Why do people in radio think you can get by with “local talk” when the host is not from the city and calling the show in on the phone?
The latest to fail at this is Heidi Harris. Her schtick is she’s a former Vegas cocktail waitress turned Conservative Tea Party talk radio host.
She had been doing a local show in Vegas. Vegas is her town – she knows the people, she knows the casino business, she knows the city – but she lost that job.
Salem Radio in Los Angeles decided to put her on in morning drive time on two stations. It’s clear from her blog she is still living in Vegas. There are few success stories of females doing major market or syndicated talk, other than as the sidekick to a male host, behaving deferentially to him (see: Christine Craft), so she already is starting off with an uphill battle. Los Angeles is not exactly a hotbed of Conservative politics – strike 2.
Since she doesn’t know LA, doesn’t live there, doesn’t experience the city – she is limited to national issues or pretending she’s local, maybe by reading the local newspapers). You might get away with being a long time LA person who moves away and calls the show in – for a while – but not the reverse. If you make a sincere effort to move to the city you might be accepted, as long as you don’t constantly compare your new city to the old “when I lived in Philly, we had odd/even parking, and we should try that here”…
So Heidi is gone. So sorry. Good luck on your next venture.
Heidi Harris was a better cocktail waitress then radio host, i’m guessing that is why they canned her..
Heidi couldn’t work with Alan Stock on KXNT, so she left for KDWN. Not long after, Alan Stock left KXNT and was promptly hired at KDWN. They had separate shows with some brokered legal hour between them to keep them apart, but one day she suddenly disappeared and Alan Stock had taken over her time slot. Vegas is a terrible place for talk radio. Right now, Stock is the only live, local talk host I can name. There’s a guy on afternoons at KXNT (Kevin Wall), but I doubt that he’s even there.
Kevin Wall is from Texas – another guy with a studio in his house and an ISDN line – we was on WTKK in Boston for a bit – need a fillin host for a week, he’s your guy.
It was kind of cryptic, but when Heidi left, there was vague hints she was thinking of legal action against someone. It was very abrupt.
I wasn’t really a listener to her show, even when I lived in Vegas. Her voice is shrill and she doesn’t seem to have that much of a sense of humor. She must have said something on the air that angered her bosses at Beasley pretty bad, because her show was apparently #1 in Vegas at the time. I actually met her and Alan Stock when I was in in the KXNT Radio Star competition in 2005. The winners got a weekend show on the station…at least for a while. I lost.
Vegas is a terrible talk radio market, the worst of any big city I’ve listened to. Absolutely no local flavor. KDWN had a live, local person on the air most of the time until they were sold to Beasley in 2006.
Damn, you mean to tell us that gamblers, prostitutes, whores, mafiaso characters and other various and nefarious characters don’t listen to talk radio?
Just kiddin’. I knew a really great guy from Vegas. He was in our group in Antarctica, and boy-oh-boy was he a great basketball player. We had a pretty good time, small league that played 2 games a week. I was lousy and did not see much playing time. Anyways….. he explained that there is the real Vegas, and then there’s the Strip – and the 2 don’t really mix well.
I love Vegas, and have even thought about moving back, but everything’s about money. Even the sports radio stations (and there are maybe 5 now) all approach it from the gambling angle. The talk radio hosts are way, way below par…anyone who had any ability left a long time ago. Thank God for the internet and satellite radio.
Interesting that Hannity’s former radio producer Elisha is being brought in by Phil Boyce to replace Harris at KRLA.