- Forum Clout
- 17,780
Neither of us will be able to definitively disprove the other wrong but acting like Howard Stern wasn't a household name vs. O&A is nuts. O and A weren't even on in Calif!There was no shock jock craze. There was O&A and Stern. The media were calling political dinosaurs and hacks like Imus and Rush Limbaugh 'shock jocks'. Stern's entire shock jock image of Fartman and Private Parts was a total failure. Stern himself has failed everywhere but radio and likely should be considered a failure on satellite unless you only count money as success. Pretty much no other shock jock show had any long term presence in radio. People like Mancow were mostly out of the top ten in ratings. The Greaseman had to buy airtime on stations to get a job.
O&A's success came from the Mayor is Dead prank. Had nothing to do with Stern whatsoever. Their work at WAAF and stuff that is mocked now but was massive back then like Demented World pushed them into the mainstream in lots of areas. And they did it all on their own. They just mixed it up with Howard because he worked for CBS as well and tried to sabotage their careers.
This idea that Stern was influential in radio is false. He never made another show as some kingmaker and his other ventures like television shows and his movie were disasters that hurt his image more than helped. Who came from Stern other than Artie? And even then Beer League saw zero interest from Stern listeners and was a flop that anyone could have "shit out their ass" according to Sal. O&A made Rogan which dwarfs basically all other radio show influence. Pretty much every comedy podcast is a poor imitation of O&A at this point and not of Stern.
What radio shows or comedians now come from Stern? He had nothing that worked outside of his terrestrial career. Stern arguably peaked in the late 80s or early 90s in the Jackie, Gilbert, and Kinison years. He had a good resurgence with Artie until 2006 and Sirius. But that was the extend of his popularity.
As misguided as the Sirius execs clearly are, there is at least a semblance of a reason they're giving Howie $500M and O and A are doing...what they're doing. It's not because they were equally popular.