It sucks when you contradict yourself. I particularly hate it because it makes me look like I have no convictions and can be easily persuaded into anything, which in most cases, is untrue. However, there are times when I do have to admit that things I would usually cheer for instead enrage me.
A few weeks back, I wrote an article proclaiming the glories of big business. I meant everything I said in that article, and I still feel that most big businesses are a healthy and welcome part of our society. In some industries though, when big businesses work together towards the common bad, rather than competing against each other, we as consumers lose.
To most people, radio is not a business. Radio is simply entertainment in your car, your dorm room, or wherever you want to hear music. I too love to listen to the music, but I also see radio as a business and as an art form. The problem: business and art usually don’t mix.
Radio since its infancy has been about creativity and style. Since the days of playing music on the radio began, there was always a personality behind the music – the disc jockey. DJs can become so famous that nationwide most people know who they are, whether it’s Rick Dees and Casey Kasem, or their ancestors Alan Freed and Wolfman Jack. As a DJ myself, I know about all the hard work and practice that goes into sounding good on the air. One must get their style down and constantly practice how they are going to sound on the air so that it comes out just right. I could go into all the little details, but really that’s not the point of this article.
As long as there have been unique personalities in radio, there has also been the business aspect. Radio is one of the more lucrative industries in America for those who make it big, both in front of and behind the microphone. Radio stations used to be owned by tons of small companies, as there were government limits on how many stations in a given market one owner could control. Within the past decade the restrictions have been severely loosened, and thus, certain companies have ballooned to gigantic size. Radio is now, for the most part, controlled by a number of large nationwide owners. The list includes such names as Infinity (part of the CBS-Viacom empire), Cox, Citadel, Entercom, Saga and of course, Clear Channel.
Most of those names probably seem foreign to you, but I’ll bet a number of you have heard of Clear Channel. The monopoly Clear Channel has over radio makes Microsoft seem tame. They own somewhere between 800-1000 radio stations, while the largest of the other owners has about 200- 300 at the most. I champion Clear Channel though, because most of the radio stations they run are great stations to listen to. The production is often top notch and the music is enjoyable, in whatever format you’re looking for. I’ve not had a problem with the Clear Channel monster, until now.
Every market has some DJs that are institutions. Boston radio is a very different place if you take away Matty in the Morning, Loren and Wally, the recently retired Charles Laquidara, or Baltazar. Wait – scratch another name off that list, as Baltazar has said so long to the Hub.
Baltazar, the morning show host for the past seven years at WJMN-FM (Jam’n 94.5) in Boston, will be let go by the end of February, and he performed his last show on October 26th. His replacement, Ramiro, a.k.a. the “Freakin’ Puerto Rican”, is a more than competent DJ and I’m sure will do a fine job in his new time slot. I didn’t even listen to Baltazar that often, as I prefer to turn to Matty. However, the reason Baltazar was let go is what has me so mad. His most recent ratings were his best ever and over the years he had developed one of the most listened to morning shows in the 8th largest radio market in America.
WJMN says that their decision to not renew Baltazar’s contract had to do with “strategic conversations and thoughts about the future of the station.” That’s bulls**t! What this all came down to was a matter of money, plain and simple. Officials at the station don’t want to admit it, but the real reason that Boston’s radio dial has changed again is the almighty dollar. Baltazar was hot, and rightfully wanted to be compensated for the huge amounts of cash he brought to his employer. Instead, they let him walk.
This is only one example of many that have caused Clear Channel to earn the nickname of “Cheap Channel” in the industry. Clear Channel, owners of not only a ton of radio stations, but also of SFX entertainment, which operates a majority of concerts in America and a massive amount of billboards and outdoor advertising, constantly feels that it must cut costs and it does so at the expense of its listeners. It’s not often so drastic as the WJMN case, but there are other, more subtle ways that the creativity in radio is taken away.
When you listen to the radio and hear a DJ, especially one that is identifying the station and talking about local events, you must be hearing a live person…right? Wrong! Welcome to the world of voice tracking. Voice tracking is when a DJ comes into a studio and records all that they plan to say for their show. A computer then plays the sound bites when appropriate, in between the songs, so in actuality the whole show is automated. In certain instances, the DJ may not even live in the area. When I interned at WXKS-FM (Kiss 108) in Boston, one DJ I worked with taped two shows, one for Denver and one for Orlando, once he was done with his own shift in Beantown. Some stations don’t even go that far, and just have a computer play the music without a DJ. This saves money, by the way, because the DJ is only paid for the time they spend recording, not the amount of time over which their show is aired.
Let me be the first to state that Clear Channel is not alone in this practice – most large radio companies voice track in some way or another, often in small markets. However, soon the overnights at both Kiss and Jam’n, two of the biggest Clear Channel stations in one of the nation’s largest radio markets, will be voice tracked. This is a shame not only to listeners but also to those hoping to enter the field. For as more and more shows are voice tracked to save money, there become fewer and fewer slots for young DJs to earn their stripes so that they can advance in the industry.
There are other ways that people say radio is being ruined by the giant conglomerates. Music has become similar across the market. However, stations still have Music Directors who make choices on which songs will work best in their own given market. And even so, if you can’t find a song you want to hear, you can always go buy it in the store or download it from some website onto your computer.
For a radio fan such as myself, though, there is no substitute for the always unpredictable DJ. When I pop in a CD of the latest hit songs, they just play, one track after another, with no question as to what’s coming next, and even more importantly, without some clever person doing his best to entertain me. Though this is not an issue to most, it is one that deeply disturbs me, as my view of radio hell, completely automated stations in the nation’s top markets with no live people at all, seems to be an ever more likely reality.
For now the casualties are light. I’ll just have to wait and see what happens. I hope and pray that things will reverse course, and more local and live DJs will return. All I can think of at the moment is that I won’t get to hear any more Jam Scams.
