Kick-Ass Audio Breaks

When a local story breaks, you can recount the facts as you know them from the paper, TV, or the internet.  Or you can grab someone who was in the middle of the story and get them to tell you what happened.  Doing the latter is much more interesting because you can ask questions and get firsthand perspective, making the story come alive.  Dave and Veronica, WQYK, Tampa, heard that there was a streaker at the Rays baseball game the previous night.  They found one of the arresting cops who knew more than they did and invited him on the show to create the fun break.  The moral of the story:  do the work to pull this stuff off and you’ll have something the rest of the market won’t.

If you’re telling a story on the show that has other people involved, instead of just giving the details of the story yourself, get them to participate so there is more to play with.  Karson and Kennedy, MIX 104.1, Boston, ventured into Karson’s relationship with his wife, Lana.  She’d purchased a massage for him that he never used and this caused friction in their relationship. Their great producer, Mike Morgan, told Lana to listen to the break they were about to do on-the-air.  He then had her leave a voicemail with her reaction (a novel approach).  This break is Lana going off, uninterrupted, on Karson.  It’s a terrific character building break because Lana is very real, very passionate, very opinionated, and very funny.