My radio hero. I first tuned into Scottie McClue at the age of about 14 or 15. Initially I wasnt even sure if it was a proper radio station, it was so out there. Id grown up listening to Radio 4 when it came to speech radio and Atlantic 252 for music. Initially I wondered if McClue was on CB radio or something. He denies this but Im sure hed pop the odd light swear word in here and there. At the time it felt so fantastically edgy to be listening to it. What I recall above anything else was the callers, they were so extreme AND YET so real. They reminded me of the people Id grown up with. Relatives, friends, etc. They didnt mind their ps and qs. They just said what they liked. They were precisely the sort of people you NEVER heard on the radio back then. Nowadays its possible to forget how powerful that was. Reality TV has made much from the charisma of those who are prepared to keep it real and so forth. If this were the only thing that was great about McClue this post would end here and I probably wouldnt have been drawn down my current career path. What still strikes me as brilliant is the fact Scottie McClue is a character. Hes a projection of a certain specific archetype. The loud-mouthed know it all windbag which us men turn into as we age, whether we like it or not, is represented by McClue. Some people HATE this part of McClues act. To a certain extent its his raw honesty around this which has frustrated and confused lesser programmers in the industry. Ive spoken with more than one of them about it and their response is always but if its a character how can you know what he really thinks?. This fails to comprehend the beauty of the device. Firstly, as a caller, that McClue is a part played by an actor should not be relevant to you when the show is asking what YOU think about something. Secondly that you cannot be sure of what McClue thinks means when you call him hes difficult to predict, that makes for an interesting listen. Finally, that you cant trust hes telling you THE TRUTH is a great thing. It forces you to THINK FOR YOURSELF rather than just sit there nodding along and trusting the media. Perhaps nowadays the notion and value of a distinct media persona is more widely understood, Jordan / Katie Price being one example. McClue was ahead of his time back then. His enormous radio audiences are to me only a symptom of the fact that when his time comes he will be a huge mainstream success with what he does. The new world suggests to me that those with his skill are about to be needed on a bigger scale than before as the online world opens up new opportunities to do talk radio. If youre trying to learn how to do talk - learn from this man, hes a master.
Posted on: Thu, 03 Jul 2014 16:53:55 +0000
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