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  1. #1

    Default Denver's comedy radio station 103.1 is serious about dominating the airwaves

    From The Denver Post:

    Radio listeners have long welcomed Led Zeppelin, Aretha Franklin, Ira Glass and Rush Limbaugh into their cars and cubicles.

    But lately those names have been competing for air time with Larry the Cable Guy, Chelsea Handler and Lewis Black.

    The culprit? A wave of all-comedy radio stations that are aggressively courting listeners from other formats, such as sports talk and pop country. And Denver's Comedy 103.1 FM, the city's first (albeit mostly syndicated) all-stand-up station, is the most ambitious of the bunch.

    "We hope to be the model for the format," said program director John E. Kage. "And if we're the model, that's a reflection on the whole city. It's a real chance to put Denver in the comedy spotlight."

    Denver has already proven that it comes out to live comedy in droves, with successful clubs like Comedy Works and the Improv regularly attracting top-tier names. Homegrown comedians such as T.J. Miller, Ben Kronberg, Adam Cayton-Holland and Josh Blue have also been representing Denver on Comedy Central, "Conan" and the touring and festival circuit in recent years.

    Comedy 103.1 is looking to latch onto that momentum. And the station is quickly gaining traction with a demographic coveted by advertisers: Men age 25-54, who are considered to be short on attention spans and long on disposable income.

    The latest ratings report from industry watcher Arbitron placed Comedy 103.1 as seventh in the Denver market for men 18-34, beating "heritage" stations such as Denver's 92.5 The Wolf.

    That's impressive for a station that's a little over 4 months old. But it's not good enough.

    "I want to be No. 1. I always do," Kage said. "And I'm not patient about it. I want to be No. 1 quickly."

    Denver's big appetite for comedy

    A 20-year radio veteran, Kage admits that he hasn't attended many comedy shows. But he's been immersing himself in the culture to understand it better.
    "It's just a different vibe than anything I'm used to," said Kage, who has also been program director for hip-hop station KS 107.5 FM since 2008. "I believe there's a really thriving comedy culture in this city, and there's a real appetite to hear some of the local talent on the air."

    Kage has already brokered a Comedy 103.1 partnership with the Comedy Works clubs and begun localizing his station's satellite feed with contests, call-in lines and in-studio interviews with comedians. He wants to add local comedy bloggers and podcasters to the station's website in the coming months.

    It's all about creating a Denver-specific identity for the station. Among the 37 other radio stations that carry Comedy 103.1's "24/7 Comedy" format in North America, none have customized their broadcasts for the local market as much as 103.1.

    "This is a syndicated product, but a lot of folks don't realize that," said Barnes Goutermout, the sales manager for Comedy 103.1 and Cruisin' Oldies 950 AM — both of which are owned by Lincoln Financial Media of Colorado. "It's really just in its infancy right now."

    The 24/7 Comedy brand, which is carried online by Clear Channel Broadcasting's iHeart Radio, was created in 2008 by George Gimarc and Bill Bungeroth after they sensed an opportunity for a new radio format that would parallel stand-up's resurgent popularity.

    "It's a hybrid," Gimarc said by phone from Dallas, where 24/7 Comedy's programming originates. "We are doing comedy, which is a talk format and has never really successfully been done before, and wrapping it into a delivery that you would find at a high-powered hit music station."

    Gimarc said the reason Denver has quickly become one of 24/7 Comedy's most important markets is because the staff at 103.1 love and understand it. Kage noted that the dozens of other DJs at Lincoln Financial Media's office — which also houses country's 98.5 KYGO FM, 104.3 FM The Fan and others — frequently volunteer to help with 103.1's interviews and promos.

    "It's whatever you want to make of it, but some people get it more than others, and Kage has been tremendous," Gimarc said. "He has actually brought ideas to the table that have affected everybody in the chain," such as tracking when particular jokes air and other formatting tweaks.

    Although its target market is men, Kage notes there's a 50/50 gender split among the followers on Comedy 103.1's Facebook page.

    And with nearly 10,000 followers, Comedy 103.1 has about three times as many as any of the other syndicates' Facebook pages — and twice as many as 24/7 Comedy's main profile.

    Plenty of rivals

    From a distance, the format has a lot of competition. Subscription-based SiriusXM has offered all-comedy stations since at least 2008. The Internet is heavy with stand-up clips from funnyordie.com or Comedy Central. And the number of comedy podcasts continues to grow exponentially.

    But a free, terrestrial radio station that plays nothing but stand-up is as unprecedented for Denver as it is for the dozens of other markets it occupies, from Tuscaloosa, Ala., to Bakersfield, Calif. Each day, Comedy 103.1 airs local listener testimonials that praise the station for providing an alternative to the stale chart-toppers that make up many radio playlists.

    Comedy 103.1 needs all the help it can get. The Denver radio market's ad revenues are expected to rise only modestly from their 2012 total of $155 million, according to Chuck Lontine, managing director of media brokerage firm Marconi and a radio industry veteran.

    But that's where Kage thinks Comedy 103.1 has the advantage.

    "There's more engagement with this format," he said. "You get into drive-time rush hour or you're at lunch, and once the bits begin, you want to listen through all the way to the end."

    The 24/7 Comedy format aims for broad appeal. It spans genres and decades in a way that would make a similarly programmed music station sound disjointed.

    SiriusXM's comedy channels, for example, are specialized by genre or host. But on Comedy 103.1 artists such as Henny Youngman, Bob Newhart and Richard Pryor alternate with Ron White, Hannibal Buress and Maria Bamford. That's like tuning into a music station that plays big band, folk, funk, pop country, hip-hop and indie rock — all within the space of a few minutes.

    "Like the bag of jelly beans, there's a precise measure of how many blue ones are in there, how many red ones, how many black ones," said 24/7 Comedy creator Gimarc. "There's a crafted element to make it the most appealing but broadly based thing that it can be."

    Gimarc programs most of the 3-to-5-minute bits to include newer comics such as Denver native T.J. Miller — recently honored as 24/7's "Comic of the Week" — mixed with more recognizable jokes from Jerry Seinfeld, Eddie Murphy and Bill Hicks.

    A win for comics, too

    The growing number and popularity of stand-up radio stations is a boon not just for Comedy 103.1's advertisers, but comics and the clubs that book them.

    "I get a (royalty) check at the end of every three to four months, and it can be anywhere from $1,000 to $4,000," said Lewis Black, whose material airs regularly on 24/7 Comedy and other stations. "With more channels, more would be coming in."

    Black, whose recent Front Range shows were heavily promoted on Comedy 103.1, enjoys a fame that most comics will never achieve. But any touring comedian can benefit from being played on the radio.

    "I was surprised how many folks at my Denver shows said they'd heard me on that station," said Bobcat Goldthwait, who stopped by 103.1's studios last month for an on-air interview before performing at Comedy Works. "You're impacting the audience that actually wants to hear comedy, instead of just being a speed bump on some (shock-jock) morning show."


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