Before the consolidation of radio networks in the late
1990s, local studios were buzzing with vibrant energy and DJs were
musical trendsetters who connected with youth culture while chatting
live over the airwaves.

How times have changed.

After a number of corporate buyouts, much of the local
on-air talent in Lansing (and beyond) is gradually being replaced by
nationally syndicated shows that are recorded and produced in other
regions of the country. Yet, somehow radio is still clinging to the
“live and local” ideal.

Lansing radio veteran Deb Hart, 42, is one of the
survivors. She’s hosted morning shows since 1997 for WMMQ-FM (94.9), a
classic rock station now owned by Cumulus Broadcasting. She said she’s
not able to comment on the recent Cumulus buyout; however, she did
voice her positive thoughts on the future of radio.

“They said television was going to kill radio, they said
MTV was going to kill radio, they said cable was going to kill radio,”
Hart said. “But it’s an immediate medium. People can pick up their
phone and be a part of it. You can e-mail us and hear it read on the
air. That is fun for people, I think. 

“I am absolutely blessed beyond words to still be working
in morning radio in Lansing for 21 years now. I feel really fortunate
to have been given enough freedom to do and say what I want to on the
air. I think I have earned that, after proving myself to be reliable
after 21 years. I still love the freedom of radio. As long as radio
will have me, I’ll be here.” 

An endangered species

At some stations, though, live DJs are an endangered
species. The human host has been replaced entirely by a computer that
plays automated selections of music and programming, an impersonal
practice in what used to be a copiously personal form of media. How are
homegrown listeners supposed to phone in song requests when a microchip
is manning the board? 

Like businesses, in recent years there’s unquestionably
been downsizing in the radio industry. The blame is placed on a
mish-mash of circumstances: the slumping economy, SiriusXM Satellite
Radio, the Internet, iPods and the Internet station Pandora Radio. 

“I think FM, or music radio, is now at a serious
crossroads,” said Michael Patrick Shiels, 44, host of Michigan’s
Morning Show on WJIM-AM (1240) for the past five and a half years.
“People can get in their car, plug in their iPod, they can get their
music any way and any time they want.”

While technological growth in the past decade has
undoubtedly left a sizable gash in the radio waves, the current state
of radio seems to be a mixture of many fluctuating elements. 

Another hazy piece of the radio puzzle is the effect
corporate media conglomerates have had on local stations. Are these
companies dehumanizing the programming? Or are they keeping the
stations alive? Either way, bulky media companies are incessantly
buying and selling bundles of stations across the country, which has
led to tight consolidation and job losses. 

Tim Barron, 51, has seen it firsthand.
He has become one of the most recognized voices in Lansing radio since
he first hit the city’s airwaves in 1985. He’s now hosting a morning
show on WLMI-FM (92.9), but he spent time working alongside former
Lansing personality Jaz McKay, and alongside Hart for 15 years on the
Tim & Deb morning show on WMMQ-FM (94.9). 

Barron said after Citadel Broadcasting bought out WMMQ’s
previous owner, Liggett Broadcasting, he knew his days were numbered.
In 2005 he was let go from the station, with severance pay. He was
replaced by Rich Michaels, who worked for another of Lansing’s Citadel
stations. 

“Citadel comes in — and I knew the clock was ticking
because they’re going to consolidate,” Barron recalled. “Why would you
pay Rich Michaels and Tim Barron all that money to fight it out when
you own them both? Why wouldn’t you kill one and elevate the other?”

Over the course of two years Citadel decided that would be its strategy. 

Barron said when consolidation began spreading across the
radio market conglomerates began firing what he calls highly paid radio
“dinosaurs” in an effort to save money. It was much different than the
on-air environment he first encountered when he started his career in
1976. 

“The trend when consolidation occurred was to take the
old, big money guys and do an ‘Old Yeller’: Take them out, shoot them
in the head and bring in a younger talent to do the same job,
supposedly, for a lot cheaper,” Barron said. 

As far as the increase in automated programming and
syndicated shows, Barron said it all comes down to money. His station,
which is owned by Midwest Communications, has created methods for
localizing programs that aren’t recorded anywhere near Lansing. 

“Local guys cost money: air conditioning, toilet paper,
they have an hourly rate,” Barron said. “Syndicated programming can be
very effective, but it will never beat a local person.

“There are also local sounding things that can be done
within station groups. For instance, when I leave at 9 o’clock, a guy
in another state (Chuck Lakefield, a.k.a. “The Laker”) is doing the
mid-day show. He knows Lansing, he gets memos from us every day and he
sounds much warmer and very genuine because he knows he’s broadcasting
to my audience after I leave. That is a local sound to a large
called-in show, but it’s still not the same as a local guy.”  

(As for the sometimes controversial Michaels, who was
fired from WMMQ by Citadel in December 2010, he’s been back on the air
since July 2011 — only this time in south Florida working at talk radio
station WIOD-AM (610). He’s ditched his on-air name and is now using
his real name, Rich Minaya.)

Locally owned and operated stations have become a rarity
in the business — and with conglomerates being able to own four FM
stations, and two AM stations in the same market, many stations owned
by the same company share offices.

Each of the top stations in Lansing is owned by one of
three corporations: Midwest Communications (of Wausau, Wis.), MacDonald
Broadcasting (based in Lansing) and the latest conglomerate to come to
Lansing, Cumulus Media, Inc. (of Atlanta), which formed in 1997. 

On Sept. 16, Cumulus acquired all
stations across the country owned by Citadel Broadcasting (of Las
Vegas). The deal was finalized after months of negotiations and Federal
Communications Commission approval. 

The now-defunct Citadel, formed in 1984, was a leader in
the radio market; it was in the ranks with industry giant Clear Channel
Communications Inc. In 2007 Citadel’s reported revenue was
$719,760,000. But in 2008 Citadel began facing severe financial
trouble, letting go hundreds of personalities and staffers. In December
2009 it filed for bankruptcy and then re-emerged in June 2010 — but
only lasted until September 2011. 

After this merger Cumulus has become a major part of the
Lansing media industry. It now controls WMMQ, WFMK-FM (99.1),
WJIM-FM/NOW-FM (97.5), WJIM-AM, WVFN-AM The Game (730) and Lansing’s
frontrunner in the ratings, WITL-FM (100.7). 

So what’s the story with this new massive company that recently planted its corporate roots in Lansing?

Lansing-based Cumulus representatives refused to comment
on the merger. Before the Citadel merger, Cumulus employed roughly
3,400 full-time employees. With the completion of the Citadel
acquisition, Cumulus Media is the second largest radio station owner in
the country, owning or operating more than 570 radio stations in 120
markets and a nationwide radio network serving over 4,000 stations.

Buying and selling

J.P. Hannan, Cumulus Media Inc. senior vice president,
treasurer and chief financial officer, estimated the Citadel purchase
to be $2.4 billion. This is the company’s first acquisition since 2002,
and it’s Cumulus’ biggest buy to date. Before that, the company did 145
acquisitions between 1997 and 2002; only a few periodic one-off deals
followed, until recently.

With corporate buyouts often comes loss of jobs. Although
Hannan said he feels the stations Cumulus acquired from Citadel are
strong, he isn’t sure what the Lansing stations can expect. 

“Our operating team is out evaluating (in Lansing),” he
said. “I mean, I’m not familiar with what’s on the ground in Lansing,
so I don’t know what the team will be doing there.

“It’s a unique property acquisition for us. We take our
time, we’re evaluating it and we’ll see. These are great assets — we
didn’t buy this company to gut it.”

Scott Truman, Midwest Communication’s
market manager in Lansing, said he’s been through this type of sale (in
July 2010, Midwest bought out his previous employer, the Rubber City
Radio Group) and he understands the apprehension former Citadel
employees may be feeling. Truman manages WJXQ-FM (106.1), WQTX-FM Big
Country (92.1), WLMI-FM and WVIC-FM The Edge (94.1), all out of the
same building in Holt. Altogether, Midwest owns 47 stations.  

“For us, just coming off a sale — immediately, I
sympathize,” Truman said. “I have friends over there. I know what it’s
like to be bought and sold and have the uncertainty of what your job is
going to be. I was very fortunate with Midwest. It’s a company that
talked to us in advance. There was a lot of dialogue I had with
management before they actually took over the stations.”

Shiels, whose “Michigan’s Morning Show”
has been simulcast on FOX-47 television for the past two years, said
the purchase of his station didn’t come as a surprise, adding “that’s
the way it’s going in the industry.”

“These stations switch hands between these giant
broadcasting companies on a regular basis all across the country,”
Shiels said. “There are a number of big ones now. As far as I
understand it, they may own it from Atlanta, Las Vegas or New York, but
there’s a definite value to a local face.” 

Shiels said listeners of his show, which is recorded live
at a storefront studio on Michigan Avenue in the Stadium District
building, won’t notice a change in his locally themed program, which
often invites area politicians, business people and newsmakers on the
air. 

“Nobody that’s listening right now on Michigan Avenue
cares that (WJIM) is owned by Cumulus,” Shiels said. “They care that
they get the person they want to hear, the information they want to
hear, and the music they want to hear. I don’t know how much it affects
the average person. When Citadel owned it, we were still a local radio
station.” 

As for the longevity of radio, Shiels said talk radio has an advantage over music-based stations. 

“The thing that gives talk radio the upper hand is that
it’s totally unique. On a day-to-day basis you get the freshest and
latest of what’s going on — and you get it with personality.

“Right now it’s on AM, but there’s a national trend to move talk shows on to FM. I think eventually that will happen.”

Chris Holman, publisher of Greater Lansing Business
Monthly and the Michigan Business Network website, spent 14 years on
the air, 12 of those at WJIM-AM.  He said he feels mom-and-pop operations are a thing of the past. 

“Small, locally owned stations are not making it,” Holman
explained. “Most of them grow because they want to be bought by
somebody bigger: They’re all waiting for Clear Channel to buy them,
basically. It’s more of a dollar game than a radio game.”

Brock Elsesser, 32, started as a rookie disc jockey in
1997 on 92.1-FM The Edge, which signed off in 2003 (it’s now back on
the air at 94.1 FM). He also spent a few years as program director at
88.9-FM The Impact, the Michigan State University radio station. He
left radio altogether in 2009 after a four-year stint at Q101-FM in
Chicago. 

Elsesser said he feels the radio giants dropped the ball
on the creative side of radio, as well as the opportunities the Web
offers, and now the industry is suffering. He said he began to lose
faith in the industry after attending a few National Association of
Broadcasters conferences while working at The Impact.

“Every year I’d see the people that would get together,
the big head honchoes who are in charge of radio, so to speak,”
Elsesser recalled. “I’d hear them talk, hear their plans. Honestly, it
was a big group of 60-year-old white guys who used to be sales
managers, who didn’t have an artistic bone in their body and had
absolutely no idea what the fuck was going on. 

“They dropped the ball on podcasting, dropped the ball on
any Internet content whatsoever. They were so backwards. … They were
saying stuff like, ‘We really need to push the fact that terrestrial
radio is live and local, and blah, blah, blah’ — all this bullshit.
Now, 90 percent of radio stations across the country are automated.”

’Its days are over’

Elsesser, who now teaches audio production classes at
Lansing Community College, said listeners are turned off by the preset
programming radio depends upon.

“It’s the cheap way to put something together,” Elsesser
said. “It’s all about dollar signs and that’s not necessarily a bad
thing, but when there’s no real thought behind it people can feel that
and are not going to take it seriously. 

“People are not as dumb as radio
broadcasters like to think they are. You can only push so much shitty
content for so long before people just say, ‘Why?’ It’s too bad it’s
become what it has. Aside from talk and sports radio, in my opinion,
there’s no future for music radio. Its days are over.” 

In Elsesser’s eyes, program directors — who were once
responsible for determining what went on the air and how it was
presented — have been taken out of the mix by the conglomerates. 

“They’re essentially just managers of the employees,” he
said. “They really don’t have a say over the programming or the music
they’re playing — they don’t have the ability to be creative or
innovative. It all comes down from the head office.” 

With batches of stations across the map being owned by
the same companies, Elsesser said it’s simple to spot the striking
similarities, even across state lines.  

“You can drive across the country and listen to a
conglomerate’s radio stations, and as you cross Michigan, Illinois, all
the way over to California, you’re going to hear the same music, same
imaging, many times even the same voice guy: There’s no
differentiation,” he said. 

Elsesser may be fed up with corporate radio today, but he
spoke highly of his early days at The Edge, as well as his time at the
student-operated The Impact, a station that’s been managed by Gary Reid
since it debuted in 1989. Reid is a 35-year MSU employee and also
WKAR’s director of radio and television broadcasting services. 

“We struggle every day to try and remain relevant to our
listeners,” Reid said. “We try to be open-minded enough to find new
music that will be of value to listeners and move forward.”

Back when The Impact first hit the airwaves, the Internet
didn’t even exist. Reid, 58, said his student staff today is
technologically savvy.

“They think much more broadly about radio and what radio
could be in today’s world,” Reid said. “I find they have broader tastes
in music and are interested in doing other things than just being a DJ.
We have a bunch of people who are interested in video; we have a
branded YouTube site. The young people look at media in a much broader
way than we have in the past.” 

Robert Waggley, 55, a former Cumulus employee and now the
general sales manager at MacDonald Broadcasting, has a more optimistic
look on the slumping radio numbers. MacDonald, which owns WHZZ-FM/MIKE
FM (101.7), Power 96.5 WQHH-FM, WILS-AM (1320) and WXLA-AM (1130), is
one of the few private, locally owned broadcasters still in operation.
It owns stations in just two markets, Saginaw and Lansing. 

“In the industry, radio revenue is down some,” Waggley
said. “It’s not down huge — some people would call it huge, I guess.
But I firmly believe the radio industry can re-grow some of those
numbers and move back in a positive direction. The last couple years
haven’t been easy for anybody.”  

Peter Tanz, 51, vice president of Michigan operations for
Midwest Communications, said even with the intense changes, he feels
what comes out of the speakers hasn’t waned. 

“What the audience experiences and what the audience
feels isn’t necessarily what’s changed,” Tanz said. “It’s how we
deliver content and how we look at our own internal business model;
it’s just changed dramatically. Change is constant. There’s constant
change, but as long as you continue to serve the advertisers and serve
the community, you’re going to continue to do well.”