• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Bongino tapped for FBI Deputy Director

The president has now tapped talk show host Mark Levin to his homeland security advisory committee

www.insideradio.com

Syndicated Host Mark Levin Among Trump’s Homeland Security Advisory Council Appointees.

Syndicated conservative talk radio host Mark Levin is one of several appointees to President Trump’s “revamped” Homeland Security Advisory Council, along with former New York Police Department Detective Bo Dietl,
www.insideradio.com www.insideradio.com

Because it's advisory, Levin doesn't have to leave his full time job. Another member is Bo Dietl, who was a regular on the Don Imus talk show.
 
TheBigA said:
The president has now tapped talk show host Mark Levin to his homeland security advisory committee

www.insideradio.com

Syndicated Host Mark Levin Among Trump’s Homeland Security Advisory Council Appointees.

Syndicated conservative talk radio host Mark Levin is one of several appointees to President Trump’s “revamped” Homeland Security Advisory Council, along with former New York Police Department Detective Bo Dietl,
www.insideradio.com www.insideradio.com

Because it's advisory, Levin doesn't have to leave his full time job. Another member is Bo Dietl, who was a regular on the Don Imus talk show.
Click to expand...
Jesus, what have we become.
 
TheBigA said:
The president has now tapped talk show host Mark Levin to his homeland security advisory committee

www.insideradio.com

Syndicated Host Mark Levin Among Trump’s Homeland Security Advisory Council Appointees.

Syndicated conservative talk radio host Mark Levin is one of several appointees to President Trump’s “revamped” Homeland Security Advisory Council, along with former New York Police Department Detective Bo Dietl,
www.insideradio.com www.insideradio.com

Because it's advisory, Levin doesn't have to leave his full time job. Another member is Bo Dietl, who was a regular on the Don Imus talk show.
Click to expand...

That's one host whom people must like solely for the message. I mean he doesn't have the booming, comforting bass voice that used to be associated with most broadcasters. And, at least to me, he sounds very nasal and sing-songy. While there were/are some conservative talk show talents I could listen to even if I didn't agree with them (the late Jim Bohannon), I never could get into Mark Levin.
 
ted chittenden said:
That's one host whom people must like solely for the message.
Click to expand...

I also don't find him interesting or entertaining. He is strictly an ideologue, who selectively uses the law in an attempt to prove his point. Any lawyer can tell you there are always two sides to every issue brought before the court. But because that's not required on talk radio, he gets to selectively pick and choose the way he presents his case in an angry way that misrepresents the law. He's not funny or entertaining. I think they hope he will justify what they're doing in court. The bad news for him is that the other side gets representation in court. Bo Dietl is at least entertaining.
 
wadio said:
That's unfortunate. When I first saw the headline I thought there was hope! 🥺
Click to expand...
Nope, he will still be there screaming at us and having us believe that we are all ignorant fools waiting for him to guide use.
 
www.theguardian.com

Steve Hilton, former David Cameron adviser, to run for California governor

Ex-advertising executive, who hosted a Fox News show and has criticised Kamala Harris, will stand as a Republican
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

abcnews.go.com

Former Fox News host Steve Hilton to run for governor of California

Conservative commentator Steve Hilton has announced that he’s joining the 2026 race for California governor
abcnews.go.com abcnews.go.com

Steve Hilton a former Fox News Pundit is allegedly hyping up the 2026 elections specifically for Governor of California. We will find out by December how many more will run for office in the 2026 elections specifically. Yes this is another of these pundits going from talk show host to running for office.
 
ted chittenden said:
That's one host whom people must like solely for the message. I mean he doesn't have the booming, comforting bass voice that used to be associated with most broadcasters. And, at least to me, he sounds very nasal and sing-songy. While there were/are some conservative talk show talents I could listen to even if I didn't agree with them (the late Jim Bohannon), I never could get into Mark Levin.
Click to expand...
His habit of very long pauses when it's the worst etiquette to have any dead air, the first thing any broadcasting teacher teaches to this day (even on YouTube) is the worst, even more so than his need to make sure the VU is always in the deep red.
 
nathannah said:
His habit of very long pauses when it's the worst etiquette to have any dead air, the first thing any broadcasting teacher teaches to this day (even on YouTube) is the worst, even more so than his need to make sure the VU is always in the deep red.
Click to expand...
Paul Harvey masterfully used pauses (great for taking meter readings on AMs with no modulation). Not sure about the guy you're referencing
 
Paul Harvey was a master at pausing for dramatic effect and he had creative freedom most don't, along with defined timeslots to perform those pauses. We understood that he came up in a different era and that the stories he often reported had the gravity to deserve those pauses.

Every time I tune to the local station for the Brewers and Mark's still on before the pre-game, I'm not sure if my audio device is working and his pauses are always ill-timed, way too long, and then I'm going for the volume down because he's yelling out his points for no real reason except he can, about the political equivalent of 'who slept with whom' gossip with all the class of Matthew Lesko.

It's even worse because his broadcast setup is video-first (because of course all these guys can't be humble and do a radio show only these days, so you hear that awful audio whine you hear in TV dead air moments rather than complete silence like radio has, and you also have that big studio echo when he yells. It's the absolute worst audio setup on radio today involving someone who just thinks of radio as an afterthought.
 
nathannah said:
His habit of very long pauses when it's the worst etiquette to have any dead air, the first thing any broadcasting teacher teaches to this day (even on YouTube) is the worst, even more so than his need to make sure the VU is always in the deep red.
Click to expand...
I was not taught at a "broadcasting school" but at my first job I was told to keep the meter out of the red, but as high in the black as I could without pot whipping. And in the format of the FM, where they stuck me most of the time, we used pauses in the presentation of jazz album cuts to separate the artists... "Dave Brubeck on piano... Paul Desmond on sax... in their version of...."

Shulke made an art of pauses: "All day... All night... Oasis 97."

Shulke also made sure that stations did not have aggressive AGC (like the famous "zero ohm resistor" in the CBS Audimax) which would pump up noise in the pauses.
 
DavidEduardo said:
I was not taught at a "broadcasting school" but at my first job I was told to keep the meter out of the red, but as high in the black as I could without pot whipping. And in the format of the FM, where they stuck me most of the time, we used pauses in the presentation of jazz album cuts to separate the artists... "Dave Brubeck on piano... Paul Desmond on sax... in their version of...."

Shulke made an art of pauses: "All day... All night... Oasis 97."

Shulke also made sure that stations did not have aggressive AGC (like the famous "zero ohm resistor" in the CBS Audimax) which would pump up noise in the pauses.
Click to expand...

I *was* taught at college to avoid long pauses whenever possible. If you did pauses, you would, say, skip a couple of seconds between the artist and song title as you suggested above. Willis Conover, the great late host of the Voice of America's jazz show (I forget its title now) was a master at pauses; so are many classical announcers today. (Listen to the breaks on MPR's Classical 24 satellite service to see what I mean.)

All of that said, I've heard stories of disc jockeys not realizing that certain songs were not over because they had a long pause in them and then being afraid to play those songs again. The top song on this list was the Beach Boys' "The Little Girl I Once Knew," that had, if memory serves, a 6-second break between each of the song's two verses and chorus that followed them. The result was that that Beach Boys recording would only peak at #20 on Billboard in December of 1965 while the song directly before it, "California Girls," peaked at #3 and the song released directly after it, "Barbara Ann," went all the way to #2.
 
ted chittenden said:
I *was* taught at college to avoid long pauses whenever possible. If you did pauses, you would, say, skip a couple of seconds between the artist and song title as you suggested above.
Click to expand...
I took one course in broadcasting in my last year of college (I was working as a consultant after a decade of ownership and management) and did a term paper on "format selection". I was given what for me was a low grade of a "B" and the professor thought the idea was too theoretical.

I was immediately put in charge of an AM and FM in what would be, later, Arbitron's 12th market. I implemented the concept, and had the #1 18-49 AM station and highest rated of all FMs in the first book.

That should give you my ongoing feeling about most broadcast courses; I majored in business and social sciences (psychology, sociology, etc).
ted chittenden said:
Willis Conover, the great late host of the Voice of America's jazz show (I forget its title now) was a master at pauses; so are many classical announcers today. (Listen to the breaks on MPR's Classical 24 satellite service to see what I mean.)
Click to expand...
When I owned a classical station, we always paused before talking after the last notes of a piece and also before starting the next work.
ted chittenden said:
All of that said, I've heard stories of disc jockeys not realizing that certain songs were not over because they had a long pause in them and then being afraid to play those songs again. The top song on this list was the Beach Boys' "The Little Girl I Once Knew," that had, if memory serves, a 6-second break between each of the song's two verses and chorus that followed them. The result was that that Beach Boys recording would only peak at #20 on Billboard in December of 1965 while the song directly before it, "California Girls," peaked at #3 and the song released directly after it, "Barbara Ann," went all the way to #2.
Click to expand...
I think that the "Little Girl" song was basically a stiff, pause or not.

When I was an intern in training I did some board work at XERC in Mexico City, a Top 40 station. There was a big hit that had about a "one-two-three" totally dead piece about two thirds of the way through. I was too nervous being on the board in our continent's largest market and I hit a jingle and signaled the jock. The jock did not talk, and let the song continue. Fortunately, the jingle exactly fit the pause in the song. But the episode was good for a lot of joking about me for several days... other people on the staff would sing the piece of the song that had the pause and laugh!
 


Back
Top Bottom