Comments on: BOB DYLAN LOS ANGELES RADIO MYSTERY

By: Joe Knapp

Joe Knapp — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 17:03:30 +0000

Thinking I was ever so clever while visiting a heritage rock station in a major market, I corrected the jock who had just played a record by Ray DAY-viss of the Kinks. Having heard his name pronounced DAY-veez all my life, I was feeling pretty cocky about my musical knowledge; that is, until the jock informed me that he’d interviewed Ray Davies just last week, and Ray himself corrected HIM on the pronunciation of his last name!

I don’t blame the jocks as much as I blame their managers. People in any profession need proper training. If you’re hiring someone to talk about the music, you may want to screen the applicants to make sure you find someone who has an active interest in the artists and music your station plays. If you only hire people based on how their voice sounds, you may want to have someone else write everything they’re going to say. Just because someone has a nice voice doesn’t necessarily mean they can ad lib

Of course, in these days when economy of scale translates into firing all your talented people, there’s a very good chance you’ll hear this kind of thing more often in the future; that is, unless those who are misinterpreting PPM results, or bankers who think they can run a business they don’t understand, eventually dispose of all the on-air talent so they can play nothing but commercials mixed with a little music.

By: John Pellegrini

John Pellegrini — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 14:39:38 +0000

Two favorites from my memory here – I remember an article in Rolling Stone describing two girls in a record store (remember them?) holding up a Beatles album and one saying “Wow! Paul McCartney was in a band BEFORE Wings?”

And the other – driving through a small town in the midwest in 1986 listening to a local radio disck jockey introducing a song by “Joo-Lie-Oh Eye-Glass-EE-As”. Considering that Julio Iglesias was everywhere that year including multiple appearances in Johnny Carson I thought the dee jay was amazing!

By: Rob Holding

Rob Holding — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 03:38:10 +0000

My bad, it was Shep and the Limelites. It was 1961. And it reached #2 on the billboard charts in May of that year. Maybe I should do some research. (Good thing I’m no longer on air

By: Rob Holding

Rob Holding — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 03:24:10 +0000

I used to listen to a guy that would say things like “That was Cliff Richard and ‘Daddy’s Home’ which is actually a remake. It was origonally recorded by a band called the Hi-lites back in, I think, about 1964 and they took it to something like number 4 or number 5 on the charts”

The funny thing was many years later I came across the book that he was READING out of when he said that. He knew full well when it was recorded and where it got to on the charts because the book told him all the details.

No excuses for sloppy announcing

By: scott snailham

scott snailham — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 11:12:00 +0000

I remember working for an AC station who started getting their CHR format talent VT on weekends….the PD really should have advised her to say “The CHY-lites like it should be and not the “CHEE-Lites” like she ended up on the air saying after “oh girl”.