Tag Archives: Aaron Rand

What’s happening to Montreal radio?

January 9, 2010 – 4:22 am| Posted in Montreal, Radio

Aaron Rand

In the wake of Ted Bird's departure from CHOM, I got an unsolicited email from Aaron Rand, one of the few remaining veterans of commercial radio in Montreal. It was actually a belated response to comments I made about him after he lost two co-hosts at CFQR. But he included some thoughts about the radio industry that he asked I share with you:

As someone who has been in the radio business for more than 25 years, the latest round of cuts, changes, format shifts - call it what you will - seem to have hit home particularly hard in Montreal.

Morning shows, especially teams, have been among the hardest hit. But while we all mourn the on-air losses of people like Tasso, Terry DiMonte, Suzanne Desautels, and now Ted Bird, I felt it important to point out that these changes, drastic and disturbing as they may be, are not unique to Montreal or even Toronto.  A bit of research suggests a much different and industry wide story. Plain and simple, the business is changing. The audience profile is morphing, and the worst economic downturn seen in a generation is forcing the hands of those who run the ship. It's just happening sooner and more dramatically than anyone had a reasonable right to expect it to.

In markets from San Diego to Detroit, to Chicago to St. Louis, Vancouver, Calgary, New York, L.A. (remember Rick Dees?) morning shows are being blown up one after another. So the question isn't why, the question is what's going to work in the future, and how can you adapt and be part of that future.

When I read about Ted Bird (who I know only in passing) and his reasons for leaving, I was struck by one central theme. Not the fact that big corporations now control the business (it's been that way for awhile), not that they seek to, as he said, take the craft out of the hands of the craftsmen (which naively maybe I choose not to believe) but by the fact that it stopped being fun for him. And in a business where translating that fun you feel into fun an audience can share, once you've lost that feeling, it's time to move on, I respect Ted for that.

I still get up every morning (at 4 not 3) and look forward to going to work. Yes, I miss seeing the faces and hearing the voices of the friends I shared that studio with for what seems like forever, but I'm a realist. You can't help but see and feel the business changing, and the choice is to either embrace that change, or be left behind by it.

Is it the right thing to do, am I still being true to myself as a performer by staying? Honestly, I don't know, but I'm willing to at least give it a shot and then make that decision with a bit of perspective to reflect on. The truth is, I still have fun doing what I do on the radio every morning. The only difference is now I'm working with other talentedpeople who offer new perspectives, a different outlook, and maybe, a glimpse into what the future of this business will become.

It's not better, it's not worse, it's just different, But it's still fun. The day it no longer is, I'll walk away too.

Aaron Rand

On a similarly philosophical note, local radio enthusiast Sheldon Harvey remarked about the state of radio in a post to the Radio in Montreal discussion group:

In a management seminar I attended in my early 20s, the instructor told us that, at some point in our lives, we would realize that money in life is not a motivator. At a young age, I think all of us think that the more money we have, the happier we will be. Eventually most of us realize that life is not long enough to spend it doing things that we really don't enjoy and don't believe in, regardless of what we are getting paid.

Rand is right that the economy is putting pressure on radio station owners to cut back, and one of the biggest expenses is those high-priced morning show veterans. And, like newspapers, even the best ones are suffering in this economic climate and changing media landscape.

My problem with commercial music radio, as I expressed when talking about Rand in October, is that they seem to have given up. With respect to all the professionals working at CHOM, CJFM and CFQR, I find most of their names and voices interchangeable. They seem to lack personality that sets them apart from the rest, because they're not allowed to develop one on the air. It's why some of them, like Kelly Alexander, are starting on their own with podcasts where they can actually connect on a human level with listeners.

Maybe listeners don't want to connect with their DJs, maybe they just want the music. It's a fair stance to take, and studies show that people want music - not talk - from their music stations. But then the music suffers from this same lack of personality. It's all from the same tiny playlist. And while limiting variety concentrates hits and increases the likelihood that someone turning the dial will stop on your station to hear a familiar song, it also decreases the likelihood that someone will discover something new. And if they're just listening to a bunch of songs they already know (some of which they like and some they don't), what competition can that offer to iPods and other recorded media, which are programmed by the user?

Personality and discovery are the advantages that live broadcast radio have over iPods. And yet music radio stations seem to be reluctant to exploit them.

And they wonder why ratings are slowly going down.

UPDATE (Jan. 10): Mitch Joel has some thoughts on local radio from a marketing perspective.

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Murray Sherriffs joins CFQR morning show

November 15, 2009 – 5:12 pm| Posted in Montreal, Radio
Murray Sherriffs

Murray Sherriffs

Proving once again that when you leave Corus, you join Astral, and when you leave Astral, you join Corus*, Murray Sherriffs, the popular morning man on Mix 96, who was canned from the station when it rebranded as Virgin Radio in January, will return Monday as the morning news anchor on CFQR 92.5 the Q (formerly Q92). (via RadioInMontreal)

Sherriffs's departure caused a lot of negative reaction from listeners, who saw it as the biggest mistake of the rebranding.

Sherriffs will join morning host Aaron Rand, who has been riding solo since fellow hosts Paul "Tasso" Zakaib and Suzanne Desautels were ditched in August. Another move that caused a lot of protest from listeners.

Also joining the team is fellow Astral castoff Sarah Bartok, whose previous job was at Astral's CISL AM 650 in Vancouver. She'll be the traffic reporter. She replaces Shaun McMahon, who moves from traffic to show producer.

*See DiMonte, Terry; Charles, Patrick

UPDATE: The Gazette has a story, with reader comments.

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Aaron Rand, the last DJ

October 2, 2009 – 4:16 am| Posted in Montreal, Opinion, Radio

The days when commercial radio DJs were given the freedom to program their own shows has long passed. Playlists are set by corporate bigwigs who are more interested in what's popular than what's good. The DJs, if you can still call them that, sit in the studio and fill the space in between songs with light banter, trying to seem personable without having too much of a personality.

If you listen to them, it seems their attitude has shifted from being music critics to being publicists. The hosts (a better term for them than DJ) deliver advertising messages, plug upcoming shows or contests, and they do so seeming as happy and excited as they could possibly be.

This happiness extends to major changes. When Mix 96 became Virgin Radio 96, that resulted in more syndicated programming and less local voice. But the employees put on an excited face about their new station, wearing T-shirts bearing its logo and plugging it in any way they could on Facebook.

This everything-is-happy-no-matter-what philosophy doesn't mesh well with inevitable firings. Nobody likes to see people lose their jobs, and listeners rarely like to see hosts get booted to the street, especially when there's nobody to replace them. So what tends to happen is that the on-air personalities will do their best to minimize these staff changes, emphasizing the new arrivals and hoping listeners forget about the departures. Beyond a short goodbye, in many cases their names are never spoken again. Their blogs and bios are quietly deleted from the station's website, and it waits until the recently departed become the not-so-recently departed so they can be fully forgotten.

Aaron Rand

Aaron Rand

Aaron Rand is not this type of on-air personality.

When Rand learned (along with the rest of us) in August that his morning co-hosts on CFQR, Paul (Tasso) Zakaib and Suzanne Desautels, were being dismissed, he was devastated. Aaron and Tasso had been a fixture on Montreal radio for decades, and now they were being split up. And for some reason, Aaron had been left as the sole survivor.

Most people in this situation would have laid low for a while, refused requests to talk to the media, and done everything in their power to not join his friends on the unemployment line. You don't want to rock the boat, to bite the hand that feeds you, to let the world know that your boss was an asshole for what he did. You want to keep your job, and that means staying quiet about your feelings.

Rand didn't do that. Instead, he talked to his listeners, talked to The Gazette, and even answered critics online. While Tasso and Suzanne kept quiet (to this day they haven't said anything publicly), Rand had to speak for them.

And yet, he had to speak for the station as well, which made everything awkward. He couldn't trash-talk the station or its decision, but he couldn't hide his feelings either. He talked about how sad he was, how hard it was to get through his first solo show, and yet how these kinds of on-air changes are how commercial radio works now. He didn't like the decision, but it wasn't his call. So he had to live with it and accept it.

A month later, the public outrage has died down. The Q has reopened its Facebook page to discussion after shutting it down to prevent the flood of negative comments. The station apparently believes enough time has passed for people to forget.

Not Rand. He's organizing a party, inviting fans of the show to join him (and presumably Tasso and Suzanne) at the Mount Stephen Club downtown on Oct. 20. It's not a gathering to protest CFQR's decision to fire them, but a thank-you gathering to celebrate their careers and give listeners a chance to say a proper goodbye.

The Mount Stephen Club is a classy joint, which only seems appropriate for this classy move. (Admission is free, but space is limited, so reservations are requested at aaron@925theq.com, first come first served.)

In a post on the Radio in Montreal group online, Rand explained his attitude thusly:

I felt the textbook approach should give way, to a real, human, caring approach. People, especially long time listeners, have been calling and e-mailing, voicing their opinions on what happened, and now, asking if both Tasso and Suzanne are okay. That's not a question for management to answer.

I felt it would be cold, callous, and disrespectful of me to ignore their queries, especially given the fact that we were a team. This was not just a situation where someone had left after a year or two for greener pastures, this was about the breakup of the heritage morning show in their market. Listeners, in my estimation, are owed an explanation, an update, call it what you will, and that explanation can only come from me. I think management understands and accepts that.

I hope they do. And I hope they understand that if local radio had more people like Aaron Rand, they might care a bit more about local radio and fewer of them would be leaving in droves for iTunes and podcasts.

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Tasso, Suzanne leave CFQR morning show

August 20, 2009 – 3:31 am| Posted in Radio
Tasso: gone

Paul "Tasso" Zakaib

After 20 years in morning radio in Montreal, Aaron and Tasso is just Aaron.

CFQR a.k.a. 92.5 the Q a.k.a. Q92 Program Director Brian DePoe announced on Wednesday that two thirds of its long-running morning trio would be leaving the station: Paul Zakaib (aka Tasso Patsikakis) and Suzanne Desautels. No reason was given beyond a vague statement of making changes.

The Aaron and Tasso show began on CFQR in 1989, but their collaboration began years before that when they worked at CKGM and CFCF radio. The CFCF partnership ended in 1987 when management decided Tasso was no longer a good fit for the ratings-stalled show hosted by Aaron Rand. Later, when they were teamed up for Q92's morning show and the ratings skyrocketed, the powers that be learned their lesson, and Aaron and Tasso stuck together throughout the 90s and most of this decade.

Considering the revolving doors of morning shows at the competition CHOM, CJFM and even CJAD, it's astonishing that they stuck around for so long, cementing their names into the city's consciousness. (I remember one morning a while back when a woman got a surprise call from the CHOM morning show - the hosts asked if she knew who they were, and she said "Oh, it's Aaron and Tasso!" There was a bit of an awkward silence after that, but it demonstrates how they were the most recognizable of the morning teams.)

Suzanne Desautels

Suzanne Desautels

Desautels also hails from the old days of CFCF radio, where she started off as an intern in the early 80s. But she spent most of her career at CFCF television, as a weather presenter and co-host of its Travel Travel program. In 1999, when the budget axe fell there, she moved to CFQR as a news reader and has been there since, eventually moving to morning traffic and then recently as a full partner in the morning team.

So far, the plan is to keep Aaron Rand going solo, with a scaled-back morning show (less talk, more music). I can't help but wonder if that may be an indication that the two-men-one-woman morning crew format we see on Montreal's anglo music stations might be a bit excessive on the talent for these belt-tightening times.

Those who want to express their opinion on the dumpings can do so on the station's Facebook page or by contacting management directly. (UPDATE: The station has shut down the discussion forums on its Facebook group page after being swarmed with comments about the programming change. Listeners are being asked to email PD Brian DePoe directly, presumably so negative comments are kept out of public view)

UPDATE: Coverage from CTV Montreal and The Gazette, both of which have been flooded with comments about the move.

Neither The Gazette nor CTV (nor I) have gotten any comment from the two fired personalities. Instead, Aaron Rand has been stuck in the unenviable position of explaining the decision of someone else to fire a good friend.

UPDATE (Aug. 21): Some insightful comments from radio buff Sheldon Harvey.

UPDATE (Aug. 25): Comments from Aaron Rand, who says he's passing along people's thoughts to Tasso and Suzanne, even while the two of them remain silent.

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