Kick-Ass Audio Breaks

The first break of your show can be the most critical – they get you in a groove and help you wake up, so you can help listeners who tune in wake up.  Mark and Neanderpaul, KSLX, Phoenix have a very simple, well-framed break in their show’s first half hour called “Middle School”.  It’s a trivia-based game with questions centered around a topical news item, quizzing one listener for a prize.  The questions are relevant and the goal is to have fun around an idea that is vicarious to all others just waking up or driving to work at that moment.  Humor is created around the answers, thus serving the most important goal of laughter.  PPM is a game of occasions so their locked in time creates yet another appointment for early risers.

The audience requires us to build out breaks so they sparkle.  Oftentimes when telling a personal story, it’s no more difficult than getting audio of the experience to help tell it.  Brando, inside Spencer’s Neighborhood, 106.5, The Arch, St. Louis, did his usual holiday decorating, which meant getting on the roof to string some lights.  Not content with just telling the story, the team got Brando’s wife on to add some drama and tension to it – Alex’s take on his efforts adds to the narrative.  Also, always worried he’d fall off the roof, Brando recorded telling his daughter how to call 911 before he got on the ladder, which added more audio to the break.  These moving parts positioned the break in truly HD quality, helping the audience see everything in their head so they could more easily imagine where he was and what it was like.  This, in turn, made the break even more entertaining.  Side note – this show does an amazing job getting to things, commencing with the storytelling quickly, and wrapping the break up before the audience bores.  This happens because they have a game plan – no wasted moments respects the audience’s time and they’re rewarded with additional listens because of it.