Category: Radio

One of the things that came about with the rise of FM alternative album rock radio in the late 60’s was the search for perfect segues between songs. Finding that just-right combination — sometimes a tight cut, other times a fade-out going to a fade-in — was a thing of joy to a disk jockey.

Today, with streaming services like Music Choice on cable TV and TheRadio.com on the Web, if a transition between songs strikes my fancy I have no idea if it was done intentionally by a person, or by accident by a computer. The use of narrowly focused genres is, for me, really limiting. I wish every service offered a totally wide open, free-form channel. In the 60’s you’d hear Donovan followed by Frank Sinatra. Steppenwolf and Dionne Warwick, back to back. The thing that drove the all-time greatest morning man in radio, WABC’s Herb Oscar Anderson, crazy was the very thing I loved — variety, from hard to soft.

Tonight on the drive home I heard Wall of Voodoo’s “Mexico Radio” (which has always sounded to me like it was inspired by Adam Ant), and the old DJ brainwaves got going, and in my head I heard the perfect follow-up track. So I’ve put them together on the audio player.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2009/FEB/WallofK3.mp3]

The Boston Globe finally has a feature article about the return of WBZ AM 1030’s previously laid off overnight man, Steve LeVeille.

http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2009/02/08/this_time_the_listeners_were_heard/

Another departure from WBZ, but a permanent one, is longtime sports announcer Gil Santos, who retired at the end of January. Last week LeVeille, basking in the well-deserved glory of his triumphant return to Boston’s airwaves, saluted Santos.

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2009/FEB/LeVeille.mp3]

Here’s the great news:

Friends:

Exciting news! I just got off the phone with Program Director Peter Casey–Steve will be back on the air in his old time slot starting Sunday!

See WBZ’s front page story: http://wbz.com/Steve-LeVeille-and-Lovell-Dyett-to-return-to-WBZ/3735627

Wanted to make sure you got the story ASAP! Thanks for all of your hard work!

I’ll “‘BZ-ing you!”

Ben Goodman
BringBackSteve.com

I’m ashamed to admit that Steve’s own comments about his departure took the wind out of my sails about the chances of his return to the Boston nighttime airwaves. Thanks go to Ben Goodman for hanging in there!

There’s a brief interview with Boston radio personality Steve LeVeille in today’s Boston Herald:

http://www.bostonherald.com/blogs/news/messenger/?p=712

“This is the nature of the business,” said LeVeille, noting that there’s been a lot of layoffs at CBS over the last year-and-a-half. “It wasn’t any big surprise.”

As for his next gig, LeVeille told MediaBiz he’d like to host a morning show in Boston and he plans to hire an agent.

Another version is on this page, that can also be found on Steve’s website.

He doesn’t want his old job back? LeVeille wants a morning gig. I’ll take him at his word and assume he’s not just being a nice guy.

There’s a “Bring Back Steve LeVeille” campaign. Link here. Also, a small but significant change has been made to Steve LeVeille’s homepage.

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I was talking to my buddy SamJay, another former radio biz guy like myself, and I mentioned that if Steve were back on WBZ, but his start time was moved down to 1 AM, I’d have a hard time catching him, because I listened during his first hour, before going to bed. Sam pointed out that Overnight America starts at 1 AM because it’s midnight in St. Louis, so WBZ cuts the last hour for its morning drive slot. Which means that even if Jon Grayson somehow gets Boston fans, they’ll be ticked off because they can’t listen to the whole program. SamJay says the only explanation is CBS wants to ditch WBZ AM 1030, and maybe all of the stations that are carrying Overnight America, so nobody there cares, and I think he’s right.