You're listening to k f I, a m six forty wake up call with
me Amy King, on demand on the iHeartRadio app kf I n k OST
HD two, Los Angeles, Orange County. Everyone listen, it's time for
your morning wake up call. Here's Amy King. Good morning, It's five
o'clock. This is your wake up call for Monday, January first, twenty
four. I'm Amy King. If you're up this early, hopefully on one
of the first first to say to you, Happy New Year. I would
also a venture to say that if you are up at this time, you
probably did not ring in the New Year at midnight and you were, like
me, sleeping, But we had the lots of explosions. I'll say that
that's how I rung in the New Year. I was sound asleep, and
then there was lots and lots of celebratory explosions. We'll call them up.
Who knows what they were because I didn't go look, but yeah, LA
gets a little loud on New Year. See if hopefully everybody had a nice,
safe time. You know what. A lot of times when you start
a new year, you go, you know what, good riddance to the
last year. And after the pandemic and other things. There have been a
couple of years like that for me, but this last year, twenty twenty
three was pretty good. So let's hope to build on that and look forward
to a great twenty twenty four. Here's what ahead on wake up call.
Up to a million people are expected to crowd the streets of Pasadena for the
one hundred and thirty fifth Tournament of Roses Parade. The parade along Colorado Boulevard
gets center way this morning in about three hours at eight o'clock, and in
just a few minutes, we're going to be getting a sneak peak at the
big parade when we talk with the president of the Tournament of Roses Agajanian,
Alex I'm sorry, I know I screw up your name all the time.
A tsunami warning has been issued following a series of earthquakes in Japan. The
strongest quake hit just after four pm local time. It was a magnitude seven
point five. Roads are damaged, power has been knocked out. There are
reports of injuries. The western part of the country along the coast is where
where it hit hardest. Officials are warning waves could reach as high as sixteen
and a half feet and have told people on the coast to head to higher
ground. The Rams have clinched a wild card berth with their one point win
over the Giants and a Steeler's win over the Seahawks. The Rams are nine
to seven and have won six of their last seven games. They close out
the season next weekend against the Niners, who are first in their division.
At six oh five, it's handle on the news. Masks are back at
La County healthcare facilities. We'll tell you about that, but let's get started
with some of the stories coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom.
Japan has issued tsunami alerts and are telling people to evacuate seaside areas because of
a series of strong earthquakes on the western coastline. ABC's Claire Bauer says one
of the quakes was a seven points five. Initial tsunami waves have already struck
and authorities are urgently directing the population to evacuate to higher ground, with warnings
of possible tsunami waves as high as sixteen feet. Bower says the earthquake's impact
was felt in Tokyo and swayed power lines and light fixtures. Israeli airstrikes in
central Gaza have killed at least thirty five people. The strikes yesterday after Israel's
Prime minister resisted more international calls for a ceasefire, the IDF saying it expects
the war with Hamas to likely last throughout the entirety of twenty twenty four,
adding that some reservists or returning home this week, taking a brief break to
give them the needed strength for a prolonged fight. ABC's Rheanon Ally says over
the weekend, the Prime Minister vowed to take back control of Goz's border with
Egypt. He said any other arrangement would not ensure the demilitarization that Israel is
after the world's population has increased by seventy five million people in the last year.
The US Census Bureau says there are more than eight billion people on Earth
now. The worldwide growth rate in the past year was just under one percent.
Census Buro says at the start of twenty twenty four, four point three
births and two deaths are expected worldwide every second. So we're going to be
keeping you up to date on everything that's going on this morning, and of
course a lot of what's going on today is the Rose Parade, and we've
got some really fun sneak peak interviews for you coming up in just a few
minutes. But we also want to let you know that there's still time for
you to go see this really cool exhibit in Rancho Palace, Verdes. It's
here for a couple of more weeks, so you do have time to see
this one. It is it's called Trolls. So let's say good morning now
to Marylynd Mack, who is the chief operating officer at South Coast Botanna Garden,
Maryland. Please tell us about trolls. They're so excited to welcome Thomas
Dambo's trolls here. They have their West Coast premiere happening here at South Coast
and that's here. We're the first in the West Coast. Yes, and
we are just happy to have the trolls here because they're here to save the
humans amy we need it. Yes, And actually that is part of the
story. So I want you to kind of launch us on the journey of
the trolls, and we will tell you that there are trolls strategically positioned throughout
the gardens, and you'll go on an expedition to find them and discover what
they're doing to save the humans. Humans not humans, humans, these are
the young trolls. So basically they've come with a very serious mission in mind.
The elder trolls were sitting around the fire and they were talking about all
the horrible things humans are doing to the earth, the water, and the
birds and the animals and just not respecting nature the way we should. Okay,
yeah, these six young'ins heard that. Because the elder said, we
got to get rid of the humans. They got to go and the and
the young troll said, oh my gosh, you know there's hope for them.
We can teach them to do better. We must save the humans.
So I like those I know me too. They formed a troll gang.
Okay, six of them they took off and now they're here at South Coast
and they're going to teach us how to do better and be better. Okay,
so let's start down the journey and tell us about all these bird houses
and what their significances. I know, we're in a wild place right Usually
in the spring, this is our butterfly pavilion, but it was empty and
one of the trolls Ibby Pip, the bird house troll. They all have
super fundation. She got here first, and you know, so she was
placing her bird houses around because that's what she likes to do, take care
of the birds and animals. And she discovered this eighty seven acres and started
to pick up some other beautiful plants and other objects and saw this empty space
and thought, well, you know, we're gonna have to have a playhouse
while we're here. So welcome to Ibby Pip's playhouse. I love this,
Okay, So I think we should go out. We should take a look
at Iby Pippy. Now you can tell me a little bit more. So
Ibby Pip is one of the trolls. And I will tell us about what
the trolls are made of, because they're pretty spectactical. That's what's exciting is,
you know, we are on a landfill or use or used to be
a landfill amy and now we're eighty seven acres of a botanic garden, and
we still like to talk about what we used to be, turning trash into
a treasure, okay. And that's what a standbo dig with these trolls is.
He now has taken reclaimed wood palets and turn them into something magical.
We have six trolls. They all have distinct personalities, and this is Ibby
Pip, our birdhouse troll. That is pretty spectacular. So you can see
and we'll just explain it to you. Ibi Pip is hanging birdhouses in the
trees. One of the cool things that you're doing along with this exhibit is
you're not only coming out to see what Ibi Pip is doing, you can
actually do it. So you're you're holding workshops. So tell us about one
of the workshops. Yeah, one of the workshops that we have is you
can make your own birdhouse. So we were very inspired by these trolls.
Every troll has different classes and workshops that you can take advantage of. And
Ippy thus make your own beautiful birdhouse and take care of the birds in your
own backyard. Okay, And so all of the trolls have kind of their
own little mission, so you're going to have to come out to see it.
We can't go through all of it in this short period of time,
but tell us about, like, what are the other missions of the trolls.
Rosa fung figure is the botanical troll. Her mission is to make sure
that we respect nature by planting more beautiful things. Okay, and so we
can teach you how to do that in our gardening classes. We have Sofa's
Lotus, the Listening Troll. It's all about being quiet and listening to what
the world tells you. I think we could all use a little bit of
that every day. We also have Ronja Red Eye. You can't underget her.
She's the smallest, but she's the fiercest. She's the leader of the
trolls, okay, and she wants you to use your voice and tell the
right thing. Okay. And then we have Bossi Buler. Bossi is a
little bit of a wild child. He loves to paint and create things with
symbols, and he's just one to tell you to never lose that child inside
of all of us. Okay, those children do the right thing, okay.
And your favorite troll, my favorite Camma Can Caammi Can. She's our
trash troll. Okay. She saw all these eternity pieces laying around all over
the earth, just kind otherwise known as plastic junk, not doing anything right,
and she said, I can turn this into something beautiful. So what
I like, Cama cam for is not only does she have fabulous jewelry on,
but she's a trash troll and so what better symbol for us? I
love this. So if you haven't been out to South Coast Botanic Garden,
it is in and of itself without anything extra. It is absolutely spectacular and
what a fun way to spend an afternoon just strolling through the garden. And
now you've added the trolls to it, and so you can come and you
can help save the humans and see these beautiful exhibits. We've got to come
see them. They're here through mid January, okay, and you're open every
day. We are open every day. Okay, come out and see the
South Coast Botanic Garden Trolls exhibit. Save the Humans, say the humans,
and we need saving. It's really a really fun, relaxing, chill way
to spend an afternoon, whether it's with a friend or with your family because
it's it's so great for the kids, or maybe a day or something like
that. But that exhibit again, is is here through mid January. And
if you see a nice afternoon and you want to head out and do some
kind of chill, it's really worth a worthless seed love the South Coast Botanic
Garden. Let's get back to some of the stories coming out of the KFI
twenty four hour newsroom. Two people have been shot and killed. Three others
were wounded in a shooting at a commercial building in downtown La. LAPD says
a shooting happened shortly before one this morning on Porter Street. Officers apparently saw
the shooting happen. The two killed died at the scene. The others were
taken to hospitals, one in critical condition. Police are looking for the driver
who hit a man in the Peco Union neighborhood of La leaving him seriously injured.
Laped says the man was walking across the street last night when a dark
colored car hit him. My son didn't deserve to be hit and left on
the road like he was trash. He is his very love by his family
and we just want him to be okay, and the person who did this
neeeds to be held accountable. The man's mother, Jessica Rameira, tells Kate
La her son is still on a ventilator. Police say the driver may have
been in a four door Dodge Charger. Where is your sister, right?
Yeah? I thank you? Okay? Let's get you out of her first.
Police a shot and killed a woman who apparently broke into her sister's home
in Chatsworth and set the place on fire. Officers responded to Laramie Avenue last
night to reports the home had been set on fire. Lapd says a woman
locked herself in the bathroom and called nine one one after her sister broke in.
She then escaped to a neighbor's backyard and told police her sister had a
gun. When police found the sister, she apparently pointed a gun at the
officer. Lapd says that's when officers shot and killed her. President Biden has
appeared on Nick Clark's New Year's Rock and Eve with Ryan Seacrest to celebrate the
welcoming of twenty twenty four. Biden says he hopes everyone has a happy,
healthy, safe New Year. Beyond that, I hope that they understand that
we're in a better posion in any country in the world to lead the world,
and we're coming back and it's about time. Biden says he's truly optimistic
about prospects for the country. He says the economy's coming back, and he's
looking forward to a Great Year. Thousands of people have camped out along Colorado
Boulevard, staking out their spots for the Tournament of Roses Parade, which steps
off at eight this morning. A million people are expected in Pasadena today for
the parade. Pasadena hotel workers are on strike ahead of the Rose Parade and
the Rose Bowl game. Workers at the Hilton Pasadena and Higatt Place Pasadena hotels
walked off the job yesterday. Workers are demanding more money and better affordable healthcare.
Alabama goes for its second consecutive victory over an undefeated, top ranked team
when it faces Michigan today in the college football playoff semifinal at the Rose Bowl.
The game starts at two. The Wolverines are one and a half to
two point favorites at six zero five. A handle on the news. More
rain, possibly more big waves are headed towards southern California to start the new
year. Now, we are just a couple of hours away from the one
hundred and thirty fifth Tournament of Roses Parade, and we wanted to give you
a little bit of a sneak peek at what you're going to see today and
maybe some history about the parades. So let's go straight to the source.
We're going to the tournament house in Pasadena and let's see if we can catch
up with President Agagenian. Let's see if someone's home. Hi, Amy,
Hi, Look at there, it's Alex Agagenian. Come on in. Just
happens to be the president of the Tournament of Roses, and we are so
excited to talk to you today. So let's talk about the parade. It's
if we have to, if we absolutely have to. How long has the
parade been going on? Eighteen ninety so this is the one hundred, okay,
and when when it started out, like do we know how many floats
there were in the parade? There really weren't floats. Carriages and buggies and
all sorts of things that the families that lived in the area used and they
went to their garden and they took their flowers and their plants and decorated those
carriages and all that. And it started as a way to show the East
Coasters who were buried in snow, you come out to California and look what
we're doing out here. So it's just a floral parade. They started with
buggies and carriages. That's amazing. And then when was it first televised?
Nineteen forty seven, I believe, I believe KTLA was the first station to
televise it. It went on the radio about nineteen twenty five when we went
coast to coast and that's when the parade started getting it's footing as a statewide
parade that people wanted to hear about. The Tournament of Roses parade is so
spectacular and unique because it's all about live things. Correct, So our floats
have a requirement that they have to be decorated with something that's alive or should
have been alive or could have been alive. Right, Okay, so seeds
and all those things are on there, but anything that was alive. Our
horse are also decorated sometimes with flowers and all that, and our marching bands
don't really decorate that way, although this year we have a band in the
parade from Westchester, Pennsylvania that is marching down the street with floats around it
and all that flowers and their banners all flowers. So it's something we should
look for this year in the parade. Okay, And how many bands participate
twenty one and how do they get picked? Did they submit entries or do
you just kind of look around and say that one's good, that one's good.
How's that done? So the president in the President's family has a final
say so on the bands that are in the parade. Oh wait a second,
So you are the last line there with a lot of help. Okay,
all right, And we have a music committee. So the music committee
starts about two years before the parade. They're going to march in accepting applications.
They screen them and then make a presentation to the President and the President's
family. And at the presentation, the president decides what band or bands are
going to be in the paray. Where are some of the bands from this
year? So we have three international bands, Costa Rica, Japan, in
England. We have the remainder bands from throughout the United States. Okay,
and there's a very special band this year from Hawaii, there is, and
can you tell us a little bit about that and why it's special that they're
here this year. So the Hawaii band is a composite band, and one
of the groups that are in the band is from Maui. And those Maui
kids, as you know, from the fires, suffered a great deal absolutely
about ten of them when we visited aren't coming this year. Their homes were
destroyed, their instruments were destroyed, and their poor families just can't afford it.
Yeah. I'm hopeful that they had found a way to come, but
it's just that it didn't happen. Yeah, and so we're going to celebrate
those kids. I know, Japan is going to do a concert, the
Japanese band. It's going to do a concert to support the Hawaiian band and
more particularly the kids from Maui. That's great, and so it's so fun
because all of the bands have a story. And then of course there's the
floats that are so fantastic. So give us a little sneak peak of some
of the floats that maybe caught your eye a little extra special. I know
they're all special. So we have two flys in the parade. Okay,
okay. The first one is the traditional bomber and it's escort this year of
two planes in the first one and then the second one is coding for veterans.
The float they have, yep, they're going to in addition to their
float, they're going to have a fly over with vintage World War II planes.
Oh cool, Okay, so we haven't had two flyovers in my recent
memory. And then we have a whole number of floats because of the theme
that have musical acts on them. The Calgirl channel has got musical acts all
women, a Calgirl group on the float, and twenty five equestrian units riding
around it. There is a forty three foot tall bear. It's riding behind
me in the parade. Thank god, it's a unit behind me. Cal
Paula Pomona's got an undersea concert with Manna Rays and all that. There's just
a lot of really fun things to come see. We have four entertainment units
in the parade. You're going to be surprised at Honda is the opening show
and how their float is really cool. It's a futuristic design. It's really
really cool. You know. The Mansion group is closing the parade and they've
got some real good talent in all these units. We have a five unit
float from Newport Beats and that's five separate, five separate units carriage as opposed
to the one. And I think one of the things that is so cool
when you're watching the floats is like you were saying that everything has to have
something that was five. It's a natural, organic and the movement that they
get, especially like when they show the animals. I saw that there's one
and there's going to be a lion on there somewhere, and I can't wait
to see the main and the flowers or the plants that they use to get
that movement and make it look so realistic. Well, I'll be lying to
you if I wasn't telling you it's spectacular. And then we have our Grand
Marshal and the theme for this year is celebrating a world of music, so
only appropriate that our Grand Marshal is correct, the Grand Marsters Auto McDonald,
don't tell anybody. And then just recently we announced a special performer that we're
just finding out about. Who's that and what is she going to do?
She's going to be singing on the mansion float the closing act. Oh,
that's what a great way to end the parade. Okay. So for people
watching, when is the parade? When does it start? Eight o'clock in
the morning, and it lasts for about how long? About two hours?
Okay? We finished within an hour and fifty seven minutes, okay. And
then for people who want to come and take a look at the floats because
you see them on TV or if you are at the parade, you get
it to see them going by, but seeing them up close is really a
pretty cool thing, and you can do that after the paray's over. You
can we exhibit the floats at float Fast after the parade. This year,
it's a day and a half long and you can come in and tour the
park and see the floats up close. Awesome. Can't wait. I'm so
excited for this year's parade. Thank you so much for your time out.
You're welcome, appreciate being with you. And the paride steps off in two
and a half hours. Supposed to be kind of chilly, about fifty one
degrees at parade time. Do not envy the people who've been camped out all
night, but I'm sure that they're nice and toasty warm. Hopefully they have
lots of hot cocoa. Let's get back to some of those stories coming out
of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. A man has been shot and killed
inside a car near a golf golf course in Santa Clarita, Ella. Kenny
Sheriff's Department says deputies responded to shots fired on Vista Fairways Drive yesterday morning,
deputies found a man with a gunshot wound inside a car parked in the middle
of the road. He was taken to a hospital where he was later pronounced
dead. Helicopters from the US have repelled an attack by hooty rebels on a
Maersk ship in the Red Sea. Ten militants were apparently killed. ABC's ran
On Ali says the US retaliated after Navy helicopters were fired on yesterday. US
Central Command saying the helicopters, acting in self defense after being fired upon,
responded by sinking three small hoothy boats that were trying to attack a container ship.
Ali says a fourth boat took off. Marisk says it's pausing all of
its sailing through the Red Sea for forty eight hours. The Pope has led
New Year's Day Mass from the Vatican. Pope Francis delivered a traditional blessing while
also calling on people to pray for peace in Ukraine and in the Middle East.
Last night. He asked Christians to cultivate their gratitude in the new year
and follow the example set by Mother Mary. Up to a million people are
expected to crowd the streets of Pasadena for the one hundred and thirty fifth Tournament
of Roses Parade. The parade along Colorado Boulevard gets underway this morning at eight.
Also, we're going to take a closer look at some of the floats
you're going to see in the parade, how they're put together and what makes
them so amazing. That's coming up in fifteen minutes, so stick around for
that. A tsunami warning has been issued following a series of earthquakes in Japan.
The strongest quake hit just after four pm local time. It was a
magnitude seven point five. Roads have been damaged, powers knocked out in much
of the quake zone in the western part of the country. Officials of warned
waves could reach as high as sixteen zero point five feet, and I've told
people on the coast to head to higher ground. Twenty twenty four could be
off to a multi million dollar start for anyone who matches all six winning numbers
in tonight's Powerball jackpot drawing the lot of jackpot is worth eight hundred ten million
dollars. At six oh five, It's handle on the news. A concealed
weapons law struck down as unconstitutional by a judge in California. We'll go into
effect today. We'll explain why I can't stand to fly. I'm not there
night. I'm just to fine the better pot of me. I'm more than
a bull. You're waking up to Grammy nominated platinum selling artist Five for Fighting,
also known as John on Drassic. Thank you so much for joining us
this morning, John, I want to talk about five for Fighting because five
for Fighting sounds like you're a big old band and you're actually a one man
show. Well, back in the day the age of litla fair boy bands,
grunge music, late nineties, my record company came to me and said,
you know, John, the male singer songwriter is dead and you need
a band a band name and La King fans will remember Wayne Gretzky's bodyguard Martin
McSorley, and I'd been to a King's game that day, okay, and
I was a little miffed that they wanted me to change my band name,
but you know, nobody can pronounce my name anyways, you did a wonderful
job, thank you, And so I started sarcastically, said, well,
how about five for Fighting? Because Martin McSorley gotten in two fights that day,
and I expected them to hate it, and they're like, we love
it. I'm like, you're crazy. It sounds like we should be opening
for Metallica. And it was so surreal. Early in my career, we
would go out and you know, you take any gig you can yet,
right, and they booked me at these you know, heavy metal gigs and
I'd be sitting there with my piano playing Superman for people maching. It was
very strange. But you know, for fighting over the years has kind of
paid off on me because you know, with the sports world and being a
big Kings fan and being able to get a hockey ticket where I want to
go, there's there's some fringe benefits. And you're a You're an LA native,
grew up in Granada Hills, mom's a piano teacher. I've lived pretty
much everywhere in the Valley Van Eys and you know we're in Thousand Oaks right
now. So yeah, born and raised Valley boy. Okay. And so
the music that you heard at the very beginning of this was Superman and that's
the song that really got you going. So tell us about what happened there.
Yeah, it was. It was very interesting. You know, I'd
had a minor hit with a song called easy Tonight, and the record company,
Columbia Records said well, you know, it's Sally Records, but we'll
give you one more song, and I suggest, thanks guys, yeah,
thanks, UK so a lot and and they said, you know, what
do you want to pick? And I said, well, I have this
little song Superman that you know, when I play it, people seem to
react and they're like, no, it's too slow, the piano's not on
the radio. And I said, well, you know, if this is
my like one and done, I'll go down with this one. And it
was interesting. Radio initially didn't want to play it because it was so different,
it wasn't kind of what was on the radio. And over time it
kind of grew and grew, and I got this weird call one day from
the label and they said, you know, your song's number one in the
Philippines. I'm like, really really, But we had a hint that it
was catching on, and then you know, you hit that tipping point and
the song, you know, really started to take take on some legs.
And then of course, after nine to eleven, it became one of the
songs that kind of recognized the heroes of nine to eleven and then like an
anthem type of song, Yeah, especially in New York. And then with
the concert for New York, of course, it kind of took on a
whole new dynamic nobody could have very imagined. But and that's when you played
the benefit show at Madison Square Garden, Yeah, to honor the first responders,
and that was there was two months after nine to eleven. It was
surreal, you know, twenty some years later, it's still hard to explain.
You know, any other night of my career, being on the stage
of every living icon would have been, you know, incredible, But of
course that night was very somber. But you know, to play that song
and look out and see, you know, twenty thousand people who'd been down
at ground zero kind of digging through the rubble, be able to release and
cry and sing and scream. I remember I was singing Superman and I looked
out and there was just some big, burly union worker with two beers and
singing Superman with tears running down his face. And it really kind of,
I think, impacted the rest of my career because I saw, you know,
very honestly, how music can matter in ways beyond fame, fortune,
hits and all that stuff. And it wasn't just my song. It was
watching the Who blow the roof off Madison Square Garden and seeing everybody release and
how much it mattered to them. So to this day, it was a
very surreal and humble moment. Yeah, and when you do a show like
that, that's so powerful. I mean I get teared up just talking about
nine to eleven and it was, you know, more than twenty years ago.
Yeah, So like, have you ever just broke down and lost it
during a performance? Yes, yes, many times. And you know,
we actually just did a reunion with the Gary Sonese Foundation with some of the
firefighters that were on that stage, and I played the song again with them
kind of standing right next to me like we did at Madison Square Garden,
and I couldn't keep it together. You know, I forgot the words of
my own song that I've sun twenty thousand times. But yeah, it's you
know, but that's the wonderful thing about those moments. It transcends and it
allows music to provide a solace that I don't think other mediums can. Okay,
I want to ask you one more thing, because I read that you
just recently went to Kiev. Yeah, tell me about that. Well,
I wish we had a couple hours. It was insane. It actually started
with Afghanistan. I'd written a song kind of critical of the Afghan withdrawal,
okay, and became kind of very appointed within the Afghan VET community, and
I actually started getting emails from people trapped in Afghanistan. So I didn't know
what to do. So I started working with some NGOs, one being a
group called Save Our Allies, who rescued sixteen thousand Afghan allies in nine days.
Wow. And so I'd had this experience with them, and they moved
some of their operations to Ukraine when the war started, and I'd written a
song called can One Man Save the World, kind of recognizing the fortitude of
Ukrainian people, and we got word that the ministry was open to us going
over there and playing a song with the Ukrainian orchestra. And it was surreal.
It was humbling in every emotion you could imagine. It's just incredibly angering
when see what was happening. But we put this orchestra in front of the
symbol of Ukrainian independence. It's actually an airplane. It's called the Maria.
It flew missions during COVID. It's the largest cargo plane in the world.
It's the symbol on their army patch and putin blew it up in the first
few days of the war when he tried to take Kiev. So it's in
this bombed out airport. But we put the kind of orchestra in front of
this plane on hollow ground and put piano in a pool of jet fuel and
recorded this song with these amazing people. Every remember that orchestra either had a
family member killed missing around the front lines. So we really, I think,
got a sense of what's going on there. And it was surreal and
as you can imagine, you know, very moving. And where can we
see that? Yeah, it's called Can One Man Save the World? With
Ukrainian Orchestra. It's on YouTube. Okay, I gotta do is just you
know, put that in your YouTube and you'll you'll see firsthand our experience there.
And I look forward to going back when they win this war and playing
it again for those amazing heroic people who are kind of fighting this goliath.
What I love about the songs of yours is it. It's a big song,
but it's also intimate, one of your hits one hundred years and you
have a little a special rendition for wake up call for us. I sure
do. Okay, let's play that right now, the fifteen for a moment
between ten and I'm just training, counting the wad. Let's do where you
are fifteen still time for you to buy, time to lose fifteen. There's
never a wish better than they love that song. So tell me, John,
how many people come up to you and say, oh my god,
your song changed my life because that one's so impactful, you know about how
your life just kind of flies by, and and how you remember when you
were that Well, certainly there's been a lot of home movies and uh yeah,
it's kind of wild that, you know, here we are twenty years
later and still graduations and weddings and having babies and funerals. That song really
seems to, you know, kind of encapsulate that, you know, appreciate
the moment, right And And it's interesting for me because I'm always moving through
the song. And when I wrote it, I was in the second verse.
Now I'm in the bridge. Soon I'll be in the vamp, you
know. So I'm always in there somewhere, and I think that's why people
it still kind of resonates, because you can always find yourself, you know,
somewhere one hundred years and again, it's very you know, I feel
very fortunate to have a song that kind of sticks like that. Lots of
songs that stick like that. John and Rossick local boy, Love Love Love.
You know, he was here not too long ago and did a show
up in Santa Clarita and it was spectacular. It was just so fun.
I love live music in small settings like that. If he comes back,
we'll let you know. Truly talented, talented man. Thousands of people have
camped out along Colorado Boulevard, staking out their spots for the Tournament of Roses
Parade, which steps off at eight this morning. A million people are expected
in Pasadena for the parade. Pasadena hotel workers are on strike ahead of the
Rose Parade and the Rose Bowl Game. Workers at the Hilton Pasadena and High
A Place Pasadena hotels walked off the job yesterday. Workers want more money and
better affordable healthcare. Actor Ian Zerring, best known for his role on Beverly
Hills nine oh two one zero has gotten into a fight with a bunch of
people riding mini bikes near Hollywood and Highland. TMZ says the fight yesterday afternoon
was all caught on camera. Both the bikers and Zerring left the scene before
police arrived. We're just minutes away from Handle on the news this morning,
police in riot gear been called out to a mall in Torrents. Tell you
why right now, let's say good morning to Heidi Hoff with AES. She
is the one responsible for eleven of the floats in this year's Rose Parade.
So much goes into putting these floats together, so we wanted to get started
with one of the less flashy but key areas that help paint the complete picture
of a Rose Parade float. So we're starting in the seed area. Yes,
this is the seeds and the dried material area, because the dry material
isn't just seeds, it is, as you can see here, some straw
flower, some white rice, some parsnip. We want to take a look
at this because we have cranberry here and then we have old cranberry. And
the reason that we have so many different colors and dimensions of material is because
all of that goes on to a float, and it gives each character the
dimension in the detail that's required to make these things come alive. That's what
it's going to say to make them come to life. And it's something that
you know, I've watched the parade for so many years. I've gotten to
see it a couple of times, but I'm always astounded at how many different
colors you're able to get. And if you look around, you see how
many bins are there, there's like fifty of them. Yes, there's large
walnuts over there, small walnut shells over there. What's that? This is
a gold clover seed. We have brown lettuce? Who knew there was brown
lettuce, dark lettuce, light lettuce. Any kind of lettuce you want,
we probably have. And because they're all different colors, So then we take
all of those seeds and start assembling on the floats. And that's kind of
the base. So let's show you a couple more things as we take our
tour around the pavilion and see some of the floats. And one of the
areas that you told me about just a minute ago was the glue area.
And apparently the glue area is a big deal when it comes to putting together
floats, and here it is the glue station. This is the start of
the glue station, and there's really a process about the type of glue you
use and the type of glue stick you use to apply the glue. So
people come here and they fill their glue. Either you're going to use clear
glue or white glue. Different products require different type of glue. So when
you're assigned decoration, you get educated on your material and your glue, and
of course you are a glue stick over here. I think this is always
fun. Here are the rules of gluing. It's very important, like look
at leave a glue line, make sure that you stack your beans in a
row, and fill in all of the little spaces. It's really I mean,
it's really intricate, because the floats wouldn't look so spectacular if it wasn't
all planned out so well, a very choreographed project. Okay, so let's
take a look at a couple of the floats that you're working on. As
has eleven floats that they're working this year, yep, and we're just going
to focus in on a couple of them. One of my favorites is the
Kindness is free float, which is the Boys and Girls Club, right,
Boys and Girls Club of West End, Gabriel Valley this year has be kind
is their motto, and that is a B I G elephant. It is
a ginormous elephant being so kind to a little tiny mouse. But that little
tiny mouse up front is really five feet tall. That's crazy, and so
you can you can see it's a big blue elephant. And the big blue
elephant is an interesting thing this year because, as we have heard over the
years, everything has to be plant based right correct, It's all natural material
canadium dide colored. We use a version of blue which is probably a combination
of some blue status or blue iris that will reflect and have it look as
close to a blue as we can get absolutely. And then the other thing
that's really interesting is we're inside a pavilion right now, and how tall is
that elephant going to be when he's in his upright and parade ready position.
Well, he's actually sitting on his bottom, So when he's sitting on his
bottom fully upright, he will be twenty nine feet tall. So we've got
his head tilted over. And I've noticed that several of the floats they're not
in their upright position because the ceilings aren't high enough, and because I just
found this out when they're being moved over to the parade route, they have
to go under overpasses, and the overpasses are too low, and boy,
that would be a real bummer if you chopped his little head off before he
got to the buried. Thankfully, the end of the parade route is the
only place that there is a bridge that these floats have to fall into themselves
and go under the bridge. Okay. And then this one over here,
I love it's bees. I'm a big bee fan. Yes, this is
Union Station Homeless Services. Their theme this year for their company is be the
Solution and they're celebrating that with the Rose Parade, and they have all these
fun bees working around their bee hive and there's a sign up front that says
home sweet Hive. I love it. And then we're going to take a
quick look over here because we have the Pasadena Humane, which is near and
dear to my heart, not only because of our friend Kevin mc manus,
which is right there, but also that's where I got my own little baby,
Alexander the Great. So here's the Pasadena Humane and the theme for this
year is feed the Love. Yeah, and we're going to have dogs on
the float. Are we going to have any cats on the float? No
cats on probably a good idea. No live cats. We'll see there's some
cats up there though. If you look up top, this is going to
be so beautiful. And then the theme of the whole parade this year is
celebrating the world of music, so each float, also incorporating their own messaging,
has music as an overall fame as well. Yeah, and I don't
know if you know this, Kevin can talk about it a little bit more.
But Pasadena Humane had a student from the Music school write specific a song
dedicated for this float. Yeah. La Music College is our neighbor, so
yeah, they held a little competition for their students. This young woman,
Ella Buyer, wrote this beautiful song for us, So if she won a
competition, we're excited to have it, you know, broadcast from our float
playing on New Year's Day. Cool I love get stuck in your head.
Okay, all of this work takes there's so many volunteers. There's like,
is it eight nine hundred volunteers We have probably about we like about two thousand
volunteers a day, You're estimated a little while to help finish the decorating for
this. I am so thrilled Heidie that we got to take a sneak peek
behind this and see them like in production. And I cannot wait to see
the finished product on New Year's Day. Thank you so much. And the
finished product is going to hit the streets in about two hours. It's the
one hundred and thirty fifth Tournament of Roses Parade. And I haven't seen all
the floats since we saw the kind of the base being done with the seeds
and the dry ingredients, so I can't wait to see all the flowers and
everything. And they have some really, really really fun floats this year.
And Jordan Sparks is going to wrap up the show. I Love That Love
Her. This is KFI and KOST HD two Los Angeles, Orange County.
We lead local live from the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. I'm Amy King.
This has been your New Year's Day wake up Call. You've been listening
to Wake Up Call with me, Amy King. You can always hear wake
Up Call five to six am Monday through Friday on KFI AM six forty and
anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app,