Jim Lang is a renowned broadcaster who's worked all over Canada, mostly in AM radio and almost always covering sports. You probably know him best from either Sportsnet Fan Radio 590, or his Toronto Argos coverage on AM 640. In this episode, we work our way through his broadcast history, from his humble beginnings as a radio intern all the way to his coverage of events like the Superbowl. If you're a sports fan, you'll love this one. Jim talks at length about the most stand-out moments of his sports career- the aftermath of Superbowl 42 and the ensuing chaos, the feeling of living in Montreal while the Canadiens were on a Stanley Cup run, and the privilege of becoming the radio voice of the Argos. This is a great episode for radio buffs as well, as Jim shares his story of moving from Halifax to Toronto and falling in love with the radio offerings the city had. He shares the exact moment he knew it was the career for him, the trepidation he felt the first time he stepped inside a big-city radio control room, and even some tips about making a voiceover sound punchier. Nowadays, Jim hosts his own morning show on 105.9 The Region. You can listen to him from Monday to Friday, 5:00am to 10:00am. Hockey fans should also check out any of his 3 books, all co-written with hockey legends: Bleeding Blue with Wendel Clark, Shift Work with Tie Domi, and Everyday Hockey Heroes with Bob Mackenzie. SHOW TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:00:01 The Sound Off Podcast The podcast about broadcast with Matt Cundill starts now. Matt Cundill 00:00:11 Jim Lang is the morning show host at 105.9 The Region in York. York, by the way, is located just north of Toronto and it covers a big area. Jim and I worked together for a few years back in the early 90s when the Blue Jays were winning the World Series. The Expos were getting ready to win one of their own and the Stanley Cup came back to Montreal. As the years carried on, it was great to see Jim call football games for the CFL's Toronto Argonauts and become an anchor at Sportsnet. In 2014, he got reacquainted with the alarm clock and morning radio. Jim Lang joins me from his home just outside of Toronto. I'll tell you one thing I completely forgot, though, and that's you were born in France. Jim Lang 00:00:53 That's right. My father was in the Air Force in the 60s. Now it's funny what's going on with Russia and Ukraine because my dad was there in the height of the Cold War and the Canadian Air Force, the Canadian military was much, much larger then, and what happened after World War II is West Germany had huge allied bases, American British, Canadian bases with airplanes and troops. And the whole idea was they were expecting the Warsaw Pact, Russia and East Germany and all those countries to come through West Germany and right to Paris to the English Channel. And the only thing stopping them were the Canadian bases. So my dad had been posted in Ottawa, met my mother, and then basically if you were in the military in the 60s, in the Canadian military, you were going for a four year stint in Europe at one point because they had so many people there. So my parents had just got married and we were living in a little village in Belgium because we were stationed in Marville, France, which is just basically not far from Bastogne, not far from that part of the Luxembourg, Belgium, France confluence there. And then I was about a year old and then we ended up moving and set up base and we were my dad and his other members of the military team, they were the first people to open up the Canadian Armed Forces base in Lare. They would do World War Three drills twice a year. They would have to drive around the base at midnight, my dad and a group of other young airmen and say, you have X amount of hours to be at your post, pilots, crew, air traffic controllers on the idea that you would have to be airborne, flying into Russian territory at a moment's notice. So that's what my dad and the members of the military, the Canadian military and the British and American military went through all the time in the 60s. And so it would have been '68 when we left Germany and ended up moving to Trenton. And they did our cycle of moves in North America. Matt Cundill 00:02:45 So where does your radio story begin? Jim Lang 00:02:49 I think it starts. I remember in CFB Trenton being in grade 6-7, listening to Rochester. An FM station from Rochester basically came across the Lake into Trenton. But in grade- the start of grade eight. My dad got transferred to Burbank. The Canadian military bought an aircraft called the CP 140 Aurora that still flies today. It was built in the late 70s, early 80s, and arriving into Southern California radio in the fall of 1978 from living in Trenton, Ontario, in the Quinte area, Matt, was well, I mean, I'd never heard anything like it. They had a Charlie Tuna was the name of a huge Top 40 Jock in LA. Then you had Rick DS on the air. You had these huge 200, 300,000 Watt stations in Southern California that would blast into Nevada and Arizona. And I fell in love with a station called KLOS. They called it the Best in the West KLOS. And it was an FM rock station unlike anything ever heard. And you would hear music like you just did not hear in Canadian radio. In the late Seventies. The Canadian radio programmers would never play this stuff. And their attitude on the air, how they did stuff on the air was very different. And then we moved from there, about halfway through Grade 9 to Greenwood, Nova Scotia, in the Annapolis Valley in Nova Scotia in the early 1980s. Matt, this was they had, I think, C 100 FM, which was a Chum station. And that was almost like a hybrid of CHFI at the time. And Chum FM, like there was no rock radio east of Shone in Canada in the early 1980s. English radio. I mean, there was some Francophone in Quebec City, but Chhum FM, that's where it stopped. And east of that, it was just top 40 and easy listening FM and some country music and CBC radio. And it was sort of a dark period for radio, for me, for those half a grade 9, 10, and 11. And then my dad got transferred to Camp Borden, which is about an hour and a half north of Toronto. And then all of sudden, I was picking up Chum FM, Q107, The Edge. CFRB signal went from Lake Shore. I swear it was like almost up to North Bay. It was such a huge signal. And that's where you sort of started to think about radio. And that's where you thought, well, I thought I had heard the best of the best in LA. And I said, this is just as good what I'm hearing in Toronto. The big thing for me in high school was 680, the Top 40 station. And especially in the afternoon, Mike Cooper was a huge influence. And he had the 5:20 stupid joke of the day. And I was lucky enough years later to cross paths with him and get to know him and absolutely wonderful human being, like one of the best you'll ever need. But one of those guys off the air and on the air, his voice is one of the top radio voices the country has ever produced, Matt. And definitely in that mid 80s era, as I was ending high school, it really kind of put the radio bug in my ear what I wanted to do after high school. Matt Cundill 00:05:49 Did I know about your stint in Greenwood, Nova Scotia? Jim Lang 00:05:52 I don't think so. Back then I was just in the early parts of high school, and my whole life was just going to school and playing hockey and a little bit of football and just living life. Yeah. Matt Cundill 00:06:05 Yeah. I worked down in that area for a time in the 1990s and yeah, C100 would have not even gotten to Greenwood. Jim Lang 00:06:13 Kentville was the only station. Yeah. Matt Cundill 00:06:16 Well, Kentville had Annapolis Valley Radio, and that was really a string of AM sticks that went across the Annapolis Valley, and Greenwood would have been close to the Middleton stick. Jim Lang 00:06:25 That's right. Matt Cundill 00:06:26 That didn't really offer much other than some country music and a whole lot of news and information. I mean, I worked there, so I kind of loved it. It was a great place for our first gig. Jim Lang 00:06:36 Yes. And I can remember like it was yesterday because we would be bused from the base to the high school, West Kings District High School, because that was the closest high school to Greenwood. CFB Greenwood. And honest to God, they would do a turn onto this road to get to the school. And there was about a three or four month period where every day at the time of the turn, they'd have the local AVR station on and they'd play Billy Joel it Ain't Rock and Roll to me or Still Rock and Roll to me, like every day at the same time. And we go, we'd be sitting in the bus mullets and the lumberjack shirts going, oh, my God, here we go again. And I hear that song and I'm in grade ten on a bus in the middle of Nowhere, Nova Scotia. And when Jake Edwards set up Q 104, that was a huge thing for Maritime radio, that changed radio in the Maritimes forever. And that created the whole rock radio culture in the Maritimes. So people take it for granted. But before Brother Jake Edwards did that, they didn't exist. Matt Cundill 00:07:35 We had Tom Bedell from Q 104 on here a few months ago, and he was talking about that launch. And I'm sure if you did a survey in Halifax that 90% of people aged 18 to 34 will say that they were there for the first day of Q 104. Jim Lang 00:07:52 Well, my cousins, I have a lot of family that lives in the Halifax area. It was a game changer for them Matt because they hated the local radio and it was a lot of easy listening. And then they had like April Wine and Rush. It was rock and roll and the attitude. And they're presenting concerts at the Metro Center, and it was a huge thing. And then that spawned the rock stations in Monton, I think was the next one. And sort of now all of sudden and then the St. John's, Newfoundland. All of a sudden, you had a number of stations in the Maritime taking that sort of Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, rock attitude and took it east to them. Matt Cundill 00:08:29 When did you first land inside of a radio station? Jim Lang 00:08:33 Well, I guess my favorite story is when I started a Humber College, I had applied to different colleges for radio broadcasting, and Humber was the one that accepted me. And so there was about 65 of us in the first week, and it was the second or third day class. And it was like, hey, I'm Matt and I'm from Montreal and I did some volunteering here and everyone, they're going along like L Lang. So they started A and so Hi, I'm Jim Lang from CFB Borden. I like to listen to radio. Jim Lang 00:09:02 That was my experience. Jim Lang 00:09:05 I'd never been inside. They were like from a small town. They had to work at their local radio station. They had a high school radio station because they were from the city. And I didn't know I mean, the first time I was actually inside a radio station was I had to do a project. And I think at the end of the first year of Humber College, and I met Lee Eckley, and he invited me, another partner of mine, Doug Smiley, who was my roommate and worked in some of the radio stations. We got to go to Chum FM to see Lee "Beef" Eckley, tall, skinny guy. And it said on the door through these doors past the finest radio talent in Canada, and it was like Indiana Jones finding the Holy Grail. I mean, it hit me like a diamond right to the forehead mat. I couldn't believe it. I saw the mixing board, and this is why we're in school. It blew me away. It was like, it was like an instant addiction. That's why we're going to have to put the work in because I want to sit in a chair like that some day. Matt Cundill 00:10:07 So I had the same experience in the control room you wound up in one day. When I saw Terry Demante doing his job, I go, what's this? It's got those are carts and these are lights and those are phones. And wow, it was next level. Jim Lang 00:10:21 So fast forward. So I ended up doing my internship at Q107 because Stan Lark, God Rest his soul, the late great Stan Lark, who ran the radio program at Humber for years, and he had worked at CKY and RB, and he had a syndicated gardening show through the 70s and 80s that was broadcast in like 100 Am stations in Canada. And he had this big, deep, classic radio voice. So he made calls. I ended up doing my internship with Q, which was a wonderful experience. And I got my first job. I sent about 35 resumes and one place hired me. And it was CKBB in Barrie. And the program director and parttime announcer, Jeff Walther, was a Humber alum and always liked to hire Humber people. Give them a break. Don Landry was doing the evening show who was a year ahead of me at Humber. And I got hired to do the all night show. And they had the old pan pots, the old dial pots. And I go, this is not quite the Chum FM board. It was the summer of 87, and I was talking at a microphone being paid to do it on a radio. So this is great. Matt Cundill 00:11:29 They had those pan pots, by the way, at AVR. Jim Lang 00:11:32 Oh, I believe it. So it was like a big dial on your oven. And that's how you adjusted the levels as opposed to the nice what you see the nice mixing boards and that. But it was old school, but Matt, by God, it did work. Matt Cundill 00:11:46 How did you get into Q 107 as an intern? Yeah. Jim Lang 00:11:52 I think there was somebody I think he called Gene Valaitis because Gene Valaitis and Jane Hawtin ran the newsroom. He called Gene Valaitis and said, there's this young man who wants to do an internship here. And at the time, FM radio did a lot of foreground programming in Canada, and this is the late 1980s. And they had magazine show. So Gene Valaitis, who was the news director, and Jane Hawtin, who was a newsreader, did a weekend magazine show called Barometer. And it was a series of interviews with musicians, politicians. And the weird thing is we do a version of that on the radio station I'm at now 105.9 The Region in York region called the Feed. But in the 80s, that was pretty standard. The Edge had it every almost FM station had a weekend magazine show to really maybe shine a spotlight on a charity or something happening in the community. And I really liked it. So I was the intern and I would help edit the interviews and help edit and put the show together. And in that newsroom was Kathleen Rankin, John Gallagher, Jane Hawtin, Gene Valaitis, Steve Anthony was there, John Derringer, Bob Mackowitz, Steve Warden. Steve Warden had not started yet. It was just before Steve Warden with Andy Frost, like Jake Edwards, like broadcast icons, and walking through there, being in school and being a radio, you learn a lot of good theoretical foundation stuff. But when you're in an intern at a station like that, you realize this is the Big League and you realize it's been like an athlete and you think you're pretty good and you get called up to training camp. But I've talked to hockey players like they're hot stuff in Junior and they go to pro camp and they're like, wow. And they know why they're going back to their junior team, Matt, because they're not ready. And as much as I thought I knew everything, I walked into a place like Q in the late 80s doing an internship with that talent. Like, there's no way I'm ready to get in front of a microphone. Q 107 send me away somewhere because you realize you have a lot to learn. The more you do it, it becomes muscle memory. And it was explained to me, you start talking about athletes and they like they said, Look, Jim, we don't have time to think. Things are happening so fast and so immediately you practice it so much that it happens without thinking. There's no thought that goes into it. And you're asked afterwards, How'd you do it. And you're like, you almost have to look at the video. Oh, yeah, that's how I did it. Because in the moment you're not really sure how it happened. And I find in broadcasting, you have to do these shows, host these shows, host a podcast, voice a comment and write it. And you learn the best way to write it, the best way to voice it. The one thing I find it takes time is- at the beginning, everyone talks in a pretty flat tone of voice with a few I find minor modulations up and down. But with time, you really learn how to do, almost like a singer looking at the music sheet, you learn the up and down of your voice. So if I give a script to someone out of school, they're going to read it. It's going to sound like Matt Cundill is hosting a podcast on Squadcast, and it's going to sound pretty basic. And I think with time you learn how to read that in such a way it sounds completely different and that only comes with time. To me, that's only experience. And the longer you do it, the longer you're doing it. You're reading the same words as someone else, but it sounds completely different because of your understanding. The voice has got to be almost like you're listening to a song. Like, a singer can't hold the note up. Like here, you can't sing like down here, it's got to be somewhere up and down. There's got to be moments where you punch the words in a song. It's the same thing reading a script. You have to know when to punch the words in the script. Matt Cundill 00:15:39 So you were doing some production with John Derringer at Q 107. I think you were doing the 06:00 Rock Report in and amongst all the other stuff, because I know you came to Montreal with all these great relationships with bands and you came part of the deal to CHOM in Montreal, as I recall. And when you come so John goes and lives out in St. Lazar, which is past Hudson. It's not even a suburb like you're in the country, but you choose to reside in Outrement, which is like the polar opposite. The neighborhood is predominantly French. It's fairly diverse, but it's really in the heart of Montreal. And you're not really near the radio station, which was located over in Westmount on Green Avenue. So why did you want to jump in and do Outrement? Jim Lang 00:16:27 I wanted to live the Montreal experience. I really wanted to feel like I was in Montreal. And I mean, the other thing is I was making 20 grand a year and my apartment was 350 a month. This is great. First of all, this is the most money I ever made in radio. It was 20 grand a year and 350 a month. And it was like a studio, one bedroom, kind of open concept, hardwood floors, but really cool area. There was a Metro, a small Metro a couple of blocks away. And I'm like, oh, the Metro in Quebec. I can get beer and wine. This is fantastic. And there was like a real Montreal bagel shop nearby. And I would have to drive over the mountain to come down Green Avenue. And I had an old K-car and I couldn't afford winter tires. And I can remember one time coming into the morning show and I'm coming down the Mount to get down to Green Avenue. You come down from Mount Royal and it flattens out by Sherbrook. And I was doing this and I missed a Jaguar by that much. And I'm like, oh, my God, I still to this day don't know how I didn't hit some of those expensive cars parked along because I was not in the fancy area. But I drove to the fancy area to get to the radio station at CHOM. But I really wanted to immerse myself in the Montreal experience. I was in my late 20s. I was single. I said, I'm going to live in Montreal. John wants to live out in Saint Lazar, out in the sticks with his big dog. That's fine. But I want to live in Montreal, be able to hop on the Metro, be close to things. And I don't regret it for a second. It was an incredible experience living there and working there. And years later, married with kids, went to Montreal. We were driving through and going to some of the places. It was awesome. And going up the lookout on Mount Royal, and I could say, hey, girls, my apartment was just a few blocks over there, and that was really cool. I really liked that. Montreal is a fantastic city. Still is. And to this day, it's the only time I witnessed the Stanley Cup parade was four months after I moved there is on Sherbrook Avenue up in the sales office, one of our sales associates of the corporate sales division that work with us, looking down on the floats going by, and it's still one of the highlights of my sports life is watching the Montreal Canadian Stanley Cup raid in the spring, summer 93. Matt Cundill 00:18:44 That was such a weird year. Here are these two die hard Leafs fans who came to work at Shelley and the Leafs had this great run because I know you and I watched a lot of it down at Old Blitz. That's right. Jim Lang 00:18:58 Yeah. Matt Cundill 00:18:58 That's where Toronto eliminated Detroit, I think in overtime. I think that was a Wendell Clark goal anyway, the Leafs go on this great run and then it gets to game seven and then they get sort of hosed by the high stick and Kerry Fraser, which I'm sure he will never live down or at least no Leafs fan will ever let that go. But then you're in Montreal and you have to endure the Habs winning a Stanley Cup, which I guess you guys got caught up and was a lot of fun. But yeah, we had a riot and then they had to put the parade on Sherbrook Street that year and then the Expo started to take off. It was really good times for Montreal sports then. Jim Lang 00:19:33 Incredible. And I've been fortunate enough in my career, Matt, years since to get to know a number of the players in that 93 team. And Gary Lehman, who played a key role, he honestly said we didn't know that Jacques Damiris was illiterate. No one had a clue. And Jacques LaPierre was a veteran Montreal Canadian assistant coach. And Jacques Damiris would be talking and motivating and go, Lappy draw it up and that's what he would always say. Lappy. And Lappy would draw up the notes and that. But they just thought he was delegating the job to Jacques LaPierre as his top assistant coach to do that. It was such a tight team and a diverse team. And this is where you realize when you talk about all time great goalies when it comes to play offs, if my life is on the line, I think I'm going Patrick Roy in his prime at that time, because when you smell that Stanley Cup, you were not beating them. I mean, that playoff, that Stanley Cup final. One of the great highlights in the history of the NHL is winking at Thomas Sandstrom because he just robbed them of a goal. And you're like, you're not beating Patrick Roy in this series. I don't care if you clone Wayne Gretzky. They're not beating Montreal that year. Matt Cundill 00:20:43 Ten overtime games or ten overtime wins out of eleven. I think we're the numbers and I'm glad you mentioned Gary Lehman because he's one of the ones that came to mind. But you and I would go out, we would run into these guys in bars and there was a bar below CHOM and Kirk Mueller was generally there. Lyle Odeline would frequently be there. Of course, this was late at night and you have to get up in the morning. So you may not have been there, but I had this question down and I want to ask it now because we're kind of here and talking about this. The Montreal media, Kirk Mueller, told me at that time, you could win two games and go out and everyone loves you, and then you could lose two games and I can't go out of my house without getting yelled at. And you spent a lot of time in Toronto, and all these years have now passed. What is the difference that you see between the way the Toronto media treats the Leafs and the Montreal media treats the Canadiens, and what effect does it have on the teams and their success? Because I think there's a correlation. Jim Lang 00:21:45 I still think that the Francophone press in Montreal is tougher on the Canadiens if they've lost two or three games in a row. I'm not saying the Anglophone press in Montreal isn't, but it's the blue blanc et rouge, the thought that they're held to such a high standard. Because if you think of that run from the mid 50s to the 60s underrated dynasty through the 70s, it's as good as there is in sports. It's Yankees, it's Green Bay Packers, it's Manchester United. I mean, that's what the bulk of the Montreal Canadiens Stanley Cup and this run of hall of Famers. I'm not sure if you're going to find it in other sports. You basically went a group of hall of Famers in the fifties, to a group of hall of Famers in the Sixties, to a group of hall of Famers in the Seventies. Like that doesn't happen. You might have one decade as good as the Green Bay Packers were in the 60s. By the 70s, they were horrible, horrible for a long time until Brett Favre came along in the 90s, but not Montreal. So when they have an off year, it's not accepted. And I think the difference with the Leafs, they've struggled so long. Like, I know right now in Toronto they have all these good teams, but losing in the first round. Now, honest to God, if they win a first round playoff and they lose the second round, the people well, they won a first round, right? I mean, hey, they're getting there, but I think it's the little higher standard in Montreal. And I honestly think the pressure is tougher in Montreal, especially if you're a Francophone player or Francophone coach in that press. I mean, it's unrelenting, and I think that's part of the toughness of it. And let's face it, there is a lot of great players who maybe from Quebec, from Ontario, who may have grown up Leafs or Canadiens fans who get drafted in an American team and they come time for contract renewal. You know what? I don't mind visiting there. I don't mind going there for the playoffs. But living in Dallas or Tampa or San Jose, when I'm away from the rink, almost nobody knows who I am. And they've got all that money. I can see why they stay there, Matt. I really can because not everyone can deal with that pressure. Not everyone is Patrick Roy. I think he's one of the most mentally tough athletes we've ever seen. It seemed like no matter what the stage was, he could rise up to it. Not every athlete is built like that. Matt Cundill 00:24:03 Well, you and I are talking about a Stanley Cup that took place in what is now ancient history between us a long, long time ago. But it is the last time a Canadian team won a Stanley Cup. And you pointed out if you're free agent, you don't want to go to Winnipeg or Edmonton or Vancouver when you can go to Anaheim, two Florida teams with no tax, you also probably have a wife who would probably like nights in the swamp in Florida rather than in cold Winnipeg in December. With, by the way, your husband out half the year. Jim Lang 00:24:38 And I think that's it like being a parent. I know I was on the Leafs beat for a couple of years, and my wife was a single mother for about two years because I was on the Leafs beat and I'd be pulled off and sent to cover the Super Bowl. And I had a flight statement one year, and I took 36 flights on Air Canada, and that's not including the other Airlines they put me on. And I was gone half the year. And so if you're a professional athlete and you have a chance to be gone half the year and your wife doesn't have to shovel and she's got toddlers in the driveway and wondering how to get to school. Yes, I get that. I get that if it's a warmer climate, that it's more appealing to play your hockey there. I totally get that. And that is part of it. And if you're going to be gone that long as an athlete, but it's spring or summer pretty much all the time. And the worst, you're going to worry about a little bit of rain getting the kids to school. That's a big advantage. It's been a long winter here in Southern Ontario, but it's been a lot longer in Montreal and even longer out west. And so when you have family in Northern Alberta, you're in Edmonton and God bless the Oilers. And the wife looks at her husband's Instagram and they're with the boys golfing in Phoenix because they have a day off before they play the Coyotes. You think that goes over very well? I don't think so. Matt Cundill 00:25:57 It's clear that I need to calm down with the sports talk in just a second. We'll get back into the radio talk and find out what it takes to have a morning radio show that is both local and social. What were Jim's biggest pandemic radio takeaways? Why did Jim leave sports television behind? But you know what? We aren't quite done with the sports questions yet. Jim has worked a few Super Bowls, including that 2007 one where the Patriots just couldn't quite make it an undefeated season. You know the one with the helmet catch? Yeah, that one. There's more. Oh, there's always more at soundoffpodcast.com. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:26:35 The Sound off podcast. Matt Cundill 00:26:38 You mentioned that you worked some Super Bowls. I know you worked the one in 2007 where I guess at the time it was a 17-0 Patriots went in and then lost to the Giants. What was it like after the game? Jim Lang 00:26:50 It's one of the greatest, wildest five minutes of sports I've ever experienced because I had spent the week in New England. The Leafs have played Boston on a Thursday, and then I stayed there to cover the Patriots AFC Championship game against the Chargers on a bitterly cold day. They win. I come home for a few days, clean up, pack and then head down to Phoenix for Super Bowl 42. And I've never seen more odds stacked against a team. And then the Giants and Eli Manning. I mean, the Patriots that year were so good and they had everything going for them. The credit of Tom Kauflin and his coaching staff and the defensive coaches and really Michael Strahan and Justin Tuck were fantastic, fantastic in that game. They kept after Brady and kept hitting him and kept that game close. And that was the David Tyree game. So at about six minutes, seven minutes to go in the game, all the media that's going on the field, we are ushered down to the tunnel. So we're about 10 meters from the field. We can see the field and we're just under the seat. So what the NFL does is they have TV monitors all along this concrete walkway. So all the reporters about to go on the field can see what's happening the last few minutes. The Patriots score. And I'm not kidding. All the Boston media are like, yeah, and fist pumping, which you're not supposed to do, but they're into it. Well, guess what? All of a sudden, Eli throws a back corner to Plaxico Burress in the corner to take the lead. And the New York media, I thought they were going to go at it, some of the New York and Boston media and then all hell broke loose when the game ended and, the Giants won. And it was just mayhem on the field. It was incredible. And that's the thing about sports is up until a minute to go in that game, the Patriots were going to pull off the undefeated season season that hadn't been done since the Dolphins. And Don Shula. And I bet you if you get Bill Belichick home alone in a private moment that still sticks in his craw, that they lost that game because it would have been of all the great things on his resume, he also would have had an 18 and old perfect season. And David Tyree and Eli Manning, they blew it on that impossible play. And it was incredible to be on the field afterwards. And what happens is on the field, it's almost like swarms of bees. All the reporters running around, try to grab players and get sound. And then you have to do stand ups afterwards. And it's an absolute blur. And we had some good camera people and producers trying to get everything done in that. And it was incredible. And then I was lucky enough to next year at Super Bowl 43 in Tampa. That was the game where Ben Rothesburger hit Santonio Holmes in the corner of the end zone, the opposite corner of the end zone, and he did the toe drag. And they beat Larry Fitzgerald on the Cardinals because Larry Fitzgerald that year in the playoffs was as great a receiver as I have ever seen. And the Steelers, their fans travel well, that was another crazy atmosphere as well. Matt Cundill 00:29:53 I mean, it's nuts to go out and do all that reporting, but you also called some games, you call the Argos on the radio. How much fun was that? Jim Lang 00:30:01 Well, that was a lot of fun. I had called some OUA football and a little bit of OUA hockey in 2000 and 2001 on CHTV, which was a great experience. And then I did a little bit of arena football, which I really enjoyed. And then they said, would you like to do the Argos radio? And at the time I was doing Sportsnet radio. So I had to go to Scott Moore and say, hey. And they're like, yeah, that's fine because it doesn't conflict with your schedule. And so I did it for a year and it was great because you really, really get a sense when you leave Southern Ontario, the Southern Ontario bubble and go to CFL teams and CFL stadiums in other cities across Canada. How different it is. It is so different the approach to the games, the fans, the media, the community in other parts of Canada than you see in the Toronto, especially Toronto, Hamilton. So it was really eye opening. It was a great experience. Matt Cundill 00:30:57 I mean, Doug Flutie, he did fumble in 96 against the Eskimos, right? We agree. Jim Lang 00:31:01 Well, I think he did. I was at the game, but there was no way they were going to let the Argos lose that game. And that was one of the great football games I've ever seen. And even with the fumble, they scored a defensive touchdown late in the game with PB Smith with a pick six. And then Mike Vanderjack kicked like five field goals in a snowstorm. I still think the Argos would have won. Matt Cundill 00:31:23 Yes. That wasn't Hamilton. That one, right? Jim Lang 00:31:25 It was, yeah. So we get to Hamilton and this starts snowing. I'm like, oh, okay, this wasn't in the forecast. And it's snowing. And that's coming sideways off Lake Ontario through the Burlington Harbor into old Ivor Wynne Stadium. And it was snowing. And then it picked up and they were like, wow. But no matter how hard it snowed, they kept playing and it was the atmosphere. And to be honest with you. That game to me saved the CFL at the moment because the CFL was in some rough shape at the time. So I think that game, the way it played out, it was on ESPN, the highlights. Doug Flutie goes to the Bills afterwards. The whole thing that happened, it helped revitalize and save the Canadian football. I feel a big way because of the way the game played because all of a sudden like Chris Berman is doing highlights on Sunday night. Like, did you see this game, the Blizzard? Because Doug Flutie is still a huge name down there. I mean, we were on vacation a few years ago. We happen to be in a mall going to get something for the kids who are younger. And we happen to be in Attic, Mass. On the outskirts of Boston. And there is a street called Flutie Pass named after Doug Flutie from his days at Boston College. So that was really something special. And I talk about this all the time. The CFL when it's on, it's fantastic. My problem is the Grey Cup ends. It's Christmas. And then you don't hear anything about the League for months. And unfortunately, back in the day, Matt leagues and teams had off seasons, you didn't hear them and you had an off season. Then they'd come back. But you can't have an off season now with the current news cycle. With social media, you've got to produce content all the time, whether it's a podcast with a coach or player, whether it's Instagram or Snapchat. I mean, my kids are in their late teens, early 20s, and it is all Snapchat, Instagram and social media. They don't consume stuff on a conventional TV. They're not going to have a phone on the wall. It's going to be laptop, tablet, phone, watching stuff. Or looking at their social media feed. They'll say, dad, I saw on Instagram, I saw a Snapchat news feed. This happens if you're in sports, you're in media. It's crucial. I know one thing I do every morning I come in for the morning show, I do an Instagram story. What's happening on the day. It takes about 50 to 55 seconds and then I shoot it selfie mode and it's like me talking to you. This is what's happening today and happening later and just hey, hello. I think it's crucial that someone broadcasting or sports or anything does that every day. And at least in sports, you could have someone in your media relations Department do a quick thing. Hey, I know it's the off season. Don't forget tickets coming up, by the way. I know it's off season. Matt Cundill, he just ran 5 miles today with his dog on his back to get ready for the season, that kind of thing. Yeah. Matt Cundill 00:34:15 It was pointed out actually during the pandemic and became really evident that the CFL does have a social media problem and a lack of engagement problem. I added up a lot of the engagements for some of the teams and for the League, and a lot of it's just not there, any problems that you had going into the pandemic were just accelerated by it. And I think it became very evident during the off year that the CFL needs to find better ways to engage. And you just mentioned it with TikTok. The CBC is bringing back Street Sense and they're putting it on TikTok. Jim Lang 00:34:47 I think platforms like that, they're free, they're available, and they allow you to show some personality that maybe is separate from what's happening in the field, because when you're on the field and you get interviewed after a game, you're not saying a lot. Now if you're away from the field and you're with your dog in the park, you're probably a lot more relaxed and you're going to show some personality and show more human side than the athlete all. You know what I mean? I think the connection and you realize they're an athlete, but they've got a golden retriever like I do. Oh, they're an athlete, but they watch Outlander like I do. I didn't know they loved it as much as I do. Showing that personal side, I think, is important in that engagement. And with the technology we have now, you can create content every day. It's very easy. Even something as simple as the Instagram story. I'm a big fan of the Instagram story. You don't have to worry about trolls. It's a quick hit. It's 15 seconds here and there. It's a photo, but it shows a little bit about who you are, and then it's gone. I love the Instagram story. I'm a big fan of it. Matt Cundill 00:35:52 I'm very impressed by how advanced you've become in this whole new world. By the way, I don't mean to glaze over your career and not talk about your time at Mojo, because you talked about all star teams at Q107 before, but you worked at Mojo as well, which was an innovative concept at 640. And the people in there, including yourself, I mean, it's just loaded with talent. Jim Lang 00:36:13 It was a great idea and a great concept, Matt, and it was really cool to be part of. I think part of the problem is I've been in Canadian media for a long time, but Canadian media is very conservative, and people can talk about we're going to do this, this and this, because they got inspired by something they saw in the United States. But to have the stomach to see it through, to back the talent, to back the management that we're going to do this, it doesn't happen very often. People wonder why has there not been a Canadian Howard Stern? Because between the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council, the CRDC conservative Canadian values, to have someone like a Howard Stern talking like he does, doing talks like he does, having the kind of topics that he does, it wouldn't fly. All it takes is a couple of sponsors, especially now post pandemic to say, hey, we're not comfortable with that and that's not money. Coming in to the radio station TV, do you think they're going to back you if they lose key sponsors because of some offside stuff the host is saying? I don't think so. I just don't see it. Matt Cundill 00:37:12 I remember turning on my TV, I just can't remember where I turned on my TV. And then I saw your face and I said, oh, look, Jim's got a job at Sportsnet. That's really cool. And he's got great hair, lot of product. Jim Lang 00:37:27 So what happened was I was at 640, I was the sports director and doing stuff at Q. And unbeknownst to me, the management of the station and Sportsnet were working on a deal called Sportsnet radio. They basically said, Jim, I got good news and bad news. He goes, you have a job. It's just not here. And I kind of looked at my boss said, you're still going to do what you do, but you're going to do it in a radio studio at the Sportsnet Studios. And I had like an ISTN box. And I would punch in numbers and I would do different stations. I had about six stations. I would bounce around, do morning updates, and we had people do afternoon. So at the time, the Sportsnet TV show was live. So the host had to be at the studio for four and they were live at 06:00 a.m.. But that also means the production crew was in about 230 or three to get ready. So it was a real grind. And the host, the regular anchors and Sportsnet were all night time hosts. They traditionally done the 910 or 11:00 sports highlights. This is early 2000s, right? Matt. And they were complete- Their body clocks were so skewed to game at seven, do the highlights, probably don't go to sleep at two or three. And they said physically they could not do the morning show. They could not physically perform at six in the morning. And they said they can't do it. So they went to me and said, hey, can you do a screen test? And I had already done some stuff for CHTV. And they said, okay. So Damien Goddard was the host at the time and he was going away in a multi week vacation. And they wanted to train me basically to do his three week run in the morning show. And it was easier for me to backfill the morning show on Sportsnet radio than for them to get what the other host, they said, Scott, we can't do this anymore physically. We're ill because they can't get up and be that early if you're not used to it. It takes a lot out of you, especially if you're night and then all of a sudden dropped into the morning, it shocks you. And I have been doing in the morning the morning sleep cycle, the morning work cycle for so long. And that's what I did. So I ended up doing that for three weeks. And then I became the backfill for Damien, and then he left and Hazel came in and I became her backfill. And then I started doing lacrosse and other reporting. And then by '03, I was a full time anchor reporter at the network until 2010. Matt Cundill 00:39:49 And then you got let go. And I was so sad to see you go. Jim Lang 00:39:51 Yeah. Famous words. Hey, we're going in a different direction, Jim. And I said, okay, it was a bit of a shock. And I did a few different things and ended up at The Fan five months later during the Fan morning show. I did that for about two and a half years. And, hey, we're going in a different direction, Jim. Matt Cundill 00:40:08 So did you do that with Greg Brady? Jim Lang 00:40:10 I did, yeah. Matt Cundill 00:40:11 I remember listening to you there, too. Jim Lang 00:40:13 I think Rogers is trying to tell me something because that's twice in the last. So I took my envelope and said thank you very much. And then I ended up getting hired at 105.9 The Region. They were starting the radio station in York region. And it worked out great because it was a busy time for my wife, for my kids. And it was 30 minutes door to door, 25 minutes. And in Toronto commuting, that's nothing. And it was just a better lifestyle for all of us. And basically we were starting a station from scratch. It was a brand new station brand. It was kind of exciting. And we're like eight years on the air and counting and made it through the pandemic knock on wood. To me when you're broadcasting, I guess to me, Matt, is things are going to happen. You're going to have changes. Some of the biggest names in the business that I know, whom I consider hall of Famers have had sudden job losses. Aaron Davis, Maureen Holloway, you name it. I can run down all the names of hall of Fame broadcasters who have had unexpected changes in management, you name it. And so I think you have to be flexible. You have to be adaptable. And the biggest thing that's helped me in my career is you've got to learn new skills along the way. Back when I started- back when I started, you did radio or you did TV or you were a writer. You didn't do either one. But if you're in business now, you've got to be able to be comfortable. You got to hold that camera in front of your face and get comfortable doing a daily video Vlog to help promote your show, promote the station. You've got to get comfortable writing something, whether it's a small blog or writing social media. You've got to be able to do different things because the odds are your station is going to pay you one salary to do different things. So you have to train yourself to do different things, to stay employable. Matt Cundill 00:41:56 I kid you not. This morning on social media, I believe I went into Milkman where they were discussing how in Newfoundland there's really nobody manning the stations there anymore. And it was Lee Eckley who chimed in to say that companies like the one you work for, you work for Durham Radio, correct? Jim Lang 00:42:13 No, it's Markham Radio. It's called Markham Radio. So that's the official name of the company. Matt Cundill 00:42:18 Yes. But the company that you work for, Markham Radio and other stations that are built like this are really doing a good job connecting with the community and really redefining what Radio's relationship is with communities and really setting a blueprint for what radio should be doing everywhere. Jim Lang 00:42:35 Really, our whole thing is hyper local. I do morning sports. I'll do like Elise Halves, but I'll do York region high school sports and triple A hockey and junior B hockey from kids in the area. We talk about events and charities and things happening in the area. And what's happened is you look at suburbs in big cities in Canada because of the price of housing. You have large segments of the population who live outside of the city core who are really underserved by the radio. Where we are, York region that steals north, that's over a million people outside of north of Steeles. Mississauga, Brampton, west of Toronto is over a million people. That's 2 million people who live outside of the city core of Toronto, who have concerns about local traffic and local politics and local charities and events and local sports that they would never hear about it in downtown Toronto station because they've got enough to worry about dealing with their own station. And that's the one thing I really like about it is trying to be hyper local, because hyper local, to me is the future of radio in Canada. If someone's going to say, I'm going to listen to satellite radio, well, that's fine. You can listen to satellite radio and you'll listen to podcasts. But if you want to know about this big charity Five K Walk happening in your community to help the local hospital, you're not going to hear it on Howard Stern. You're not going to hear it in your podcast, but you're going to hear it on your local radio station and you're going to hear it through your local radio station's social media feed and the website. And there is a place- there's room for everybody. And maybe that piece of pie that once was in the early mid 90s is smaller, but it's still a very tasty pie. And there's still a lot of talented people doing great things every day in Canadian media and maybe on a smaller scale, but a very hyperlocal scale. And it's so important to people, especially through the pandemic. Where do they go with their senior parent for an inoculation what happens? We had a big ice storm just after we went on the air in December 2013. And there was big power outages in parts of Markham, Richmond Hill and Aurora. They're like, well, where do they go for a warming station? We had to tell them. That's the beauty of having that local radio. Matt Cundill 00:44:49 How do you cover traffic? I know that seems silly, but I know you're probably near a very busy highway, but many of the commutes of your listeners are probably not to downtown Toronto. They're probably 15 minutes, maybe they're 30 minutes, but they may not even go inside the 416. Jim Lang 00:45:08 When I'm doing the morning traffic, I try to focus on Steeles up to highway 9. That's the main area of York region, East, West, North, South. And most people are going down 400, 404, or 27 and 48. And then highway seven is the big East-West through the heart of the region. So you're focusing on choke points in areas of Aurora, Richmond Hill, Vaughan, Markham, in that area. Now we will touch on stuff like, hey, if you are going into the city, the bottom of the 404 of the DVP every day is a nightmare. In Toronto. It's no different. In Montreal and Vancouver, there's going to be a highway. I could be blindfolded know that highway at that time of day is awful. It's just the way it is. So we really try to say, hey, there's an accident in this part of 16th Avenue Woodbine, just east of the 404. Well north of Toronto. But for people in that part of Markham, it's important to getting off the highway who are trying to go east. So we let them know about that. We really try to be hyper local, working with the York Regional police, working with the transit. They'll say, hey, there's a bus stoppage because of a problem at Rutherford and Jane, and we let them know about that. Matt Cundill 00:46:15 What's the biggest pandemic takeaway involving radio? What did you learn the most about radio between 2020 and 2022? Jim Lang 00:46:24 Well, we learned like our online numbers went through the roof. The amount of people that listen to the radio station on their laptop where they were working at home grew in a huge way because they needed to know locally what was happening, where to go, is it safe? They needed that information. And so we were providing that information with our daily programming. And then our weekend magazine show, we have a show. Anne Romero is the lead on it. She's so well known in the area. And it's called The Feed. It's an hour and we would talk to health experts and mayors and nurses and just people in the community and businesses. And that was a big thing, too, is people. If you're getting into this business, if the business community suffers, you suffer. If the local businesses aren't making money, you're not making money. They may have a campaign, an advertising campaign to promote vaccines, but it's limited. Let's be honest. When the local economy is doing well and local businesses are doing well and they have disposable income to spend in advertising. There's more money for local TV and radio and Internet and digital media. It's important that you're making sure that you have good campaigns letting people know we're big on shop local, help local business, get takeout. If you're not comfortable going in, just get some takeout and come home. But you're helping local business. And people may think, well, hey, if that local business goes under and that's one less piece of money out there in the community to spend on advertising, that's going to hurt you in the long run. So it's in your best interest to make sure that you're reminding people the importance of shopping local and helping local business. And that's one thing. Maybe people forgot the pandemic, but it was really brought home big time in the pandemic because, I mean, for a lot of radio stations, Matt for years had relied on depending on the format, car dealers and bars and restaurants, and that it was gone. They were shut down. They weren't spending money in advertising. And they're like, Where'd the money go? So you have to be creative. How are you helping business? Because if you're helping business, then they can spend money in advertising. They're helping you, because if you're not the CBC, you have to really be always thinking about the business angle of your station and how it benefits everybody. Matt Cundill 00:48:45 Jim, I'm going to put all of your social connection points in the show notes of this, because I think a lot of people should follow you because you're doing it right. And of course, you're a great follow, and you're a sports fan and all the things. But for anybody who wants to be more local and social, you're a great example. So thank you. Jim Lang 00:49:01 I appreciate it Matt. To me the media has changed a lot through the pandemic, but the need to be informed locally of what's going on, the need to know that this is happening is important. I can remember they had a vaccine clinic at the Ray Twinney Arena, Newmarket, and there was a long lineup, it was a really cold day. There were seniors standing outside and they hadn't done it before. This was all new. They had never had a mass vaccine clinic in a lot of parts of our community, and it's like that across Canada. So everyone was learning. So I had the Mayor of Newmarket on the next day who I've gotten to know really well through the years of working at the station, and he basically explained what happened and how they helped. And then sure enough, a few days later, they had tweaked things the community had heard. They got involved. If it was a really elderly person, they said, here's a chair, here's some water. Don't stand out in the cold, things like that, because all of a sudden you're working for a local community no matter where you are in Canada, you're told you have to close down the hockey rink, turn it into a mass vaccination clinic and It's -20 out. And half the community wants their shot because they're seeing the news and they're worried they're going to die from COVID. Everyone's learning as they go along here so the radio station can be a great conduit to help everyone stay informed and learn about ways things can be done better and just inform people. You're letting- hey, this is what happened. They're doing this now. It's okay. These are the hours that kind of stuff. To me, that's the invaluable thing about radio still in Canada. That's why it's so important. Matt Cundill 00:50:32 Jim, thank you So much For Doing this. It's Great to connect after 30 Some-Odd years. Jim Lang 00:50:37 Yeah, well, I mean, Matty Cundill And I, A Few Expos games, a Few Habs games back In The day. It's The One Thing I Still remember the Old CHOM studio. When I First started there, it Was windowless. And It Was A Classic FM studio. And if You Push Your Seat Back Too Far, you Would Run Into The Rack Of CDs. So you Had About this Much Room To Move Your Seat back and There Was A Glass Booth For News And Traffic. Oh, God. I mean, I Have such Wonderful memories of working In that station, in that city, and I'm A Huge Believer if You're In Media, You Should Do At Least one stint away From Your Home community In Another province. I Think It's So Important. You're Not Going To learn everything by Watching A TV Show Or A letter, Kenny Or Trailer Park Voice. As Much As I Love them. Get In The Community. You live there. You Immerse yourself. You Maybe Live In A Neighborhood You Didn't Think About. You're In The station. So When You Do Move around Or Go Back To Your Own Thing, You're Better for it. And you're More informed. And You Bring All that To The table as A broadcaster, as a communicator. Matt Cundill 00:51:41 Jim, thank you So Much, man. You're the best. Jim Lang 00:51:43 Thanks, Mattie. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:51:44 The Sound Of Podcast Is Written and hosted By Matt Cundill. Produced By Evan Surminski. Social Media by Courtney Krebsbach. Another Great Creation From The Sound Off Media Company. There's Always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

If you've ever been in radio in North America, either as a producer or as talent, you've probably heard about Morning Show Boot Camp. Heck, you've probably heard us talk about it on the show before. But why should you care? Well, for starters, it's been a killer resource for training radio talent since the 80's. Most broadcasters have either been to a session or know someone who has, because it's developed a reputation for being the best way to keep your on-air skills sharp. And today, we've got one of the original founders of the Boot Camp, Don Anthony, to tell us about how it's evolved and why it's still incredibly important and relevant. Don knows, as should everyone, that people just don't listen to radio for the music anymore. Sure, it's nice to find a station that plays your favourite songs, but it's even nicer to be able to pull them up on Spotify or Apple Music and play them anytime. So the question remains: what's the draw of radio in 2023? Don's answer is simple. Streaming services don't have a personality. Radio stations do. He talks to us about the importance of a good host, and the ways Morning Show Boot Camp helps on-air talent learn to harness their entertainment skills. He also shares some of his favourite experiences from the last 35 years of watching people become famous right in front of his eyes. If you want to stay updated on all things radio, check out Don's website, The Morning Mouth. You can also sign up for their newsletter, Jockline, to get updates on all the latest radio news directly in your inbox. Submit your email, first name and last name here to register. One of the things Don asked me in this episode, was what new subject matter should be explored. I can safely tell you that I did not get the question right. The correct answer is "NEGOTIATION". In this era of non-compete's, NDA's and digital rights.... this will be stellar. Here is a fun moment from last year's even in Chicago where everyone took full advantage of discussing the implications from an erectile dysfunctional ad leading the stopset. Transcript: Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The sound off podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast... starts now. Matt Cundill 0:13 Morning Show boot camp has been a fixture on the radio calendar since the late 80s. As a former program director, it was one of those discretionary budget items where you can send yourself and or the morning show off for a few days of living and learning alongside other people who get up at 3:30am. One of the things we know in this post pandemic era is that listeners are coming to radio stations for personalities marginally more than for the music. You can get the music anywhere, but personality leads to station ality. And while other events weren't held or moved online and 2021 and 2022. Morning Show bootcamp was in session. Don Anthony has been putting on the event since it's on set. And I have reached out to him today to help you make a decision on whether or not you want to attend the show, which is held every summer. Don Anthony joins me from Atlanta. You know, somebody said, Are you gonna stop your podcast? I go, I can't because I haven't interviewed Scott Shannon yet. Don Anthony 1:09 Have you met him? Do you know him? Matt Cundill 1:11 I've never met him. He's an idol of mine actually growing up. Don Anthony 1:14 I'll send you an email and introduce you. He's very reachable, and very responsive to things. And a good guy. I've known him for a very, very long time. And the funny thing about him is that I was really terrible. Not terrible. I was just an okay DJ in New Orleans, and he was in movil Alabama. So you know, here he is this higher than bigger than life personality. And so we met him. He says, Don, I used to listen to you all the time in New Orleans. Oh, man, you were so good. I'm thinking, Scott, you're way too nice. But anyway. So that was that. Matt Cundill 1:51 Scott's story starts I believe at WAAB in Mobile, Alabama? Where does your story start? Don Anthony 1:59 Oh, I think they're legit start was probably a small station. And well, I worked at KRB in Houston. So long ago, it wasn't contemporary CHR back then. I was still in high school. And I just wanted to I was one of the radio geeks that everyone you know, when people sign my yearbook that always they can't wait to hear you on the radio. And I'd always get the you know, make me the PA announcer of school announcements. And so I ended up getting a job and I literally somebody said, you know, what you have to do and you heard this before, remember when if you want a job, right? You just keep knocking on doors, knocking the doors to people sooner or later to get a job. And I literally did that. So I went over to all the stations in Houston, and into formats. They were I just wouldn't say you know, Hey, my name is Don, I'm really want to get radio. Um, so let's go want to get out and go to school. Anyway. True story July 1. I can't remember the year it was a long time ago. But July 1, the day before my birthday, I had knocked on the door and the the PD was on the air. And he pulled his headphones off and spins around and see if he waved me in. And so I come in and he says, How can I help you? And I said, Mama Mama. And I'm what I want to be a DJ and he said, Can you be here tomorrow? Can you be here tomorrow to be Walter absorbed that you want me to be here tomorrow. And what I didn't know is back then that station was classical. And I knew nothing about classical music. And it was all subscription. So people knew exactly what you're going to play. You just follow the follow the Lord and occasionally introduce very sanguine and I had a pronounciation book to learn the differences, Wagner and Wagner and so forth. But I mean, I did horribly but you know, it was enough to get my feet wet. And all that got into school, I got a job offer in Louisiana, small city. And then I first started in mornings those city called Alexandria, Louisiana, then I made my way up to Monroe, Louisiana. And then from there got hired from New Orleans. And that's where I pretty much ended my on air career. And from there, I ended up in the West Coast went to Denver where I was running a marketing and research company. And in 1985 I had the idea to start with something I always wanted to do. I started a headhunting firm called Talent masters. And it was a pretty viable industrial company for over 25 years. Until consolidation station, the industry just shrunk. And you know, people were finding jobs and magazines and online services what but then 88 or 89 Actually, we started the morning should boot camp, two things I just wanted to do three, I want to be on the radio, I want to start a convention, and I wanted to publish a newsletter. And so I've managed to do the trifecta, but we still you know the conferences and also the daily newsletter. And that takes me to where we are now. So we've been doing boot camp now it's our 35th year and we've been doing the publication since 95. So and the reason we did the publication we wanted to market, the conference. And that was the reason we did that. Matt Cundill 5:05 And for those who have not yet signed up for this, how do we sign up for it? Because I know there's people who aren't signed up. Don Anthony 5:11 I'll have to send you a link, because it's kind of a lengthy link, you have to plug into- and don't ask me why, was just what they sent me was just four letter compared to it. But I will send that to you, which you can include in your post production. Matt Cundill 5:21 Perfect. For anybody who, by the way, wants to sign up for that publication and get that sent to them. You can find that in the show notes of this episode. And of course, it's completely free. What do you love about working and being around talent? There's a lot of things. And you know, I just spoke at a college last weekend. And I'm still one of those believers. And I want to discover the next big star. And in my career, I've been fortunate, especially in headhunting, I was able to uncover a couple of people that a few people actually that ended up becoming quite huge. And that's always gratifying. So my favorite part of what I do is finding new talent discovering new people. And it's becoming harder and harder because the proverbial farm League, what you're doing now is probably as much of a farm league for a lot of people doing podcasts. That's a good link to getting on the air. So that's certainly and I enjoy, I enjoy young talent I enjoy I don't I certainly like people that are mature talent, people have been around a long time, people like the bird show, and Dave smiley, and just name the show is there all day, Brian, and Minneapolis closer to you. And Mojo and Detroit. These are all phenomenal personalities and listen, as someone who kind of brought a new meaning to the word average, I'm in awe of really great talent. Who's someone, and it could be from any era, who was on a trajectory for some other completely different career that you convinced you should really pursue radio just a little bit more, and has made it? Don Anthony 6:47 I don't want to name names, because a couple I'll tell you why. Because some people would not want to share something very personal, I have had issues with some a couple of people that were on the brink of saying, I've been doing this thing for so long, I'm really you know, had it, I haven't gotten a break. And I kind of talked them out of it. I never, I always tell people that, you know, get into radio because it's easy. You find a job you find somebody to fund a program directors that believe in you, someone that will take you to another level, etc. But it's very hard. And right now, I think in the last year or two, I have come across, you know, I think the reality is where we are as a business, there are more people that are, you know, kind of deciding what to do. If you did you ever follow any of the AQ studies, the air talent questionnaires for Jacob says, I have that on the list to discuss, but go ahead. Yeah, those are in my opinion, you know, it's the callate opportunity to really speak up. And I always say, Fred, and I'd go back for too long. I don't want this to be everything that's wrong with the business kind of thing I want it to be this is information is what we're feeling. This is what we're going through. Here are our thoughts. And so they have a voice. And I think he's done a good job of kind of walking that line, but at the same time, making it very honest. Look, I got a call recently about the non compete, non competes going away and people not wanting them. And somebody called me up and asked me if I wanted to participate in an article he was doing. And I said yes and no, yes. Because I'd like to say something but no, because I can see both sides of the aisle on a very popular syndicated show. So you know, we lost somebody a while ago, that worked with us for several years, we took him from nowhere into a really established personality. And so suddenly he's negotiating, it falls apart. I don't want to see him go across the street and start competing against me. And I can see that. On the talent side. I certainly see I don't like when somebody leaves a job, let's say involuntarily. Somebody comes a couple of your budget cuts and you're out. And then all of a sudden, this person is on the beach and can't work in that market. I totally understand the situation there. But no, I mean, I think for things like that. I mean, you certainly. Oh, go back to your question. I'm very good about evading answers on it. Yeah, there are people that I've come across that were working in the wrong place. Okay. I'm sure you've met them. They were just in the wrong station. And getting nowhere, not the right people working with them. And they suddenly went somewhere else and things just happened. But like I say, I do love and I'm sure you do, too. I love when you come across a talent that you just see blossom just turned into this giant star. I remember a conversation many, many years ago, Mark and Brian, who were on the way to, I call them about the station in Los Angeles called Cale Lewis. And I'll never forget, I can't remember it's Mark Brown, one of the two said, Do you really think we'd work in a classic rock for him? Today? No, he's on Chr. And so yeah, I'm very glad, by the way that I said absolutely. And and there are other shows. Somebody came I believe that was originally from Canada. Let me think. Jeff and jer were they in Canada or Detroit? I think Detroit, Detroit, close to Canada and we got them to Chicago and then we got them to San Diego. And that was just a terrific journey to watch, they turned into one of the most recognized and famous shows in San Diego. So when did you start Morning Show boot camp, we began planning for 88. Our first show was in 89, we wanted to put together a, a little weekend thing that prepared people for the big fall book. So my thought was, if we could, you know, convince a couple of dozen talent to be able to come in and do this thing, you know, and we can help grow it and so forth. That it would be a good idea, because at that point, big morning shows really didn't have on top shows, really didn't have their own thing. There were seminars and things designed for talent, you know, general talent, and so forth. And but I really wanted to focus more on the high profile talent. So we started the morning, show the recap, I wanted to make it special. And I borrowed $20,000, to market it and give us a logo and give us a program guide and do whatever. And I'm here to tell you, I've shared the story before we lost $20,000, very first year. And we had about 100, we got about 130 people to show up that your lot of you know people just do something new, something different. No sponsors, but it was strictly new, a lot of people were coming in. And I knew I had lost money. But I kind of read the room. And I just knew it would work and knock on Formica or something. We have not lost money since then. We've never gotten rich off of it. But it's it's a in my, in my opinion, the opinions of others. Thank God. It's a it's a fun event. It's a very energetic, very vibrant. We try to keep people who's leaving, just say how do you you know, how do you if these people don't, they seem so after an energetic and what's the key and really met, I think the key for us has been bringing new people into the event every year. And infusing a young, young young young face of new people, newbies who meet established vets. And then there's that chemistry. And so all these people understand what it's like to be sleepy at four o'clock in the afternoon. And it's been a great, great event. By the way, I'm motivated at the end of my part as I am, I'm very encouraged and usually motivated by what takes place. Matt Cundill 12:20 What was the effect of consolidation in the 1990s. And then sort of into the 2000s, as you sort of see with talent and how it sort of correlated with with the event, if any? Don Anthony 12:32 Well, we've always had a lot of people believe it or not, there are a lot of people that pay out of pocket. I mean, as a tradition, I will drive to the event, only two events we've done that I haven't driven to what was in LA and what was in Vegas, because I live in Atlanta, that's a bit of a hike. But one of the shows that used to come in the early days of bootcamp used to drive from the Quad Cities and every year they packed the car, load the show on it and drive to boot camp. And as a tribute to them every year and decided I'm gonna get in the car, pack it up and drive to where you are. It just kind of has a young a humble touch to what we do. Consolidation we've done well, and it's it stays because so many people pay out of pocket, they're not overly reliant on Well, the biggest difference is stations used to pay for most everything. Station by and large would cover a lot of their shows a lot of shows had bootcamp under budget. A lot of shows had boot camp under contract to come to boot camp after consolidation, things a little tighter, and that kind of went away. But I will tell you that with the good fortune of great friends. And I at the risk of leaving totally out I won't go through that we have some phenomenal people of supporters and groups and whether it's Odyssey, cumulus Beasley Hubbard I heart we have some terrific friends who really supported us and believe in what we do. And they've kept it where the effects of consolidation haven't really heard us. Listen, we did to two of our last events, one sort of right at the very not the tail end, just as COVID was kind of fading. And then we did it last year, last year was terrific. And we certainly feel we're on track to have another great month this year as well. Matt Cundill 14:20 I think one of the nice things about driving to the event is all the radio you get to listen to on the way. Don Anthony 14:25 Yeah, oddly enough, you're- take me at my word, I actually try to listen to a lot of the shows that are going to be there that are new. And I will purposely try to go to some of their stream shows whatever, just so I'll know them. The single greatest thing I've always found you can say to someone when you meet them a talent, and I know you know this. Hey, I was listening to your show. I listened to your show. And some guy in Saginaw I'm using it just generically it he knows you've listened to the show that just means so much to them. When somebody knows you know knows your name when somebody you know recognizes you from- if you meet somebody and tell you, Hey, weren't you in this city in that city, it's a really good feeling. So we've really tried to stay true to that core, so. Matt Cundill 15:09 You touched on it, and that's the pandemic. And somewhere in the middle of all of it from, you know, 2020 and beyond, I get the feeling that morning show boot camp went from being something that was nice to go to, if you had the budget, to, you gotta go, because it's really about talent more than ever. And some of the research that Fred Jacobs has done with tech survey has really shown that people are coming to the radio for personalities, more than they are for music. And that means talent is not as indispensable as they once were, they're actually more in need than ever before. Are you getting that feeling from the last couple shows you've done? Don Anthony 15:53 Our tagline has always been, it's all about the show. And Matt, you know this, having programmed, great radio has always been about the show. And with all due respect to music, and the music and radio business had an unbelievable relationship, right? For 50, 60 plus years. And then all of a sudden, all these new platforms came along. And people could literally render music, who want to listen to music, they have all these new platforms, and they can share and you know, choose here, choose there, but there's only one great personality and that, you know, wonders great personalities that they want to listen to. And they can't get that anywhere else except that station from that show. And people are saying to, you know when to give me that line about where's the where's their talent, I can start naming names, because there are a lot of really good personalities out there that basically drive the car. They're the ones who get people to do by the way, the argument is that people get into is that if you've been in radio for more than 20 or 30 years, the question always comes up. How was talent today compared to 30 years ago? Don't you think? You know, well, it's fair and unfair to ask, because listen, I would have killed 30 years ago to have had the internet, or 40 years ago, you've had an internet to be able to, you know, pull, you know, get show prep, good ideas, good stories. And, you know, when USA Today came out, kind of dates me, that was like a big thing for you know, wow, USA Today, look what I've done. But that's all changed in a good way. So I think putting on great shows is still the, the engine that drives the truck. And I think that, you know, I'm all I'm a total advocate for great talent. Always have been when I when I come across, I was at this. I've spoken to college last Saturday. And there's a young guy, very quiet, kind of recalcitrant, sort of shy and not saying very much. And then we got into an air check session. So both myself and the guy who's running this program, we listen to the air check his first couple of weeks was in an urban station or kind of a kind of older, more classic urban kind of station. College. Okay. He was great. He was great. And then he popped out a video, he was phenomenal. I'm saying, I looked over the guy. He says, Who is this guy? And when you ask for you before, what makes life exciting that when I hear somebody who I think has potential, and I told him this in the air in the critique, it says, Look, you're ready. You may not be ready for a major market right now to go. Certainly weekends. You can get jobs and a lot of things for people, you know. So that's what's really all about. So in terms of where we are meant, I think that yes, it's a different time in our business, but a lot of change. I know technology has been front and center of late. But I got to tell you, great talent always cut through. Always does. And that's been true for talk radio. It's been true for rock radio, I mean, you know, just all the things that have happened over the past 30, 40 years. Sometimes change scares people. But at the same time, there's a shimmer of life that says, hey, wait a minute, there may be something we can learn. Voiceover 19:00 Transcription of the Soundoff Podcast is powered by the You May Also Like podcast, the show about people, places and things. Follow the show on your favorite podcast app, or at YouMayAlsoLike.net. The Soundoff Podcast supports podcasting 2.0, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 19:29 I'm sure that's gonna come up again this year, and that's that AI discussion. I personally find the discussion to be a little bit much. I just think that you know, you and I have been around talent for so long that we know it's just going to cut through and people are always going to have a yearning and desire for it. And I'm not- I'm certainly not afraid of any one of your attendees ever being replaced by AI at all. Am i naive? Don Anthony 19:54 No, listen, I think the great shows are not going to be you know, I'm- You know, not Never, not big words, but I don't think it's intended for that. And in my personal opinion, as we sit right now, I think it's just too early to comment with any, you know, just I mean, people are using it, it's been around for a while, it's being used in a lot of different industries. But when talent hears that, they immediately think of, you know, job replacement. And I think that maybe in a few months, maybe a year, we'll know more about it. I just personally think it's, I'm not trying to tell somebody what they want to hear either. But I think for really good talent, they're going to be fine. Some of those shifts, or Dayparts, were there maybe four bucks an hour, things are happening? Hard to say. But no, I tend to agree. And we are developing a session, because I believe we'd be remiss in not having a discussion on that. But just where we are now, even two months, even two months away, I think it may change. Matt Cundill 20:56 How did you involve Fred Jacobs in the AQ studies? What was the genesis of that? Don Anthony 21:01 Giving talent a voice, you know, all the surveys that people do, so it's, you know, it's all feedback from these people, that people, audience members, and on and on. And I like when I talk to shows that are being totally candid, about what's going on how they feel what's going on, and I want them to have a voice. And so boot camps always been that kind of, we give them a voice. I remember, in the early days, when people had not been to boot camp, they come and say, cheese, they use some pretty foul language and some of these sessions. We allow them to speak the way they want. And you know, it's a private event. And it's their chance to really speak out, they given sessions very open about it. Is there been some other issues, too, when we first began, I think, if you look at our sessions, and what we do, and worked on the last few years, actually, the last 30 years, we've always tried to make it more diverse, give women a voice as well. So we had the Women's Forum. And I can tell you very candidly that in the first you may 2 year, we had trouble getting women on panels. Some of the some of the women were nervous about getting on the panel and saying something that would upset their co host or boss, whatever. And there was a lady on CNN here in Atlanta at the time, Catherine Cryer and we had her as a special guest and one of our things right. And we were having just a conversation heard I believe the lady with a Mary Katherine Sneed, who at the time was at Summit, had a program, terrific woman. And she was a very big proponent of getting her people to boot camp and very strong supporter, one of our original members of our committees. And but we were talking to doing this thing, and I said, How do you get more, you know, I'd like to get more wind and panels went to summer, just kind of hesitant on doing it. And I remember Catherine saying our words to the effect, why don't you give them their own forum. So we created the Women's Forum. And that lasted for even now, this year, we're doing a little, a couple of things differently reading we're trying to get as many winners can two more panels, because one of the one of the comments some of the people would say is that instead of just limiting to one panel when it just we've always said, I don't try to make it where you look and count hits, but I'm very conscious of how our panels look and and how it looks to people than when they're looking at those panels. So anyway, so that was one of the sidebars. So what's taking place over the years. Matt Cundill 23:25 One of the great moments of the show is when the data is revealed, it's done to all the talent who are incredibly intent on finding out how they feel about what's going on in the industry. The phones are away, people are paying attention, they're ready to the question. There's a lot of oohs and ahhs going on. And there's a lot of really deep questions that get asked, such as, you know, are you getting enough feedback, but how's your mental health? Don Anthony 23:50 We're actually doing a panel on that, devoting a panel to it this year, Odyssey has been very supportive of helping us with some ideas and then we actually pulled a couple hundred people who have been to boot camp and ask them what they want on the agenda this year. What are the topics they want? And to my surprise, well I'll ask you. What do you think the top two topics were? That they wanted discussed? Matt Cundill 24:14 Mental well being would be one of the big ones that they would want discussed. What would the other one be? The other one would be- it would probably revolve around something job security, and I'm gonna say AI. Don Anthony 24:26 Job negotiation, salary negotiation, you know, that's all changed. Now people would have large contracts I mean, everything is being adjusted and a lot of people you know, we're negotiating ways to never have before so that was very near and dear to them. But mental well being, I was speaking to a lady yesterday with a supplier, and he wants to sponsor this year's boot camp. First time ever. And as we're talking to it's asked me to rundown on some of the some topics and the the agenda and the schedule and what and for some reason, she was looking for something to sponsor, and I was giving your list of the items and what? And when I went mental well being she went, ah. I liked that one. And I said, I said really? Oh, yes, definitely. I've been very involved in suicide prevention. I'm very, I'm all about having dealt with situation like that in real life and being a mom, etc, etc. So yeah, it's a very hot topic, hotter than- and by the way, even in Fred's studies last year, that proved to be a very hot topic, people were all over the Fred's done an amazing job with it. And he, they work in those things, and really, really tried not to sugarcoat the questions and throw softballs. But every year, you got to, you got to, you know, this is a 15 minute survey. Now, think about it. That's a long survey for a lot of talent to sit down and actually answer all these questions. And I don't mean that I mean, that the respectful way, they they're tired, they're gonna reorder, they suddenly here, it's 15 minutes early to fill up. But last year, I think we had over 700 respondents, you filled it out. And it gives you wonderful feedback. I'll be very curious how AI will pop up in this year's survey, or the feedback I should say to it. Matt Cundill 26:09 Well, I'll roll it back to last year, because Fred did appear on this show. And we talked- one of the things that I saw in the data that I guess I found interesting was how a lot of radio people were maybe feeling a little bit behind by some of the stuff that was that was going on in their in their studios. And I'll just play the clip for you. Voiceover 26:28 They want to learn, they understand that tech skills, and social media skills and keeping up with new technology is critically important to their success. I think they very objectively assess their own skills as being poor to mediocre. And I think they really want to get better, they don't want to be left behind. They don't want the digital parts of their company to go well beyond them. And I think there's a fear there, Matt, on a lot of people's parts, the I'm in the old dinosaur wing of the building here in radio, and meanwhile, the company's off doing streaming, and podcasts and video and all this stuff, and am I being left behind by the technology and by my own company, and God, I sure love training. Don Anthony 27:15 Here's the deal, and you know, this better than me. The last few years, compared to any other time and radio, I can't think of a time it's been more taxing. People were at homes, they're broadcasting in makeshift studios. They're not connecting, they're not, you know, it's just it's a different environment all of a sudden, and we all in radio, live with a certain insecurity, some greater than others. And suddenly, we don't have access to these people we've been to engage with for all this time. And so it was the new reality, and so some navigated better than others. But yeah, there was definitely that feeling of attachment. And listen, let me say in defense of it, because I think programmers sometimes or you hear that my biggest disappointment is we don't have enough time to be able to spend time with our PD, I want to go over, you know, error checks, I want people to just give me feedback. And what I hear from PDS is, I'd love nothing more than to spend more time with our talent, spend more time at the station, you know, doing those kinds of things. But they too, are very stretched. And I think that in their defense, I think if they had the opportunity at the time, they would like that opportunity to do that. But and that's why and this is not a cheap plug for morning show boot camp. Boot Camp has given them a place where suddenly everyone can connect. We had VPs of programming tell me that it's been extremely eye opening to them to people spend time not just their talent, but a lot of other talent, and kind of hear their side of the story and hear some of the things going on in their lives. And I'm very refreshing because they kind of walk away. Look 20 years ago at Boot Camp, PDs, programmers would tell me they were a little nervous about going to boot camp to the NFL, they're gonna be they're gonna be all the panelists bashing PDs. I don't think that was ever the case. People would complain about certain things but bash I think would be too harsh a term. But I will tell you as more more programmers and VPs programming talent scouts would have come to boot camp. There's been a real connection for him there. Some of these people have become a dentist Clark with I heart is friends with so many people outside of IR Dave Richards with Odyssey and and this year, we have a lot of other people that are coming in. And so just these people have a chance to really connect with talent they didn't know before. So it's really a good thing. So I'm really happy about that. Matt Cundill 29:40 There's somebody listening to this somewhere in Canada or the United States who's thinking, Should I go? Shouldn't I go? Tell them why they have to go. Don Anthony 29:48 Well, every person has a unique situation, but I think this: This is a show that was created specifically for, and about, the show. If you're connected to a show, if you're on a show, if you're part of a show, if you're a believer in personality radio, if you want to hear what talent are doing, saying the stuff they're using and different things, what, it's a place to go. It's a very cool event. I say that openly. I think it's, it's very cool. It's very engaging, unbelievable networking, you'll meet people, and we have a ton of people that have been friends now for life, since that they met at boot camp, and now can't go a week without some kind of connection or, you know, get together what, and really, it's not a place where you walk into and you don't know who's we're, you see a lot of old friends meet a lot of new friends, I think the last couple of years, we have over 100 100 new people at each event. And that, to me is very refreshing and encouraging. Because it makes me feel like there is a there's a new era, there's a you know, a new frontier. And yet, I always, I always tell the people at the top, I sometimes look you know, I got things that are whatever we try to talk him into going because I can't express to them, how important it is, and how special it is, for a young up and coming personality to meet somebody like a mojo or a Dave Ryan or Bert Weiss. That's a big deal. And it's something they never forget. And we have people that tell me stories today that when they first came to boot camp many years ago, he's coming this year but I'm not gonna mention his name. But he tells the story that when he first boot camp he ever came to he met Kid Craddock. And the late Kid Craddock, one of the most amazing morning show hosts ever. And he just, you know, he didn't think he was gonna meet him. And he suddenly you're meeting and he's just kind of talking. And he said he left went to the room and through it. And by the way, this guy is now a pretty famous disc jockey. I mean, having that kind of an impression on someone. I know, when I was a kid coming up, when I met the first big jock. That was a big deal to me. And so I think there's a need for the guys at the top to come to share their their wisdom and experiences and talent. And on the younger the younger side for people to engage with some of the other people and meet them and get to know them and follow them. Because look nothing better than meeting a great mentor. Right? And I'm sure you've mentored a lot of people, haven't you? Matt Cundill 32:07 Yes, and I had a chance to meet some of my mentors along the way too. So I can totally see why this becomes something that you gotta go to. Don Anthony 32:14 And I say, with some embarrassment, that I'm not really like, I'm not trying to be- I don't want to sound like I'm overselling. We're 35 years old now or going on 35 years. And I think we've been doing something right to be able to keep it going. But this thing is not about me. I've never said come to boot camps or something. I'm just the guy in the kitchen putting dinner together. Everybody else brings the groceries. But the real secret of boot camp are the people who come to boot camp. They bring a energy and an excitement you can't find anywhere. And I I owe everything we've accomplished to them. Matt Cundill 32:53 Don, thanks so much for being on the show and telling us about it. We'll see you in Dallas. Great, and listen, if you're- if anybody's interested they can always click on radiomsbc.com, and start that with an HTTPS, okay? But radiomsbc.com, we'd love to see you. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 33:09 The Soundoff Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski. Edited by Chloe Emond-Lane. Social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com

This week we're joined by Dean Blundell to talk about his newest venture: Crier Media. It's the best way to find all the blog and podcast content you love from Dean's network, all in one place, but it's also a lot more than that. It's a cooperative of podcasters, writers, bloggers, and all kinds of folks from the radio industry who got sick of seeing big radio companies prioritize the wrong things. The Sound Off Media Company partnered with Dean a few years ago and manage the podcast side of their business and collaborate on marketing. Crier Media wants to shift the focus back to the talent, and give them a springboard to do whatever they want with their own content. We talk with Dean about why he started Crier, as well as how it ties into his storied and controversial history with radio and his podcast. He calls it being a responsible citizen- no guidelines for what can and can't be covered, no fear of taking risks because some corporate bigwig is afraid of losing profits, just digging as deep as you need to on stories that need to be told. This discussion inevitably leads us to talking about Caryma Sa'd, who works with Dean regularly and who we both agree is awesome. The best place to follow her is on Twitter, but you can also check out her website, carymarules.com. And hey, you can find her posts on Crier, too! And, of course, it wouldn't be a Sound Off Podcast episode with a former radio personality without copious discussion about the inevitable death of radio. But we're not just ragging on it needlessly- a lot of Dean's reasons for starting Crier are tightly tied into the problems radio is facing. From personalities taking the backseat to radio stations broadly sucking wind when it comes to transitioning to podcasts, we talk about all the things that made Dean sick enough to start his own place for the lost and forgotten souls of radio to feel at home again. It should go without saying that you should check out Crier Media, but that goes double if you're a broadcast industry vet looking to start doing your own thing. Head to their website, Crier.co, or shoot an email to info@crier.co and they'll see what they can do for you. You should also follow Dean in all the usual places: DeanBlundell.com, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. Transcript: Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:00 I hate video. You know I hate video, Dean. Why do you make me do video? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:00:06 Because it's good for you. It's good for your brand. It's actually the best thing you can do for your brand. You know that. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:00:06 The Sound Off Podcast. The podcast about broadcast with Matt Cundill starts now. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:21 This week, I invited Dean Blundell back on the show to discuss the launch of his brand new company, Crier Media. As a matter of disclosure, the Soundoff media company- that's my company- handles the podcast network and works with their people, the same way a radio consultant works with talent to grow audience. Dean's show has been in production since 2018, and it's not everyone's cup of tea. The show was at the focal point of the Freedom Convoy, which took place in February 2022 in Ottawa. The show offered a long form view from the nonsensical side of the protest. By the way, this episode has been repurposed for audio. A live version of this conversation was recorded on January 31, 2023, and it resides on YouTube, Facebook, and a few other places. But I like to repurpose these things for your ears. That's just the way I roll. Dean Blundell joins me from Crier Media headquarters in the center of the Universe, Toronto, Ontario. By the way, welcome back to the Sound Off podcast. We're actually putting this up on YouTube and a bunch of other places, including the newly formed Crier Media. And congratulations on the launch of that. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:01:27 Oh my God, what a day. I'm really happy about it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:30 I love working with all your people. They're fantastic. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:01:33 That makes me feel good, because I don't think we've ever had that conversation. How do you like working with all our people, man? Sorry for dumping them in your lap, but we needed some professional help and you were the best guy in Canada to do it. Can you do it? Sure. That's great. That happens for a year and a half, two years and I'm like, I haven't even asked you how it's going yet, so sorry. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:52 Well, I think we elevated a lot of people who were starting up in podcasting, and got them going in the right direction. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:01:58 Yeah, well, of course you did. I mean, that's kind of the currency for people in broadcasting now, right? Or people like you. I mean, it's so hard to find people that want to do content and want to help you produce it. And it's really hard in this digital space to find people who can actually touch all the right kind of keystrokes and know exactly what has to happen for you to be pretty successful. And it's very different coming out of radio, obviously, we've talked about that a million times, so man, we're just lucky to be working with people like you. Guys like Envision, guys like Jack over at Diner Agency. And we put together a good group of people at Crier Media, so we're pumped. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:38 A lot of people said, why would you get together with Dean Blundell? And I said, Because we need to give people a chance. And certainly we don't need to give you a chance, Dean, but we need to give all the people that you work with sort of a chance to succeed in podcast and from your side, on the video side of creating content. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:02:53 They ask you that? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:54 Yeah, there are people who-. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:02:57 Really? What do they say? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:57 Well, you probably owe them money, for one. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:03:00 I don't owe anybody money. It's like one of the only things that's good about me. I'm debt free. Really, people ask you that, huh? What do they say when you're like, I'm working with Dean and we're working on this project, Crier media, what do they say? Because obviously I come with some really interesting narratives. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:16 So I think a lot of people do that because they see your Daily Show. Your Daily Show, which we'll talk about in just a second, for those who haven't connected with it yet, it's a lot. But then there are other people that you work with who are not a lot like that. They're just doing regular podcasts. So I think when people see your show and they see DeanBlundell.com, they're going to assume that every content creator is out stoking the Freedom Convoy or tracking down Dr. Peterson, amongst other things that you're up to these days. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:03:46 Oh, that's what you meant when you said a lot. Yeah, when you said a lot is tracking down Jordan- We did that yesterday. And I get that. I get that I'm not for everybody and that's really not my concern. We do what we do and if people want to latch onto it, that's great, but we have a bunch of people that do what I do, right, and as do you. As do we in this kind of network of people that love making digital content, is that there's something for everybody, right? And I think that that's really kind of when you go back to the original statement that you made, why did we start Crier Media? I think the same reason why we reach out to each other and ask for help, right? And in this space, because it's really still the wild west of podcasting and monetizing podcasts and amplifying podcasts, even calling them podcasts, sounds weird to me. These are shows. This is content that people do, right? There's so many people out there that are being fleeced out of traditional. There are a lot of people out there that just are really great creators. There are people out there who don't know the right people and can't get into these spaces where they are considered journalists or videographers or content creators or production experts or musicologists, whatever the situation is. The Internet kind of bore that out, right? All of us anyway. We can't sit here and claim that we are what we are or we are in some kind of space and we're some kind of label or we're some kind of whatever title you want to give yourself if you're someone that produces content but depending on who you produce it for, you've been considered legitimate or not. But those walls are gone, right, Matt? I mean, we talk about that all the time. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:24 Glad you mentioned that about it. It's a podcast, but you're right, it's a show. And actually I'm rebranding the the the Sound Off podcast little bit. It's going to be- used to be the podcast about broadcast, and now really, if you've paid attention to it over the last few years, it's really the show about podcast and broadcast. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:05:40 But have you had to morph that in terms of- and this is just a quick aside, but when you decide you're going to repivot, and you can do- that's the beauty of podcast, you can do that anytime you fucking want. But did you do that because you're like, man, the things around me are changing. So I have to change the focus of my show, like the focus of media in this country, in Canada, North America, the world, the focus of media has changed so much. Did you have to change the focus of your podcast? Or you're like, man, I just want to do this. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:06 I'm looking at the people who come on the show, and most of them don't have very much to do with broadcast. And you look down, up and down the stream of who's coming on the show. And I'd love to have a radio person on every week and talk radio, but that's a dwindling number as well. I don't think that the person who is voice tracking ten shows with the same content, the same bits and recording them and dumping them down has a lot to contribute to radio going forward, so. Not bringing them on. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:06:37 This is like such a weird time. Like, I was talking a buddy of mine the other day who's in LA. His name is Paul Feinstein, and he's the head travel writer for Fodors. He's like an author. He's like a super travel guy. He's one of the best dudes on the planet. He's part of, actually, the network. He's got a podcast called the Paul Cast. You can check it out at Crier.co. But I was talking to him the other day and we were talking about people that do their content, and the way that content is changing with travel. Travel has changed so much that all of his stuff has changed too, right? And he's like, that's the beautiful part of this space, is that as things change around us, we get to change and talk about it, right? We get to have the narrative in this time. And I think that that kind of speaks to why I love what I do. And why I think maybe you love what you do, is that when you're in this weird wild west, sort of- because we're in the frontier territory of digital content, despite the fact we've been doing it for, well, for 10, 15 years as a society. And we've seen the usurping of traditional media outlets like print, television and radio, and equilibrium has arrived financially in those spaces in relationship to digital. But we look at it and we go, oh, there's so much to learn. And I look at it and I go, oh, my God, we are at the fucking forefront of online space technology, and we have a chance to be the first people through that door. And I'm amazed at how many people that are doing this kind of content look at it like it's a fucking burden to learn how to hashtag your podcast. Like it's a burden to learn new technology. It's a burden to be able to- we want to switch what we're doing, but we can't because we're so far behind in the digital space. But for people that really- like yourself, who left traditional media because you saw the writing on the wall. People like ourselves who've really kind of just said no to the opportunities in the traditional space because we see where the future is. We know what the upside of digital content is and how much easier it is to be able to get it to people's hands, and how it's not governed or guarded by the fences of geography. How you can just put your shit anywhere and people will watch it. And if you know what you're doing, a lot of people will watch it. A lot of people will listen to it. I find it cool that way. And I think people like you, and us and I think a few other people that have really embraced the learning curve here, these are the people that are succeeding, right? And it's unfortunate because in that traditional space, the entire industry has that "it's too hard to learn" attitude. And it's fucking wild out there, because all I do is work with people that want to do this stuff. All I do is work with people who go, man, I want to be my own boss. I want to have the autonomy of the content I create. I want to be able to push myself out there, and I want partners that can kind of help me make money, amplify my voice, amplify my brand, help me grow, get more clicks, get more subs. User acquisition is what they call it in the space. And that's kind of where we have to be, where I have to be, and I think where, generally speaking, most people that are doing digital content have to be. And I'm sorry that I've evangelized and vamped for the past, like seven to nine minutes, but I believe in it. And I believe that's why we are doing what we're doing. That's why people like you and I get along. That's why we help each other. That's why we work together, because nobody has these answers. We're all figuring them out at the same time because it's the final frontier of digital content. I fucking love it, Matt. Like, love it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:07 So I've got a comment here from someone who says, weren't you kicked out of the traditional space? Well, weren't we all kicked out of the traditional space? And isn't the traditional space sort of gone? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:10:19 Wasn't I kicked out of the traditional space? Yeah, I was, and I've got no problem with it. It was the greatest thing that ever happened to me. And last, I think, fall, 750 people at Bell got kicked out of the traditional space, and 300 people at Rogers got kicked out of that traditional space, because that traditional space doesn't work anymore. And when I got kicked out, I was still really good at it, and it mattered. And when you say kicked out, I got fired. I mean, we could happily talk about that, too, because it's all part of the story. It's all part of everybody's narrative, is your past and your present and your future, and you embrace it, and it doesn't matter, right? But, yeah, I've had, I don't know, seven to ten opportunities to get back into it, and I've said no to all of them because that's not the future. I mean, no one's in it. No one does it. No one has it. No one has that ability to give me what I need to be successful in that space. I hate shitting on radio for the sake of shitting on it, just because it was my chosen profession for a long time and made a lot of money in it. Because it was good to me. I had a good time in it. But it's technologically mature. It's not going to get better. It is going to get worse. There is no future for radio unless somebody looks at radio and says, hold it. We need to include this in what we are doing. It can't be the purpose of why we do what we do as a media company. It just has to be an addendum to it. And then you have to use it to do a few other things that I don't like talking about because people pay us to tell them that stuff. So anyway, that's where I'm at. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:49 Remind me, who had more broadcast violations? Was it you or Jerry Forbes? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:11:54 It was me. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:55 It was you? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:11:56 Yeah. I don't even know how that works. I think there were, like, nine to eleven CBSC- no, CRTC adjudications. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:12:04 It's the CBSC. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:12:06 Oh, is it CBSC? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:12:07 They would basically, with the panel, they would look at your complaint and go, yeah, this is in violation. Say sorry. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:12:13 Yeah. And then if you got enough of those, they'd be like, we're going to take away your radio station license. For what? For telling jokes that were too awesome. That's what they do. And that's again, I mean, the disadvantage that they give themselves in that medium, which is- let's be total pricks. Let's have this mechanism called the CBSC and use it to be pricks that we don't like in the business, and use it to judge people's character. Not the content, just the character. And it's silver. That's their disadvantage as well. That was one of the things we laughed about when radio put out their- You and I, I think, had a great fucking laugh about this when you called me. You're like, hey, Seen the new radio guidelines? And I'm like, no, I haven't seen them. And you're like, 23 years. You know what the changes are? You can own maybe one or two more radio stations. They're suggesting they play more music. And I'm like, what about the language? And you're like, what do you mean? Can you swear on the radio yet? Have they decided to let people give them that competitive advantage, have they decided to remove the CBSC and the CRTC so people can fucking do content? You're like, no, that was it. It took them 23 years to say, you can buy one more radio station and status quo. And I'm like, Fuck, of course. And I don't care. Like, it's funny. I don't spend any time talking to people about the problems the radio has anymore in terms of governance or regulations and how those hurt them and give everybody else in this space a massive competitive advantage. I don't talk about that stuff. I just laugh now, because it's unfortunate, because people are just deciding that they don't want to be a part of a solution for a really fucking cool business still. It's not the same, but it can still be very cool. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:51 How do you describe the show you're doing now? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:13:53 A ratatouille of sorts? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:55 Yes, that would be one way. I think it starts at is it 03:00 Eastern? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:14:01 Whenever we want. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:14:03 Kind of like this show today. You were, like, a few minutes late. You're wandering in. We'll see what happens. I might do- I start on time. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:14:09 I know. Sorry, buddy. I apologize. I'm very sorry. How would you describe it now? I don't know. I mean, we kind of talk about the things that I think that a lot of people don't want to discuss. I think we go hard in the paint on a couple of issues on an ongoing basis where we'll dip into the responsibility that we have as citizens to each other, but we try to have fun with it, and I think that that's really kind of what we do. The show that I used to do or the shows that I used to do are irrelevant and always will be, especially when you consider where you're going and where you need to be today and the sensibility of how you feel as a different individual. So I have no desire to kind of go back and redo more wacky Morning Zoo shit, but I have a desire to do content that is humorous, that makes a difference for the greater good, where you can kind of smell the character. You can see that the people that are involved in what you're doing or trying to make a bit of a difference, trying to be accountable at the same time, trying to push some boundaries and trying to have fun and really talking about the things that don't get talked about. I had a boner for a long time when I was in traditional media about how immoral amoral actually is a better word valueless that industry is how they treated people like assets, like shit, like garbage, like legitimately treat people like garbage. And traditional media, it's always happened, it's always been a problem and I was part of it. I enjoyed the privilege of whatever that industry was and so I try to do the opposite of that now. When we do content and we try to point out the valueless, individuals and the danger that they might serve to you and the people around you. We try to tell the truth about not just industry. We try to tell the truth about politics. We try to ascertain intentions. We try to have fun when we talk about the really hard shit because there's a lot of hard stuff that's happening. So we try to be an outlet but also we try to explain things to people, try to educate people in terms of disinformation. We try to educate people in terms of why society is under this incredible transition period because it is. We're a pretty divided group and this happens every 75 to 100 years generationally. We go through these things where a massive group of people is like you know what, fuck you and everybody else pushes back and we divide. So in the time of our time it's important to me that we offer a little bit of a solution to it when it comes to common sense and when it comes to what people are seeing out there and trying to kind of cut through the kiff of disinformation misinformation. But we try to fund while we do it. We've built podcasts where we'll talk about everything from how much better muscle Lachlan needs in his diet to the real intentions of Rebel News and why they use disinformation to try and steal from people. We'll also talk about the Toronto Maple Leafs and their historic run with two less than stellar goaltenders. And we'll get into some basketball, we'll get into hockey, we'll get in whatever. I mean it doesn't really matter what it is. And I also feel like chasing down assholes with what we do too because I can do whatever I want. So we chase down guys that have a negative impact on society. Jordan Peterson is one of them. You mentioned him out of the gate. I can't stand the man's teachings. So we try to make sense out of that. And do we shit on people a little too much as a result. Yeah, we do. But we don't do it just to shit on people. We definitely take a run at assholes. So if that's the explanation that you needed and you can put that in like a mission statement for a podcast, that would be it. I know it's a lot. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:17:45 Two of the first words you mentioned were responsible citizenship, which I think is pretty important. And I think a lot of your show is built around that. I'm sure people can argue about what that definition is, but I think that's a great way to summarize a year ago what your show is all about. When the trucker convoy took place, you were actually on the street with people on the ground, going through the convoy, and doing it in a long form way with individual stories. You would let both sides tell their stories. In fact, there was really only one side. Actually, there was like 100 different sides, depending on who you ask. There was 100 different reasons why are you here? And it was 100 different reasons for why people were here. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:18:24 My mom came. I'm just a babysitter. My dad told me I had to be here. All that stuff. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:18:32 You never had more downloads, though, than you did a year ago. You were filling a void. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:18:37 I know, and we saw that. And it's funny. You can take from that kind of stuff. Oh, I'm some kind of fucking hero here. Look at me. No, we never did. Because it also came with some downside, like 1400 death threats when all that happened. And I look at it like analytics. I looked at it like, what's not happening with content that makes this important to people? When we were doing those podcasts from Ottawa, and we had criminals wading through the crowd, and we were at it all fucking three weeks trying to explain it to people because I needed to understand it. You know what I mean? It was kind of one of those fuck, I need to understand who these people are, where they came from, and what their intentions are. But I'm like that with everything, right? I'm like that with learning the digital space. I was like that with radio when I first got into radio. I'm like I think that's why a modicum of success is I had to understand how it works and what the advantages were and who had the advantages and how they got them. And then I wanted to repeat those, but also come up with my own strategy to do so. And strategically, we live in a digital space where alt right, anger, hatred, alt left the extremes of our society. And I'm very centrist, or at least I try to be, really kind of captivate the audience that people want, that monetized audience people really need to have on their side to be able to curate a believable narrative on social media or the news I mean, we don't get real news. We never really did. But we wanted to not be responsible for the ongoing confusion and the psychopathy that disinformation and misinformation caused. And it would surprise a lot of people to know how many websites, how many blogs like ours, specifically, in the early days, before we achieve any modicum of success, we're approached by lobby, groups, individual agencies, a guy representing agencies from different countries to give us money in return for writing their stories. And we had a conversation with someone in law enforcement, and they said about 80% of blogs like ours, which was Dean Blundell at the time, was a compromised blog, meaning it had taken money from a foreign entity with or without knowledge of the intention of the people that gave the money, whether it's funding, whether it's advertising, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And that bothered me. Like, it bothered me to the point- and this is a couple of years ago- it bothered me to the point where I'm like, we can't do that. I can't have to serve two masters here. We can't be serving the interest of easy money and doing misinformation or disinformation for people on the right or people on the left or the Chinese government, that was a fun one, or any other entity that's trying to push some kind of religious, antivax lying, bullshit narrative or trying to create more confusion in this world. And so we just decided that we weren't going to do any of that. And it was early. And then the more I saw the way that disinformation had kind of created this chasm between people that wanted to have a good life on both sides, the more I saw the intention of it, the more fucking angry I got. And I'm still actually angry about it. I think about companies and corporations like Rebel News or Canada Proud, anybody that has the opportunity to communicate with someone and they choose to communicate that kind of vitriol and hatred for the express purposes of A, taking money from somebody, or B, curating influence on behalf of whatever group. I mean, we don't have to go too far to see what those groups are, but at the same time, I wouldn't be able to. I know how I look at Rebel, Canada Proud. I know how I look at those agencies. I know how I look at people that are duplicitous, like super fucking duplicitous in this space, and there are a lot of them, and they have no respect. I mean, there's a reason why nobody respects The Toronto Sun and the Post Group of companies or Post Media Group of companies, because this is what they do. There's a reason why nobody likes traditional media and mainstream media anymore. There's a reason why mainstream media has a trust score of 23% as I sit here today, down from, like, 69% sweet number five years ago. So, I mean, we're just trying to take advantage of all the opportunities that are out there. And the opportunity out there is to be a good fucking human being, inform people, entertain people and do it with really good character and try to fucking make a positive difference in and around your purpose and what you're trying to do, and it will be successful. And it is. I said that to someone yesterday. I'm like, I can't believe fucking being a good human being and doing your best for the people around you and filling a void works. It's like, yeah, it fucking works. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:23:03 A lot of people may not be high up on the media literacy chart, but they can certainly smell a hedge fund and corporate shareholders when the media is dull to them, which speaks to the all time low that you were just talking about. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:23:15 And here's a question I would ask you. Didn't they create this? Didn't they create guys like you and me, guys like Jeff Bollinghall, whether or not you love them or hate them, guys like Ezra, I mean, they created this. They created this by being lazy. And they created all the good and the bad, you know, the people like us that are bubbling up underneath them, destroying their processes, and the fact that we understand that it's all a house of cards and it's going to end soon. Do you not agree that the way that they've treated people, the way that they've not evolved technically, technologically, the way they haven't decided to do the right thing via human beings, I mean, that's kind of what it comes down to, does it not? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:23:52 It erodes- they've eroded all that made them. There was a great comment in the blog I saw yesterday where somebody said, Well, I don't listen to radio. This was a gen z. I don't listen to radio. And then you scratch them enough and, well, I do listen to the morning show. I do know that person. And radio is really about personalities now more than it is about music. Don't argue with me, because we've got the data for that. Because music, you can get it anywhere. And now it comes down to personality. It doesn't seem like traditional media is very interested in investing in personalities because it costs money. Which is why you'll see a billboard saying, Check out Laura on Mornings. Who the fuck is Laura? Laura in the morning. That was the billboard. They spent money for that. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:24:33 And I feel sorry for Laura. I don't even know her. No, I know, but there are so many Laura's, right? There are so many fucking people out there who are literally trapped in that industry. It's like being on the outside of a bubble going, how can we help these people out? That's what I think when I see Laura. And before I would go, They've got my job, they took my job. I should be on the radio. Nobody should be on radio anymore. Nobody. Radio should be the end result of your ecosystem. It's exactly what it should be, but they continue to. And you and I obviously know the players involved in Toronto. They just did this morning show shuffle with three stations. One I used to work at, and I wish them the best. All of them. All the people involved in radio, all the people that have made life changes for that business, all the people that are still in it. But, man, they're going to turn the lights off soon. Like, they're really going to turn the lights off soon. And it will be in small markets with AM stations that cost so much money to maintain. It's dead technology. Don't need it. You've got a phone in your hand. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:25:38 In just a second, more with Dean, as we discuss the mission statement for Crier Media. If you're a content creator and want to retain your intellectual property, there are solutions for you. And just who is Caryma Sa'd, and why is she all over social media? There's more. There's always more. Including a transcript of this episode at soundoffpodcast.com. Sarah Burke (Voiceover) 00:26:00 Transcription for the Sound Off podcast is powered by Poddin. Your podcast is an SEO goldmine. We help you to dig out. Start your free trial now at Poddin dot I-O. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:26:12 The sound off podcast. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:12 By the way, you mentioned Caryma. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:26:16 Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:17 Okay, so here's what I know, and you tell me if I got her right. Lawyer with a GoPro and a scooter who films weird people, and somehow this is a lightning rod for something. Can you explain this to me? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:26:31 I can, actually. And thank you for asking. Caryma's awesome, by the way. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:36 She's awesome. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:26:37 One of the great human beings you'll ever meet. I met lots of people, worked with lots of people. She is most valued, virtuous, kind, accepting, unbiased, loving human being I've ever met in my life. She's also a killer. Like, an absolute killer, because she has no fear. And Caryma was a lawyer. I interviewed her right at the start of the Pandemic, and it was about- I don't know. Fuck, I can't remember what it was about. I just thought she was awesome because she was the head of Normal, which is like a cannabis advocacy company, too. She smokes a ton of pot. She's just cool. And I'm like, Fuck, I want to talk to her. So I started talking to her, started interviewing her. Then she started going out and doing these things on weekends, and I started just posting them on the website. At the time, it was DeanBlundell.com. It was like black and yellow. And I'm like, this is awesome content. Look at her. She's talking to people, doing these crazy person parades. At the time, I had no idea what they were, right? They were just people who didn't want to get vaccinated. I'm like, oh, this will last couple of weeks, like most of these movements do. It's been going on for two years. And in that two years, she and I decided, like, literally a day before the convoy, I guess we better work together on this. And she's like, okay. We had 200 million impressions that month. We did, I don't know, 10 million page views that month. We did- which are important. We doubled our user base in a month. She did the exact same thing. And what happened after that? And this is what happens when you do a good job and you become important to a narrative. And other people that think that they can do what you're doing, they get mad at you. That's what's going on with Caryma. Caryma is so good at what she does because she is so capable as a Gonzo journalist, as a lawyer. She is so incredibly smart, that she went up the middle. And if you can use a football term, there's a little bit of a run pass option up the middle. And she destroyed an industry of journalists who sat back, had commentary, didn't say anything, and she went right into the lion's den. So in the case of the convoy, do you remember all the CTV reporters reporting from, like, a building above the actual convoy? She went right into the convoy with her scooter and her camera and just started talking to people. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:28:42 No, I will preface that Graham Richardson from CTV did not. He did go through the middle. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:28:46 Some people did a little bit. But generally speaking, after Caryma started getting millions of views on her videos because the world became enamored with this convoy, which was total bullshit, every single news outlet started doing the same thing. They started sending Annie Oliver, Bergeron in, exactly the same all the other people. So she really started to change how people did that job because she wasn't attached to anybody. There's no liability for her. She just went in and did the gig. Right? Again, another huge problem that traditional media has. However, back to Caryma. That pissed off a lot of people, and pissed off people on the right, and it pissed off people on the left. It pissed off right leaning news sites like Rebel News. They discounted her. They treated her like shit. But over the past, I would say, two to three months, she's been really targeted by the left. And the reason why she's been targeted by the left is because, again, we have an unaccountable disinformation ecosystem that is fucking prevalent in Canada. And one of those information ecosystems, which is almost pure bullshit, is the Canadian Anti Hate Network. That is a left leaning lobby group collaring company that Caryma has been harassed by civilly and criminally for, like, two years, because she tried to interview Chris Sky. So some of the proxies from the Canadian Anti Hate Network- so now the right hates her, the left hates her. Right? Which is really the systemic issue that we have right now in Canada. Kind of just an example of it, is that you've got people on the right and people on the left, but in those camps, you've got extremists. You've got people who are willing to fucking just trade it all in. Their pride, their reputation, their employment future and history. They're willing to trade in anything they can to be someone in their fucking community of morons. And I believe that to be true, and it is. So she's somehow been able to not only piss off people in that industry who would like to see her fail, because she's much better at it than them. She's pissed off the left because she doesn't put up with their fun and games and their bullshit with the Canadian Anti Hate Network. And she's pissed off the right because she shows everybody's work, right? She just shows up and shows everybody's work. So she's become a target because there are so many assholes out there that don't want you to see their bad work, the bad things that they do, and all she's done is show them, and she's become a rock star as a result. And you won't meet someone with less fear than that woman. I'm in awe of the places that she goes and what she chooses to do for content, because I got to tell you, I would not do any of it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:31:15 So one of the things I really like about what you've done is you've gone and you've found people who would not normally find their way, I don't think ten years ago, some of the characters and some of the personalities that you have on these shows and podcasts, people like James DiFiore and Ryan Lindley, I'm not sure that they necessarily find their way into a radio station or on the air, but they will get on with Crier Media because it's pretty open space. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:31:42 Isn't that how it should be? Isn't that what we call merit based? Isn't that what we should be doing? All the things that the media landscape in this country, and it is really exclusive to this country. Canada is a terrible, terrible country when it comes to media. How they treat people, what they think is important. The United States is not. In Canada, we hate our stars, because we do not want our stars. It is fatal for the stars, for your traditional outlet, to become bigger than you, more important than you, more nuclear than you. And Lisa LaFlamme proved that. I believe, in large part, I proved that. Quietly, but I did. I think a lot of people in those spaces are proving it now, because that industry just has gotten rid of any high priced star that moved any needle, because they don't care. They don't want that. They want a profit take. They don't want to be the biggest. They don't want to be the best. They just want to be the safest company that's able to generate a little bit of money out of dead technology. And that is fucking brutal. That is a terrible way to treat people. So when we started doing what we did, which was create Crier, we did it because people out there, and there were way more of them, needed a solution to get in here, right? They needed everything from microphone- You know this. Dude, we fucking work together every day. They need to know how to fucking plan a podcast. They need to know how to build one. They need to know how to brand one. They need to know how algorithms work. They need to know how algorithms work on all different platforms. And it is such a fucking mountain to climb, that we created this ecosystem of people that have already climbed the mountain, that are willing to help people to do that. We've also created an ecosystem that helps people monetize those things. So we've got an agency as part of Crier Media because those are solutions that we needed. So we had to scale them for people. Because no one's willing to do that in traditional media. They're looking to get rid of those stars. We're looking to empower them all. And I don't care if you think you're a star or not. You come out of that industry, you know this, Matt. Like you know nothing when you get into this shit, it's like fucking ground zero. You're like a baby. And there's no one out there trying to help those people. And so we decided that we would. And that's what this is. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:01 So I put the question, it was actually one of the things I had on my list, Why is Canada so bad at building personalities and stars? I would like to say that Quebec does a good job of it. They are exempt from this question because they know how to do it. Why are we so bad at this? Is it a regional thing? I think it's a media thing. I think the traditional media just hasn't lent itself to building it properly. Maybe we're humble and we just don't think that we need to build people up. And also, another thing, I'll just let you dovetail on this, is that success, whether it's in music sometimes, definitely Hollywood and acting, you have to be able to export your content in order to be successful. It's very rare that you can be domestic and just be the Tragically Hip. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:34:45 It's wild. Why does Canada, outside of Quebec, why do we hate stars? And I go back to the original statement that I made, which was Canada. Traditionally, it is an incredibly socialist country when it comes to the people who have all the gold. And this will come as no surprise. It shouldn't come as any surprise. We are owned by three companies. Really. Three to four companies. Media information, how it gets disseminated in this country, is owned by Rogers, Bell, Quebecor, a number of others. But those are really the two, three biggest ones. Post Media is another big one. And those are cultural organizations. They're funded culturally. So they are funded by in the case of Post Media, they're funded by Chatham Asset Management, which is basically a Trump company. It's a company run by megadonors and the David Peckers of the world, who's also part of Post Media group, who's under serious indictment in New York as of yesterday for fraud, lying, disinformation, bunch of other shit. And that's the problem that Canada has. Canada has the same problem. The United States has effectively been allowed to own a whole bunch of different companies in the United States and around the world. Steven Harper took away the domestic ownership rules and regulations for media in this country a decade or so ago. And since then, it's been run on purchasing, consolidating a whole bunch of different companies. And they have this very incredible way of empowering people to have the exact same messaging of their religious Ideologies, their political ideologies. And that is what media has turned into. I mean, you don't have to look very far to know that if you are media literate in any capacity, you know that there are really no news outlets like Axios or AP or even Bloomberg for that purposes. Up here in Canada, we have government funded oligarchies that parade around as media. Let's just affect they're all government funded, so they've already lost, right? They've lost the stars in that industry because they're socialists that don't want stars to be bigger than their brands. So they get rid of those stars. They don't empower those stars because they're afraid. They're afraid that one human being, a brand, one individual or an outside brand will become a threat to whatever revenue, whatever influence they may have. Because the one thing that these media companies in Canada really, really fucking need more than anything is to be considered authentically, unbiased, to be considered the arbiter of information. Because that's the society we came from, right? Like, you and I grew up watching the evening news. Do you remember that? You'd come home, you're like, Fuck, that's the truth. That was an hour of truth. You don't get that anywhere anymore. Not from radio, not from television, definitely not from print media, which is dead. So there's no opportunity for stars either, right? Because those are diminishing returns, diminishing businesses, and they're fucking trying so hard to hang on to that relevancy as the arbiters of information, that it's a fucking war against people like you and me, right? At the same time, they're also working with people like you and me, looking for answers to an industry that they totally fucked up and totally decided they didn't want to be a part of when they fired everybody and continue to do so. There's going to be an avalanche of people and by the way, we'll take you info at Crier co there's going to be an avalanche of people that are so much better at them than them, at what they're doing that. It is going to be and it's going to take a couple of years, but it'll be over quick. There's going to be a time when someone's going to put together a collection of people who are way bigger, way better, big stars, trusted in their brand, trusted in their niche that traditional media not only can't afford to have but doesn't want to have because it doesn't fit their Mo. And it will die. It will die. These little radio stations, these little TV news stations, they're dying now. They're dead now. It is going to be lights out at some point in the next three to five years for a lot of them, because the individuals collectively are better than brands individually. It's just the fucking immutable truth of where we're at now, because everybody down here is hungrier than everybody up there. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:39:01 The question posed by Scott McGregor, who has a podcast, I believe, called Hot Trades, why is radio so bad at podcasting? How do they miss the boat? It reminds me of cable companies and Blockbuster missing out on streaming. And I think, Dean, you just answered the question, because it costs a lot of money. You need a lot of runway. Podcast is on demand. It's not live. So it kind of runs as a juxtaposition to what radio is, which is live and local, and podcasting is not. It can be local, but it isn't necessarily you're not going to make your money back by the next quarter and by the next shareholders meeting to get the money into the dividend checks. It takes three years, and radio doesn't even have three years to build a morning show, so they're not going to have time to build a podcast. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:39:45 What do they do wrong in that space? Like, what does the radio do? Man, that's a fucking massive question. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:39:50 They don't invest. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:39:52 They look at it like they can just get their people to do more and that will create a market for themselves. This is the worst fucking thing. We work with radio companies, radio divisions, radio stations on this. None of them are reticent to splash out and buy something if it makes sense. The only thing that makes sense to anybody in traditional media today, and this is the truth, is if you do not have a digital footprint of significance, of critical mass, you're done. If you have decided that you're going to go all in on propping up dead technology, dead industry, when you're not even fucking empowering the people there to do that job properly, you're toast. It's over. So what do they have to do? They need to look at it like it's an entirely new ecosystem, new business, new opportunity, and they have to do the right things first, and nobody is willing to do that. Some are. I think actually Corus is actually pretty good at it, which kills me to say, but they've done something different. It's not about personalities. It's about brands, it's about like true crime, that's about that kind of stuff. So they've kind of harnessed the idea. Some people, Rogers have kind of harnessed the idea. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:09 They've got the Frequency Podcast Network, which has some good ones in there. I think a lot of people may be listening to Radio podcasts and they don't even realize that it emanates from a traditional broadcast. If you listen to Jann Arden, I think Jann Arden, I think that kind of goes through Bell and iHeart Media and the Frequency Podcast network. And of course, I think they've got a second one at Rogers for Sportsnet. Curious Cast, which shout out to Dunner, by the way. Good dude, yeah. Who's done a great job with Curious Cast. And I think radio does do podcasts. I just don't think they do it at the local level. And you may not know it, but you're probably listening to a Radio podcast if it comes from NPR or the CBC. They've kind of branched off into separate companies. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:41:50 Yeah, they really have, haven't they? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:51 I think they are involved in podcasting. It just doesn't really feel that way necessarily. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:41:56 Well, it's not about and again, that requires to kind of dig into the minutiae of the question is what do they do wrong? And I go back to it, like I said, with Curious Cast and Chorus, there are some companies that have really embraced the idea of it as a business. And so they've planted their flag in and they've decided to learn about the business by leaning into what podcast might be most profitable or the true crime things that people are that's separate. What we're talking about is, and it's important, if you're a media outlet and you don't have a hopeful, robust online network of content and content providers, you're in trouble. It's fucking number one. You're in trouble. You're like a standalone and you put a bunch of money into a bunch of stations and you've got little stations that you are in trouble, right? There are a couple of companies in and around here that actually have a great digital ecosystem where they service the community and they've got like a decent ecosystem when it comes to their podcast or when it comes to their traditional stuff. But when it comes to how to marry those two spaces, right, you have to literally commit as a company to making everything you put on the radio be digital first. Like everything from your morning show, to features, to your afternoon drive show, to your evening show, to your weekend feature show, to your infomercials to fucking tradeo. It has to land digitally first. And you have to be able to have enough content in that ecosystem to be able to service that traditional outlet. Because let's face it, dude, how many live announcers are on a radio station a day in an average market? Two. Seriously? Two during the entire day? Some none. That's the current ecosystem. And landscape that we live in. So unless someone is willing to go okay, for that to be better, we need to get more of this, right? We need to have a crier co. We need to have a company that produces content that's so much outside the Sound Off podcast we're capable of doing online. But we need to take that and represent it with that traditional outlet. Because the one thing radio will do and television to a lesser extent is everybody streaming. The one thing that radio can do still is get to people immediately and free, right? And if you're not using it to introduce people to different ways that they can experience you, your content, your ecommerce, if you're not using it consistently to tell people where all the good stuff is, you're fucked. Like legitimately fucked. Because everything's on demand. You said it earlier. And I think that that's really super key is that funneling doesn't happen anymore. We're not sending people to malls anymore, right? Home delivery is where it's at. The way that we live, the way we consume, everything has changed to on demand. Everything from ordering a t shirt to listening to something to learning about something. It's when you want, how you want, and when you want to do it. And traditional media offers none of those things anymore. Like zero, right? The second a newspaper gets printed, it's old and no one fucking reads those anymore. The second your newscast is up, it's old. Radio is different a little bit because you can just continually keep updating people as to the changes that you are creating within your own ecosystem. It's fucking awesome that way. But at the same time, you got to commit to listening to something in an appointment fashion. Nobody does that anymore, dude. Human behavior is incredible, right? We have changed. We have rewired the way that we expect to get things now. And if you can't meet people there with your content, if you're still telling them no, you've got to come here, everybody at the same time, no matter how inconvenient for you it is, you're fucked. You just are. And it's easy for me because we don't have people telling us otherwise. We don't. It's easy for you because you can pivot and you can go, Fuck, you know what? I'm going to do whatever I want today, but I'm going to learn how to do that properly. And I'm going to learn to give people things, right? I'm not going to learn to tell people to come here. I'm going to give it to them. I'm not going to give them any excuse to avoid us. Like, none, which is what we do. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:05 And I'm going to start the show when I want. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:46:07 Exactly. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:09 I would like to just mention, by the way, the last podcast I listened to last night was a podcast from about two years ago and it was from Curious Cast. I think the show is called This Is Why. I don't think the show runs anymore, but again, speaks to the behavior of people in podcasting. A lot of people make the mistake. Oh, the latest episode is the only thing that's important when you have an entire back catalog. People are Googling all the time looking for information. And I saw a stat, 47% of downloads are on old episodes. So for those of you in podcasting, market all your episodes, your best ones, not just your latest one. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:46:44 It's weird, you know, like, everything here is different than everything we've been taught. And can you imagine that? That's why there's so much frustration, I think, with so many people, because everything is different in so many spaces. It's not just tech, it's not just media fucking vaccines. It's so different. It's hard. It's hard for people to wrap their head around different because it's awkward, it's difficult. It's hard to learn new things. It's hard to go fuck scratch. I got to start from scratch. And we kind of do in a lot of different ways. And I would encourage everybody and this is one of the things and obviously it's a bigger conversation and not about podcasting. I would encourage everybody to live by first principles. I really would. When it comes to what you're deciding that you want to do, where you want to go, if you're coming out of traditional media or if you're sick of it, or if you know the end of the runways here, because BuzzFeed just said they're going to use AI to write all of their future articles. No more feedback. You really need to embrace the process of investing in yourself by learning this space. And we have put together a group of scalable solutions for individuals that are trying to get into media, try to create their own trying to be part of a group, be part of a collective where you own your own content. And you're part of a group of people that not only help you monetize your content, but help amplify your content, help find your solutions. Whether it's video, audio, whether it's written word, whatever the situation is, that's what we are. That's what Crier co is. It's not about me or the other partners that are involved in this, the other content providers, and we got a lot of them. It's about you, right? And I say that and I mean it. Which is, I was thinking about this the other day. I'm like, as far as authenticity goes, there's nothing that I believe more in today than giving people in this space a solution to be successful so that they can be happy, provide for their families. It's really it that success to me in this space is, can we change the way that things have been done? Can we empower people in this space to be really fucking good at what they do and how can we help them do it so they feel great about it? Loyal to the process and experience some success. Because, dude, that's fucking reciprocal. If you can find solutions with people, you'll get fed too. Everybody in traditional media, again, doesn't think like that. They think in terms of how much can we squeeze out of this fucking lemon before we throw in the garbage. That's not the currency of the realm. The currency of the realm is, how can we help you? And what do we have? 80, 90 podcasts. We've got a robust network of 50 to 60 bloggers. We're in the process, in the next couple of weeks, announcing a couple of really cool things that will put us in a different space to be able to do that. Right? Because that's the goal. It's not about me. I get fed by the work that I do. And the more I help people, the more things go well for me. I think that's lost. I think it's lost on a lot of people. And it's not like a Jerry Maguire moment where you're like, here's what we got to do. Burn the fucking industry down. I'm the best. It's none of those things. It's none of those things. It was like, I had to fucking figure some stuff out. I was lucky enough to figure it out with some really good people who were better than me at doing this. And isn't that the purpose of of why we're here in an existential sense? Like, to fucking work with people, meet new people, have a good life, enjoy things, work hard, sustain your industry and your family. And along the way, if you find some solutions that might help change the way things are done, so be it. But someone has to step up. Someone's got to step up in this country specifically for the people that love what they do and do this kind of job, and even for the people that do it poorly, right? Like Rebel News or Canada proud. I mean, they're going to get their own legally in the next, I would say two to three months. But, you know, there are that is why those places and things are successful. Because, I mean, everybody's onto it. Everybody's onto the crookery and the collusion in traditional media. Everybody's onto the fucking lies that they told you when they said that you were great and you're going to be fine, and they fire you three months later during Bell's Talk Week. Like, everybody's onto the valueless industry of fucking Canadian media. And it is valueless, and it is trench coat mafia. That's what it is. And that's our advantage. And that's your advantage too, Matt. It's fucking everybody's advantage. There's contactless space, right? Mary Anne Ivision (Voiceover) 00:46:44 This Podcast supports Podcasting 2.0. If you like this show or are getting value from it, hit the boost button now. If you don't have a boost button, you can get one now at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:51:23 I think when I got let go from Corus, I thought, you know what, I can build something and start stripping away quarter hours from them. And that's all I wanted to do, was start to strip away quarter hours from traditional media and bring them into my ecosystem where I could own it and not be told what to do, how to direct it, give bad advice to talent, lie to the sales department. We know it's crazy. So I just started out with an idea in 2015 of how do we strip away quarter hours from these people because, frankly, they don't deserve them. How am I doing? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:51:55 Really fucking good. They come to you for solutions now, don't they? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:52:01 I think they look to me for solutions. They don't call me up, that's for sure. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:52:07 They will be very soon. They do call us, by the way, and you know that because we're having meetings with these people. But I wonder what your motivation is now, right? There's the question. Because I think when guys like you and I leave that space under any negative circumstance, whether it was your own doing or someone else is doing and I know you and I both know how we feel about that industry, but are you still operating, getting out of resentment? Like, are you still doing this because you're like, fucking I want all the quarter hours, or are you doing this because you're like, I fucking love this space. I love how dynamic it is, and I love the partnerships and the friendships and the relationships and the fact that it's fucking so new. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:52:42 No, they'll lose all the quarter hours on their own. They're perfectly capable of doing it all by themselves. They do not need my help. When somebody is in the process of of terminating their business career or whatever it is, I got some great advice, and that's don't hand them the rope. They'll figure out what to do with the rope themselves. I think what happened with me is it became a lot what you were saying, it was like, can we help people? And a lot of people a lot of people helped me in 2016. And from that, I said, okay, just going to pay it back. Not paid back tons, but I'll always be paying it back. Podcasters are very good at helping one another. It's what they do. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:53:21 And so different than that traditional space. Like like when you and I were cutting our fucking teeth and radio, if you didn't have the competitive spirit of a fucking hungry lion, you were toast, right? If you didn't shit on the competition, find ways to demoralize them. So every time they cracked a microphone, you weren't doing your job. You weren't. This space is about, how can I help that person? Because when you help them, they're like, hey, I want to introduce you to my audience. And you're like, great. I'd love to meet your audience. I'd love to introduce you to mine too, because we're doing the same things. Have you found these solutions? No, I haven't. Oh, I found this one great. You found that one great. Well, let's work together and find more solutions, because we're both looking for the same result, right? Because the landscape is so incredibly different. And if it weren't for helping, if it weren't for people going, happy to explain that to you, no problem. Happy to talk to you about it, we wouldn't be in a position where we could do the same thing for other people. And that means we're not in a position to fulfill our business plan. And if you ask me, the biggest problem that traditional space has, it comes down to that one thing. They stopped helping people. Because it's not about helping people. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:54:32 They have absolutely no interest in building up their morning show personalities to the next level because then they realize they'll have to pay them. Which then leads you to why we have Greg in the afternoons or Polly. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:54:44 On weekends doing five different stations. Do you notice that? And everybody's radio bio that's still in the business, which is great. I do wish them all the best. I hope they can hang in there and get whatever they can out of it, too, before it fucking dies. But I get a kick out of it because, like, every radio person and these are big radio personalities that usually could only be capable of doing one show a day because it takes 10 hours to prep, four hour show. If you're good at your job. It's like mornings on this station, afternoons on that station, middays on this station, part of this group of companies. And I'm like, that's where we're at. And there's nothing local, nothing cool, which is the service of the licenses. Like, you get a radio license in this country if you commit to sign an agreement to service that city where your license is for your radio station. There are cities in this country that don't have any local programming at all, and I would say half of them are that way. So, I mean, it's just a fucking joke. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:55:37 So the roster at Crier Media is somewhat built, but always looking for more. How does one apply? Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:55:45 We need a semen sample first. You email us, tell us, why do you love what you love? Why do you want to do what you're doing? What are you doing? And you can email us at info at DeanBlundell.com, you can email us at info@crier.co. DM me, DM us, Ryan Locke, anybody. You. I mean, if you're in that space, and this is the advice I would give anybody that's kind of, if you're in that space of wanting to do something for yourself, own your own content, be your own boss. Monetize your own stuff, amplify your own stuff, and you're in that space where you're like, I am tired of working for people that demean the entire process and shit on me while I do it. Don't give me the resources to be able to be successful at what I do, then you need to change. And we're happy to be there for those people. I don't care who you are, what you do, what your content is within reason. Obviously, we have a desire to give other people the same solutions that we've been able to find for ourselves. We also have a desire to be able to create a very disruptive media entity in this country. And that's something that obviously we're doing and we've been doing for a while. And we also have a desire to be able to help people. I mean, you said it earlier, if people didn't help you, you wouldn't be in the place that you're in to help other people. That is something that I'm shocked that I love to be. Truthful is, we've got a few of those stories at Crier. A few podcasters, a few bloggers, a few people who have their own brands, because really we're just a brand amplification revenue company, right? Everybody owns their own stuff at Crier. That's the other kind of cool part about it is we have people who came to us broken. We have people who came to us in bad shape financially. We have people who came to us with no solutions to bring together their new day jobs with what they love to do. People that came out of media, people that had no media experience. We've got people that have no writing experience writing for us because they're great writers and they're passionate about what they do. And so if you're passionate about what you do and creating content and we want to give you as little direction as possible to harness the things that you're most passionate about, we just want to be able to surround you with the solutions that you need to be able to be successful and be sustainable for a long period of time. Because the market has changed, my dudes and my ladies. Everything's changed in this space. You can't operate unless you know people that can help you find those solutions. And again, isn't that what we're supposed to be doing? Isn't that what traditional media was supposed to do, was find good people, support those people, to do a tremendous job for them that brought them the solutions they were looking for in their lives, the goals that they were looking for in their lives. It's a little more existential than you work for me, I pay you. Shut up. You do exactly what I want. We don't work like that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:58:29 I really hope I got the email right on the screen info@crier.co. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:58:32 Yeah, you fucking nailed it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:58:33 Because if you don't, people will flood the YouTube with comments about what an idiot I am for getting that wrong. Now they'll have to find another reason. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:58:41 One of the things I love about this podcast so far? I don't see any comments. I'm not a comments guy. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:58:45 Oh, there's comments. I'm just not showing them. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:58:45 Good. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:58:45 Because it will derail my interview. This is my show. It's my interview. Some of the stuff that's been contributed here is okay. Dean Blundell (Guest) 00:59:00 That's the thing. I remember when Twitter made its appearance. I'm old enough in this world to be able to say, okay, I was on the radio and a big swinging dick at the time with a 40 share going, what is this Twitter machine here? And Kelly Beveridge, our lovely PR person, was like, you kind of got to do it. I'm like, all right. So 2009, I joined Twitter, and I'm like- I remember we finished a break, and I grabbed my phone, and I looked at Twitter, and I never really did that because I fucking hated my phone too. I got a cell phone in 2008, for fuck's sake. And all of a sudden, I'm on Twitter, and I'm like, Read this thing. What you just did sucked. You suck. And I'm like, no, I don't want to look at that. Same reason why I wouldn't allow that text screen to come in where it's like Text us at star, one, nine, two, and you can have your say, and we'll read your shit. I'm like, Fuck that. I don't want any of those people in my day. And now we live in a world where it's like, literally a fire hose of that shit towards us, so. But I've changed enough where it's like, I don't even pay attention to the comments anymore. We have a very robust comment section with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of comments, and some of them aren't good. Some of them are great. But that's another thing that's changed, where it's like, I've had to change with it and get better at being able to get feedback as I'm doing something, because we never had that radio. You could fucking finish a radio break back in 2004. Hang up your fucking headphones and go, I'm the king. That was the best. You would have no feedback for days, and it could have been shit. Like, seriously, that's what changed with that business. That's why a lot of those people are scared today, because they're afraid to fucking finish a break and then look at their phone and go, you suck. It's death for a lot of those people, that instant feedback. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:00:41 Actually, this person, Sean here, who has made a comment, he says I'm your only viewer, so he thought I was talking to him. But the truth of the matter is that this is going out on about six different platforms right now. So I want to say hi to Howard and Jen and Elaine, MG, Sherry, Ashley, and Big Chris, who's watching right now. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:01:00 Big Chris. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:01:02 And by the way, all of a sudden, I feel like the teacher at Romper Room saying hi to everybody. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:01:09 Well, that's the thing, right? And another change is, when you're doing something live on social media, you're fucking doing it. You can't get out of it. This is it. I mean, you might have one or two people watching, but you're not doing it live just because you want a live audience. This goes 74 different places, four or five different podcast catchers and fucking hosting services. Apple, Google, Spotify. I mean, these are people that don't understand how this works either. But they're like, I'm your only viewer. Which is fine. Sean's probably a good dude. But again, this is something that nobody understands. So you get in there. Let's say you're coming out of traditional space, and you're like, I'm going to do a podcast. You throw it up in your social media. You got a couple of thousand people on there, and one person watches, you get demoralized. But you're not doing it for that. And these are, like, things that people need to start understanding in this space. You're not doing it for a live audience. You're not doing it for one viewer. You're doing it for you. And then you're going to strategically put it in places where lots of people can listen or watch. That's what this space is. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:02:08 Yeah, I mean, this will be out in podcast form probably by the end of the week or early next week. I'll put one out so there will be a completely different listening experience that will happen just between the ears. I know people are watching right now. I personally find watching two guys talking about this boring, which is why I'll have this edited. I'll have it cut up. I'll put some nice music in it, repurpose it. We'll take it down from whatever it is, like 80 minutes. I'll probably drop it down to about 68 minutes. Just taking out umms and ahhs and your coughs and wheezes and other things. By the way, one thing I really like about Crier Media, and that's there's really no exclusivity because you own your IP. You can still run things the way you want. You're asked to contribute. That's all you're being asked to do is really to contribute to the ecosystem of Crier Media. But this idea of exclusivity is gone. I cannot believe that it still exists in this day and age. If you need to be compensated for exclusivity, what's the cost of it? Well, I think Joe Rogan has it, about $200 million. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:03:12 It makes sense. If someone said to us, hey, listen, we'll give you $200 million, but you're exclusive. You and I would both go, okay. But when it comes to this stuff, no. I mean, fuck, what's the one question people ask when you onboard them at Sound Off Media? What's the one question? Who owns it? Matt Cundill (Host) 01:03:28 How do I make money? Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:03:29 And then do I own this? And you're like, yeah, fuck, of course you own it. It's yours. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:03:35 Not only do you own it, you own the ad inventory. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:03:36 It's all yours. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:03:37 Yeah, that's all yours. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:03:39 And I'm shocked that we operated that way for a long time with NDAs and non competes and all the other bullshit and exclusivity and contracts. That was a fucking long haul for people to feel indentured to a company, a brand, a group of individuals. That's like one of the fucking greatest selling points of what we do, right? You know, this fuck, we talk about it all the time. We don't want to own anybody or anything other than the umbrella that enables people to fucking work and amplify and monetize. That's the only thing we care about. We want you to own your shit. Because when you own your shit, you're accountable for it in terms of quality and in terms of legality as well, which is kind of cool, right? Like, if you get into trouble with your shit, you get into trouble with your shit. We're just your agents. We just monetize your stuff. And that's really how we look at what we do, is that we're an agency on behalf of really good content providers. It's what we do. It's what we are. I just happen to be one of them. Doesn't that make Crier Media socialist cooperative? Sean Webb no, it just makes us fucking smart. Makes us smart to be able to give people the lift. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:04:42 Yeah. I don't know that just because it's a cooperative that it becomes socialist. Cooperation is not like something that's owned by the left. The hell is wrong with people? And I'm not singling you out, Sean. Thank you for listening. But this is where people are, like, this is cooperation. Cooperation is not like something that is owned by Jagmeet Singh. It's not. And sometimes Justin Trudeau will practice a little bit of it. And Pierre Poilievre never cooperates! Which may or may not be true, but still, people, man, isn't it awesome? Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:05:15 You can put out like this. We can be doing a podcast on Daffodils right now, and somebody like, yeah, that's nice until you get a yellow one and an orange one. And the yellow reminds me of Justin Trudeau is a total fucking coward. And the orange one is Jagmeet Singh and that NDP fucking commie. No worries. I wanted to rib him after his comments. I love it, Seany, but yeah, we live in that world, don't we? Which, again, makes it really hard for old cats like me. There are people that do content now that they get a bad comment or they get some shit feedback or they get a bad tweet from someone and they're like, I'm not cut out for this. I fucking look for it. I invite it, I ask for it because I know how this fucking machine works. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:05:57 Yeah. So this is a cooperative. And I really like that, by the way. I'll tell you a good story. Nathan Baylor. What's his podcast? Minimal Filters, I think it's called. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:06:07 Yeah. On the network. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:06:09 So what happened was he came to me, I helped him get started. Didn't charge him, didn't put him on my network, nothing like that. He disappears. Next thing you know, I'm getting an order from you saying, hey, can you put this podcast up? Right? So he basically left me and then went to you. And then I called him up and said, now you're back with me. Right? Why don't you just come to me, and I would have put your podcast- what are you doing? Because I never wanted to get into a- I didn't want my company to be competing podcast wise with your company. I know, you do more than just a podcast. You're actually more into YouTube and more into the video side of things, which is great because you're ahead of the game. But I didn't want to be like, oh, we're going to fight over the personalities and pull them from A to B. Well, you get something better over here with Dean or you get something better with Matt. That's not it. That's not how it works. And to that, exclusivity is not something that will ever work with, I think, a lot of creators starting up, unless of course, you're getting a big check, at which point we say, take the check. But if you're getting $45,000 a year from Bell and they're not letting you start a podcast, I would rethink that. I think maybe you could maybe give up that salary and you could start to build a podcast. And how long would it be if you've got a great idea before you make that money back and more? Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:07:23 Do you know how many people that work for those media outlets, traditional media outlets like Rogers, Bell, Quebecor, all those companies? Pattison? Do you know how many of them have anonymous podcasts on their own? Matt Cundill (Host) 01:07:35 Lots. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:07:36 Hundreds. And they're like deathly afraid that their employer, that gives them barely livable wage is going to find out. Kids, everybody, listen very carefully to Uncle Dean and Uncle Matt. It's over. Go do whatever the fuck you want. Press the issue. Do whatever you want to do with your life. Do whatever you want to do with your content under your own name. Legally, they have no fucking foot to stand on, and they're going to turn the lights out soon anyway. And if you don't get started, if you want to be in this space, like if you're one of those people like my buddy Ian, who left traditional media and became an accountant at the age of 43, which is awesome, by the way, I'm not laughing because I look down on it. I'm laughing because it's like, fuck, anybody can do anything they want. But if you want to stay in this game, man, you got to cooperate with people. You need to find people that have the ability to be able to push that rock down the hill for you to get it started. And the rest is really up to individuals. But to your point, at some point it is going to be very, very apparent to individuals that are in that traditional space and they are, believe me, all and you know this dude all asking these questions like when is the end? When is it over? At what point is this industry not this industry anymore? What point are they going to turn things off, stop servicing or funding certain things? Because it is coming and they can lie to you and tell you that it ain't. But every truth that has been predicted about that industry being in negative territory across the board has come true every year for the past basically ten years. When it comes to jobs availability, the way that they post jobs, how much money is available for any job in that space, it's a joke. And people are getting paid $25 to do a four hour radio show. It's just the way that that market is. And I can't tell anybody. I don't know if you're like me where you're like, I hate talking about this because it sounds so negative. These are just facts, right? These are just facts that you have to fucking dig out. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:09:35 I have to correct you. $18 for a six hour show. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:09:42 Oh, is it $18? Matt Cundill (Host) 01:09:44 I know a company that does it at $18. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:09:47 What are you getting for $18 over 6 hours? Matt Cundill (Host) 01:09:49 6 hours of voice tracks? Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:09:51 And how good are those going to be? Matt Cundill (Host) 01:09:52 Because I'm willing to take they are not good. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:09:55 They are bad. Very bad. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:09:57 Coming up next, your local weather. You know what? You can get that right here in 3 seconds. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:10:03 That's sad. I mean, you get what you pay for. That's always been the case specifically in that space. But fucking that's $18. That's a deal. Should do it. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:10:12 Well, I'll continue to highlight the great stuff that radio does on the Sound Off podcast because that's what we set out to do. And there is, by the way, lots of great radio being done, just not everywhere. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:10:23 So smaller markets. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:10:24 Yeah, I'll tell you. Yes, I had Randy Chase on a few weeks ago and her and Vinny are doing a great show. And it's clear across Alberta, it's on the Stingray stations, but again, it's spread out across about a bunch of radio stations. 18. Some stations may or may not have anybody in them necessarily, but still a good show. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:10:41 Just do more of that. Matt Cundill (Host) 01:10:42 Yeah, I think radio has realized that they need some personalities and they need teams. And if you roll them out to a few markets, hey, I'm fine with it. I'm fine getting Fearless Fred on the radio in the evening. I'm fine getting Tyler and lynch from C Fox for 2 hours. I think you can do a very nice voice track show when it's two people together and you're doing content, it doesn't matter that it's not live. I got past that anyway. There's some talent out there that can do that very, very well. There are some who could do it very badly. This guy, for instance. I could not do it. Know, some people were weak at it, some people were very good at it. And it really just depends what you put on the radio and when. But you need to be developing talent. And that's, I think, really what you've been saying for the last little while. We're not developing a lot of talent. We will develop your talent here at Cryer Mediate, though. Dean Blundell (Guest) 01:11:29 Yeah, that's the goal. You want to bring in individuals and people that want to be able to fucking move that mark right for themselves. And if you can find everything in life, it may be finished with a little existential stuff, but everything in life is what you fucking make it. And there are lots of answers out there for people. Like, tons of answers out there for people. We're one of them. We're a really good one. And there's nobody like us out there when it comes to helping people. Transition into a profitable space for yourself and owning your stuff. And I think that there are solutions. And I think, as I said earlier, it's not the industry of assets that is the problem. It's how they're used. Radio is still fucking super vibrant. It can be, and it's just being used wrong. And if you're in that business and if you're in a traditional space, radio, television, print, the last part of the equation to be able to stay in that industry happy is, are you working with good people? Right? Are you working with people that promote you, that want you, that need you, make you feel like you're part of the process, make you feel important, that enable you in your work to feel fucking really good about what you're doing? Are they treating you like a partner? Because if they're not, then you don't want to work for them or with them. This space is so much bigger than that space now. It is. I mean, independent content across this country dwarfs nationally syndicated, what you would consider news outlets or legitimate legacy news outlets dwarfs it. But there's, like, fucking 5 million of us, and everybody's doing their own shit. Cooperate, work together, find solutions with great groups of people, and you will be okay. But, fuck, you got to get started. Now, I don't know if you've thought about this. We've done a couple of studies. If you're not in a position to be able to serve yourself digitally in a big, bad way, as a brand, as a company, as an individual, in the next, again, in the time that it takes to transition out of that space again, you're in trouble, too. So get started, kids. Get started. And we're here for all of it. Info@crier.co. Any questions you have, happy to help. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 01:11:29 The Sound Off podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski. Social Media by Courtney Krebsbach. Another great creation from the Soundoff Media Company, there's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Jimmy Fink has one of radio's most storied careers. It includes legendary call letters like WHFS, WPLJ (when it was an AOR station), WXRK (K-Rock, the station where Howard Stern worked in the 90's through to Sirius) and now 107.1 The Peak. It is also the station that brought Jimmy back to radio after he left it in the late 90's. In this episode you will hear about Jimmy's early days in radio, how he led his family business for a brief period in the 90's, why he left WPLJ, and what it was like to follow Howard Stern. We also dig into what makes the Peak a compelling listen, and why the station has quietly grown a world wide audience. Finally, no 2023 interview would be complete without discussing what impact the pandemic had on Jimmy's work. (Spoiler: He doesn't feel a need to go back to the studio) It was an earlier episode with Arielle Nissenblatt that conjured up memories of this cool station I would listen to on my trips down I-87 into New York. Arielle grew up listening to the station and contributes a question as well. Jimmy gave a great interview with Westchester Magazine a few years ago and listed his top five favourite albums of all time as: The Beatles (aka White Album), The Beatles Close to the Edge, Yes The Dark Side of the Moon & The Wall, Pink Floyd Les Miserables (1987 Original Broadway Cast) Band on the Run, Paul McCartney & Wings We are going to assume that #1 has not changed because he had the White Album as his backdrop. And we are not talking about the backdrop that Zooms let's you add as a filter - but a white backdrop with the Beatles. After the mics were turned off, Jimmy spoke to me fondly about what his children are up to these days. We can confirm that there is music, media and business in the blood. Rob Fink is currently working at Spotfiy with the Spotify for Artists program, to help them build their careers through monetization. His daughter Lucie builds brands and is an influencer on Instagram, and has a solid YouTube Page. Her twin sister Allie works as a trader in New York. Lucie made an attempt to try out Allie's job for a day. I made mention of a song that I had heard on the Peak while I was making dinner. The song is called "Psychos" by Jenny Lewis. Sounds like your favourite song by Fleetwood Mac... Jimmy makes playlists on Spotify... Here's one that is a tribute to the late WPLJ: TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:00:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about Podcast and Broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:13 I did an episode last year where I asked Arielle Nissenblatt what station she listened to growing up. Arielle Nissenblatt 00:00:18 I remember loving The Peak 107-1 since high school. It's the kind of radio station that every time you turn it on, you're like, wow, they get it right every single time. Like every song, you're like, they pulled that out of nowhere. And yet it is perfect for this moment right now. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:31 107-1 The Peak is now a regular listen in my car and on my smart speaker. Oh, I've got Spotify. But honestly, I still love music being curated for me. I love to be surprised and wowed by the songs that come on the radio.I've reached out to Afternoon Drive host, The legendary Jimmy Fink, not only to talk about the great radio that gets made at the Peak, but also his remarkable career that is now into its 7th decade. With nearly 20 years of that being at the Peak. You're going to hear some legendary New York City call letters and Arielle will be by later in the show to ask a question to Jimmy about the station she listened to growing up. If you are a fan of the AAA radio format or what used to be AOR, take a moment to connect yourself to the station and give it a listen. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:01:14 If you want to get The Peak on your phone, just text Peak to 87301. We'll send you back a link for The Peak app. And you can also go to 1071 The peak.com to listen to me wherever you are, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And of course, if you're in the New York area, you can listen to me on the old FM radio at 107.1 The Peak. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:37 Okay, here we go. Jimmy Fink joins me from his home studio in Scarsdale, New York. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:44 Where is Westchester County in its relationship to New York? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:01:47 I'm about 23 miles north of the city and we're the suburbs of New York City. And I've actually lived in Westchester all my life except when I went to college. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:58 And college was American University? Correct. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:02:01 I graduated from American, but the first two years I went to the University of Arizona in Tucson, then I transferred to American. My wife and I actually transferred at the same time. She was going to Southampton College at the end of Long Island, and our best friend Donald Levy was at American, and we all decided to transfer together and be there with him. So the last two years I went to American and did college radio there. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:29 Why did you want to study communications? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:02:31 I was a drama student at University of Arizona. I really did not like the drama department there all that much. I found it very tedious memorizing lines for plays, and I really switched to communications after I already had a job in radio. So I didn't really intend to be a communications major. I graduated with a degree in speech communications from American. But that's because when I got to American, I transferred in the middle of the year. So I started there in January, and then at the end of the semester, I came back home to New York and got a summer job at WABC FM, which turned into WPLJ. That was my first job in radio. And then when I went back to American at the end of that summer, I changed my major. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:24 And what about working at the campus station, WAMU? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:03:28 WAMU Am. Steve Leeds, who just recently retired from Sirius, was my station manager. He's my colleague. He's the same age as me. I mean, he didn't work at the school. He was a student just like me, but he ran the radio station there. And WAMU FM is the big radio station in Washington, DC. The Am where we worked was carrier current. So the only way you could hear it is if you plugged in your radio in your dorm room. Otherwise, we were broadcasting to ourselves. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:04:04 That was such a weird technology, by the way, carrier current. This is the only other radio station I've ever known that has had carrier current aside from my campus station, which was the same technology. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:04:15 Yeah. What it means for those people who don't know what that is, it means that there's no real broadcast tower sending out the signal. The signal actually goes through the electric system of the university, and in order to get the signal, you have to plug in your radio into the electric socket on the wall, and that's where the signal would come in through, and that's what carrier current is. And we had a beautiful radio studio at the time, early 1970s, with a board and tape machines and turntables. And I went back to see the college radio station several years ago, and now it's just like a closet with a computer and a microphone, and there's no longer a board or a studio or anything like that. So I would hope that most college radio stations are not that, because I always tell people, if you want to go into broadcasting and you get to do college radio, that's just like the greatest. You get to do things in college radio that you'll probably never do in your actual broadcast career. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:20 Did you know there'd be a job waiting for you when you went back to New York? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:05:24 Here's what happened. I was just a kid into music. I called WABC FM when I was home for this summer and to make a request, and I was connected to a vice president of ABC by mistake. And he started asking me all kinds of questions about music and why I wanted to hear what I was requesting, which happened to be a Rod Stewart song and a Van Morrison song. And he said, you know, you have a pretty nice voice. Why don't you come down here and make a tape and maybe you will put you on the air. Okay, great. I was into music. I knew everything about music since the Beatles came out in the early 60s. That sort of changed my life in a way. So I went down on a Wednesday and I never actually made a tape. And he said, well, just come back on Saturday and be on the air for a couple of hours on WABC FM, 50,000 Watt FM New York City radio station. So I did that. I had a summer job there. I worked all summer. In addition to that Saturday afternoon show, some of the staff was changing, and he put me on the air to fill in while they were figuring out exactly what to do. And at the end of the summer, as I say, some of the staff was changing. And I realized the staffs at radio stations change quite often. And it doesn't seem practical for me to not finish my college education in order to take a full time job at this radio station where I had already seen half the staff leave during the course of that summer. And so I told him, I'm going to go back to school. And I did go back. That's when I went back to school. And I worked at the college radio station and also worked at a station called WHFS in Bethesda, Maryland. Pretty famous classic rock station from the past. And then when I came home in January for Christmas vacation, for the semester break or whatever, he said, I have some work for you, so I wanted to work during your vacation. So I did do that. And then when it came time to go back to school at the end of that semester break, I kept a weekend job at WABC FM in New York and commuted back and forth from Washington DC to New York every weekend to keep my job. And that job wound up lasting for about 1314 years. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:07:53 What was the proverbial attitude about FM radio at that time? Because here's a phone call that goes the wrong way. It's a request that goes to a vice president who immediately wants to trap you for research, then wants to trap you into doing work at the station. So what was the attitude about FM? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:08:10 Well, FM was in its infancy then, I would say. This guy was Alan Shaw. He was the vice president of ABC, all the owned and operated FM stations. There were seven of them across the country in all the major cities in the United States. And he had this network that was called the Love Network that was basically taped programs that were rock and roll. But people like Tony Pig, Brother John, Michael Kiskuna, these are people who were doing these tapes that were circulated around to all the radio stations. And he decided he wanted to get away from that tape situation and go live. It was in its infancy, and I can best describe it by saying WABC FM was on the same floor as Wabcam, the major power top 40 station in New York City, on the same floor, just around the corner of the hallway. And we had engineers at that time, and when the engineers were working in the Am side on WABC, they would say, oh, I have to go on the air. But when they came to the FM side, they would say, oh, I have to go over on FM, as if to say FM wasn't on the air. Also the way WABC was. So FM was in its infancy, just beginning to develop a strong audience. So it was a great time to get into radio on the FM side. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:42 A lot of the times when you did interviews, you would interview rock stars, and of course you still do interviews, but you'll ask them maybe about their early years. So I'll ask you about your very early years, but growing up in a family that had a bakery. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:09:55 Yeah, my family was in the bread business. It wasn't a corner bakery. It was like a bread factory. At the height of its business, we did about $65 million a year in business. We served all of the New York City school system with bread. We were a wholesale bakery, so we served restaurants, hospitals, hotels, schools, concert venues, Yankee Stadium, and yeah, it was a bread factory. When you say bakery, people think maybe it's like a little corner bake shop. And it really wasn't that at all. It was 300,000 equipment making thousands of loaves of bread and rolls every single day. So I had probably thought that that was my destiny. And it was actually because for the first seven years of my radio career, from 1970 to 1977, I also worked at the bakery, I guess you might say on the corporate level. I wasn't down there kneading the dough or anything like that, but I was involved in my family's business. My dad died when I was 16, so it was my brothers and myself and some other people. We had merged with various companies over the course of the years. And that brings me around to in the 1980s, my brother and I decided that there were too many partners in the company as a result of several things. One was that we merged with companies over the years, and the officers of those companies came in as officers of our company. And also my grandfather used to pay, like the accountant and the lawyers in stock. And so by the time the 80s rolled around, those accountants and lawyers had died off. They left their stock to their kids, and there was a million little shareholders of the company. And so my brother and I engineered a buyout of everyone, and we took the company back into the fink family, and it was just my brother and I. And also around that same time, I went full time on radio. So that's why I say I worked there on the corporate level. I wasn't really involved so much in the day to day operations of Fink Bacon Corporation after the late 1970s. But the company, as I say, was very large and successful for a while, but as time went on, it became more and more difficult to operate a big bread factory in the city of New York because of unions, taxes, the price of gas and electricity, and the company was failing. And so in the year 2000, we sold it. We sold the company, and the person we sold it to only lasted in business for 18 months after the company had been in business for over 100 years. And that was because of the current economic conditions of the time in New York City and doing business in that environment. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:01 Does that include 911? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:13:03 It was right around 911. When they finally went out of business. There was 911, 2001. So we sold it in 2000, 2001. Shortly after 911, they went out of business. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:15 Tell me about your career as it sort of pivots into the 1980s and you're in New York City, and along comes MTV, and most of the things that you were doing on the radio were then going to go to television. Did that change any of the things you did or the relationship with artists? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:13:33 Or did video kill the radio stars? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:37 I mean, it's an attempted murder. Jimmy. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:13:41 All throughout my radio career, there have always been changes. I remember when fax machines came in, all of a sudden that was something new, and we started taking requests by fax. So MTV came and okay, so people had another way of watching music and being turned on to music. And of course, later on, as the internet became more prominent, streaming services started coming up, napster and all that kind of things. There's always been many different ways of listening to music. And I always tell my audience, the fact that you have chosen to listen to my show is humbling and flattering because you have many different options of ways to listen. Certainly MTV, it was a visual thing, and it sort of brought the visual aspect of music more to the forefront, rather than just having the visual aspect of going to a concert. Now you could see TVs and people started making videos, and it also gave us more to talk about on the radio because the artists were more accessible. And friends of mine were the people on MTV. Mark, mark Goodman, who's still around on Sirius, he was a friend and also worked at PL J. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:15:00 Tell me about your time at Krock and how you got on board. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:15:04 In the early 1980s, PL J decided to go into a different direction. They wanted to be more top 40. I remember we had a meeting one day. Jim kerr was there, I was there, and they were describing how they were going to change the format. It wasn't going to be album oriented rock any longer. It was going to include Lionel Ritchie and Michael Jackson and more of the pop area. And I remember Jim Kerr held up a piece of paper and said, in other words, this represents the format of the radio station, this piece of paper. Then he tore the paper in half and threw away one half of it and held up that little other half and said, this is what the new radio station is going to be. And so, yeah, that was the first time I experienced and really realized that a radio station is not your friend. It's a business. And there's a very strong possibility that you might wake up tomorrow and your favorite radio station will all of a sudden be, for example, a Spanish talk station. If the owners of that business and that radio station decide that that's the direction that they want to go in, and then they can make more money doing that than playing music and having the personalities that you love, it's an insecure business. And I'm very lucky to have worked for three radio stations in a long career with a pretty long, long life in each one. I mean, I was 1314 years at PL J, over ten years at Kroc. I'm here at the peak now almost 20 years. It was 19 years this summer. Next year it'll be 20. But after PLJ changed its format and they got rid of most of us, I continued to work for ABC, which owned PL J, of course, at the time, and the ABC Radio Network. And I was producing a show for them called The Continuous History of Rock and Roll, which was on about 150 radio stations and Armed Forces Radio all around the world. It was a weekly program, hour long, with five 1 minute segments that ran during the during the week in order to promote the weekend show. That was an hour long show, and that really is what got me into intense interviews with many, many rock personalities. Not only rock personalities, but I also would be interviewing politicians and sports stars. That's where I really honed my interview technique. So for a couple of years, I continued to do that for ABC after PLJ, after I was not on the air on PL J anymore. And then in July of 1985, live Aid Weekend, kroc was going to come on the air. Their actually first broadcast was over. Their first thing as a station was to broadcast the live aid shows. And I was on vacation out in the Hamptons with my wife and got a call from Pat Evans, who was a woman, patricia Evans, who was the program director of Kroc, and she said, Would you come over? So I left my vacation came over, and yeah, wound up working at Kroc for ten years through the 1980s up to 1997. A little bit more than ten years, actually, from 85 to 97. And that really changed me, because when Howard Stern came to Kroc, it changed the way I approached radio. My show was on after Howard's. He was supposed to be on from six to ten, and I was on from ten to two. But if you listen to Howard, he never got off at ten. He would keep going until maybe 1045 or sometimes even eleven. Nevertheless, my show started at ten. So 10:00 I came into the studio and I became part of the Howard Stern Show. All of a sudden, it wasn't really an announcer thing anymore. You were more like a real person when you were with Howard. And never in my whole career, after being on the radio for 20 years, already did more people say to me, hey, I heard you with Howard today. I heard Howard was busting your balls or doing this. And if you're in the room with Howard and you see the twinkle in his eye and he is just like a friend of yours busting your balls, he's not trying to hurt you or be vindictive in any kind of way. It's just fun. And it was fun. And at the same time, you saw the things that Howard was doing on the radio, and I saw the things that Howard was doing on the radio, and I said to myself, well, what am I going to do that's going to be more outrageous? And what I'm trying to say is it basically gave me the opportunity to become more myself and be a little bit more outrageous, because I know that I was on the station where Howard Stern was, so nobody's going to care what I do when he's doing his stick all morning. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:20:19 What did you have to do to make that transition? I'm thinking, is it a block of spots and then everybody sort of piles out and you pile in? Or is it a record? How do you make that transition? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:20:30 What do you mean? The transition from the Howard Stearns show to the Jimmy Fink show? Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:20:33 At some point. How do you make that transition? Do you have a record ready to go? Is it commercials? Like they're clearing out and you're coming in? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:20:41 Yeah, at the end, finally, when Howard was over, he would play a record. And during the course of while that record was being played, fred and Gary would basically be cleaning out the studio from all of this stuff that they had left around. And by the time the song was over, I was sitting down in that chair where Howard was sitting, and I did my show. But at the same time, I had just been on with Howard, just talking regular, not being an announcer, not saying this was, that is, and talking about the Beatles, blah, blah, blah, whatever. It got me to just be more of myself and be more real on the air. And that really has lasted all of this time, where when you're on the radio, even though maybe thousands of people are listening to you, you're only talking to one person, the person who's listening, you're not addressing the whole of Madison Square Garden like you're on stage. You have to be one on one with people. It's one thing that working with Howard made me realize. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:43 Tell me a little bit about the 90s, because we weren't quite into napster yet. Music was still really confined to radio stations and record stores and whatever you purchased, and it was a hard, physical piece that you owned. So throughout the 90s, you who were going to be interviewing artists, you were the gateway to connecting listeners to the artist. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:22:11 Yeah, and through my show that I did, when I was worked for Krock, I also did another nationally syndicated show. It was called Rock Watch. It was basically like American Top 40 of album rock, that kind of program. It was distributed and produced by United Stations Radio Network. It was also on, I guess, maybe 100 some stations. But yeah, music was always changing. It was changing. Before I was into it, before I was into it, there was Frank Sinatra or whatever, and then came The Beatles, and after The Beatles, then came all this corporate rock, what you might call corporate rock journey and Foreigner, Sticks, Cheap Trick, Cheap Trick, bands like that. And I remember one time I was doing a show with Foreigner and their second album wasn't selling as well as their first album was, and the record company wasn't really happy about that. And the same thing happened with Boston, the band Boston, their first album, was massive. I think at that time, maybe it had sold 1215 million copies and the second one only sold 8 million copies. Meanwhile, if a record had sold 8 million copies today, you'd be like a star. You'd be amazingly huge. So music has always changed. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:23:30 How did you find it, that grunge music could live alongside all the other music that had come before it? It felt like a weird combination. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:23:38 Yeah, it was. But you know what? Krock was a classic rock station. They didn't really play it. They didn't really play it. They pretty much ignored it. Ignored it. I remember one time someone was talking about Green Day, the band Green Day, and I said something like, Green Day is like, down here. And I held my hands down by my knees and then I would held my other hand, like, over my head and say, the Beatles and Queen and The Who and the Rolling Stones and yes, they're up here. Of course, that was just because something else was coming into music. And the same thing with New wave. The Joe Jackson's and the Elvis Costello's. When they came in, it was another kind of a change. So it's always been an evolving thing, and I'm happy to be at a radio station now which plays all of that. We go all the way back to the Beatles, and sometimes on a special show that I have called After Six on the Peak. That's basically like free form. I might even go before the Beatles sometimes with a song or two, but I also have to remember that the Beatles were 55, 60 years ago. So you can't go really too far back, but we also play everything all through seventy s, eighty s, ninety s. And music continues now, and there are still some great songs coming out now, so there's always been an evolvement of music, and I'm happy to be working for a radio station that recognizes Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:23:38 Transcription of the Sound Off podcast is powered by the Podcast Super Friends, five podcast producers who get together to discuss podcasting. Sharpen your podcast and creation skills by following the show on the Sound Off podcast, YouTube or Facebook page. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:23:38 The Soundoff Podcast supports Podcasting 20, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one@newpodcastaps.com Matt Cundill (Host) 00:23:38 How does One prepare to interview Paul McCartney? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:25:49 Here's the thing of me, I'm very prepared when I go into an interview, I guess I could tell you a couple of stories. Like, I have had these books, the Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll and various Rolling Stones books that they published, and I always would do a lot of research before an interview. So I was in the PLJ studio one day and I had scheduled an interview with Frank Zappa. So I had these books laid out on the table, and I'm just researching some things so that I try to want to ask him some questions that he's not asked all the time. And you get those questions by doing some research and finding out some things that maybe not everybody knows about various artists that you're going to interview. When all of a sudden, as I'm taking notes and looking through the Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll, frank Zappa walks in the room and looks down at me looking at the book, and his attitude was, oh, great, you had to look me up in order to ask me some questions like you didn't know who I was. I'm always very prepared. Well, when it came to Paul McCartney, as you just asked me about, I happened to be invited to go to a sound check of a show that he was doing at Madison Square Garden, and a lot of media people, radio and television personalities or whatever, were in the room as Paul was doing a sound check. And after the sound check was over and he had just played a few songs and it was pretty impromptu and informal, somebody from Paul's staff said, okay, so who was supposed to interview Paul McCartney? And I looked around and nobody was raising their hand. So I raised my hand, and they said, okay, come on, let's go. And I thought, oh, shit. Because I did not prepare for an interview. I had no idea I was going to be interviewing Paul McCourney. Of course, there probably isn't that much about Paul McCourney that I didn't know because I was like a beetle freak for years. But nevertheless, when I got backstage and we were in the green room sitting on a couch together, my mind was racing. I'm looking at his fingernails. I'm looking at his shoes. And I did a not very good interview that lasted very short time, maybe about ten minutes. And I was a little disappointed in myself. But I always chalked it up to the fact that, well, you weren't prepared. There was a few questions that came to my mind, but I'm sitting here next to Paul McCartney, somebody who I've idolized for so many years, and I had trouble focusing. Then about 25 years later, my daughter was in the Hamptons, and she went into a restaurant, and Paul is sitting there with his current wife, Nancy. And Nancy happens to be a friend of a friend of ours, so there was a connection there. So my daughter Lucy went up to their table and sort of didn't pay too much attention to Paul. She said, Are you Nancy? And Nancy would say yes. And Lucy said, Well, I'm friends with Debbie Wecker, who's our friend, and she knows each other. And they chatted for a little while. And then Nancy says, this is my husband Paul. And my daughter Lucy looks at Paul and she goes, oh, yeah, I know who you are. My dad has a picture with you. And Paul. Says who's? Your dad? And she goes, oh, it's Jimmy Fink. And he goes, oh, yeah, sure. I don't know if he really remembered me. He might have known me because he was in New York often enough to listen to the radio. So, yeah, there's my Paul McCartney story. At least one of them. There's a few times when I had close encounters with Paul. There was another time when he was at Radio City Music Hall doing some kind of event in the afternoon, and I was up the block at the Krock Studios, and somebody said, well, Paul's going to be at Radio City. So I grabbed an album sized photograph that I have of Paul from the Ram album, and I ran down to Radio City Music Hall and got him to sign it in the lobby. Just a simple autograph. And it was cool. I don't know, especially if you've seen any of these recent TV shows like McCartney one, two, Three, where he's with that Rick Rubin, the record producer. And he's a genius. He's an absolute musical genius. I recently saw something on TikTok with Paul where he is picking out the guitar riffs of Blackbird, his song Blackbird, and then. He starts talking about, you know, it's based on the music of Bach, and he starts picking out some Bach thing on his guitar that's very similar to Blackbird. And it was just like, Paul is a genius, really is. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:31:01 Why does the Peak work so well? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:31:03 When The Peak first came on the radio in 2004, the classic rock radio stations were limiting themselves to playing like a total of 300 songs. If you listen to the classic rock radio station in New York, you would think that The Who or Jethro Tall or Queen only made like five or six songs, the ones that they play over and over and over again. And when The Peak came on the air, we started playing deep tracks, not just The Stairway to Heaven. As a matter of fact, during the course of the 20 years of The Peak, we've probably played Stairway to Heaven less than 20 times on our station. We don't play it, generally speaking, and we don't play a lot of artists. I play them during the free form after six section of my program or in another part of the show. That the part of the radio station we call the Ten to 1010 great songs from one great year. But in the regular course of the format of The Peak, you don't hear Bob Seager, you don't hear Billy Joel, you don't hear Journey Sticks or any of those artists that exist in classic rock radio stations. And I think people were just perking up their ears and realizing that music didn't stop in the 1990s. It keeps going on and there's a lot of new music still, and the combination of playing those songs from the plus still playing brand new stuff works. And it works at several radio stations around America. The Peak is not a unique format. It's called AAA adult Album Alternative. And there are stations in every city that have that sort of format. It is a format. It's not free form. I don't just go on the radio and start picking things out of my head. It is a format. And when I say format, songs are in a certain rotation and it works. And I don't know why no New York City big radio station has picked up on it the way stations in maybe like Chicago where big stations are, or in Philadelphia. But I'm happy that they have it, because that leaves The Peak in the suburbs of New York City to pick up the ball. We're a local radio station in the suburbs. We exist in the shadow of these big New York City radio stations, in the shadow of CBS FM and Z 100 and W Light, the light rock radio station. I was amazed when I turn on the light rock radio station and they're playing Worlds Apart by Journey. I never thought of that as light rock, but I guess it is. It's probably just a misnomer that they call it light because it's not all that light all the time. But I think The Peak works because we are into the music that we play and it's always not so much that's what you hear on the radio. I remember I was listening to Z 100 once and someone called in and they put this listener on the air and the listener was saying, what was that song you played two or three songs ago? And the Saki goes, I don't know, we don't listen to the music. They're doing their stick, whatever, their radio stick, and the music is sort of incidental. It's almost like playing a commercial and that's not what it is all about on The Peak. And that's why The Peak works. And The Peak, by the way, for those of you listening to this podcast, is not just a suburban New York radio station. I guess maybe our largest audience is streaming. We have an app, The Peak app, that you can just text Peak to 87301. We'll send you back a link that you can put The Peak app on your phone or of course, you can just go to The Peak's website, 171 The peak.com, and listen to The Peak wherever you are. And we have it's very interesting. There was a station in San Francisco called KFOG. They were a similar formatted station to The Peak, and a few years ago they changed format, just like I was talking about before. You can wake up one morning and KFOG is no more. It's something else. It's not playing the things you want. It doesn't have the personalities on that you have grown to know and love. But these listeners of KFOG, they call themselves Fogheads and they have a Facebook page called Fogheads in Exile and those people somehow found The Peak. And we have this enclave of an audience in San Francisco, the former listeners of KFOG that now listen to The Peak even though it's not their local radio station. And they hear an advertisement for suburban carting that you can get a dumpster delivered to your house here in the suburbs of New York, and they're in San Francisco listening, but they don't care because they like the music we play and they like our approach to the music. So that's also something that's very humbling and flattering. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:36:19 You and I are recording this podcast. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:36:21 Via Squadcast and we have a listener question from Ariel Nissanblad, who is the. Community manager at Squadcast. She's also been a lifelong listener of The Peak. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:36:30 Okay. Arielle Nissenblatt 00:36:31 Hello. Sound off, Podcast. And hello Jimmy Think. Please excuse the sound quality situation here. I am recording this while walking back from a soccer game in Brooklyn, New York, so you may hear the sounds of the city. However, I am originally from Westchester, which is why I am so familiar with The Peak and I love The Peak so much. I talk about it all the time. So thank you, Matt, for allowing me to ask a question. Here is my question for Jimmy Think. How did you come up with the Ten to 1010 great songs from one great era? I would love to know how did it start? And it's just so unique to me. And if I need to explain it, I would love to explain it. It's every day at 10:00 a.m and 10:00 P.m. Peak chooses ten songs and sometimes commercials and sometimes other audio clips and shares it on the radio and it's just the best. And I tune in and I stream it from everywhere. So I would love to know about the origins of the Ten at Ten. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:37:22 Well, thank you so much. The Ten at Ten is not my original idea. There are, I think, maybe three or four versions of the Ten at Ten that are done by radio stations around the country. So when I say it's not my idea, but nevertheless it is my little baby here in New York. It is ten great songs from one great year. But it's not just one great year, it's from that very month. Ten songs from a specific month of a specific year anywhere starting in 1964, all the way up. We only go up to the year 2000, although actually 1999, although we have had discussions about now that 1999 is like 24 years ago already, expanding it into the reason why we haven't done that yet is because it's very tedious to locate all of the other elements of the Ten to Ten. Not the music. We have the music. That's not the problem. The problem is what you just referred to, like the commercials and the video clips and clips from movies and stuff like that and sourcing those, although with YouTube it's easy to find them, but it's very tedious to download them and put them into the thing for the Ten to Ten. So the Ten to Ten, the first section of the Ten to Ten is the news of that particular month, of that particular year. The news headlines, those are pretty easy to find. And then comes the ten songs mixed in with, like you said, clips from movies, TV shows, TV show theme songs, commercials from that month of that year. And then finally the back announce, which also tells you what the ten songs you heard were. And a little fun fact about each one of those songs, those are written by me. In the past month I had Chat GPT actually write a Ten to Ten for me and I found several errors in Chat GPT. I left the errors in I told the audience that Chat GPT wrote this particular Ten at Ten, it wasn't me who did it. So I left the errors in to show that Chat GPT isn't exactly perfect. Not saying that I'm perfect, but Chat GPT was not perfect. When I source the songs from the ten to ten, I basically look at the hot 100 or the hot 200 albums from that that were on the charts of that particular month of that particular year and pick out some songs that I know were being played on the radio, because I was on the radio during most of those months and years and put it together into a kind of entertaining show. People really like the Ten. At ten it's on at 10:00 A.m and 10:00 P.m on the peak New York time. And on Sunday afternoon, starting at 04:00 New York time, we play back all week's, ten attends. So that goes for 5 hours, takes up 5 hours of programming on a Sunday and gives the opportunity for the radio station to not have a live person there. Take a break. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:40:41 So that was Arielle Nissanblatt, who, by the way, is really great at recommending podcasts to people. I had her on my show and she told me about this radio station, The Peak, and when I can, I always ask my device to play it and in comes the radio station and it's this mix of music, of songs that I've heard before, kind of forgotten about. You mentioned the who? You don't play the same who song all the time. But I had to go back and re remember a song pure. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:41:13 The title is Pure and Easy Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:15 Pure and Easy Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:41:16 Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:16 Thank you. I had to reacquaint myself with this stuff and I had worked at AOR Radio at Showman Montreal, but just some songs had sort of slipped away in the 2000 3000 record universe as stations began to pare down. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:41:32 Yeah, as I said earlier, we don't play a lot of Billy Joel, but the after six section of my program, which is this sort of free form hour of music, yesterday was Billy Joel's birthday. It might not be yesterday when you're listening to this podcast, but it was May 9, is that right? Yeah, May 9. And I got an email from somebody who said I was great hearing those Billy Joel songs, including the ones that I didn't even know. And I thought to myself, with God, I thought I was playing pretty popular Billy Joel tunes. And I was pretty amazed that someone really liked the show but didn't know some of the songs because they were all pretty familiar in that after six section of my program, which is on Monday through Friday at 06:00 P.m., between six and seven, it's sort of like a free form hour. We usually have a theme or I'll play one particular artist or songs that are all about the same thing. Like for example, on Monday of this past week, which once again might not be right when you're listening to this podcast, but we had the Coronation of the King over the weekend and so I played all of these kind of King songs on Monday. And that's the unique part of the after six section of the program. You never know what you're going to hear on there and get to play songs that are a little bit deeper, but at the same time, I try not to go off the deep end. I don't want to be too self indulgent, just play songs that I know and love, but I know that will be completely unfamiliar to everybody. So I have to mix it up a little bit just to bring everybody in. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:11 It feels like when you're putting the songs together, that it's era or the time doesn't seem to matter. Yesterday I heard it's. The end of the World as We Know It by REM But I was also served up a new song as well, and it was Jenny Lewis psychos Jenny. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:43:28 Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:28 And I loved it. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:43:30 Yeah, it's great. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:31 I had to go back on the website to say, who sang that and where do I get this? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:43:35 Yeah, it sort of reminds me a little bit of it has a part on it where the melody is actually very similar to the current Miley Cyrus song, the biggest song of the year, Flowers. And also, it sounds a little bit like Fleetwood Macs Dreams. I'm glad you mentioned that song, because it happens to be my current favorite new song. Jenny Lewis. She's from RYLA Kylie, the band. RYLA Kylie? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:59 So Lindsay Buckingham Trouble came To mind when I Listened To it. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:44:02 Yeah, it has a Fleetwood Mac sound. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:44:05 To it is a lesson here that people still love to have music curated for them more than we give them credit for. In a world where you can get. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:44:15 Music anywhere, it's interesting because everybody could recreate their own playlists. Now, you can do that on Spotify. My son works for Spotify and, yeah, I'm basically creating a playlist every single day. That's my radio show. And, like I say, try not to be self indulgent, but also want to play the music with some modicum of intelligence and forethought that I'm not just throwing a bunch of songs together for no reason, just to play them. But nevertheless, during the course of the regular day, we are following a format, as I said, but during that after six section of my program, it takes more thought than just the normal format of the radio station. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:45:04 A curated and a shared experience would sort of come to mind. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:45:08 Yeah, well, I'm always happy when people would send me an email or contact me one way or another on Facebook and compliment what they heard on the air, because you never know. You're sitting in a room all by yourself, you're playing music, picking songs, and you're talking about them and you don't really know if people are digging it or not. And when you get a message from somebody that says, oh, man, that was just so great, and the way you put those two songs together, or I heard a Segue, it just sounded so good. And, yeah, the fact that I worked on that Segue, I planned it and I executed it and someone noticed it and liked it. That's why I do what I do. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:45:57 What about working at home during the pandemic? How'd you adapt? Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:46:01 I built a studio at the same time when COVID came around the Peak, sort of decided to move their studios and I started doing my show from home. Built a studio here, got the focus right, like you said, and also have the symmetrics and several computers and I log into the peaks next gen system that runs the radio station and create my show and I never want to go back to the radio station again. I love doing it from home, not just because I can wear my pajamas, but just because it's not like the big New York City radio station where there's 50 people working there and there's a lot of camaraderie. We're a very small station. We're like a triumvirate. It's basically Coach who does the morning show, chris Herman is the program director and does the midday show. And me, we are the only real, true full time personalities on the air. At The Peak, there are a few other people, but we're never all there at once. And the radio station is not like a social thing the way it used to be. We get together once a week for a music meeting at the radio station, but other than that, Chris is doing his show from home. Coach actually does his show from the station and I do mine from home. And I don't want to go back. I don't want to go back there. There's no reason to because like I said when I visited my college radio station, it's just a computer and a microphone and now I am basically with computers and a microphone. I don't have any turntables or CDs or tape machines in my studio and we don't have them at the radio station either. It's all digital. So I don't know it's changed, but I like it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:02 Jimmy, thanks so much for being on the show. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:04 I really appreciate it. Jimmy Fink (Guest) 00:48:05 This has been a trip. I always like doing it and I never know where these shows are going to go. I've been on podcasts before and there are the standard questions that I get asked, but I think that you really delved into sort of different areas that and came up with some questions that I hadn't been asked before and that sort of made me think and I didn't have my standard answers already for you. I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:33 I did have pages I just want to share that I do have. I did prep this. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:48:39 The Sound Off podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill, produced by Evan Surminski; edited by Chloe Emond-Lane, social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the soundoff media company. There's always more@soundoffpodcast.com.

The first time I heard about some of the great work Chris Myers was doing was when he was programming the Beat in Vancouver. I managed to get the before story and everything that happened next. It a very extensive collection of working with innovative companies and talented on air people. Companies like Rawlco, Bell Media, Harvard Broadcasting, and smaller outfits like Focus Entertainment, the first owners of the Beat in Vancouver. Chris was recently caught up in layoffs from one of the aforementioned groups, and took to Twitter to solicit audio from anyone willing to send it to him for free feedback. Chris was recently caught up in layoffs from one of the aforementioned groups, and took to Twitter to solicit audio from anyone willing to send it to him for free feedback. What a great opportunity considering nearly half of all air talent believe they do not get enough feedback as it is. Send Chris some audio or talk to him about his next opportunity. TRANSCRIPT Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The Sound Off Podcast The Show about, podcast and broadcast - starts now. Matt Cundill 0:13 This week I'm speaking with chris myers, who's worked at the BT in Vancouver, few places in Saskatchewan and a few places in Edmonton. Recently, Chris was caught up in the layoffs from Harvard broadcasting. Now I'm never really sure if in between opportunities is the right time to bring someone on the show. But you know what it is. I saw that Chris made a really kind gesture soliciting audio from talent for feedback via Twitter. Doesn't matter if it was podcast or broadcast. You can connect with Chris if you want to take him up on his offer. Send him something. I'll give you a little feedback infos on the episode page at sound off podcast.com. Now Chris myers joins me from Edmonton, Alberta, home of the recently eliminated Edmonton Oilers. Chris Myers 0:56 My career started 30 years ago 1993 graduated from ch it broadcasting school in Edmonton, Mel Stevenson, and got my first gig at CK CK in Regina. It was all oldies at the time. I was doing weekends. And you know, I was I was the weekend talent at the time, I wasn't getting Air Checks. It wasn't getting groomed for anything. So I just felt like it was just, you know, a big waste really. And I really wanted to do top 40 radio at the time. And in Canada. There just wasn't a lot of options for for a guy like me. So I looked so and I started sending out demos to the US to every medium market, small market that had a top 40 station. And I got an offer actually from a station in Laramie, Wyoming power 103. And I was told that, Hey, as long as they're offering you a job, no issues, no problems while there were problems. And, you know, obviously I couldn't work there. So mail Stephenson at the time, had closed down his school in Edmonton and started a radio station in Drayton Valley. So I was probably one of Mel's pet students, I would say and he offered me a job. So I did that for a bit, did a morning show with Kevin Becker. And yeah, I was there for I don't know, maybe about a year or so. And wanted to get back home to Saskatoon. So I'm trying to get through this as quickly as I can. There's just so I get so many. You've Matt Cundill 2:28 conjured up a memory and that was, you know, Mel Stevenson school. We used to have interns come in and hang with us from from that school. Chris Myers 2:35 And where were you at the time? Matt Cundill 2:36 I was at the bear in Edmonton. Okay, right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Chris Myers 2:41 So Mel was a interesting teacher would probably be canceled if he was still around today. But, you know, he was, he was great. He was what I needed at the time. I was, you know, I was I was a kid who loved radio, with really low self esteem and Mel kind of shut that out of me. So, yeah, so after Drayton, you know, it's everyone's dream to work in their hometown, I think so I went to work at CJ WW and hot 93. in Saskatoon I was doing a little bit of everything I was doing some writing and then I became a full time swing jock. And that's right around the time 1996 Now where Scott studios came in and automation and the cut the evening guys, and so I was I was looking for a job again. And that was the last time I was unemployed actually was 1996. And, you know, I did bar gigs, just kind of sat on my ass, you know, hoping for another job and in a market like Saskatoon or bigger and just wasn't getting any bites, you know? So, after my, you know, after my parents, you know, threatened to kick me out because I was staying at their place, of course. I said, Screw it, I'm gonna go back down to the bottom and start again. And I had some some friends up in Peace River, Alberta, working at CK yml and at the time, they were just launching a brand new station kicks 106. So I applied for that. Got it. And I was doing afternoon drive there. And that was the best thing that could have ever happened for my career because I never had that real small town experience where I did, every everything. I did imaging, I scheduled music, and was on every single shift. It was it was a great experience. And that's where my career really kind of started again. So I did that for a couple couple years. And after that I wanted to hit back to Saskatoon again. On the mighty CNIT five, you know, that was a station I grew up listening to. And so I got an offer to go to C 95 to do evenings. I show up at Rothko on Eighth streets and I'm greeted by Jamie Wall the time who says hey, what? So we got to, we got to change here. You're not going to be evenings on C 95. You're going to be offering a show on Newstalk. Okay, so I quit my job and Peace River after two and a half years to being off on the news talk station. But you know what I was I was back home. And I was going to prove to them that, that I that I could do more than that. And at the time, there was Dr. Opening on CK LM FM at the time, which is now rock 102. So I did that for a little bit. But that was just temporary. And they had a bunch of plants at that time for rebranding a bunch of stuff. And I wasn't part of that. So after catching wind, I went to Harvard broadcasting and Regina, kiss 92, where I was mad dog Meyers. And that name still follows me around today. It wasn't. It wasn't my choice. I was I was given that name. And I didn't want to take it because Toronto obviously had Mad Dog Michaels. And I didn't want to be seen as a copycat, but I didn't really have much of a choice. So I did drive there. Then I went over to mornings. And it was, it was that stint and mornings. That was another eye opener in my career. I really liked the money. It was the best money I've ever made to that point. But I hated the job. You know, mornings wasn't really for me. I was paired with, with a co host who I didn't really get along with. We didn't really see eye to eye on a lot of stuff. But I liked the money. So I'm like, Okay, well, I'm really passionate about programming in the music side of things. So yeah, maybe maybe this is my new path and Peace River broadcasting, they were hiring a program director at that time where I had worked for two and a half years. So I went back there to program and that was another two and a half year stint. Peace River is one of my probably one of my favorite places in Western Canada to the state. And then from there, you know, it was it was time to move on to a bigger market perhaps. And on milkman, I saw an ad for a program director at the BT 94.5 of Vancouver, which was fairly new at that time, they were going through a lot of changes. I knew that I'm just this, you know, this kid and Peace River with his first PD gig. You know, there's no way that I'm going to get this job, but I'm going to send a resume anyway. Because I love the format's, hey, Vancouver, why not? And then I got a phone call, you know, about a week later from Jennifer Smith. And she said, we might have a gig for you. It's not it's not the PD gag. We gave that to Scott Turner. But we want you to come be our music director APD. And so I'm like, Yeah, I mean, that sounds great. Yeah, still just an amazing opportunity from somebody from Peace River to go to Vancouver. So, yeah, I mean, it was, it was it was a real great time being a, you know, a full time MD. Scott was great to work with. And then about a year later, Scott went back to Ontario. And, you know, just went into the the GMs office at the time, and I said, I want to be the PD, you know, he said, Okay, all right, well, we're gonna we're gonna advertise for the job. You know, but here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna we're gonna let you go through the fall book, we're gonna change formats, we're gonna go from urban to CHR. Because said 95 had gone hot AC at that time. And he said, at the one on one, the ratings come out, if the ratings are up, they got the gig. So we went from, I think it was, like, maybe a 3.5 with a team 34 to like a five share was something like that. So they're like, good job, you get the job now. So, so So I did that for four years. There's a Matt Cundill 8:57 lot going on in that market, right around that time. And you mentioned that Z95 That was sort of abandoning, and had a lot of struggles with CHR. And I guess they really didn't figure out how to sell it, or at least continued, you know, because CHR goes up, it goes down, it goes up, but then the beat came in, and just we're going to take the spot, and we're going to own the CHR spot. And that will be that. And that was that. Chris Myers 9:19 It was happening. And we did great. I'm the guy who put good Carson in, in mornings for the first time, which I mean, it worked fantastic for us. I mean, he was a instant hits, you know, the the station just kept continuing to grow, not just 18-34 but now we were seeing good numbers and you know, 25-54 we were commonly top five and by the time I had left in 2007. We were number one females 25-54. And we're just acquired at that time by by the chum Radio Group. So, we had CHQM as a sister station and feel kind of cool to be this this brand new station in the building and oh The sudden we're number one with women now it was it was, it was, it was pretty cool. Matt Cundill 10:04 I guess the be part of that tumultuous pneus at the end of that in 2007 is standard got sold to astral. And of course, Zed went through the moments where they decided to become craved for a bit. And I guess all that instability around you was a good thing. For sure. I mean, it helped. You know, I think I did a pretty good job there. I had, I had a great onair lineup, a good team. But yeah, there, you know, the circumstances at the time was said, Crave, whoever they were, I mean, they I mean, they really, they really helped us quite a bit as well, because they were really trying to find who they were throughout throughout all of this. So your new PD, and keep Carson's new in the morning, and lot of young talent around? Is this a case where you all learn together, and then the station all grows at once. Chris Myers 10:56 I mean, I think that's part of it. We were all just like super hungry. I was able, as a program director to convince my bosses at the time to hire some consultants that that I had been, you know, reading about following seeing at conferences, and they said, hire whoever you want. I mean, at that time, we had a pretty big budget for that kind of stuff. And I've as a program director, I've always welcome outside help, I love it. So, you know, I got I think we had three people at one time actually, we had Randy Lane who joined us for on air coaching and he was really instrumental to helping kid and Paige Nienaber, I've always been a fan page. So he helped us with some crazy promotions at the time. And then we also worked with Jerry Clifton, who was working with Paige (Neinaber) at the time, so he was kind of helping us on the overall programming. Matt Cundill 11:54 So I love Paige (Neinaber). I just think just working with somebody who deals in promotions and marketing, which is just so key to the success of a radio station. If you ask normal people and say what's the difference between all these radio stations? They're like, I don't know it's I guess the music. But then along comes some marketing. So what did Paige teach you? Or what did you manage to draw inspiration from the work that Paige says, Chris Myers 12:18 Paige has always been about don't do the norm don't do what everybody else is doing? Have some fun with it. He's all about it's basically you know Hillsville talk about its promotion is much like a movie. You need to you need to write the beginning the middle and most importantly, you need to write the ending how does this thing end? And what can you add to it just to bring light to it. And so like Paige is definitely one of my my biggest mentors still is to this day I I've tried to get him on with other stations not not as successful. But yeah, I mean, especially back then because it was it was still diary. This is before ppm. So we just did We did a lot of crazy promotions that would, you know, would get the whole the whole city talking. If you asked me to name any of them, I would have a hard time remembering. Matt Cundill 13:11 By the way for anybody who is looking for another podcast to listen to that's a lot shorter than this one that also talks about radio, but specifically promotions page has a podcast called three radio promotions in three minutes. And it is free advice. So help yourself to that. If you can. Tell me when your time in Vancouver came to an end. I think you went back to Saskatoon at that point. Yeah, that's right. Chris Myers 13:35 So yeah, this was 2007. And I had just heard the news that Harvard broadcasting had won an FM license in Saskatoon things were going great at the beat. I loved it there. But you know, at the same time again, Saskatoon was my hometown and with radio, I always felt that maybe it wasn't the best radio out there. Radio in Saskatoon is pretty much been it's it's very safe. Never take chances don't offend anybody. And, you know, I just I wanted to be that guy to go back to my hometown and build a radio station from scratch. That will get the city excited about radio, you know, you know, see 95 at the time was probably doing 35 to 40 shares. And everybody listened. But not a lot of people loved them. They liked them. I mean, they always did a good job. They were always great in the community. But that market was just really missing something that was a little bit edgy. And the Harvard wanted to launch a Chr. So I called Michael Ahlstrom at the time in from Vancouver. And I said Michael, congratulations on the license. You know, I would love to move back home. I got two young kids, great place to raise a family I would love to launch your station. I would love to help launch that. And he just said Are you fucking crazy? Sorry, can I say that? You said you're at the number one top 40 station in Western Canada. What are you doing? It's home. It's home. I want to, you know, again, be close to my family, and really give Saskatoon something different, you know, and wired 96 Three was born. Matt Cundill 15:18 Yeah, I remember that so well when it happened. And I thought back to all the C 95 demos that I had received over the years and nothing against the people who had sent it to me. But the brakes were really simple. And the station was pretty simple. Wasn't a very groundbreaking radio station. really right for the pickings. So when you go to an 18 to 34 is a full blown CHR where was that just gonna be a demo you wanted to take over? Chris Myers 15:44 It was a full blown war. When word got out that I was moving back to Saskatoon. They actually had a couple people listen to Rocco had a bunch of couple of people listened to what I was doing on the beat, and they tried to basically copy everything I was doing on the beat on the C 95. They you know, they were kind of a mass appeal hot AC and then they went, they went for it. They went full blown. CHR so I'm sitting in Vancouver. I don't I'm not even in Saskatoon yet. I'm still working for the BT. Watching this all go down. I'm like, Oh, those dirty little. But you know, that's one thing Rawlco has always done very well. You know, they've, they're always they love it a challenge. Like nothing gets scored Rollinson more excited than a than a good little radio battle in the in the great attics, they really are. So I moved to Saskatoon in September 2007. We have plans to launch the station in December. So with with pages help, we have this big promotion, we are going to launch as a Christmas station Santa FM, and give Saskatoon what they really want Christmas music all the time. And then come December, somebody realizes that they forgot to file a very important piece of paper for the frequency change. So we were not ready to go on the middle of December, we had to wait for very long months to get approval from the CRTC. So we had we had the entire entire staff of the radio station was there. And the hill family, you know, at that time, they could have fired everybody they could have said everyone's laid off, you know, reapply when we actually get approval. But they didn't. We had a full time staff full Morning Show drive midday evenings, DJs sales, like we had everybody. And we were working out of the the GMs house at the time in the basement. We were just listening to radio stations, you know, coming up with promotions, and really just kind of going through the motions and you know, having, you know, music meetings and creating playlists, and it was it was a lot of fun. But it was, you know, it was pretty heartbreaking to to watch See 95 You know, become this really great top 40 station at the time and we don't have a stick yet so. So when it came time to launch wired in April, Paige said, You should do the Santa thing again. You should do the Christmas thing. It's even funnier now because it's April and it wouldn't make any sense. So we hired fifth the Santas. I think they were mostly broadcasting school students from WBC and yeah, we if the Santas all around Saskatoon brand new station 96.3. And man, was that market pretty choked up at the time. We had Johnny Jasna was our producer, and he was recording phone calls at the time just angry people like, are you serious? You're launching a brand new station, you're playing Christmas music like so many people fell for it. It was it was just insane. But hey, we got the market talking. They knew there was a brand new station coming. There was no no mistake in that. Matt Cundill 18:55 And Don Scott had to put out a memo to the students saying, Well, we have a field trip today. And here's your Santa uniform. Chris Myers 19:02 That's right. Yeah, yeah, that's right. So we let that trade go on for I don't think it was very long, maybe three or four days. And we just said, oops, the consultants screwed up. And when we were asking, you know, Saskatoon, what kind of music format they wanted? It turns out the Christmas music was dead last but we thought it was the top we just kind of screwed up. And yeah, then came wired. Matt Cundill 19:28 You know, and I'm thinking with the creation of that radio station, it might have been the one to really sort of turn the tide for radio in in Saskatchewan overall, because then it became a little more creative. The demos from C 95 that I referenced earlier, which were all fairly rudimentary and, and darling, again, that's no shot at the talent. That's just what the radio was. And here you are, you're in Vancouver. He say I want to go back to Saskatoon and I want to make a change and cause a little bit of upheaval and then bring and sort of elevate the whole market. I don't necessarily think that was your intention. Chris Myers 20:00 But you know, to be able to go back to Saskatoon and put a radio station on the air like wired, it really did sort of raise the game for everybody in the province. It did it forced everybody to be to be a whole lot better for sure. And you know, in doing a top 40 battle in Saskatoon with, you know, a station who had enjoyed, you know, dominating that market for so long, we knew we had to do something different. We knew we had to be a little bit edgier. So you know, I was very excited to bring Mark Michaels in because I knew that he was he was that guy who could really shake things up against the competition. And, you know, we had we had live DJs, they didn't. And again, we had all these great promotions that were just a little bit too edgy for the competition to try. So our first ratings book, we were number 118 34. That's all that's all we had wanted at that time. And that prompted a phone call from from Meralco. Matt Cundill 20:56 And this was their big strategy was they're just going to destabilize the whole thing by luring you to cross the street. Chris Myers 21:02 Yes. And the first time I said, I said, No, I said no way. I said, this is just way, way too much fun. And they mean, you know, and they really did back up on money truck. It was an insane offer. But I was so happy at that time working at Wired and for Harvard. I had everything you know, that I wanted. So I'm like, you know, thanks. No, thanks. And, you know, probably about a year later, they called again. And you know, this time I was a little more motivated. We were having some some house problems at the time. I'm like, You know what, that's that's a lot of money. I think I actually got to go and you know, to this day, I still tell people that that was the biggest regret ever in my career. You know, was was leaving Harvard at that time to go work for Rocco was great. You know, as great as it was the you know, they they treated me, they treated me greats. They welcomed me with open arms. But I just really wasn't having as much fun as I did over at Wired. Yeah, I had I had a little more money. But yeah, I did that for five years program, C 95, rock 102. And Zed 99. On and off. Matt Cundill 22:11 That's a long time to be not having as much fun as another place. I mean, I usually I think three years would be the cap on that. Chris Myers 22:21 Yeah. But again, at the end of the day, it's not just about fun. I mean, you do need some money to have fun, I guess. Matt Cundill 22:28 You also had to manage that. 99 and Regina to right. That's right. Yep. Yeah. Yep. So Chris Myers 22:33 that wasn't too bad. I live pretty close to the airport. And they would actually fly me down on this, whatever. It was a nine seater plane. So that was, that was every Wednesday, it was a lot looking back. But in my most recent situation at Harvard, I was also programming three stations as well. I guess my point was that it seemed very avant garde to be doing three stations back in 2006 and seven, maybe not so much a few you know, for some, but I thought maybe back then you had to have multiple stations that that was it definitely was was a lot for sure. For sure. And said 99 is you know, just like C 95 has, like always dominated that market as well. So it was a pretty pretty big station some some big talent there as well. So yeah, I had a pretty pretty full plate for sure. Is that nine seater? Is Matt Cundill 23:24 that a commercial jet? Chris Myers 23:25 All I know is that like that I got a free beer on the way back home. This station had a I think they had a contract deal. Obviously. That the paid for that to get the same seat every time. Yep. And I think that the best moment was we were delayed once it was a pretty snowy icy day. And I actually look out my window and I see people behind the plane pushing it because it's stuck. Yeah, we're in Saskatchewan. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 23:55 Transcription of The Sound Off Podcast is powered by the "You May Also Like" Podcast: The Show about people, places and things. Follow the show on your favorite podcast app, or at You may also like dot net. The Sound Off Podcast supports podcasting 2.0 So feel free to send us a boost. If you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at new podcast apps.com. Matt Cundill 24:25 Saskatchewan is thought of as being a very safe and simple province. And you'd think the radio was the same and then in the end we find out it's not Chris Myers 24:34 That's right. Let's do let's go at all 25-54 We're which of course, prompted Rocco to kind of change the strategies on both on both of their FM's as well. So things got, you know, pretty stale kind of boring, you know, and I got a phone call from David quarry who was running bell at the time. And he was in Saskatoon for a country conference. So I went for breakfast with him. And, you know, shortly after I was talking to Pat Cardinal, and they brought me to Edmonton to be the Program Director of virgin. Matt Cundill 25:32 So I have a few questions about this one. Okay. Notably, because I've been in the building before, but I've always been curious about virgin in Edmonton, and why it never got traction in the market. Right? I'll preface but formerly 104.9 was a juggernaut, AC radio station. And then one day, I think precipitated by PPM and the numbers sort of surrounding AC radio, they move it to CHR they put the Virgin label on it at some point it anyhow, it's never really caught on the way you would expect a Virgin brand to. Chris Myers 26:08 No, no, it You're right. And it still hasn't we, you know, we had done some research. And I think there were issues with the Virgin brand in general, just listeners knew that. It wasn't really an Edmonton product. And it was an international thing. Obviously, there were a lot of talent changes, they really expected peppered daylon to, you know, to drive this station to be a top top tier station. At the time, they thought maybe they could do this without promoting them. So you know, pepper and Dylan at the time would run into people on the street, they would say I I really miss you guys. I wish you were still on the bounce. And they'd be like, well, we're on 104.9 and like nobody knew nobody knew. I remember being in a board room with with all the big wigs you know David Corey, obviously their impact cardinal and as a group we're looking at this research that says that pepper and Dylan should be the number two Morning Show behind crashing bars in this market by a longshot. So we all agree hands in, we're betting all our money on pepper and Dylan we're and we're gonna go all the way in. Fast forward. Maybe about a month later, I get a phone call. Yeah, we've changed our mind, we're gonna let them go. We had a consultant, listen to them. And he just seemed he doesn't think they're right for the station. So we're going to we're going to try something new. I was I was the bad guy. And all of its, it was actually instructed that I had to go into the control room, and then fire them. The frustrating part was being part of a strategic meeting where everybody agrees that this is the hill we die on pepper and dill, and we're going for it. And then a month later to say now we changed our mind. You know, that was disheartening. Just talking about this I miss Pat Cardinal, me, Pat was an idol of mine, I you know, would go to power 92 probably once every couple months, and just, you know, out of the blue, just ask for Pat Cardinal give him a tape, I always wanted to work for him. So that was that was definitely part of the decision to you know, to to delete Saskatoon and go and go to Hamilton was to work with Pat. And you know, and, you know, I think it was maybe about a month later, he you know, pulls me in back into the office. And, you know, it's tells us about his, his his cancer, and that it's terminal. He doesn't have very long so that was that was a it was another hard day. Matt Cundill 28:39 Yeah, it was pancreatic cancer. Chris Myers 28:41 That's right. Matt Cundill 28:42 I mentioned that just because my dad passed to that. So it's, I think once you've experienced it, you kind of know what it's all about. And it was it's heart wrenching. And I still miss him today. And I know a lot of people who listen to this podcast, speak up Pat, and mark them down for a five when it comes to golf. Chris Myers 29:01 Yeah, that's right. It was such a dream to work with a GM like Pat, you know, who was not just a, you know, radio programmer, but he was a, he loves top 40 He was very passionate about CHR as was I. And very sad day when I wasn't able to work with Pat anymore. Matt Cundill 29:20 And so 18 months on Stony Plain Road, working with Belle, and then time comes to an end and look who's back. Harvard is back in your life. Chris Myers 29:30 Yeah, yeah. Christian Hall was in town he was. I think he was filling in as PD at the time for hot 107 and cruise. And he invited me out for a beer and he said, What do you think? What do you think about coming to program hot 107 Cruise I'm like, I like I make a lot of money. I don't know if you guys can, can can do that. And he goes, You know what? We're we're basically getting rid of two program directors and going With one so yeah, we we can afford it we. So I jumped at it because here I still get to do a top 40 station. But I never wanted to be typecast as the top 40 guy, personally, when I, you know when I'm out in the garage playing darts, it's it's classic rock all the way. So just to have that shot to do a format that I've never really done before. That was my favorite musical format. I'm like, Yeah, I saw I jumped at it. And this was my third time now with Harvard. And yeah, I mean, I jumped at it because Harvard was always a great company and always treated me very well. You know, they lacked some other resources. But at that time, they they really knew how to treat employees for sure. Matt Cundill 30:49 What part of the conversation with Christian did he say we also have a condition in the license for some category three music? Chris Myers 30:56 Yeah, well, yeah, I knew about that one. 15% category three traditional blues, basically, which is how many hours a week? I don't know. But it's basically like, nine to midnight 10 to midnight, some nights. Definitely a bit of a hinderance they've applied for relief on that recently. And the other, you know, the issue on 107. At the time was it was it was the last frequency commercial frequency to launch. That's when you know, the CRTC were handing out licenses left, right and center. And while it was John York's I guess, at the time who won that license, nobody wanted one Oh, 7.1 nobody, because it couldn't be full power at the time, the Edmonton Municipal Airport was still a thing. And we couldn't go over 40,000 Watts, I might have the story. I don't know if it's 100%. Pretty sure it's 40% or 40 40,000 Watts, it couldn't be any higher, because that would interfere with some some of their signals at the airport. So I mean, I had one station with, you know, not a great signal, and then another station with 15%. Cat three blues. Matt Cundill 32:10 I should have mentioned earlier when we were talking about virgin and just talked about the CHR landscape at that time, who was involved in with CHR music there was hot 107 Chris Myers 32:20 Virgin Reuben the bounce at the time and Virgin? Yeah, the three of us. You know, so Harvard's take on hot when I was seven was, you know, pretty similar to what I had done at Wired was we need to be the one that's a little bit younger, a little bit edgier, maybe a little bit faster on the music, we'll play EDM and hip hop, and we won't do a party to just evenings. So it definitely had a little bit of an edge to it live DJs it was, you know, it was a big part of what that station was. Matt Cundill 32:51 And how do you fight your way through all that mess? Because I mean, I'm going to answer the question for you. But it's talent. And he had some great talent, and imaging, great imaging promotions, you come fully stacked with with the marketing. But even with that, it can still be an uphill battle. Chris Myers 33:08 I mean, it really is, it's not, there's just not a lot of loyalty. With those listeners. They're just really, at the end of the day, just in search of the best song. You know, except for mornings, you know, peppered Dylan had found a home at the bounce. And that's I mean, that's always been that station's sole focus with marketing is pepper and Dylan pepper and Dylan. And those guys have done really, really well. Virgin at that time was, you know, experimenting with new morning shows, like every four or five months, they tried to Brooke and Jubal thing. So it was really hard for Virgin to really make an impact. So at that time, it was really, it was really a battle between 91 seven and 107. You know, we had great talent and writer and Lisa. But I mean, again, one of the one of the struggles at Harvard as well was I was mentioning before about the resources. We just didn't have a big budget for you know, for marketing and contrasting it was it was pretty limited. Matt Cundill 34:08 Yeah. And I guess that's sort of extends into the digital part and social send you like, oh, well, social media is free, and then you spend either too much time or not enough time depending on who you talk to. Creating content online. Chris Myers 34:22 Yeah, I mean, that's that was a big part of it. And that entire crew on the station, they were they were they were always probably the top of their game in the markets. You know, when you looked at the other top 40 stations we were, you know, a lot more aggressive on social media. Matt Cundill 34:36 And Lachlan crosses during the mornings that cruise he goes through one incarnation I believe it was so with co host Nicola. Yep. What's her last name? Nicola Crosby, Nicola Crosby. So Lachlan goes through an incarnation with Nicola Crosby as co host and then later on sort of develops into the locker room, which was sort of the incarnation that was over on the bear. Chris Myers 34:56 Yeah, so when I went over to Harvard, one of my managers over a bell, trying to convince me to stay said, Yeah, you don't know what you're getting yourself into. I mean, Lachlan is a handful, he's, you know, you're gonna have a real hard time with him. He's super high maintenance. And, you know, when I went over to work with Lachlan, I mean sure. I mean, he Lachlan by a longshot is, I would say, the hardest working on air personality I've ever worked with. He's in incredibly early, he doesn't bail at 10 o'clock, he's there until noon, he's at home prepping, you get phone calls from him all the time. You know, just wanting to bounce ideas off you. So my, you know, seven and a half years at Harvard. Laughlin actually made it a lot a lot better, a lot easier. Because it was just it was so great to work with talent to who just wanted to work that hard. You know, and, again, there's there's no stopping lock. You know, if he has an idea, he'll run with it. He'll ask if you know, how do we make this better? You know, so lock was definitely, you know, again, I'm not gonna say high maintenance, but I love working with them. I wish there were more jocks like him. Matt Cundill 36:13 Let's also remember that when he gets an idea, and the idea is wrong, he still has room left to double and triple down on that idea. quite yet, quite often. Yeah. That's one of the things I love about him. Chris Myers 36:26 Yeah, whenever I would get a, an email from the CBSE, my inbox, I'm like, Ah, what did Lachlan do now? And you know, nine out of 10 times, it was something to do with luck. Matt Cundill 36:37 I did have one question about the move from hot windows seven. It was power 107 for a little bit. And then came the infamous court case a cease and desist, which I can't believe did not go your way. Chris Myers 36:51 Yeah, you know, Christian Hall. And I remember the moment we were in a hotel room, planning the station out. And we had that important phone call with a lawyer. And he looked at the trademarks and the fact that it you know that it had expired and was abandoned, basically, they said, Yeah, you guys got this, you have nothing to worry about. At all that I remember the day, we're like, maybe two months into power at this time, maybe a month, month or two. And the station is going great. The feedback is amazing in town, and then Tamara comes into my office closes the door, and puts, you know, puts the letter on my desk, the cease and desist letter and my shit. You know, and we went through with it. We were you know, we were gonna we were gonna fight the cease and desist, you know, obviously, that ended up going going to courts. Not in our favor. We could have continued, we could have appealed. But at this time, the hills, the hill family just said now is we've spent enough on this come up with a new name. So and that's, that's when play came in. Matt Cundill 38:00 And I totally understand that as a radio owner. I guess if I were in court, I would be a terrible lawyer because I just be looking at the judge and I just sit there not even fucking using it. Keep it up, they abandon it. What are you doing? At least let the station use it. And then you can have the discretion to fight it out in court? That's right. Yeah. It just sort of said to me that this judge just had no concept of the business, the medium, even right to the level of trademarking. I don't even understand how you could even say, Oh, well, you know, it was like 20 years ago, it was called Power 92. But were called Power 107. But they haven't used power 92 in over a decade. And somehow that's a problem. Yeah, Chris Myers 38:48 I you know, I think some of the issues that were pointed out, were some of the attributes that we were doing at that time, you know, having Gary James host a countdown. And you know, right down to the logo, the logo was pretty close. We got a jingle package that resembled you know, their their jingles. So, I mean, I think that's kind of what really screwed that up and looking back at it now. Matt Cundill 39:09 I guess that's sort of the power of audio. It sounds like something that used to be in the market. And perhaps that judge was a fan of the radio station and saying, oh, yeah, this is bringing back memories for me. Totally. trademark infringement. Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah. And then comes the end. And your time at Harvard is, has come. Yeah, that's that was. Chris Myers 39:34 That was a shock. It was kind of out of nowhere. The you know, the company had gone through some changes at the very at the very top. Paul Hill, basically, you know, I don't think he's officially retired. But he, you know, his son Matt kind of took over the, you know, the media division. The company merged with this digital agency out of Regina. And so all of a sudden you have all These new players at the top with all these new ambitious ideas, and all of them are about digital. And they decided just to make a lot of changes on the broadcast side. And yeah, I mean, it's it's sent a shockwave, I think through not only the industry, but obviously, you know, the company. I remember being like go and one of the other program directors who was let go said, Oh, my God, am I next? I'm like, No, you're fine. They need you. They, you know, they can't have nobody in your market. So you're fine. Your job is 100% safe. And then of course, he calls me a couple days later, and, and he was termed and so was the other program director and Regina. So that market has zero program directors for three stations. Matt Cundill 40:47 Listen, I don't want a Monday morning quarterback this thing. But no, it's a podcast. But here we are. So I don't mind doing it. But I mean, it's an incredibly large push into digital. I'm not sure that they're copying the Townsquare model in this in the US, which, you know, works rather well. But I think you need to have a very strong analog product in order to promote on the digital side. So I hope they find the right balance with this thing. And and it works. I really hope so do which is very odd strategy for me. Oh, I hope it works. Chris Myers 41:21 I have a lot of great friends still in that company. I mean, that was my home for seven and a half years and my family really I know that sounds cheesy, but writer Lisa Lachlan, and it's just an amazing, amazing crew there. So I really hope that it works out. Matt Cundill 41:39 Anybody listening to this, who wants to get in touch with you hire you, or perhaps even just send you something for some feedback. Chris Myers 41:47 My email is chris myers 306 at gmail.com. I put it out on Twitter the other day, I was just sitting back thinking one day that one of the things that's hard for a program director of three radio stations to do is to help other talent who don't work for you. They send you audio quite often you're like, I can't even like get my air check with so and so in like how am I you know, how am I supposed to find the time to do this. And I've always really enjoyed helping others just get better at their craft. So I put it out on Twitter, you know, and I got I got a few replies from from talent across western Canada, saying yeah, I'll take a free air check while I figure out what the next chapter is. And I guess enjoy a little temporary vacation. I'm happy to help however, I can Matt Cundill 42:39 make a bold prediction. What do you think you'll be doing next? Chris Myers 42:43 It's a real tough question. And I love programming. I love working with talent and I'm open to a lot of stuff. I mean, I with my 30 years of radio I can kind of do everything in radio and I think that's I think that's been a big part of my success is I've been behind the mic I've written commercials I've produced I've scheduled so on and so forth the only thing I really haven't done the sales or engineering know even that even then I've been to a transmitter site here and there. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 43:12 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill produced by Evan Surminski, edited by Chloe Emond-Lane social media by Aiden Glassey. Another great creation from The Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at http://www.soundoffpodcast.com

Randi Chase is back for another round on the show. The last time we had her on in 2018, we talked about her adventures up and down the radio dial in 7 Canadian markets- she was certainly living a "WKRP in Cincinnati" lifestyle. She's remained at the same station since 2018, but a few changes have taken place. Firstly, she moved to Red Deer, and her morning show with Vinny Taylor is now simulcast across stations in the Stingray radio group. And yes, you can still find her doing mornings at Real Country 95.5. You can even listen in live on their website if you're not an Alberta native! In this episode, Randi and I talk about how Alberta has changed since the first time we both moved there. We also explore the project she was working on with Sarah Edmondson, which is a name you might remember from the collection of stories about the NXIVM sex cult stories that came out of Albany, NY. If you want to hear more about that, check out Sarah's podcast, A Little Bit Culty. You can hear some of their latest episode below: If you want to keep up with Randi, you can find her on Instagram, Twitter or LinkedIn. Transcription Randi Chase (Guest) 00:00:01 The sound off podcast. The podcast about broadcast with Matt Cundill. Starts Now. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:10 This week I get back together with Randy Chase from real country 95, five and red deer. We had this epic podcast episode back in 2018. Today she's moved from Sylvan Lake into Red Deer, and her morning show with co host Vinny Taylor appears on stations both country and otherwise on stingray stations across Alberta. Let's dig in. Randy Chase joins me from Red Deer, Alberta. How have you been? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:00:35 I've been really good, actually. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:37 Do you remember the last time we spoke? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:00:39 I remember it was a long time. Well, not that we spoke personally, but on this podcast, it was like four years ago. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:48 I know. And then I posted up the podcast and was promoting it still. And you wrote back. That was like three years ago. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:00:54 So much has changed. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:56 So what has changed in that time? So I wrote down a few things I think have changed, but what has changed in four years for you? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:01:02 I feel like I'm in a better place than I've ever been personally and professionally in the sense like Vinny and I when I first talked to you, we just kind of started the show and it was always great. Like, we always had really good chemistry and got along really well. But now it feels like he's family to me. We've never had a fight, not one fight. And we've been doing mornings for five years in January, so I'm pretty proud of our relationship. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:28 Is it something that the two of you work on? Because I think A, both the nicest people I know, b, you have a propensity to get along with everyone, both of you, and it just seems to work between you. Now you're telling me you've never had a TIFF between you? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:01:43 No, we've never had a fight. I mean, obviously we argue and laugh about it, but never anything serious. Never anything that truly made me angry. No, never. And I know that's sometimes hard to believe, like even saying that out loud, would I believe somebody if they said that? But truly, we really get along and we really understand each other. And I think understanding why we are the way we are helps the show so much. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:11 I don't want to play psychologists, but I think both of you are very grateful to be working together. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:02:17 Oh, my God. Yes. That's an understatement. I think once you've worked with certain people on a show that are harder to work with or not the best people, I mean, you really appreciate going to work and not getting nervous about it or anxiety ridden or feel this amount of pressure to get along and it's seamless with us. So for me, that's a huge thing. I want to enjoy going to work. I never want to work in a building or with people that I don't like to see every day because there's no frigging point in doing this job. Otherwise we don't do it for the money, that's for sure. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:55 It wasn't so long after you guys started working together that Stingray asked you guys to take on a whole bunch more stations. I don't even know how many stations that you work with under the Real Country banner. How many is it? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:03:08 Yeah, we're on 15 other stations besides the local show we do in Red Deer, Alberta. We're on 15 other stations and they're not just country so they're also the Boom network, so Boom Radio. We're on a whole bunch of their stations all around Alberta and it's kind of cool because in Red you we are a country morning show but we have to produce content that is not local so much and not just aimed at country fans because we're on other stations. We have to keep that in mind when we're doing our show. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:39 What was it like when they came to you with the idea of you're going to be doing a whole bunch more radio stations? What did you and Vinny have to change about the show you were just doing for Red Deer and then said, well we got to take on all these other markets too? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:03:51 Yeah, well we have to be very mindful of different demographics and where we are broadcasting to. I think we had to figure out still had to do some local things, obviously because we are a big station here locally and people do listen a lot. So we had to make sure that we had a balance of both but still able to be able to cut out some local things that have a break we do to produce that break to other markets. So we're very mindful of how to word certain things so that it could appeal to everybody and people here still feel like we are being local and inclusive so that was definitely challenging. We don't struggle with it as much anymore. But at first it was definitely kind of like a struggle. Every time you open your mouth you're thinking, oh my God, is this going to translate to everybody? And you're second guessing yourself. It's kind of like but now it's more of a natural thing. Definitely. We also had the help of a producer for a long time and we have another producer now but we had the help of a producer to cut out all the stuff that is local that can't go to the other markets. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:04:51 How many of the markets have you visited? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:04:53 Shut up. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:04:57 Well Matt, you don't have to answer the question. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:05:00 I think my shut up answer was very obvious. No, we haven't really been to any of the other markets. I mean we've driven through I did go to Jasper, I don't know a year ago and it was really cool being in Jasper which is like such a touristy cool place and hearing I didn't even realize we were on there. We're on in Edson which is right near at Jasper. So I've been to Essen, which is one of the markets, and it was cool to be in Jasper. And just like Gallivanting, and we were at a pub, my husband and I, and all of a sudden I heard my voice and I was like, that sounds like me. Oh, it is me. Oh, I didn't even know we were on here. And another time I was in Saskatoon, and somebody from another market that listened to us I don't remember what market it was, but she was like, we listen to you all the time, and I didn't even realize we were on there. So that's kind of cool. I would love to visit all the markets, but it's kind of hard. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:50 15 other stations I've been to that Edson radio station. I think there's an A and W right near there, and I've eaten at that A and W like, three or four times on my way to Jasper. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:06:00 I mean, and you can never go wrong with A and W. I only. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:03 Ask you the question about, have you visited all the markets? Because Queen Victoria did. You know she never visited Canada. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:06:09 I know I'm not very comparable to the Queen, but I think she's busier than I am, so she may have an excuse. No, it's the winter conditions here. I'm not driving to all those markets. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:20 I'm in Winnipeg. I don't even want to drive to Safeway. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:06:23 I know walking the dog is bad enough. I have to mentally prepare myself some days to go out and walk him. And yesterday I actually gave up halfway through the walk and went home. I was like, It is too cold. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:37 I don't want to date you or give away your age, but I do know that you're brave enough to go on Twitter and say that you love Nickelback and Creed. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:06:45 Oh, yeah, I say my age all the time on the radio. I don't care. I'm 38. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:50 Well, you said it also on Twitter, you said you're pushing 40 because you were slamming Instagrammers for all their makeup tips. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:06:55 You know what influencers drive me absolutely nuts? I don't care about your makeup tutorial. You're 24 and you're promoting eye cream and you're like, Look, I have no wrinkles. And I'm like, yeah, that's because you're 24. That's why. Speak to me when you're pushing 40 and you smile and your eyes crack underneath. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:07:14 By the way, congratulations. You are still active on social media. So many people have abandoned little certain parts of it, but you're still rocking the Twitter, which I love. Did you take up TikTok? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:07:26 I have TikTok. Have I tried to be relevant on TikTok? No. I've made a couple of videos here and there when I feel like it, but I feel like social media is draining in itself. We already have so many social media platforms. We have to keep busy. When you're having a public kind of job like this, and don't get me wrong, I like sharing my life and stuff, but I feel like maybe TikTok isn't for me. I like watching videos, though. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:07:52 Yeah, that's the thing. I thought maybe some of the things that go on on TikTok would be something that you might like to consume. But I just sort of look at social media as being the sort of thing where you're either a consumer or you're a creator. And I try my very best to be a creator. And I see people all the time. I was in Montreal a couple of weeks ago and somebody was standing on the Metro and they were just swiping their phone and took a look over and they were swiping through TikToks. And I go, that's weird. Life has passed me by. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:08:17 No, I mean TikTok. I could get lost. And I'm gonna say this and it's embarrassing, but I talked about it on the radio. I was saying I was on TikTok for 3 hours. One 3 hours. And I didn't realize it's been 3 hours. And I felt disgusting. I was like, this is a trap. It's really entertaining, but it's a trap. And I want to live more life than scrolling TikTok for 3 hours. So I feel like people like, we should consume it, of course, because it's great and there's fun ideas for radio especially. I get a lot of info from TikTok, but I also think it's something you could easily get lost in and your brain is fried by the end of the three hour session on TikTok. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:08:57 While I'm happy that you continue your upkeep on social media so I can continue to follow you, I'm still not beyond the odd drunk FaceTime to you. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:09:07 I never drink alcohol. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:09 I know you don't, but I do. So I'll like drunk FaceTime you sometimes. And I'm sometimes wondering, what does she think of her phone in this moment when it's like 10:00 at night and the FaceTime goes off and it's randomly? Matt from Winnipeg. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:09:22 Oh, I would love it. I welcome you to Drunk FaceTime me again. The last time you did, you were in Montreal as well. Speaking of Montreal but I mean, how could you go to Montreal and not get drunk? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:32 Yeah, I was in the back of an Uber on my way to dinner and I called you from the back of an Uber. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:09:37 I loved it. I love a good drunk FaceTime. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:40 I'm just happy to still take my calls. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:09:43 I love you. I think you're so great. Your podcast is so great. And just as a person, I feel like you're such a solid guy, it's going to turn into a love fest for you. I love your personality and your sarcasm and you have this unique personality I think a lot of people maybe don't know about because you're kind of serious on the podcast sometimes, but you're really sarcastic and funny and you could take a joke. And I like people like that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:10 Yeah, some people, if it's first thing in the morning, they're just not ready for it. So it can come off a little bit edgy and curt. And by the way, the first time a lot of people meet me, they go, what's that guy's problem? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:10:21 That's like Vinny my co host. You would get along with Vinny. I feel like you guys would be best friends. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:26 I feel like I know Vinny, although I've never met Vinny because I listened to the show. And so Vinny doesn't know this, but I know Vinny. He's my best friend. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:10:35 Oh, he's going to be so happy. You should invite him on the podcast sometimes because when I said I was coming on your podcast, he was like, oh, you know, I've never been asked. I was like, oh, he'll ask you after this. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:46 By the way, Jen Dalen, she's your program director, right? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:10:49 No, Jen Dalen was my program director for a while. She actually got kind of promoted and sent to Cam Loops, where she loves because she's very outdoorsy and she still is very much involved with she's in our company, Stingray still. So we still have calls with her every two weeks. And we have a talent coach named Craig Bruce who's out of Australia, and she's in on those calls. So we get to see her. Her. I miss her. I love that girl. She is so good at what she does. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:18 It's funny. I read into Craig at Canadian Music Week in 2018 and I said, oh, I'm going to have you on my podcast. And it could be years before I actually get around to bringing you on the podcast. So I got to reach out to Craig. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:11:29 You need to have Craig on. He is one of the best talent coaches I have ever worked with. And as a person, I'm just such a fan of him. I can't say enough good things about that man. He's changed our show for the better, and his advice is just so easy and minimal to already compliment what we're doing. And I really like Vinny and I really look forward to our talent sessions with him, which is something I don't think a lot of people could say with coaches. Like a lot of people, especially on air people, some of us have egos. We don't want to be told how to do our job better. But I really appreciate him and I think he should have him on the podcast. He's a really interesting guy. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:12:07 I think back to like when you and I worked together in Montreal and he'd finished your show and you really couldn't leave without passing the program director's office and talking about the show or talking about what was coming up. And here you are now with a little Fyfedom of 15 radio stations, the real country brand. But you're also on the boom stations. You've got this whole big radio show that goes across Alberta. Do you get into BC at all, by the way? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:12:34 I don't think so. I know we're not on in BC, but I don't know if the frequency maybe in some spots. I haven't heard that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:12:41 So here you are with an Alberta wide radio show. You've got your pulse on Alberta. You and I also both lived in Alberta. I in the you in the 2000s for a vet. It feels like the province has changed in strange ways. And I know we'll probably have a little bit of a negative talk here, but we're just going to offer a little perspective. How has the province changed in your view? This is not Ralph Klein's province anymore. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:13:04 No, it's very different. I moved to Alberta when I was in Montreal, so I'm just going to guess the years here. But essentially, probably 2007, I moved to Alberta. I went to go work at the Bounce in Edmonton. I don't know if I was younger. Well, I was younger, but I don't know if it was because I was younger. I didn't really realize the politics and the climate of Alberta, but it did seem like a much simpler place than it is now. I feel now there's so much anger and political talk and people who don't like you if you vote for this person and like you if you vote for this person and if you drive a hybrid car or you're a bad person because you should be supporting oil and gas. It's just like I don't know, I feel like it's definitely changed since I lived I lived in Calgary as well for two years. And yeah, it does feel different. It feels divisive, like we're like now the Quebec of Canada back in the day when Quebec was trying to separate. That's kind of how it feels sometimes here. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:14:05 Well, if you're going to table something called the Sovereignty Act, that's a divisive act unto its own. And yeah, I suppose you're right. That's kind of the thing that drove me out of Quebec the first time was all that sort of divisive nature. And now I sort of take a look at Alberta and I see that going on inside. It makes me want to run for the hills. I don't feel like staying around and fighting any sort of fight like that. Same way with Quebec, I didn't feel like fighting that fight either. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:14:28 And there's more people I know here that are like minded like you and I are. I'm not saying everybody is a certain way, because that's definitely not the case. And I don't want to stereotype. I mean, yes, there's a stereotypical people here, but there's stereotypical. Every province has a stereotypical people that we hear about. So I don't want to say that, but definitely it has changed and I'm not the person that's going to get it back on track. But I don't know what the solution is. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:14:55 Yeah, I just want to finish every sentence with no I don't agree with you, but you don't have to be a dick about it. It's kind of the way I want to finish talking to everyone. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:15:02 Yeah, I just wish everybody just like I don't want to say get along because that sounds so cringe, but I just wish people who are more respectful of people's beliefs here and people's sexual orientation and people I just feel like sometimes it is like the US. In certain aspects and I don't want to generalize the whole United States of America, but the kind of stuff we see on TikTok and stuff like that, where we make fun of people sometimes I feel like it is a little bit like that here. Keep in mind I live in central Alberta. It's not exactly Calgary, which is different than where I live, but I also have never lived somewhere, though, where the community is so generous and so kind and I've met some of the best people I've ever met in my life living here. So there's both aspects to it and yeah, I don't really know what else. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:15:50 To say in just a second. More with Randy, including working on a pretty cool podcast surrounding the Nexium case, you might have heard of Keith Ranieri Nexium and how things got a little bit guilty. Also, Randy has moved to Red Deer and we discussed the Alberta she and I moved to versus the one that exists today. There's more. Including ways to connect to Randy@soundoffpodcast.com. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:16:17 This podcast supports podcasting 20. If you like this show or getting value from it, hit the boost button now. If you don't have a boost button, you can get one. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:16:27 Now@newpodcastapps.com tell us a little bit about Sylvan Lake. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:16:33 I lived in Sylvan Lake the first year when we first did the podcast together. I was living in Sylvan and we bought a house in Red Deer shortly after. So I've been in Red Deer for like four years. Sylvan is only 20 minutes away and I love Sylvan Lake. Anybody that hasn't visited Sylvan Lake needs to go ASAP. It's a cute little community of really giving people with a lakefront and tons of bars and restaurants and it's where everybody in Alberta goes for the summer and it's still affordable. That's such a big thing for me. I love part of living here is like you really could have a home and not be in a million plus debt, which is very appealing. They make it easy to live here and Sylvan Lake is one of the only places with a waterfront and a gorgeous beach that you could buy a home in and live there comfortably. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:17:25 Who do your listeners prefer more, the Oilers or the Flames? Because when you're in Red Deer, it's one or the other. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:17:33 I'm going to say the Oilers. I think the oilers. If you're listening to the podcast right now and you haven't been to Alberta and you don't know much about it, calgary would be kind of the white collar city where Edmonton is very blue collar and where I live in central Alberta. And Red Deer, it's very blue collar as well. So I feel like a lot of people do root for the Oilers. Don't get me wrong. There's tons of flame spans, too, and they hate each other. It's kind of like the Habs and the leafs. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:18:02 How did you spend your pandemic? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:18:05 Depressed. I hated it at first. It was okay because you're like, oh, I don't have to do anything. This is kind of great. I get to cancel all my plans, and as I get older, I've become such a homebody. I love my home. My husband is a homebody through and through. So at first we were like, oh, this is cool. Then it started getting to the point where like, okay, I haven't seen my parents. At that point, it was a year, and then it went to a year and a half, and then it went to two years, and I was like, this is crazy. I started getting sad. I was like, I missed my family. I want to see my niece who's just born. I missed my other nieces. And Alex's family is in Vancouver, so it was hard on us not having anybody around. The pandemic was spent mostly at home. I think I gained, like, £40. I lost, like, 40 or £50, and then I gained it all back during the pandemic. Lost it again, though. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:18:54 Hey, all right. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:18:58 But I think everybody was in the same boat during the pandemic. They just ate and sat at home, and it was blah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:19:04 What did you eat? I ate a lot of pasta. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:19:07 Yeah, me too. I'm a big pasta lover. Like, I haven't had pasta, a good bowl of pasta in about four months, which I need to have bowl of pasta. But during the pandemic, we ordered every Friday. Alex and I would order this cheesy pasta from this restaurant here and eat it in bed every Friday like gluttonous pigs and watch Netflix. And I'm like, we we have to switch this up. When the pandemic started coming to an end, I'm like, we got to switch this up and get healthy again. And, yeah, we both dropped a lot of weight and started walking more and going out more, and now we're doing fun things in the community again. So I feel like my mood has definitely changed since the pandemic has kind of been I don't want to say over, but restrictions have been lifted. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:19:49 I love the cheesy pasta tips, but what I really want to know, and I think a lot of people would want to hear that if you're going to drop that amount of weight, what sort of commitment did you make to making that change? So you mentioned a little bit of walking. What else is involved? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:20:04 I basically really started just watching what I'm putting in my mouth, and honestly, it's metabolism it's getting older. It's all of that, right? As you get older, your metabolism slows, you can't eat like you used to eat. And I wasn't feeling good in my skin at all. I was just uncomfortable. I didn't like the way I looked. I didn't like the way I felt. I think it was the overall feeling, though, was worse than what I felt like. I looked like it was the overall feeling bloated and uncomfortable and tired. So I just started watching what I ate and prepping healthy meals and eating what I want in moderation. That's just the big key, is just portion control and eating what you want. Because if you give up everything you want, you're just going to gain it all back because you're going to be deprived and mad and binge eat. So I feel like, don't get me wrong, I'm not the poster child for weight loss, but that's all I did. It was just simple. I think simple changes help the most. It's not like a bad diet or like I went keto or any of that, because I tried all that and then I just put the weight back on. So for me, it's just simple changes and slow. Do it slow. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:08 I had the same issue. I had some stuff start to pop up, a little bit of blood pressure, and then came the snoring, and that's generally tied to weight loss. So actually, of course, me being sort of a gut person with audio. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:21:28 Is that your snoring? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:29 Yeah. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:21:30 Are you still snoring or has it gotten better? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:32 I got this thing called the snore Lab, and it gives me a score every night to let me know how well or how poorly I performed in my sleep. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:21:41 How are you doing now? How was last night? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:44 I got the score down to 13, but when I started, it was like 65 and 70. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:21:49 Oh, shit. Good for you. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:52 So we're seeing somebody for some acupuncture. We're eating better. We're cutting back on. Alcohol is a big thing as well. Some warm liquid before bed with some lemon in it, some little things. It's all small changes, right? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:22:06 Yeah, it's all small. And as far as alcohol goes, I really stopped drinking. I don't mean altogether, like I've had drinks since, but about three and a half years ago. I just decided I don't really like drinking anymore. And it makes me anxious, and I feel depressed after I drink. And I just started going, like, why do I want to feel like that? So I cut it out, and I think I drink probably three times a year on special occasions. And it's always fun when you save it for a special occasion. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:22:36 One of the members of Pearl Jam once told me that they only drink three times a year to remind themselves why they only drink three times a year 100%. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:22:44 You know, every time in the morning, I'm like, See, this is why I don't drink usually. I hate it now I do partake in the weed game. I do love my edibles. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:22:55 Do you have a favorite store in Red Deer that you support? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:22:57 Oh, I support them all equally. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:22:59 Matt of course you do. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:23:02 Yeah, no, I do have one that's my favorite because they are the cheapest. They're called value buds, and they're great. I mean, it's so cheap, and you don't feel like crap, and you don't have a hangover, and you feel relaxed and good, and it's such I don't know why weed was such a big deal for so long, but alcohol is so legal. Like, alcohol is way worse than weed. Have you ever seen a bunch of potheads making a ruckus? No, it's always the drunk people. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:23:27 It's true. Also, alcohol really screws up your liver. It slows everything down. It screws up your metabolism and a bunch of things. I mean, you really need both in moderation. But no, I don't think wheat is nearly the boogeyman that it was made out to be, but whoever made it out to be that did a really good job. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:23:45 Totally. There's still some people who have such a bias and a preconceived notion of what weed is, and they've never tried it. I'm not saying you should be a big pot head. That's not going to do anything for your motivation. But as far as, like, on a weekend, if you want to relax, you smoke a joint, take an edible. It's so chill. You just feel relaxed. And it's so different than getting hammered and making bad choices and feeling like shit. The next day I saw this in. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:24:14 Your social media feed, and that was something involving the people who were involved with nexium. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:24:20 Yeah, I do. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:24:22 Who are you friends with in that group? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:24:24 Sarah Edmondson is a friend of mine. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:24:27 So she's from Vancouver, right? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:24:29 Yeah, she is. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:24:30 So did you know her before the Netflix special and the CBC next year podcast and all that? Did you know her from before? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:24:37 No, I didn't know her. I mean, we followed each other on socials, but I didn't know her well at all. I didn't even know her. What happened was I've always been obsessed with true crime and cult stories and kind of the psychological aspect of what's behind people that join cults. And I think people think that, oh, that wouldn't happen to me. I would never join a cult. I would see right through that. And I think they don't understand that. The people that join cults are usually some of the smartest people ever, and they're just trying to better themselves. They're not going into it saying, I'm going to join a cult and be brainwashed. And I always found that interesting. So Sarah is part of the next IAM story, if you want to Google that. I can't explain the whole thing. It's pretty long. But it was a cult, and it was led by a man. Named Keith Reneiri, who's now in prison for life. And Sarah wrote a book and she was on the HBO show The Valve. And I don't remember how it happened, but I think I reached out to her because I heard she was it a podcast. I maybe reached out to her after the story to say how brave she was for writing the book and coming out and talking about it. And then she mentioned that they were going to be starting a podcast. And I said I would love to be a part of the podcast, which is called A Little Bit Culty. And so for the first season, I was a part of the podcast and I helped with research and different stories and guests to bring onto the podcast. I'm not doing that now. I'm busy. And they have like a team of people, but we're still friends and we still talk. And she lives in Atlanta now with her husband Nippy, who is also part of NXIVM. And they're such wonderful people. I'm so happy that they're out of that situation and telling their story. But yeah, google that story. It's really interesting. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:19 Google it. And then watch the Netflix special. Then watch the HBO special and HBO, I think they're now into season two and they actually cut back a little bit on the story and they're not really focused as much on Nippy and Sarah and Mark, who were really the bunch that broke the whole thing wide open and flipped it to becoming a criminal case. But I'm like you. I'm fascinated by it and how people do get wound up into cults. And then I realized them in Radio, which has kind of got its own set of dysfunction, but it's got sets of dysfunction that we don't really recognize as dysfunction until like ten years later. Oh my God, that was crazy. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:26:55 It's definitely like a culty environment in the sense that it's hard to leave. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:00 Oh, absolutely. I'm still not out. I mean, look at me. I'm out, but I'm not out. I'm still talking about it. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:27:07 Yeah, exactly. I always think, like, if I'm going to leave Radio, what am I going to do with my life? And then I think when the industry is pissing me off or I feel that there's unfair treatment of certain people and I just want to get out, I go, well, what am I going to do? A and B, there's probably this stuff in every industry, and every industry has their issues. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:30 I love it. I think I'm caught up. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:27:34 You're caught up with my life. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:35 Yeah, pretty much. I just want to know that if I ring you up all tipsy this Christmas that you'll still take my FaceTime call. Randi Chase (Guest) 00:27:42 Always. I'll always take your friggin FaceTime. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:44 Excellent. I'm so glad you're doing well. And my best to Vinny, okay? Randi Chase (Guest) 00:27:49 Oh, of course. And you should reach out to Vinny because I feel like you guys are kindred. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:27:49 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Kundal produced by Evan Surminski social media by Courtney Krebsbach. Another great creation from the sound of media company there's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Joel Denver is the owner, publisher and president of All Access.com. If you work in radio, broadcasting and now podcasting, you likely have visited the All Access dot com website for industry news. Way back once computers began to take up room on the desk at and internet speeds hit 56k, you might have gone searching for radio industry news and found mainstays like R&R behind a paywall and Billboard Online just recently launched. All Access has always been free, always online and stays connected with it's users with a free job board, music access and more. In short, it is worth parting with your contact information for All Access. In this episode, you will hear how Joel found his way to the intersection of radio, music and technology. We also spoke about the good and bad about pre-pandemic radio, and what it is going to take to get us all back together in the same room for a fun convention. I also mentioned that Joel is a fun Twitter follow - so give him a follow. Thanks also to Corey Dylan from B100 in San Diego for supplying a question. As I mentioned during the show, I am subscribed to a bunch of email alerts and lists from All Access, including Perry Michael Simon's weekly column, "The Letter", and anything of course "Bulletins" "First Alert", and the Morning Recap. (I'm a sucker for e-mail, what can I say?) I was also featured in 10 Questions which spotlights someone in the All Access community. This was done in 2016, shortly after the above picture was taken. The Podcast also got coverage for the ever so epic, episode 100 where I reunited with Jake Daniels for a three hour catch up. Finally, we spoke in depth about Radio and Records Magazine. If you ever want to simply lose your in the 70's, 80's 90's or 2000's - there are lots of R&R Magazines stored here.

I had my first trip to Dallas last August and was looking forward to a few things: Visiting the Texas School Book Depository, Eating some Texas BBQ, and listening to the radio. We did all three but I did not check out a lot of country radio which is weird because Dallas radio is full of country music, sports, and is the home of the venerable Kidd Kraddick show. It also has some legendary personalities who have left their mark on the city (like Kidd), but also Ron Chapman, Terry Dorsey and Tom Joyner who did mornings in Dallas before jetting off to Chicago DAILY to do afternoon drive. Hawkeye has been apart of all of that in the market, including working alongside Terry Dorsey where he learned how to morning radio on the job. In this episode we discussed what makes Dallas a great place to do radio, what it takes to have a successful show in market number 5, why consultants can help grow your career, and what you need to know when you move to Dallas to do radio. We also had some random discussion about the sports scene, the changing demographics in communities and where to get some good Texas BBQ. We also spent time talking about the morning show, including the division in work and performance between himself and his co-host Michelle, and how much time to allot to on air vs. online. How about this for a legacy initiative? Camp Bowie Boulevard was looking a little plain and boring in the 90's. So Hawkeye decided to plant some trees. It started with working with city council to get approval, followed by getting volunteers together to plant the trees. Last month Fort Worth commemorated the 25th anniversary of the planting of those trees. Hawkeye said, “When I started the tree adoption program and campaign in 1997, Camp Bowie Boulevard, Fort Worth’s last brick road, had a wide, bare median. I went to work getting donors to adopt trees and by 1998, we raised the necessary funds to make my crazy dream a reality, and the planting began. 25 years later, Camp Bowie Boulevard is known for its miles of mature majestic oak trees that shade this historic street.” What an incredible achievement that touches all the bases of great local radio. Read the whole story. TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:00:02 The sound off podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:00:13 A trip to the Dallas Fort Worth area this week as I speak with Hawkeye from Cumulus owned New Country 96 three. I had my first taste of radio in Dallas last August when I traveled there, ironically, for a Pod cast convention. My listening was on the previous incarnation of Hot 93 Three, which featured Mason in the Morning. I also checked out 96 Seven, The Ticket and The Fan because it is Dallas Cowboys territory and as we know, the Dallas Cowboys are the biggest drama on TV since Dallas. I did not check out two of the more popular country stations in the market, like The Wolf and New Country 96 Three. Time was short and I haven't felt the need to keep up with country music since I stopped trying my luck at Esmeraldas in Edmonton back in the 90s. By the way, both those country stations are owned by Cumulus. Two country stations in the building. Yeah, we're going to talk about that now. Longtime Dallas Morning host and Country Radio Hall of Famer. Hawkeye joins me from his home in. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:01:10 Fort Worth, starting in San Antonio. I actually did college radio in San Antonio and the department chairman at San Antonio College, her name was Miss Jean Longworth and she's passed away now, but the department building is now named after her. She was in her 70s when I was there, so I was in her office one day and radio station called. They needed a part timer for the weekend. And this is basically how everybody in San Antonio, Texas got their first job, is some program director would call Miss Jean Longweigh up. And I just happened to be in the office when a job came through and she told her secretary, we need someone for this job. At Sunday mornings from 06:00 A.m. To three in the afternoon, I was like, I'll take that job. I was working at the college station, and then I started working commercial radio there, thanks to Miss Jean Longwith. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:56 So were you working on air or are you just changing religious tapes like. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:01:59 I was I was mostly changing religious tapes, but they had like from noon to three we got to play music and they didn't really have a log. And I didn't really know the music all that well. And I'm sure I didn't make the best selection, but it sounds like you did the exact same thing they did. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:20 Let me talk between six and eight in the morning, but after that I was going to give way to somebody a little more religious than I was. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:02:29 Did you ever fall asleep during one of the hour long tapes that you had to run? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:33 No. I do know that the worst thing that happened was the tape got twisted. Just never a good thing. And then the next thing that happened was, we're going to let you read the funeral announcements, and that's the first thing that happened during the shift. And you never really want to, first off, do that the very first thing because you're going to botch someone's name, right? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:02:54 Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:55 And you can't apologize to them because they're gone. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:02:58 No, that's a bit I still do. I still do that bit every morning. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:03 Was radio on your radar before you got the call? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:03:07 Yeah, definitely was on. I just always was enamored by radio, and I always thought it was a great profession. And I remember as a kid, you remember the I might be older than you, but the mobile radio stations that used to be, like, in the shopping center parking lot, oh, my gosh. We had one in Lansing, Michigan, and I lived there for a short time, and my mom drive by that all the time, so I could peek in the window. I just thought, that's got to be the greatest thing ever, to be sitting in there playing music for everybody, talking to everybody. So, yeah, I was enamored by radio at a very young age. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:40 What did you do after San Antonio? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:03:42 Finished up my degree at University of North Texas, and then I actually worked a year in New York City doing video production. And then I went back to San Antonio. I just really didn't like video. I wanted to get back into radio, and I missed it. And I went back to San Antonio. I knew a bunch of people there, and I was able to get a job pretty quickly, a part time job. And I did part time radio for about a year until a full time position opened up. And I was in San Antonio for probably four years total before I got a call out of the blue from a former program director who was in Dallas, who asked if I wanted to come up to Dallas and work with a guy by the name of Terry Dorsey who was like legendary in Dallas. And it was kind of like, if you're a high school baseball player and Derek Jeter called you up and said, do you want to come play for the Yankees with me? That's what that was like. It was out of the blue. And Terry was at the top of his game at the time, and they had just hired him at KSCS, and they needed someone to be a sidekick. And it was the best call of my life, totally changed my life, and I've been there ever since 1988. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:04:46 Why did you get that call? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:04:49 I worked with the program director, Ted Stecker of KSCS. I worked with him in San Antonio where he was a consultant, and he knew me there. And unfortunately for Ted Stecker, he got let go as the consultant when a new general manager came in. So one of the first things he did when he was already working at KSCS in Dallas, and he had hired Terry Dorsey. So one of the first things he did after hiring Terry Dorsey was, give me the call. Do I want to come down and work with Terry Dorsey? And so it was just right place, right time. I worked with a great consultant who was also a program director, ted Stecker. To be honest, he was kind of like my dad in this industry. He was like a father figure. He passed away way too soon, but he was a great programmer and I just loved working for him. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:34 I think anybody who's gotten this far through the show knows that you're clearly a student of radio and people have always had something to say and you've been able to take it in because we've mentioned a number of people who are called in to consult or they're programmers or whatnot. What is it about what you do that makes you a student of radio? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:05:55 Well, you know what, I was watching a little clip from Steven Jobs the other day, and he was saying, if you just really love something and for most people, if they don't love it and it gets hard, they just walk away from it. I'm a student of radio because I love it. I absolutely love it. My favorite 4 hours of the day, literally are the 4 hours in the morning that we do our show. That's my favorite 4 hours of the day. I love when we have a great show. I have a great co host, Michelle Rodriguez, and we have like today, our show just killed from top to bottom the minute we turned that mic on until we walked out of there. Every break we just had, something was just fantastic. And days like that, you're just excited when you get off the air. You're excited for the next day if you know you got stuff coming up. And that's what makes me a student radio. I love to find out what other people are doing things at work. And I'm just a fan of radio in general. We don't get to listen to a lot of morning shows because we're on in the morning, but I definitely am fan of what other people do. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:48 What was that first year like in Dallas? You get brought in, you're going to be alongside for the ride. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:06:55 I'd never been at a station before. That was their promotions and they had a plan. I'd never been at a station before, like in San Antonio, like this one, they had a plan. They just hired Terry Dorsey. They were losing to another station across town. So their plan was to be the number one country station and then the number one station in the market. And then we had a great general manager, Victor Sanson also, and him and Ted Sticker put together a plan. And within a year we were the number one country station. And when within three years, we were the number one station in the market, and we were that for a very long time. We knocked off a guy by the name of Ron Chapman on KVIL, and that was pretty amazing. If you're not familiar with KVIL, this is a true story. KVIL and Ron Chapman, he was so dominant in this market that in the late eighty s, the Dallas Cowboys sold for $86 million. KVIL sold for $84 million. That's how valuable KVIL radio was. It sold at the same price as the Cowboys. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:07:57 You know, there's actually an Art Volo video bit with them talking about that on KVIL. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:08:04 Yes, I have seen that, yes. Clip 00:08:06 The people who are buying us this week yeah, this week's, owners of KVIL are paying. The rumor is now, I'm not here to officially state this because I don't know, and I may be told totally differently right after nine, but the rumor is that the price tag is now up for this station alone to something around $82 million. Gang, I mean, that's the highest price ever been paid for any radio station in the history of the world, and it's us. Okay, now that's a lot of money. Okay, so that's significant enough. We've seen the bidding go up and up, but listen to what he says here. Graham points out that that means that KVIL is worth more than the entire Dallas Cowboys franchise. Wow. Now think about that. How much did the Cowboys sell for, Mark? A little over 60 million. Over 60 million. And we're going for about 82. That's amazing. There's an answer to that, though. What's the answer? There go your season tickets, Jonathan. The other thing I'd like to have is I'd like to have one owner for 25 years. Okay. We haven't had one for 25 years. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:23 That's right. And it's funny that's like the second week in a row that I've brought up the Dallas Cowboys and that sale because we had Jeff Smellion on. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:09:31 Oh, okay. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:33 And the same year Jeff bought the Seattle Mariners. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:09:36 Yeah, I remember when that happened. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:38 Yeah, it was definitely a wild time. And KVIL and Ron Chapman. Legends in the market. Dallas has really cranked out a lot of legends. Kid crate it comes to mind. And you're talking about a country radio station that you're trying to knock off an established country brand. How's that done? Because I've had people come up and say, there's the country station and then there's the other country station. What is the plan to try to change those roles? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:10:06 Well, you know, over 35 years, it's it's really interesting. And even if you go back before I started working here, KFCs was the dominant station in the early eighty s. And then Kplex hired a guy by the name of Terry Dorsey, and he came up with this radio bit that's just so ridiculous called a Heiny wine. And that really propelled that radio station KPLX to number one. And then KSCS, which was owned by the time by ABC Cap Cities in the late 80s they decided they wanted to be number one again. They were going to do what it takes. So they hired Terry Dorsey away and they had a promotional budget that was huge. They became number one through the late eighty s and into the then around 2000 Caplex decided that they need to do something. They've been number two for over a decade. So they changed their whole identity to The Wolf. To be honest, when you're number one for over a decade, you tend to get a little overconfident, maybe a little fat and lazy. And then they came out like a runaway train. It was something I'd never seen before promotionally. They just hit on all cylinders. So they were number one for like another three or four years. And then it went back and forth like book to book to book for a number of years. Now we're owned both owned by Cumulus, and that's really strange too, to be in the building. There's a lot of advantages to having both country stations. We get promotions that nobody else in the nation gets because they don't have to worry about offending the competing radio station. But there's also disadvantages too. If we come up with a great promotion, it's like, yeah, that's a fantastic promotion. We're going to do it for you guys in January and we're going to do it on The Wolf in February. So there's an advantage and a disadvantage to it. There were some growing pains with that, but it's not too bad. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:48 Right now I'm familiar with both the brands because I've had a chance to listen to them. And what Cumulus does with the Wolf War New Country, whether it was Atlanta or Minneapolis or wherever, I got to give it a listen. How do you differentiate those brands? Is there record splitting? Is it voices? Does it skew? How do you carve up that country pie in Dallas? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:12:10 That's an interesting question because they tried a couple of different things and it wasn't an instant success. Even at one time when the Dickies owned Cumulus, when they ran Cumulus, they tried to put pop music on KSCS to differentiate. That was a disaster that lasted like maybe two weeks and it was just overwhelmingly people were upset about it. And now the differentiation of the two is the newer music ends up on New Country 96, three KSCS and The Wolf does not play anything that is brand new out of the box. They play stuff. The newest stuff they play is probably six months old, going back all the way deep into the 90s. We are from today all the way back into probably 2010, 2005 in that era. So they kind of skew a little bit older than us now. So they've done a good job differentiating the two. But you can do that because we're owned by the same people. If we were competitors, we'd probably have the exact same formats when it comes. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:07 To music on the show and as well as station does revolve a little bit of round new music. Yet we have an established morning show host. What is the role of music on the show? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:13:18 We play about eight songs an hour in the morning, seven to eight songs an hour. And the two stations that are above us in the market, one is Kid Cratic and the other is a sports station. The Ticket. They're the two stations, the last book that were ahead of us, and both of them don't play any music. And I think eventually that's the way you have to go. But when country is such a part of people's life, country music is such a part of people's life in Dallas, it's really difficult to kind of go all talk because people expect to hear they're coming to you to hear music and great bits and conversation and topics and so forth. It's really difficult to kind of make that step to all talk, and especially when people have been hearing music on your station for a long time. So I don't know if we'll ever get there. I don't know if we'll ever get to that point. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:14:03 Well, I look at country music, the songs are short enough. Eight songs. That seems reasonable. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:14:08 Yeah, it's about 20 minutes, 23 minutes around there. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:14:12 So that puts a little pressure on you to keep it short, keep it tight, keep it bright, which is probably something you've been doing all along anyway. But I hear a lot of people sort of struggle with taking great content and then putting it right down into the nice, tidy amount of time that you need to do in order to get through it. So how do you keep it that way? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:14:35 That is a challenge. So my co host Michelle and I, we plan on our whole show. Exactly. We're going to do every break, and then we get in the break before the break, we kind of discuss how we're going to get into it, what we're going to discuss in there, and how to get out. And we may say this is a good point to get out, might get out at point A, point B, or point C. We have different exit points quite often. We might not get to this. I had a great program director, Lauren Pelagi, who once told me that, hey, don't be afraid to leave some stuff on the editing room floor. The pacing is very different. Sometimes I go over next door, we have a sports talk station. It's more really guy talk. They have no songs, obviously, because it's talk and their pacing is so slow, pauses and so forth. We would never do that because we're trying to cover a topic in three to four minutes and have a beginning and middle and the end of the story and then maybe leave a portion for the audience to jump in with phone calls and so forth. So you really got to plan out your breaks very, very well. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:15:39 I love that word that you said, which is pacing. And I can tell that this morning's show, because you're still beaming from it, had great pacing because that's really what makes the show great, is did you get in, did you get out, how did we feel? And could we move on and leave enough on the floor? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:15:56 Yeah, exactly. If I got stuff I never got to. I know we had a good show. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:16:01 And there's so much going on these days with the prep you can do and the social media. So again, we've got more pie to sort of break up here. And when you're on the air, there's still an online component. So between you and Michelle, how would you divide that and how do you look at what's important in that moment? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:16:19 The show, what we put on the air has to be the first priority. And we don't have a large staff, it's just Michelle and I. And then we have a producer, which we did not have till a year ago. It was just Michelle and I for a long time. So we had to be very judicious with our time. We try to reformat as much as our stuff we can to put online feature stuff that's really great that day, if we can make a video format of it. But then also, where do you post it? Do you post it on your website? Do you post it on TikTok? Do you put it on Instagram? Do you put it on your Facebook page? What's your audience? We have more followers on Facebook, but I kind of feel we get more reaction off Instagram and everything kind of interacts differently. Man, I tell you what, it's kind of maddening to see where to put all this stuff and just try to figure it out all the time. But I would say, can I point out one thing that I think is really interesting that I think a lot of people kind of just forget about? If they're so into Instagram or TikTok these days, they really neglect how important it is to post stuff on their own station website, on their own web page. If you Google yourself in your name, if you're a fan who's a P two or P one that wants to be a super fan heard someone on your show, just like, if you want to find out more about a restaurant, you'd Google it and they would send you directly to your station's web page. And there are so many stations in my market that there's nothing on the station web page for those shows. And so I want people, when they come to our web page, it's almost like a history of our show, links to different bits and videos, ways to contact us. But hey, we raised a million dollars at a radio thon last year. That story needs to be archived somewhere. If you put it up on TikTok, it's gone. People won't ever find it. But I want our website to be, like I said, kind of a directory of all things that's happened on our show. We had a great bit on our show today that people are going to talk about for a while, Phil, and we're going to make a web post. People can find out about it, kind of go back to it all the time. So many people neglect their web pages these days because they have a web page designer at their cluster, and they think that guy's taking care of it, but he's probably have four or five stations to take care of. And so Michelle and I really kind of made that a priority to keep it up to date on our web page. And I even saw someone in my market on their station's web page. They had a bit from the guy who had the job before them. They had never taken it off the web page. So I'm wondering if he ever even went there to look what was on his own site. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:18:40 You raised such a good point, and it's really the Google game, and having that SEO, and it's one of the things we don't have the benefit of a transmitter in the world of podcast. And people say to me, what do I need? I said, well, you can have a podcast, but you really need to have a web page that is going to be your home base to what you do, who you are. And I know this is a new story. I didn't have to Google this one because this was actually new, but an initiative that you had started years ago. And I really want you to go back to the beginning with this because I really think it's important and I really think it's local and fantastic. And that's what you did with the trees in Fort Worth. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:19:16 So I used to live on this historic boulevard in Fort Worth called Camp Buoy, and it's the last brick street in Fort Worth, and it goes for miles and had this really wide median strip, and there weren't any trees on it. And I just thought this was in 1997. I thought, you know, this street would be just so gorgeous if on that giant median strip, they just had a line of oak trees going all the way up for a couple of miles. So I actually wrote my city council member, I said, hey, what would it take to put trees on this strip? And I really you know what? If I knew how hard it was going to be, I probably wouldn't have started it. And he said, Actually, the trees aren't the problem. It's the irrigation. Because the Texas heat, you've got to put an underground irrigation system to make sure these trees are going to survive, and it has to be watered on a regular basis. For three years. So you got to raise money to build the irrigation system. And so we started an Adopt a Tree program, which really was really adopt about 8ft of irrigation, but that's what it really was. But that's not as sexy as Adopt a Tree. This was before the Internet was really anything. So we literally when I say we, I'm saying the neighborhood kids that I hired would print up flyers, and we'd go door to door in the neighborhood to drop off flyers to Adopt a Tree. We talked about it on the air. We had different businesses in the area that put out a phone number where you would mail in a donation, because there wasn't really websites yet for the websites were just starting. It took us about a year to raise enough money to plant trees on the first section up and down the median. And after we did that, these are little teeny trees that are, like, 3ft tall. We went to the next section, and then the businesses actually took over the project after I did the first section, and they just kept going with it. And that's what I kind of was hoping, that they would see the value in it. So I did the first, like, couple of miles. So that was in 97. They were planted in 98. And you saw the story from a couple of weeks ago. The city of Fort Worth honored me for the 25th anniversary of the program because the trees now, that street is just shaded. The trees are 15, 20ft tall now in 25 years, and it's one of the most beautiful streets in the city, and it's totally changed the whole neighborhood. And I always joke with my wife whenever we live in Dallas now, but I lived in Fort Worth for 20 years. Whenever we're in Fort Worth, we always drive down the street to check out the trees. I call it my garden. Check out my garden. And it was really neat to be honored by the city, but it's neat to see what that street looks like today and how beautiful it turned out. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:52 How many radio stations ago was that? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:21:55 I was still at KSCS. I was still at the same station. Still at the same station, yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:22:00 That's wonderful. And such great vision. Obviously local and something that keeps you connected to the community. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:22:08 It was really neat to see how it came out. It really is. And it's been so long that I did that that a lot of people didn't remember me doing that. And that was the cool thing, because when the city honored me and the story came out locally, so many people were like, wow, I didn't know you did that. Or I reconnected with people who adopted the trees 25 years ago, like, hey, people who are in their forty s I was 15 when my family adopted a tree. Now I'm 40. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:22:35 Okay, so this is a little bit of a crass question, but does something like that get done today because there's so many fewer people inside a radio station. There's eight people doing 85 things. So does that get done or is it something maybe we should go back to? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:22:54 I think it does get done. But you know, what I think is really happening is I think there's like in our market, and we're a top five market, and there's so many radio stations that just they're owned by a corporation and they're a shell of what they used to be 20 years ago. They may have one person working who's local, and everything else is either voice track or syndicated. And when you have a station like that where there's one person working, yeah, that's not going to happen. I feel like I'm very lucky because we have a radio station that has a morning show, a midday show and an afternoon show. We have six stations in our cluster. All six of them had local morning shows until like a few months ago. One station now, which is a rim shot, they actually have a syndicated show on there now. So we have five local radio radio shows, morning shows in our building, and four local midday shows and six local afternoon shows. So there's a lot of people in our building. It's kind of like radio was a long time ago. There's just a lot of people working there. It's very vibrant and everything because there's so many stations. But I think your point is a very valid one because there's so many radio stations, I call them stations that are off the board, stations that really don't promote. They're just part of a large cluster and they're part of a national sales buy. So they don't really make a big splash in the market anymore. They don't do anything promotionally. And I don't want to really call anybody out, but it's not hard to find stations like that in every market. And when you have stations like that, yeah, things like a tree planning project up and down camp, boy, that's just not going to happen anymore. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:24:30 I think the key to the promotion, why it was successful, is you did get outside people. You're talking about kids with the flyers and passing that stuff out, that if you do want to get involved, I think often we may feel that we can't reach outside the building to go and get the help we need to do the things that we want to do. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:24:48 I agree with that. And boy, if you do reach outside the building, it's amazing how much more you can get done. We actually were looking for some type of local community project to do this summer, and we found an organization called Feed the City that kind of takes over in the summer where school program is due in the fall because kids aren't in school anymore and Feeds these Kids, and this organization was like. Yeah, we're here all the time. We would love to partner with you. People can know about it, just the publicity you guys would bring and more volunteers. And we're taking what they do to another level. So I would really encourage radio stations, do what you just said, reach out, find organizations that are already doing what you want to do and help them do their job better. And it's a win win for everybody. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:25:34 I don't want to bore you with my stories, but I actually no, please do. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:25:38 I listen to your podcast all the time. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:25:42 Somebody would come into my office and he said, we need to change the name of garbage day to Recycle Day. And I said, this is a silly idea. And I kept sending him away until he came back and said, Finally, I'll just do it. And we started a campaign to change the day of Garbage Day to Recycle Day. And the motion passed five to four in City Hall. But it was our radio station pressure that I think sort of tipped the vote in the favor. And nobody calls it garbage day anymore. It's all about recycling, and the focus is on recycling. And people now think recycling first before they throw something in the garbage. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:26:16 You know, if that was my radio promotion, I'd be telling people about that every single day. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:24 You just mentioned something about stations being off the board. They're there for the buy. You don't have to feel bad. It's not just radio. The NHL does it, too. There's the Arizona Coyotes in the world's smallest arena. I think it's what is it? Seats 5000 or something. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:26:43 Yeah, I know. Yeah, it's a college arena. It's Arizona College Hockey. I mean, that's amazing, too. You might want to put the Oakland A's I was really rooting for them to stay in Oakland. We almost want to put them in there, too, before the last couple of years, before they moved to Las Vegas. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:58 How are the Dallas Stars doing? Because I know they moved from Minneapolis, but they fit right into the community. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:27:03 It's kind of interesting. I remember I went to the first game when they moved here and I thought, this is never going to work. And I was thinking, how did Minnesota lose their team to us? Because nobody even plays hockey. And the Stars were really, really smart because what they did is they didn't just put a hockey team in town, they created a hockey culture in Dallas and they built rinks all over the area. They started leagues for kids all over the area. They got people playing hockey, growing up with hockey and really built a fan base. And they did a really great job with that. I don't know if you're familiar with a basketball player played for the Dallas Mavericks. His name was Popeye Jones. And his kids were always hanging around the arena and they told their dad when they were pretty young they wanted to play hockey. So Popeye Jones went over to some of the players in the Stars. Hey, what do I do? My sons want to play hockey. And some of the Stars player says, don't sign them up for hockey, sign them up for skating lessons, teach them how to skate first, and then when they get good, then put them in hockey and they'll be far ahead of everybody. His two sons both got drafted by the NHL. They're both in the NHL. I don't know if they're still there, but they were there for a while. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:28:14 I have a couple of Dallas stories that you just brought back, and we're thinking right back to 1997. I was working up in Edmonton and we had those great series against the Dallas Stars for a couple of years that went back and forth. So I'm very familiar with the club because we had the best ice in the NHL and you had humidity that you had to so the ice was always soft. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:28:35 I forgot about that. Yes. The first arena they were in where they had these huge vent pipes that were coming out of the arena when you walked in trying to pump out the humidity. I totally forgot about that. Yeah, that's true. Yes. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:28:48 I remember Bob Ganey as well. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:28:50 Who's? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:28:50 A notable Montreal Canadian. He was down there running the team for the longest time, and his son Steven, I think was also I think he got drafted at one point. He didn't play in the NHL, but I think he did get involved, was also involved with the Dallas Stars. And I don't mean to have a lot of hockey talk, but we are emanating from Canada, so I thought I'd throw a in there. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:29:08 And the thing two people don't remember about Dallas and Fort Worth is there was a very vibrant minor league hockey scene here, going all the way back to like the late sixty s. And there was a rivalry between Dallas and Fort Worth when it came to minor league hockey back then, there wasn't even NBA basketball. The Mavericks didn't come on the scene until the 80s. So minor league hockey had a huge impact during the winter here in the area with some very exciting minor league teams. I remember actually going to a minor league game. They had a couple of different leagues here. This was before the Stars came. And I just remember the hatred between the two teams. It was so much fun. It was a great place for minor league hockey for a long time. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:29:52 It seems like just about anything you put in Dallas has the ability to work. Even when people say, this isn't going to work, you can put something in Dallas and it's going to work. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:30:04 You know what? You know what we're getting here in Dallas to illustrate your point? Professional cricket. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:30:09 Oh, for sure, of course. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:30:11 Yes. There's a huge Indian community here and they're starting a professional cricket league in the US. And Dallas. They took a minor league stadium and they're repurposing it to make it a cricket field. And it's supposed to come, I think might be as soon as this summer that they are going to have professional cricket and you know, what kind of interested. I could go to a game and see what that's like, but I bet it will be successful. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:30:44 The sound of podcast supports Podcasting 2.0, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one@newpodcastaps.com. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:30:58 Tell me about your relationship with Michelle as it pertains to roles on the show. I mean, I think everybody in Dallas knows who you are. People know who she is, but then when it comes to dividing up the work or coming in and out of the breaks. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:31:14 So Michelle and I, I had an opening a couple of years ago and Michelle and I had been friends for a long time. She did the Middays and they asked me, what do you think you want to do for this opening? And I said, I really like to give Michelle a shot on this because she's filled in on vacations. We have a certain amount of chemistry, we're friends. I think it would work. So I kind of lobbied for that. And I think management was kind of excited to go that direction too, one, because they found someone who'd been in the market. She grew up here in Dallas. She's lived here her whole life. The thing about Michelle also is, and I've noticed back when, even when she was coming in and this is a great lesson, she actually, by the way, she never aspired to do mornings. Also. I had to really convince her like, yes, you want to do this. You are ready to do this. You're going to be great at this. And Tracy Johnson calls this the for the show attitude. She's always thinking about the show and she comes up with so many great ideas, ways to execute them. We did a bit this whole week where she got a friend of hers, John Randall, who is a Grammy Award winning producer, to have me go into the studio and sing, I have no music ability. And then he was going to auto tune it and kind of demonstrate just how amazing auto tune is for someone that they use on all these songs now. And then we played the auto tune version back to back with a dry vocal and we kind of like had a story arc that went the whole week. This was her baby, this was her idea and she created this. And that's kind of her genius is she thinks like a morning person and not a lot of people do that instinctively. And that's what I really liked about her, too. She knew right away from the beginning here this will work. Let's try this comes up with ideas. So it's really a team effort on when we plan the show and so forth. And that's what I really like working with her with. It's so much fun to put together a show with her. And so often, too, when you're listening to a radio show as just a regular listener, it may sound one way, but behind the scene, if you dissected it, maybe the person who's not the lead or the segment is not about them. The other person that may be the person who put together the whole segment, who conceived it, who kind of planned it out, who wrote it, if you may use that term. And that happens so often on our show. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:33:35 What's that conversation like where you're convincing somebody, no, you really want to get up at 330 in the morning. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:33:44 That was kind of one of the points. She goes, I don't know if I want to get them at 330 in the morning. And I said, you know, the amount of people that are going to hear you and the amount of more time that you're going to get to talk on the air and do stories more in depth than doing it. 30 seconds in between a song and get to show your personality and let people get to know you. That way, it's going to take your career to a whole new level. It's going to open so many other doors for you. It's going to be a lot different. And this is the pinnacle of radio these days, is morning radio. It's been that way for a very long time, and maybe you never thought of yourself being there. She's literally someone who started in the promotion department and worked her way all the way up from that to doing Mornings, and it was a long process. She paid her dues like nobody I've ever seen. So I think she just didn't realize when we're trying to convince her, me and the program director, that she would be great at it, I don't think she ever really thought about doing that, doing Mornings. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:41 Remember when we used to have to tell people, you're going to have to go to a small market in order to be on the radio in Dallas? You need to cut your time in Lubbock. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:34:49 Yes, I know. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:51 You don't have to anymore. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:34:53 Well, unfortunately, because there's really not very many places in Lubbock probably that have local radio, maybe one or two shows only in the morning, so it's hard to even find a place in the Lubbock or Waco or wherever that you can go down there and cut your teeth. That's the unfortunate part of it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:35:07 But if you play hockey, you can still play for Lubbock. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:35:10 Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:35:12 How do you look at the share of country music from 30 years ago? Country got a bigger share of the radio ear now than it ever did. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:35:21 I think it's kind of brought pretty much the same share that it did 30 years ago. It ebbs and flows. When Garth Brooks came out, he kind of really took it to a new level, and probably our share had gotten larger than ever before. In fact, at that time, Dallas even had a third country station for probably about eight years, maybe a little bit longer. And now maybe the share is actually even a little less just because Dallas has gotten so much growth. So, see, I'm so close to it. To me, it seems mainstream. So I don't know what it's like in other markets. If you live in Texas, if you live in Dallas, it is kind of mainstream. I mean, country is just everybody has a country station somewhere on their dial. They may not listen to country all the time, but definitely some of the time, and they have it somewhere on their dial. So it is kind of I've been lucky to be in a market where country is that important. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:36:10 I guess the reason why I mentioned is because I think I had 97 one the Eagle in my car. I listened to that here in Canada. But I think the station's gone now, right? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:36:20 Yeah, probably about six months ago. They became like an all talk station called the Freak. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:36:25 Yeah, see, I missed that. And when I hear stuff like that, I think country must be taking over. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:36:32 I don't know if it's taken over, but I think, you know what, both us and our sister station, 99 five the Wolf, we've firmly planted our flags on top of the hill along with others, and as one by one, some of these flags start coming down and going away. Our flags are still there, waving in the wind. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:36:48 So I didn't want to get this far in without having a little food conversation. I just wanted to ask you if I made the right decision, barbecue wise, to go to Terry Black's barbecue when I was there. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:36:59 I would say that was a strong decision. I would say that's a strong decision. And Dallas Fort Worth has really kind of just emerged as a mecca for barbecue. Almost any major Texas city has, but there are so many great places that it's kind of hard to recommend one and be wrong. I will tell you a very quick story. I was on a plane flying back, and I was sitting next to a pilot who was, like, doing the puddle jumping, coming back to Dallas and deadheading. I guess that's what they call it. He goes, oh, man. He goes, I love coming to Dallas for the barbecue. I go, oh, what's your favorite barbecue place? He goes, that place at the airport. As soon as I get to Dallas, I go right to that place at the airport. I don't think they're really cooking their brisket down on the tarmac. I don't know how fresh that is. But if you like it man, go for it. That say you do you. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:37:54 So I know for a fact that you are working in a top ten market because you said you worked with Steve Reynolds, and he's like the top ten guy. Just ask him. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:38:05 You know what? I got to work with Steve for about a year and a half, and Steve did a great job for me. I got to work with Randy Lane also for a short time, and I really enjoyed them. And this is the mark of a great consultant. And if you get a chance to work with one, don't fight. It a really good one. I would recommend open up your mind. Hey, you know what? And if they suggest something and it doesn't fit your show, then tell them. Fight for what you think fits your show, but be open to their ideas. But most consultants kind of have I call it the Vince Lombardi philosophy. Vince Lombardi, when he was coaching the packers, he decided to stop looking at game tapes and pointing out all the things that his team was doing wrong. Instead, he would point out the things his team was doing right. We need to do more of this and more of this and more of this. That's great. That was a great play. Let's do that again. And that's what a good consultant will do. Hey, here's what you did great. These are your strengths. Let's build on that. Let's do more of that kind of stuff. And guys like Steve. Steve Reynolds, Tracy Johnson, Randy Lane. Those are the kind of consultants they have. If you get a chance to work with them, don't pass it up. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:39:16 And so many people talk about their experience working with a consultant, about what they didn't like, and sometimes I wonder maybe you were not open to change in that particular moment. And so I think when you meet a coach or consultant just being amiable to change and what can they offer? And look at it as an opportunity to take something and add to your show. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:39:37 Yeah, I look at my shows. I have 16 breaks I've got to fill every single day, five days a week. And if you've got ideas for me or we're brainstorming and try stuff, then thank you very much. One of the things that Steve really taught me that I never really thought of about before is like, hey, don't just tell the story. Like, hey, this is going on in town. And here's the story. Here's the players. Here's maybe a little audio clip because see how you can involve yourself in that story and take it to a next level, find a way to become part of that story. And one of my favorite things that we ever did, that Michelle and I did, and it was basically we were thinking of that way is how we could involve ourselves in that story. Remember probably about two or three years ago, all these monoliths that started popping up all over the world. Well, we got a high school shop class to build us a monolith, and we put it on the riverbed where you could actually kind of see it from the freeway, but you had to pull over and drive down the access road. Is that a monolith? And then we got some people to just start tweeting about it or posting photos of it, and then it became a sensation, like, hey, who put this monolith out here? But because the monolith thing was a story, like, how could we be involved? So we even told our audience we're going to get a high school shot class to build it. So people who are listening to our show knew that was us that did it. And then it just took off from there where it started. Like, who put the monolith over here? It was on the news, it was in the newspapers, and people were doing selfies next to it. It ended, though, when someone stole our monolith in the middle of the night. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:12 There's a trophy behind you that does not look like your hall of Fame Award. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:41:16 Yes. So there's also a photograph. There it is right there. That trophy is from my actually, just. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:23 Point to it and there'll be a picture. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:41:25 Go ahead. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:25 Okay, give it a point. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:41:27 There you go. Okay, so the trophy is from my grandfather's semi pro baseball team. And my grandfather had a semi pro baseball team in Middletown, Connecticut. And the interesting thing about his team is it was desegregated. It was like an all white team, but he added black players before the Brooklyn Dodgers did. Obviously, he wasn't in a league like the Dodgers were, but there was a barnstorming team called the Florida Hobos, who used to play all the white teams in the Middlesex County League in Connecticut. And they got too many of their players were drafted during World War II. They didn't have a team anymore. So my grandfather took the remaining players on this barnstorming team, added it to his team, and immediately improved the team to a level where they won the league championship, like, four or five years in a row. But that's what that picture is. My dad's the bat boy, and I love that picture because my grandfather is really a pioneer that he did that, that he added those players to his team. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:42:29 I also love the fact that you yourself, you were inducted in the Country Radio Hall of Fame in 2020. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:42:35 You know what the real honor to me is that I got inducted a few years after Terry got inducted, terry Dorsey. And then I'm in there with him. And unfortunately, Terry passed away right after he retired, like, six months later. Not even that. Like, three months later. And I would have loved for him to be able to share that honor with me because he was so instrumental. He really taught me everything I know about morning radio. I thought I knew a little, and then I saw the way that Terry did, and I thought, wow, this guy is everything is open. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:01 How much different was the show compared to yours? You mentioned you got 16 breaks and you like to segment a little time, but how much different was his show? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:43:09 It's kind of funny because I feel like I kind of became him. And what's different is, on his show, I was kind of the renegade, the young guy. He was the dad, almost like an Everybody Loves Raymond type character. And now if you listen to the show today, michelle's like the young person that keeps me in line, and I'm the bumbling dad. Everybody Loves Raymond character. And so sometimes I say, man, I'm just doing Terry's act. I'm just doing what he did. I kind of assume that character of the everyman the dad. The show is different in the fact that radio is different. And we talk about different things that are more topical, but kind of the structure of the show. I feel like I've just taken over his role. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:56 How'd you get the name Hawkeye? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:43:57 I got it in San Antonio. When I started there, I did traffic for a short time, and so I was Mark Lewis on one station, and they wanted to put me on a second station, which is pretty normal for traffic guys to be on multiple stations. And they said, you have to have a different name of the other station. So the program director came up with Hawkeye because something like Eye in the sky, and it just stuck, and I was never able to get rid of it. And now that's what I'm known for. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:44:21 How hard is it to work in Dallas if you come from afar and move from another market? How hard is it to succeed in radio? Because there's a lot of established people who've been doing it for a long time and are doing it well. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:44:37 Well, that's the hard part. I see so many talented people who come to this market, and just like you said, there are so many shows that are established. Okay, I've been on the air here for 35 years with Terry Dorsey. After he passed, I continued on. So I've been on for 35 years. You have kid cratdock. He's been on now. Kid obviously passed away, but his ensemble has been there for well over 20 years. You have the other big morning show in our town is Sports Radio 1310 The Ticket. They have a show called The Newsers, dunham and Miller. They've been there since the mid 90s. Hal J at Wbap, he just had a heart transplant and he came back to work. Yes, he's upstairs. He's in the same building as ours. He's part of our cluster. He was in the market when I came here in the 80s. So he's been here, like, 40 years, and then you have Bo Roberts, who does classic rock on KZPs. He's been here for over 30 years. So it's not that it's hard. It's not that we're the most super talented people in the world, and there's nobody can be as talented as us. Sure, there's other really great talented broadcasters, but in an era where nobody really has promotion and marketing budgets anymore, it's really hard to break in against established shows when you don't really have a way to do it except via social media, which everybody has. Everybody has the same tools. So everybody who's been here for decades has listeners that literally grew up with them. They're five steps ahead of you. When you the very talented broadcaster who came here from Kansas City, come to the market and you're trying to create buzz and so forth, and everybody's else is listening to people they've known. It's really hard to separate yourself or move up with the pack. Like I said, we're not the most talented broadcasters in the world. We've just been here a long time, and it's very hard to separate yourself from the pack. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:38 Is there anything you can see on the horizon for radio or your show that you're curious about? We don't need to talk about AI, because that's silly. But is there anything else that you're interested in to go, you know what? I think that's coming in the future, and I'm looking forward to it. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:46:53 The interesting thing to me is there's so many shows that are syndicated now, and in our market, the local shows really do the best. Kid Cratdock is here viewed as a local show because they're based here. They were here for so long, even though they're syndicated. Most people who listen to Kid Cratdock here, the Kid Cratdic show here have no idea that's a syndicated show. They think that they just do it in Dallas. But what I think is actually and I kind of interested in this and I'm surprised it hasn't happened more is our show gets listeners now from really all over the world with people who want to hear country music, who live overseas. And where do they want to hear country music from? Two places, nashville, because they've heard of that, and they've also heard of Texas and Dallas. People all over Europe know Dallas from the TV show that still airs in Europe. And so we get people all the time who listen from overseas. Even though you're a local show. I think it's kind of cool how you can cultivate a streaming audience nowadays. And our sister station, the sports station that's right next door to us, marconia award winning station, I think their streaming audience now is over 40%, and they have people all over America that listen to it. So I think the cool thing is you could be a really unique brand and be very local, and people want to hear people will seek you out still as if you were a syndicated show, but you could remain local and different and talk about things that are very particular to your area. I'm excited to see more of that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:24 Did you hear that? Odyssey. We'd really like to hear the signal leave America. It's my beef with the Odyssey app. It just can't get it in Canada. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:48:36 Right. Not on the smart speakers. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:37 It says, I can't listen to any Odyssey station. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:48:41 I think a lot of that has to do with they just don't have the rights to the music to be played outside the US. I think that's what it mainly is. Yeah. People find ways to get around it all the time. We have a bunch of listeners in Australia, but one guy, he listens every single day from Australia and comments. I love people like that. We have people all over Europe. One of our michelle and I, we've talked about this before. Our goal is to do our show from London someday. We'd love to do it from London and take listeners with us. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:07 See, you can actually just call somebody in London and maybe they'll fly you up. You just got to reach outside the station now just to make that happen. Don't go to promotions. Just go past them. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:49:19 Exactly. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:21 I think that'd be great. And Australians do love their country music. They are fascinated by it. They are country with funny accents. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:49:28 Yeah. I mean, Keith Urban is one of our biggest formats, biggest stars. And he's Australian. And there's a couple of other guys, morgan Evans, another one that's from Australia. So yeah, we talked to Keith Urban once about that. He said, yeah, people would come from Nashville all the time to do festivals in Australia. And that's how I found out and fell in love with country music. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:46 What's your wish list for radio? Hawkeye (Guest) 00:49:48 I kind of feel radio for the industry. We're at a point I kind of compared to where newspapers were in the early 1960s when television came and started sapping away their ad dollars. Like, New York City had a famous newspaper strike in the early 60s. They had like twelve newspapers. At the end of the strike, I think eight of the newspapers folded and they only had four left. And I kind of feel we're in the same area now for radio where we have like 70 stations in Dallas. And probably the large signals, if you take those, there's probably 20, and of those 20, there's probably ten that really put out a full effort. And the others are, as I said earlier, are taken off the board for my station. It's great if you've got a station that doesn't really put a lot of effort into it and you're putting a lot of syndicated programming or voice tracking and so forth and you don't do local promotions, that's great for me. But for the industry, for radio, I wish more operators would see value in their station. And I know you maybe can't. Afford to have someone on every shift anymore. Maybe that's not possible, but have more of a local presence in your community than just a station where you're trying to sell national spots. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:51:01 Hawk, I thanks so much for reaching out and offering up to be a part of the show because I think it's important, because I think people think I know they exist, but I don't. Last time I was in Dallas, I glazed past your show because I don't know what to listen to there's. Yeah, there's 50 signals in the market. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:51:16 There sure are. They really are. Yeah. Well, I've been a fan of your podcast for a long time. I love to hear different people from the industry talk about what they've got going on. So yeah, that's true. I did. I reached out to you and I said, I listen to your podcast all the time. I'd love to be on it and just kind of maybe I could pass a thing or two along to people. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:51:33 I think it's important. By the way, if you do reach out and you do want to be on the show, I'll just send you back a link and we just sort of set it up and we just do it like this. It's pretty easy. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:51:40 It was very easy. Yeah. I reached out to you like, yeah, here's the link. Can you do next Tuesday? Yes, I can. Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:51:47 Thanks so much. I appreciate it. Hawkeye (Guest) 00:51:49 All right, Matt. Thank you. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:51:51 The Sound Off podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill, produced by Evan Surminski edited by Chloe Emond-Lane social Media by Aidan Glassey Another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Broadway Bill Lee is someone you can think about when you hear the words in the WKRP theme, "Town to town, up and down the dial." That's the way it was in that era. The rest of the story is kind of thing legends are made of. Broadway Bill Lee is the afternoon host at WCBS-FM in New York, a station which always carries a Hall of Fame roster. I got my first taste of Bill Lee via Art Vuolo's Video Air Checks. Basically, Art would travel across America selling his radio guides for each market and film DJ's performing on the radio and sell those videos to young talent like me who would gather the air staff together and watch with a case of beer. I had no idea, but Bill mentioned during the podcast that he did the same thing back on the 70's. Today Bill continues to inspire people all around the world to be great on the radio by doing what we really want our talent to do today- and that's connect with the audience on multiple platforms. He posts his "Break of the Day" to Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. The top comment I see online is, "Why can't we get radio like that in this market?" Broadway Bill Lee will be at the Conclave Radio Learning Conference in Minneapolis July 26 to 28. I will be on a panel speaking about the opportunity between podcast and radio. Bill isn't sure what he will be speaking about but he would certainly qualify to join Drake Donovan's video seminar the way he has mastered this techincally. (Note how the music is still playing while he is recording.... Bill tells you how to accomplish this in the episode) To Join us at the Conclave - click on the banner and you will be taken to the homepage. To find out more about the event - you can listen to our episode with event chair Lori Lewis here. Did you like this episode? Another podcast from Australia about radio called Game Changers Radio by Craig Bruce also featured Bill Lee. There are even more stories in this episode. Subscribe to this podcast as well! Craig Bruce is the former national head of content for Southern Cross Austereo. During his career Craig did everything from push buttons behind a desk to managing and driving some of the biggest names in the industry. If you click on the Game Changers artwork, you will go straight to the Broadway Bill Lee episode.

About 90 percent of this podcasts downloads come from two North American countries, Canada & the USA. But a look across the ocean shows the UK in a solid third with Australia and Nigeria tied for 4th, scoring higher than Ireland and New Zealand. I felt compelled to find out more about radio in Nigeria. EDK is Osato Edokpayi from Abuja, Nigeria. He does the breakfast show at SoundCity in Nigeria's capital. Over the past year, we have been seeing some consistent downloads from the African nation. It is apparent that Nigerian radio is does a lot of things well and has a number of the same challenges that North American stations do. I asked EDK to tell us a little bit about the radio business in Nigeria and spent a few more minutes finding out about that whole Nigerian Prince e-mail scam, some of the foods that he loves, and some of the sports rivalries in the country. I would also like to say hello to everyone at Inspiration FM in Lagos, whom I follow on Instagram. I love seeing your Instagram Live stories. The show is powered by Promosuite - which does serve Nigeria. Go paperless Nigeria! Finally - I promised EDK that I would add the Jollaf rice recipe we spoke of to the show notes. Here's one I made. #nigeria