Monday, May 14, 2007

Spring cleaning

Hi kids! Miss me?

Okay, news has been slow lately. So, I've been taking a bit of a break. Lots of things going on in the outside world, ya know.

Not to mention that this beautiful spring weather brings other things that are not so beautiful - namely every airborne allergen one can possibly imagine. Needless to say, I've been feeling pretty crappy as of late.

But there's oh so much to talk about. so without further ado, here we go:

Yes indeed, Lionel is now on Air America Radio. Lionel wrapped up his WOR gig just over a week ago, and some right-wing dork named Steve Malzberg has been hired to take his place. Nonetheless, Lionel fans (and I know you're out there) can tune in every day now, twelve hours earlier than normal, to hear "The Lionel Show" on Air America.

The rest of Air America's roster changes will be phased in starting this weekend, with Sam Seder's new Sunday afternoon show debuting this Sunday, May 20. Next Monday sees the weekday shuffle, as they launch "The Air Americans" weeknights (8P-midnight ET), bump Jon Elliott to three hours later (midnight-3AM ET) and make other changes. You can see the rest here.

And soon, you'll see a whole new Air America website. That is, if you can actually pull up their website (which seems to have been on the fritz too frequently as of late). I dunno, when I redesigned my site, I worked on it offline, then launched it in mere seconds, with no disruption. Then again, it doesn't seem like a real web-saavy bunch over there. Nonetheless, look for a redesigned presence and allegedly a new logo for Air America sometime soon. Perhaps prior to next week's on-air makeover. So if you haven't listened to or downloaded those year-old airchecks currently at the bottom of their front page, better get a move on. Stop procrastinating.

One show that will be displaced is "EcoTalk" with Betsy Rosenberg. Air America programmers dropped it from the weekday lineup, in order to roll out the new lineup. They did however reserve a Sunday slot for the show, 10A-noon ET. Only thing is, Rosenberg and company are trying to line up sponsors to keep it going. Doing a radio show isn't cheap, and they actually have to pay out of their own pocket. You can read more here.

As Lionel makes his Air America debut today, another liberal talk show makes its return today. After pondering the shuttering of the whole operation, Radiopower.org has rebounded, deciding to rebuild instead. And today, they welcome Tony Trupiano to the fold, with a new show airing exclusively on Radiopower. It will air from noon-3P ET weekdays, displacing Thom Hartmann, who will no longer be on the service. Trupiano has been around talk radio for awhile, mostly syndicated around his home state of Michigan. A few years back, he left radio to run for Congress. As of late, he has returned to the airwaves, often as a fill-in for Ed Schultz. Now, he's back on the air. Other shows on Radiopower currently include "American AM," a Tampa-area morning show, "KC Live," which I have absolutely no information on, and Peter Werbe's Sunday night show, which airs on WRIF in Detroit. Replays of the shows fill out the remainder of the schedule.

Another web radio service serving up liberal talk is Head-On Radio Network, which I regrettably don't get around to covering much (and some of those guys have been getting on my ass about it). Like Radiopower, they carry a generous slate of original programming, running a live lineup from 10A to 9P ET weekdays, with replays filling out the remainder of the lineup. There's been quite a bit of shuffling as of late, a new website layout (take THAT, Air America!) and other tweaks. You can check out shows such as "The Cup-o-Joe Radio Show" with Joe Vecchio, "Fox'd Up" with Jon Fox, Jeff Alan Wolf, Bill O' Brien, Guy James, Mark Levine and Bob Kincaid. They do a pretty bang-up job, pay out of pocket to provide quality talk radio to the streaming masses, and generally kick ass and take names. So instead of bitching and moaning about Air America and their balancing act of trying to please fickle listeners and terrestrial radio people at the same time, you can check out some legitimate alternatives. Check them out at Headonradionetwork.com.

Fans of Stephanie Miller are still gushing over her MSNBC simulcasts a few weeks ago. Don't look for this to become permanent. Miller said she would not want to do it again, whatever that means. MSNBC, in the wake of the whole Imus fiasco, has been in the process of throwing things against the wall to see what sticks. Last week was Moral Court radio clown Larry Elder. MSNBC has also been shuffling their own hosts in and out of the slot, and this week White House correspondent David Gregory steps in, and he may get the gig permanently.

If you're a fan of fine theater looking for something a little more esoteric, then head over to Chicago, where "Jerry Springer: The Opera" has made its trek across the Atlantic from 609 performances in London. The production, about the talk show host and former Air America personality, starts on May 14 at Bailiwick Repertory in Chicago. How intriguing is this? David Soul, the former "Hutch" of "Starsky and Hutch" played Springer at one point, and both Harvey Keitel and Kevin Kline have reportedly been courted to play the role. Wow. Just plain wow.

Last we checked, WCMI in Asheville KY/Huntington, WV was still on the air and carrying Air America Radio programming. And they're evidently getting some attention, since the local paper even wrote an article about the syndicated radio show that appears on the station - The Young Turks. "They're one of the hottest commodities in progressive radio," WCMI Assistant Program Director Brandon Millman said recently. You can read more courtesy of the Herald-Dispatch.

Another newspaper article about a talk radio station came Sunday, as the Traverse City Record-Eagle did an article about Petoskey, MI move-in WJML. As you read here last week, the owner of WJML consummated some station-swapping, dealing mostly liberal talk WWKK and a quarter million in cash to another company in exchange for their high-powered Traverse City station. As a result, the best of the former WWKK and WJML have been combined on one station, simulcast in both Petoskey and Traverse City. So, liberal talk fans in Traverse City can now hear Ed Schultz every afternoon right before Michael Savage, and maybe even tune in to Air America, albeit delayed into the wee hours. Provided they don't sleep at night, of course.

Conservodorks are paranoid and live in perpetual fear that liberals are coming after them to force Limbaugh, Hannity, et. al. off the airwaves. Oh boo fucking hoo!

Oh shit. It's back. Just what we need - more unfunny comedy on television.

And finally, a side note to President Bush: Never, NEVER accidently joke about a 281 81-year old woman being alive during the the time of the 13 colonies. Especially if she's the Queen of England. Just plain embarassing. I'm beginning to worry about the 28% that still like this guy. Perhaps expected incoming British Prime Minister Gordon Brown will remember this, as he's expected to be less of a lapdog to the Bush Administration. We shall see.

6 comments:

Jill said...

I still say MSNBC should get the Morning Sedition gang together (sans Riley, who's obviously a good company man but adding Seder) and put that in the morning slot. Hell, I'd DVR that puppy every friggin' day.

Anonymous said...

Speaking of Jerry, Jerry ....
I finally received the first WKRP DVD from Netflix.
On the audio commentary track, producer Hugh Wilson talks about how he had worked with the mayor's office prior to shooting the exteriors in Cincinnati for the show's opening and closing credits.
They were supposed to meet with the mayor while they were in town but the mayor became unavailable when the story broke about him having credit card charges from a hooker.
This is incident became one of the bits in the opening used in early episodes (a car radio being tuned to different stations before finding WKRP).
And that Cincinnati mayor (who did not last in the job) was.... Jerry! Jerry! I wonder if that's in the opera?
And now you know the rest of the story.

ltr said...

Emacee, I'm shocked. Don't tell me you were the last person on earth to know about Jerry and that hooker business! Egads!

BTW: The story I heard was he paid by check, which is even dumber than plastic.

Anonymous said...

I had forgotten about it. And I had not connected Jerry's time in office with the period WKRP was in production.
Too bad they didn't have trash talk on TV back then. Jerry could have been a guest with both his wife and the hooker. ;)
Back then, TV daytime talk shows were all recipes and puff interviews with celebrities - except for Phil Donahue (well, he did some celebrity interviews, too).
If any daytime TV talk host should have gotten a progressive talk radio show, it should have been Phil.
You know, if I were a Cincinnati PD and I hated the idea of progressive talk radio and wanted to kill it, Jerry would be the guy I'd call. No matter what he does on the air, a lot of people will be thinking about hookers and trailer trash cat fights.

Luther Blissett said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Luther Blissett said...

Well, three days into the Lionel show and I'm not that impressed. While he's obviously competant, the overall attitude of intellectual and moral superiority to the callers is vaguely unpleasant to the extent where he'll use five minutes to eviscerate someone who dares to stray from his topic.

Coupled with dumb games, and a buildup for the Opie and Anthony bit that went on far too long and frankly confused people without a viable point, he's in danger of removing any credibility he has with new listeners. It's too damned easy to come up with a secret and act as if nothing is happening, it's just extremely tacky.

Likewise, coming down hard on the side of apathetic atheism, then sucking up to AAR 'State of belief' Welton Ghetty as an admirer of televangelists show a nuance that strays very close to hypocrisy.

Unless of course, this is all intended to shift listening figures around like a movable block of ratings. I'm not a radio person and therefore don't 'get' the vital importance for this reshuffle.

OTOH, I loved Lee Rayburn [sic]. Someone needs to give that guy a major show. The other guy that covered couldn't handle a debate on dangerous dogs, which wasn't exactly material for a political show.


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