You may not think of it this way, but radio IS performance art. It’s not an “exercise,” it’s not just about mechanics. Yes, you want to play the right songs, the right number of them, and a solid rotation… blah blah-blah blah-blah.
But it’s really all just about connecting with the Listener.
The great movie director Arthur Penn (Bonnie & Clyde, Little Big Man, The Missouri Breaks, etc.) often spoke of what he called ‘happy accidents’ occurring during the filming. Little movements or reactions or lines that weren’t in the script, but were magical.
I see the same thing in radio – breaks that just “appear” out of nowhere and crack people up.
New York Yankees Hall of Fame shortstop Derek Jeter recently played in his first “Oldtimers Game.” At one point he was asked about the current Yankees team bringing up some young players, and how to handle the pressure of playing in New York.
I think it resonates to anyone in radio who’s looking to move up to a larger market.
He said, “It’s the same game, there are just more people in the stands. I think sometimes when you get up to this level you try to do things a little bit differently, but you have to be yourself. Don’t try to do something that you’re not accustomed to. You have to enjoy yourself, and try to improve each and every day. The bottom line here is you gotta win.”
Amen.
A PD in a large market contacted me recently, asking if I’d like to work with their morning team. Since I hadn’t heard it, he was nice enough to send me some audio of the show. He also told me that the lead guy had enjoyed a great deal of success before he came to this station.
But it was pretty typical. Several things all tossed into the air at once. Phone calls about an innocuous subject that didn’t really surprise me. A spate of multiple punch lines to a bit given by two people at breakneck speed (so it couldn’t possibly sound spontaneous). It wasn’t bad, but there just wasn’t anything special about it.
Look, I’ve worked with hundreds of stations in every English-speaking format, coaching many hundreds of air talents, and not being predictable has been a key for all of them. (Consistent = good. Predictable = bad.)
Here’s a first step: Listen to your show yourself, and be honest about whether it would make you come back and listen to it again tomorrow.
Then, weed out anything that sounds typical. Hold your feet to the fire about WHY each thing is done. “This’ll be funny” isn’t nearly as powerful as “This will be something the listener can identify with.” I can hear “topics and phone calls” anywhere nowadays. Get out of the Control Room and meet me in my car. What matters to me (as a listener) supersedes what matters to you.
Oh, and about that team show, I doubt if the PD liked much of what I had to say about it. But I can fix them – if they’ll listen.
One of the things I’m always getting asked about is phone calls – how to get listeners to call, how to get better calls, and how to build a dependable core of really good callers. Over the years, I’ve coached hundreds of people on this, so if you want the phones to ring, here you go…
This is primarily a team show tip, based on an aircheck a friend sent me of him and his new female partner.
He’s very conversational. She’s LOUD. And this is something I hear a lot. People (regardless of gender) on the radio seem to get LOUD when they’re talking to each other.
I don’t understand that. You’re supposed to be friends. Why are you shouting at each other? And why are both of you shouting at me?
You want to talk loud enough to be heard at the dinner table, not to be heard at the end of the continent.
In honor of Jimmy Buffett’s passing, I’m using his song “It’s Five O’Clock Somewhere” (sung with Alan Jackson) as the starting point for this tip.
Some questions for you:
When you get off work, is what you want to here “somewhere” radio? You know… generic playlist, generic Content. Or would you rather hear songs that you love, and songs we think you’ll grow to love, and Content that relates to your life, today?
On a great radio station, it’s 5 o’clock HERE. NOW.
God bless you, Jimmy Buffett. And everyone else, wear sunscreen.
If you’re not familiar with NFL Hall of Fame coach Jimmy Johnson, watch the pregame and halftime shows on Fox. To be brief, Johnson won a National championship in college, then, in just 5 years from starting 1-15, he won back-to-back Super Bowls with the Dallas Cowboys.
He’s also a powerful motivational speaker, and one thing he told a group of athletes several years ago really struck me: “Fatigue…makes cowards of us all.”
“They had to choose between him and I.”
No…just no. It was between him and me. “Between he and I” isn’t right either. “He and I applied for the same job. And it came down to that. They had to choose between him and me.” This is called the object of the preposition.
“And I was like, ‘I don’t want to go,’ and he was like, ‘But you have to.'”
The word “like” flies into every conversation like sand at the beach – useless, but people can’t seem to stop it. Try, “I said, ‘I don’t want to go.’ Then he shouted, ‘But you have to!'”
“So…I went to college on a scholarship.” Continue reading
We’ve all heard the station that thinks talking LOUD works, and that people like that.
And we’ve all heard a massive number of air talents that just read stuff off a computer screen with no emotional investment at all. They rattle it off, then move on the next thing.
Shout, Rattle, and Roll.
These things, of course, do nothing for the listener. (Or a client or a sponsor.)