My Father Thought I was Crazy.

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OK I’m back trying to find out what Women want and don’t want only this time I’m doing it in a studio so I can record the answers. My latest research victim Laura (pictured) told me Women are getting tired of Rap, Pop and even Classic Rock. She claimed they all would prefer to hear a lot more alternative music which there is none of in South Florida. In fact she still is in a snit about “BUZZ” disappearing from the West Palm airways so she moved to Miami thinking surely a city that size must have a Radio Station playing Alternative. Nope!

There is no Reward nor Punishment for your behavior only Consequences!

Let me check again … Yep, Still hate the word No!

Might as well check on this one too … Yep, Holding on to what you have still keeps you from having what you want. Damn!

And lets not forget the golden rule, The only way to get a raise is to still make Management afraid you’re going to leave.

Remember 10 atta boys are still all wiped out with one … Aw Sh*t !

The rumors about Tom Cruise being “Gay” have been flying around for years but I’m pretty sure he’s asexual.

Rich Stevens wants to know why all the great clever stuff you could have really used in an argument always shows up about 10 minutes after the debate is over.

I think the reason Radio isn’t very creative anymore is because of the lack of rules. The more rules there are the more people become creative trying to figure out how to get around them them.

My friend Shotgun Tom Kelly who now has his own Star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame was with a bunch of us years ago as we walked from our Hotel in New York to the place where a Radio Convention was being held. As we walked along Shotz kept falling behind as he looked up in wonder at all the tall buildings. Bill Gardner said to Tom … Yeah that’s right Shotz you’ve never worked in the east so you’re not used to this kind of stuff. Tom said … Wrong Man! I worked in the East I worked in Phoenix but they sure didn’t have buildings like this.

I’ve never figured out why a Morning guy expects the Radio Station to pick up the tab for show prep. You would think they would want me to think that all that great stuff was theirs.

I’m not sure how many times you can get a moment like this. I’ve worked for or with Jim Hilliard for most of my life but at some point I left to start my own company in San Diego. Luckily my Consultancy got some traction early so I went ahead and bought some very nice digs in Coronado. You know a big old two story place Mediterranean Style with a wall around it with a nice pool of course surrounded by tons of exotic plants and flowers. Anyway Jim and his wife Barbara come out to visit and my Wife and I pick them up at the Airport and head over the Coronado over bridge and swing by the famous Hotel Del which is right on the route to my home. We of course are riding in the car Kokomo style which is an Indiana talk for Girls in back Boys up front. As I slowly drive towards my home down this very short street from the ocean we are all chatting about nothing. I stop at the stop sign directly across from my home and say excuse me for a minute Jim as I reach into the glove box and pull out what looks like a garage door opener. As I point the device at the big black iron gate and it begins to rumble open the car went silent as I drove into the driveway. The next morning when I got up early to work on cleaning the pool Jim was already up and sitting by the pool just looking around and enjoying the California sun. I said good morning and he looked up at me and said … Johns I knew you were doing well but I didn’t realize you were doing this well. How priceless was that!

When I brought my Father and Mother down for Christmas to kinda show off my digs I sure didn’t get the same reaction as I got from Jim in fact my father couldn’t even stay there. He made me get him a motel room that closer matched his life style. My Dad thought the place was too ostentatious and I had gone crazy.

Wow, Rick Dees out at Hot in LA I had heard it was going well.

The way things are going in Radio right now I wonder who will be left to go into The Radio Hall Of Fame.

OK so July 4th is over has Football started yet?

12 thoughts on “My Father Thought I was Crazy.

  1. Gee, not even one ‘atta boy’ – He probably thought you were impossibly up to your eyeballs in debt. Imagine tho’ he couldn’t sit back & enjoy the fruits of his son’s labor.

  2. My Dad never understood what I did in radio. I read a script they put it on TV and they pay me. He got that part but that’s about it. He didn’t have a clue about anything in the media world….maybe your Dad was the same way. The media world is radically different from the world of working on the railroad. Wasn’t he after you to go get a real job when you were playing in the band?

    • I was doing pretty good playing with my band Jason and making decent money. But my Dad said when you are a Johns you work for a living you don’t play for a living. So I had to get a bunch of part time jobs and I hated every one of them until luckily I got a part time job in Radio.

  3. My Dad was an Analytical Chemist by trade. He never thought the radio business was an honorable profession (probably he was right). He used to say “Son, do you think you are going to make a living playing those little round records with the big holes”…… I said “I’m gonna try to make it”. Dad finally softened with I got my first PD gig at ABC-Chicago. Because then I finally had an office and was a “manager”. It guess he thought PD’s were “honorable”. (Wow, how little he really knew).

    • Jim it was lucky the record ducks sucked up to us a little when we were PDs, they were the only people who even pretended to like us.

  4. Q: The way things are going in Radio right now I wonder who will be left to go into The Radio Hall Of Fame.

    A: The Electrovoice RE20 ???

  5. A Triple A/Alternative hybrid would kill in SoFla/WPB. In ten years of living there, I never heard the P1s gushing about the Buzz. But they gushed about Buzz Lite, which was only a few hours aweek (and full time on the HD channel for the 16 people radio spent millions to get to buy one)

  6. George and I are in ‘the Pit’ (the step-down main lobby hotel gathering area) at a Radio n Records confab in Kansas City in the middle of Winter some years ago, when Buzzy (buffalo coat and cane) and entourage are coming in. The Buzzter sees us and takes one step down into the pit and goes ass over tea cup into the party – now THAT was Radio.

    You have to know how to make an entrance.

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