Our View

Our View
In Old Towne Ridgecrest

Saturday, March 31, 2007

Multi-Tasking in the Studio

Wild day today (Saturday). We had Al and Gary's show this morning with live reports from the Home and Leisure Show and the April Fool's Classic Car Show in Old Towne. Then after that Fritz went live from Old Towne on the FM and then over to the Home Show. We got dug in for all of that and the Madman showed up to put on Cerro Coso Basball right next to me on the AM board. We have been doing a live broadcast on both stations at the same time. I won't bore you with all of the technical details, but with two small boards, purchased at Guitar Center and two phones bought at Wal Mart we had two quality broadcasts going on four feet apart!

If we had used "real" radio equipment, it owuld have set us back thousands of dollars.

It's small market and we have to do what we have to do.

-Eric

Friday, March 30, 2007

One Web Site Down...

And one to go. We're real happy with the results so far on the KZIQ.COM web site. It has all kinds of new goodies and the only delay in loading it up would be the rss headline feeds from the DI and Fox News. There is more content on the Big Show page and the mp3 podcasting files are easier to find as is the live stream. We also have some FAQ's for the technical stuff. There are more goodies on the way like Vegas and So-Cal concert schedules and some discounts. We also have better sponsor presence and the first Ridgecrest Online Auto Mall. Check it out here.

On the way, we'll go to work on the FoxTalk 1360 web site. We have loads of new content for that one. Sports schedules, new lineup info, links to hosts webcasts and podcasts and much more.

You know as always we love input. We want to have the very best for you online. Feel free to send an e-mail from the web sites and we will get back to you.

-Eric

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

FoxTalk Sports Update....

While we spend a lot of the 168 hours of the week on talk radio, we're very proud of our sports lineup. We've added Cerro Coso Baseball this season (thanks Coach Adams!) and we may throw in a few BHS baseball games. Next season we'll have BHS basketball (boys and girls) and we are working on first ever broadcasts of Cerro Coso women's basketball. BHS football? Well that will be on 92-7 The Coyote. More on that later.

Baseball season is cranking up and again we'll have Angels baseball. We'll stay on the Ducks as well and early on in the season the Ducks will take priority over the Angels because of their playoff drive. I would also like to announce that we signed a new deal with the Chargers and will have their games for the next couple of seasons. The one thing we have been waiting on has been some basketball coverage. I have several ways to go, but the magic scenario is that my satellite provider I use picks up the L.A. Clippers. They ave been working on that for a while now. The Clippers popularity has never been high and it would be awesome for them to put together a radio network.

As always, we start each morning at 5am with Fox Sports talk and have several hours of Fox Sports talk on weekend, evenings.

We are always open to suggestions. Just ask the Leo Leporte fans!

-Eric

Monday, March 19, 2007

What, 4th Of July Already??

I sit here two day, of course being Monday and all, with sauce from the new Buffalo chicken sandwich from Carl's Jr. on my San Diego Chargers shirt. Yup...Monday.

But...I have made my own day by starting to wade through the 3,000 or so 4th of July music cuts I have collected over the last 6 years. I am stoked already and putting together the first batch of tunes. That's what I do. I make a playlist folder and put in about 100 tunes that I want to work with this year. In a couple of weeks, I will then beging to piece those together in three basic movements. No trade secret here, because I would love the help! I usually start with a movie open, into some music to reflect awe. Then I move into what I call the Pop section, which includes a little of every popular style, and then finally the big Patriotic finish.

One thing is for sure. With my continued use of cinematic music I have expanded my already huge regard for the composers who score movies. I wouldn't even be able to pick my favorite, but I love the work of Randy Newman, Hans Zimmer, Michael Kamen and Thomas Newman.

There is a channel on our DirecTv that has nothing but movie music. I make notes from that. You can ask Kim, this is a year round obsession for me. We'll be driving around in L.A. and something will play on the radio and I have her write it down.

I'll keep you posted on the progress here. But I am excited!

Thursday, March 15, 2007

GPAC Rocks!

But I am very proud of this one. It is the GPAC Committee who will be helping develop a new general plan for the future of Ridgecrest and the IWV. Thanks to Nellavan for asking me!

We had the Kern COG blueprint meeting last night and I have to tell you, if you missed it, you missed out. This one was for anyone to attend. There will be others. This really is an opportunity to be in on the ground floor to help plan this community's future. I will keep you posted on the air and will try to here on the blog.

It's everything from preventing urban sprawl, to meeting our water needs. From diversifying the economy to the simple "we need a Long John Silvers!". Kern COG will be back in about 6 weeks, but I also believe that the City may be doing some workshops like this as well. Here is the Kern COG web site where they can keep you posted and as they told us last night you can always leave feedback re: the planning anytime you want.

We learned a lot about how the population is going to grow between L.A. and San Francisco. I'm still not real sure how much of that is going to make it into our little corner of Kern County, but we will be getting more folks here and we need to be ready.

I found a web site about futuristic travel today too. You should really watch this video. If not for anything else, at least for the computer animation. I feel like we would be affected by this, not directly, but with hopefully a train to the A.V. and then onto this bad boy.

The Follies are over!

So now I have some time to blog. There is probably a similar post from this time last year...but I just wanted everyone to understand how many hours the cast and crew put in for this fund raising efforts. Each song that a person is in practices 10-15 hours between February and March. Most people are in at least two numbers and there are many with three. Now add in the 3 plus hours on the first full cast rehearsals and then an additional 15 or so the two days prior to the Saturday night show and finally it's about a 10 hour commitment on show night.

On the crew, they do all of that AND put in 30-50 hours each the week and a half prior to the show. The committee, also in the show (about 10 strong) work almost year around with regular meetings to plan and cast the show.

That's why it is so rewarding to see Mesquite Hall filled to capacity on show night.

The Chamber is working harder and harder every year to make attending the show an even better experience.

Thanks to all who came this year and if you didn't you missed a great time! Just ask someone who went!!