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Sunday Morning Odds & Sods

32° - light snow at 11:50am

Greetings from snow-packed Mid-Michigan. A little bit of snow just about everyday this past week...

Listening as I type: To Lee Arnold's WORJ.COM. The Doors' "When The Music's Over" segued into "Rosalie" by Bob Seger. Very cool Lee! Later: "Room To Move" from John Mayall. And Lee must be a heavy Fairport Convention fan...me too!

WCSX/Detroit Radiothon revisited. Total funds raised for the Children's Leukemia Foundation of Michigan were $78,419. Very nice! See my original post here.

Tom Petty Tour: Earl and The Heartbreakers will follow his appearance at this year's Super Bowl (are we allowed to use that name?) with a nationwide tour to begin May 30th in Grand Rapids. Check out the dates here.

Some stations can use Tom Petty to cap the spring book; others as a kickoff to summer.

Two 'Fer Tuesday Weekend: KKRW/Houston doing one with Van Halen coming to town Monday Night. It sounds odd so it works! See here.

BTW: KKRW sporting a great new web layout; based on the template Clear Channel installed a few months back at WAXQ/New York. More filling with less fat.

Speaking of web templates: Citadel strikes a deal with MediaSpan - and upgrades the web efforts of quite a few of its rockers - including my ala-mater WMMQ/Lansing, WZRR/Birmingham, KHKK/Modesto and WSHK/Dover. Very nice layout and easy to navigate.

And Cox? I'm betting even those at Cox Radio have to admit that their websites aren't very exciting. But WHPT/Tampa Bay is showing a little bit of attitude with both Bubba and Cowhead content teases on their site. The website almost showing signs of a personality.

Added: Radio Stories. Rick Kaempfer's Chicago Radio Spotlight shines on 30-year radio vet Karen Hand. Read here.

Have a great Sunday.

Sunday Morning Odds & Sods

40° - fog at 10am Left: via Randy Raley's blog. Just too weird to pass up. More here.

Listening: My usual Sunday Morning fare. Bob Stroud/WDRV currently playing "Some Velvet Morning" (1968) from Nancy Sinatra and (the late) Lee Hazelwood. Video here

Velvet Morning one of my favs - a moment when pop met psychedelia. I see on Wikipedia that Vanilla Fudge covered it; I'll have to dig it up - I can only imagine.

Reading this morning: Jerry Del Colliano's INSIDE MUSIC MEDIA^TM - posting on Friday about Christmas Radio and the PPM success of WBEB/Philadelphia and KODA/Houston. Jerry writes:

"My own personal program director's people meter located right here in my gut tells me that audiences like it when radio stations create a feeling of something special."

My gut too - and this relates entirely to what I wrote last night regarding special programming - be it A to Z, a Top 500 Countdown - the clever stuff coming from John Hager in Buffalo - all that.

Jerry adds:

"Imagine what radio could really do if it tried harder. In fact, imagine what terrestrial radio could do if it tried harder the other 46 weeks a year. Betcha the ratings would soar among existing radio listeners."

"Trying harder" will never be a directive from the home office. It takes initiative at the PD level to make it all happen. Perhaps extra staff time. If it doesn't start with the PD - then where?

And GMs: you do trust your PD to do the right thing, yes? Empower them - or replace them with ones you can.

More: The Legendary Bill Drake - from the year end issue of R&R via Jaye Albright:

"Whoever puts the best on the radio wins. Obviously today you’ve got iPods, satellite and all kinds of goodies. There are some good programmers, but some lousy-sounding stations—and some of them have incredible signals. There doesn’t seem to be that fever anymore."

"I know when we were doing it we were like a brotherhood. We went in to win and did whatever it took. We were totally, absolutely dedicated. It doesn’t come across on many radio stations now. A lot of people just don’t know what they’re doing. Of course, that’s always been true, thank you, Jesus."

Great Audio. KRFX/Denver PM driver Shark recently spoke with the legendary Barry Fey about the concert business - music - and Led Zeppelin.

Recorded on the 40th anniversary of Led Zep's first show in America - in Denver. An act added as a favor to an already "sold out" show. Listen here. Great stories you'll love hearing.

Lee Arnold's moment of epiphany. A great read here.

Have a great Sunday. Tomorrow the start of another great week.

Working For The Weekend

I've been a longtime been advocate of spicing up weekends and holidays with special programming and features.

Its when listening habits change - when that "workforce" audience that gives you long TSL during the week is off doing other things at home or otherwise. You've got to work harder to get them to listen throughout the weekend.

Spotted a couple of stations with some great ideas this weekend:

CHEZ/Ottawa offers up a "Debut Album Weekend"; highlighting first album releases from Classic Rock's greats. Very cool. And its all about the music.

As part of its "JanYOUary" programming (see the post just below this) - WGRF/Buffalo is doing a "Jeopardy Weekend".

Every hour is a theme (suggested by a listener); with every song title in the theme a contribution from other listeners.

To the right: some of the themes 97 Rock is doing this weekend; see the complete list here.

No station involves its listeners in its programming like WGRF; all credit to its very talented PD John Hager. Audience interest through participation.

Just passing along some ideas I've seen. Got a great one? Share.