FM (24 page)

As a New Year’s party started onstage after the brief E Street Band set ended, I said good-bye to my friends at the Capitol and prepared to go home. As I started out, Bruce grabbed me from behind and spun me around, giving me a big hug. “I’m sorry, my friend,” he slurred, drunkenly. After all, it was New Year’s and we’d all imbibed a bit.

“Will you forgive me?” he asked plaintively.

“Forgive you for what?”

“I don’t want you to be mad at me. Please don’t be mad.”

“Bruce, I’ve got no reason to be mad at you. I just hope you’re not mad at me. You understand we wanted to broadcast your set for our listeners, that’s all.”

“Don’t be mad,” he repeated. This was making no sense. Was he apologizing for cutting us off when he had every right to do so?

“Johnny’s a good guy. Don’t be mad at him, either.” He gave me a warm embrace.

I felt that he was appealing not to the representative of a radio station important to his career but to a friend, and I was touched that he seemed genuinely concerned that I thought well of him personally. He is extremely sensitive and expresses himself from the heart, and I think that’s one of the reasons he’s such a great artist. As I drove home, I felt pangs of guilt, hoping that I hadn’t betrayed him and that when we both drew more sober breaths, our strange sporadic friendship would survive.

Nightbird Flying

Alison Steele is probably the most revered woman in radio. She’s been an inspiration and role model for hundreds of other women in the business. And like Frank Sinatra sang, she did it her way.

There was always an aura about her. Men that she reportedly dated included the aforementioned Francis Albert, Sean Connery, and William Holden, all many years her senior. She reputedly caused an Emerson, Lake and Palmer concert to be canceled because Greg Lake couldn’t tear himself away from her charms. In the twenty-five years I knew her, though, her steady companion was a muscular assistant district attorney named Roy Kulcsar, who would pick her up in his Mercedes convertible many nights after her show. He accompanied her to hockey games, often with her friend Dani Greco, whom she introduced to everyone as her sister. There was a period in New York when she was considered the most desirable woman in a city filled with them. But the talent responsible for her seductiveness didn’t come from any of the typical areas, although she was no slouch in those either. Quite simply, it was her voice. Deep, sexy, provocative.

Her mother was an opera singer, and young Alison (née Celia Loman) grew up around music, both classical and big band. She never talked about her father. Alison married and divorced bandleader Ted Steele at a very early age and it was that relationship that gave her a new name and began her career in television and radio. Her alliance with WNEW-FM came about in 1966, when she was selected from among four hundred auditionees to become a disc jockey on the short-lived all-female format, originally doing afternoon drive. When the switch was made to progressive rock in 1967, she was fired three times by Nat Asch, but refused to leave. In fact, it was possible that the only reasons she was able to retain her job when the others were let go were her willingness to work overnights and her determination to learn a style of music that had been completely foreign to her until then.

She began doing overnights on the progressive station in January of 1968, and quickly attracted a following of college-age men, who were suckers for her sexy presentation. Although in person she displayed a tough, slightly New York accent, on the air there was a distinct mid-Atlantic feel, most apparent in her pronunciation of “buhhd” as in “Nightbird.” The voice of actress Kathleen Turner comes to mind.

She came up with the Nightbird in December of 1967, when she was on a two-week hiatus, having moved out of afternoons to make way for Scott Muni. It showed a side of Alison that would alternately haunt her and benefit her throughout her life. Whereas Schwartz and Muni had no shtick, Alison came up with an alter ego. In person, she was as hard-edged and pragmatic as anyone I’ve ever known. She smoked thin Nat Sherman cheroots—smelly, dark brown cigarettes that aspired to be cigars. She liked leather, and her outfits weren’t bashful about showing off her lean build. You’d never see Alison less than completely made up, even at two in the morning. Her red hair was perfectly coiffed, a perpetual tan gracing her well-toned physique, even in the dead of winter. She could curse like a sailor. In the company of her fellow jocks, she was like one of the guys—laughing at their crude jokes, telling some herself, and showing no signs of vulnerability. I don’t think I ever saw her in tears.

But on the air, she was spiritual, sensual, and gentle. As she began her show with some new-age poetry, read over Peruvian pipes, one was instantly transported to another sphere. Perhaps it was her classical background that caused her to favor bands like the Moody Blues, Yes, Renaissance, and Vangelis.

They say that the character “Mother” in the 1978 film
FM
was based on Alison. There was a certain nurturing quality about Alison when it came to young talent. She certainly was kind and helpful to Michael Harrison and me in our early days at the station, and she later took a mentoring role with Jo Maeder, who was known as the Rock and Roll Madame on various New York stations. But she also could be competitive and even fight dirty if her role as queen was threatened.

An example of this happened in 1973, when Carol Miller from WMMR joined the station. Carol came from Long Island, and was a pretty, dark-haired college girl working on a law degree. Unlike Alison, she was without pretense on the air, at least in her early days. She grew up with the music and was good at the technical aspects of presenting a program, something Alison could be lax with on occasion. Carol began working weekends, soon impressed Muni with her talent, and seemed to be a rising star.

Not long after Carol had been hired, WNEW-FM hosted a benefit concert for WNYU, the radio station at New York University, where she was attending graduate classes. Held at Town Hall, it featured David Bromberg and a host of artists from the Village folk-rock scene. As was his custom during the intermission, Muni came out onstage to introduce the troops. Alison was brought out last, since she always got the biggest ovation. Some of us took this as an indication of our relative popularity, but comparisons to Alison were discounted because of her spectacular appearance, especially from a slight distance. Alison played this to the hilt. There was once a summer concert in Central Park when she wore a thin leather halter top, a leather bikini bottom, with high boots and a bare midriff. Boys were literally falling out of trees to get a closer look. No telling how many dramas inside their pajamas it later inspired.

But that night at Town Hall, Carol, dressed simply in a granny skirt, got a huge ovation when brought onto the stage early on. When Alison came out, there was a noticeable chorus of boos amid the normal raucous applause. She stormed off with fire in her eyes; it was the first time she’d ever been upstaged by another woman and certainly the first time she’d been booed.

While doing her show a couple of nights later, Alison took requests. She always liked to answer the phones and develop personal ties with her audience. That night, some callers claiming to be from NYU told her that Carol had deliberately incited some of her classmates to boo Alison. Since Steele had some acolytes at WNYU, she investigated further and others confirmed this. Alison immediately complained to general manager Varner Paulsen, and issued an ultimatum—either Carol goes or I go.

To be fair, no one really knows if Carol had anything to do with the response to Steele. At the time, it seemed pretty obvious why Alison was upstaged—Miller was twenty years younger, very attractive, and more accessible sounding on the air at a time when some college students were appreciative of that approach. But Alison was able to prove her case to Paulsen’s satisfaction, and Carol was dismissed.

It was difficult for me to fully understand what Alison had to deal with because I had always respected her and saw her as a larger-than-life figure. But for her, life was a constant battle for acceptance in a male-dominated world. She always kept her age a closely guarded secret. Whereas Muni was seen as an éminence grise and the rest of us were fairly young (except Zacherle), Alison was fearful of being portrayed as a middle-aged woman playing kid’s music. She also had credibility problems with her musical knowledge in the beginning, and even when she had caught up, she went out of her way to impress with her acumen in a manner that indicated insecurity. She was nearly fired several times in her first year, and I think that spurred her to work even harder to not just be an equal to the guys, but to be better.

Of course, male chauvinism did rear its head. There were those who just refused to accept that a woman could know and love rock, and present it properly. These people, many of them coworkers, were constantly seeking out chinks in her armor to prove that she was a fraud, whereas if a man showed similar weaknesses, it would be dismissed as minor. Her sex life was gossiped about in salacious tones, whereas a man sporting the same adventures would be admired.

Her liaisons with rock stars were legendary. One night, soon after young Marty Martinez had been hired by the WNEW newsroom, Alison asked him to do a favor for her. It seems that the building guard had called up to the station, saying that a dangerous-looking man was demanding to be let up to see her. He was driving an expensive car, and swore that he was friends with Steele but refused to reveal his identity. Would Marty go down and find out who the man was?

“Dangerous-looking” was right. The man wore an expensive custom-tailored suit, Italian loafers, silk shirt, and with his slicked-back black hair appeared to be the very image of a stereotypical mobster. The black Mercedes he drove completed the image.

“Can I help you, sir?” Martinez asked meekly.

“I want to see Alison. I’m a good friend.”

“Can I ask who is calling?”

“Here.” The man pulled out an elegant pen and scratched out a note, which he folded and gave to Martinez. “Take this to her.”

As Marty turned to go, the man said, “Wait a minute, kid. Take this.” He extracted some bills from a wallet and pressed them into his hand. Martinez was insulted at being treated like a bellhop, but since he wasn’t sure who he was dealing with, he merely thanked the dark stranger and tucked the cash into his pants pocket. He brought the note to Steele, and as she read it, she burst out laughing.

“Oh, damn. Bring him up, Marty. It’s my friend Gene.”

Martinez looked at her quizzically, and then she whispered, “He doesn’t like people to know who he is without his makeup. It’s Gene Simmons from Kiss.”

Not being a fan of the band he was unimpressed, and further bothered that a rock and roller would treat him like a servant. It wasn’t until later, when he reached into his pocket to get some cash to pay for a sandwich, that he unfurled the wad Simmons had given him—three hundred-dollar bills. Martinez was less offended.

Steele had a way of breaking the ice with her rock-star interviews by posing questions that no man would ever ask. In 1978, Columbia Records finally convinced Bob Dylan, during a very cold phase of his career, to extend himself to radio in hopes that his latest venture might get some airplay. He reluctantly agreed to grant an audience surrounding his shows at Nassau Coliseum. Several WNEW jocks were driven out to the arena and ushered backstage, where they were seated in a semicircle around the diminutive legend. Dylan was clearly uncomfortable with the attention, and some of the jocks felt sorry for him, that this icon had to be subjected to relentless fawning from his admirers. This clearly wasn’t the time to ask who “Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” was about. But Alison complimented him on his boots, and got him into a discussion about the best shops in the Village to get exotic footwear. Although some of her colleagues rolled their eyes, the exchange loosened Dylan up. He became much more comfortable in the setting, and actually seemed to enjoy himself as the dialogue continued.

Later, other women came into the market to challenge her title. Unlike Carol Miller, Meg Griffin was able to work at the station contemporaneously with Steele and to my knowledge there were never any problems between them. Maxanne Sartori, Carol, and Pam Merly all followed Alison, and Mary Turner made noise on a national level, but they all represented the next generation of women, who didn’t have to overcome quite the same obstacles, largely because of the pioneering work done by Steele. She made it de rigueur to have at least one prominent time period reserved for a woman. That may sound like tokenism today, but in her time it was an accomplishment. And whereas she did fend off challenges from other women early on, she fought hard for her sister broadcasters later in her career, offering advice and encouragement to all who asked. None of her successors at the station achieved the legendary status that Alison did.

All in all, she deserves a huge amount of credit for paving the way for women to be taken seriously in broadcasting. Sadly, some of the beneficiaries of her struggle now only see the superficial trappings—the leather outfits and such—and are unable to understand the context of the times. There may have been other paths, but Alison Steele got there first.

L.A. Woman

In 1975, metromedia’s KMET in Los Angeles was ready to make a move. The station was completely free form, with jocks like B. Mitchell Reed, Raechel Donahue, and Tom O’Hare leading the way. The celebrated Shadoe Stevens had once been its program director but now ratings languished in the 1.2 range, although they were still marginally profitable. ABC’s Rock in Stereo entry, KLOS, was dominating the market by a4–1 margin. The time had come for a change, meaning its free-form days were over, at least temporarily.

L. David Moorhead was the general manager of KMET, and his appearance was similar to that of comedian Mike Myers’s character Austin Powers. A man of sizable intellect, he wore thick glasses and his brown hair fashionably long. Unlike Powers, he favored modest business suits rather than psychedelia, but he shared Powers’s propensity for being a bit on the chubby side. His personal life was also the subject of delicious rumor—divorces, drugs, scandal—but no one knew for sure. In some purely business ways, he was similar to his counterpart at WNEW, Mel Karmazin, in that he was a brilliant, ambitious man with an underperforming station.

When Michael Harrison left San Diego and landed in Los Angeles to work with Bob Wilson on the trade journal
Radio and Records,
the very real possibility loomed that his direct involvement with radio was over. But the first call that greeted his arrival was from L. David Moorhead.

“So you’re out of radio, Michael?” he teased. “Do you miss it?”

Harrison was intrigued by Moorhead’s question enough to join him for lunch the following day. Although he’d enjoyed success at KPRI and his WNEW morning ratings had not been forgotten by Metromedia, Michael had found his niche in publishing. Bob Wilson had become an intimate friend, and the two men and their wives spent the majority of their waking hours together.
Radio and Records
was providing a service specialized for radio’s specific needs, not as a music business publication that treated radio as a sidelight. Although Harrison wasn’t involved directly with any one station now, he was working with a host of stations on a number of levels. Managers, upon reading his work in the magazine, constantly called him for counsel, and many extended this to a formal arrangement where Harrison would consult their stations. He provided research, designed formats, tweaked marketing plans, and gave pep talks to their sales staffs.

But ever since he’d left WNEW, his sights were set on one job—programming KMET. His time in San Diego had convinced him that he could guide the sleeping giant to new heights if given the opportunity. Indeed, years before, Varner Paulsen had recommended him for the position, but at that time Moorhead had eschewed structuring the station, preferring to stay free form. At their lunch, he offered Harrison the job.

It was tempting, but his relationship with, and commitment to, Wilson prevented him from accepting. He felt he was building a lifelong business with
Radio and Records,
and program directors tended to last only a few years. But Harrison desperately wanted to involve himself with the struggling station, and he appreciated Moorhead as a visionary who saw radio in much the same terms he did. So he formulated a unique proposal—he would consult KMET in a confidential manner, in an arrangement that would only be known to Moorhead, sales manager Howard Bloom, and Moorhead’s assistant, Samantha Bellamy.

Bellamy was involved in running the programming already, along with Raechel Donahue and, until recently, Tom O’Hare. They made an odd troika. Raechel was estranged from her legendary husband, who was to pass on at the age of forty-six in April of that year. She was still a vital woman, but radio didn’t seem to consume her life anymore. She enjoyed the freedom a show on KMET afforded her, but wasn’t really interested in becoming a radio executive. O’Hare was a large, intimidating-looking man, with a droopy mustache and long, dark hair tied back in a ponytail, usually underneath a ten-gallon cowboy hat. He looked almost like a Cossack, with a brooding persona that belied the gentle man inside. He was a child of free form and had left in 1974 to program WQIV in New York. But much like Scott Muni at WNEW, programming a progressive station was a largely ceremonial position that involved hiring the right staff, gaining favor with the record labels, and developing ties with the local purveyors of culture. Very little attention was given to actually directing the jocks or the music.

But Sam Bellamy had ambition. She was a businesswoman who had little radio background, but was a quick study and was willing to do what it took to achieve success. She was selected to be Harrison’s alter ego at KMET—she would act as program director and execute his plan.

And what was that plan? Much as he had done in San Diego, he first conducted some market research. To Harrison, research is best done informally, seeking the big picture rather than easily quantifiable details that don’t help to achieve the objective. A common tool of scientific researchers is the focus group. Quite simply, a focus group is a select body of eight to twelve average people. They are gathered into a room, placed in front of a two-way mirror, and asked questions about the product being investigated. Politicians use them to gauge public opinion and corporations use them to market their products. Safeguards are taken to ensure that the answers given are honest and not influenced by outside forces. Most groups are not told of the sponsoring organization, although smart members can guess within minutes if the leader of the discussion doesn’t carefully mask his intentions. They are paid a small fee, and walk away feeling that their opinions count.

The problem with focus groups is that they put their subjects in an artificial environment that is influenced by a group dynamic no matter how carefully they try to avoid it. An outspoken member can lead the others in directions they might not go on their own. People also tend to respond the way they are expected to, as opposed to revealing what they really think. Focus groups can be costly, so few stations can afford to do enough of them to reveal much of what they don’t already know. But they look good on paper—an official-looking document that draws conclusions on people’s opinions of a given product, in this case, a radio station.

One of Harrison’s gifts is his universal taste, and by this I don’t mean anything cosmic. It’s his ability to think like Everyman when it comes to popular culture. He genuinely likes what’s popular without passing judgment on it. His taste generally mirrors that of his audience because he
is
the audience. He could essentially program to please himself and be right a large percentage of the time. Michael could listen to an album and select the proper tracks for airplay instantly. He knew what people liked because he knew what
he
liked. But rather than rest on those laurels, especially in markets that were unknown to him, he’d perform his own brand of research. He’d walk through malls, hang out in clubs and bars, and talk to people in record stores. He wouldn’t announce that he was Michael Harrison of KMET, but just engage everyday people in conversation to see what they liked and didn’t like. It could be as simple a foray as, “Hey, I’m new in town. What’s a cool rock station to listen to? Oh yeah? Why is that?”

More scientific types would dismiss this as anecdotal, but radio stations win or lose on intangibles that can’t be easily quantified by formal research. After a few days of this informal polling and compiling the results in his head, he could get a handle on what people wanted. Combined with creativity, Harrison could then forge a radio station that would appeal to the masses, without condescending, because he liked what he was hearing as well.

To further gauge what was happening in Los Angeles, he asked Moorhead to give him a show on the station—a talk show. But L. David Moorhead did his own listener feedback show at KMET, “Mangle the Manager,” which aired 10 p.m. to midnight Sundays following the popular Dr. Demento. He offered Harrison the Saturday morning, six to noon shift—6 to 9 a.m. being a talk show, and nine to noon, a music show. He was also free to do fill-ins whenever called upon. The talk show soon became known by the catchy moniker
Harrison’s Mike.

With Sam Bellamy programming under Harrison’s governance, the station grew and within two years eclipsed KLOS in the ratings. Michael met with Moorhead on a regular basis, and would sneak into the station at night and mark tracks to play, organize the library, and refine the formatics. The staff suspected that Harrison’s involvement was more than that of a part-time jock but he had no other official title. He was content to let Bellamy take credit for the station’s rise, happy to accept the remuneration and inner satisfaction of knowing that he retained control. There was a system to direct the music, but the jocks were encouraged to develop their own wacky personalities. Promotions and tie-ins with local concerts and sporting events abounded. In many ways, Harrison was refining Rick Sklar’s formula for success at WABC a decade earlier for a new generation of FM listeners.

Harrison had some bizarre experiences while living in Los Angeles. Through
Radio and Records,
he began a series of artist interview programs that would be syndicated to stations across the country. The first was done in 1976 with a reunited Jefferson Starship, looking to make a comeback with their
Red Octopus
album. He traveled to KSAN territory, to the famous Starship house in Haight-Ashbury, to interview each member separately. An old Victorian manse with dozens of rooms, it accommodated the band’s business offices and studios, additionally serving as a crash pad for the group and their entourage. Grace Slick insisted on being interviewed while in bed, with Harrison sitting alongside. Therefore he can always brag about how he went to bed with Grace Slick.

But he took a few useful lessons away from the encounter. First, it taught him how splintered a successful rock band can become—how petty jealousies and slights are magnified until they collapse the band’s structure from within. Democracy rarely works in rock; too many talented leaders generally pull in different directions until the whole is shattered. The group dynamic is like a corporation—everyone tries to take credit for success and likewise distance themselves from failure.

The second thing he learned was how easily two hundred stations could be signed on to take the program nationally. Unlike the situation today with consolidation, stations who didn’t take a special program back then risked losing it to their competition. An ambitious entrepreneur could hustle for exclusive interviews and be heard across the country. Now, since large groups control multiple stations in each market, there is no incentive to take premium programming from outside sources. Competition is squelched and quality can suffer as a result.

By far, the strangest journey he took involved the mysterious Cat Stevens. He was commissioned to put together a special program, highlighting the final album the reclusive singer was to make before becoming an Islamic minister. He was warned that Steve (his real name being Steven Georgiou) could be difficult, and that Michael might not get much out of him during the interview. But Harrison was a huge fan of the man’s music, and was prepared to write off any eccentricities as the vagaries of artistic temperament. He’d seen such behavior a hundred times before, with friends like Lou Reed and David Clayton-Thomas of Blood, Sweat and Tears.

He was flown to Minneapolis, where Stevens was mixing the final tracks in a stately old mansion on the outskirts of town. His flight arrived at midnight, and he was met at the airport by a chauffeur in an antique Rolls-Royce. As he traveled forty minutes through the snow-covered Minnesota hills, he felt like a modern Renfield on his way to visit Count Dracula. The whole nighttime journey took on a foreboding nature as the Rolls pulled up to the majestic gated residence. He was led down to a cavernous studio where Stevens sat behind a prodigious mixing console, tinkering with the single “Remember the Days (of the Old Schoolyard).” The handsome artist greeted Harrison warmly, and bade him to sit while he put the finishing touches on the track.

Michael watched in awe and wonderment as the black-bearded Rasputin attended the details of the final mix. Stevens paused several times to ask for Michael’s opinion, but the young broadcaster would only issue encouragement, feeling it was inappropriate to criticize a sensitive performer who made such meticulously crafted records.

Finally, at around 3 a.m., the song was finished and the two men retreated to another room to set up for the interview, with comfortable leather chairs and a bottle of whiskey, two glasses and two expensive cigars carefully set out on an oak table. As they fired up the cigars and sipped their drinks, Michael asked questions. Stevens responded freely and openly, discussing his childhood, romances, and music. As they spoke, Harrison was puzzled how anyone could consider his subject to be difficult, since it was the most candid dialogue that he’d ever had in a professional situation. The conversation rambled on for nearly two hours, and when it concluded, both men seemed enraptured with the outcome.

Harrison was chauffeured back to a hotel, and plans were made for him and Stevens to be picked up later that morning for flights to their separate destinations. Stevens’s flight departed first, and Harrison helped him carry his guitar cases and kept him company until takeoff. As they said their farewells, Michael sensed that he’d formed a lifelong bond with an artist he held in high esteem.

Back in Los Angeles several days later, he received the raw tape for editing and was impressed again with the quality of the interview and the kindness of his new friend. He also knew that he had a winner of a radio program, and hoped that his efforts would help boost the career of the artist he genuinely admired.

The next day, he was very surprised to receive a stern call from Stevens’s management. The interview was never to see the light of day, he was told. He would be sued if any part of it aired anywhere in the country. He was denied permission to mention anything he’d been told, and was asked to immediately return or destroy the tape. When he protested that the interview would only do favorable things for the artist, astonishing news was delivered. Stevens was maintaining that Harrison had hypnotized him without his consent during the interview, and that he’d forced him to say things that were either untrue or too personal to be revealed.