Is it time yet?

[Lkeller]

the DJ (and with him/her, the passion, excitement and human element of radio) wasn't done in by technological advance or changing tastes, but by a lack of support from those who run the stations, [....]

I disagree.  If listeners wanted to hear radio personalities the stations would still have them.  What people wanted was the music.  During the heyday of the DJ/personality, there was only the radio.  Listeners heard the song first on the radio and then if they could afford it, they bought the record at the store.

Now they get the music from their iPods and MP3 players, CDs, etc.  It's clear they don't want to hear radio personalities much anymore.  Or if they do, they want to hear talkshows.  While radio personalities are still alive and well on non-comms and eclectic stations such as KPIG, the audience is barely there for them.

Michael Hagerty's post was teriffic...really well written too.  But I have to agree with David too, up to a point.  Even back in the heydey of Top 40 and MOR radio, the majority of people I knew wished they would just "shut up and play the music."  We who post here all loved the Real Don Steele.  Many of my friends thought he was loud and obnoxious - they just didn't appreicate his 'act.'

By the 80s, when there were still many great personalities on the air, most of my friends couldn't name more than a couple of jocks, and often didn't even know station call letters...they'd say things like "I listen to that station..y'know...99 point something."

Like most things, it's been evolutionary, and gained momentum with the growing popularity of the FM band.  I remember when KLOS came on the air in Los Angeles - I thought it was a truly dull, bloodless station.  Unlike KMET which had a few jocks that liked to talk - KLOS only allowed their jocks to back-announce the songs, read the weather, and say "Rock N'Stereo KLOS."  I'm sure they talked less than KOIT jocks do these days.  As I remember, KLOS was the first AOR station in LA that gained mainstream popularity, and beat the competitors in the ratings for a number of years.  That was 38 years ago.

[michael hagerty]

Let me see if I can be more clear...because David and Llew are right...most listeners do want the jocks to shut up and play the music.

But...the truly great jocks connect and entertain at least some of those people some of the time...reducing the impression of interruption. Scale ALL on-air talent back to marginal liner card readers and you actually increase the impression of interruption...because the listener KNOWS when they hear that voice that they won't be entertained, informed or engaged...just told the same stuff they were told 40 minutes ago...which doesn't even include the time or temperature anymore...

In short, radio has stopped adding anything to the music beyond commercials and plugs for the website...and who wouldn't choose an iPod over that?

[Lkeller]

Let me see if I can be more clear...because David and Llew are right...most listeners do want the jocks to shut up and play the music.

But...the truly great jocks connect and entertain at least some of those people some of the time...reducing the impression of interruption. Scale ALL on-air talent back to marginal liner card readers and you actually increase the impression of interruption...because the listener KNOWS when they hear that voice that they won't be entertained, informed or engaged...just told the same stuff they were told 40 minutes ago...which doesn't even include the time or temperature anymore...

In short, radio has stopped adding anything to the music beyond commercials and plugs for the website...and who wouldn't choose an iPod over that?

Very clear and very well said.  I can't disagree with a word.

[DavidKaye]

We who post here all loved the Real Don Steele.  Many of my friends thought he was loud and obnoxious - they just didn't appreicate his 'act.'

I think you can count me out of the Don Steele lovefest, too.  I didn't much go for Robert W. Morgan, either.  Yeah, both had ballsy voices and could deliver liners with the best of them, but I seriously found them lacking in conversational skills.  This is probably why then eventually left the Bay Area and ended up in LA, where big voices are more important than anything else in radio there. 

JMF, Bobby Ocean, and Beau Weaver could/can all talk circles around RWM and Steele. 

[SFStatic]

A ballsy voice is great to have, so long as it is saying things that matter to listeners. When it is just reading liners or obviously coming from someone that just loves to hear themselves, it's a total waste. You might as well just have Mr. Big Voice record station liners. The same is true of bad jingles...they fly right by, but the great ones you can see listeners singing along with in their cars.

[Bowler Bob in Brisbane]

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You want to hear interesting mixes?  Go to a club or bar where DJs are in big demand for their mixes. 


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To quote the great Jerome Lester Horwitz (Curly Howard, to the uninitiated)  "I resemble that remark!"

And the reason I say that is, when I'm DJ'ing live upstairs in the Poster Room Lounge at The Fillmore on a "retro" show like Foreigner, Pat Benatar, Tower of Power, Santana, The Monkees, The Zombies, etc. , I am basically paying homage to the great radio DJ's that I grew up listening to here in San francisco during their heydays of the '60's & '70's, like John Mack Flanagan, Bobb Ocean ,Chris Edwards, Tom Campbell.

I grew up listening to the great Bay Are Top 40 AM stations like KFRC, KYA, KLIV, KDIA, & KSOL, while buying every 45 RPM single released from 1967 to 1972.

Still having & playing those very same records 40 some odd years later for those appreciative audiences at The Fillmore is my way of keeping those tradtions alive.

As I'm posting this right now (1:10 pm PST, 11-06-09) I'm listening to KFRC 1550 AM playing Scott McKenzie's "San Francisco (Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair), another record that i bought during the "Summer ofd Love", 1967.

Now how's that for serendipity?!

I don't care what anyone says about Scott Shannon's "True Oldies Channel", it's better than the alternative, having no oldies at all to listen to on the radio!

Love, cheers, & long live pop music on the radio,

Bowler "Professor Phil Moore, Jr." Bob in Brisbane

P.S., If you're at the Joe Perry Project show at The Fillmore on Wednesday, November 25th, come up and request something!

[michael hagerty]

Having grown up with LA radio, and only having heard KFRC at night, the big surprise for me when I moved to Ukiah at age 20 in 1976 was how much more human and relatable SF jocks were....not just Top 40 either, but KSAN more so than KMET...KSFO more than KMPC...KNBR more than KFI.

Whether it's the insular showbiz nature of LA or what...jocks that made the human connection there were few and far between.  SF seemed to have them with every turn of the dial.

[Lkeller]

We who post here all loved the Real Don Steele.  Many of my friends thought he was loud and obnoxious - they just didn't appreicate his 'act.'

I think you can count me out of the Don Steele lovefest, too.  I didn't much go for Robert W. Morgan, either.  Yeah, both had ballsy voices and could deliver liners with the best of them, but I seriously found them lacking in conversational skills.  This is probably why then eventually left the Bay Area and ended up in LA, where big voices are more important than anything else in radio there. 

Huh? Morgan and Steele didn't 'eventually' leave the Bay Area...they weren't here for that long. And they left because they were offered an exciting chance to leave not-so-hot KEWB to get in on the ground floor of a new Top 40 station in Market #2.  And I believe Morgan had already worked with Bill Drake in Fresno.

I was never a big Morgan fan, either.  In the morning...er...morgan...I was usually listening to Lohman & Barkley on KFWB - who were brilliant, or whoever was on KRLA.  I always thought Steele was fun though.  My feeling at the time was that he was playing the stereotypical loud Top 40 jock, but satirizing it at the same time.  That's what I meant when I said many people didn't get his 'act.'  With his act, conversational skills were more or less irrelevant. CERTAINLY, baby...can you dig it?

JMF, Bobby Ocean, and Beau Weaver could/can all talk circles around RWM and Steele. 

I do agree with that, and with Michael's point.  The great SF jocks were/are much more relatable as people.

[michael hagerty]

Llew beat me to it. Steele to me was a studied parody of showbiz insincerity, broadened from '67 on to include a sense that he wasn't fully in control and that it could all spectacularly blow up at any moment. To allow a connection would have been to break character.

I found him very entertaining until about '72, when he seemed to stop having fun with it. He got some of his mojo back and loosened up a bit at KTNQ from '76-'78 and was arguably at
his best from '85  on at KRLA, KODJ, KCBS-FM and KRTH.

Morgan was all about the line he was delivering at any given moment. Great voice, stellar delivery...but it was focused at all times on the punch line. And from about '69 until his move to weekends at KMPC in '75, there was a real mean streak to it. I think he developed an ability to converse, be relatable and connect while at KMPC. You could sense the genuine warmth between him and Big John McIlhenny.

But as time went on, he was faced with competitors who were more naturally communicative with their audience (Charlie Van Dyke), better able to transition to it (Charlie Tuna) and/or made it a bigger part of what they did (Rick Dees).

And none of those guys...good as they were...could touch Dr. Don Rose.

[DavidKaye]

Huh? Morgan and Steele didn't 'eventually' leave the Bay Area...they weren't here for that long. And they left because they were offered an exciting chance to leave not-so-hot KEWB to get in on the ground floor of a new Top 40 station in Market #2.  And I believe Morgan had already worked with Bill Drake in Fresno.

Not so hot KEWB?  KEWB was an incubator for DJ talent.  Note that not only Morgan and Steele, but also Casey Kasem and Gary Owens went through KEWB.  KEWB wasn't exactly podunk.  Prior to KEWB, Morgan had been in Monterey, Fresno, and Sacto, and Steele in Spokane and Portland.  So, for both, KEWB was a step up. 
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