Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
One reason I do the live shows - and the monthly speeches at public radio stations - is to remind myself that people hear the show, that it has an audience, that it exists in the world. It's so easy to forget that.
People are always surprised when they meet me. I was in Nigeria and I went to one of the radio stations and they were like, 'Aww you look cute!' They were expecting me to look more rough, and I was like: 'Yeah, I'm polite!'
Originally, I think, I wanted to be an actor. But I got into broadcasting by accident, if you will, because I needed money to pay for my college education. I applied for a summer announcing job at a couple of radio stations.
The hip hop industry is most likely owned by gays. I happen to think there's a gay mafia in hip hop. Not rappers - the editorial presidents of magazines, the PDs at radio stations, the people who give you awards at award shows.
I grew up learning Russian and translating English songs when I became a teenager, we got to listen to West Germany radio stations, and learning lyrics with picture book. These are my first experiences with the English language.
The last time I spoke with Robert was back in May. When his wife was murdered, I talked to several radio stations in defense of him because I know how Bobby Blake really is, and as far as I'm concerned, there's no murder in his heart.
Radio stations provided a service. They weeded out the stuff that no one should ever have to even think about. Now, they made mistakes and they made mistakes with me even but, by and large, they provided a service. They were an editor.
Atlanta is a very good scene for the type of music I'm making. The biggest radio stations are all trap or rap stations. All the clubs are just based around this music and just the southern sound, that's what I really love about the city.
I saw an Elvis Presley movie Jailhouse Rock, where he gets out of jail and makes his own records and takes them to the radio stations himself. And then, he puts records in the store. After seeing that, I made records an put them in stores.
Writing is not work. In fact, there's nothing better. Writing is something that if the music business went completely away tomorrow - radio stations quit existing and music quit being popular and it was old hat - I would still write songs.
I've made my records and I've done all the interviews. I've done lots of long tours. I've made stupid videos. I've done all that stuff and learned all the lingo and gone to radio stations and shmoozed with DJs on the air and met retail people.
The Sixties were different in an isolated place. We got two television channels if the wind was blowing in the right direction. The radio stations went off at sundown. Then you picked up Chicago and heard the teenage music you really yearned for.
Internet radio stations like KCRW do take you everywhere, yet that's just one of a hundred small things you have to do to succeed. It used to be, if you just got on the cover of 'Rolling Stone' and a spotlight on 'The Tonight Show,' that was enough.
And in an era where radio stations that are inclined to play Styx music are your classic rock stations and the stations that play current music look at us as dinosaurs - the only way we could reach people with our new music, generally, is to perform live.
The radio stations strayed away from the raw hip-hop that they were playing in the early 1990s. We were like, 'All this watered down stuff is dominating the airwaves. We should make a record to make fun of that' and Guru's like, 'Let's call it 'Mass Appeal.''
During the time that my recording career seemed to be in a slump a music called disco came on the scene and literally took over radio stations as well as having radio stations created to play it which sort of negated my music as well as that of some of my peers.
When radio stations started playing music the record companies started suing radio stations. They thought now that people could listen to music for free, who would want to buy a record in a record shop? But I think we all agree that radio stations are good stuff.
When you listen to Christian radio stations - and there are thousands of them now in the United States - and when you listen to Christian television networks - and there are thousands of Christian television shows across the country - they are all politically right.
When the first record came out, I'd go down to radio stations pretty much every day to get the record played, and I would walk in and they'd tell us how much they loved the record, but they weren't sure how much they could play it because they were already playing a girl.
We managed to put together a compilation that had some creativity to it. In the meantime I was listening to the free radio stations and I noticed that during their war coverage they were playing these songs born out of the Vietnam War that were all critical of the soldiers.
Record labels collude with some of the radio stations, and the radio stations have their play lists, dependent upon what they call the, quote, 'hits.' What's commercially viable gets recycled, endlessly repeated, and as a result of that, the progressive music can't break in.
I think you get in a situation where once you start hearing the boos and hearing the radio stations talk and people on the outside begin to bring your name up of being benched, then you begin to lose focus, and now your play begins to fall and you begin to focus on other things.
Where I grew up, we had the three TV networks, maybe two radio stations, no cable TV. We still had a long-distance party line in our neighborhood, so you could listen to all your neighbors' phone calls. We had a very small public library, and the nearest bookstore was an hour away.
For Bobby and I to sing R&B and sound black was probably the stupidest thing we could do. White radio stations wouldn't play us because they thought we were black. Black stations wouldn't play us because they thought we were white. Any time you break ground, you go against the grain.
I remember, when I was a kid, listening to the radio and hearing 'Big Bad John' by Jimmy Dean - and it just blew me away. I used to sit there and call the radio stations and request that song. And then the Beatles were obviously out already, but I really didn't know about the Beatles.
Demagoguery sells. And therefore radio stations will put it on. But that doesn't mean that you can't do something else and also make it sell. You know, when I look at an Ann Coulter or I look at a Rush or I look at a Sean Hannity, I think to myself, 'What kind of self-image do you have?'
I remember when I first came out as an artist, back in 2004 or 2005, the record label used to take me to all the radio stations and just have me sit in, like, their lunchroom or their conference room, and play for the whole staff. Just to introduce them to me so they would play my records.
What worries me are these so-called radio stations with program directors who don't play all the different flavors of hip-hop. They should play the old with the new, 24/7, 365 days a year. A lot of these program directors are just jiving around and not playing all the good music for the people.
The great jazz radio stations have a duty to continue evolving their format just as audiences ask the musicians to evolve. How do you do that with a form of music that has 100 years of recorded history? How do you also keep it contemporary so you don't isolate your listeners? These are major questions.
Flipping the dial through available radio stations there will blare out to any listener an array of broadcasts, 24/7, propagating Religious Right politics, along with what they deem to be 'old-time gospel preaching.' This is especially true of what comes over the airwaves in Bible Belt southern states.
Before the show, there's about two or two and a half hours of meet and greets with radio stations, promoters, people who I need to see and thank and talk to to make sure they remember me. And then, I get - out of all that day of talking and smiling and shaking hands and getting photos, I get to sing for two hours.
I'm confused that there is a lack of faith in listening to and deciding what is a great song and instead going for these formulaic, bad songs over and over again. But that's what happened when people from beverage companies bought record labels and radio stations as opposed to people who love music owning record labels.
I know that there are going to be people that don't like my music, but I think in the industry itself it is always that, 'Oh. you're from the 'X Factor.' There have been certain radio stations that will not play your song because you are from the 'X Factor,' yet they'll play another song from an artist from another TV show.
You used to have to come to America for 18 months and drive around in a van, trying to get radio stations to play your song. But I remember One Direction's manager telling me that the first time they came to America, they hadn't released a song - they'd only been on 'The X Factor.' But there were 2,000 fans waiting at LAX airport.