Speaker 1: When your old career gives you lemons. Throwing some ice,
mix in some vodka in color. A podcast from the
Mac of All Trade Studio in Fairport and driven by
Victor Chrysler Dots jeep Ram.
Speaker 2: It's Billified, the Bill Moran Podcast. Well, hello and welcome.
Thanks for getting your pot on. Thank you for telling
a friend. That's how we spread the word about the
pirate ship. A lot of local radio talk lately on
the podcast here and there, and I did want to
continue in a little bit but even talk further about radio.
And I couldn't think of anybody better than BJ Shay
because BJ has was part of Brother Weeze's world twice
and then went off to Seattle and just exploded and
just built an empire out there, and is uh, you know,
currently living his best life. Is that the right way
to say it? I don't know what. I love that.
Speaker 1: That's what the kids are saying.
Speaker 2: Live in my best life, living my best life.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was. I tell everybody that I was kicked
into retirement, kicked into and kicked into my dreams because
I didn't want to leave radio when it happened. And
I don't know if I completely left radio but it's
been almost a year since I've had a job, and
you know, Billy, what I found is not a lot
of call for a sixty five year old, cisgendered, heterosexual,
Caucasian broadcaster. For some reason, nobody is really banging down
the door to get more old old white guys to
give their opinions. I don't understand it. I feel like
the country just doesn't have enough old white guy opinions.
Speaker 2: I know, I'm with you. I'm with you on that.
The old white guy opinion was very popular. We had
a run, beach, we had a run.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we had a man. And of course, just like
my life, my entire career has been you know what,
you're almost ready. Oh wait, now you are, but we're
moving on.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Well that's it. That's yeah, that's very that's very funny.
But you so we's uh. I'm going to say, I
think to the audience abruptly retired. And I said on
my episode yesterday that these decisions and a company and
it was it's iHeart that he was working for. I said,
there's so many layers there that any decision that seems
to have come abruptly has not. It was four or
five months in the making, and from what I understood
from some insiders that I that still connect with me,
because the great thing is there's somebody in Seattle that
will talk to me once in a while because I
was on their national rock platform, so I did like
eighty stations for them, and I'd have to be all
these meetings and stuff, and uh, I think it was
the kisw st Eve Well anyway, doesn't yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
no no no no, no, yeah, not Steve Miggs. That's
your guy, that was your old pride. No no, no,
this is a paps. This was somebody way up in
I heeart. Well maybe it was where anyway.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's not I probably don't know that.
Speaker 2: That's my bad. But this guy would kind of tip
me off to some things that were happening, and from
what I understood, they wanted we used to stay and
do his music show on the weekends through the end
of the contract, which was coming up at the end
of this year.
Speaker 1: And that's what we said on his bro He deluded
to that on his final.
Speaker 2: Show, okay, and then he he did say that that
was he wasn't going to do it, and he was
very upset. We did talk briefly after his final broadcast,
and he says he's going to do a podcast at
some point, and he will do. He'll he'll reveal all
at some point. But I just think that the people
don't understand that these things. Well, there's two to me, Beach,
and you can speak to this very well. There are
two things that play here. One is business. Business is
cold and has no emotion. It's just about making money
or not making money. Was it Weez's fault that the
station was not making money? No, he was near retirement himself.
He was you know, he had it. I think he
stayed longer than he intended to stay, but maybe I'm wrong.
So I don't think there was anything really there. But
the rest of the station, the ratings were horrible. The
place was like basically a dumpster fire, and so you
got to make a change. But the emotional side, and
especially what we did and do is talk to people
and make connections. And that's hard because you have become
people's friends. And I think that I tried to look
up some radio stats. I still think currently in the
United States, and I don't know when this is from, up,
around ninety two percent of Americans listened to the radio
at least once a week. Thirty one percent tune in Daly,
which is down from thirty seven percent in twenty twenty three.
So we're going back a few years on that data,
maybe even lower now, because do.
Speaker 1: You know what the problem with that is? Really?
Speaker 2: What's that?
Speaker 1: The problem with that is nobody in the advertising world
believes those numbers. I don't know if they're true or not.
I don't even not a statistician, but what I do
know nobody believes it. Listeners, younger people don't believe that,
and a lot of advertising agencies, big companies, they don't
believe that. It is very frustrating. It's very very frustrating
that if that number is true, that somehow, some way
radio can't get people to believe it because my gosh,
the price that radio charges for advertising, and if those
numbers are true, the ritual investments insane, right, But that
really is the big problem. They can't get people to
believe that that number is true, that that that statistic
is true.
Speaker 2: So I'd like to go back at some point and
hit so many your time with Wie's But let's keep
on this sort of trajectory of what happens in radio.
I mean, there's so many layers, and this is why,
so they knew.
Speaker 1: I have a great story that won't get me in
trouble because it happened so long ago, but it will
illustrate your point about the ridiculous nature of how they
don't plan and how they are also so covert and
ridiculously secret that they will hurt people's lives. They will
do really dumb things. And this still goes on in radio.
But this happened to me many years ago, so it
won't get me in trouble in any current situation or
even in anything that happened in the last twenty years
of my career, because this happened more than twenty years ago.
But this is very typical for radio, how they operate. Well,
we'll get to that if you want to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I'd like to, because I'm just saying that
I think that they knew they were making this move
back around May. That's my guest only because if it's iHeart,
probably any radio company, they're going to want to do
a music test, which takes time to find out what
lane we go in if we're getting out of the
spoken word genre, and then I think a lot of
people were very hurt because of personality as big as
We's and as such a part of the fabric of
the community. It would be like Letterman saying, I'm retiring
in a year, and we have time to prepare, and
you do things, you practically have a parade for the person.
I mean, I know some people go, wow, We's's old news. Okay, maybe,
but he wasn't, and he, to me he deserved that.
He did too much for the community. I think the
problem BJ corporate radio is very big and runs very lean.
When I left, I was doing business reports for the
news station and helping produce Brother Weez's show, a talk
show with John Detulio, and eighty stations around the county.
I mean, it's just the way it is. And if
you look at the guys in charge here, they're in
charge all the way down to New York City practically
along the Thruway in terms of markets and managing and
all that. And I just think they don't have the
manpower and they don't have the people who know Wes
that well anymore to put something together. I really do.
I don't know that it's a lack of caring. Certainly
I guess I always say this, so maybe I'm contradicting myself.
If you will, if you want to, you will. This
is what I always say. If you want to, you will.
So if they wanted to, I guess they would. But
there was no I mean, it should have been planned.
This hasn't been a secret to somebody that his contract
was going to end. And that's the part that I go, boy,
you really miss something. And oh, by the way, could
have made a ton a ton of money, right, yeah,
I mean really.
Speaker 1: I was in that same situation with kisw for Odyssey
where it was the last year of my contract in
twenty twenty three, and it was the same thing. You know.
It was they they were in a situation where they
were like, we have to make a change. Uh. It
was more financial in my case, whereas I don't know
what the real issue is with why they couldn't do
what they wanted to do and keep WE'SE. I don't know.
I mean, we can you and I can guess, but
I don't know why they decided to let We'se go.
But for me, they were they it was financial. I
got to talk to my general manager because he retired
shortly after I left the station. So we got together
for lunch and I'm you know, I put together. I said,
I want to know everything, tell me everything. I'm not
going to be mad at you. I just want to know.
It's really good to know how things went down. And
they you know, what they did, though, to their credit, was,
you know, they gave me enough lead time and said, look,
here's what we're going to do and it's not going
to include you. And that gave me enough lead time
to you know, to figure it out. They let me
stay on air, which I thought was really bizarre because
normally you don't want someone on here. You want to
you want to force them to almost have like a noncompete.
Speaker 2: That was a really, really I thought, unique situation for you.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, the company, I'll tell you the local people,
it says, well, I always love KISW. I don't know
if corporate wanted them to do this, but I know
that local management said we're going to do right by
this guy. We're not going to enforce this. In Washington State,
it's really hard to enforce a non compete. They're really
unenforceable in most cases. And in my case, it would
have been unenforceable because they just said we don't want
you anymore, and then Washington State will say, well, he
gets to go do what he wants. You said goodbye.
They said, well, we're not going to give you a
hard time anyway if you find something else, And they
also said, we want to give you a proper sendoff.
You've been here for almost twenty years at this radio station.
You had amazing success for us, not only the fact
that you worked for our company at another station and
had great success. We want to honor you. And I
was so they did the right thing, and my partner,
Steve Miggs, put together a fantastic show for me. So
to your point, Billy, it gave closure. That's the thing.
The reason I wasn't going to do it first because
I was bitter, because I was like, I can't believe
that people don't want me. Because I had the weird
thing where I was brought in an office. We had
been fighting really hard with a very top show, the
Brook and Jeffrey Show here in Seattle, and they're syndicated
and they're a very successful show. But we were really
going neck and neck with them at this point, and
I finally beat them, like we were, you know, like
in the month of May we were number three. Then
in the month of JUNI we were number two. Finally
in the month of July we were number one and
beat them. So I get called in the management's office
and I thought, they're going to be so happy with me.
They're seeing that our show is amazing, and and then
they said, no, we're going to let you go at
the end of the year. I like, what, I've never
been let go at number one. This is insane to me,
but that's where the business is. But even still, they
gave me the final show and I wasn't going to
do it, but then a lot of people got to
me and said, what about the listeners, what about everybody
that loved you over the years, Like they give them
some closure. Radio never it gives closure. And I finally said, okay,
I'll do it. And I'm so glad that I did
because everybody from the station came in. They got people.
I mean, Steve did such a great job, he got
rock luminaries, Duff McKagan is saying goodbye. Those are the
kind of things. Even more, you know, it would have
been a ton more for Weeze, because this is the
great relationships he had.
Speaker 2: This is what I believe they didn't do that. No,
I and I do wonder beach honestly, if looking at it,
I mean, look, you worked with Weeze, right, it would
always be yeah, yeah ah bra ah bra you take
care of that, right. He just exactly he was the
guy behind the mic and living the life and bringing
the stories in. Anybody else had to do the other stuff.
And I even remember trying to get him. I put
a syndication package together when I produced his show, and
his agent, who since passed at the time, took.
Speaker 3: It as he used the syndication package I put together
for Opie and Anthony's a real story, that is absolutely true,
and so I go, okay, But so I always just
thought we's just needed someone who could kind of manage the.
Speaker 2: Wize brand more or less. And I did that sort
of as the when I was producing the show. But
then you know, when he left and I did stayed
with Tommy and we had some nice success and all
I still, you know, I always, but I always appreciated
Weez and I still think, I go, here's just an example.
You worked at CMF Dave Kane did a music show
afterwards Dave super talented, knows music, but he did, but
he did a.
Speaker 1: Music great guy too, by the way, Dave is such
a good guy.
Speaker 2: But forty years gets a key to the city, then
then announces his retirement. They have a retirement party, they
have a whole sendoff, they do all this stuff, and
then the station he's on gets into the local music
Hall of Fame and he's the one to induct it
and wee'ze. It's like, see, you don't let the door
hits you in the ass. And that's the part that
I think.
Speaker 1: I want to say again because I just had a
great career. That's an Odyssey station, and you talk about
two different companies. Odyssey really you know, respects those brands. Now,
Odyssey is not a perfect company.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: You know a lot of people, including myself, had a
lot to say, but they definitely you see what they
do for you know, Dave Kane, what Odyssey Seattle did
for me, and you see what was done for a wheez.
You know, it's it's pretty glaring.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I just wondered too, though, if if it
became locally, like everybody's just stretched so thin and people
around him now don't know him as well, Well, look,
you know, like meg us with you from the beginning
pretty much.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, but to see the thing is that someone
could have done something. I agree if you if you
listen to the broadcast. This seemed to be a shock
to his management team because it seemed because it seemed
like up until because we said, I was going back
and forth at night lest I figuring out if I
should do this. When I heard that, I thought so,
I bet his managers thought, oh, he's gonna tell everybody
I got a weekend show and I'm gonna go do.
Speaker 2: That is exactly what they thought. That is exactly what
they thought.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So my thing is, I must.
Speaker 2: See didn't such Weeze?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well this was gonna happen. But I'm a geeky
board game strategist, loser nerd I know Weez, And so
if I were his manager, I'd be like, guys, we
need to plan a plan B. What do you mean
a plan B? He said he's gonna do this. I go, yeah,
we said this right now, we still have twenty four
hours they need to get happened in twenty four hours
with Weez? What are we going to do if, in fact,
he just doesn't want to do this. After all, I
would have asked that question in meetings and say, what
are we going to do? Secondly, you still should have
a final show and then at the end you can go, oh,
by the way, I'm not gone, I'm gonna go do this.
But it still should have been a final show because
he's no longer doing a daily show. He's no longer good.
Come on, this should have It's such bad planning. And
I know some of the people that work there in management.
I know them. I've done I've interacted with them as
a professional, and I have opinions. I won't give them, okay,
because my mother and father taught me say, you know things,
you have nothing.
Speaker 2: Good to say about anybody screaming into a microphone.
Speaker 1: Because of the some of the people that work there
that I know, I am not surprised that this gut bungled.
Speaker 2: I'll just say that, Yeah, well, I think that's fair.
Your time with Weez, I mean you really were part
of his great success or his rise to the great success.
You you were in there was you and Cindy and Weez,
and I mean that was a that was a very
interesting yea.
Speaker 1: I will tell you that he was at the top
of his game. That like, the ratings were insane when
I got there, And I first got there with a
person named Kris shi Or. She was the one that
recommended me for the job, and she was she was
the news person for our show. So it was Wheeze,
myself and Chris and then eventually Cindy came right. Ok. Yeah,
the trio of Cindy, Myself and Weez there was something
that just I think unlocked. Also, I Weeze in a
short amount of time teaches you that whatever you think
you know about radio. And this was back in the eighties,
So I thought I knew about radio because everybody was
doing crappy radio and I was. I was at the
top of that heap of crappy radio. And then you
meet Weez and think is this This can't be No,
nobody does it this way. But eventually you realize as
an artist, he like you, Oh my god, this is great.
This is so good. You could just feel it happening.
And even though management was resistant, even though a lot
of people who did crappy radio were resistant, there was
he was such a threat to everybody's job because he
was up and being what was considered good and there's
there were so many people resistant to Weeze because they're like,
oh my god, people are going to turn around and
realize I suck. I don't want that to happen. I'll
lose much. So I've got to make Weeze look like
he's bad, he's a problem. There was so much of
that that I saw in the early days, So much
of that, really, but it was great to learn. Yeah
it was, but you know we's you know we's And
also I was it's funny. Weez is a very courageous
person on air. He will fight the good fight, do anything,
but when it comes to management, he will play ball.
He doesn't like to fight. What I think he saw
in me was that I was too stupid to understand
you have to play ball. Oh yeah, And I was
much more courageous off air, Like on air, I was
afraid to take some of the Louise would go take it.
James daked, James, what are you doing? Just be who
you be you. I'm like Weezy, I'm a geek. Nobody
loves just be you being the love you of your you,
but nobody knows he goes You're right bright. I would
never want to be we still got to be you there.
They would be like, here's what we want Wes to do,
and we would be like, he'd sit there and something,
you know, and he would ask for you know, forgiveness
rather than permission. But I could see that they would
try to beat him down, so off their pipe. Was
a terrorist because I saw that this is a great
talent and that management would try to give him a
hard time. So I decided, you know what, I'm going
to be the tiger that wee'ze isn't. And I was horrific.
I was a horrific employee. But because We's and I
got along, we had good ratings. I was able to
say things to management and do and frankly put them
in their place because I saw they were actually making
life tough on Weez and I thought, you're you guys
are insane. You're not supposed to make talent crazy. You're
supposed to support them. So I would say, well, you
know what, I'm going to be the angry guy here.
And unfortunately that's all I ever was in my career,
which is why I didn't have as great career as
I could. Because I fought with management every day yeah,
because management's mediocre. Pro tip for anybody in radio, if
you're a manager, don't tell anybody make up another job,
because being a manager in radio is lower than somebody
that sweeps you basically crap out of a zoo. You
are not good. Radio management is the lowest form of
life form there is, and you're not talented. I don't care.
If you're a CEO in radio, don't tell anybody you're
a CEO in that business because again, anybody can be
You can get a rangutanks to do your job, and
that's just you see things like this. This is a
managerial failure on every level. I mean, his company on
every level failed. He is a Hall of Fame broadcaster
who gets in the Hall of Fame these days in
radio from Rochester. From Rochester, I mean, I mean, oh,
it's this is a massive failure. And I can excuse
corporate because look, the CEO of his company maybe shouldn't
know how great Wheeze is because most radio managers don't
know the that that's just the history of somebody being
just an amazing talent in a town like weiz but
local knows nobody. And this is a massive failure. And
this is what's wrong with radio radio Just I get
radio has its challenges, but it's always had challenges with
bad management. They don't have people that go to managerial
training programs that actually teach them how to be managers.
They take people who should never interact with artists, and
that would be a salesperson. A salesperson should never interact
with an artist. It is the wrong thing to do,
and they put them in charge. A salesperson should never
be in charge of anything because they don't care about
anything but convincing people to do what they want. That's
not a good manager. The great going out and that's
what radio does. Or they'll get some program director who's
basically just a computer and they don't know how to
talk to people either. And radio continues to make this mistake.
They don't have casting directors, so they always put people
together who do not want to do radio together. Oh,
this person will be great with this person now they
have no chemistry. How do you go to see that?
And it's the business is bereft of good management. Well, sorry, Billy,
I'm off, I'm off, and there's just I'm ranting about
how bad management is in the industry.
Speaker 2: I hit that nerve. I hit that nerve beach.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, this, I mean, can you think of a
good manager, Well, I would like either I've worked with
in my career. It's how bad it is.
Speaker 2: I thought Stan Maine was great when I when I
worked with him. I don't know how he was when
when you if you when you worked with.
Speaker 1: It, you know, I'll tell you right now. Stan was
one of those guys that he had to he had
to make the adjustment because Stan and I both were
cut from the same cloth, as is how you your radio,
and then We's upended both of our world right and
to stand to Stand's credit, Stan was like, Okay, I'm
going to make the adjustment, and you don't find a
lot of human beings that can do that. Sam Ming
was in person that could actually say, you know what,
I'm not afraid of this. I will roll with this
because a lot of program directors would be afraid of
we is because they have to look like it's them refence,
it's made, it's doing this. I'm the one that's creating
the success. Stan realized there's no way that I can
sell that I'm in charge of the entire success of this.
Weeze is a huge part of it. But Stan was
really good at making the adjustment and then everything else
that happened on the radio station outside of Whez, Stan
was a master master, you know, orchestrator of all that. Yeah,
I agree with you. Stan was one of the good ones.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I thought Stan was good. And then the late
John Thomas if you ever interacted with him.
Speaker 1: I never got to work with John no j T.
Speaker 2: He was one of my absolute favorite guys. So two,
I had two good managers. Then there were you know
the other ones I I turned into the carpet salesman.
Speaker 1: Did you ever work with a carpet salesman? Uh? Yeah,
the guy who the guy who told me wee'ze was
horrible and and now he's selling carpet somewhere. I'm just like,
you gotta be Why do I have to listen to
a guy but I'm gonna wa Oh my god, I
know exactly, Yeah, you know who it is. It's like
he's literally was a carpet salesman.
Speaker 2: Oh, this guy's telling me, no, the biggest.
Speaker 1: Success in Rochester shouldn't be on the radio. And then
two days later I'm walking the wall. He's asked me
if I want Burber or Shag. Get away from me, man,
please get away from me with this ridiculous name.
Speaker 2: That was. That's very funny. I forgot about it.
Speaker 1: Yes, I won't mention him by name, but he's a
complete lovely individual. Well, and I hope his carpet sales
are well.
Speaker 2: The the It's just funny because I did think I
had somebody come to me earlier in my career who
is maybe in managing still today, and said to me,
you could be a GM. Let me train you to
be a GM. You don't want to go in afternoons
and die somewhere. And I said no, and I blew
off the meetings and I wouldn't go because I didn't
want that. Now, I also wish I hadn't pushed so
hard against what I from whence I came, so to speak.
I came from you know, educated parents who had master's
degrees and doctorates and you know that sort of thing.
And I just wanted to be the rebel. I wanted
to not have to tell you know what I mean
all these different things. So it was just very interesting
to me to see that, and I think it was
wheeze over the years, and then especially when I was
part of his show that you could just kind of
be yourself and start to share your opinions and your insights.
And I had learned early on, and I don't know
about you, I had the I still think this was
one of the greatest times in radio for me. I
sat out of here at Saint John Fisher College here
in Rochester now University, and I worked midnight to six
on rock station at Poughkeepsie, and I got bored playing music,
so I knew no one was, like, nobody important was
listening in the middle of the night. So I just
opened the phone speech and I did Who's up in
why at three o'clock in the morning, and I called
pay phos and I did all these and it was
just peep looking to feel like they had a friend
or they mattered and they were heard. And that's what
I realized radio was. And to me, that's the greatest
thing is I loved people. I was so curious about people.
I loved people. Why did they do certain things. I'm
not a strip club guy, but I had gigs at
strip clubs. I wanted to know what the fuck this
guy was coming every day to see Ginger who was
never going to sleep with him and he brought her
flowers once in a while. It was like, what's going
on in the head. I want to know, I want
to know. I found it so so interesting, really interesting,
and that was like it was a playground for me
to do all that stuff. But then, you know, with
the cool thing with Weez was like cause I was
moranimal at first. He would make fun of me, and
I go, yeah, he's right, you're trying too hard because
authenticity has become it's now like the buzzword. You know, eh,
if it's a podcast is gonna work, it's got to
be authentic. And it was, yeah, it always was. It
always was.
Speaker 1: We just we just denied it and whatever if somebody,
if somebody tells you they're authentic, you're like, no.
Speaker 2: You don't know, because yeah, it's the thing in the world,
that's the dumbest thing.
Speaker 1: But we we He's one of those pipole He's like
the leaders, you know, he's like, he's liking treaties. I
don't want to lead, son, but you gotta lead for
you Dune fans. We's was the talent who never believed
he was a talent. He never thought he was an artist.
We he and I had so many fights about this
because I really consider myself a performer, which is another
problem radio was. They don't consider it performing art. They've
ruined the industry with this management mindset. That and some
guy named Leslow put out this Facebook message about how
radio is not in art and I took great exceptions that,
and I know Les, he used to work in my company.
And I'm just so tired of people who are not
artists are saying this business is not about art. It's
like it's a performing art. I mean, radio once convinced
this country we were being invaded by Martians. That's how
good of an art it was. So we typifies why
it's a great art, because he is perhaps the best
storyteller in this industry has ever seen. You and I
both know on or off the air. Once he starts
spinning a yarn, he captivates whoever is around him. He
just doesn't know his own strength. I'm not an artist, bro,
I'm like, oh, I'm not gonna fight with you about this.
Yes you are. You have so much unbelievable talent. You
just don't want to know it for whatever reason. I
don't care. Just keep being you. But he is a great,
great talent. Again, another reason why this is such a travesty.
He could have been anything. He could have gone anywhere,
you know, Billy, we had opportunities to go to New
York and Los Angeles when we he and I were
working together. I put it air checks and things, you know.
And but he loved Rochester and he was just like, look,
I'm going to stay here. This is my town. I
love this place. I'm I'm successful here. And he still
transcended Rochester. I mean that Woodstock video that he made,
you know, was people. I put that on my page recently,
just said hey, I want you guys to know a
bit about the man that was my mentor and who
means so much to me. My listeners were like, oh
my god, this guy is so cool. I wish I
could have listened to him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was.
Speaker 1: He was a great talent. And that's why it's so
sad if this is how he goes out. I just
it's just what a ridiculous, ridiculous travesty. And this is
I wish the radio had a governing body. I mean,
even though like in the NFL, the commissioner is useless,
but still every once in a while, the commissioner will
go to the you know, go to the owners and say, look,
this is a bad look. Can you guys do something
about this. I know you guys run the show, but
can you do something about this. It's a bad look.
And there's nothing in radio that seems to be able
to go to the major companies and say this is
a bad look. You need to do it differently. Look,
and I don't have a problem with the what, it's
the how we you know, we've had to go Probably
that's what they said. Okay, I mean, I'm not going
to argue with that. There's an inspiration date on everything. Yeah, exactly,
it was horrible.
Speaker 2: You were absolutely right. And I think that they knew
that he had signed on for one more year and
this was going to be the last year. I think
they knew that at the beginning of the year. I
think they knew they were flipping the format on the
station sometime many months ago. And that's the bummed out part,
because people do lose jobs and it comes down as
a sudden and shocking thing to you. But they knew
it all along.
Speaker 1: And why do they have to keep these things a secret?
Speaker 2: To me?
Speaker 1: Like, maybe they will try to just the plans. I
get him throwing out some plans, but they could tell
wei's after we signed that contract, or maybe whenever they
made the decision, pull them aside and say, hey, we're
not going to continue with you. That's what happened to me.
And my company trusted me because I was still on
the air for five months. They trusted me not to
go on and lose my ass. I mean they were
they trusted that I wouldn't go on there and just
start bad mouthing everything and blow the place up. I
mean that was five more months I had to do
a show knowing that I was dead man walking. Radio
doesn't seem to get that. It's different now, you know.
And let's make a plan, let's have an exit. And
like a story I wanted to tell you is this
was more than twenty five This maybe thirty years ago.
I applied for a job and they said, okay, we
love you. Let's go the general manager of the program director.
We sat down, everybody loved each other, and they said, look,
come on over and I'm like, oh, I need a contract,
and they go, well, yeah, our company's not going to
let us give you a contract. I said, well, I'm
not coming out. I'm not moving my family to your town.
And they thought, well, yeah, that's reasonable. So they went
back to their company. Their companies like, well, we're not
going to give them a contract, and they said, what
do you want us to do. We're not going to
hire somebody good and they're not going to read their
family out. So the company begrudgingly said oh fine. And
the reason they were so resistant, and this is what happened, Billy,
and this is this is still what happens. A month
after I got there and started my morning show, they
fired the general manager. Three months they fired the program director,
and in five months the station at Flip format there
was a brand new morning show. I had a guaranteed contract.
So they said, well, we're going to move you to evenings.
Speaker 2: Oh this is Phoenix.
Speaker 1: Yeah oh okay, now you know, yeah exactly. They knew
all the time. They knew all the time. I'm like,
you shouldn't have hired me. I moved my entire family,
and the company knew that they were never going to
keep me. And the sad thing was is I actually
did get good ratings that they should have kept me,
because they hired a different show and here's Oh, here's
the other stupid. This is the thing that radio does.
So I had a bonus structure that said, hey, you'll
get ratings if you're in number one, number two or
number three, you'll get bonuses. At night. I was number one.
I was number one at night. I had a great
show at night. And they said, yeah, but we're not
going to bonus you. I'm like, why are you a bonus,
because well, your contract says that it's six to ten am.
And I looked at the manager and I said, and
you look really happy. I was. I did get one
bonus when I was at the company. It was my
first book I got. I was number two, and then
they took me off boardings and said we're going to
put this other guy on. That other guy never ever
got me a bonus. And I said to him and
he was always laughing, like, ah, we needed not to
give you because the six And I said, you're the
idiot that doesn't have bonuses in the morning. I want
to tell you. You can be mad. You could sit there
and think your genius, but your morning show is so
bad that you don't have any bonuses. You want bonuses.
You want to be number one ray. It was so
bad and it's still that way. It is still that way.
They keep secrets, they ruin people's lives, They don't do
what you're supposed to, and they don't give a damn
about the customer. Because the customers like what happened? What
do you go? Or even the way we went out.
People are just sad like this is it? This is
and they don't care. And you know why they don't
care because they know, in my opinion, this is my opinion,
they know radio is on the way out. They're strip
mining it. They just know that they're going to leave
a dead husk and the golden parachute. People don't care.
And the company and the two big companies have new owners.
They have these new owners with restructuring and bankruptcy. These
new owners do not care about anything but just getting
the last drop of data. They don't care. And anybody
with a brainer head knows this. The radio once she
unfortunately is not in good shape. And it's because the
people that just don't care at least in my opinion,
in the big, big, big company.
Speaker 2: I think you're absolutely right. I think that the corporate
radio we'll call it, that has ruined radio to a
certain extent in that Oh, and I have said on
this podcast, I was part of the problem. You're on
in markets. You've never walked the street. You're reading liners
talking about an event that's going on that you don't
even know. If you're pronouncing it correctly, they may call
you up and go, hey, man, it's the Hucinani not
hu chanuni or whatever. I'm just saying like anything that
was a colloquialism was lost in that, and so now
you've homogenized and lost those things. I will ask you this.
I do believe that radio is still viable, primarily in
the spoken word format at a local level, if you
brought it back to the local level. So you're in Seattle,
we're here in Rochester, if you had stations that were
just serving here. And that's why I don't like when
I hear I don't care who it is. I don't
care what my relationship was with the person, if we
ever worked together. I don't like hearing local voices off
the radio. I don't. I think that it's bad for
the industry as a whole, and I think it hurts
the local community because you know, if I the one
oh four Bridge and it feels like it sways. I
don't know that if I'm not if I've never driven
the one oh four bridge, you understand what I'm saying,
Like back to Webster. So those are the things that
I think that I go. But if somebody, and I
do think at some point they're gonna have to start
selling them off because they're not going to be making
their money and they've gotten so big. And you know,
Ryan Seacrest seems like a real nice guy, but he's
on all the stations. It's homogenized, you know, for for
iHeart and whoever it is for Odyssey has certain talent
like that as well, and to be those talent, it's great,
that's nice. It's a nice life, but it's not a
very you don't get that personal. And that's the thing
that weiz to me was like I started thinking about it.
We weren't talking. I mean, I produced the show during
its cancer time, and I will never forget when when
he was on, he would come on from New York
City and he was talking about how bad the radiation
is and how much it sucked. He would only some
days it was a half hour, some days not at all,
some days two hours but you know he did as
much as he could during that time.
Speaker 1: I have a story about his cancer that will also
illustrate how horrible this industry is. I will tell you.
I will tell you if you want. I mean, I
don't even know if Weez knows this story. I don't
know if I've even told him, But I will tell
you something that when you're ready, Yeah, let me finish.
Speaker 2: Let me finish this thought, and we'll go to that.
Because here's my point with why I think we've needed this.
Weez's son, Sammy, was I don't know how old, like seven, six, five,
I don't know, somewhere in there, maybe ten, somewhere in
that range. I'll say five to ten years old when
we'ves was going through this and Weeze comes on and
he's talking about how bad it is and how bad
the radiation is. And a listener who was very active,
and some listeners would become part of your life, like
I had guys come over when I was on the
radio doing mornings and help me build a treehouse for
my kids. Just listeners pulled up did the thing right.
We's had people like that too, And this woman who
would be on the radio and get talked about and
got known because through the Wei show, calls up and says, Weez,
if you want to give up, you've done it everything
you can. We love you, we support you. But if
you just can't hack it, we understand, don't worry about it.
And man, you would have thought. Doreen practically dove across
whatever couch she was near. She's screaming into the microphone,
don't you tell my husband to give up? What the
And then somebody has Sammy, who's still here in Rochester.
He's like a little boy. He gets on, he goes, Daddy,
don't give up. He's calling, and I go, you can't
have I mean, that was emotional and an investment. And
it was the Osbourne's before the Osbourne's. It was you
know what I'm saying. It was a real It was
a real reality show. There was nothing scripted here. We's
had no writers. Stern has writers, Ryan Secrets has writers.
He didn't have writers. And that stuff was so authentic
and and and people remember it. I remember sitting in
the studio just I had headphones on and I'm sitting
there with a microphone in front of me saying nothing
because I don't know what to say, and I'm just
taking all this in. I go, you can't have that
personality in this town so into the fabric of people's
lives and people so into his life and just go, well,
that's it, folks, it just doesn't work. Now what happened
during the.
Speaker 1: Cash You're right, Billy, That's why this is such a
travesty many of the industry. In the industry itself, so
many people contacted me, people that nobody in Rochester know,
but they knew Weeze. He affected their lives by going
to conventions and just owning the panels and being Weeeze
on panels. He changed so many radio careers. People just
did an about face and said, oh, we better stop
doing our show. The way we're doing it will never win.
Weeze is the future. So many people love him and
would have come on his show like it would have
been a cavalcade of stars of anybody and everywhere. It's
disappointing to all of us, including a lot of people
that Rochesterians don't know about, but radio luminaries that would
be like, you got to be kidding me. My story
is that right after the Phoenix tobacle, where I was
doing nights. I was brought back to Rochester. Oh yeah,
so I didn't know this. This is where I had
to talk to the carpet salesman. And I had a
massive bar getting with the carpet salesman because I went
to the carpet salesman. And when I was brought in,
we believe in you. We want to do this afternoon
personality show, and we're going to put you with Bowl,
and I love Bowl, and I personally believe Bull and
I were onto something really good. Even though we was like,
what the hell are you guys doing? I just felt like, look, dude,
I think we're doing something that eventually became the core
of what I did in Seattle and made me whatever
the hell I am in Seattle. But at the time
it was really revolutionary. We got good response. It wasn't
like we were horrible, but we weren't brought there for that.
That was the problem. We were not brought there to
do an afternoon show. They really thought the management team
thought that Weez was going to die. Yeah, they thought
he was going to die and they wanted me as
a replace, but they didn't tell me that. They moved
me and my family out there and they just said, oh, hey,
we just want you. You're a great talent. How cool
would it be. We's in the morning, BJ in the afternoon. Yeah,
I mean they old they sold me on this. They
also paid me really well, so I thought, okay, they're
not full of crap, you know. So I thought, all right,
I mean I'll do this. I love Rochester. What a
great opportunity. And then when we didn't die, Honestly it
was it was amazing. How yeah, it's like I then so,
you know, and I remember I was my my family.
We wanted to buy a house. We were there for
like one and a half years, and my wife was like,
let's buy a place. You know, the kids love it here.
So we we you know, we we found a nice
place in Brighton. The kids loved the school, they loved
their friends, they loved the neighborhood. And I went to
them before buying the house. Because we had toured the neighborhood.
And the neighborhood a couple of people knew that who
I was, and so they were like, please move in,
you know, And so I went to the carpet salesman
and I said, look, I'm getting a vibe here. I
just have by spidy senses tingling. I don't know, but
I just feel like I shouldn't buy a house. But
my wife is killing me. We can afford to buy
a house, but I just feel like this might not
be the right thing. Why am I getting this vibe?
Speaker 2: No, you're here forever, You're here forever.
Speaker 1: I buy the house. Three months later, they're like, you're done,
and it's I noticed. So I'm like, what has happened?
So I remember being me. I peppered the carpet salesman.
I insulted him. I did everything I could because I
know all the behavioral science strategies to get people to
tell you the truth, and you know, you cook it
every button you can. And finally he finally is he
just blurted it out. He's like I thought he was
going to die. It isn't dying. Somebody'll need you. I'm like,
oh my god, and I that's radio.
Speaker 2: It's like, I.
Speaker 1: Say, you up ended my entire life. I had a life,
and you moved me to Rochester under these false pretenses.
And oh it's like I am so angry at this
business because I had just gone through it in Phoenix
with lying deception and you know, I'm so happy Weez
is a lot, but it's like, did Weze know that
they didn't care about him? They were just trying to
keep the gravy train going. And first of all, there's
no way I could have replaced Weees. It's like, I
don't know, but I want a bunch of morons.
Speaker 2: He really So at that time, I was like the
promotion director, so I would be in some of these
meetings and they called it building a bench. So they
wanted you, and they brought in Beth to do knights
and I thought it was great. And then they moved
me out of a management role and put me on
the zone to do mornings, which was another station that
they had, and that was that was fine. Yeah, I
remember that, but but that was it. And so I
never really heard much after that. But I was under
the impression everybody knew they were building a bed and
you forget that. They say a lot of stuff behind
closed doors that they don't tell you, and I don't
know if it's well, it's two things. One it's a
power play and the other is I just think they
think less of talent, like you're too emotional, you can't
handle it, and it's a radio thing. It's not a
TV thing. And I always love because I want to.
I'm working on something that i'd like to do where
I go out and I would come to Seattle even
and film just conversation radio days stories like this. And
one of the guys I want to sit down with
who I talked to once and told me a fuck
a great story about radio. He had been in TV.
He gets in radio. The management, his manager calls up
and says, hey, can you provide peanut butter? He wants
peanut butter in the morning, can provide peanut butter? And
the radio is like, what, we don't do that here,
That's not what we do. And they're like, this is
in craft services. This is a but like you see
the disparity how they treated talent like talent in TV
it would be like, what do you want? We're gonna
make sure you're happy, we want you to be at
your best. We're looking for the best from you. How
can we help pull the best out? How do we
make you comfortable? How do we do that? Radio? It's
like fuck that you and her or him and him
and you and go It's like, oh my god. And
when you look at it is. It is absolutely insane,
and that does make me laugh. It's funny. I hadn't
really thought of it that way, Beach and I got
I love that you're calling this guy the carpet salesman.
He was such a douche. I just have to say this.
I've told this story a few times. I've never used
his name. I don't know if it was prior or
after you. No, I had to be prior to you.
He had inserted himself because they Stan Maine put me
in afternoons and then was sort of pushed out to
Austin and so I'm doing afternoons and the carpet salesman
becomes the guy in charge now comes in and he
would do he was part of a show in Boston,
which was a pretty big show in Boston, and he
would play bits for weez you need to do stuff
like this, and it was like drunk magnum Pi, like
magnum p. I wasn't even on the fucking air at
the time. So this is what this guy's doing. And
then he decides that he was trying I didn't realize this.
Here's another one. He was trying to push me because
at the time I might have been twenty four, twenty three,
twenty four years old, trying to push me to overnights.
He wanted Uncle Roger, who did overnights, to come and
do like afternoons. And Roger wasn't coming off overnights because
he didn't want to deal with management. He didn't want
to see people during the day.
Speaker 1: And he just like, yeah, you know what, Roger was
perfect for right where he was. There's no way he
wanted to interaction. No the idiots. So he was smarter
than all of us. He was smarter than all of us.
Speaker 2: So this guy decides that he's going to extend Dave
Kane to four and then he's going to do four
to six, and then I was due to do six
to nine. He used the radio as a dating service.
He would oh, oh, he dated calling number nine. He
would invite the women up. They would get he'd tell
them they'd have to get there because I think the
station closed at five thirty. I think the office the
front office. So he said you got to get here
before five thirty. And then he would ask people to
go up and check out the woman and if she
was oh, lovely, somewhat decent, you could he would come
out and see them, but if not, he had a meeting,
something popped up, he couldn't get to them. Blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: This is the car kind, yeah, leader, yes, yes, this
is it. I can't tell you that leader.
Speaker 2: I had another one, Beach. I played strip poker or
strip trivia, and a woman would come up and she
was just a listener and she was pretty open, even
on the radio at times, saying my husband travels a lot.
And she talked, she danced the line, but saying how
lonely she would get. She calls me once and says,
I just left your boss out of and she names
the hotel he had banged, and she's going on about
how terrible he is, and she's telling me this whole story,
and he walks in the fucking studio and you know
how like the calls, yeah, I'm playing music, but the
little speaker. Oh god. It was an awful day for me,
but at the same time so entertaining. And it tells
you so much about these people, so much about these
people that there's this internal happiness that they just don't have,
and so they got to then shit on everybody else,
and that's not what you need. To be in life.
Speaker 1: Radio's best people are its talent because they're artists that
want to make the world a better place. You know,
Wese you know how Weez is at the end of
the day. You know, his show was his heart coming
through trying to make the world a better place. A
lot of people may have had complaints about the fact
that was too political, but Weise was like, dude, I
am doing what I can do to give back and
make the world a better place. That's who he's always been, right,
and that's the heart of an artist, which is why
he and I will always fight. It's like we as
you are so an artists, you have the heart because
that's what artists do. Artists want to just use whatever
their gifts are to make the world better. You know.
And sure, whether you agree with his politics or not,
you can't disagree with where his heart is. And you know,
like he said in the Woodstock video, he never grew
into this conservative person who was bitter and stopped having
a heart. He just maintained that he was the same
hippie that he always was with those ideals and can't
we all just get along and love each other? I mean, yeah, God,
that's a horrible credo to live by, isn't it. Whereas
radio management, those are not the best of the best.
There's a great story which I love, the Hitchhiker's Guide
to the Galaxy. At the end of that book, at
the end of the multiple books, they basically leave a
planet and leave all the salespeople behind, all the marketers,
all the salespeople, because they go, you really add nothing
to humanity, right, And it's so we know this, and
I know not all salespeople are bad. And also salespeople
have been pretty mistreated by our industry as well. I
have all your friends that, yeah, but it's the salespeople
that go into management that really don't belong in management,
that just don't have the skill set. It's like, hey, look,
go out and sell what you sell, thank you very much,
but you're not a manager. And they ruin talent, they
ruin this business, and they ruin people's just will to
live sometimes because they don't understand how we operate. The
reason you get us for a ridiculous price, and the
reason kids are still wanting to do this is they
love the art. That's why they'll do five jobs, ten jobs,
twelve jobs and get paid minimum wage. It's not because
you're a great negotiator and you pull one over. It's
because they don't care about money. They want to do
their art, and this business takes advantage of that, like
you know nothing. I mean a lot of entertainment businesses do,
but radio is the worst, I think, And I mean
that's why it's the way it is now. Because the internet,
these people could go on the Internet and do your heart. Yes,
and now they can make pretty much what radio is paying,
because radio is not paying like it used to. And
someone says, I can go do a podcast and get
my Patreon going and pretty much make the same money
that you want to pay me, except I don't going
to listen to your crap.
Speaker 2: Why exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And that's and radio still has the arrogance like,
oh no, we're the big dog, we're the big and
I'm like, no, your stock price is lower than you know,
the low sea level, and you can't be arrogant. You can't.
You've just been delisted. No, you're not a Wall Street
company anymore, and therefore don't act like you are. You
guys have failed. It's a failure, but you still can
do something. But you need to figure out that your
failures and get people who are not failures. If they
fired everybody in management and brought people and got brought
in anybody into the half price, they can't do a
worst job. I don't care who they bring it. They
can't do a worse job. And that's the sad thing
about it. And they keep instead cutting talent and cutting
people and cutting this. A really good friend of mine
just got let go of Odyssey and he a terrific
talent behind the scenes guy, and boy was he so
instrumental in so many things that we did. He made
us look so good at all of our live broadcasts,
remotes and all the wonderful things we did at w
He was a guy that nobody ever saw, but was
so instrumental and wore a ridiculous amount of hats and
still no room for him. Ridiculous. It's just so ridiculous
what this business has become.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's running lean and it's one that doesn't care.
And then and on the artist's side, you do you're
more of an emotional sensitive person. Not you, I mean
collective you. Our language is bad, right, we don't have
a collection.
Speaker 1: And we deserve better. And listeners of Rochester listeners, because
let's be honest, I would say a third to fifty
percent of that town know who we'z is. Whether or
not you listen to a show, or you might have
listened to a little bit, but you've got generational listening.
You've got grandfathers, fathers, and sons and daughters and grandmothers
and mothers who listened. I said, listened together. Yes, he
was perhaps one of the biggest stars ever to come
out of that town in any entertainment media. And that's
the send off. Okay radio, okay radio, what what? And
where's the governing body to pull somebody aside and say this,
this is bad. You guys have hurt the industry. You
guys have hurt our industry. And I don't know the
NA B, the R A B, you're just letters to me.
I don't think you do a damn thing because you
allow this to happen. You're like you're you're like that.
You know, you like the mlbmission you like you like
the NFL commissioner. You're useless, you really are. Uh And
I'm sorry to say it, but that's what I do.
That's why nobody wants to work with me. You know,
Weize would never say that Wise's last show. Weez and
Dorian were so kind on their last show, you know,
yeah anymore, they were kind, and I know they wanted
to make sure they didn't in trouble for anybody. I
get that me. No, I mean even on my last show,
I basically called out the ables I did anyway, even
though it was my last show. You're a great guy.
Let's talk too tough for cake it And I'm like,
oh yeah, I don't forget the guy who used to
work for He's a moron. I hope he dies. You know.
That was me because I'm just so angry at the
people that ruin this business. And it was my last show,
so like, what are you gonna do? You know, you know,
I don't know. I don't know how we since got
in his contract. You know, I understand obviously, you know
if depend how long it is, you know, all right,
you got to play nice for me. That day was
my last day, Like that was my last Like, okay,
you're not gonna pay me tomorrow, So what are you
gonna do? Not pay me? You're gonna fight? I mean,
so I was happy to go out that way, and
I I also am a fair person. I love my
local management team. I thought the corporate people that I
had to deal with were idiots and all the weight
to the top and they just were not good at
their jobs. And you know if they were well with us, horrible,
I go, well, point to the rates. Their ratings are
the stock price. You're not good at your job. I
don't care whatever email you put out there. Your ratings
are horrible because no one's making money off your company.
You should you should do a career sepaku, do us
a favor, Go out behind a friggin' bush and fall
on the career sword and save. I saw the embarrassment.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know what, if you had any dor,
if you were raised in a culture like the Japanese culture,
you would do that for your family.
Speaker 2: Beads talk to me about the mental health stuff a
little bit, because.
Speaker 1: I didn't really talking about a perfect look at me
I have a picture of.
Speaker 2: But we'll get to the show you did. But here's
one that shocked me, saddened me deeply, was whatever was
going on with Ace? Uh? You know that one caught
me Batman caught me by surprise, and I know there
was a lot of uh, there was some tragedy in
his life of recent recent kind and changes and things.
But boy, do we need to look out for the
mental health of the performers a little bit more? Do
we need to listen closer to them?
Speaker 1: Yes. Angela Pirelli is a consultant in this business and
and she's been in radio for a long time. She's spearheaded.
For the first time. I went to Don Anthony and
who runs the morning convention for radio, and she went
to him and said, we need to do a mental
health panel. Uh. And I have so much love for
Angela because to your point, she was like, we need
to at least start the conversation because like the NFL
with you know, the whole CTE stuff, they did not
want to know about that for the longest time, and
then eventually, you know, like, Okay, I guess we have
to acknowledge that this was a thing. She felt the
same way about mental health and the way that talent
is treated by corporations, that it has an adverse effect
on a person's life, and as well as the families
and the extended families of people that have to interact
with somebody that end up having severe mental health issues
because of their environment because mental health. You know, there's
mental illness and there's mental unhealthiness, and it gets conflated
a lot in our society, and so the idea that
people confuse the two. Angela said, Look, environmental stuff is
huge in radio because it's a highly stressful industry. Even
if in fact everything's going right, if everything's going perfect,
you still have a highly stressful job on the levels
of air traffic controller. And my therapist did research and
found out about that, and I was very happy that
he did because he was a military PTSD specialist. And
so with that level of stress, it's already a high
level of stress that most human beings don't ever experience
at their jobs. That's if it's good. When radio does
bad stuff, then the stress level is just beyond human
tolerate likes. It's abusive when the stress level is and
beyond just the normal level that radio has. And she
wanted to bring attention to it. So, yes, she believed it,
just like you do ability that Oh yeah, there needs
to be better, better work in understanding how to treat
your employees better than co corporations do. The lie, the secrecy,
the not caring, the building a bench not caring about
people's families or whatever. That has a massively adverse effect.
And another reason why I'm pissed at the nabra b
or whatever, because it's a huge talking point. It's a
real thing. What happens in this country today with all
this horrific stuff is due to environmental bs done by
unthinking corporations and also a horrible government, and it's affecting
human beings. This is not the way we should be.
We shouldn't be living like this. Therapists will tell you
we're not meant to live like this. This we're in
fight or flight mode all the time, and we're not
on the Serengeti. There's not a tiger trying to kill us.
Yet we're at a state a lot of us where
we feel like there's tiger chasing us and we're going
to lose our life. That's insane, since we're the most
safe part of an American you could ever be. It's
the safest time to be an American. The History Channel
did research on that. Yet people like, yeah, and that
is environmental and it's a travesty. And radio was definitely
playing its part and contributing to that negative effect.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Uh, you did do a mental not a mental
health show, but you did. What was the show that
you started that did go national for all Odyssey? Was
it about suicide or suicide provision?
Speaker 1: It's a show called I'm listening And I want to
give credit? Where quits do Dave Richards, who is perhaps
you know, one of the best program directors in the
history of this fringing business and now he's the vice
president for Odyssey. Uh, he got he could? You know.
I think he was really inspired by my story, which
was the story of my daughter Sarah, who had an
ex boyfriend died by suicide. And you know, he worked
with me every day as we try to navigate this
our family, like what are we going to do? Because
a lot of times suicide guilt of survivor guilt is
such a huge thing that then some of those survivors
will die by suicide too. And I was so like,
oh my god, And it wasn't nobody really knew what
to tell you. Therapists didn't really have a lot of
information to help you with a person that was a
suicide basically a survivor of somebody who died by suicide.
And so Dave was so inspired by this, and boy
you talk about it. I mean that Day just was
a brilliant orchestrator and a guy that deserves so much
credit for my success. I wouldn't be anything if not
being able to have worked with him. And he's like, hey,
bj I want to do this. I know how much
this means to you. Would you like to host the show.
I want to make a national show. One day a year.
We will do a national show on all of our
stations and we will just get celebrities, guests, whatever. And
boy or boy did everybody want to partake in at
musicians and athletes. So many people wanted to speak out
about it because they all were touched by this all
at some point in their life, whether it be family
members or them selves dealing with, you know, trying to
attempt suicide and great people like Michael Phelps. You know,
you've got people on that level. You know, all sorts
of musicians and Lizzo and I'm just starting thinking few
that were a lot of rock people, you know, and
it was wonderful. It's now a gigantic, huge national thing
and Carson Dally is now the host, I guess being
replaced by Carson Bailey. That seems fair. I think he had.
I think he's got a little bit more playing. So
we get started. We started it in Seattle, and I'm
proud of it, Billy. It was. It's one of the
best things I have done in my career. It was
wonderful to start a show to start a conversation about
mental health, especially for men. Men don't want to even
talk about it because you appear weak if you talk
about mental health in any way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I to address that. I do want to give
back to the Carson Daily thing, because there's a connection
to Carson Daily and then to Wei and you. I
have had somebody come up to me recently who is
a podcast listener, and I've talked about going to therapy
and said I'm going and thank you for talking about it.
But over the years I had talked about being molested
as a kid and the number of letters I would get,
like handwritten letters sometimes even in the age of email
and all, I would get these notes from people going, man,
I was like, you know, just thought I was. It's
one of these things where I really believe that we
make a mistake, and this was something that we did
very well. I think we make a mistake that you know,
if let's say a kid admits that to the parent
hate so and so touched me and molested me whatever,
and the reaction is so big that you feel like,
as a kid, you can't process is that you've caused this.
And I made my mom cry. My dad's all pissed
off now and oh my god, this person, they're going
to kill them and they what did I do? And
I remember when I told this story the other day,
Sammy got left on the school bus and I'm producing
the show and I get a call heys, we's there.
I go, no, well, we have his son. He stayed
on the school bus, uh and didn't get off when
he got to school and he was asleep. So I
call you that he'll be fine, don't worry about it.
And then all of a sudden, I go, well, I
think they're calling Dorian because he knew what the reaction
would be. But if you did, don't over If we
don't overreact to things, I think we can navigate, help
navigate them, especially for young kids early on in life.
But the going back to the Carson Daily thing, I
think that's a Howard Lapitas fine, and Howard was a
good friend. Oh yes, I'm pretty sure. The late Howard Lapedes, Yes,
the late the late Howard.
Speaker 1: Tom Green, yes, Jimmy Kimmel. Howard Lapedis was responsible so
much and also one of his biggest mistakes is he
would let me do a comedy club that Howard may
but yeah, how it was really good at spotting talent.
Speaker 2: That's funny. Well, Beach, I loved talking to you. I
would love to have you on every once in a
while if you've got time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I would love to man especial. If you're gonna
do any mental health, yes, I am. I'm on fire
for that. I think it's a big, big subject and
we can you know, Bill, you and I can help
because men don't want to go or do it and
think it's weak. And it is to me one of
the best things that humanity has ever done is the
behavioral sciences. I know there are bad therapists out there.
I get it's like anything else, you're gonna have to
keep looking. There are really bad therapists out there, But
behavioral science is tremendous. It is this to me, it
just shows humanity at its best. What they've done with
behavioral science and learning how we tick it's fantastic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 1: I'll talk about anytime you want.
Speaker 2: All right, I'm gonna stay in touch with them, Beach.
Maybe we launched it as its own podcast. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Hey, what what am I doing? I not the time?
Speaker 2: We could do it just like this. Yeah all right, Yeah,
well I'll reach out to you and let's see if
we can.
Speaker 1: I love that, Billy, I'm all about it. I love that.
Later this month. Actually, there's a guy in Seattle that's
also podcasting about mental health, and uh, you know, I'm like, sure,
I'll come on your podcast all again, because usually men
don't talk about it. So I'm a man that is
known in my area and they're like, you do you
go there? Yeah, And it's so good for other men
to hear that, because we suffer in silence, we really do.
And uh, there's a guy named Terrence Real I'll just
leave you with who talks about the psychological patriarchy, which
is different than the regular patriarchy. But basically, men have
been given such a raw deal that both men and
women in society have contributed to. We are capable of
so much more, but we have just been put in
this box that says no, this is how you are.
You can show anger, you can show lust. Those are
the only emotions you get to have as a man,
and we're let to believe it's just, oh, it's wiring. Well,
I guess this is just how we're made. But in
reality that is so not true. And I love people
like Terrence Reeal and other authors that have come out
and said, hey, guess what, everything you know about emotions,
you know they're completely wrong and mental health and so yeah, Philly,
let's do it.
Speaker 2: Brother, all right, I love it. I love it. BJ Shay,
thank you for coming on. I love I. It's such
a fan, and it's such a fan over the years.
Speaker 1: So I write back at you, Billy, I really you know.
Especially I love hearing some of the stuff you did
early in your career. I don't think I knew that.
That's awesome. I love the late night stuff.
Speaker 2: What are you?
Speaker 1: What do you do? What are you doing at this hour? N?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Who's up? And why? All right, beach, I'll talk
to you soon then, thanks brother. All right, there he
goes BJ Shay, and we will close it out. I
love what BJ gets all hot, that's my favorite, very thoughtful, right,
it's not like anger just to be Angry's anger for
a purpose. For brother weez. It's nice to be important,
but it's more important to be nice. I'm Bill Murran.
We'll see you tomorrow.
Speaker 1: I woke up in a hotel, didn't know what to do.
Speaker 2: I'm turning a TV Gonta do