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Ken Hamblin

No, he's not. He still lives around here (Denver) somewhere, but what he's doing I don't know.
 
That's too bad, really. His show was entertaining -- conservative, but not cookie-cutter, Rush-wannabe conservative. Had a three-year stand down from regular radio listening, and his was one of the voices I missed hearing most. I noticed his web address is up for sale, and that all of the links mentioning him on Google are very dated. Heck, he may have just pulled the pin and retired. Thanks for the info, though!
 
Witchlover said:
That's too bad, really. His show was entertaining -- conservative, but not cookie-cutter, Rush-wannabe conservative. Had a three-year stand down from regular radio listening, and his was one of the voices I missed hearing most. I noticed his web address is up for sale, and that all of the links mentioning him on Google are very dated. Heck, he may have just pulled the pin and retired. Thanks for the info, though!
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Mega Dittos! Hamblin is a great radio talent. FUnny how you brought him up. I was just thinking of him today.

I think he did retire.
Here's a good article in the Denver media about this legendary host, one of Denver's most well-known talk hosts (up there with Alan Berg).

http://bestof.westword.com/1999-11-18/news/man-without-a-city/2

[size=10pt]While chatting with Chris Rock on HBO, he purposefully insulted an audience that was starting to turn against him ("They cut that part out," he says), and when they reacted to his departure with boos and catcalls, he walked off defiantly waving a pair of peace signs in their faces. "I wasn't being Nixon-esque," he explains. "That was my way of saying, 'Screw you.'" But when asked about critics who accuse him of being more shtick than substance and of playing into the white man's hands for commercial gain, he drops the civility he loves to tout like a hot rock. "If it's true that I'm just doing this for the money, then why aren't I on the Fox network or CNN? Because I've had my chances. But I turned them down because I'm doing things the way I want to do them, and I believe in what I'm doing. I work seven days a week, and if people think what I do is a cakewalk, I don't really give a ------ about them. I really don't care."

But he does. Deep down, it frosts him that he's not on a Denver radio station and that the current merger mania will likely prevent that from changing: "With consolidation, you don't have competition, and you have only a couple of people calling the shots. And if they don't like you..." Nonetheless, he plans to stay in Denver, proud that the powers that be still haven't found a way to grind him out of existence.

"When people told me I wasn't talented, I proved them wrong," he says. "And [size=10pt][size=10pt]when they told me a black guy couldn't do a syndicated show, I proved them wrong[/size], too. The politics of Denver is what it is, but it has not been powerful enough to reach out and touch me across this land."[/size][/size]
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Another good argument for stripping monopolists like Cheap Channel of the 30 stations they can own in a market.
 
For all of the stations running News/Talk these days, there is not a lot of diverse programming actually making it on the air. I have heard that much of what is out there is bought and shelved to keep potential competitors from running it. Just enough is run in late-night and on weekends to satisfy contractural requirements, but the rest gets buried. If this is indeed true, it is indeed a shame.

Witchlover®
 
Witchlover said:
For all of the stations running News/Talk these days, there is not a lot of diverse programming actually making it on the air. I have heard that much of what is out there is bought and shelved to keep potential competitors from running it. Just enough is run in late-night and on weekends to satisfy contractural requirements, but the rest gets buried. If this is indeed true, it is indeed a shame.

Witchlover®
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Clear Channel did that in Columbus. Bought many syndicated shows and shoved them onto a week 1kw 1230AM station. CC's paranoid or greedy owners were so afraid some competitor would get the shows and destroy the heritage station CC stole with their millions.
 
What did CC/WTVN steal? It's rather cookie cutter now, but three years ago I would have called it perhaps the best medium market talk station in the country.

What you're alluding to is not that unfrequent. KTBL in Albuquerque does the same thing to flank KKOB. Other stations do it, too. It also serves a purpose that people here always whine about: a talent pool. Sure, the second-stringer is usually mostly or all syndicated, but it gives management a way to test up-and-coming shows for future use on the big station without ruining the big station now. Maybe some of the CC stations that brought Jerry Springer on could have used a second-tier station to test him on. ;)

I don't exactly understand how people are being taken advantage of in Columbus. WYTS airs a bunch of second-tier talk shows that previously had no other home in the market (being on in Heath or Newark doesn't count). The citizens of Columbus can now hear this shows, giving them more choice in talk. CC may not promote it, but it's not like Laura Ingraham isn't on from 9-noon everyday. How is this burying her show?
 
Who sings that "Stanley" song Ken used to play on his show?
 
Witchlover said:
That's too bad, really. His show was entertaining -- conservative, but not cookie-cutter, Rush-wannabe conservative.
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That's probably why it failed. Way back in the olden days of radio there used to be radio shows. Each one was different and stood on its own. People would tune in a show, and expected to listen to the beginning, middle and end, and when one show was over, they'd pick another show to listen to. It was more like television is today.

Now, news/talk is a format just like AOR, MOR, CHR, or any other acronym. It's not a collection of shows, it's just wall-to-wall programming. The host may change every couple of hours, but the basic programming just keeps on rolling. The goal is to have the programming on a news/talk station be as seamless as the programming on a music format station. When anyone hits their station selector button for news/talk, no matter what hour of the day, they should hear pretty much the same thing as what they'd hear any other time of the day.
 
Yup. Can't do anything creative or stand out from the pack.

Just wall-to-wall sameness. See what it gets us. Pathetic and mediocre radio.
 
Don62 said:
Yup. Can't do anything creative or stand out from the pack.

Just wall-to-wall sameness. See what it gets us. Pathetic and mediocre radio.
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Yeah, but all the consultants say that's what the mass audience wants. And they've done the research to prove it, so who cares what people who prefer being entertained to being bored prefer?

I once heard someone observe that no one should want to be tried by 12 people who are too stupid to get out of jury duty. Maybe no one should pay any attention to market research conducted on test subjects who'll say anything to get a quick $50 for answering what they think some researcher wants to hear.
 
Witchlover said:
For all of the stations running News/Talk these days, there is not a lot of diverse programming actually making it on the air.
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So true. Blame it on the lowest-common-denominator mentality. Phil Hendrie said it best: the average radio suit wouldn't know an original idea if it walked up to him and kissed him full on the lips... :-*
 
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