Why are we so pasionate about this business? I think every one of these points is a snapshot of my early career. You have to wonder if anyone these days goes through any of the things we did, and if not, where does their passion come from?
From the Communications Dept. at Illinois Wesleyan University:
> For the Next Generation of Broadcasters
> By Stew Salowitz
> With Thanks to Steve Berger
>
>
> Thinking. Thinking...about how and why you got into radio, about who influenced you, about your best radio moments, what you still hope to achieve. War stories about completing a broadcast despite impossible conditions, accidentally locking yourself out of the studio, on-air flubs. Stories about personal connections you and colleagues made with listeners: the girl who called to request her late grandmother's favorite song, the fan who dropped off the chocolate chip cookies on your birthday, the all-seeing blind listener you counted on for an on-air phone call every day, the listener who berated you for mispronouncing the name of his favorite artist. Stories about transistor radios under the bed covers, endless struggles to control the car radio buttons. "Would you PLEASE turn that down!" and "WAIT, I want to hear this!"
>
> Novelty records and girl groups and Motown and Stax and Cadence and Elvis from the waist up and hearing "I Want to Hold Your Hand" for the very first time. Stories about lovesick teenagers dedicating songs back and forth to each other. About children turning on the radio before they're even awake, feverishly hoping to hear those magic words coming out of the speaker: "No school, snow day......"
>
> Thinking about loneliness and a solitary voice reaching out to you. About making a complete stranger laugh or reflect or remember. About baseball games from far away on the car radio. About someone driving across town or cross country with only you and your radio brethren for company.
>
> Stories about Larry Lujak and John Records Landecker and Robert W. and Wolfman Jack and Gary Owens, and about those crazy young jocks who brought American-style radio to Europe in the 1960s by taking to the seas in honest-to-God pirate radio ships (imagine broadcasting under the worst possible conditions; now, imagine doing it while seasick).
>
> Stories about bad news and about everyone immediately turning on the radio to confirm, to learn more. About sad news and where you were when you heard it. About practical jokes and misunderstandings and mild or wild revenge. About getting fired ("we're changing format, going in a different direction"), packing up the U-Haul, and being scared all over again. Getting angry, getting older, and the good old days. Static-y voices crisscrossing in the night. Fifteen hour air shifts, flaky jocks, and disappearing engineers.
>
> Thinking about all those stories of the legendary radio people you almost met in an elevator at a convention. The major market PD who did you a favor, the request line caller you can't forget. Practical jokes on the news guy, disappearing company stationery, and a bedroom full of gratis promo records that one day will be worth something.
>
> Staying up late talking radio, swapping tapes, borrowing ideas, embellishing your ratings, deepening your voice, losing your voice, losing your place, losing your keys, losing your cool. Boxes or rolls of wire service copy paper, 15-inch reels, pin-controlled automation. Caffeine addictions and junk food, and whatever the station could trade for. Old friends, borrowed headphones, uncontrollable sleep-deprived laughter. Razor blades, splicing tape, grease pencils. Draping the tape edit over your shoulder until it was safe to throw it away. Cue tones, cue sheets, in-cue, out of breath. Slip-cueing, back-announcing, and hitting the post. Egos, rivals, and friendships. Imagination, excitement, Orson Welles and Jack Benny and Ma Perkins and Franklin D. Roosevelt. And Arthur Godfrey and Don McNeil's Breakfast Club.
>
> Thinking about losing jobs, gaining weight, changing names ("Johnny Dark," "Johnny Rabbit"). "How do they do that?" and "Listen to this!" Storz, McClendon, Drake.
>
> Play by play and blow by blow, scoreboard updates, and election returns, number one on the charts this week, on the tens. First ticket, Hooper, Pulse, Arbitron. "You don't look anything like you sound."
>
> "What am I doing with my life" and seven day workweeks and "I can't believe I get paid for this!" Slow starting turntables, wow, needle burn, nickel on the tone arm, the cart machine sticks. Stories about hotlines, hotshots, skimmers, phantom cume, time checks, time warping, ratings, feelings, winning, showing off. T-shirts and coffee mugs and iridescent Frisbees. Billboard and Claude Hall, Cashbox, Record World, R&R and the Gavin report. Floods and tornado watches and power outages and school lunch menus. Lost dogs, lost accounts, lost tempers. Jiving, shouting, rhyming, whispering.
>
> Thinking about hiccup remedies, lemon 'n' honey, and good old fashioned adrenaline to save the day. Embarrassed, elated, delighted, Hi-Low, Sponsor Wheel, Name it and Claim it, and Dollar-a-Holler.
>
> Playlists and station surveys and Good Guys, Q, Zoo, and Boss. Bob & Ray, jingles, stickers, and Chickenman. Silly stunts and intense rivalries. Buying the book. Passion. B-sides and label colors and songwriter credits. BMI logging. Favorite songs, favorite artists, favorite moments. Newspaper wars, live remotes, and meter readings. Shouts, stingers, sweepers, stagers, stabs. Make-goods, live tags, rip 'n' read and backtiming to the news. Allen Freed and Dick Biondi and Cousin Brucie. Beat the bomb and Lucky Bucks. Pinning the needle, pegging the meter, riding gain, potting down. Feedback and wrapping the capstan. "The machine ate the cart" and "Hold on a sec, I gotta go on the air...." Sign on signoff, warming up the filament and Compression, Compression, Compression! Gates board with rotary pots, Magnacorder reel to reels, ATC, ITC, Automax. Intros, ramps, talk-ups. False endings and records popping and skipping. Philosophical differences and late night resume photocopy sessions. Tight board, good pipes, will relocate, no drifter or floater. The big break, bad luck, skip waves, skipping town with the air staff's paychecks.
>
> Thinking about cueing past the splice, heavy phones, cue burn. Solid Gold, Hot Nine at Nine, Hot 100, Boogie Check. Friday night countdowns, Saturday Swap Shops, Sunday drag racing commercials, double-spotting, twin spins, doubleplays, triple shots and instant replays. Daytimers, big stick, metro, TSA, 18-34 share. Romantic entanglements, broken hearts, big dreams, small wins.
>
> "NO ONE is to touch these carts! and that means YOU!"
>
> "Were you listening when....?" and "What'd ya think?" and "You shoulda been there...."
>
> Now, YOU are there. What are you gonna do with it?
From the Communications Dept. at Illinois Wesleyan University:
> For the Next Generation of Broadcasters
> By Stew Salowitz
> With Thanks to Steve Berger
>
>
> Thinking. Thinking...about how and why you got into radio, about who influenced you, about your best radio moments, what you still hope to achieve. War stories about completing a broadcast despite impossible conditions, accidentally locking yourself out of the studio, on-air flubs. Stories about personal connections you and colleagues made with listeners: the girl who called to request her late grandmother's favorite song, the fan who dropped off the chocolate chip cookies on your birthday, the all-seeing blind listener you counted on for an on-air phone call every day, the listener who berated you for mispronouncing the name of his favorite artist. Stories about transistor radios under the bed covers, endless struggles to control the car radio buttons. "Would you PLEASE turn that down!" and "WAIT, I want to hear this!"
>
> Novelty records and girl groups and Motown and Stax and Cadence and Elvis from the waist up and hearing "I Want to Hold Your Hand" for the very first time. Stories about lovesick teenagers dedicating songs back and forth to each other. About children turning on the radio before they're even awake, feverishly hoping to hear those magic words coming out of the speaker: "No school, snow day......"
>
> Thinking about loneliness and a solitary voice reaching out to you. About making a complete stranger laugh or reflect or remember. About baseball games from far away on the car radio. About someone driving across town or cross country with only you and your radio brethren for company.
>
> Stories about Larry Lujak and John Records Landecker and Robert W. and Wolfman Jack and Gary Owens, and about those crazy young jocks who brought American-style radio to Europe in the 1960s by taking to the seas in honest-to-God pirate radio ships (imagine broadcasting under the worst possible conditions; now, imagine doing it while seasick).
>
> Stories about bad news and about everyone immediately turning on the radio to confirm, to learn more. About sad news and where you were when you heard it. About practical jokes and misunderstandings and mild or wild revenge. About getting fired ("we're changing format, going in a different direction"), packing up the U-Haul, and being scared all over again. Getting angry, getting older, and the good old days. Static-y voices crisscrossing in the night. Fifteen hour air shifts, flaky jocks, and disappearing engineers.
>
> Thinking about all those stories of the legendary radio people you almost met in an elevator at a convention. The major market PD who did you a favor, the request line caller you can't forget. Practical jokes on the news guy, disappearing company stationery, and a bedroom full of gratis promo records that one day will be worth something.
>
> Staying up late talking radio, swapping tapes, borrowing ideas, embellishing your ratings, deepening your voice, losing your voice, losing your place, losing your keys, losing your cool. Boxes or rolls of wire service copy paper, 15-inch reels, pin-controlled automation. Caffeine addictions and junk food, and whatever the station could trade for. Old friends, borrowed headphones, uncontrollable sleep-deprived laughter. Razor blades, splicing tape, grease pencils. Draping the tape edit over your shoulder until it was safe to throw it away. Cue tones, cue sheets, in-cue, out of breath. Slip-cueing, back-announcing, and hitting the post. Egos, rivals, and friendships. Imagination, excitement, Orson Welles and Jack Benny and Ma Perkins and Franklin D. Roosevelt. And Arthur Godfrey and Don McNeil's Breakfast Club.
>
> Thinking about losing jobs, gaining weight, changing names ("Johnny Dark," "Johnny Rabbit"). "How do they do that?" and "Listen to this!" Storz, McClendon, Drake.
>
> Play by play and blow by blow, scoreboard updates, and election returns, number one on the charts this week, on the tens. First ticket, Hooper, Pulse, Arbitron. "You don't look anything like you sound."
>
> "What am I doing with my life" and seven day workweeks and "I can't believe I get paid for this!" Slow starting turntables, wow, needle burn, nickel on the tone arm, the cart machine sticks. Stories about hotlines, hotshots, skimmers, phantom cume, time checks, time warping, ratings, feelings, winning, showing off. T-shirts and coffee mugs and iridescent Frisbees. Billboard and Claude Hall, Cashbox, Record World, R&R and the Gavin report. Floods and tornado watches and power outages and school lunch menus. Lost dogs, lost accounts, lost tempers. Jiving, shouting, rhyming, whispering.
>
> Thinking about hiccup remedies, lemon 'n' honey, and good old fashioned adrenaline to save the day. Embarrassed, elated, delighted, Hi-Low, Sponsor Wheel, Name it and Claim it, and Dollar-a-Holler.
>
> Playlists and station surveys and Good Guys, Q, Zoo, and Boss. Bob & Ray, jingles, stickers, and Chickenman. Silly stunts and intense rivalries. Buying the book. Passion. B-sides and label colors and songwriter credits. BMI logging. Favorite songs, favorite artists, favorite moments. Newspaper wars, live remotes, and meter readings. Shouts, stingers, sweepers, stagers, stabs. Make-goods, live tags, rip 'n' read and backtiming to the news. Allen Freed and Dick Biondi and Cousin Brucie. Beat the bomb and Lucky Bucks. Pinning the needle, pegging the meter, riding gain, potting down. Feedback and wrapping the capstan. "The machine ate the cart" and "Hold on a sec, I gotta go on the air...." Sign on signoff, warming up the filament and Compression, Compression, Compression! Gates board with rotary pots, Magnacorder reel to reels, ATC, ITC, Automax. Intros, ramps, talk-ups. False endings and records popping and skipping. Philosophical differences and late night resume photocopy sessions. Tight board, good pipes, will relocate, no drifter or floater. The big break, bad luck, skip waves, skipping town with the air staff's paychecks.
>
> Thinking about cueing past the splice, heavy phones, cue burn. Solid Gold, Hot Nine at Nine, Hot 100, Boogie Check. Friday night countdowns, Saturday Swap Shops, Sunday drag racing commercials, double-spotting, twin spins, doubleplays, triple shots and instant replays. Daytimers, big stick, metro, TSA, 18-34 share. Romantic entanglements, broken hearts, big dreams, small wins.
>
> "NO ONE is to touch these carts! and that means YOU!"
>
> "Were you listening when....?" and "What'd ya think?" and "You shoulda been there...."
>
> Now, YOU are there. What are you gonna do with it?
