Month: November 1993

11/26/1993

Be kind to those people who are being paid to be kind to you.

Some years ago, the esteemed Bill Gavin uttered that quote when he was questioned as to how radio should treat record promotion people. Years later, conflict still exists between those who play the records and those who promote them. And Bill Gavin’s quote rings louder than ever.

For a program director, never is the contradiction of his job more pronounced that in his dealings with record promotion people. For the promotion people, the relationship and job description are pretty well defined. It is their job to work their way into a program director’s office, into his heart and onto his playlist. It’s really simple. Do what it takes to get the record added.

For a program director, it’s not nearly that simple.

A program director’s job is to choose the music that’s right for the station. What is right and what is not so right is almost always undefined. Adding records to a playlist is usually a subjective judgment at best.

In the past few weeks, I’ve talked to several program directors who were confused about this relationship. “Doesn’t his guy understand the record is not for my radio station?” “Why is the record company pushing so hard on this record?” “Some guy is even threatening to pull service if I don’t play his record.”

Just as many who do record promotion have posed questions from the other side of the fence. “Why won’t this guy play my record? It’s perfect for his station.” “After all we’ve done for this guy, I can’t believe he’s not on this record.”

The answers to these questions depend on your relationship with people who do record promotion.

If you’re a program director who has never asked for a promotion, has never asked for a group to play at a station function, has never asked a record company to pick up the tab to fly your listeners somewhere to see an act, has never accepted a record company invitation to travel to hear a particular recording artist perform, then you have a very definable relationship. The record people who promote you are free to present their product to you with an emphasis on promotion and not pressure.

If, however, you’re a program director who asks for promotions (hey, it’s not a sin…sometimes you have no choice…if your station’s budget requires it, you’ve got to go for it), if you’ve asked for a group to play at a station function, if you’ve asked for a record company to pick up the tab for winners to travel to hear a recording artist or you’ve done the same, then you’re open to pressure as well as promotion.

As a program director, you must understand where the pressure comes from. In almost all of the cases, the person you ask for the favor doesn’t have the power to grant it. The local promotion manager will have to ask his boss for approval of an expenditure for the station. Before the boss approves it, he almost always asks questions…questions you might not be aware of. Will the program director “pay back” the favor? Can we depend on him in the future? Will this solidify the relationship?

If the LPM answer yes (and be assured he will answer yes…he is, after all, in promotion), then the VP who okays the promotion will expect favors in the future.

As a program director, it is very easy for you to avoid problems in your relationships with promotion people. Be honest and upfront in all of your dealings. If you need a promotion, explain your needs. If the promotion person can help you, be specific in asking what the record company wants in return. Don’t be, or allow the promotion person to be, ambiguous. Find out exactly what is expected of you in return and then determine whether or not the price is too high.

If you’re a promotion person, do the same. If it’s a favor, explain that. If you expect something in return, outline your expectations. Later, when you feel the program director owes you and he doesn’t share the feeling, your ambiguity may very well harm a relationship that could have been maintained.

The biggest problem in relationships between program directors and promotion people is ambiguity. Be upfront and relations will improve.

As a program director, you can’t ask for favors, even little ones, without having a payback. As a record promotion person, makes sure the program director understands that there must be a give-and-take when favors are extended.

As for relationships in general, I’ve found that the more educated the promotion person, the better for the relationship. Do you want promotion people to understand your station and philosophy? Take the time to explain it to them. It won’t take long. They’re intelligent people. If you take a few minutes to explain how you work, what segment of the audience you’re trying to attract and how you’re working to position the station, you might be surprised at what you get back. Promotion people are looking for an edge. Educate them about your station and it could come back to you in a big way as they look for and design promotions that are specific for your needs.

You don’t have the time? Make time. It’s your business to carve out an edge in every facet of this business.

Promotion people should take time to listen to the stations they service. Try and find out what the program director is looking for and fill that need. Spend time with the program director when you’re not working a specific record. Nothing impresses program directors more than when you say you don’t have a particular record for them this week. Or how about pulling them off a record when you know it’s fried? Those little things create more good will than 10 promotions.

Both sides shouldn’t kid themselves. Relationships are important. If you’re a program director who thinks you don’t need relationships with record company representatives, you’re wrong. The same goes the other way. We’re in this business together. Handled correctly, the relationships can help both ends of our business.

As a program director, be honest in your expectations and your ability to pay back the favors. I always said it’s the record company representative’s job to ask, it’s the program director’s job to say no. However, if the program director asks, it’s the record company representative’s job to say yes. Although that’s supposed to be a joke, many program directors take it as a fact!

If, as a program director, you’re upfront with record promotion people who are still pressuring you about records you don’t believe in, make a proposition. Tell them that you don’t believe in their record, but if they are sure it’s a hit, you will add it. If it turns out to be a hit, everything is fine. If it turns out to be a stiff, they can never again promote you on any record. In other words, if they are willing to bet their future on this one record, you’ll take their word for it.

Their answer will determine your future relationship.

Honest give-and-take…that’s the best policy.

Or a stack of $100 bills about six inches tall!

10/19/1993

Thanksgiving is a time for reflecting…reflecting on the good things that have been bestowed upon us in the past year. So before we sit down to cut our R&R, I mean, turkey, let me give thanks.

First of all, to the superstars who released hit records in the past few weeks. It’s amazing what hits can do for Top 40 radio.

To Madonna and Prince for being so prolific. If all superstar acts would release as many records as they do, Top 40 would be feeling a lot better.

To R&R and those who work there for giving me so much to write about.

To the people of radio in general who have been so responsive to the efforts of The Network Forty staff and who helped us created a new, innovative positive reflector of our medium.

To the people of the record community who have supported our efforts, even sometimes at their personal expense. Change, particularly in our business, is often talked about, but seldom acted upon. The Network Forty has created a lot of controversy in the past few months when we trumpeted change as a way to improve our industry’s prospects for the future. To back away from the controversy would have been easy. To stand and be a part of it was sometimes touch. We appreciate those who took a stand.

To particular friends in the radio and record communities who have worked with us to create a magazine that everyone is now calling special.

To Cher, for having the guts, sense of humor and intelligence to cut a record with Beavis and Butt-Head. And to Geffen for releasing it.

To The Network Group publishers for biting the bullet and letting us plow ahead against the advice of their lawyers. And for never once editing this space, even though I know at times they wanted to.

To Burt Baumgartner for all the obvious reasons…and many more not so obvious.

To Tommy Nast of The Album Network who helped me realize that in spite of everything, we would still get the magazine out…relatively on time.

To Bruce Tenenbaum for taking me to the fight.

To Mr. Ed Lambert for never saying anything negative about anyone…at least not for publication.

To Barry Fiedel for all those mentions at his last convention.

To Alternative Editor Karen Holmes for taking me to see Ministry…3^rd row, center stage.

To Lonnie Gordon for bringing out the freak in me. (Though it wasn’t buried too deeply!)

To Music Director/Crossover Editor Wendi Cermak for interpreting all the rap lyrics.

To Steve Kingston for helping to bring Alternative into the Mainstream and for being my first Network Forty interview.

To Kevo for The Chrome Lizard.

To The Chrome Lizard for getting all the gossip. It’s amazing what people will tell an animal.

To Scott Shannon for honestly sharing his thoughts and ideas for so many years.

For all the nekkid ladies who graced Page 6.

To Richard Palmese and Don Ienner for not staying mad too long.

To the dog that still won’t hunt.

To Keith Naftaly for taking my phone calls.

To Steve Wyrostok and the others who went public and wrote letters about the restrictive policies of R&R.

To Jerry Blair for sleeping through Page6…and to Iris Dillon for not.

To the moles at R&R.

To Jon Leshay for giving Bob Garland a job.

To Xscape and all the other  performers who “unplugged” in our atrium.

To all the night people who religiously phoned in their overnight requests.

To Barney, Kenny and the other thieves who participate in the poker games at my house.

To Marc Benesch for taking the time to explain to me how it works…again and again.

To Mark Gorlick and Marc Rather for their input and ideas.

To Brenda Romano, who gave me my first ad and who I would marry if it wasn’t for Miss November.

To Steve Leavitt for the stunning meal at the Conclave.

To Dave Sholin for giving me the gossip he won’t print.

To Ben Fog-Torres for calling me the “Prince of Pulp.”

To Michael Plen for the famous, “Double Buy.”

To Jeff Wyatt for the longest pool game in history.

To Butch and Skip for being from the South.

To Murdock for The Palm.

To Polly and Barb for helping me with the mugger in Central Park.

To Rick Bisceglia for “Ladies and Gentlemen…Jeffry Osbourne.”

To Burruss for five o’clock.

To Rip Pelly, Bill Richards, Justin Fontaine and Bill Pfordresher for not being good enough to beat me at golf.

To Blaylock for graduating from Ole Miss and to Fagot because the Bulldogs suck.

To Andrea for the gentle conversation.

To Satter for the Jive.

To Leach because he isn’t one.

To Joey cause we always work it out and we both work for lunatics.

To the loon.

To Craig Lambert and Ritch Bloom for being tall.

To “Please Advise” for not doing so too often.

To Rich Fitzgerald for the tequila.

To Barbis for not hiring me at Polygram and pawning me off to Bird.

To Les Garland, my life partner in a relentless pursuit of anything and everything.

To Gary Bird for signing me to a seven-year deal. (It was only after I read the contract that I realized they were “dog” years and I would be treated as such.)

To being single and semi-wealthy in Los Angeles.

And to my Grandfather, who owned several “real” newspapers, who taught me how to write quality journalism and who, at this very minute, is spinning in his grave.

11/5/1993

I’m confused. Again. Most of you who read this column already know that I get confused from time to time. Usually when it concerns R&R. But this time, I’m really confused.

It’s hard enough for me to understand a Hitmakers convention. It’s harder still to comprehend a Hitmakers convention with R&R publisher Bob Wilson as a featured speaker. Excuse me, but what is this all about?

Why are radio programmers asked to pay to participate in a gathering sponsored by one trade magazine to hear another trade magazine make a sales pitch? Hey, maybe it’s a merger.

Now I get it. It’s like those Miller Lite commercials you see on television. If they can combine great taste and less filling, we could do it with R&R and Hitmakers. Let’s see, if you combine Bob Wilson with Barry Fiedel, you get Barry Fiedel with shoes on. If you combine the back page of R&R with the front cover on Hitmakers, you get a back page that you have to pay for. And if you combine the Hitmakers Discovery Club with R&R’s vapor-ware, they might just discover an on-line system that offers hype and speculation.

Wilson has cracked. For years, he has sat upon the top of the heap, content with making money at the expense of radio. Have any of you in radio ever heard from Bob Wilson? Has he ever called to offer you help or advice? Would any of you recognize his face or voice? It’s doubtful. Up to now, he’s been as accessible as the Wizard of Oz.

Now, facing an industry that has lost faith in R&R and its entire process, the mountain comes to Mohammed in an effort to sell us the Holy Grail. Bob Wilson, unfortunately, believes that just because he tells us something, we’ll believe it. My question is: Where has he been the last 20 years? If Bob Wilson and R&R had been attentive to the problems of radio and concerned about the industry in the past, they wouldn’t have to resort to a misguided, 11^th-hour plea for support and understanding. Where have you been, Joe DiMaggio, when the industry complained and pleaded with you to change the reporting status of radio stations? Where were you hiding when radio asked for clarification on reporting guidelines? Why did you not care that your system welcomed corruption and choked the record industry into a pattern that rewarded “reported” record play with no correlation to sales?

Bob Wilson was making money, that’s where he was. And as long as the cash flowed, the system continued. So why is he now, like a Scientology recruiter, speaking to an assemblage of radio programmers to hype his heralded vapor-ware? Because the radio and record industries have finally rebelled against R&R’s dictatorial approach. This has caused R&R to lose power and with the loss of power comes the loss of money. Dwindling power and decreasing revenues brings Bob Wilson to the Hitmakers convention.

Does Bob Wilson believe that just because he is the founder and publisher of R&R, the industry will embrace his empty promises with open arms? With all due respect, Joel Denver has done an admirable job in selling the coming of vapor-ware. It wasn’t Joel’s fault that the system has been delayed and flawed for years. Hey, he’s just been following the company line. Empty promises are empty promises, no matter who delivers them. It ain’t the messenger, it’s the message.

Had R&R been listening to the industry instead of dictating to it, maybe this point would be moot. Welcome to the 90s, Bob. The industry isn’t buying hype and bullshit any more.

The emperor has no clothes.

Since I inexplicably wasn’t invited to participate in this gathering of the greedy, I won’t be in Hoot-lanta to pose questions to the podium. But if I was, here are some to ask, supplied by the readers of The Network Forty:

#1:  Please explain, in 500 words or less, the exact criteria for reporting status.

#2:  Why do you limit the number of reporting stations?

#3:  Why do you keep making promises about delivering this vapor-ware and not coming through?

#4:  How long would you allow a reporting station to promise to deliver information, then not doing it, before you wouldn’t accept anything reported by the station as fact?

#5:  Exactly when will this vapor-ware be available? (This answer is easy…it’s always “three months.”)

#6:  How much is this going to cost? I know the company line is that the software is free for the first year, but what about hard costs and telephone charges…and please spare us the MCI “Friends And Family” line.

#7:  Do you really think my life will change because I get “Street Talk” earlier? It’s useless information anyhow.

#8:  Why isn’t WPLJ (whose Scott Shannon was honored in R&R as the top programmer of the last 20 years) an R&R reporter?

#9:  Speaking of selling, R&R has been for sale for almost a year and no one has bought it. Why?

#10: Do you still insist on predicting Plays Per Week and do you think radio will participate?

Of course, the biggest question is when will the R&R monitor system go on line? Perhaps we’ll invite R&R to invite that question at the 1994 Network Forty convention. And 1995. And 1996. And 1997.

Most of us won’t be in Atlanta to hear Bob Wilson’s speech, but we won’t miss a thing. I’m sure, to quote from William Shakespeare’s “MacBeth,” “It will be a tale told by an idiot…full of sound and fury…signifying nothing.”