November 5, 2021 • 42 mins
We catch up with Danny G Radio, who has worked in radio since he was 15 years old. Danny made his return to the Ben Maller Show this week for a cameo appearance. He's worked music radio, sports talk, talked's to sitting Presidents and animal handlers.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ka boom. If you thought four hours a day, minutes
a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
of the old republic a sole fashion of fairness. He
treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
rich pill poppers in the penthouse to clearing house of
hot takes, break free for something special. The Fifth Hour
(00:23):
with Ben Maller starts right now. Everywhere. Welcome into the
Friday Friday edition of the Fifth Hour with me Ben Maller,
flying solo today. It's Friday, Friday Friday. Because four hours
a night are not enough. On the overnight eight days
(00:45):
a week, eight days a week. We do this show
from the Mallard Podcast studio at a secret location somewhere
deep in the north Woods. And we thank you for
supporting the overnight show and finding this podcast. Tell a friend,
word of mouth. We have no advertising budget. You will
see no billboard, you will see no television commercial. There
(01:08):
will be no radio commercial for the Fifth Hour with
Ben Mallord podcast. The only advertising we have is word
of mouth advertising. Other than moving man Matt, who's got
the Mallard logo on the back of his big rig.
Outside of that, uh there's no no real advertising. Maybe
(01:29):
there's a few feud of food i'ms but nothing, nothing massive,
nothing massive. So on the podcast this week, we've talked
to professional athletes, we have talked to random figures, some politically.
We had a chef on the podcast. But we are
going to go back, way back in the history of
(01:51):
the Ben Mallor Show to another one of my radio friends.
So far back that this guy made a surprising appearance
on our show, Danny G. Radio. He returned that Cooper
Loop was away, took a couple of days off, was
in Vegas and Danny G, who was my engineer slash
(02:14):
producer for a number of years on the Overnight Show.
After Jake Warner left. We had Jacon a couple of
weeks back, and so we had Danny G fill in
for Cooper Loop, and I thought, you know, let's we
didn't give Danny enough time. We had Tinderroni tips. We
brought tinder Rooni tips back, but still a little deeper dive.
(02:36):
And Danny has had a very interesting life in radio.
He's actually been in the radio business. He started a
younger age then I did. I started when I was nineteen.
Danny was still in high school when he started on radio.
He made the the plunge, the leap frog from music
radio to sports talk radio. And I had a great
(02:59):
time working with Dan any on the show. We had
a lot of fun in those days. We hung out
together at a minor league baseball game. Some of the
some of the things we did off the air, occasionally
ugly sweater parties and things like that that popped up.
But let's give it up now for the man, the myth,
the legend, the great Danny g Radio back on with
(03:24):
us here this week he was on the radio show.
Now he's on the podcast, and so Danny, let's cut
right to the chase here. How weird was it for you?
How odd was it to be back on the Ben
Mallard Show after several years away? You know, frightfully, it
was actually not weird to be back at all. I like, well,
(03:48):
it felt like a time machine a little bit because
some of the same regular Mallard militia members were calling
the show, so in a way I felt right at
home like I had never left. It was a little weird, though,
because my legs were aching as I walked into the
studio because of some long work days recently, so maybe
I feel a little older, but uh, mentally it was
(04:10):
good and the show was really fun and entertaining as usual. Yeah,
it was great to have you back, Danny. I I
I was. I was pleasantly surprised. I knew Coop was
going to take a couple of days off to go
to Vegas and then to have you back back in
the saddle again. How many I'm very bad at dates, Danny,
I'm very bad at days. How many years ago? You
(04:31):
were with Clay for a while. When when was your
last time on our show, Because it's been at least
two or three years, right, it's been maybe longer than that. Yeah,
there's there was a little bit of overlap between the
two shows, so I think that's why the math is
confusing for myself as well. But I started with you
(04:52):
at the end of and obviously back then the Date
Break guys were still on, so I would produce your
show and then co produce the Daybreak fellas. And then
obviously when Clay came aboard, which I guess was that's
when I was working on your show and his, and
(05:13):
then I moved to his time slot to be the
executive producer. I guess it was when that happened. Alright,
So but that's three years ago. Now that's it's time.
It's time flying by for you, as it is me
as I I don't think I'm that old, but then
I realized, my god, I'm becoming old. What happened? Time
(05:36):
flies when you're not part of a union and you're
getting screwed left and right. Yeah, you ain't kid moment.
You ain't kid moment. It's uh. It is an interesting, wacky,
wacky world, man, And I especially just the radio life
in general, you know, just like the daily radio thing.
But I think that's true probably for any job. I
(05:57):
don't know that it's any different in a different, different
gig than radio. But you've been in radio your whole
life too, so you know, you know the daily grind
and what that's like, and it's a it's a weird thing.
But I wanted to ask you about going from the
Overnight show. We do things a little goofy on the Overnight,
as you know, Danny, because you were part of the
(06:18):
show for so many years, and then you work with
Clay and Clay's a sports guy, but he's also a
political guy. And how weird was that when you know,
you know, Clay's ending up as a topic of conversation
on CNN or something like that, and you're working with
him and you know, some polarizing story and Clay's right
in the middle of it and you're in that world.
(06:39):
What was that like for you? It definitely was a
little bit of an adjustment period, although I kind of
went in knowing, uh, some of the ramifications, if you will,
of being um, you know, so well tied to a
program like that. In fact, when I interviewed too officially
(07:00):
get that, executive production gig our boss Scott Shapiro told
me he was like, hey, you know, whatever Clay's big
opinion is on something, especially if it means political, you're
gonna kind of be dragged into that and people are
gonna assume you feel the same exact way. Are you
okay with that? And you know, really I didn't have
a problem with that because I did get to speak, uh,
(07:23):
you know, somewhat as a co host on that show.
So if I disagreed with Clay the same way when
I was on your show, if I disagreed, I got
to say something about it, and I got to tell
him that I disagreed. So you know, I was fine
if some average casual listener would just assume something then
you know whatever, that's on them. But are regular listeners,
(07:44):
which we have a lot of, they kind of know
all the different personalities and they don't think we're all
the same robot. Yeah. Well, but there's also those you know,
as you you know, there's those vultures out there that
are just looking for anything they can you know, they
can blow up on that, you know, social media, anything
you say, especially on a show like that, they just
(08:05):
they just run with it and and make it much
bigger than it is. And that's one thing that the
difference between like sports for me and political and the
last couple of years we've had to dabble in that world,
even on on the Overnight Show. But the difference is
the amount of victriol. Like we have a lot of
sports hate and people get upset because you have a
(08:25):
bad sports opinion. But political, I mean that is a
personal assault, Danny g Right, I mean, that's a that
is just they want to rip your guts out because
you had an opinion that does not fit with their
ideology or their dogma or whatever. And it's pretty pretty crazy.
What was the coolest thing that happened? Was it the
(08:46):
Trump thing where you got to talk to a sitting
president as a producer of of Clay show and is
working on that show. Yeah, I would say that the
two most memorable guests were the India most famous tiger hunter,
which Clay gave us a challenge on the air because
there was a big story that went viral about this
(09:08):
guy in India who was hired by their government to
kill the you know, the biggest threats there in their
country as far as the man eating lions, tigers, lions, jaguars,
whatever they were dealing with there that were, you know,
the animals terrorizing villages there, and this guy, uh there.
There were some magazine outlets and websites to his stories
(09:30):
on this guy because he was so interesting, and Clay
read a story about him on one of our animal
thunderdomes and he gave us a challenge. He's like, any
of you in l a back in Nashville and anyone
producing this show, if any of you can track this
guy down and actually get him on my show, you
know you're gonna get a major reward. And he kind
(09:51):
of laughed, and you think in a way. He was
joking because he didn't think we could actually track this
guy down in India. But one thing about me, and
you know us, because we've worked together a long time,
I'm pretty competitive. Uh. If somebody gives me a challenge,
I'm gonna go all out to try to meet that challenge.
So I immediately started researching, you know, the Internet, finding
(10:14):
out who this guy was, who his management was, what
kind of phone numbers there was. I I tracked it
down within an hour. I found a website that this
guy was attached to. Within the second hour of the show,
I found his uh, his field manager in India, and
by the end of that day's show, I was talking
to his manager through email. By the next day on
(10:37):
the program, I was able to get him on us. Uh,
they're one of their SAT phones out there in India.
And he got on the air with Clay that day.
And as if that wasn't cool enough, this guy was
an amazing interview of his His accent kind of sealed
the deal. But he was just super entertaining and all
(10:57):
the information he was giving us about the guns he carried,
what kind of AMMO, his kills in the past, and
what he was doing out there was just so amazing
it it literally rocks Twitter to the point where I
could not keep up with the mentions. And you know
that's for you. You have so many hundreds of thousands
(11:18):
of listeners and followers that you've probably done this in
the past in your career where you did something kind
of controversial or you had to take that really exploded.
But being a producer, it's not every day where you
get so many notifications about something you did that you
can't keep up with all the mentions. Yeah, that's cool,
(11:38):
I actually remember that. And uh, I did I love
the animal Thunderdome that that they did on you guys
did on that show. And animals one thing I've noticed
from years in radio. People love stories about animals. They
love that, right, It's especially when death is involved. Yeah,
when you make death and wild animals. And it is
(12:00):
crazy when you go to you know here in the
in the South, when you go to Florida or South
Carolina or somewhere like that, and you know, these these
massive dinosaurs, these alligators walking around, you know, amongst us
and things like that. But and then you know, outside
of America, as you guys on that show with all
the wild animal stories with tigers and hippos and you
(12:20):
name it. It's it's pretty pretty crazy, man. What was
the crazy was that? That was the greatest. Guess what
was the craziest animal story that you dug up? Did
you remember off the top of your It? Is there
one that stands out? There is? Yeah, one a couple
of years ago. If it happened in Alaska, and it
was actually a guy who was known for composing albums
(12:43):
with nature sounds, and he had an assistant too that
would go out to the field with him and they
would camp and he would set up his audio gear
and he would record nature sounds and he unfortunately was
was dragged out of his tent or there. There was
controversy surrounding what exactly happened to this guy and how
(13:07):
a bear was able to get them and um, and
so there were different stories that were At first it
was two assistants with them, and then it was only one.
Nothing happened to the assistance only he died. So we
were like, well, how did they not hear him being
dragged out of his tent? You know what I mean?
And and so I actually contacted their their version of
(13:31):
CNN out out and so that, you know what, not Alaska,
my bad, this was Canada. So I I actually got
ahold of their version of CNN out there and was
was able to talk to a reporter that was covering
the story, and you know what, she was tight lipped
about it too. She it was kind of like you
pesky Americans, you don't believe what we're reporting. And Clay
(13:54):
had lots of questions about the story because it didn't
add up, It didn't make a lot of sense the
way it was being reported. So we spent a good
week or two kind of keeping track of that story
and the moves surrounding it. And um, that one really
stands out because to this day, I still have not
gotten a straight answer from that reporter the TV station.
(14:16):
I talked to all the people we got in contact with,
and I think that that was one of the intriguing
things about the animal Thunderdome and still is is you
you want more details? Uh? You know, nowadays reporting is
not what it used to be, so you'll, you know,
you'll sometimes see stories where you still have a lot
of questions after you read the article. Yeah, yeah, well exactly,
(14:40):
because it's not about detail. The attention span they've determined
years ago, and and when I was doing Ben Mallard
dot com in those old days, and and just putting
little blurbs up. And it's even worse now because of
social media. Like you just you don't read anything more
than at the most two paragraphs on any story. There's
(15:00):
really no point in if you're in that business of
publishing stuff, why are you gonna why are you going
to publish a long story when it's not gonna be
read other than the first couple of paragraphs. People just
want bullet points. But you but you are obviously right,
I mean you want yeah, occasionally want more information. They
copy and paste then, Like there were times where a
(15:21):
news outlet would get something wrong. Later we'd find out
what really happened, or we see a better written article.
But so many of the outlets ran with the first
thing that was reported that they just copy and pasted,
and they never even um, you know, they never even
went back and corrected what they reported. And you see
a lot of that nowadays. Yeah. Absolutely, And but part
(15:44):
of the deal also is it's the echo chamber, right,
It's not. There's only here's the way I look at it.
Social media. There's only a few people creating original content,
and then there's just a lot of people repeating, you know,
the echo chamber, repeating the same stuff off, repackaging it
and putting it all over the place. And so that's
(16:05):
it seems like there's a lot more possibilities to get content,
but a lot of it's just the same stuff regurgitated
and all that. I got an email from Yo Yo
mob Benny. He said the headline, this is Barry. Barry's
in Nashville. He's a huge fan of yours. Then he
wanted you on this podcast and he wanted he had
some questions that he wanted and I'm Barry has been
(16:27):
a big fan of the Overnight Show for a while,
and so he wanted it all like like a little
behind the scenes inside radio stuff. So you're working for
Clay Rush. Limbaugh is sick. Rushi had been sick for
several years. He had been in poor health, diagnosed with cancer.
And then Russ Rush ends up passing away. And so Clay,
(16:49):
Clay's in the running to get the gig, and you're
working on Clay show. He's doing a sports show. So
what's going on behind the scenes. How soon did you
know that Clay was getting the the Rush Limbough job,
and uh, you know, also, were you in the running
to go and work on that and just leave and
do political stuff. Yeah, Well, to answer the first part
(17:13):
of that question, I didn't know much about what was
going on behind the scenes because at that time, there
were a lot of other things also happening simultaneously. Clay
had just sold his website, OutKick dot Com to Fox Corporation,
and so while all that was, that was kind of
at the forefront, and we were dealing with what was
(17:34):
going on with that, and Clay was adjusting his schedule
slightly to kind of, you know, make all that happen.
And as I was dealing with that, that's when I
got the news about, you know, him not returning to
Fox Sports Radio Network, and so it you know, it
was pretty sudden, um. But the explanation that was given
(17:57):
to me by our bosses was that they didn't want
to tell anyone, not even his producers, until his ink
was dry on the contract, because the way it was
explained to me is he obviously is good at talking politics,
but he wanted to stay in the sports world because
that's where all his stories originated and at heart, he's
a sports guy. But you know, they were able to
(18:21):
convince him that he could do even more of what
he wanted to do with a slightly larger audience if
he took over um or half took over Russia limboss chair.
So you know that's kind of how that all shook out. Um.
The timing was crazy with all of it, because, like
I said, so many different things we're already happening behind
(18:41):
the scenes. But once he decided, Okay, you know, I'm
gonna go ahead and do it, um man, it it
was like the next day, Hey, this is gonna be
the final show. So I sped over to the studios
and I put the best of together where I dug
back years and years to some of the highlights of
the show, and I worked an all night or uh
(19:03):
leading into his program um so that I had something
to play at the end of his show to say goodbye.
It was super quick, such a quick turnaround, and then
you know, I was told by the bosses, Hey, we're
gonna have you in place right now. Uh we either way,
you were a rock star for Clay. We need you
to do that again for the next show that's going
to try out and in my conversations with Clay, you
(19:26):
know he he obviously um, him and Buck Sexton took
over Russia's show. But the Rush Limbough show was already
in place as far as the producers and the phone
screener and the the guys back at their New York
studio and then what they set up in Nashville. It
wasn't like it was a brand new show from scratch
that Clay was, you know, the only person in charge
(19:47):
of so AY. I would have had to live in
New York or Nashville and be I do sports radio.
I I I gotta tell you. I mean, I don't
mind when politics get gets mixed in the sports a
little bit, especially if you open it up for everybody
to give their opinions about it. But as far as
doing political radio every day, um and and maybe you'd
(20:09):
agree with me on this, I don't know if I
could do that. I I love sports stories. I love sports.
I don't wake up every morning and check out what's
going on with Democrats and Republicans and party stuff on
either side. That's that's just not me. I I wake
up every morning and I checked sports scores and stats
and stories. So I'm a sports guy. Number one, it
(20:31):
would be really hard for me to do politics every day. Yeah,
you know it's always if the check was big enough, right,
if the check was big enough, you would you would
do it. But yeah, I love not for me, not
for me. But then, honestly, I've made good money in radio.
And I know that's kind of funny to say that
because we've we've both done this a long time, and
(20:53):
we hear horror stories about radio guys who died broke
uh and we've also you and I have met Steve
Harvey and other guys who have gotten rich from radio.
Uh And, and you and I met Rush Limbaugh that
morning because he used to work right across the hall
from us whenever he was in l A. Well, actually
I did not. I was. I have run of Russia's
(21:14):
pens because I got one of his pens, but I
I missed Russia. And and we for those that haven't
heard past podcast, we've told the story working Fox Sports
Radio is that the premier networks studios in l A.
And and I've been lucky enough to work there for
a long time, with the exception of six months in
(21:34):
twenty six days, and when Rush would come in it
was unreal. They'd roll out literally the red carpet he has.
He had his own studio right across from the Fox
Sports radio studios. He you know, they and he'd only
be in l A maybe once or twice a year,
and his whole professional better studio than we have, and uh,
(21:57):
you know, we're there, you know, three five days a year,
pre COVID and uh yeah, and it was it was crazy,
and it's just everyone was on their best behavior and
it was like everything was planned out when Rush would
get there. But yeah, it's been pretty cool. We've met
some really need people over the years. I remember the
old days. I had a chance at one of the
(22:18):
Christmas parties back when we had Christmas parties to meet
Art Bell was there, Matt Drudge did a show for Premier,
met him and Dr Laura And these are some big
radio stars. If you're a radio nerd like us, Danny,
these are big names and radio right to be able
to schmooze with these radio people. And Jim Rome was
(22:39):
working for the company at the time and and all that,
and so uh A lot of people have also asked, Danny,
I mean, where are you at right now? Obviously you're
you filled in for our show. I know you're doing
some stuff on the weekend, so you're kinda you're kind
of bouncing all over the places. They try to, you know,
figure out what's next for you. Is that Would that
be an accurate portrayal of what's happening right now? Yeah?
(23:00):
It kind of ties into what we were talking about
there with you know, some people in radio not doing
great with money and others thinking a ton of it. Um.
You know, in my past, I was fortunate enough to
have a couple of hip hop stations that I built
or helped build, and they did really well and I
made a lot of good money. Of course I blew
(23:21):
most of that money in my twenties. But but then
to cross over to sports was a really cool experience.
You know. I went from hip hop to sports, and
from NBC Sports Radio, I went to your show, uh,
and then to Clay show and and so sports has
worked out. Uh. And so that's kind of the lane
I'm in now. And you know, when you say if
(23:43):
the check is big enough, you know to a certain point,
because if it's something you don't like, man, money is good,
you know, and I've had it and and I grew
up without it, but I was able to get it
at an early age. Um, you know, there's something to
be said on both side sides of it because you know,
obviously everyone always references Biggiemore money more problems, but it's
(24:06):
so true because when you find yourself in the middle
of something that's huge, uh, and everyone's making a ton
of dough off of it, it's great while it lasts,
but it's also it also takes years off your life.
You know, there's a price to be paid for it,
whether that's stress or ulcers or you know, like athletes
(24:27):
where they take some years off their life because of
what they do physically. Uh, there's something to be said
for having a peaceful life where you make enough money
to be comfortable, but you're not stressed out of your
mind and you you actually have good balance in a
life away from your job. So that that's what I've
been trying to figure out right now. After Clay Show
(24:47):
left and the new show took over, they brought in
their producer that they had on Sundays for Jonas and
Brady Quinn. Their longtime producer lead To Lap was able
to come along for the ride with them so that
they could start a brand new show fresh, and you know,
I have feelings about that where I'm like, well, I
(25:09):
did the hard work and I didn't do anything wrong,
So personally, I don't think I should have been moved.
But at the same time, it's radio. That kind of
stuff happens. So for me now, the challenges to find
the next Ben Mallar show or the next OutKick the coverage,
those shows don't come along every day, and that's the
hard part is, as you know, radio, a lot of
(25:31):
times it's a waiting game and you have to wait
it out and then things fall into place and then
the next the next journey begins. So right now, I
have just been hustling as much as I can to
pay the bills, and thank god I had a little
bit of money in the bank, and of course Clay
gave me of his Fox Corporation sale. I'm sure, I'm
(25:56):
sure he's still that was awesome. I mean I could
live off that money for years. I gave you some
of the limball money that he got, right and you know,
want of Russ one of the old gold microphones that
Rush left behind, you know, and all all that stuff.
But uh yeah, I just want to be you know,
we're at the point you're around my age day. We're similar,
and I'm like, I want to get to the point
where I don't have to worry about this payment and
(26:18):
that payment. You know, I want to be and I'm
still I'm still chasing a lot of stuff, you know,
I'm still chasing a lot of stuff financially. So I
just want to get to that point. I don't have
to be Steve Harvey Rich you know where I have
the you know, the houses here there and everywhere. Not
that I wouldn't mind that, but I'm I'm good. I
just you know, I'm wanna be okay. But as it,
what's the old saying, what's the yeah, comfortable? Comfortable without
(26:41):
TMZ chasing you around? Yeah, exactly. I don't want someone
like you know, It's just like Jim Rome. When Jim
Rome or Colin Cowherd sell their house, it ends up
in the l A Times real estate section. When I
I just move, nobody knows where I live, Nobody cares
where I live. You know. It's that, it's so the end.
Animity is a a good thing, for sure, but it's
(27:05):
you know, and I made some good money too, I mean,
I mean when we got into radio before the salary
structure went to hell in a handbasket back in the
nineties went you know, it's really a late nineties started
to change and then it just continually got worse and
worse as the years went on. But you know, I
(27:26):
don't know. You started radio younger than I did, though,
did he didn't you start? How old are you? How
old were you? I was fifteen, So I just celebrated
my thirtieth year in broadcasting. Wow. Yeah, So it's been
a wild ride. I mean, I I was. We had
a high school radio station where I was at and
I started there when I was in junior high. I
(27:48):
would I would walk after school to the high school
and the the electronics teacher was the dude leading that
little radio station. But it wasn't a little radio station,
which was the cool part. It had a lot of
wattage for a you know, a station like that. It
covered the entire city. So if you had a show
on that high school radio station, you actually had listeners.
(28:10):
It didn't just cover the parking lot of the campus. Um.
So my older brother and I we took advantage of that.
We played some good hip hop and R and B.
Music and read everybody's dedications and requests a couple of
times a week when we did the afternoon radio shows there. Uh.
And then I parlayed that into the college radio station
(28:31):
uh there in northern California where I was at and
did this really popular Friday night rap show. And then
at sixteen years old, I got my first commercial radio job,
working weekends at a big station in our city. Um.
And it was my first paycheck from radio. It was awesome, uh,
you know. And from there that I was already doing
(28:51):
it all through high school. So as soon as I graduated,
packed up my bags, moved to Ventura and built helped
build a big pop station that still stands with big
ratings there today. Uh So, now what a wild fun ride, um,
you know. And and that's the part, that's the part
I love about it, is just connecting with the listeners
(29:13):
and making an impact in the community that you're in.
In our case, it's a network, so we're all over
the world the country, and you know, we have listeners everywhere,
which is even more amazing. Um. So, if the paycheck
is good enough to just cover your bills and for
you to be comfortable, then the bottom line and from
what I found out in thirty years of doing this,
when you have unscripted moments on live radio and all
(29:37):
of us are trying to not laugh like the other night,
but we can't help it, and we just are interrupting
Eddie's update because uh, you know, we're all just laughing
and we can't stop. When the show is over, you're
on like a natural high. I guess that's the best
best way I can describe it. It's like you smoked
some good bud, but none of us are smoking. You know,
(29:58):
we're all sober. But when you do really good radio,
you are buzzing afterwards. It is like a natural high
because we know that we have listeners out there that
might be having a hard day, a hard morning, a
hard life, a hard month. But you are that moment,
that bright spot in their day where you actually make
them smile and laugh. And that is the best part
(30:20):
of radio. I completely agree with. I could not say
it better than you, Danny. And you know I started.
I was nineteen years old, so you have four more
years on me. Um. But that's the I get email
from people and being on the overnight show, and you
know this, when you worked on the show, we have
a lot of people that are sick, a lot of
people that have bad health, that are going through some
(30:42):
really dark times in their lives. And it is when
you're alone late at night and there's no one around,
it is so bad. I mean, he just wants someone
to talk to. You can't call anybody, you can't, I mean,
just by yourself. And I always love when I get
an email or something from somebody who said so and
(31:02):
so listen and every night they were sick, they had this,
that and the other thing going on with them and
they love the show, and um, it's great. And I
you know, not that you don't get that during the
day per se, but I think it's more of a
nighttime thing. I think during the day it's more of
the hustle and bustle, and there's people in the car
on the way to work or on the way home
from work or whatever. And we have people that listen
(31:23):
overnight that are working. But I think there's a lot
of people that are by themselves, whether it's in a
hospital or at home or just dealing with the crap
that life throws at you. And it is it's one
of the great powers of radio. And I think, yeah, well,
I'm biased. I'm sure you're biased to Danny is a
lifetime radio guy. But I don't think you get that
same sense from any form any other form of media.
(31:46):
It's just different. There's something about radio and just having
somebody talk to you, or listening to music. When you
worked in music radio, you know, I have somebody. It's
just a different animal than television, and even like the Internet.
I mean, the Internet is great and wonderful, and I
can spend hours on YouTube, which is basically just television
when you choose what you want to watch and all
that stuff. But it's something about radio to me that
(32:09):
and and I guess I'm archaic because I believe that.
But you were doing a podcast right now. I think
it's a similar thing with a podcast, it's not quite
the same. One of the magic things about radio is
you're actually like, we're there, we're live. There's another human
being alive that's on in the middle of the night,
you know. I think that was always the big selling
point I thought was that we're actually there, We're not recorded,
(32:29):
we're doing it live. Do it live right? Do it
like like phil O'Reilly said back back in the day. No,
you're you're you're you know, you're spot on with that,
because as a kid, uh, you know, there was some
some pretty can I curse on that show or yeah
it's a podcast, say whatever the funk you want there.
There was some pretty shitty things going on when I
(32:50):
was a little kid, um, you know, between my mom
and dad and divorce at a young age, and my
mom was displaced and for a while we didn't have
any where to it for a long while, we didn't
have anywhere to stay when we were in southern California,
and it it was a real ship show, to put
it lightly. But one thing I did have, and you
laugh at this, it was a G I Joe transistor
(33:13):
radio and it was hooked up to like one of
those uh walkie talkies, so it had a base and
then it had like the walkie talkie you could take
off of it to be mobile. On the base was
an a MFM radio and I listened to Vince Scully
on that thing every night. And yeah, I mean, he's
(33:33):
calling a baseball game. But I still thought that that
was my dude. I thought like I knew that guy.
You know, you might as well have been my grandpa.
And and I had that every night, no matter what
crap was going on in life, I could count on
him and I could count on that time with my radio,
and it was awesome. Man. And then when I got
(33:55):
into music, when I got a couple of years older,
there was k DY Radio with the early hip hop
in k Poo and San Francisco, which did a lot
of live mixed shows and played unedited versions of rap songs,
which was pretty amazing at that time. And I listened
to all of those live turntable mixes on that radio.
(34:16):
I listened to Vince s Guli on that radio, Bill
King calling Raider games on that radio, and it made
a huge impact in my life. And you know, that's
that's why radio is so important. It has played a
big part in just about everybody's life. Yeah, When when
I was a kid, my mom used to listen to
Coast to Coast with Art Bell and uh, you know,
(34:39):
late at night, and he sold one of his advertisers
was this radio antenna that you could get to get
you know, listen to far away radio stations. And I
was all in on that, you know, and I begged
my mom. I said, Mom, you gotta hook me up
with that thing. And finally she did. It was pretty
pricey at the time. I don't remember how much, but
probably by today standards it would be dirt cheap, but
(35:01):
it was. It was a pretty pricey thing. And I
got that, and man, I was like, you know, a
pig and slop. I was listening to. You know, being
in the West, it's not as cool as I'm here
on the East listening to far away radio stations you
can get everything. But I got k O A out
of Denver eight fifty. I I heard a station I
used to listen to Utah jazz games on eight seventy
(35:22):
out of St. George. I think it was maybe ninety.
It was a station out of St. George, Utah that
I listened to. I got Sons games out of six
twenty k T A R. I got a station out
of Seattle, which was like a news station. So I
like all this, like it was like awesome. I was like,
you know, that was before the internet. That we're old, Danny,
and that was like before the Internet. You could hear
(35:43):
these far away stations and all that, and uh and
it was radio nerd. I respect that. Yeah, I'm I
was full nerd. I was full radio geek. I had. Yeah. Uh,
any any regrets, Danny, any gig that you had that
you would have gotten that, you didn't get that? You said,
Oh man, I wish I had taken that, or you
(36:04):
not a look back guy. I wish I could say
I'm not a look back guy. But unfortunately I passed
up on a one hundred thousand dollar a year job
in Honolulu. Oh yeah, so I was. I was programming
k c a Q Ventura Santa Barbara in the late
(36:25):
nineties and the station just blew up in a major way.
I I had an ulcer, I had hemorrhoids. I was
bleeding out the mouth in the ass. I mean it
because ben I worked ninety hours. I literally had a
cot in my office there and the programming offices. I mean,
(36:45):
to make it be a monster, I had to turn
into a monster, if you know what I'm saying, And
I mean you, as a program director, you have to
will your station to victory. It's kind of like, you know,
being a quarterback with a broken leg the field and
they are limping you up and down the uh the field,
they have to carry you. But at this station, I
(37:06):
had a bunch of talent that was screen. I had
no budgets for promotions. I didn't have much to work with.
But what I did have was really really good music.
I had a large signal, so that was good um,
and so I was able to put it all together.
And it was the toughest challenge of my life at
the time and still looking back, probably the biggest challenge
(37:29):
I've ever had, besides that early stuff my mom went
through as a kid, and I drew on on those experiences,
though I'm like, you know what, I'm not scared of this.
I had worst crap go on in my life. So
I had bad stuff going on in my personal life.
But the radio station was doing really, really well. So
suddenly they were building over a million dollars a month
(37:51):
in advertising revenue, and they're they're in Ventura, which was
market one nine at the time, and they're now building
know tons of money. Just it turned into their cash
cow for that company. So they were giving me a
nice salary. But it caught the attention of some other
radio stations and some other groups, and so I got
(38:12):
a plane ticket sent to me from this radio group
in Honolulu. They flew me in, they interviewed me. But
you know, I'm in my twenties, and here at k
c a Q, I had control over everything. I get
to Honolulu and they're like, oh, this is our in
house you know consultant. This guy is the programmer to
(38:32):
the programmer, this guy is the you know this to that,
And so to get one song on the radio, I
would have had to go through like four different people.
And I was like, Ah, the money is good, it's Hawaii.
But but I wasn't ready to retire. I was just
getting started. Now. If somebody came to me now and
you know the equivalent of that now would be two
(38:53):
hundred thousand dollars in Hollolulu, that obviously I would go
move there tomorrow. But in my twins, with everything going
on in Southern California the way it was back then,
I actually turned the job off or down. I did
get a raise from that group. When I got back
from Honolulu. They wanted to lock me in, so they
gave me a raise and locked me into a contract.
(39:15):
So it did help with the long term success I
had there. But I still look back in fact, um
my girl and I we have a little three four
day trip planned to Hawaii at the end of November. Yeah,
and then this is something I planned, not smartly because
I didn't know the shakeup was gonna happen without Kick
(39:37):
the coverage and all that. So, you know, I planned
this a few months back, and then when my life
I turned up upside down. The first thing my girl
did was look at me and she's like, what about
our Hawaii trip? You know you gotta do it. You
know we're gonna go to Hawaii while you're unemployed, because
then you're really on the beach. Well, now you're you
(39:58):
are you didn't ask the bigger veal. We were all shocked.
We were talking about that last night actually, Danny the
other night on the show that you know, Danny g
I mean, we've known you forever and you know, you've
always been the bachelor guy, and now you're you're engaged,
which is outstanding. Congratulations on that. Now, would if you're
in Hawaii, where are you going to Honolulu? Are you
(40:19):
going to one of the other islands? So we're gonna
go to mah Yeah, yeah, we're gonna try to avoid people. Okay, Um,
so we're going to Maui. Okay, that's great. I recommend
I got married in Kawaii if you ever If that's
that's the garden. Hardly anyone there's like forty miles of roads.
That's it. It's all uh, it's all crazy. But I've
(40:40):
heard wonderful things about Maui. I've never been to Maui.
I've heard good things. But when you're there, are you gonna,
you know, knock on the doors of some radio stations,
Danny and see see what's going on? Where your Hawaiian
shirt and all that. Yeah, I live that dream again,
be like, hey, I'm ready for you now. No, I don't.
I don't think so. I think I'm in a good place,
um in southern California right now. Um. You know, I
(41:04):
was able to come to an agreement with Fox Sports
Radio Network to stay on and kind of kind of
float and produce the shows that need an executive producer,
which was how I got to fill in for Coop Um.
And so that's okay for the time being. I'm not
in a rush to rush into anything else right now.
And and you know, radio, Ben, if you don't have
(41:27):
friends inside the building, you're just really not going to
get a job at that radio station. Yeah. It's not
what you know, it's who you know. Is so Yeah,
unfortunate unfortunately. And the other thing that I hate about
this business, Danny, is when you're unemployed or whatever, when
you're nobody wants to talk to you, like it's like
(41:48):
you got or whatever, and they like you got COVID
and you're coughing exactly exactly, all right. I know you
gotta go, Danny, but listen, thanks for doing this. I
appreciate this, and it was fun catching up with you,
and yeah, for sure, man, I look forward to the
next time I'm on your show. And you know I
didn't tell I didn't tell you this when we ended
(42:09):
the show the other day. Man, I'm not I'm not
sure if Coop would give me the green light on
this or if you knew I did this, but I
give them. I gave away thirty seven Golden Chicks answering
the phones together night, So you guys have fun answering
those calls next to Yeah, I can't wait. I'm sure
you're giving all the blind Scott to that that the
lunatic anyway, have fun, all right, Thanks Danny, all right,
(42:33):
love you guys,
Ka boom. If you thought four hours a day, minutes
a week was enough, think again. He's the last remnants
of the old republic a sole fashion of fairness. He
treats crackheads in the ghetto cutter the same as the
rich pill poppers in the penthouse to clearing house of
hot takes, break free for something special. The Fifth Hour
(00:23):
with Ben Maller starts right now. Everywhere. Welcome into the
Friday Friday edition of the Fifth Hour with me Ben Maller,
flying solo today. It's Friday, Friday Friday. Because four hours
a night are not enough. On the overnight eight days
(00:45):
a week, eight days a week. We do this show
from the Mallard Podcast studio at a secret location somewhere
deep in the north Woods. And we thank you for
supporting the overnight show and finding this podcast. Tell a friend,
word of mouth. We have no advertising budget. You will
see no billboard, you will see no television commercial. There
(01:08):
will be no radio commercial for the Fifth Hour with
Ben Mallord podcast. The only advertising we have is word
of mouth advertising. Other than moving man Matt, who's got
the Mallard logo on the back of his big rig.
Outside of that, uh there's no no real advertising. Maybe
(01:29):
there's a few feud of food i'ms but nothing, nothing massive,
nothing massive. So on the podcast this week, we've talked
to professional athletes, we have talked to random figures, some politically.
We had a chef on the podcast. But we are
going to go back, way back in the history of
(01:51):
the Ben Mallor Show to another one of my radio friends.
So far back that this guy made a surprising appearance
on our show, Danny G. Radio. He returned that Cooper
Loop was away, took a couple of days off, was
in Vegas and Danny G, who was my engineer slash
(02:14):
producer for a number of years on the Overnight Show.
After Jake Warner left. We had Jacon a couple of
weeks back, and so we had Danny G fill in
for Cooper Loop, and I thought, you know, let's we
didn't give Danny enough time. We had Tinderroni tips. We
brought tinder Rooni tips back, but still a little deeper dive.
(02:36):
And Danny has had a very interesting life in radio.
He's actually been in the radio business. He started a
younger age then I did. I started when I was nineteen.
Danny was still in high school when he started on radio.
He made the the plunge, the leap frog from music
radio to sports talk radio. And I had a great
(02:59):
time working with Dan any on the show. We had
a lot of fun in those days. We hung out
together at a minor league baseball game. Some of the
some of the things we did off the air, occasionally
ugly sweater parties and things like that that popped up.
But let's give it up now for the man, the myth,
the legend, the great Danny g Radio back on with
(03:24):
us here this week he was on the radio show.
Now he's on the podcast, and so Danny, let's cut
right to the chase here. How weird was it for you?
How odd was it to be back on the Ben
Mallard Show after several years away? You know, frightfully, it
was actually not weird to be back at all. I like, well,
(03:48):
it felt like a time machine a little bit because
some of the same regular Mallard militia members were calling
the show, so in a way I felt right at
home like I had never left. It was a little weird, though,
because my legs were aching as I walked into the
studio because of some long work days recently, so maybe
I feel a little older, but uh, mentally it was
(04:10):
good and the show was really fun and entertaining as usual. Yeah,
it was great to have you back, Danny. I I
I was. I was pleasantly surprised. I knew Coop was
going to take a couple of days off to go
to Vegas and then to have you back back in
the saddle again. How many I'm very bad at dates, Danny,
I'm very bad at days. How many years ago? You
(04:31):
were with Clay for a while. When when was your
last time on our show, Because it's been at least
two or three years, right, it's been maybe longer than that. Yeah,
there's there was a little bit of overlap between the
two shows, so I think that's why the math is
confusing for myself as well. But I started with you
(04:52):
at the end of and obviously back then the Date
Break guys were still on, so I would produce your
show and then co produce the Daybreak fellas. And then
obviously when Clay came aboard, which I guess was that's
when I was working on your show and his, and
(05:13):
then I moved to his time slot to be the
executive producer. I guess it was when that happened. Alright,
So but that's three years ago. Now that's it's time.
It's time flying by for you, as it is me
as I I don't think I'm that old, but then
I realized, my god, I'm becoming old. What happened? Time
(05:36):
flies when you're not part of a union and you're
getting screwed left and right. Yeah, you ain't kid moment.
You ain't kid moment. It's uh. It is an interesting, wacky,
wacky world, man, And I especially just the radio life
in general, you know, just like the daily radio thing.
But I think that's true probably for any job. I
(05:57):
don't know that it's any different in a different, different
gig than radio. But you've been in radio your whole
life too, so you know, you know the daily grind
and what that's like, and it's a it's a weird thing.
But I wanted to ask you about going from the
Overnight show. We do things a little goofy on the Overnight,
as you know, Danny, because you were part of the
(06:18):
show for so many years, and then you work with
Clay and Clay's a sports guy, but he's also a
political guy. And how weird was that when you know,
you know, Clay's ending up as a topic of conversation
on CNN or something like that, and you're working with
him and you know, some polarizing story and Clay's right
in the middle of it and you're in that world.
(06:39):
What was that like for you? It definitely was a
little bit of an adjustment period, although I kind of
went in knowing, uh, some of the ramifications, if you will,
of being um, you know, so well tied to a
program like that. In fact, when I interviewed too officially
(07:00):
get that, executive production gig our boss Scott Shapiro told
me he was like, hey, you know, whatever Clay's big
opinion is on something, especially if it means political, you're
gonna kind of be dragged into that and people are
gonna assume you feel the same exact way. Are you
okay with that? And you know, really I didn't have
a problem with that because I did get to speak, uh,
(07:23):
you know, somewhat as a co host on that show.
So if I disagreed with Clay the same way when
I was on your show, if I disagreed, I got
to say something about it, and I got to tell
him that I disagreed. So you know, I was fine
if some average casual listener would just assume something then
you know whatever, that's on them. But are regular listeners,
(07:44):
which we have a lot of, they kind of know
all the different personalities and they don't think we're all
the same robot. Yeah. Well, but there's also those you know,
as you you know, there's those vultures out there that
are just looking for anything they can you know, they
can blow up on that, you know, social media, anything
you say, especially on a show like that, they just
(08:05):
they just run with it and and make it much
bigger than it is. And that's one thing that the
difference between like sports for me and political and the
last couple of years we've had to dabble in that world,
even on on the Overnight Show. But the difference is
the amount of victriol. Like we have a lot of
sports hate and people get upset because you have a
(08:25):
bad sports opinion. But political, I mean that is a
personal assault, Danny g Right, I mean, that's a that
is just they want to rip your guts out because
you had an opinion that does not fit with their
ideology or their dogma or whatever. And it's pretty pretty crazy.
What was the coolest thing that happened? Was it the
(08:46):
Trump thing where you got to talk to a sitting
president as a producer of of Clay show and is
working on that show. Yeah, I would say that the
two most memorable guests were the India most famous tiger hunter,
which Clay gave us a challenge on the air because
there was a big story that went viral about this
(09:08):
guy in India who was hired by their government to
kill the you know, the biggest threats there in their
country as far as the man eating lions, tigers, lions, jaguars,
whatever they were dealing with there that were, you know,
the animals terrorizing villages there, and this guy, uh there.
There were some magazine outlets and websites to his stories
(09:30):
on this guy because he was so interesting, and Clay
read a story about him on one of our animal
thunderdomes and he gave us a challenge. He's like, any
of you in l a back in Nashville and anyone
producing this show, if any of you can track this
guy down and actually get him on my show, you
know you're gonna get a major reward. And he kind
(09:51):
of laughed, and you think in a way. He was
joking because he didn't think we could actually track this
guy down in India. But one thing about me, and
you know us, because we've worked together a long time,
I'm pretty competitive. Uh. If somebody gives me a challenge,
I'm gonna go all out to try to meet that challenge.
So I immediately started researching, you know, the Internet, finding
(10:14):
out who this guy was, who his management was, what
kind of phone numbers there was. I I tracked it
down within an hour. I found a website that this
guy was attached to. Within the second hour of the show,
I found his uh, his field manager in India, and
by the end of that day's show, I was talking
to his manager through email. By the next day on
(10:37):
the program, I was able to get him on us. Uh,
they're one of their SAT phones out there in India.
And he got on the air with Clay that day.
And as if that wasn't cool enough, this guy was
an amazing interview of his His accent kind of sealed
the deal. But he was just super entertaining and all
(10:57):
the information he was giving us about the guns he carried,
what kind of AMMO, his kills in the past, and
what he was doing out there was just so amazing
it it literally rocks Twitter to the point where I
could not keep up with the mentions. And you know
that's for you. You have so many hundreds of thousands
(11:18):
of listeners and followers that you've probably done this in
the past in your career where you did something kind
of controversial or you had to take that really exploded.
But being a producer, it's not every day where you
get so many notifications about something you did that you
can't keep up with all the mentions. Yeah, that's cool,
(11:38):
I actually remember that. And uh, I did I love
the animal Thunderdome that that they did on you guys
did on that show. And animals one thing I've noticed
from years in radio. People love stories about animals. They
love that, right, It's especially when death is involved. Yeah,
when you make death and wild animals. And it is
(12:00):
crazy when you go to you know here in the
in the South, when you go to Florida or South
Carolina or somewhere like that, and you know, these these
massive dinosaurs, these alligators walking around, you know, amongst us
and things like that. But and then you know, outside
of America, as you guys on that show with all
the wild animal stories with tigers and hippos and you
(12:20):
name it. It's it's pretty pretty crazy, man. What was
the crazy was that? That was the greatest. Guess what
was the craziest animal story that you dug up? Did
you remember off the top of your It? Is there
one that stands out? There is? Yeah, one a couple
of years ago. If it happened in Alaska, and it
was actually a guy who was known for composing albums
(12:43):
with nature sounds, and he had an assistant too that
would go out to the field with him and they
would camp and he would set up his audio gear
and he would record nature sounds and he unfortunately was
was dragged out of his tent or there. There was
controversy surrounding what exactly happened to this guy and how
(13:07):
a bear was able to get them and um, and
so there were different stories that were At first it
was two assistants with them, and then it was only one.
Nothing happened to the assistance only he died. So we
were like, well, how did they not hear him being
dragged out of his tent? You know what I mean?
And and so I actually contacted their their version of
(13:31):
CNN out out and so that, you know what, not Alaska,
my bad, this was Canada. So I I actually got
ahold of their version of CNN out there and was
was able to talk to a reporter that was covering
the story, and you know what, she was tight lipped
about it too. She it was kind of like you
pesky Americans, you don't believe what we're reporting. And Clay
(13:54):
had lots of questions about the story because it didn't
add up, It didn't make a lot of sense the
way it was being reported. So we spent a good
week or two kind of keeping track of that story
and the moves surrounding it. And um, that one really
stands out because to this day, I still have not
gotten a straight answer from that reporter the TV station.
(14:16):
I talked to all the people we got in contact with,
and I think that that was one of the intriguing
things about the animal Thunderdome and still is is you
you want more details? Uh? You know, nowadays reporting is
not what it used to be, so you'll, you know,
you'll sometimes see stories where you still have a lot
of questions after you read the article. Yeah, yeah, well exactly,
(14:40):
because it's not about detail. The attention span they've determined
years ago, and and when I was doing Ben Mallard
dot com in those old days, and and just putting
little blurbs up. And it's even worse now because of
social media. Like you just you don't read anything more
than at the most two paragraphs on any story. There's
(15:00):
really no point in if you're in that business of
publishing stuff, why are you gonna why are you going
to publish a long story when it's not gonna be
read other than the first couple of paragraphs. People just
want bullet points. But you but you are obviously right,
I mean you want yeah, occasionally want more information. They
copy and paste then, Like there were times where a
(15:21):
news outlet would get something wrong. Later we'd find out
what really happened, or we see a better written article.
But so many of the outlets ran with the first
thing that was reported that they just copy and pasted,
and they never even um, you know, they never even
went back and corrected what they reported. And you see
a lot of that nowadays. Yeah. Absolutely, And but part
(15:44):
of the deal also is it's the echo chamber, right,
It's not. There's only here's the way I look at it.
Social media. There's only a few people creating original content,
and then there's just a lot of people repeating, you know,
the echo chamber, repeating the same stuff off, repackaging it
and putting it all over the place. And so that's
(16:05):
it seems like there's a lot more possibilities to get content,
but a lot of it's just the same stuff regurgitated
and all that. I got an email from Yo Yo
mob Benny. He said the headline, this is Barry. Barry's
in Nashville. He's a huge fan of yours. Then he
wanted you on this podcast and he wanted he had
some questions that he wanted and I'm Barry has been
(16:27):
a big fan of the Overnight Show for a while,
and so he wanted it all like like a little
behind the scenes inside radio stuff. So you're working for
Clay Rush. Limbaugh is sick. Rushi had been sick for
several years. He had been in poor health, diagnosed with cancer.
And then Russ Rush ends up passing away. And so Clay,
(16:49):
Clay's in the running to get the gig, and you're
working on Clay show. He's doing a sports show. So
what's going on behind the scenes. How soon did you
know that Clay was getting the the Rush Limbough job,
and uh, you know, also, were you in the running
to go and work on that and just leave and
do political stuff. Yeah, Well, to answer the first part
(17:13):
of that question, I didn't know much about what was
going on behind the scenes because at that time, there
were a lot of other things also happening simultaneously. Clay
had just sold his website, OutKick dot Com to Fox Corporation,
and so while all that was, that was kind of
at the forefront, and we were dealing with what was
(17:34):
going on with that, and Clay was adjusting his schedule
slightly to kind of, you know, make all that happen.
And as I was dealing with that, that's when I
got the news about, you know, him not returning to
Fox Sports Radio Network, and so it you know, it
was pretty sudden, um. But the explanation that was given
(17:57):
to me by our bosses was that they didn't want
to tell anyone, not even his producers, until his ink
was dry on the contract, because the way it was
explained to me is he obviously is good at talking politics,
but he wanted to stay in the sports world because
that's where all his stories originated and at heart, he's
a sports guy. But you know, they were able to
(18:21):
convince him that he could do even more of what
he wanted to do with a slightly larger audience if
he took over um or half took over Russia limboss chair.
So you know that's kind of how that all shook out. Um.
The timing was crazy with all of it, because, like
I said, so many different things we're already happening behind
(18:41):
the scenes. But once he decided, Okay, you know, I'm
gonna go ahead and do it, um man, it it
was like the next day, Hey, this is gonna be
the final show. So I sped over to the studios
and I put the best of together where I dug
back years and years to some of the highlights of
the show, and I worked an all night or uh
(19:03):
leading into his program um so that I had something
to play at the end of his show to say goodbye.
It was super quick, such a quick turnaround, and then
you know, I was told by the bosses, Hey, we're
gonna have you in place right now. Uh we either way,
you were a rock star for Clay. We need you
to do that again for the next show that's going
to try out and in my conversations with Clay, you
(19:26):
know he he obviously um, him and Buck Sexton took
over Russia's show. But the Rush Limbough show was already
in place as far as the producers and the phone
screener and the the guys back at their New York
studio and then what they set up in Nashville. It
wasn't like it was a brand new show from scratch
that Clay was, you know, the only person in charge
(19:47):
of so AY. I would have had to live in
New York or Nashville and be I do sports radio.
I I I gotta tell you. I mean, I don't
mind when politics get gets mixed in the sports a
little bit, especially if you open it up for everybody
to give their opinions about it. But as far as
doing political radio every day, um and and maybe you'd
(20:09):
agree with me on this, I don't know if I
could do that. I I love sports stories. I love sports.
I don't wake up every morning and check out what's
going on with Democrats and Republicans and party stuff on
either side. That's that's just not me. I I wake
up every morning and I checked sports scores and stats
and stories. So I'm a sports guy. Number one, it
(20:31):
would be really hard for me to do politics every day. Yeah,
you know it's always if the check was big enough, right,
if the check was big enough, you would you would
do it. But yeah, I love not for me, not
for me. But then, honestly, I've made good money in radio.
And I know that's kind of funny to say that
because we've we've both done this a long time, and
(20:53):
we hear horror stories about radio guys who died broke
uh and we've also you and I have met Steve
Harvey and other guys who have gotten rich from radio.
Uh And, and you and I met Rush Limbaugh that
morning because he used to work right across the hall
from us whenever he was in l A. Well, actually
I did not. I was. I have run of Russia's
(21:14):
pens because I got one of his pens, but I
I missed Russia. And and we for those that haven't
heard past podcast, we've told the story working Fox Sports
Radio is that the premier networks studios in l A.
And and I've been lucky enough to work there for
a long time, with the exception of six months in
(21:34):
twenty six days, and when Rush would come in it
was unreal. They'd roll out literally the red carpet he has.
He had his own studio right across from the Fox
Sports radio studios. He you know, they and he'd only
be in l A maybe once or twice a year,
and his whole professional better studio than we have, and uh,
(21:57):
you know, we're there, you know, three five days a year,
pre COVID and uh yeah, and it was it was crazy,
and it's just everyone was on their best behavior and
it was like everything was planned out when Rush would
get there. But yeah, it's been pretty cool. We've met
some really need people over the years. I remember the
old days. I had a chance at one of the
(22:18):
Christmas parties back when we had Christmas parties to meet
Art Bell was there, Matt Drudge did a show for Premier,
met him and Dr Laura And these are some big
radio stars. If you're a radio nerd like us, Danny,
these are big names and radio right to be able
to schmooze with these radio people. And Jim Rome was
(22:39):
working for the company at the time and and all that,
and so uh A lot of people have also asked, Danny,
I mean, where are you at right now? Obviously you're
you filled in for our show. I know you're doing
some stuff on the weekend, so you're kinda you're kind
of bouncing all over the places. They try to, you know,
figure out what's next for you. Is that Would that
be an accurate portrayal of what's happening right now? Yeah?
(23:00):
It kind of ties into what we were talking about
there with you know, some people in radio not doing
great with money and others thinking a ton of it. Um.
You know, in my past, I was fortunate enough to
have a couple of hip hop stations that I built
or helped build, and they did really well and I
made a lot of good money. Of course I blew
(23:21):
most of that money in my twenties. But but then
to cross over to sports was a really cool experience.
You know. I went from hip hop to sports, and
from NBC Sports Radio, I went to your show, uh,
and then to Clay show and and so sports has
worked out. Uh. And so that's kind of the lane
I'm in now. And you know, when you say if
(23:43):
the check is big enough, you know to a certain point,
because if it's something you don't like, man, money is good,
you know, and I've had it and and I grew
up without it, but I was able to get it
at an early age. Um, you know, there's something to
be said on both side sides of it because you know,
obviously everyone always references Biggiemore money more problems, but it's
(24:06):
so true because when you find yourself in the middle
of something that's huge, uh, and everyone's making a ton
of dough off of it, it's great while it lasts,
but it's also it also takes years off your life.
You know, there's a price to be paid for it,
whether that's stress or ulcers or you know, like athletes
(24:27):
where they take some years off their life because of
what they do physically. Uh, there's something to be said
for having a peaceful life where you make enough money
to be comfortable, but you're not stressed out of your
mind and you you actually have good balance in a
life away from your job. So that that's what I've
been trying to figure out right now. After Clay Show
(24:47):
left and the new show took over, they brought in
their producer that they had on Sundays for Jonas and
Brady Quinn. Their longtime producer lead To Lap was able
to come along for the ride with them so that
they could start a brand new show fresh, and you know,
I have feelings about that where I'm like, well, I
(25:09):
did the hard work and I didn't do anything wrong,
So personally, I don't think I should have been moved.
But at the same time, it's radio. That kind of
stuff happens. So for me now, the challenges to find
the next Ben Mallar show or the next OutKick the coverage,
those shows don't come along every day, and that's the
hard part is, as you know, radio, a lot of
(25:31):
times it's a waiting game and you have to wait
it out and then things fall into place and then
the next the next journey begins. So right now, I
have just been hustling as much as I can to
pay the bills, and thank god I had a little
bit of money in the bank, and of course Clay
gave me of his Fox Corporation sale. I'm sure, I'm
(25:56):
sure he's still that was awesome. I mean I could
live off that money for years. I gave you some
of the limball money that he got, right and you know,
want of Russ one of the old gold microphones that
Rush left behind, you know, and all all that stuff.
But uh yeah, I just want to be you know,
we're at the point you're around my age day. We're similar,
and I'm like, I want to get to the point
where I don't have to worry about this payment and
(26:18):
that payment. You know, I want to be and I'm
still I'm still chasing a lot of stuff, you know,
I'm still chasing a lot of stuff financially. So I
just want to get to that point. I don't have
to be Steve Harvey Rich you know where I have
the you know, the houses here there and everywhere. Not
that I wouldn't mind that, but I'm I'm good. I
just you know, I'm wanna be okay. But as it,
what's the old saying, what's the yeah, comfortable? Comfortable without
(26:41):
TMZ chasing you around? Yeah, exactly. I don't want someone
like you know, It's just like Jim Rome. When Jim
Rome or Colin Cowherd sell their house, it ends up
in the l A Times real estate section. When I
I just move, nobody knows where I live, Nobody cares
where I live. You know. It's that, it's so the end.
Animity is a a good thing, for sure, but it's
(27:05):
you know, and I made some good money too, I mean,
I mean when we got into radio before the salary
structure went to hell in a handbasket back in the
nineties went you know, it's really a late nineties started
to change and then it just continually got worse and
worse as the years went on. But you know, I
(27:26):
don't know. You started radio younger than I did, though,
did he didn't you start? How old are you? How
old were you? I was fifteen, So I just celebrated
my thirtieth year in broadcasting. Wow. Yeah, So it's been
a wild ride. I mean, I I was. We had
a high school radio station where I was at and
I started there when I was in junior high. I
(27:48):
would I would walk after school to the high school
and the the electronics teacher was the dude leading that
little radio station. But it wasn't a little radio station,
which was the cool part. It had a lot of
wattage for a you know, a station like that. It
covered the entire city. So if you had a show
on that high school radio station, you actually had listeners.
(28:10):
It didn't just cover the parking lot of the campus. Um.
So my older brother and I we took advantage of that.
We played some good hip hop and R and B.
Music and read everybody's dedications and requests a couple of
times a week when we did the afternoon radio shows there. Uh.
And then I parlayed that into the college radio station
(28:31):
uh there in northern California where I was at and
did this really popular Friday night rap show. And then
at sixteen years old, I got my first commercial radio job,
working weekends at a big station in our city. Um.
And it was my first paycheck from radio. It was awesome, uh,
you know. And from there that I was already doing
(28:51):
it all through high school. So as soon as I graduated,
packed up my bags, moved to Ventura and built helped
build a big pop station that still stands with big
ratings there today. Uh So, now what a wild fun ride, um,
you know. And and that's the part, that's the part
I love about it, is just connecting with the listeners
(29:13):
and making an impact in the community that you're in.
In our case, it's a network, so we're all over
the world the country, and you know, we have listeners everywhere,
which is even more amazing. Um. So, if the paycheck
is good enough to just cover your bills and for
you to be comfortable, then the bottom line and from
what I found out in thirty years of doing this,
when you have unscripted moments on live radio and all
(29:37):
of us are trying to not laugh like the other night,
but we can't help it, and we just are interrupting
Eddie's update because uh, you know, we're all just laughing
and we can't stop. When the show is over, you're
on like a natural high. I guess that's the best
best way I can describe it. It's like you smoked
some good bud, but none of us are smoking. You know,
(29:58):
we're all sober. But when you do really good radio,
you are buzzing afterwards. It is like a natural high
because we know that we have listeners out there that
might be having a hard day, a hard morning, a
hard life, a hard month. But you are that moment,
that bright spot in their day where you actually make
them smile and laugh. And that is the best part
(30:20):
of radio. I completely agree with. I could not say
it better than you, Danny. And you know I started.
I was nineteen years old, so you have four more
years on me. Um. But that's the I get email
from people and being on the overnight show, and you
know this, when you worked on the show, we have
a lot of people that are sick, a lot of
people that have bad health, that are going through some
(30:42):
really dark times in their lives. And it is when
you're alone late at night and there's no one around,
it is so bad. I mean, he just wants someone
to talk to. You can't call anybody, you can't, I mean,
just by yourself. And I always love when I get
an email or something from somebody who said so and
(31:02):
so listen and every night they were sick, they had this,
that and the other thing going on with them and
they love the show, and um, it's great. And I
you know, not that you don't get that during the
day per se, but I think it's more of a
nighttime thing. I think during the day it's more of
the hustle and bustle, and there's people in the car
on the way to work or on the way home
from work or whatever. And we have people that listen
(31:23):
overnight that are working. But I think there's a lot
of people that are by themselves, whether it's in a
hospital or at home or just dealing with the crap
that life throws at you. And it is it's one
of the great powers of radio. And I think, yeah, well,
I'm biased. I'm sure you're biased to Danny is a
lifetime radio guy. But I don't think you get that
same sense from any form any other form of media.
(31:46):
It's just different. There's something about radio and just having
somebody talk to you, or listening to music. When you
worked in music radio, you know, I have somebody. It's
just a different animal than television, and even like the Internet.
I mean, the Internet is great and wonderful, and I
can spend hours on YouTube, which is basically just television
when you choose what you want to watch and all
that stuff. But it's something about radio to me that
(32:09):
and and I guess I'm archaic because I believe that.
But you were doing a podcast right now. I think
it's a similar thing with a podcast, it's not quite
the same. One of the magic things about radio is
you're actually like, we're there, we're live. There's another human
being alive that's on in the middle of the night,
you know. I think that was always the big selling
point I thought was that we're actually there, We're not recorded,
(32:29):
we're doing it live. Do it live right? Do it
like like phil O'Reilly said back back in the day. No,
you're you're you're you know, you're spot on with that,
because as a kid, uh, you know, there was some
some pretty can I curse on that show or yeah
it's a podcast, say whatever the funk you want there.
There was some pretty shitty things going on when I
(32:50):
was a little kid, um, you know, between my mom
and dad and divorce at a young age, and my
mom was displaced and for a while we didn't have
any where to it for a long while, we didn't
have anywhere to stay when we were in southern California,
and it it was a real ship show, to put
it lightly. But one thing I did have, and you
laugh at this, it was a G I Joe transistor
(33:13):
radio and it was hooked up to like one of
those uh walkie talkies, so it had a base and
then it had like the walkie talkie you could take
off of it to be mobile. On the base was
an a MFM radio and I listened to Vince Scully
on that thing every night. And yeah, I mean, he's
(33:33):
calling a baseball game. But I still thought that that
was my dude. I thought like I knew that guy.
You know, you might as well have been my grandpa.
And and I had that every night, no matter what
crap was going on in life, I could count on
him and I could count on that time with my radio,
and it was awesome. Man. And then when I got
(33:55):
into music, when I got a couple of years older,
there was k DY Radio with the early hip hop
in k Poo and San Francisco, which did a lot
of live mixed shows and played unedited versions of rap songs,
which was pretty amazing at that time. And I listened
to all of those live turntable mixes on that radio.
(34:16):
I listened to Vince s Guli on that radio, Bill
King calling Raider games on that radio, and it made
a huge impact in my life. And you know, that's
that's why radio is so important. It has played a
big part in just about everybody's life. Yeah, When when
I was a kid, my mom used to listen to
Coast to Coast with Art Bell and uh, you know,
(34:39):
late at night, and he sold one of his advertisers
was this radio antenna that you could get to get
you know, listen to far away radio stations. And I
was all in on that, you know, and I begged
my mom. I said, Mom, you gotta hook me up
with that thing. And finally she did. It was pretty
pricey at the time. I don't remember how much, but
probably by today standards it would be dirt cheap, but
(35:01):
it was. It was a pretty pricey thing. And I
got that, and man, I was like, you know, a
pig and slop. I was listening to. You know, being
in the West, it's not as cool as I'm here
on the East listening to far away radio stations you
can get everything. But I got k O A out
of Denver eight fifty. I I heard a station I
used to listen to Utah jazz games on eight seventy
(35:22):
out of St. George. I think it was maybe ninety.
It was a station out of St. George, Utah that
I listened to. I got Sons games out of six
twenty k T A R. I got a station out
of Seattle, which was like a news station. So I
like all this, like it was like awesome. I was like,
you know, that was before the internet. That we're old, Danny,
and that was like before the Internet. You could hear
(35:43):
these far away stations and all that, and uh and
it was radio nerd. I respect that. Yeah, I'm I
was full nerd. I was full radio geek. I had. Yeah. Uh,
any any regrets, Danny, any gig that you had that
you would have gotten that, you didn't get that? You said,
Oh man, I wish I had taken that, or you
(36:04):
not a look back guy. I wish I could say
I'm not a look back guy. But unfortunately I passed
up on a one hundred thousand dollar a year job
in Honolulu. Oh yeah, so I was. I was programming
k c a Q Ventura Santa Barbara in the late
(36:25):
nineties and the station just blew up in a major way.
I I had an ulcer, I had hemorrhoids. I was
bleeding out the mouth in the ass. I mean it
because ben I worked ninety hours. I literally had a
cot in my office there and the programming offices. I mean,
(36:45):
to make it be a monster, I had to turn
into a monster, if you know what I'm saying, And
I mean you, as a program director, you have to
will your station to victory. It's kind of like, you know,
being a quarterback with a broken leg the field and
they are limping you up and down the uh the field,
they have to carry you. But at this station, I
(37:06):
had a bunch of talent that was screen. I had
no budgets for promotions. I didn't have much to work with.
But what I did have was really really good music.
I had a large signal, so that was good um,
and so I was able to put it all together.
And it was the toughest challenge of my life at
the time and still looking back, probably the biggest challenge
(37:29):
I've ever had, besides that early stuff my mom went
through as a kid, and I drew on on those experiences,
though I'm like, you know what, I'm not scared of this.
I had worst crap go on in my life. So
I had bad stuff going on in my personal life.
But the radio station was doing really, really well. So
suddenly they were building over a million dollars a month
(37:51):
in advertising revenue, and they're they're in Ventura, which was
market one nine at the time, and they're now building
know tons of money. Just it turned into their cash
cow for that company. So they were giving me a
nice salary. But it caught the attention of some other
radio stations and some other groups, and so I got
(38:12):
a plane ticket sent to me from this radio group
in Honolulu. They flew me in, they interviewed me. But
you know, I'm in my twenties, and here at k
c a Q, I had control over everything. I get
to Honolulu and they're like, oh, this is our in
house you know consultant. This guy is the programmer to
(38:32):
the programmer, this guy is the you know this to that,
And so to get one song on the radio, I
would have had to go through like four different people.
And I was like, Ah, the money is good, it's Hawaii.
But but I wasn't ready to retire. I was just
getting started. Now. If somebody came to me now and
you know the equivalent of that now would be two
(38:53):
hundred thousand dollars in Hollolulu, that obviously I would go
move there tomorrow. But in my twins, with everything going
on in Southern California the way it was back then,
I actually turned the job off or down. I did
get a raise from that group. When I got back
from Honolulu. They wanted to lock me in, so they
gave me a raise and locked me into a contract.
(39:15):
So it did help with the long term success I
had there. But I still look back in fact, um
my girl and I we have a little three four
day trip planned to Hawaii at the end of November. Yeah,
and then this is something I planned, not smartly because
I didn't know the shakeup was gonna happen without Kick
(39:37):
the coverage and all that. So, you know, I planned
this a few months back, and then when my life
I turned up upside down. The first thing my girl
did was look at me and she's like, what about
our Hawaii trip? You know you gotta do it. You
know we're gonna go to Hawaii while you're unemployed, because
then you're really on the beach. Well, now you're you
(39:58):
are you didn't ask the bigger veal. We were all shocked.
We were talking about that last night actually, Danny the
other night on the show that you know, Danny g
I mean, we've known you forever and you know, you've
always been the bachelor guy, and now you're you're engaged,
which is outstanding. Congratulations on that. Now, would if you're
in Hawaii, where are you going to Honolulu? Are you
(40:19):
going to one of the other islands? So we're gonna
go to mah Yeah, yeah, we're gonna try to avoid people. Okay, Um,
so we're going to Maui. Okay, that's great. I recommend
I got married in Kawaii if you ever If that's
that's the garden. Hardly anyone there's like forty miles of roads.
That's it. It's all uh, it's all crazy. But I've
(40:40):
heard wonderful things about Maui. I've never been to Maui.
I've heard good things. But when you're there, are you gonna,
you know, knock on the doors of some radio stations,
Danny and see see what's going on? Where your Hawaiian
shirt and all that. Yeah, I live that dream again,
be like, hey, I'm ready for you now. No, I don't.
I don't think so. I think I'm in a good place,
um in southern California right now. Um. You know, I
(41:04):
was able to come to an agreement with Fox Sports
Radio Network to stay on and kind of kind of
float and produce the shows that need an executive producer,
which was how I got to fill in for Coop Um.
And so that's okay for the time being. I'm not
in a rush to rush into anything else right now.
And and you know, radio, Ben, if you don't have
(41:27):
friends inside the building, you're just really not going to
get a job at that radio station. Yeah. It's not
what you know, it's who you know. Is so Yeah,
unfortunate unfortunately. And the other thing that I hate about
this business, Danny, is when you're unemployed or whatever, when
you're nobody wants to talk to you, like it's like
(41:48):
you got or whatever, and they like you got COVID
and you're coughing exactly exactly, all right. I know you
gotta go, Danny, but listen, thanks for doing this. I
appreciate this, and it was fun catching up with you,
and yeah, for sure, man, I look forward to the
next time I'm on your show. And you know I
didn't tell I didn't tell you this when we ended
(42:09):
the show the other day. Man, I'm not I'm not
sure if Coop would give me the green light on
this or if you knew I did this, but I
give them. I gave away thirty seven Golden Chicks answering
the phones together night, So you guys have fun answering
those calls next to Yeah, I can't wait. I'm sure
you're giving all the blind Scott to that that the
lunatic anyway, have fun, all right, Thanks Danny, all right,
(42:33):
love you guys,
Host
Ben Maller
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Football’s funniest family duo — Jason Kelce of the Philadelphia Eagles and Travis Kelce of the Kansas City Chiefs — team up to provide next-level access to life in the league as it unfolds. The two brothers and Super Bowl champions drop weekly insights about the weekly slate of games and share their INSIDE perspectives on trending NFL news and sports headlines. They also endlessly rag on each other as brothers do, chat the latest in pop culture and welcome some very popular and well-known friends to chat with them. Check out new episodes every Wednesday. Follow New Heights on the Wondery App, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to new episodes early and ad-free, and get exclusive content on Wondery+. Join Wondery+ in the Wondery App, Apple Podcasts or Spotify. And join our new membership for a unique fan experience by going to the New Heights YouTube channel now!
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