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A mistake some jocks make...

I heard myself get a job when I listened to a guy blow a live read. This was back in the last century where things were actually done live and when AM stations could be heard above the static of yet to be invented electric devices.

I had recently ended up in a conversation with the PD of a much better local station than the one I was taking a paycheck from. He told me his liked my stuff, and wished he had room for me on his station, but there were no openings.

A short while later as I drove along listening to his station, the guy on the air was reading a spot for a hot dog place where you can get anything on the dogs. " you can have mustard, meat sauce, sour kraut...ANYTHING. you can have ketchup, you can even have cockroaches.". Yes he said THAT. To make sure people heard it correctly he elected not to ignore it and move on with hopes of people thinking they may have misheard what he said. He removed all doubt with, "no, you would not want cockroaches on your hotdog. A cockroach would be a terrible thing, but you can have mustard and ketchup, and ..."

I got a call a couple of days later from the PD of that station who wanted me to meet him that night for a beer. I started my new gig a few weeks later.

Completely true story. I still love listening to the few live reads when I hear one Radio was much more interesting back when it was live and relevant
 
Hyrum said:
I heard myself get a job when I listened to a guy blow a live read. This was back in the last century where things were actually done live and when AM stations could be heard above the static of yet to be invented electric devices.

I had recently ended up in a conversation with the PD of a much better local station than the one I was taking a paycheck from. He told me his liked my stuff, and wished he had room for me on his station, but there were no openings.

A short while later as I drove along listening to his station, the guy on the air was reading a spot for a hot dog place where you can get anything on the dogs. " you can have mustard, meat sauce, sour kraut...ANYTHING. you can have ketchup, you can even have cockroaches.". Yes he said THAT. To make sure people heard it correctly he elected not to ignore it and move on with hopes of people thinking they may have misheard what he said. He removed all doubt with, "no, you would not want cockroaches on your hotdog. A cockroach would be a terrible thing, but you can have mustard and ketchup, and ..."

I got a call a couple of days later from the PD of that station who wanted me to meet him that night for a beer. I started my new gig a few weeks later.

Completely true story. I still love listening to the few live reads when I hear one Radio was much more interesting back when it was live and relevant
Click to expand...

You automatically dismiss it as being relevant because it isnt live. Just like alot of other radio guys who assume the same info is automatically better just because its live.

In WY, were tracked outside of AM Drive weekdays but we beat the pants off the dead lawyers cluster and the corporate cluster in terms of community involvement/localism and we smash them 2-3x in TSL.. time spent listening. locally owned, operated and programmed for about 15 years, in their own owned building and one owner.
 
Ok. You
SomeRadioGuy said:
You automatically dismiss it as being relevant because it isnt live. Just like alot of other radio guys who assume the same info is automatically better just because its live.

In WY, were tracked outside of AM Drive weekdays but we beat the pants off the dead lawyers cluster and the corporate cluster in terms of community involvement/localism and we smash them 2-3x in TSL.. time spent listening. locally owned, operated and programmed for about 15 years, in their own owned building and one owner.
Click to expand...
Ok you are right. I should have said "entertaining", which is is not, with few exceptions. To me it is like a stage performer. They are always better working with a live audience. I think radio guys should better live. If nothing else voice tracks are bland because the have to be. You can't talk about much of anything if you have to worry about it changing before the computer gets it on the air. I know agencies but by the numbers. I believe that someday as budgets tighten even more they will start to look for a bang for the buck and a live fun station can probably sell more hot dogs with any condiments than any of the stuff I hear today. Furthermore as I listen now (yawn) I am hearing a....ZZZZzzzzzz..... Sorry. I dozed off and lost my train of thought
 
Hyrum said:
Ok. You

Ok you are right. I should have said "entertaining", which is is not, with few exceptions. To me it is like a stage performer. They are always better working with a live audience. I think radio guys should better live. If nothing else voice tracks are bland because the have to be. You can't talk about much of anything if you have to worry about it changing before the computer gets it on the air. I know agencies but by the numbers. I believe that someday as budgets tighten even more they will start to look for a bang for the buck and a live fun station can probably sell more hot dogs with any condiments than any of the stuff I hear today. Furthermore as I listen now (yawn) I am hearing a....ZZZZzzzzzz..... Sorry. I dozed off and lost my train of thought
Click to expand...

Our station in Wyoming doesnt depend on agency buys... they get some but not many. As for agencies buying a live, fun station.. thats not really a metric they go for. its a pure numbers game.
 
Hyrum said:
I know agencies but by the numbers. I believe that someday as budgets tighten even more they will start to look for a bang for the buck and a live fun station can probably sell more hot dogs with any condiments than any of the stuff I hear today.
Click to expand...
More and more agency buys are done via computer programs that optimize the Cost Per Thousand or the Cost Per Impression against station rates, so there is no human intervention at all. And even where buys are selected "by hand" more often than not the buyer is in another city and has no idea what each station does other than the very generalized Nielsen format names.

That said, local agencies and local direct accounts can be influenced by such arguments, but how many order "live reads" any more? At most stations, a "live read" is actually recorded; the jock does a whole bunch of slightly different reads at one time and they rotate.
 
Easily Amused said:
Interesting terms. What do they signify?
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If you follow Paul's posts, one group is owned by the heirs of a lawyer who owned them and the other is owned by a multi.market group owner.
 
Easily Amused said:
Thank you.
Click to expand...
DavidEduardo said:
If you follow Paul's posts, one group is owned by the heirs of a lawyer who owned them and the other is owned by a multi.market group owner.
Click to expand...

The dead lawyer stations are pretty bland too. one has no jocks. when i was there, the pop station had an afternoon show and the country station had no jocks either. their rates are cheap.

The corporate owned cluster.. the AM in town has no local programming, the fm that was in town moved to cheyenne hadnt had much local programming in awhile... i think theyve got one local jock last time i looked
 
Mistakes made? No one has ever selected the wrong speed on a turntable, right?

I remember doing an instrumental cut from an album, but the TT was set on 45RPM. I could have changed the speed, but then it would have been obvious that I did that, so I let it play. Other than it being a bit shorter and brighter, it sounded okay.

Vocals, well, a little different, but just be quick on the shifter.

I do remember one evening shift where the DJ started a song on the wrong speed, it was corrected and in outro-ing the cut, she mentioned the wrong speed and then maybe ten minutes later, mentioning it again. I had said to her that the two mentions of the speed issue brought attention to the mistake. Just say nothing and only those who actually heard the speed change even knew about it.
 
DavidEduardo said:
More and more agency buys are done via computer programs that optimize the Cost Per Thousand or the Cost Per Impression against station rates, so there is no human intervention at all. And even where buys are selected "by hand" more often than not the buyer is in another city and has no idea what each station does other than the very generalized Nielsen format names.

That said, local agencies and local direct accounts can be influenced by such arguments, but how many order "live reads" any more? At most stations, a "live read" is actually recorded; the jock does a whole bunch of slightly different reads at one time and they rotate.
Click to expand...
We still do live reads at the group of stations I work for. There's a folder of cue-cards for news and weather sponsors, etc. It's always a lot of fun to do those when I fill in for morning drive on one of the stations.
 
One of the worst mistakes I make was at WDBL. I was running the board for a 2 hour remote right in the middle of the Saturday noon to 6pm shift. The manager (Billy Grey) was set up at the local BF Goodrich tire store. We also had a Goodyear tire dealership in town too. The Goodyear dealership had a remote the Saturday before with at the the same time.

After the rip and read news and weather I did an intro " Now we switch you live to Bill Gray at BF GOODYEAR downtown Springfield.".

After that I always wrote the intros down and used the script word for word.
 
A jock saying the name of a former employer- the only example I've actually heard on air was a few years ago, when I lived in upstate South Carolina; one morning I was listening to classic hits WRTH (103.3 Earth FM), and morning jock Bill Love slipped up and said "My 102.5." Of course, he immediately realized his mistake, then emphasized the name of his then-current employer and continued on.

As for playing a record at the wrong speed, never heard a real-life example, but Dr. Johnny Fever did it once on an episode of WKRP in Cincinnati. After he realized his mistake, he stopped the record and then said, "And now the LONG version!" before starting the song over at the correct speed.
 
rhead said:
A jock saying the name of a former employer- the only example I've actually heard on air was a few years ago, when I lived in upstate South Carolina; one morning I was listening to classic hits WRTH (103.3 Earth FM), and morning jock Bill Love slipped up and said "My 102.5." Of course, he immediately realized his mistake, then emphasized the name of his then-current employer and continued on.
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One thing I never understood: back in the day, when you had one station one studio, why did station owners not spend less than $50 for mike flags, or if you were too cheap, at least a large poster directly in the line of sight?
 
rhead said:
As for playing a record at the wrong speed, never heard a real-life example, but Dr. Johnny Fever did it once on an episode of WKRP in Cincinnati. After he realized his mistake, he stopped the record and then said, "And now the LONG version!" before starting the song over at the correct speed.
Click to expand...
Well after that turkey drop anything can happen!
 
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