Fluffy asks a favour

I would like to ask my radio friends if they would care to do my a favour and play one of the following songs at some point.

Call it “helping a friend”

Thank you.

.

.

Wolfie!

Radio Ga Ga

There are so many wankers out there who go on about Social Networking already, and when I stumble on a site about it, I usually stumble away pretty quickly.

But someone said something about Twitter on my timeline which I thought about.. That people who follow, but never talk to you, are creepy.

Well…. maybe, and maybe not.

I used to be in radio years ago, and I think that Twitter has a lot in common with it.

Let me explain.

You are the star of your show, and you feature a panel of interesting people who are always on your show.

These are the same as the people who you always talk to on Twitter, and usually at length.

They will make up a small percentage of your followers.

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Then there’s your regular audience, who are mostly there to listen, but once in a while will play a small roll by asking a question or participating in a segment of your show.

These are the people on Twitter who hang back and don’t say much, but once in a while, they’ll see one of your tweets and respond, You may see this person in your stream about once a day at most.

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Then there are those who tune in merely to listen, they may never bother to talk to you, but they enjoy your show very much.

These are Twitter users who follow but never join in… unfortunately there’s really no way of knowing why they follow unless they do speak up, and I would rather they did.

If you fall into this category, and are following someone, Give them a shout and a friendly wave, “Hello, I’m Mick from Australia, and I’m following because….”

If they don’t, there’s a chance that they could be blocked, for appearing to be a spammer or some other undesirable, when all They’re doing, is being a good, quiet audience member who just wants to drink their tea in peace and enjoy their favourite show.

These people will generally make up the bulk of your followers.

Air Waves

The sound of radio has changed with each passing decade, not only with our tastes in music, but in what was technically possible at the time. Radio wasn’t always as clear as it often is now, and depending on your location, it still might not be.

Last year an idea occurred to me, what if we could re-create radio of the time, down to the most timy detail… the sound of the music being played, the way the announcer spoke, the hum of equipment, the static the audience would hear, the commercials and news reports of the day.

So that it’s almost like a person had somehow gone back in time, and is listening to a broadcast from a particular day.

No, this is not hits and memories, it goes deeper than that, this is a normal broadcast day by a fictional Aussie Radio Station (But it could be from the ABC).

When music is played, it’s what would have been played that week, that year of that decade… the good and the bad.

The Announcer would need to be a good actor, who understands how Australians spoke at the time, and which slang was… and wasn’t used.

The Advertisements would be genuine (Surely ABC would not worry about decades old material?).

The program would need to sound completely real, there would be no reality breaks during the two hour broadcast.

Even at News time, the reports would be from the past.

Understand this would be difficult to put together, We’d need a linguist who knows how people spoke back then (40′s to 80′s), We’d need experts on the technology who would make sure things sounded right, We’d need to go through archives and find the advertising, live interviews and anything which might surprise us and which could be used.

A script writer or two, of course!

And then, how would this be broadcast? Live on ABC once a week? On Digital? or a Podcast?

I’m sure there are things which I haven’t thought of, which would need to be addressed.

Would you be up for it?

Wolfie!

Dad songs

I began making my transition from kids music to pop in the late 70′s, suddenly becoming intrigued by Countdown and Sounds Unlimited.

Bands who merely played live were generally ignored for the ones who could provide a video with an interesting story to tell, and although I liked a lot of bands, my favourite was ABBA.

Of course some of the stuff I liked was criticised by my parents for being too monotonous (some of it was) or they couldn’t understand a word of it.

Early on, I thought that phrase meant that they couldn’t understand all the words being sung…. I couldn’t either, but I didn’t care.

But then I realised that what Mum meant was that she couldn’t grasp the concepts in the lyrics, and I admit, some songs do take a while to figure out, and lets face it, we’re still wondering about Knights in White Satin.

Mum and Dad liked 3AK, A Melbourne station housed at Channel Nine, which churned out “Beautiful Music” laid back versions of old and new-ish pop tunes, often played by the 3AK Orchestra.

Now music always kicks you in the teeth, and I would advise kids reading this, never to get too cosy with certain musical ideas, that some are right and others are not.

I hated country music, but found myself being cool with it when Thompson Twins released “You take me up” which featured harmonica, which up till then was never an instrument I wanted cropping up in my songs.

So My music was monotonous.

But when 3AK played the song that we thought went “One callamera, ah-dee-dah one callemera”

* We had no idea what the lyrics were, or what they meant, not being spanish, are they Spanish?

Dad would sing that to himself while in his shed, and I never realised how weird this was until now.

My songs couldn’t be understood, Yet Dad, a Full Australian with no other language apart from English was devoted to “Variety Italian Style” a mid morning “ethnic” program on one of the commercial stations, which featured tour videos and current italian songs.

Dad would also watch the Greek show which followed.

If you’re a kid, be aware of this, it happens with every generation.

and realise that your generation is not any different to any which has passed before, it just seems that way when you’re young and don’t know any better.

People are just plain weird.

Choices made

I think I would have been around fifteen when I decided that one day I’d become a Disc Jockey at a radio station somewhere.

One of the reasons that I wanted to get into radio, was to meet people who I knew from this side of the speaker or screen, a quick talk would be one thing, but a possible lasting friendship would be another, how cool would that be?

As you may know, I didn’t quite reach my goal, and many times I’ve said that it was my declining health which prevented me from going further, and while there’s some truth in that, I think I had another reason for dropping out.

I loved my family.

You see, new radio announcers generally don’t get their start in the city, which is where I live, but way out in “The Mulga” somewhere.

For those overseas, When an Aussie mentions The Mulga, or a place Beyond the black stump, We mean it’s far away, to put it mildly.

For me, a Melburnian, there would have been a good chance that I would have been posted off to Western Australia, Somewhere North of Perth. Several of my radio school classmates headed in that direction.

And I always knew it was on the cards, but somewhere inside I had this nagging doubt that I was any good, I got a volunteer job on a community station in Melton, Which was about an hours travel by train and bus. I was happy to work there, do my twice weekly show, write, produce and edit reels and reels of tape.

Somehow I never really considered that I’d go any further, I wasn’t being paid, but I was happy and I could go home when it was over.

Then someone at the station dropped the word that there was a scout at the station, the kind who looks for potential talent, and I was supposedly on his or her list.

This was exciting, but also frightening… I realised that I may soon have a full-time, paid job… but where?

It was the question of where which got the better of me, I gave up radio soon after.

The thing I wanted most, was to be with my family.

…

So here I am at home, years later, and the strangest thing is that I’m meeting people via twitter, and sometimes, in real life too. People who I never thought I’d meet in my life, and I love it.

But there’s a tinge of sadness that comes with it.

The person who understood me the most, was Mum, and I know if She had still been here that She would have loved to hear of the People I’ve met and spoken with.

Stephen Tobolowsky, Who has a depth to him which I would never have known about otherwise, Julian Clary a quiet soul who adores his garden, Boy George who seems to be rocketing off at an incredible pace to anywhere on the face of the planet, which I doubt I could have matched even at fifteen.

My Daily exchanges with Carol Duncan and Helen Tzarimas which I cherish, and this insanely long list of names who decided to follow me, famous or not, it hardly matters, it’s astonishing.

These wonderful people help to keep me going, and I am truly thankful for that.

I want to run to Mum and say “You’ll never guess who I met today”, But She’s not here.

Yes I can tell others, but it’s not the same, My parents “got me” it took them a long time, but they eventually did. They knew what I liked and who I liked and I’m sure they would have been impressed that I was finally getting to know people, like I always wanted to do.

While that career in radio passed me by, time with my Family did not, and I have no regrets.

Wolfie!

The Radio Works

I have been trying to piece together some of my personal history, and usually that’s not difficult, a little Googling usually reveals a few interesting sites which fill in vague memories, but oddly enough, not this time… in fact a whole chunk of my life seems, according to the internet, like it didn’t happen.

After I left High School, I attended a Radio School, Since I wanted to be one of those strange people who lock themselves up in a little room all night and tell funnies between playing records… which isn’t much different to what I do now.

Civilians might be interested to learn that there are schools for this, which is probably not much further up the rung from Clown school… They teach useful things like how to yak into a microphone without spitting on it, and advanced knob-twiddling.

We were taught how to read serious news with a serious news voice. and also how to write adverts, make them into something that plays for exactly thirty seconds and put them on carts.

Carts, for the kids born this century, are a bizarre audio cassette thing that never need rewinding, I never did understand how that was possible, Yes I know the tape was looped on the inside, but my wolf brain couldn’t understand how.

So anyway, I joined this radio school, called The Radio Works, which was near HSV7 in Coventry Street, South Melbourne. I spent about three years there. About two years into my education, we moved to South Yarra.

My Classmates, who I mostly new by first name only, included Barry, who emigrated from England, Kevin, who was with the RAAF at the time and would often come dressed in uniform, Bethany Lee, Who was the voice of Val Morgan cinema advertising during the 80′s… anyone who had seen a movie in Melbourne during that decade had heard her voice. And Fiona, Who had aspirations of having a music program, but found, much to her own dissatisfaction, that She was a great news reader… She eventually landed a job with Macquarie News in the late 80′s.

Now here’s the problem.

When I Google, I find little or no information about any of this, it’s almost like I’m in an episode of The Twilight Zone where I had actually been drugged for the entire time and have only imagined that part of my life.

There is next to nothing on Chris Heaney of 3XY (Our Teacher), But there is some suggestion that he worked with 3AW for a while here in Melbourne, I know that he was originally from South Australia, but there’s bugger all on the internet about him.

And It’s curious that despite 3XY being a big name in 70′s and 80′s rock radio in Melbourne, that there is almost no information on wikipedia about it, only after its transitional stage when it was renamed and beyond. Why was so
much history glossed over.

Chris took the class for a look one night, and I remember that Shirl was on the air, Yes, That bloke from Skyhooks, He was with someone else, whose name escapes me, sorry. I remember that some girls came in that night and handed Shirl a big bunch of flowers, I think it might have been his Birthday. Later He came out and chatted to us, He was charming and very down to earth… but I froze because I was such a shy little flower at the time… hard to believe, I know.

Steve Dale was the other teacher at the school, he was working with FOX FM at the time, I really liked Steve, He was a very easy-going bloke, I think He’s still on FM radio in Melbourne today.

It strikes me as odd that these guys have very little trace online, at least I can’t find much, most media people seem to have a webpage, an account with linked in, or at least a Facebook page… although, there were quite a lot of Facebook users called Chris (Christopher) Heaney… It would be useful if we could adjust our search for Facebook users by locality, Haven’t they considered that?

There’s nothing on The Radio Works, when I google it, I’m directed to my own blogs and webpages where I had made mention of it, it’s as if the school never existed, but I did in fact go there and I learnt all I needed to know about knob twiddling, and when it is and isn’t appropriate.

I’m sure someone must know something about the School, or know one of the students, or indeed was a student themselves back in the class of 1986.

So, If you know anything, anything at all, I’d love to hear from you, Please leave a comment below.

Thanks.

Wolfie

* Not the actress, Bethany Lee, from Australian TV.

Update: I just found that 3XY has a Facebook page.

The Brick Wall

Since being involved in social media, my perceptions have changed in many ways, and one of those things is my views on what makes a celebrity.

There was once a time when I couldn’t wait to see a movie, or to watch it at home on video or TV, I liked the people I saw on the screen, but they could never love or even simply, like, me back.

For much of my life I’ve felt like there’s this brick wall, and what I want is on the other side. Though surely we’ve all felt like that at some stage, the grass is always greener they say.

Sometimes the way I see it is that people who are in media are on that side of the wall and I’m on this side.

I find it very strange that there are people who I’ve “known” via what they do on TV or Movies for years, even decades, and yet they don’t know me from a bar of soap. a lot of people are comfortable with that idea… but I’m just a little uneasy about it.

There have been moments when I’ve been online where I felt as though I had managed to put a few small holes in that wall and manage to tell someone on the other side that I am here.

I find that these days, I don’t care about someones show unless I have had some sort of contact with them online.

Actual conversation, that’s what I’m after, it means more to me if someone has sent me a few tweets to ask how Katie is today or if I’m feeling well, or to ask my opinion, or if I could help with something as opposed to “My big new show is on Ten in five minutes”.

I have always felt that I was on the wrong side of things, a frustrated audience member, I want to be up there with those other people, I want to produce something that makes people think or wonder or just laugh for a while.

You know, for a while when I was on radio, I got very upset with myself. “What use am I?” I asked myself. I wasn’t a doctor, who does serious work like heal the sick and injured, I was just a dag who turns up to a radio studio twice a week and says silly things between records.

Well, years later, I found myself in hospital, looking at stark walls, feeling worried, not feeling well enough to do anything, or even read. The constantly beeping drips really get to you after a while, and you hear the nurses talking about patients in the other ward who died during the night, I found the whole experience pretty tough going.

Then one day my wonderful Mum bought in my old Walkman, and I managed to find one station which wasn’t blotted out by all the radio interference that a big emergency hospital generates.

I still remember the first thing I heard was Duran Duran, it was bliss.

For a while I could escape.

And then I realised that to some people, hearing a friendly voice can be vital, working in radio was definitely not a useless occupation afterall, in fact doing any sort of work that makes people smile, be it radio, TV, theatre, film, writing or anything else, is definitely well worth the effort.

But I’m getting off track a bit.

If I can feel included in some way, if I feel I’m not just listener 20,345, if the person speaking into that mic knows I’m there, then it means a lot.

OK. so if you’re someone like Justin Bieber for example, you may really want to reach out to your fans on a personal level, but with thousands of keen followers, is it even possible to form a friendly relationship with any of them?

I do follow a few people who I adored as a teenager, and have tried numerous times to get a little conversation up, but have failed.

Earlier in the week @ThomasDolby followed me, he asked me a question, I answered… I was overjoyed, could it be that he and I could have a nice conversation, I would love that. I thanked him for following me, but warned that I’m a bit chatty, anyone who follows me on twitter knows that I practically write a small novel each day in tweets.

He unfollowed me.

I felt “jilted”, like the guy who was dropped by his favourite girl via SMS.

So I took my frustration out in a torrent of humourous tweets…

I thought I’d do a Vicar of Dibley and scoff all the crunchy bars in the house.
(I do store a lot of chocolate here, so if you should ever feel emotional, drive over, I have lots to share)

Well I didn’t do that, but I did down two bags of crisps instead, besides, chocolate is bad for my kind.

I thought that perhaps I had whacked a bloody huge hole out of the wall that day, only to watch aghast as it sealed itself up again in front of me again.

People do chat back to me, that’s wonderful, I appreciate it so much. If all you do is tell your followers when your concert is on, or when your book comes out, then people begin to care less about you and even wonder if you’re really you.

I follow @petshopboys, but their tweets are pretty useless, sometimes they tour and take happy snaps, but they come across as though tweeting is a business they’d rather not do, and they don’t seem particularly interested in the possibility that anyone might be reading… I find that I don’t feel any warmth towards them much anymore.

Though @StephenFry and @MrsStephenFry are really funny, and I suspect that Stephen Fry is a gent who would probably want to have a conversation with us if he didn’t have twenty million followers.

The ideal twitter celebrity is someone who will tweet back to you, has an air of kindness about them, has a few jokes with you, tweet about personal things and the things they’re working on, adds the odd passing thought, likes to stand up for the occasional issue, asks their twitter friends for technical or even personal help, and remembers to say thank you now and then… I’m happy to support this person.

I thought of Ringo Starr, do I even need to say he was with The Beatles?
Anyway, he believed in answering every letter from his fans, most just wanted his autograph, He had a damn good crack at it, he was at it for years. it wasn’t long ago that he finally told his fans he just couldn’t do it any longer, I wonder if he’s moved onto Twitter?

I have been labeled a celebrity myself by some, and I wore that label partially with tongue firmly in cheek, and partially because a part of me desires to be on that other side of the fence.

I’m forty-five this November, and am hoping to have completely smashed that wall by the time I’m 70, Perhaps that’s when Thomas Dolby will ask me if I’m free for coffee today.

And yes, should I make it to the other side, I will do my darnedest to keep in touch with you.

Wolfie!

The tubes and how to use them.

I’m in the mood to offer a bit of a lecture on what I’ve learnt in my twenty plus years of using the internet, I am not a guru, just someone with, what I hope is, a bit of common sense.

There are things that I have learnt from being involved in forums back in the 90′s which apply equally to users of social networks like Facebook, Secondlife and Twitter today.

I’m not sure if this has ever been raised before so I’d like to talk about the structure of forums which I’ve used.

I’ve noticed on almost every forum that there tends to be a core group of speakers, a regular set of people who reply and leave comments, and a very large section of members who never say anything whatsoever.

Now alas, and wrongly, these people who make up the bulk of your members, the ones who never speak up are tagged with the awful name of “lurker” which brings to mind strange, shifty-eyed people who hang around lanes in the night, getting up to no good.

In fact, I feel that referring to people as lurkers is unfair and wrong.

The Lurkers are your Audience, Do not treat them like weirdos who are spying on you, treat them with dignity because they may in fact be your fans… is that such a bad thing?

So there you are, You are Parkinson, Wil Anderson, Daryl Somers, Andrew Denton, Ellen or Oprah… You have your Regular guests, Semi-regular guests, Special guests, Performers, Audience members who contribute to your show via Q&A sessions or competitions, some are fans who came to have a good time, and others don’t really know you but are curious… does that make sense?

How many people would appear on David Letterman’s show each night? About eight maybe? but millions of people around the World watch his show… So how does this apply to Twitter.

In the same way that programs have a large fanbase, so might you have a lot of *genuine* followers, simply having a lot of followers via some computer generated method and then boasting about it is a complete wank… Build the ball park and they will come, that’s all you need to know…. Now I’d guess that up to 80% of your Audience are never going to say boo to you, and this is for a variety of reasons… A lot of people are really shy or feel that if they say something, they’ll be laughed at, or perhaps they feel their opinion wouldn’t be valid, many are just readers who are happy to read, and that’s perfectly fine.

Let’s say you are an old or new media celebrity who has a large twitter following, I’m sure that you’ve noticed regular users who do send you messages, some are funny and some are useful, some people are right on your wavelength… Please, don’t ignore these people, always try to tweet back, even if you are flooded by tweets, please try to spend at least ten minutes a day replying to the ones that matter the most to you, even just sending a hello and a smile back is sometimes more than enough.

People who never reply to their fanbase are snobs, that’s all, Treat your fans with love and dignity… I have news for you, regardless of what current affairs programs tell you, most people out there are not dirty and creepy.

Yes, you can’t reply to everyone, that’s a fair statement, Just do what you can, it’s better than not responding at all.

Look, there’s no need to shut the door on everyone, sure there’s a few nasties out there, regardless of what people think, the internet IS real life, and real life has it’s hazards… However, if you lock the door on everyone, you’ll be locking out your white knights too, and that is not practical.

If I had not gathered up a group of genuine friends (and yes, online friends DO translate to people you enjoy going out with in meat space, that online friends remain a spooky lot of rabid inter dimensional alien beings is just the biggest load of bollocks ever) Then I most likely would not have been online at all, because I have been given all kinds of assistance such as how to use particular software, through to offers of actual hardware.

I have also made very special friends and a few who I consider to be soul-mates.

Open yourself up and talk, it’s worth it.

If you had an account on a forum, were you…
(polls)

Wolfie!