Pumping Up the Volume on Radio Relevancy with Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton by Reg Seeton
Over
the past three decades, Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton,
one of the biggest, iconic and consistently #1
personalities in nationwide radio across America,
has navigated the competitive on-air Autobahn
of radio relevancy through thirty years of peaks
and valleys. From the days when Sean was running
a pirate radio station from his basement in Reno
at the age of 16, which became the story and character
foundation for the 1990, Christian Slater toplined
film Pump Up the Volume, to his #1 nighttime radio
show at Z-100 in New York City and KIIS-FM in
Los Angeles, his top rated "Hollywood & Goumba
Show", to his 2009 move to popular afternoon drive
at 104.3 MYfm, "Hollywood" Hamilton has been a
#1 winner in radio through the highs and lows
of the industry. But what is interesting about
the career of Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton, whose
name has resided in the upper echelons of radio
alongside Rick Dees, Howard Stern, Don Imus, and
Ryan Seacrest, is that Hamilton began as a pirate,
rose to fame through elite big market stations
to still be #1 relevant today, yet has oddly come
full circle in a new radio era that's being shaped
by what some could perceive as the biggest pirate
radio station in the world, the Internet.
For the past thirty years radio has ebbed and flowed like the careers of many bands you hear on the weekly afternoon airwaves or popular nationwide weekend Top 30 shows from coast to coast. But given the advent of new technologies, the explosion of the information highway in a changing musical landscape, satellite and WiFi, the radio industry and some of America's top DJs have had to compete harder than ever to stay relevant in ways their predecessors could have never imagined. But is radio still relevant today with so many options at the public's disposal? When we caught up with Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton this week a few minutes after he got off the air in New York City, it didn't take long for the long-time #1 radio icon to catch his breath and reaffirm his belief in radio relevancy. "It's very much relevant today," answered the co-creator of the hugely popular radio hit Lovelines. "The bottom line is: When you're on your way to work and you're in traffic, people will never go away from local radio. They want to hear what's going on locally. They want to hear what's going on in their communities." Interestingly, as we settled into our chat, it was Sean who quickly pointed out the 800-pound radio gorilla in the radio room. "And as hard as satellite tries, they're never going to capture that. They just can't."
In recent years, it was the rise of such pay-per-month satellite stations as Sirius and Xfm that had many insiders convinced national mainstream radio would be going the way of the dinosaur. After an exodus of some of radio's top names to the open airwaves of satellite in recent years, including heavyweights like Howard Stern, some would argue that a variety of DJs lost some of their relevancy at the peak of being relevant. As for Sean's view of satellite radio now that the open airwave dust has settled, Hamilton doesn't see it as a threat. "Satellite doesn't worry me at all," said "Hollywood" with a strong sense of confidence. "Radio satellite is either going to be bought out by television satellite or it will just simply go away. It has no legs. It has no future."
However,
despite the lack of legs on satellite radio,
Sean Hamilton does see a threat in the current
radio landscape. "What scares me is that we're
getting more and more requests from people who
are listening to us on the internet," a shift
in radio that isn't so clearly defined or predictable
given the rapid pace, accessibility and fluidity
of the web. "Car companies can put WiFi in and
computers, and people are listening to the internet
in their car. That's where I think radio is
going to be a little bit in trouble." But in
an era when so many Top 30 and talk radio voices
are in play at the same time on national mainstream
radio, satellite, even the flood of personalities
taking to the internet to become web DJs through
podcasts, as far as Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton
is concerned, people can only be a threat if
they have that all important radio "it" factor.
"You either have something cool to say that
people want to hear, or you don't. If you don't
have anything cool to say, people aren't going
to listen to you. I don't care who you are.
From Ryan [Seacrest] to a guy who just came
into the business in a small city, you either
are relevant and you have something to say -
People want to hear you or they don't want to
hear you."
But given where Sean began his career as an underground radio rebel in Reno, Hamilton balanced and built upon his image to become a #1 on-air personality while also maintaining his own personal identity when off the airwaves. When we spoke to actor Christian Slater earlier in the year while doing press for the NBC series, My Own Worst Enemy, the former Pump Up the Volume actor admitted how the two sides of the movie and the Sean Hamilton inspired character, Mark Hunter, (aka, Hard Harry on the air), appealed to him in ways only a super hero could. "In Pump Up the Volume," said Slater, "I think I played pretty specifically a very shy high school kid, who by night was this guy who had this other personality that he only felt comfortable being inside his own room. So I like the duality of that. I like sort of the Clark Kent/Superman aspects of that particular film."
But how does the current 104.3 MYfm Weekend Top 30 host make sense of the fact that the FCC shut him down back in 1979, yet the possible looming radio threat of the internet is, what some may say, an unregulated sea of pirates? "It's weird," Sean reflected on the thirty-year gap. "Throughout the '80s and early '90s, the FCC wasn't really strict. Now the FCC is becoming strict again. But in the late '80s throughout the entire '90s, people were getting away with murder. Don Imus, Howard Stern, everybody was getting away with murder," which certainly mirrors some sectors of the internet and the unregulated evolution of many web based industries. "Now it's turning back around," Sean added. "But pirate radio is still a huge problem in New York City. Huge! It's still a big problem in the big cities."
Since Sean started as a young radio pirate,
with dreams of becoming a #1 nationwide host
of his own show, a spot where he always resides
or is close to, "Hollywood" Hamilton has already
left a lasting legacy and major imprint in radio
after making his dream come true many times
over. So how does Sean Hamilton think he's benefiting
today from the road that he paved over the last
twenty
years in radio? In an economically challenged
society, perhaps not quite in the way you would
expect, or he would like. "I'm benefiting in
a sad way. In a way I'm not too happy about,"
Sean humbly admitted at the top of his game.
"In a way that is kind of troubling to me, taking
away jobs from other people, because only a
very few radio personalities in this country
and abroad are surviving. And the survivors
are now tracking through other major cities.
I count because of my syndicated projects. I
can only do one city. I can only track for Los
Angeles. But there are guys that are tracking
for six different stations and you're talking
about markets, Top 30 markets, that back in
the day paid $150,000 to $170,000 a year in
a Top 30 market. Now these guys are getting
[a fraction of what they once earned]. That's
troubling."
But despite the tough economic times, even with the advances in technology, there's something organically positive and familiar about radio that's not only timeless but also highly relevant in such a tech-savvy era, as Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton revealed. "I think radio is going through what television went through with the introduction of cable. We're in that rocky period right now, economically, and people have so many options. They have the iPod, the internet, and they have all of these choices. So it's a weird time for radio. But I was reading a statistic a couple of weeks ago that people are still listening to the radio. 93% of people in this country still listen to the radio. They still, in some way during the week, somehow have heard something on the radio."
Here at TheDeadbolt office, if it wasn't for afternoon radio in the background,
we'd be listening to daytime soaps, celebrity
courtroom speak, spousal trailer park fights,
or spending far too much money on infomercial
products. All a bevy of options to choose from,
but we're glad guys like Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton
are still pumping up the volume on radio relevancy.
Thank god we don't have to listen to small claims
court while stuck in traffic.
Over
the past three decades, Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton,
one of the biggest, iconic and consistently #1
personalities in nationwide radio across America,
has navigated the competitive on-air Autobahn
of radio relevancy through thirty years of peaks
and valleys. From the days when Sean was running
a pirate radio station from his basement in Reno
at the age of 16, which became the story and character
foundation for the 1990, Christian Slater toplined
film Pump Up the Volume, to his #1 nighttime radio
show at Z-100 in New York City and KIIS-FM in
Los Angeles, his top rated "Hollywood & Goumba
Show", to his 2009 move to popular afternoon drive
at 104.3 MYfm, "Hollywood" Hamilton has been a
#1 winner in radio through the highs and lows
of the industry. But what is interesting about
the career of Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton, whose
name has resided in the upper echelons of radio
alongside Rick Dees, Howard Stern, Don Imus, and
Ryan Seacrest, is that Hamilton began as a pirate,
rose to fame through elite big market stations
to still be #1 relevant today, yet has oddly come
full circle in a new radio era that's being shaped
by what some could perceive as the biggest pirate
radio station in the world, the Internet.
However,
despite the lack of legs on satellite radio,
Sean Hamilton does see a threat in the current
radio landscape. "What scares me is that we're
getting more and more requests from people who
are listening to us on the internet," a shift
in radio that isn't so clearly defined or predictable
given the rapid pace, accessibility and fluidity
of the web. "Car companies can put WiFi in and
computers, and people are listening to the internet
in their car. That's where I think radio is
going to be a little bit in trouble." But in
an era when so many Top 30 and talk radio voices
are in play at the same time on national mainstream
radio, satellite, even the flood of personalities
taking to the internet to become web DJs through
podcasts, as far as Sean "Hollywood" Hamilton
is concerned, people can only be a threat if
they have that all important radio "it" factor.
"You either have something cool to say that
people want to hear, or you don't. If you don't
have anything cool to say, people aren't going
to listen to you. I don't care who you are.
From Ryan [Seacrest] to a guy who just came
into the business in a small city, you either
are relevant and you have something to say -
People want to hear you or they don't want to
hear you."
twenty
years in radio? In an economically challenged
society, perhaps not quite in the way you would
expect, or he would like. "I'm benefiting in
a sad way. In a way I'm not too happy about,"
Sean humbly admitted at the top of his game.
"In a way that is kind of troubling to me, taking
away jobs from other people, because only a
very few radio personalities in this country
and abroad are surviving. And the survivors
are now tracking through other major cities.
I count because of my syndicated projects. I
can only do one city. I can only track for Los
Angeles. But there are guys that are tracking
for six different stations and you're talking
about markets, Top 30 markets, that back in
the day paid $150,000 to $170,000 a year in
a Top 30 market. Now these guys are getting
[a fraction of what they once earned]. That's
troubling."