Forty-six years ago, Charlie Dore wrote and recorded the song “Pilot of the Airwaves,” a song about a girl who stays up late every night to listen to her favorite radio air personality. She requests that he play a record for her, either the one she suggested or a record of his choice, and adds “I’ve been listening to your show on the radio and you seem like a friend to me.”
Companionship
Radio’s most important strength has always been its ability to provide companionship to the radio listener, and the radio air personality becomes a trusted friend, like a member of the family.
Freddie Mercury
Forty-one years ago (1984) Queen released “Radio Ga Ga,” a song that reflected on the changing popularity of radio and television with the advent of MTV and music videos. In the song, Freddie Mercury belts out “Radio, someone still loves you!”
Which begs the question, if in 1984, Queen felt it necessary to reaffirm the power of radio – before there was the internet and streaming – what must it be like today, 41-years later? Who’s showing the love now, and why?
I Watched It All On My Radio
Thirty-Five years ago, Lionel B. Cartwright released a song that spoke to how radio is “the theater of the mind” in a song called “I Watched It All On My Radio.” It’s a song about a young boy’s remembrances of listening to his transistor radio growing up. This song brought to mind how Charles Osgood (CBS Radio Commentator) would sign-off his radio broadcasts saying “I’ll see you on the radio.” Ah, the good old days.
Video Killed The Radio Star
MTV signed on in 1981, playing music videos that were introduced by Video Jockeys (VJs). The first song played on MTV on August 1st of that year was by The Buggles, “Video Killed The Radio Star.” A key line in that song was “In my mind and in my car, we can’t rewind we’ve gone too far.” The original VJs were all gone before the end of the decade and while MTV still exists, it’s less focused on music videos having migrated into reality shows for teenagers.
So, video didn’t kill the radio star, but consolidation of radio ownership certainly has.
Radio Listeners Miss Hearing Their Favorite DJs
CRS ‘25 (Country Radio Seminar) just ended in Nashville. Listener research done by NuVoodoo’s Carolyn Gilbert and Leigh Jacobs found that listeners are noticing their favorite personalities are getting downsized, telling the audience that “thirty-six percent agreed that many of the hosts and DJs they had enjoyed hearing on the radio [have] lost their jobs. They’re aware.”
Techsurvey 2024
A year ago, Fred Jacobs released his company’s 20th annual Techsurvey on the habits of radio listeners. One of the major findings of Techsurvey 2024 was how a majority of listeners enjoy the local feel and connection with personalities.
Yet, radio companies continue to de-emphasize experienced local talent – in other words, fire them.
Expiring Skills & Permanent Skills
Morgan Housel, a partner at The Collaborative Fund and an expert on behavioral finance and history, says that every field has two kinds of skills:
- Expiring skills, which are vital at a given time but prone to diminishing as technology improves and a field evolves.
- Permanent skills, which were as essential 100 years ago as they are today, and will still be 100 years from now.
Is Being a DJ an Expiring Skill?
- Seems like everyone’s been talking about what artificial intelligence (A.I.), means for the future of air personalities. Radio owners seem to be excited about A.I. but radio personalities view this new technology with trepidation.
- You might be wondering if being an air personality is something that will no longer be relevant and can be replaced by a robot.
- If we’re talking about replacing mindless voice tracking, maybe A.I. is an improvement, but if we’re talking about making a human connection, I think not.
- Most permanent skills are human-centric, meaning that they are not something a chatbot can duplicate. Sharing of human experiences can only be done by another human. Permanent skills require emotional intelligence which compound over time.
- People who spend a lifetime perfecting one skill whose importance never wanes, will be the ones in demand.
AI (Artificial Intelligence) Is Not The Answer
The popular TV game show, Family Feud, began airing on ABC in 1976. It would be the personal charm and witty banter of host Richard Dawson that would make the Feud hugely popular with television audiences.
The show continued on after Dawson left, hosted by Ray Combs, Louie Anderson, Richard Karn and John O’Hurley, but it wasn’t until radio star Steve Harvey took over in 2010 that Family Feud saw renewed success. Ratings for the program increased by as much as 40%, and has become the fifth most popular show in syndication being renewed once again through the 2025-2026 season.
By the way, Steve Harvey hosts the #1 syndicated morning radio show in America too.
Personalities like Steve Harvey are not worried about being replaced by artificial intelligence because they have developed a useful and permanent skill in a world that is constantly changing.
Yes, this is both a national example, as well as one about television, but great local radio stations embrace the importance of having strong personalities, like a Steve Harvey, filling their rosters of air talent.
Humans connect with other humans that engage them.
Being human is something artificial intelligence will never be.
Remember when the rock group, The Buggles, introduced a new cable TV channel, MTV (Music Television) with the song “
Radio used to really promote its greatest asset, its radio talent. WHDH in Boston promoted itself as having “New England’s Finest Radio Entertainment 24 Hours Every Day!” The “Big 5 on 85” print ad featured Jess Cain, Fred B. Cole, Hank Forbes, Bob Clayton and Norm Nathan, as their air staff, and never mentions what kind of music they play, or news they featured or anything else the radio station did. WHDH was not alone in doing this. Every radio station promoted its talent line-up. Radio air talent WAS the reason people listened.
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