MARCONI DREAMS

Jerry Del Colliano makes me want to get tougher on radio on this site. Jerry, the founder of Inside Radio, which he sold a few years ago to Clear Channel, the biggest radio station consolidator, went on to become a USC professor. Now he writes this blog called Inside Music Media. I just made sure I placed a link to it in my Radio Trades list, over there in the right column. Today, Jerry is fomenting a coup at Citadel Radio, the company that bought the ABC radio stations from Disney this year. What makes me love Jerry is, he’s so right about everything, and he writes the stuff everybody in the U.S. radio business is saying to each other, behind their hands. The radio business has never been given to self-examination. It stamped out creativity back in the 70s and so has no experience stimulating it now, when it needs new risky ideas the most. And, because radio has allowed itself to be so overshadowed by TV, and now the Internet, nobody much cares to talk about it. I thought I’d have a very lively little Website here, and I may yet, but it’s hard to write about the business I loved for so long, when nothing fresh is going on. When Jerry Del Colliano, technically a radio business outcast — broadcasters mostly loved to hate him when Inside Radio was in its heyday as a take-no-prisoners trade publication — when Jerry is the liveliest voice with the best qualifications for the job, I’d say the business is in trouble. But, what he’s saying needs to be heard and attended to. So I’ll join in. Give ‘em hell, Jerry.