I arrive bleary-eyed at the crack of dawn and announce my presence. "We don't let anyone in the studio while they're on the air," says the receptionist."They'll let me on the air," I retort, "I'm writing an article about them." And with that, I'm led down the hallway into what must be the most informal radio studio in town. The door is open to the hallway, the same as any of the other offices except for the flashing "On Air" sign. And there's a steady hustle and bustle around and throughout the room, which is about the size of my own minuscule bedroom.
Kind-of an anticlimax. Here I am at the number one radio station in town, and it's this open-door, standard office with an admittedly cool reel-to-reel recorder, but a rather modest CD collection. In both their CD collection and the size of their on-air booth, KWHL pales in comparison to KRUA.
But as far as the ratings go, they rock.
This is a rather new thing for KWHL, which just six months ago sported mediocre ratings: Their morning show was #7, and their programming was #4. The station was in trouble, and they needed an expert to bail them out. They found JJ Michaels a little over a year ago, working as program director of Honolulu's KPOI. "JJ's been doing this for 16 or 17 years, and he's a consummate professional," says Bob Lester, KWHL's star DJ.
JJ discovered Bob in the same building, which houses a remarkable three radio stations under one roof. Lester was collecting wire stories from AP and doing general grunt work around neighboring KFQD. "I realized I could continue doing what I was doing, or get paid to listen to Rock & Roll and be a smart-ass. What would you do?" asks Bob rhetorically.
It's an exciting morning in the KWHL studio, but I assume with JJ, Bob, Mark and Sparky around, and the door open, every morning is exciting over there. JJ's neighbor, Tim, is in the studio for a visit and to share his New York accent on the air with Mark, `the news guy.'
- "We don't ring bells or wank people's puds. We're just living our lives on the radio."
When I arrive, Bob is about to call his former landlord, a participant in an unsettled dispute over funds. They've been having trouble getting him on the phone all morning, but Bob's desire to burn him on the air is overpowering, and he can taste the sweet, slippery flavor of warm blood in his mouth. "Let's call this wanker again," says Bob as he dials the phone, tape recorder already running. He turns to me and, 15 minutes after I've entered the building, before I even get a cup of coffee, I hear my first racist statement as Bob turns to me and says, "He's trying to Jew me out of my deposit."
I make a note of it and go on, watching as JJ, Bob and Mark do a dance that's been as carefully choreographed as the Bolshoi Ballet in just a few months.
The Cast of Characters
If JJ's greatest asset is experience - knowing what it takes to bring a small radio station to the top, Bob's asset is his instantly-commandable wit. He can take a caller on the phone, totally twist their words around, add his spin, and have it ready to air in under a minute. He also plays a crucial role in the morning read-the-paper game.
Mark is the news guy, and he's only been there a little over a month, but says he's loving every minute of it. "I just come in and read the paper," he says, "and I put my spin on it." Mark is always ready with a humorous analysis or skit idea based on the newspaper, and is always ready with a quick comeback for the callers - and speed is the name of the game in the morning talk show business, where listeners might turn the dial after suffering less than a second of boredom.
Sparky is the sound engineer, and it's his job to find a sound quick if it's needed. When Bob says he needs the sound of a truck backing up, Sparky resourcefully replies, "We've got a microwave that beeps when it's done. I think we can work with that." His words are met with puppy-like devotion from the crowd in the studio, who depend on Sparky's sound excellence to deliver the funky sounds that give the radio show life.
How Do They Do It?
Watching JJ, Bob, Mark and Sparky actually do the show gives me an indication of the cunning and skill required to pull off such a venture. Despite the fact that they're doing a million things at once, they successfully answer the phone, constantly creating airworthy material, while mixing in skits produced in the morning hours before.
Bob explains how they put the show together, "We read the paper early in the morning and find stuff we can make a joke out of. Probably 80% of our stuff comes out of the morning paper. If it's a slow week," he says, "like nobody famous died, we just have to make it up."
It works like this: they read the paper, find a hot story and an angle that will work. Sparky finds the sound effects, JJ&Bob do the voices, and it's all mixed together into a short skit. When its time comes during the program, they just pop the tape in. Often, The DJs' voices are left out of the tape, and they do the voices live. Other times, they just sit around, picking their noses as they snicker and grin at the pre-produced piece.
"About 50% of our stuff is produced in the morning, and 50% is impromptu," says Bob. The latter are mostly callers who are recorded for possible use on the air after the call. Sometimes, JJ and Bob will edit and remix the content of the call, like when `the only black listener', Mike, calls in.
- If Latin music was all the rage, you'd better believe KWHL would be Alaska Home of Latin Music.
The long and the short of it is, part of this call involves Mike saying `I can't, I can't.' Bob splices that part out and, when it runs on the air, it goes something like this, "Mike, our only black listener: is it true that you can't play basketball or dance?" to which the reply is "I can't, I can't." Mike calls up immediately afterward and says, good-naturedly, "I'm going to kill you guys."
Whenever someone calls in, it's the job of the people in the station to say something that will make the call sound cool on the air. If it works out well, they'll just run the call verbatim. If the call is `boring' it gets erased.
One woman calls the station with a joke. The rule on jokes is that, if you tell one they've heard before, you can't call back for 30 days, `cause they're tired of the same old jokes.
Well, this woman calls in with a joke they've never heard before. "How do you circumcise a hillbilly?" she asks, "Kick his sister in the jaw." Everybody in the station breaks out laughing and Bob promises her a T-shirt, the prize for a joke they use on the air. But JJ, though he agrees the joke was first-rate, refuses to play it on the air. "Thanks, but we can't use it on the air. Call us back with a clean one," he admonishes the caller.
Some widespread grumbling occurs, and I begin to question the reputation they've partially gained for being shock jocks - the joke hardly seems indecent, especially in light of what some of the morning shows in the country are running on the air.
Shock Jocks?
JJ describes the first six months of the morning show, where they were, "beat up real bad on the streets by other stations embellishing things we said. They took our comments out-of-context and tried to paint us as `shock jocks.'"
Certainly, these guys have never been Howard Stern, but they have taken a few risks, used sexual humor, and flirt with race issues quite regularly. But JJ disagrees with such statements, "We don't ring bells or wank people's puds. We're just living our lives on the radio."
JJ and Bob maintain they're not putting on an act for anyone - they're really like that in person, and from what I've seen, it's true. Off-air conversations carry a similar tone to the show. When Tim asks Bob, "How do you guys get up so early in the morning," Bob replies in classic quick-comeback fashion, "Amphetamines. Neither of us has slept since `77."
"We're an equal opportunity offender," Bob tells me later in an interview, "We don't make fun of skin color, but of people in general. We make fun of each other first, starting with JJ's bald spot.
And his sex life. Bob discloses the obviously well-known fact (around the studio, at least) that JJ hasn't had sex in over 100 days and counting. He goes on to insinuate that JJ was going after a 17-year-old, leaving JJ flat-footed for a response. Then, a neighboring office-denizen stops by to say it's been over 200 days for him. He took the role of a caller on the radio, in a way, though JJ and Bob were probably more sensitive to their fellow employee's plight.
"I went through a divorce on the air," says Bob, who maintains he lays his life bare for all to see, "And I just had a baby with my girlfriend," which he has also dealt with on the air.
As far as being racist, they're certainly not "politically correct," but they do advocate tolerance, equality, etc. "I'm the farthest thing from a racist you'll ever find," says JJ, "or a homophobe. My partner for six years was gay, and we don't try to come off on the air as prejudiced." To prove to me just how non-racist they were, they call Mike, the only black listener, on the phone and put the pressure on. "Chris Ridder from the Anchorage Press is here," they say, "tell him we're not racist." Mike defends them admirably, saying he didn't mind and rather likes the publicity.
Programming decisions
KWHL has been so successful because success is at the center of their mission. JJ has a powerful formula for molding the minds of the Anchorage citizens, programming them with the cool music and sitting back to watch the favorable results.
"We started out playing a lot of classic rock," says JJ, "figuring the best way to proceed was to steal FOX's audience and then move to a more modern alternative format. Our goal was to get the current features to be as familiar as the classics." By getting classic listeners listening to their station, keeping the classic rock but slowly adding modern alternative (just a few songs, over and over,) they built the popularity of the newer music while still keeping their `stolen' audience. "It's a standard formula and an evolutionary process," says JJ.
Bob is even more insistent at the importance of being attentive to the needs of the listeners, "If Latin music was all the rage, you'd better believe KWHL would be Alaska's Home of Latin Music. We've got to stay commercially viable, or else we're all out of a job."
And commercial viability is certainly what KWHL has found in the last few months. The ratings have skyrocketed, the morning show is well-organized and fast-paced, and the programming, while a bit mainstream for an `alternative' station, is improving all the time. "I've been having a great time," says JJ, "and everyone's worked real hard to make this happen. They deserve equal credit. But I still make all the bonuses."