KHJ: INSIDE BOSS RADIO ~ Part 19

Humble Harve compares the other cat's whiskers

Humble Harve: Johnny Williams once said that when you go in the conference room for the jock meeting you check your ego at the door. Well, it better be that way because the whole idea was that if one spoke comes off the wheel, the wheel’s eventually going to fall apart and everything crashes. That was the whole idea that was generated. But if anybody else would have been there other than Jacobs, I don’t think we would have been one tenth as big as we were. We would have had a nice format but it would have gone the way that other formats go. It wouldn’t have lasted more than, I don’t know, a year. ’Cause it wouldn’t have been executed properly.

Don Berrigan: I remember with particular interest the talk that Tiny Tim’s handler gave us, prior to Tiny Tim’s entrance into a jock meeting, as we were building up to a big promotion centered around him. I have echoed to others over the years that Tiny Tim was not an act, but what you saw and heard was the real Tiny Tim. In working with him during the promotion, I was moved and refreshed by the sense I had of his total lack of guile and games. I have a vivid image of the expression of disbelief on the face of The Real Don Steele when Tiny Tim whipped his ukulele out of a shopping bag and began his “thank you” serenade. I found it interesting because I had the sense that, despite Don Steele’s vaunted super-double hipness, this was a new one to him.

Gary Mack: Every week at the jock meetings Jacobs was like George Allen exhorting the Rams in the locker room. There was some picking of nits but always a lot of positives. Jacobs did a lot of fine-tuning in these sessions. More adrenaline pumping than any radio meeting I’ve been to since. Then Jacobs would unveil the latest promotion. There was a lot of ooh-ing and aah-ing when he’d roll out the latest promos he had written and Robert W. Morgan had recorded. What amazes me, listening to them now, is the quality of those spots. They’re still better today than anything you hear done on the new digital production consoles.

And all of it done on quarter-inch mono tape! I’ll bet we went through a ton of splicing tape and razor blades. And what is so unbelievable is that KHJ’s studio and production facilities were really rudimentary. But the meetings — they were good!

Shelley Gordon: There’s a perception of Ron coming down on the jocks all the time, probably based on the memos and some emotional jock meetings, but he complimented and encouraged them also. Those compliments didn’t come easily. They had to be earned. When they did come they carried a lot of weight.

Everyone bitched and moaned about jock meetings but Ron scheduled them anyway. He told me that having all the Boss Jocks together at the same time in the same place was as important as any operational details that had to be explained and it gave them a chance to interact. Radio is different, he said, in the sense that these guys were on the same team, but not really working together or even listening to each other because of their hours. Johnny Williams coming off the air at 6 a.m., Harvey just getting started at 6 p.m.

The meetings were a chance to connect, though sometimes they got pretty heated, a lot of egos in the same room. But they were effective in that everyone knew exactly what was expected of them in terms of performance — not just the mechanics of the new contest or promotion. The jocks knew Ron listened at all hours and they dreaded the red phone ringing when they screwed something up. But it could just as well be him calling to say something was great if he really dug something you did.

Charlie Tuna in radio's analog AM days

Charlie Tuna: Boss Jock Humble Harve was the designated “cool cat” — with the black shades, incense, peace-sign, love beads and the “hip” persona to go with all those props. Meanwhile, Jacobs was truly democratic and did not discriminate. He would put down anyone. All our jock meetings were behind closed doors. It was like Jacobs wanted someone to take him on. He started as a Gatling gun-tempo morning man in sleepy Honolulu. None of us knew he was also moonlighting as a Roller Derby announcer in the summers. His only chance to be “on” was during our jock meetings. They made Friar’s Club roasts look like a séance. Morgan and Jacobs had been going at it since back in Fresno in 1962.

But the funniest was when Jacobs got on Harve’s case, usually for no other reason than to get to play Don Rickles with Harve’s wonderful, but neurotic, personality. Supposedly when Jacobs met Harve for the first time he called him something like, “The most drab looking nebbish who has ever attempted to make it in show business, even as a ticket taker.” Harve was ordered to wear solid black shades at all times. Indoors, outdoors, day, night, always. “Then,” Jacobs supposedly told the bewildered Harve, “you got a shot, like maybe people will think you’re Ray Charles or Roy Orbison.”

See, Morgan and Jacobs were one another’s greatest fans when it came to putting people down. So when Jacobs starting in on Harve he wouldn’t stop until Morgan was choking with laughter.

Jim Mitchell: Working at KHJ was like going back to Colgreene. At KGB in 1963 or at KCBQ in 1965-66, somebody would say, “Let’s have a contest” and we would kind of limp through it with formulaic routines and bored promos. With Jacobs, it was like everything rode on THIS promotion. There would be major brainstorming, hours in the production studio — usually with Jacobs, Morgan, and Mouzis — doing tracks over and over again, long after I thought it was perfect. I was doing news, but I couldn’t resist wandering in for those sessions. And the jocks kept up the enthusiasm as long as the event or promo ran. Over the years, we all had enough 3 a.m. calls to know that there was no hour when the boss might not be listening.

Steve Clark: Those hotline calls from Bill Drake and Ron Jacobs were always a threat. Bill would call late at night happy on "winky-poos" (booze), always in a good mood, never upset, usually asking for a song to be played “next.” Even if I just played it to impress some chick he was with, it was “You got it, Bill.” You always did what was necessary to keep Drake pleased, fuck the format that was the legendary Bill Drake. He was always nice, a real gentlemen. We got along, always joking around, and we had much in common — those California girls.

When Ron called on the hotline, you knew you fucked up, or some precise instructions were coming. No mistakes, no questions, just do it exactly as Ron told you. Nothing less than perfection was accepted from Ron Jacobs. Ron’s memos were verbal road maps with every detail covered, nothing overlooked. Sometimes you had to read them over and over to make sure you’re clear in your head what Ron wanted. He wasn’t tolerant of fuckups — not even a little tolerant. Boss Radio was perfect radio.

Charlie Tuna: I have Robert W. Morgan to thank for, among many other things, teaching me early on about working “outside the box.” Sure, KHJ had a format, but it really was just a guideline or a safety net to fall back on during one of those days when you were less than on top of your game. The rest of the time you could be as creative as you wanted to be. And no, there were no stopwatches clocking how long you talked. “If you have something to say, say it or do it,” was a simple enough rule. We all got the concept of what KHJ was supposed to be. We attempted to deliver seven different personalities with each of us using our own style of executing the format.

Humble Harve: And it wasn’t just format. It was constant promotion. The thing that I liked best of all was the brainpower put behind it by Jacobs because every day there was a new contest or promotion. There was a new shtick to promote — it was Jimi Hendrix at the Hollywood Bowl, tie-ins like the “Laugh In” TV show, the world premiere of the Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine” flick, the “Christmas Wish” giveaways — it was this, it was that.

Every day there was something else to hang your hat on so there was more than just you on the radio. The whole station backed you up with money, with contests, with this, with that, and this was unique and that was different. I’d never had that at any radio station. It was the first time that I recall a radio station that bent over backwards to promote everybody at the radio station in huge promotions, nonstop! When KHJ came on, KFWB didn’t know what hit ’em. And they couldn’t compete because they didn’t know how. It was a brand new way to do everything.

Ripped Ron Jacobs ruminates on Rams and radio

Robert W. Morgan: Jacobs would write all this great shit at night when he was ripped, and I’m half asleep. He’d call up with some off-the-wall deal, “You gotta dig this, man. Dig this, dig that.” And I’d think, ‘Wait a minute. Where did all this come from?’

It was one contest after another. A new one began before we had a chance to physically give the prizes away. KHJ started that. I don’t think any station ever did that before. Ours was an accident. I think we did a second one right away and Jacobs put up a liner, “Boss Radio, where the contests never stop,” or something like that. That really pissed him off after like the first 20, you know, having to segue entire contests.

2 B continued . . .

http://www.93khj.com/

KHJ: INSIDE BOSS RADIO ~ Part 4

Partial Ron Jacobs 93/KHJ Boss Radio archives, shipment to Ray Randolph. March 2006.

Introduction

Boss Radio: Day One

If you can believe it, no one can agree on the exact date Boss Radio began. KHJ historian Ray Randolph and I have been arguing about this for more than ten years now. Sometimes I think that it was May 5, 1965. But that is easily confused in my mind with the launch date of earlier stations with which I was involved. Other times something tells me it was May 3.

Why wasn’t Randolph on the Warren Commission or one of the Watergate investigating committees? Here is a tiny portion of his evidence:

I’m not really concerned about any May date. What RJ is looking for is the date that Steele first cracked the mike in response to KFWB. That date is April 27, 1965.

The May 5th date in the Cruisin’ album liner notes somehow became the de facto “start date” by the end of 1965. Jacobs produced the records. Perhaps he thought it sounded better than May 3rd. A few items where the May 5th date has been heard/spotted:

1) 1965 “Christmas Wish” audio promo. Robert W. Morgan states: “... as the holiday season
approaches, for the first time since Boss Radio began on May 5th, we’re stopping the
constant contests ...”

2) One of the “Boss Goldens” albums lists May 5th as the start date.

3) On Boss 30 Survey No. 95, a promo on the back for the “Birthday Firebird” contest states:
“Boss Radio is two years old on May 5, 1967.”

4) In a 1969 form letter from Warren Earl to those who wrote in with praise for the “History of

Rock ’n’ Roll,” it states: “Not since we began our ‘Boss Radio’ format on May 5, 1965 have

we received such an overwhelming ...”

This info is “reference only” for the hardcore. It also has no impact on the fact that the “Sneak Preview” began on April 27th, 1965.

Then Randolph lists three pages of evidence in support of his claim. For over a decade Randolph has proven me wrong. And I was the damn program director. So let’s go with April 27, already.

“The Boss Jocks Are Coming to KFWB!”

We know the place was 5515 Melrose Avenue, long before it became a trendy street. Back then it was grubby and nondescript. The drab, three-story building that housed KHJ radio and TV resembled a plumbing-supply house. At the entrance, across from a guard shack, sulked a lone banana plan

t. The structure was surrounded by the Paramount and Desilu film studios and a restaurant called Nickodell's, which had red Naugahyde booths and smelled like Lysol and Scotch.

KHJ-TV and office employees looked down their noses at us. We were just the latest in the KHJ Radio Format-of-The-Month Club. It was obvious there’d be little support from our fellow RKO broadcasters. We would rely on our own small Boss group, and our collective desire to do or die.

The day began with a promo jingle recording session at a small studio a few blocks away, down Melrose Avenue. By noon, hysteria swept through the radio section of the building. New KHJ deejay Roger Christian, formerly of KFWB, was the co-writer of the Beach Boys’ hit, “Little Deuce Coupe.” Roger and Brian Wilson let us use the track to overdub our new “Boss Jock” deejay lineup. So the jocks, none of whom could sing a note, were down the street in a sound booth talking in rhythm to the song’s beat.

Professional vocalists handled the chorus, “It’s the new KHJ, now you know what we got.” The jocks did endless takes of their simple rhymes. One of them, Robert W. Morgan, was browsing around his portable radio. He stopped at KFWB at 980 on the dial. Morgan thought he was hearing things he shouldn’t have been. Like KFWB using material we planned to debut the next week. Liners, such as “Boss Radio ... KFWB.”

In those pre-focus group days we called such phrases “liners,” short for one-liners. KFWB relentlessly blasted more slogans: “KFWB 20/20 News.” “The Boss Jocks are coming to KFWB!” Morgan literally ran down Melrose Avenue to the KHJ building, through the lobby and into my office, KFWB trilling from his tinny transistor. At first, I refused to believe what I heard. It was a waking nightmare or acid flashback. But it was happening. I even realized why but filed that away ’til later.

“OK, let's do it.”

I buzzed General Manager Ken DeVaney on the third floor. “You’re not going to believe this, but ’WB is on the air using all our new stuff.” Silence. DeVaney, a lawyer by training, never spoke impulsively. I always did: “Ken, it’s fucking happening. Morgan has it here on his radio.”

“Call Drake, I’ll be right down.”

I phoned Bill Drake on his ultra-hotline. “I’m coming right in,” said America’s future #1 radio programming consultant.

With “KFWB Boss Radio” in the background, I told Morgan and DeVaney why I thought it happened. I started at KHJ several weeks before and discovered two newsmen working there who I knew from Honolulu. One was Andy West. He was “Jumpin’ George” West on KPOI in Honolulu in 1959 until he was fired for threatening me with a gun.

I never worked with the other guy. But, when I was hired he thought he’d be fired on the spot. Actually, the News Department was the last thing on my mind, there being so much to do. Anyway, this n

ewsman ran to KFWB and offered to divulge KHJ’s game plan if they’d hire him.

They did and he did, and that’s why Drake, DeVaney and I were huddled in my cubicle of an office frowning, swearing and more pissed than any trio using a Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum men’s john at halftime of a typical Rams game.

We discussed our limited options. Drake proclaimed, “We’ll start today with the new format. Today.”

“We can call it a ‘Sneak Preview’ of the new format,” I added.

“Can we do it and when?” DeVaney asked.

This photo of The Real Don Steele, taken on February 10, 1969, is one of dozens of publicity shots taken by Henry Diltz, then a starving, apprentice photographer. Diltz and Jacobs met at Punahou School in the 1960s, when Diltz was focused on music as a future member of the Modern Folk Quartet. Today, Diltz is considered one of the major rock photographers. Many more unreleased photos, such as the above, will be seen in the revised edition of KHJ: Inside Boss Radio.

“Three o’clock,” I said, faking the confidence of Eisenhower on D-Day. “Boss Radio 93/KHJ debuts with The Real Don Steele Show at 3 p.m.” It was about 11:15 in the morning.

We had 3 hours and 45 minutes to do a week’s work. Responsibilities were assigned: I’d stay on the first floor, where the studios were. Drake stationed himself close by the traffic people, convincing them that they could have a Boss program log ready in time. DeVaney returned to the executive offices and played free safety. We sent out for two dozen Nickodell’s hamburgers with French fries.

By then the jocks were back from their session. The Real Don Steele was in the production room rehearsing. That was part of our countdown drill, two weeks of practice before going live. Steele had just done one of his patented manic intros to the Supremes’ “Stop in The Name of Love” when I walked in.

“Don, uh, you know KFWB’s on with all our stuff.”

“Yeah, Morgan told me.”

“Well, ah, we — Drake, DeVaney and me — we decided we gotta go a little earlier, or they’ll cop our whole trip. And you’re the guy to kick off the real Boss Radio.”

“When?” asked Steele, casually.

“Oh, ah, you know, your regular shift. In about three hours.”

He said, “OK, let’s do it,” and cranked up his monitor until Diana Ross nearly blew out the studio windows. This would be the last day Donald S. Revert would be an unknown disc jockey born several blocks away from that very spot.