Radio Hot Talk

LATEST NEWS:

April 20, 2012
Congrats to my former co-worker with the Bubba the Love Sponge ® show, Matt "Spice" Loyd, who debuts his new Spice Show this Monday (4/23) at 7 p.m. EDT. There hasn't been a good terrestrial radio talk show in the 7-10 p.m. ET slot since the great Phil Hendrie temporarily left the radio business in June 2006, and I predict great things for Spice's show. It will be a lead-in on 102.5 the Bone (WHPT) into the Nick & Artie show, which could prove to be a great evening programming block that might work in syndication when/if Spice takes the show in that direction.

April 11, 2012
Effective Monday 4/23/2012, 102.5 the Bone (WHPT/Sarasota, FL) will move from rock to hot talk, keeping the 102.5 the Bone name and adding the tagline of "Real Raw Radio" as the positioning statement. You can hear the announcement from Shark this morning here on 102.5 the Bone's website.

Currently the flagship station for the Bubba the Love Sponge ® morning show, the Cox-owned 100kw blowtorch will keep Bubba in the morning and Cowhead in the afternoon, with a forthcoming pair of midday talk shows to bridge the gap between BTLS and Cowhead and additional talk programming to be announced.

One syndicated show that has been confirmed is, not surprisingly, the Nick & Artie show, which will air live on 102.5 the Bone from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. ET. This will be the second station to pair Bubba with Nick & Artie, joining Ft. Myers' 96 K-Rock in clearing both shows.

March 28, 2012
Once again, I found out about another Nick & Artie affiliate by listening to the show, this time hearing Jody McDonald (filling in for them this week) say that N&A now airs in Reno, NV on 1270 KBZZ (and FM translator 96.1 K241AK). The KBZZ website doesn't list them, but I'll give the nod to what I heard on tonight's show.

March 21, 2012
I tuned in to tonight's Nick & Artie show and heard Nick give a plug for a new affiliate: 750 the Game (KXTG) in Portland, Oregon.

February 25, 2012
Now online: the complete list of affiliates for the Free Beer & Hot Wings show.

Citing scheduling issues with his weekday show and acting opportunities, Phil Hendrie has announced that tonight's show on 640 KFI/Los Angeles will be his final stand-alone specialty weekend show for the station. His weekday show will continue on his flagship station, 1150 KTLK, his flagship station. Both KFI and KTLK are owned by Clear Channel. Phil recently did a guest spot on the outstanding ABC comedy Modern Family and has been involved with several other acting gigs.

February 24, 2012
Another day, another clearance for Nick & Artie. Premiere Networks announced today that Nick & Artie will debut on Philadelphia sports-talk 610 WIP effective 2/28/2012. Note that the show will air on the AM side only and not on 94.1 WIP-FM. Philadelphia was a huge market for the Howard Stern show, which Artie Lange was part of for several years in the 2000s. Rumor has it that Philly isn't the last market with a strong Howard Stern fanbase/legacy that will be adding N&A in the near future.

February 23, 2012
Many thanks to RadioInsight.com for letting me know that the Nick & Artie show airs in Anchorage, Alaska on "1080 the Ticket" KUDO, airing live from 6-9 p.m. AKT (Alaska Time). If there are any N&A affiliates I'm missing, please let me know.

February 22, 2012
Now up on this website is the full affiliate list for the Lex & Terry show.

February 21, 2012
I've found another market where the Nick & Artie show airs: a sports/talk simulcast in Wisconsin. The Nick and Artie show airs live (9-midnight CT) on 1670 WTDY (licensed to Madison, WI) and on 106.7 WTDY-FM (licensed to Mount Horeb, WI). WTDY-FM is a 2,700 watt Class A station that doesn't have a city-grade signal into Madison but which compliments 1670's Madison signal area quite well, particularly at night when WTDY has to reduce power from 10,000 watts to 1,000.

Update: Thanks to this link on Premiere Radio's website, I was able to find that the Nick and Artie show also airs in Palm Springs, CA (1010 KXPS) and in Anchorage, though the linked blurb above didn't mention the call letters and I haven't yet been able to find which station airs the show in Anchorage.

February 20, 2012
The pages are up for Todd N Tyler and Nick & Artie, including the addition of Orlando to the N&A list of market clearances. I know there are almost for sure more N&A affiliates out there, but thus far their station list is all I know of at this point.

February 19, 2012
Updating the 2/13 post, it seems that 96 K-Rock (WRXK-FM) in Ft. Myers is playing classic rock on the weekends, at least for now. This is similar to the approach that Clear Channel's Real Radio 104.1 (WTKS-FM) in Orlando takes, though the weekend music on that station is a blend of AAA/modern rock.

Also, you might notice some shows listed to the left are not hyperlinks. That's because I'm in the midst of rebuilding this website, and in the coming weeks I'll be adding individual show pages. Soon enough they will all link to a list of show information and terrestrial radio affiliates for the associated show.

February 18, 2012
It took a long time, but I finally completed the rebuild of the Bob & Tom affiliate page. More coming soon.

February 13, 2012
The Hot Talk format has, more or less, been dead for the past few years with the demise of CBS Radio's "Free FM" talk brand, save for one-off formats like Clear Channel's Real Radio 104.1 in Orlando (WTKS-FM). So the news today that Beasley Broadcasting's 96 K-Rock (WRKX-FM) in Ft. Myers, FL flipped from rock to hot talk is exciting news for those who are fans of the format.

Funny enough, I've recently been working on restoring Bob & Tom page on here and hoping to finish its affiliate list (it's a huge list) and then start on pages some other existing syndicated shows like Lex & Terry or Free Beer & Hot Wings and also new shows that fit the format like Nick & Artie (Nick DiPaolo and Artie Lange).

In many ways, the possibility of an FCC fine has terrorized stations since the maximum fine was multiplied by ten to a whopping $325,000 per violation in 2006. Radio for years and years paid off FCC fines to avoid a long court fight, with the FCC at times playing dirty pool with radio companies by sitting on license renewals, etc. on companies that dared to fight them. It took multiple major national television networks taking the FCC to court for the capricious and arbitrary issuing of NALs (Notice of Apparent Liability) to stop, and that case has finally worked its way through the courts and should be ruled on by the Supreme Court later this year in FCC v. Fox Television Stations.

Here's the new lineup for the Hot Talk format on 96 K-Rock (keeping the established K-Rock brand name with the tagline "talk that rocks"):

Bubba the Love Sponge ® (live 6-10 a.m. ET)
Zito & Garrett (live/local 10 a.m.-2 p.m. ET)
Stan & Haney (live/local 2-6 p.m. ET)
Lex & Terry (tape delay 6-10 p.m. ET)
Nick & Artie (live 10 p.m.-1 a.m. ET)
John & Jeff (live 1-6 a.m. ET)

Zito & Garrett most recently were in morning drive for Beasley sister station 99X, which is going music intensive in mornings. I really like the idea of a Hot Talk formatted station airing Nick & Artie live. It's impressive to clear 20/24 hours live and with the other four, Lex & Terry airing on delay, they've had multiple runs in the market and now fans of their show there have a place to hear it on terrestrial radio. No word yet on what the station will run on the weekend.

January 5, 2012
Congrats to Bubba the Love Sponge ® for signing a new contract with 102.5 the Bone (WHPT) in the Tampa market. Also, Bubba debutes on 94.3 the Bone in Detroit effective January 11, 2012.

October 19, 2010
I'm in the process of evaluating what the best use of this site will be. In the past few years this site has mostly reflected the post-2004 world of male-skewing syndicated morning shows -- very little activity to report.

But while shows have been toned down for the past 6+ years, there are some missing syndicated male-skewing shows that should be listed here. That means no John Boy & Billy or Mike & Mike or other similarly bland programming. The concept for the Radio Hot Talk website has always been about listing information about shows with at least some edge to them, even if that edge has to be kept dull enough to not bring about a potentially crippling NAL (Notice of Apparent Liability).

The stakes are ultra-high right now, thanks to the 2004 election year House & Senate multiplying the maximum indecency fine by 10, with the top fine now at a whopping $275,000 per incident and a cap of $3,000,000 per day. Right now there are legal battles that are making their way to the Supreme Court to challenge the FCC's ability to issue fines for broadcasting outlets for alleged indecent or profane programming, the first time that the high court will be taking up the issue since the 5-4 ruling in favor of the FCC in the landmark 1978 FCC vs. Pacific Foundation case. The challenges came not from radio companies, which didn't have the courage to take the battle to court, but instead from television networks that faced large fines for complaints against many of their O&O stations for various programs.

October 18, 2010
Bubba the Love Sponge ® debuted this morning on LM Communications rocker 98X (98.1 WYBB) in Charleston, SC. Bubba has hinted on the air that he has two additional new affiliates pending.

EVENING UPDATE: Along with adding BTLS, WYBB has reverted to its original 98 Rock name that it had from its July 1988 sign-on through January 2004, when it rebranded as 98X. The irony there is that Bubba's former Tampa flagship station is also branded as 98 Rock (97.9 WXTB).