Re: best announcer

[SteveOrdinetz <steveord@xtdl.com>]

At 03:13 AM 4/12/97 -0400, Donna Halper wrote:

>In your opinion, who is/was the best radio announcer you ever heard?  What
>made him (or her) so good?  Is there anyone around today that impresses you?   
>

I don't think I could narrow it to one.  I'm probably showing my age here
due to the vintage of some of these, but here are imho the best announcers:

Jack Armstrong (too many stations to mention)
Joey Reynolds  (WKBW + many others)

The definitive 60s top 40 night jocks.  Incredibly energetic, fast-paced and
entertaining with an ego to match.  Good integration of character voices.


Bruce Bradley (WBZ)
Kind of the anti-Jack Armstrong.  Very tongue-in-cheek humor, able to laugh
when the joke was on him (long before I ever saw a picture of him, knew he
was balding by his on-air comments), always made you feel as though you were
"in" on some conspiracy with him...don't tell, ok?  Could relate to teens
without trying to appear to be one of them.


Dick Summer (WBZ)
Took a shift that most jocks would consider a graveyard (overnites) and put
as much effort into being entertaining as any AM drive jock.  His rather
bizarre humor and bits no doubt kept many a third-shifter alert, he
certainly deprived this teenager of a lot of sleep.


Dale Dorman (WRKO, Kiss 108 until 88 or so)
Proved once and for all that personality and Drake (or other tightly
formatted) radio were not mutually exclusive.  Also proved that you could
make it big on personality without necessarily having a particularly great
voice.


Mike Waite (WPJB/Providence)
The definitive 70s top 40 night jock.  Edgy enough to be cool, but never
blue or mean spirited.  As much as he would refer to the kids on the air as
"you little brats" you could tell he enjoyed interacting with his audience.


While there are plenty of good, competent people around today, it seems the
era of the great personalities is over.  Part of the problem now is that FM
is so local, you don't have the exposure you did in the days of the
clear-channel AM blowtorches.  Another problem is that an entire generation
has never heard personality-oriented radio....there has been such an
emphasis on "10 songs in a row, don't talk over the intro" mentality that no
one knows how to do that kind of radio anymore.  The fragmentation that
radio has experienced hasn't helped either...there really is no such thing
as a "dominant" station in most markets anymore. 
I've also intentionally passed over the high profile syndicated shock jocks
like Stern, Mancow, Bubba-the-Lovesponge and others because their humor
tends toward blue material or in being mean.  The above mentioned jocks may
or may not have been my parents' cup of tea, but they proved that you could
be funny and entertaining without being crude.

Feel free to quote.

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