many forged relationships with the artists themselves. When bands came to town, they made it a point to drop into the station to schmooze with these DJs for an in-studio interview.
Markets like New York, Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, and so many others had several great rock radio stations, boasting many cool and talented jocks. Names like Scott Muni, Kid Leo, Arthur Penhallow, and Charles Laquidara (pictured) were the star QBs at their respective stations. They were tastemakers, influential not just at their stations, but industry-wide.
And then there was L.A. radio with two behemoths, KLOS and KMET, duking it out for rock radio dominance. Jim Ladd, whose photo you see at the top of this post always personified the cool
rock DJ to me, and apparently to everyone else.
Ladd was the inspiration for Tom Petty’s “The Last D.J.,” a song about the homogenization of radio personalities and corporate control of the industry.
In the comments I received on my post, many focused on this growing void on stations in big markets and small. Paul Ingles, who I worked alongside at WNCX in Cleveland, left this analysis on Facebook:
“FM radio happened in the late 60s and early 70s because corporations and station owners didn’t know WHAT to do with it so they gave it over to young freaks who knew how to speak to their tribe. It succeeded by ignoring the tightly formatted rules of the day. The drum beat was spread by word of mouth..”
Even though it was a network TV show, Hugh Wilson’s radio sitcom – and its wild and crazy guys and gals – had a ring of authenticity, insipid laugh track and all. Even “The Big Guy,” the hapless Mr. Carlson (brilliantly portrayed by Gordon Jump) realized that WKRP was nothing, if not for its jocks and its programming team.
How many kids watching that show grew up to be the next generation of DJs, PDs, or music directors, thanks to Johnny Fever, Venus Flytrap, Andy Travis, and Bailey Quarters? (I’m not sure many were motivated to pursue jobs in radio sales or news, based on the Herb Tarlek or Les Nessman characters.)
And how about the millions of viewers who watched Dr. Johnny Fever and the “WKRP” crew and wished they had gone into radio?
Johnny Fever may have been a TV sitcom caricature of a rock radio DJ, but you rooted for him. He would never have worn underwear on his head, body shamed famous celebrities, or even started a podcast. He was too cool for all that.
But that’s the point. Life imitates art. Or maybe in this case, it’s the other way around.
“WKRP” and Howard Hesseman made radio look like a cool job and a great place to work.
Because it was.
Thanks to Anita Wadd for the heads-up.
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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Loved the article Fred. Glad I was there when radio was still ‘cool’. During the “WKRP” days I was at WSHE/Miami. (Which was actually in a trailer park in Davie, but that’s another story)
A great time to be in radio, John. WRIF broadcast out of 3 house trailers, butted up to a tiny house. Lots of great memories (not to mention needles jumping on turntables when you walked into the control room).
WSHE/Miami: one of my favorite radio stations.
It was kind of a ritual to go purchasing baseball shirts and stickers of the station every time I traveled to Miami.
I may even have a cassette recording anywhere… “She’s only Rock n’Roll…!!”
Come on, “She’s Only Rock and Roll” is one of the greatest radio branding slogans of all time. I honestly don’t remember who came up with that one. My guess would be Neil Mirsky, but it could have been Louie the Broom.
The “She’s Only Rock & Roll” on-air slogan, decals and shirts were in full force under the leadership of PD Tom Judge, whose parents Gene & Jackie Milner owned and ran WSHE in the 70’s. “Welcome to my PRO-gram,” he would declare each weekday as his drive-time show began. He brought me in Labor Day of ’79, after my 4-year run over in Tampa at WQSR, “Quad 102 &1/2.”
Louie the Broom was a great creation by Dan Carlisle, having the nighttime janitor Lou “read” the weather. Hilarious. Dan had recently gotten to WSHE, down from Detroit and en route to larger markets everywhere. The Milners sold the radio station within months. New owner John Teneglia came in, hired Mirsky and, as you say, “that’s another story.”
Those were the days, Steve. Thanks for sharing. And nice to hear my friend Dan Carlisle played a role in this story.
I’ remember this cool radio that didn’t have trailers but a series of offices on the 33rd floor of the David Stott building. Lawyers dentist etc share the space. We used the elevator operator to do drops. We all thought we were going to work. Lately some of us have been looking back and yeah legend is the proper title. New sitcom in the works about radio ‘68-‘72!
You never know, Al. I’m not sure we realized just how amazing it was. BTW if you need help casting that sitcom, don’t hesitate to loop me in.
Cool, Wow, Zing Radio Connections Reach Out and Touch Someone. Great show & cast. A shout out to former KNX/FM PD Steve Marshall, one of the writers of WKRP and Bob Oakes PD at KFWB who found out turkey don’t fly when dropped from airplanes. Week starting inspiration, Fred! Thank you.
As God is my witness, Clark.
WKRP made it’s viewers feel like part of their radio family. All great TV shows and radio personalities do the same thing. Thanks for reminding us.
It was inclusive, fun, and how many times while watching it in “real time” did we admit, “Yeah, that happened.”
While I think Johnny Fever would have a mass disdain for social media, I believe I could’ve convinced him to tweet. He would enjoy one word tweets like, booger! haha
Great piece, Fred. My time as Anita Wadd was fun. Carly was just asking about it. 😂
You would have extended Johnny’s career, Lori. Plus, he would’ve loved “socializing” with listeners. As for “Anita” and Carly, just remind her what a great actress you are.
Hi Fred. I was pleased and honored to have worked at WNEW-FM in its heyday…same for 92-3 K-Rock and WFAN. All three stations had talent that “got it”—Howard Stern, Don Imus, Mike and the Mad Dog, Scott Muni and so many others. They knew how to communicate and make radio sound like fun. My job was to help when or if needed and be support system and a cheerleader. At music stations like NEW and K-Rock (outside of Howard Stern) where the music was important I put my trust in the jocks….wanting there to be some balance with the familiar and unfamiliar music and making sure we always played the hits, Scott Muni told me on day one:’Fats, a hit is a hit is a hit”. Combine that with the depth of music that Album Rock had to offer and allowing each host to inject his or her own personality and it led to success—both in ratings or revenue and a lot of the tie in both. At spoken word, like with Howard, Imus, Mike and the Mad Dog—I marveled at how they knew how to entertain—hitting all the right topics…having fun..and knowing when to be serious. I learned that it wasn’t always important to play the rating game by breaking at specific times. Yes we had to play commercials but who could ever argue with Howard going on a subject for an hour or more and then stopping for a 15 minute commercial break. No one left the station because you never knew when he might come back and embellish a live spot or just decide to get back on to talk again. Rules can be important but its important to know when content overrides the “rules”. We’ve allowed radio to be too formulaic. We’re not developing hosts…it’s become “how much money can we save by not having live jocks or syndicating them”. In some cases like Howard, Imus, or some of the political talk show hosts it can work on a national level but let’s get back to developing talent again and on the music end, finding hosts who know the music and understand how to work with the “format” to make it fun for the listeners. On Top 40/CHR there is a need to play the hits over and over to attract the “kids” but let’s give adults more credit and open the playlists up so we can all listen longer and not have to hear the same “library” cut every six hours.
Mark, honored you would weigh in on this. I’m hard-pressed to think of any programmer over the last several decades with more experience in music and spoken word, while managing some of the most spectacular talent of our era. For those of you reading Mark’s comments who don’t know him, take his reflections to heart. I got to work with Mark at 92.3 K-Rock in NYC when Howard’s career was exploding. Mark intuitively knew when talent needed managing, just a nudge, a hallway encounter, or to be LTFA. Mark, any radio company serious about talent and brand development should hire you in a New York minute.
Word!
That, too!
Let me get this straight….
the author of this piece is credited with inventing the CLASSIC ROCK format?
Q; other than ownership consolidation, is there any single thing that killed radio more than the classic rock format and its syndication>?
gimme a break
It’s a Monday alright.
What would you like me to break? Arm? Leg? Neck?
Obviously, you have no knowledge of how successful Fred has been in his decades of consulting Classic Rock stations. In fact, he has kept the format alive in a lot of situations where a station would have flipped to something else otherwise.
There are a lot of reasons why radio is much different today from when WKRP was on television. You are more correct in the first part of your question than in the second … in fact, swap out practically any format for “Classic Rock” and someone, somewhere has asked the same thing.
You missed the point, sir. It is BECAUSE of people like Fred who honestly care about how a station sounds that there is any success left.
And … yeah, Fred, it’s obviously Monday.
Thank you.
Nice. A snarky comment means nothing, but hiding behind a fake name speaks volumes. Consolidation and the abolishment of market ownership restrictions has much more to do with the problem. For my money programming that appeals to the lowest common denominator and out of control repetition doesn’t help.
Thank you.
Not to mention the 80/90 docket and the flooding of the market with signals that need to differentiate; hence narrowcasting.
And threatening your limbs? Jesus buddy it’s radio. Change the station if you don’t like. Or try to do better yourself.
That’s what we’ve been doing… for decades.
I was living abroad when WKRP was active, so I never saw it, but as one who “grew up” with radio in the SF Bay Area in the late ’60s I definitely learned to recognize on-air “cool” (eg, KMPX, KSAN). I think it’s a sum that has several components: music knowledge, technical proficiency, comfort on the mic, and humor (the latter two being aspects of personality).
And since we’re on the subject, why not nominations for a “cool talent” Hall of Fame? My vote: Sully Roddy, KNEW, and her “All Kinds of Country” show.
Happy Birthday, Fred!
Some of us can remember that the WKRP cast and producers traveled around the country meeting with stations and management, etc. Our station wasn’t one of them but I did hear of some that were. They did their homework and they turned it into a compelling, entertaining show. One has to wonder what would happen with that concept today. What a great memory!!
I had forgotten about that, John. As sitcoms go, “WKRP” was special, especially for those in radio.
I loved the break you posted – WKRP wasn’t exaggerated for entertainment, it was radio realty sanitized for broadcast TV. I remember a morning man berating the GM on the air for kicking over a bucket of paint and demanding that everyone else clean it up and (off the air), telling the sales manager that, “I don’t want a professional relationship with you. You can be all right socially, but professionally, keep your distance, I don’t want anything to do with you at work.” That same sales manager was holding a sales meeting when the person that sold to record companies barged in 15 minutes late, threw his briefcase on his desk and started ranting about how he found his girlfriend in bed with the roofer (“I told him to get out of bed and back on the roof…roofer madness!!!).This is the tip of the iceberg – I could fill pages with these stories – and they extended to national rep firms too. Maybe someday Fred will do a column where people can share their radio stories. I’ll bet Mark Chernoff has some great ones.
Imagine if someone rebooted WKRP today. Johnny Fever has been replaced with a syndicated show from LA or NY. Instead of Andy Travis, there’d be some kid loading the music that his format captain sent via VPN into a hard drive, then that same kid would send two local references to a central voicetracking location. No Herb Tarlek, now there’s a 3 person sales staff for the market cluster that take phone calls from clients, whose job is to sell as far below a buyer’s target as needed to grab the entire buy. There would be no “big guy” (he’s hundreds of miles away and in charge of several clusters), Jennifer is now a phone mail system, Les Nessman doesn’t exist and the Thanksgiving show would never happen because stations don’t do that kind of promotion anymore.
Some thoughts about Classic Rock and Fred. Classic Rock didn’t kill radio or rock, it resurrected them. Right at the time when rock’s biggest artists stopped releasing much music, Fred figured out that people would like to hear the best stuff from the previous decade more than the new Henry Lee Summer single. Who’s Henry Lee Summer? Exactly. And people still love Classic Rock and it’s become timeless. Could you imagine a station succeeding in the late 80s playing Glenn Miller, Frankie Laine and Artie Shaw? That’s what playing Zeppelin is like now…and people who weren’t born when classic rock was released are finding and loving it. Name another format or built around music from 40 years ago with anything close to that kind of success. I’ll bet that Classic Rock did more for radio and its artists than Fred dreamed it would back in the 80s.
John, I’ll point you at the seventh episode of the third season (“Bah, Humbug”), where Herb daydreams that at a future version of the station he is the only employee and does little more than make a few phone calls to potential clients every day.
Dangerously close to the scenario of your second paragraph. Art imitating life, with a time machine looking forward a half-century for the latter?
Wow, forgot about that one. But yes, maybe a precursor to today. That “housecleaning” story out of Hawaii late last week still has me feeling very uncomfortable.
Oh Bob, your second paragraph is so deadly because it rings so true. I used to look at that tiny staff of eight on WKRP and think, “How unrealistic. How can you staff a station in a big market with just a handful of people. And now I realize that for many stations (and clusters) even in larger markets, WKRP may have been overstaffed by today’s plummeting standards.
Thank you for that last paragraph, as well as Mike Marrone, KM Richards, and others who responded to the commenter. It goes with the territory, of course, but heartening to hear from you all. Bob, thanks again.
Oh, and sorry I called you “John”, Bob. I think I was still distracted from that “poster with no name” (with apologies to America).
I fondly remember my first days as a programmer in Cincinnati radio. I had been in the station for 2 days when Bobby Leach and I went to “The Rookwood Pottery” for a burger and a beer and I saw a guy sitting at the bar-by himself having a beer. We went over to him and introduced ourselves as local radio people wondering what “Travis” from WKRP was doing -in Cincinnati. This was 1983 and Gary Sandy was in town for a local stage performance. Nice guy, approachable and ironic in that we were in Cincinnati -and our station was WKR….C! People always reference WKRP when we mention Cincinnati. In ’83 our station was cool. Jerry Thomas, Dave Lee, Rich King, Alan Browning, a great news department piloted by Richard Hunt. We were a little 5000 watt station trying to stay ahead of 50,000 watt WLW which transformed into another cool station – keeping the AM dial relevant back then. We never met Howard Hesseman, but most of us reading the blogs didn’t have to. Howard was cool, speaking to his “babies”. When radio was cool, “they (the owners) gave it (the station) over to young freaks who knew how to speak to their tribe” (to quote Fred’s blog). Seems like maybe Tik Tok, Instagram and their counterparts are now speaking to “their tribe” and the streaming services fulfill the music hole-without the censorship needed on AM/FM and the 8 minute stopsets. Fixing that will be difficult but, don’t give up Fred.
Great Cincy story, Dave. And as I saw somewhere online this morning, looks like those Bengals came through for The Doctor. Thanks for sharing this. As for the give up part, not a chance!
I remember the Rookwood Pottery restaurant too, Dave! Great burgers. But I was (and will always be) a fan of Skyline Chili — they even gave me my own table in the store in Price Hill. Great times and great memories.
As already mentioned, WKRP did a lot of homework to get a lot of details right. I vaguely remember that one reason the show was taped and not on film (even though I don’t think it was the first MTM show on tape) was to help make it easier to utilize actual songs–which made everything seem that much more real.
Also, maybe the best Johnny moments that I can think of off-hand are: when he starts doing a disco show for TV, causing him to develop a second personality (“Dr. Fever and Mr. Tide”); when there’s a bomb threat that causes Venus and him to broadcast from the transmitter, which is where the bomb actually is (“An Explosive Affair”); when he does a remote from a stereo store that gets held up (“Hold-Up”); when the station is forced to make a contest unwinnable, after he reads incorrect info on-air (“The Contest Nobody Could Win”); and when his participation in an on-air intoxication/reflex test turns out very much unexpected (“Fish Story”).
Separately, I think that the second-best U.S. series that was set at a radio station came before WKRP; I was fortunate enough to see some of the ’80s cable reruns of Good Morning World. Basically, it’s what the Dick Van Dyke Show would’ve been if it had focused on the two hosts of a ’60s morning-drive show in L.A. (one married, and the other single); it helped that it was produced by DVDS alumni.
Funny, I did not watch “Good Morning, World,” but I remember it. Thanks for jogging those memories, Eric.
Another great post Fred – but thinking back over previous posts about the state of radio, the quote that should go to corporate is “they gave it over to young freaks who knew how to speak to their tribe.”
I know, Tom. That one hit me, too. Appreciate the kind words!
Well, there’s Robert L “As in loveable” Collins on WRIT and WOKY. Yes, the same Bob Collins who, years later, ruled Chicago via WGN. Of all the things he was so good at it, being so incredibily REAL was the one I appreciated the most. There’s also Bob Reitman, on WTOS, WZMF, WQFM and eventually WKTI. I considered him the un-official musicologist for Milwaukee, and the reason Cream City folks – to this day – have great taste in music. There’s also Larry “The Legend” Johnson on WZUU , who demonstrated every day you didn’t have to be smooth and slick to make a huge impact. Later, when the Milwaukee rockers seemed to lose their way, we discovered this terrific, truly free form station in Madison, WIBA-FM. “Riff” was my favorite – he played great music but he was…cool…without trying to be cool. Here’s the kicker: Not long before he (actually Jim McInnes) left for KPRI, he hired me to do…part-time sales! Hey! It was a step in the door and I took it. Thanks for jump-starting this memory ride, Fred….and Happy Birthday!
Fred
WKRP was indeed a great show for a High School kid at my High School station WPHS in Warren,MI (still on the air longer then WRIF) Don’t forget that great non- academy award winning Movie ” F M ” with Michael Brandon; Eileen Brennan; Detroit Lions Alex Karras; Cleavon Little; Martin Mull; Cassie Yates; And a Killer soundtrack Linda Ronstadt; Jimmy Buffett, Tom Petty and Steely Dan.
Another great blog, Fred, and thanks for linking to Dick Taylor’s article asking “What Purpose Does Radio Serve in 2022?” (And thanks, Dick, for the thought-provoking article.) My favorite line: “How do you get there if you don’t know where you are going?” – Lewis Carroll
Answer that question and radio just might find itself going forward again.
Thank You David.
The comments to my article, much like Fred’s blog here, produced higher than normal comments from readers and I plan to go through them on this week’s blog article that publishes on Sunday morning.
Stay tuned…
A show like “WKRP” made it very easy for me to describe to friends and family not in the business exactly what I did. I just pointed to Andy Travis, and then I got knowing nods — they finally understood! And we all loved WKRP — after all, we were in Cincinnati too. Our station, WSAI-FM, was in an old house, several yards down the street from the AM radio station, which had a nice building and setup. My office was in the (unheated) basement, and it was literally lit by a lone lightbulb that I had to pull a chain to turn on! I had to wear my coat all day during the winter months. Our general manager got the only nice office (in that master bedroom) and our “studio” was in the house’s living room, complete with egg crate sound muffling. Yet we had a fabulous team, and it’s an experience I will never forget. RIP Howard Hesseman and his fabulous coffee mug with all the radio stations he worked at crossed out.
CORRECTION – The mug had all his previous on-air names crossed out, not the station call letters.
Close enough. I had one of those mugs!
Love this. You can just feel yourself walking through the place as you describe it. What is it about radio that some of the craziest memories are the sweetest? Thanks for sharing, Corinne.
Corinne, great to hear from you about “WKRP.” We both found ourselves programming at the time the show aired, an odd weekly reflection of our jobs, our co-workers, and ourselves. Thanks for providing us this great perspective. Hope all is well with you.
I doubt we’ll ever get to what you describe and definitely needed until the radio industry literally crashes and burns financially. Then some mom & pop gamblers might get into the game just for the fun of it all.
Maybe some smart corporation will make the plunge but I don’t think most would understand the past and the resonance it had.
You will surely remember The Electrifying Mojo on WGPR. A kid, on a no ratings, not great but decent FM signal, sort of religious station in Detroit, who was allowed to just do what he wanted. After all, virtually no one was listening when he went on. Less than a year later he had really large night ratings and was a force in music sales. He most definitely was COOL. And different. And musically knowledgeable. And led his audience into musical paths most would never go down on their own. And the production on his show was so over the top that it became actually COOL to hear; like I believe the opening to his show when ‘The Mother Ship’ landed from space to get him on the air….was around 2 or 3 minutes long. Who does that? The Cool guy who usurps the rules of the day.
I met him later when we both were at WHYT. He came in and followed me on a Saturday afternoon. It’s the final 1/2 hr of the show and this young super preppy looking (picture a tech geek…in a good way) kid comes into the control room. He was very friendly and chatty and I thought he was an intern or something who worked for Mojo. He grabbed a bunch of carts and the log etc., and left the room.
I sign off and the last song is playing and in he comes again. Only then did I realize HE was Mojo. Slight shock. I had always pictured him totally different larger than life. Three minutes later as I’m driving home, The Mother Ship lands and the ‘Cool’ of radio was again restored to its natural state.
Cliche as it seems, it only takes one person to change things.
You are right. I had an encounter with him, too. I wondered what he might sound like on WRIF maybe in the overnight hours. He did amazing radio, and had a great following. Thanks for reminding us, Pat. You are right – just ONE.
Hi Pat,
The day i was fired from what I thought was my dream job my staff took me down to Alvin’s for some refreshments. We piled in the car to head home and they insisted I put on WGPR.Mojo was landing the Mother Ship and calling The Midnight Funk Association to order. Don’t say damn, say Whammy Whammy Whoa. If you’re in your car, flash your lights.
Suddenly, lights on all the cars around me are flashing. Porch lights are flashing.
When I heard Mojo was going to WJLB I hand delivered my resume.
Here’s a Canadian wasp from Montreal selling the Midnight Funk Association. Mojo had control over his show which allowed for some creative selling. You could bring him an idea and if he liked voila. In the eighties WJLB was the place to be. Prime time all the time!
WKRP was actually quite accurate in its portrayal of Radio. KZAP in Sacramento was a heritage FM Album Rock that had a huge following. It was a different era then. People made a strong connection with quality stations and programming. The homogenized product today creates no listener passion…
In a sitcom-ish way, the show’s characters were reflective (exaggerated, perhaps) of many people in the business at that time.
What Radio Stations is Charlie Van Dyke Currently the Voice Of?
I don’t know, but that voice is SO special. You might have to do some Googling.