I read with interest the announcement in Friday's MDL that last night's Madison City Commission meeting would open with "an introductory meeting with the new general manager of KJAM."
What?! New GM? Where's Lorin Larsen going? Did corporate find out he let some liberal blogger on the air Election Night?
No, no, no. As I uderstand it, Lorin isn't going anywhere. But the new man is charge of our local radio station is a remarkable recruit. Kurt Luchs lists himself as a writer. He's contributed to satirical newspaper The Onion since 1996. From 1999 to 2002, he wrote for television, first for Bill Maher's Politically Incorrect, then for Craig Kilborn's The Late Late Show. He runs his own "literary humor" website, The Big Jewel. AMong other comedy writing, Luchs published this gentle bit of management fluff, 2003's Leave the Gun and Take the Cannoli: A Wiseguy's Guide to the Workplace. I look forward to seeing if those gangster-movie quotes translate into doing business in the smallest market Luchs has ever worked in. (Actually, Luchs will need that gangster advice to stand up to the various prairie mafiosi who run Madison from their secret card table....)
Luchs has played tought guy himself. Within a month of taking the helm of Waitt Radio Networks in Omaha, Luchs laid off six on-air personalities from a staff of 22. Those pink slips went out the week before Christmas.
Luchs seems a remarkable addition to our little radio station. I'm curious to see how he fits managing KJAM helps him toward his current goal of getting "a full-time or freelance comedy writing gig either in television or at a new media enterprise run by people who know how to use the Web." People who know how to use the Web... Kurt, did you check the KJAM website before you came?
Or maybe he did, and instead of swinging the efficiency hatchet, he'll be looking for a chief Web officer... holy cow! Time to polish up the Madville Times résumé!
Wow! I guess this proves that everything lives on the web forever, including stuff I posted, like, a decade ago. If nothing else, this shout out on the Madville Times prompted me to go back and revise some of the outdated information at those links you provided. FYI, I am not seeking another job in television. I've been in radio management for 11 years now, and have always preferred audio to video, having been raised on a combination of old time radio and the BBC. Our family heard the Goon Show, Beyond the Fringe, and many other British imports, along with Lights Out, the Mercury Radio Theater, Jack Benny, Fred Allen and Bergen & McCarthy. I have always been involved in radio production, including commercials and radio theater. I like radio, especially in smaller towns, because it can be such an important part of the community, and it's more intimate. My comedy sidelines these days are mainly for my own amusement. This is what I do instead of rebuilding old cars or knocking little white balls into the water or shooting birds out of the sky. I'll never give up writing for the Onion because it's cool and a lot of fun. My own site TheBigJewel.com is simply an attempt to keep alive the kind of literary humor I was raised on: Robert Benchley, James Thurber, Dorothy Parker, P.G. Wodehouse, people like that. I'm really enjoying my time here so far. Where else could I arrive in town and by the next week have met the mayor, the city commissioners, the university president, and a bunch of other local movers and shakers? Everyone has been very welcoming. This is a nice place. I have a good team who are initiating me into the ways of Madison. My plan is to get the stations even more firmly embedded in the community and serving the listeners and advertisers better.
"more firmly embedded in the community"—I hope that's code for more live, local programming and less-robo-rehash.
"initiating me into the ways of Madison"—ooo! Did they show you the Card Table? :-D
As they used to say in the old flying saucer movies, Watch the skies!
don't take to the ways of madison too quick, but in the same respects, welcome aboard.
seems like a huge talent, and yet SD is such a funny place?!