A Complete Waste of Air

Due to popular demand, I have a new post to this blog.

Nothing.

Yes, nothing. I have nothing to say, no pictures to post, no opinions.
A COMPLETE WASTE OF AIR.

That is the blog's name and that is my entry for today.


Ok, just one little teensy weeny thing:

I don't like what this Rick Warren guy did tonight.
See Shirley Buxton's fine blog entry on this.
Politics IN the church is wrong.
The Church is for healing the sick, physically and spiritually, not for finding out what some idiot politician has in mind for the next four years.
There, how's that for a blog post.

I have been very busy. I am now the Program Director of KYKN Radio AM 1430. No more money just a great title!
I am still on the air every morning and on Saturdays as well.
Then when the Salem-Keizer Volcano's are in town I am back to being "Bill the PA Guy". So, it makes for long days.

Looking forward to a great day at Church tomorrow with my Brothers and Sisters in Christ!
amen?

The Death and Life of Radio

Last week it was announced that Rush Limbaugh had signed a nearly $400 million contract to go through the year 2016.

Now I am no big Rush fan, but for those of you outside of the crazy world of radio I am going to let you in on the "inside" of this stuff and how it has and does affect those of us IN the business.

Back in 1988 when Rush first went Nationwide, AM radio was dying a very quick death. FM was firmly established and with CD players still fairly new, listening to crystal clear stereo music was what the people wanted. Who wants to hear mono, crackly music on AM?

Radio station owners were desperately seeking a way out of this mess. "What to program?"

Along came Rush. Now there were talk shows before, but nothing like this. It was new, refreshing, in your face and utterly Conservative.

Rush Limbaugh Saved AM Radio. With he and then the "clones" that followed him, AM now had something to sell and to market to the public and it worked.

Those who worked in AM radio though, found it to be a double edged sword.

If you owned an AM station, why would you pay, say Bill Post, to do a morning show, when you can have El Rushbo for the price of just playing his National Commercials at certain times of the day, and it came right off of your satellite receiver?

Boom, out go all the "deejays" and local hosts. The salespeople still have jobs, the traffic person (the one who schedules the commercials to play) and the engineer still have jobs, but not the air talent.

Now, in 2008, FM faces a similar dilemma. Nearly all of the radio you may listen to is canned. Meaning it comes from somewhere outside of the station via satellite or it is "pre-recorded" what we call "voicetracking".

No more "deejays".

AM is still doing alright, but FM is now hurting. With IPods, Satellite radio and other ways to receive music, FM is trying to figure out what to do.

So, now you know why a person like me hangs onto whatever little shred of "radio" they can hang onto.

Rush saved AM radio but in the process, he killed our talent pool. I was thinking, along with several other very talented "former" radio people, just how many jobs could have been provided for $400 million! Some of us are actually more entertaining then Rush. It is sad that America has allowed itself to be taken to a place where they can only listen to A GUY rather than the days when we all looked to radio as a place for information and entertainment

Hope he enjoys the money.

End of whine sessions. The Cheese section begins shortly.

Oh My Aching Back!

Sunday morning, after choir stood on the risers for 40 minutes BEFORE first service, then 45 minutes during first service, my back completely seized up and I was wobbling back to my pew seat like a 98 year old man.

Ok, so why should anyone care? My friend Dan has the worst back problem of anyone in history and he suffers daily and this is a guy who is not overweight, in bad physical condition or anything like that, he has just been "blessed" with a bad back, and I get a little tiny glimpse of his pain when something like Sunday happens.

How many of you reading this suffer from the same? I workout pretty darn hard core, 5 days a week and sometimes 6, so I am in the best physical shape of my life, so it isn't that, I just can't stand in one place for more than about 15 minutes max.

I am thinking I can't do the choir thing anymore.

Now, if you are a regular to this blog and or my church Salem Evangelical, the question is: if I were to leave choir, would it be right for me to come back and sing the solo on the two songs I sing with the choir two or three times a year, specifically "Saved the Day" and "We Are United"? Or, should another choir member take that over if I leave? I am not asking because I feel I "own" them, I just wondered if there should be a policy of "you must be in choir to sing these songs".

Lastly, the only relief I got was from my MARQUIS SPA!!! Seriously, at 104 degrees, and the jets all turned on to my little corner, it did some recovery work on my back.

The one pictured below is our model, the Mirage plus the next photo is our waterfall feature.