Worst to First (2022) Movie Script
- My name
is Michael Scott Shannon.
I'm a radio programmer
and radio deejay.
I'm standing in
333 Meadowlands Parkway
in Secaucus, New Jersey.
Why?
Because this is where
the story began.
- Serving the universe.
- Good morning, everybody.
- The top of
the Empire State Building.
- It's on the air everywhere.
- WHTZ.
We're going from worst
to first.
- Z100, babe.
- Top hits.
- Pop/rockin'.
- Z100!
- They did it.
- They've gone from worst
to first.
- They went from worst to first.
- Worst to first.
- The winning formula
is wild and wacky.
- Happy birthday.
- You made my monkey weird.
- Z100!
- Z100, New York.
[ "Wanted Dead or Alive"
by Bon Jovi playing ]
- All right
- Every kid dreams of being heard
on the radio.
I was driving across
the Driscoll Bridge
in New Jersey on my way back
to my parents' house
and I was alone and it came on
and I started to drive fast
and turned it up louder,
hoping to really
to get pulled over
just so you could tell the cop,
"That's me on the radio!"
Wanted
- Wanted
- Dead or alive
- It was the summer of 1983.
Back then, the radio ratings
came in on
the Associated Press Newswire.
People would stand
around the machine
waiting for it to come off.
If we had taken this format,
if we'd taken this show
to Des Moines, Iowa
or to someplace out in Kentucky,
we would have had a great shot.
I see the number one station,
the R&B station, WRKS.
I didn't expect
to be in the top 10.
So I look down in the next 10,
no Z100.
- But in New York, we're going
against the best.
- And I get down to like 40
and 45.
- The biggest radio stations
had a reputation that went back
20, 30, 40, 50 years.
- There are stations
from Philadelphia
that are leaking
into New Jersey,
but just had enough listeners
to get in the ratings.
- A good rating is somewhere
like over five close to a 10.
- And at number 51, W-H-T-Z.
- We had a two.
A two rating is lousy.
- We were in last effing place.
I went home that night.
I couldn't sleep.
My wife said, what's wrong?
We suck. That's what's wrong.
- In 1983, I was vice president
of radio programming from
Malrite Communications Group
based in Cleveland, Ohio.
Malrite's chairman and CEO
was Milton Maltz.
One day he popped his head
in my office and said,
"Jim, we're going to buy a new
radio station for New York City.
"Just outside the city limits
just across the river
in New Jersey."
And that radio station
had the approval of the FCC
to move its tower
and transmitter
to the Empire State Building.
Now it was time to go find
just the right person
to oversee the programming,
the talent, and the marketing
of the radio station.
This person had to be
just a little bit screwed up
because they were going to take
on the biggest
broadcasting companies
in the world,
and that person
was in Tampa, Florida.
[ Static ]
- General on the Q Zoo,
final chapter.
- Today, it was a time to cry.
Scott Shannon was leaving.
- Some may say goodbye
and good riddance.
- New York was calling.
- Well, for thousands, others,
it was an emotional,
sad farewell.
- I really think that...
[ speaks indistinctly ]
- Come on, ma'am, perk up.
- As co-keeper of the Q Zoo,
Scott Shannon bid final
farewell to radio fans.
- Well, let's laugh right now,
okay?
- He, indeed, will be missed.
- And we'll miss him.
- Boom, I'm out of here.
- New York City was an impossibly
saturated media market.
It is the toughest market
in the world to break into.
If you want to be on radio
in New York,
particularly in that era,
you were facing
the giants of the business,
the Goliaths of the business.
- This guy kept
calling me from Cleveland
and I had a stack of, you know,
those pink callback pads,
you know?
So then I got a call
from a buddy of mine
who is a program director,
and he says to me,
"Why don't you call
these people back in Cleveland?
"I just interviewed up there.
Then I realized that they kept
asking me questions about you."
I said why don't you
just call him?
And they said, "Well, we did,
but he won't return our calls."
- And to come from the south
with,
you know,
kind of a funky accent.
I don't even know
what Scott's accent is.
It was really a daunting task,
to say the least.
- There are a lot
of golden retrievers
in New York in the early '80s.
You had the traditional
talk radio audience.
Listen to John A. Gambling
at W-O-R.
And you still had WBLS and WKTU
being very popular.
You had WPLJ,
which was a rock station
with some pop tendencies.
You are WNBC,
which had Imus in the morning,
Stern in the afternoon,
and really Top 40 music
in between.
But those personalities
were so powerful
that they overwhelmed
the image of the station.
- Well, to understand what was
going on in 1983,
you really have to go back
to the mid to late 1970s
because a lot of
very significant changes
in the media marketplace
took place.
See, in 1974,
when I started at WPLJ,
which became New York's dominant
rock station on FM,
rock had a very
broad definition.
It encompassed Led Zeppelin,
but also Carly Simon
and Carole King
and Joni Mitchell
the great Motown catalog.
Then came 1977.
Then came disco.
- Oh, freak out
- And the rock community
fragment.
- Basically, what wound up
happening at radio
from the way I saw it was
they could extract one lane
that they thought
was really working,
and they could just format
a whole show or a station
like that.
- About the new dance craze
- I get out there and I got this
really carefully
prepared presentation,
you know,
so I could pass them out
to all the goobers in the room.
And I play a tape
of our morning show.
- The Q Zoo in the morning
- This is Elmer Smud Pucker.
- Shannon, Cleveland,
Brooks, and Tedd Webb
Billy Bob, Phil,
and Johnson's the latest man
Good morning from the Q
morning Zoo
- And finally, there's
one wiseacre and he says,
"Well, what makes you think
that you're ready
for the biggest market
in the country?"
Then I just snapped,
I don't need this job.
And I threw my little booklet
at him
and I got up and I walked out.
So I'm at the elevator bank
and out comes Mr. Malrite.
He's the guy
who owns the company.
And he said,
"Where are you going?"
I said, "I'm going home. I don't
want to work for that idiot."
So he said, "No, no, no, no, no,
no, no, you're our guy."
And I said,
"I got to make my plane back."
He says, "Oh, but you're still
going to take the job, right?"
I said, "Yeah, yeah,
I'll take the job."
Then I realized...
[ Horn honks ]
...I don't know anything
about New York.
- Serving middle Tennessee
with 5,000 watts of fun power.
This is 7:30 in the...
[ speaks indistinctly ]
Capital city!
- I originally met Scott in 1972,
when he was Super Shan
at WMAK in Nashville.
- Super Shan, WMAK
- I didn't know
if it was him or Elvis
because he tried to look
exactly like Elvis Presley.
He had big hair, that big chin,
and he was bigger than life.
Privately, Scott is very demure
and very quiet.
And as soon as that
microphone goes on, he's on.
- Scott's passion
is being on the air.
He will do anything
to be on the air.
Scott was hired
to be program director
of WPGC in Washington, D.C.,
the Marriotts own
the radio station.
No disrespect to the Marriotts,
but there were Mormons.
They are Mormons.
They're still Mormons.
The Marriotts didn't like him
on the air.
You know,
they basically said to him,
we don't want you on the air.
Scott was driven out
of the WPGC
because he wants to be
on the air
more than he wants to program
a radio station.
- WPGC FM and AM morningside.
It's 12:01.
Good afternoon!
- The day he left to interview
in Tampa,
he drove his car
to the Baltimore-Washington
airport
and he gets on a plane
and he goes, has the interview.
A few days later,
he calls me and he said,
"Hey." I go, "What's up?"
"I think
I left my car at the airport."
I go, "Okay,
like in short-term parking?"
"No, I think I left it like up
against the curb
in front of the airport and if
I did, the keys are in it."
And he was hired
for the morning show,
which was his dream, and that's
when he started the Zoo concept.
- Good morning from the Q
Morning Zoo
Rise and shine with
folks like you
- So I teamed up with another guy
by the name of Cleveland Wheeler
and I told him
I had this plan to do this show
called The Morning Zoo,
and it had deejay shenanigans,
craziness, parody songs,
crazy phone calls, just kind of
a free-for-all morning show
that sounded like nothing
was planned.
Two and a half years later,
we had the highest morning
show ratings in the country.
- Shannon has taken Q 105
and made it
the number one station
in Tampa.
He's won an award for being
the top deejay in the country.
- Scott and I were working
in Tampa, Florida.
He calls me into his office
one day and he goes,
Nobody can know this.
And he proceeds to tell me
that he's developing
a brand-new station
called Z100 in New York City
and would I like to join him.
- I go in and I tell my manager,
I'm going to have to go.
I got to go to New York.
I signed a contract.
What? What are you doing?
You're number one.
You're making good money
and you just met a girl.
I said, I'm a try to see
if she'll go with me.
- We weren't living together.
We were dating maybe a year.
I traveled to New York
for business, which was great,
and I love to come to New York
and go shop.
And I loved everything
that New York City had to offer,
but was not an aspiration
to move there and live there.
I was a southern girl,
grew up in Louisville
and then was living in Florida.
- She did agree to go with me
on my first trip
to New York City,
and that is another story.
- We flew into Newark
and Scott's so excited.
There's tons of traffic
and he's looking.
It's nighttime and he looks up
and he goes,
"Oh, my gosh, look at that.
I'm going to be talking,
that city,
that's New York City."
And I said, "Honey,
no, that's Newark."
I hate myself
for loving you
I definitely remember hearing
the Blackheart stuff
and what it felt like
to hear your song
coming out of the radio.
It's always --
I get a big kick out of it.
It's like, hear one of our
records come on, I crank it.
Because that was the dream,
you know,
when you're kid
is being able to be in a band,
make music
that other people want to hear
and actually get it played
on the radio.
I hate myself for loving you
- Serving the universe
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
- When we made that transition
on WPLJ
from a pure rock station
to a Top 40 station.
- It's time to make a change,
the people are changing.
Let's do it.
We were about to enter Top 40's
second golden age in 1983
and ready for our climb
right to the top.
And then out of nowhere
came Scott Shannon.
- Live from the penthouse studios
of WWHTZ, the flame thrower,
it's a nearly famous,
highly outrageous,
but never, ever contagious,
Z Morning Zoo!
- Yeah.
- Along about the time
I was 13 or 14,
my dad was transferred
to this place called
Fort Benjamin Harrison
just outside of Indianapolis.
And I ran into two new friends
down the block. Two brothers.
And they had a big sister
who loved music,
and she had this little
record box,
had a handle on it
and had 45s in there.
And one day we just got into it
and I said,
"Holy crap, what is this?"
And it was rock and roll music.
It was love at first sight.
Or listen.
[ Record scratches ]
So every week, I would pedal
my little Schwinn bicycle
down the road
to this electronic store,
and he had a little
record section
and I would go through there
and pick out one or two songs
every week
that a guy could afford.
I notice he got in some new
radios and I said,
"What's that right there?"
He said,
"That's a transistor radio"
So I had in my hands.
Oh, my God, I got to have it.
"I'll put it on layaway
for you."
I said, "Really?"
"Yeah. You give me
a couple of bucks every week.
When you get enough money,
you can have it."
Finally got that radio
and I took it everywhere.
I still have that radio.
Then one day, one of my friends
tells me about WIFE radio,
the station we all listen to
Top 40 for teenagers.
- Indianapolis
WIFE
- They have a big window
right on the street,
on Meridian,
when you're going into the city
and you can stand out there
and watch the deejay work.
I'd stand there
and look through that window
and see the disc jockey with
the headphones and microphone,
the records, the turntable.
I said, "Holy crap,
that's what I want to do."
- Wait a second.
Did Scott Shannon create Z100?
- That's what I'm doing
the movie about. Boom!
And you're in it.
- Holy shit.
- So this is gonna be massive,
dude.
- I didn't even know that!
- The station was basically
designed and planned
to be the successor
to 77 WABC,
which was the huge
New York radio station,
and it covered half the country
from the '60s.
I even had a jingle cut that
brought back memories of WABC.
Theirs was...
77 WABC
Whee! Had this little chime
time at the end.
And I had one made
that went...
Z100
WHDZ
Whee!
I didn't sing it
that good, did I?
- Z100 WHTZ
- There was nobody doing Top 40
radio back in the day.
WABC, which had been doing it
for years and years and years,
which is where I came from,
was now all talk
and played no music.
- There were several attempts
with a few stations
WXLO 99X, WWDJ in New Jersey.
They did not have
the brainpower behind them.
They were just playing records,
so they failed.
- There were openings
for small -- well, at the time,
they're small niches,
Hispanic stations, for instance,
niches that were not
unimportant
and would continue to grow
as time went on.
The odds of any mainstream
format coming in to --
to become a major player
in the market were minuscule.
- There was a segment of New York
radio that had gotten lazy.
They just gotten kind of,
you know, we're number one,
so it's okay.
There's enough money
to go around for everyone,
there's enough audience
to go around.
- I didn't like New York radio
at the time.
There were no real sort of
adult contemporary stations
at the time.
Obviously, the couple
of the greatest R&B stations
in America were here,
but Larry Berger and PLJ
were the the coup de grce,
if you will,
but it was soulless,
it was uninspiring,
and it was ready for a takeover.
- So I walk into the fifth floor
of the Meadowlands Hilton
and it was
a beehive of activity.
But what stopped me
in the middle of the room
there was this giant window
facing
the Empire State Building,
and there was this mountain
of a man kind of walking back
and forth matted hair, beard,
khaki shorts, biting his nails,
talking to no one in particular,
writing notes,
scribbling things furiously.
And this was Scott Shannon
planning out Z100
and the Z Morning Zoo.
- He got not only
the soul of New York,
he got the beat of New York,
but he also got New Jersey,
got Long Island,
got Connecticut,
got all the surrounding areas,
not just Manhattan.
- So I come up with this plan
because I really don't know
the five boroughs.
Well, that's good because
there's about 10 million people
in Long Island, another eight
or nine in New Jersey,
and two to four million
in Westchester and Connecticut
that picked up our signal.
I said,
"That's what I'm going to do."
- He wanted to
come up with music that he felt
could come and thread rock
and rhythm and pop,
and the music was unlike
any other mix at any
Top 40 had ever done.
It's at that point that I knew
this was going to be something
that New York radio
had never seen before.
- I'll tell you what, babe...
[ speaks indistinctly ]
...hippest game in the city,
baby doll.
I'm looking for
the 100th caller.
I flew to New York City,
brought me over to this hotel
Meadowlands Hilton.
It was a real dark room,
and I couldn't figure out
why am I sitting in a room
that looked like
it was just dark?
So he walks over
and he turns the chair
against this big bay window
and he goes, whoosh.
And he opens up
this big bay window.
And it was the skyline
of New York City
and goes, "I'm going to give you
a microphone to talk to that."
Obviously, I knew Scott Shannon
liked the song
"Hate Myself For Loving You."
I also knew there was
a possibility
he would play the record,
and we get this idea
to send a plane
with a tail over Secaucus.
And the plane says "Dear Scott
play Joan Jett."
First day, the guy flies over
the wrong part of Secaucus,
and Scott doesn't see
the plane.
I'm having a heart attack.
- This is the room
where it all started.
It was -- I don't know,
it was a magic place to me.
I remember when we first were
getting ready to go on the air.
I remember one day
I'm standing here
and I'm just
looking out the window
and all of a sudden,
something hit me in the feet.
And it was our chief engineer,
Frank Foti.
Rolled that little dolly out
and he's,
"Huh, what are you doing?"
I said, "I'm just kind of
soaking up the atmosphere, man.
I'm just --
I'm just feeling it."
I said, "Frank, I truly believe
that radio history
is going to be made
in this room."
He's still on his back
and he said,
"Man, you just
gave me goosebumps."
He said, "Let me get up there
and look out
the history window."
Before we ever
even signed on the air,
they were working
on building a studio,
and I was promised by Mr. Maltz,
Mr. Malrite,
that it would be
a Rolls-Royce radio station.
So I went over
to take a look at it one day
and I found out we weren't
getting a Rolls-Royce.
We were getting a Volkswagen.
They had this fella in there
and he said,
"You must be the new punk,
Scott Shannon."
And I go,
"Yeah, yeah, who are you?"
He said,
"Well, I'm your boss.
I'm the chief engineer."
I went, oh, boy.
And I got a hold of Jim,
and I said,
"Jim, we've got a problem here,
"and unless I get
another engineer in here,
I'm going to have to
go back to Tampa."
I need somebody maybe
a little hipper,
a little younger, someone who
understands my language.
When he got through
with the litany
of different engineers
that they had describing
each one, I said,
"Is that all you got?"
And he says, "No,
there is one more fellow,
"I don't know, though he's --
he's very hard to deal with.
"He sits in his office
and cranks The Who up
at full volume all day long."
Well,
is there another problem?
He said, "Well,
he's a little crazy."
I said, "A little crazy?"
He said, "No,
he's a whole lot crazy."
- I'd been told by some
corporate folks,
they said, you were lucky
to have worked around
some pretty intense people
in Cleveland at WMMS,
which was the station
I grew up on.
They said, Scott's like
the people at MMS,
but on steroids.
- Next day, in comes Frank Foti.
Oh, my God, what a mess.
- And I hear this voice.
So I go, "Is that Frank-o?"
Yeah, he goes, "Hi,
my name's Scott Shannon."
- I told him, I want
a radio station that pounds,
that jumps out of the radio.
[ Explosion ]
I want a flame thrower.
- The flame thrower, Z100
- He said, "I'm your guy."
- The best way I could sum it up
is if I may borrow a phrase
from Roger Daltrey of The Who.
You know, he's always
talked about The Who's music
as somebody's punching you
in the nose
and saying, I love you.
- It's like songs sound different
on this radio station.
I don't understand how,
but they sound different.
There's like a magic there.
From a technical standpoint,
the sound of the station
was booming and loud,
and from an engineering
standpoint, it was compressed.
It just sounded really,
really cool.
- It was only in my dreams
Well, my music started
getting played, I was just like,
"Oh, my God, if I'm hearing this
in my car right now,
like millions of people
are hearing in their car, too,
to or in their bedrooms
or the...
And it was really like
this communal experience.
And I guess that's why it was
so magical to me.
It just felt like
a connectedness.
And I really put everything
behind that dream
of being played on the radio.
It was only in my dream
- I would stand right here
and then Ross Britain
would be over here
and have the bells and the drums
and all that stuff.
Claire Stevens would be back
in the newsroom over there
and then she would
move over here.
Jonathan B. Bell would be there
until the stars came in,
and he had to move over
next to Claire.
One of those Professor
Jonathan B. Bell reports.
What's going on, professor?
- Well, we got lots of things
happening around town today,
Scott.
I had heard about Scott Shannon
before I actually met him,
and he had been described to me
as a nut case
from Tampa, Florida,
who walked around wearing shorts
all the time
and was somehow going
to revolutionize New York radio.
And I thought,
you got to be kidding.
- Scott came in not knowing
anything about New York City,
and I think that
gave him the edge.
He wasn't frightened by the city
and intimidated.
You could tell he wasn't
from these parts.
And I think that's
what made him stand out.
He surrounded himself
with a lot of caring,
trusting people
who not only communicated well
with the audience,
but they elevated him.
- 6:27 in the morning
it's time for Claire Stevens.
- Good morning, it's 35 degrees
at this hour.
- Well, I must tell you,
Scott Shannon
meant nothing to me.
I was so new in radio
and I was so naive
and I was working
at this little tiny station
that was kind of isolated.
I got a call and they said,
"We were not able
to get you in Scott's office,
"but my wife got you
on our home radio
"and played it over
the speakerphone
"to Scott Shannon.
How soon can you get out here?"
I sat in Scott's office
and he's saying,
Well, you'll say this and you'll
do that and bah, bah, bah.
And I'm going, "Time out."
I said, "Don't you want to
interview anybody else?"
And he said, no.
"When I hear what I want,
I know it."
- Yes, Ross Britton and Scott
is going to be a rotten day.
Thank you very much.
- I was a talk jock at WABC.
I started there
when they were still music,
and then I was fired
pretty much the week
that Z100 went on the air.
So I went over to Scott a couple
of weeks later and I said,
"Hey, you know, good to see you.
I'm looking for a job.
I know you have
an afternoon opening."
And he said,
"Nah, you're a morning jock.
No, I want you to work with me."
- So I get to the Meadowlands
Hilton and I'm dressed up
like the former Madison Avenue
person that I was.
And there he is
with the big voice,
and he's Scott Shannon.
- And I said to myself,
"This is a nut house.
"And the guy that's running
the place is wearing
a Hawaiian shirt and shorts."
- Oh, my God,
what have I got myself into?
- He was able
to create deliberately
and hilariously
dysfunctional family.
At the same time,
it was an endearing family.
- Eddie Grant was a lead singer
of a group --
- The Supremes.
- Not the Supremes, you nitwit.
Let me take you to
the production office
right here.
This used to be the home
of the late J.R. Nelson.
J.R. would be here.
He was a big guy.
He didn't take any crap
from anybody, especially me.
And he had a little
like a table here.
And then I would come back
from lunch,
I have a bunch
of notes on the napkin
that I came up with
while we were having lunch
and maybe a cocktail or two.
And -- and I would say,
turn the mic on, J.R.
Z100 wants you to help us go
from worst to first.
We need your help.
And then he would put it
to music
and sound effects and all that.
And then within 30 minutes,
it would be on the air.
- Any broadcast or duplication
of this material
without the expressed
written consent
of J.R. Nelson Productions
will cost you a fortune.
- With J.R. Nelson in sports
the lion's mug, the Steelers,
the Cowboys beat the Cardinals.
The Giants are going to a one
back offense
for the Raiders' game on Sunday,
and Marvis Frazier doesn't have
much of a chance
to beat Larry Holmes tonight.
So say the experts.
Z100 weather looks like this.
- Now in addition to
the Morning Zoo,
which was crazy enough...
- The deejays here at
the Z Morning Zoo are up
and getting ready
to entertain you.
- Heigh-ho!
- We also had deejays named
Jack the Wack.
- Oh, Jack the Wack here getting
ready to go commercial for...
- Hollywood Hamilton.
- At Radio Z100
with Hollywood Hamilton.
- Dr. Christopher Reid,
Janet from another planet,
and one of the most incredible
deejays I've ever heard,
Shadow Steel.
- [ Speaks indistinctly ]
...just about 5:00.
It's been a long, hot,
nasty week.
I think it's time
we kick this sucker
in the head and get out of here.
- But there was one other
character who was very popular.
His name was Mr. Leonard.
- Mr. Leonard is sicker
than a dog this morning.
- I apologize for trying
to call up and guess
that I know I'm unintelligible,
but I'm a desperate, Scott.
- He drove a lime green pinto.
He had a matching lime
green leisure suit,
complete with cherry red shoes.
- What in the hell
is Mr. Leonard doing? Leonard!
- Back there, weaseling around.
- The guy comes to work.
He's been in the control room
one time since he's been here.
- And he was like
the common man,
well, he was below
the common man.
- Well, what about 8-3-7-5
on the telephone line?
- No, that's Tommy Tutone.
- That was Tommy Tutone.
- Well, who the hell
is this Tommy?
[ Laughter ]
- The problem was he had trouble
waking up in the morning
and many times
didn't even show up for work.
- Where in the world are you?
Everybody's here.
- Happy birthday to me.
Happy birthday!
- Hey, stop, stop all that.
Where are you?
- What do you mean
where am I?
I thought this was a holiday.
It's our birthday.
- Scott was known
to use the hotline.
He called me one day
and he said, "Magic Matt,
"there was some dead air
between commercial number three
and commercial number four."
And I said, "Not on this show.
There wasn't."
I said, "You must have been
listening to
our competition, WPLJ."
- He said, "Well, let me look
at my digital.
No, says 100.3."
He said, "No, that's my --"
I said, "Absolutely not
on this station."
I said, "I would never,
ever commit a felony,
"such as dead air on Z100,
the biggest station
in the world."
And he said, "Yeah,
looked again. It says 1-0 --
That's Z100. Don't you
[bleep] up my radio station."
Click.
[ Radio stations changing ]
- It's eight minutes
after 6:00 a.m.,
August the 2nd, 1983.
[ Ring tone ]
Ladies and gentlemen,
at this time, radio station
WHTZ signs on the air.
WHTZ is owned and operated
by Malrite Communications
Cleveland
and operates
on an assigned frequency
of 100.3 megahertz,
with studios and offices
in Secaucus, New Jersey.
Signing on the air,
this is WHTZ, the Newark,
the new Z100.
New York, it's time to wake up.
- The kids are telling everybody
about this great new station
that was broadcasting from
the top
of the Empire State Building.
- Serving the universe
from the top
of the Empire State Building,
WHTZ.
- Live from the top of
the Empire State Building,
the flame-throwing
hot rocking Z100.
- Everybody broadcasts
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
There's a master antenna on top
of the Empire State Building
that all the stations
share the rental on.
We're all there.
There was nothing unique
about what he was really doing,
but everything unique
about the way he was describing
what he was doing.
- Serving the universe
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
- Well, it's true.
- Every radio station comes
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
- They give you the impression
that they were broadcasting
from high on top
of the Empire State Building.
But in truth,
it was across the way.
But that is the plight
of New Jersey, right, everybody?
We do all the heavy lifting
and get none of the credit
for it.
They made of that nothing
defy its geographic reality
and instead,
transfer the whole ethos
to Manhattan,
to the heart of Manhattan,
and then not
only to Manhattan,
but to the --
to the gorilla building,
to the --
to the top of the top.
- We claimed
the Empire State Building
and everything that emanated
from the Empire State Building
over 27 counties
in the New York metro area.
Our goal was to be larger
than life.
- Serving the universe
from the top of
the Empire State Building.
This is the new Z100.
And then there was
a little pause
and then it was Scott's way
of telling other radio stations
we were in town.
- Get out of our way.
- I couldn't believe it.
This guy is crazy.
He's going after other
radio stations in town.
He's literally calling them out
and telling them
to get out of the way.
And here we come.
- Z100 was the rebirth
of that Top 40 mentality.
It existed
on some of the AM stations,
but to have an FM radio station
playing all the hits,
that was a novel concept
at the time.
And PLJ and Z100
both basically did it
at the same time and created
the ultimate radio war,
which for those of us
who are students of it,
we were all about that.
- What station did we rescue
you from?
- CBSFM.
- Oh, my God.
- New York radio stations
had indirectly referenced
other radio stations
in the past.
In the '60s, famously WMCA
and WABC, the good guys.
- Ringing with the good guys
WMCA
- They had a great rivalry
going on,
but they never directly
referenced each other.
When Scott started calling out
other radio stations on the air,
particularly WPLJ,
he got phone calls
from people saying,
"You can't do that,
that's illegal.
Won't the FCC fine you
for doing that?"
Said, of course they won't.
It's not illegal.
- We always like to take
personalities from the market,
not just radio, but, you know,
everybody and make fun of them.
- Could you do us a favor?
- Sure.
- Could you tell Roger Grimsby
something for us?
- All right. As long as it
doesn't get me fired.
- [ Blows raspberry ]
- When one
of the ratings came out
and Imus
had fallen in the ratings,
Scott offered to start
a fundraising campaign
to bail Imus
out of his -- of his problems.
- My friend Don Imus.
- Yeah.
- Hey, watch this. Aah!
- Basically Scott is
the ultimate radio attack dog.
He does his best work
when he had a target and WPLJ
saw what was happening at Z100.
They changed the Top 40.
But it was a wimpier,
more corporate version
of Top 40.
And so Scott called them
what they were -- wimpy radio.
- What we suddenly faced
was like nothing
I had ever experienced before.
- We have a radio station here.
They used to be album
rock and roll station.
- Mm-hmm.
- And they changed
their format recently
and their program director,
Larry Booger has a song out.
It's called,
"We're Going Wimpy."
It's their new call letters
WIMPY.
We'll get that on right now.
Here's Larry and the Wimps
and we're going wimpy on Z100.
- We did a skit about
the program director of WPLJ,
and Scott said,
"Make it Larry Booger."
And then it just went wild.
- They start their tape recorder
just like Larry Booger at 5:59
so they don't miss a single
second of the Z100 Morning Zoo.
- The name became so stuck
to poor Larry Berger
that all around New York,
people were calling him
Larry Booger.
- The audience loved it.
The clients? Not so much.
- This television station
has refused to accept
your commercial
advertising for Z100.
- And it's breaking my heart.
- Is it really?
Now there is a federal law
that limits how much level
you can put
into the transmitter.
And I know for a fact
because I measured it myself
that our competition, WPLJ,
that they would break that law.
It's called over modulation.
It would be like, you know,
speed limit's 55 miles an hour
and they want to drive 75.
Okay, you guys want to drive 75?
We'll drive 75.
Well, Larry Berger
was so competitive himself,
he had the technical
measuring device on his desk
that would -- where he could
look at Z100 and PLJ.
Well, one time he would --
he was looking at his monitor,
thinking we were breaking
the law and he called me.
I had my assistant, Steve Pepe,
go and flip some switches
so that his monitor
would look all crazy.
He was like, "Frank,
I got to call you back.
Something's not right here."
"Yeah, Larry, you're a dumb
ass." And I hung up on him.
So there was a writer
for "The Daily News"
in those days
named George Maksian
and for whatever reason, he just
wasn't a believer in Z100.
- George was a great guy,
but he was old school
in his radio taste.
He loved John Gamblings.
So when when Scott started,
he wrote a column about it
in which he pronounced
the new Z100 to be vulgar.
- Coming home one day
and opening up "The Daily News"
and seeing this article
by George Maksian
saying I hope he has
a roundtrip ticket back to Tampa
because this guy's the worst.
- My first comment says this
product hillbilly from Florida.
Remember that?
- Yeah.
- And he would write all of these
negative articles on Z100,
and it would drive Scott crazy.
- Take his ways
back to Florida.
- Yes, there's hope he's got
a one-way ticket --
- Roundtrip ticket.
- A roundtrip ticket.
- Go home.
- Boy, I was broken down.
If you ask most experts
or self-proclaimed experts,
it was destined to fail
this hillbilly from Tampa
going to launch a concept
that had worked in Tampa,
but hadn't worked anywhere else.
- And finally, I just got mad
and said, I'll tell you,
I'll just show that idiot.
And he's still that. An idiot.
- So Scott made up these stickers
that said,
"I break for George Maksian!"
So I hear it.
Kenny Lane, get in here.
Go to the office.
Sit down, close the door.
"I need you to do something
with these. Go figure it out.
Earn while you learn.
Figure it out."
- In a way it was --
It was kind of cool
to have so many people
talking about you,
even if it was bad.
- So I figure maybe I can go
put the stickers all over
"The Daily News"
delivery trucks.
- The newspapers hated it.
- I see a guy who's sitting
by one of the trucks
having a cigarette and I said,
"Excuse me, I've got some
stickers here
for George Maksian."
- That guy's terrible.
- Do you think I can put them on
some of the trucks?
- Other program directors
hated us.
- I must've hit 20, 25 trucks.
- He's a horrible disc jockey.
- Now I see the door wide open
and I go in and it's
a security guy sitting there
and I said, "I've got a package
for George Maksian.
Can I drop it off?"
- The ad agencies hated us.
- I go up to the third floor.
I find a couple of people
who are up there working,
and I said, "Hey,
I've got a package here
for George Maksian."
- He doesn't sound like New York.
- Would you mind pointing
out his desk?
- Other deejays hated us.
- First, I was thinking,
I'm going to put one sticker
down, and then I thought,
Why do one?
I've got a box of stickers here.
I don't want to
come back with them.
- Everybody made fun.
- And I start
putting them all over.
And I know when he comes
to work in the morning,
he's going to see I break for
George Maksian stickers
all over the office.
- You know how
bumper stickers are.
You don't get them off
as easy as you get them on.
- Tell it to my heart
Tell me I'm the only one
Is this really love
or just a game?
I'll never forget
when Z100 hit,
because there was this moment
that I said, who is this?
And it was Whitney Houston.
Who is this?
And it was Aretha Franklin.
They started playing pop music
like I remember WABC,
but it was more than that.
It was polished. It was pure.
Tell it to my heart,
tell me I'm the only one
- I wanted it to be
about the music,
the music was
the most important part of it.
And we were the conduit
from the people to the music.
I wanted to have the people
who made the music on the radio
talking about the music,
and I wanted our disc jockeys
to know what they were playing.
Very few record promotion guys
would bring us records.
We had to go buy our own records
at Tower Records.
We couldn't get any celebrity
guest on The Morning Show.
They didn't want
to come to Secaucus.
They didn't know
where Secaucus was,
and we had an intern by the name
of William Brownstein.
William heard me complaining
about not having
any famous people on the show.
He said, I can get you a guest,
a famous guest.
I said, "William,
who do you know that could
possibly be famous?"
He said, "Well,
because every year
"I volunteer
for the Jerry Lewis Telethon.
And here in New York, Tony hosts
that and he likes me."
- Whoa, tie a yellow ribbon
'round the ole oak tree
- So Tony Orlando comes by.
He's our very first guest
on Z100.
- I walk in
and there's this energetic,
unbelievable young man
introducing me
to someone who I already knew.
I knew Scott from being on
the road when I had Candida out,
he was the first person
to ever play a Dawn record.
Oh, my God, Scott.
Well, come on.
Let's do the interview.
- Whether it was an artist
or an author or an athlete,
they would stop at MTV.
They would stop
at the "Today Show."
They would stop
at "Good Morning America."
He and I sat down
and we decided that Z100
has to become a destination
for all things music.
- Ladies and gentlemen,
let's welcome, Mr. James Brown.
Good morning, Mr. Brown.
- Ow!
- Z100 really was a major factor
in what was
a really a renaissance
in a sense of a musical culture
in the city.
'83, '84,
'85 in the mid-'80s, then.
It was a catalyst.
You had
this great music going on,
but Z100 brought it together
in a way and a form
in a -- in a package
that others had not.
- I have met a number
of radio guys in my career
who -- their attitude was
I don't care.
Is it a hit? Is it not a hit?
Is my listener going to care?
Because I don't care.
You know,
and that would break your heart
because you worked so hard
to write a song,
record a song, promote a song,
and you go out there
and the attitude was like,
what does it matter to me?
It's all widgets.
So you needed guys
that loves music.
You know, he loves the music,
and it doesn't have to be
rock and roll.
But he also -- he gets
the rock and roll thing.
He played new music,
he played hit music,
and he would fall
in love with songs
and play them no matter
what the chart position was
at any given time,
which was unique.
When you're really using
the phrase to be a great
radio person, love of music
allows you to be different
to not be totally predictable.
And for that contagious spirit
to come through.
- One of the most amazing things
for me is to remember the people
that walk through our hallways
and these people got up
really early in the morning
and they came to Secaucus.
And I was promoting
"Johnny Dangerously"
or "Wise Guys" one of the films,
"Would you go on
The Morning Zoo?
Would you go on
with Scott Shannon?"
I said, "Are you kidding me?"
This guy wrote the book.
- Oh, my God, I got through
finally, my first time.
- Oh, how do you like that?
Oh, it's your first time,
I'm so excited.
- Stations like Z100
made me feel like
I had the freedom to do really
experimental projects,
and if we somehow nailed it,
that it would wind up on Z100.
We didn't -- we didn't --
we didn't try to say,
"Oh, let's make a Z100 record,
"let's make
a record from our hearts
"that we think is really cool.
"And if they think it's cool,
home free."
- When Z100, when those deejays,
and they got behind it
and when people were pulling
for you and pushing and --
and the radio
was on fire for you,
you just never got higher.
Everybody was in it together.
It was a beautiful feeling.
It took Top 40, Top 20 music,
and and turned it
into a lifestyle.
You know, it became a brand.
It was really interesting.
It was a marvelous time
to be on radio and to break.
- You know,
you're looking for signs.
Do I have a hit record?
Do I have a record that is not
just going to be a local
or regional hit,
but do I have a record
that's a national hit
that likely couldn't go --
let's say to the Top 10
of the charts.
So that in memory,
it's hard to think
of a more important ad
than Z100, which says to you,
okay, you have a hit record.
When it came to my career,
you know,
when I started to pay attention,
in essence,
when I was born in 1983,
that's when
I would pay attention to --
to what a radio station meant
from a business standpoint,
not just, you know, a kid
with his ear to the speaker.
And so the reach of Z100
was felt from coast to coast.
- It was a tough ad to get.
But if you got it and it went
on the radio and it worked,
it was exciting
and it was more exciting
because it wasn't cookie cutter,
all of the same sound.
It wasn't all rock or pop/rock
or dance.
It was the best of the best.
- If you were an artist
and you know
that you wound up
on the Z100 playlist
because that's what
we all wanted to do.
We want to crossover because
crossover means that the person
that you don't expect to love
your music, loves your music,
and I don't care
what people say.
If they tell you something
other than this, they are lying.
They are lying. They are lying.
One of my fondest memories
of going up to visit
with The Morning Crew
was a Christmas special,
and I was in a sweater
and a scarf.
And Michael Damien, who's still
a friend to this day,
was up there and he was wearing
a hat, a black round bowler hat.
And I said, "Oh, I love hats.
Can I try that on?"
And took the hat off his head,
put it on, walked out with it.
That was the black hat
that you've seen
throughout my entire career.
It was given to me
by Michael Damien on The Z100
Morning Show
with Scott and the crew.
- We signed on the air
in New York,
a brand-new radio station,
a little mini radio station
that wanted to go
from worst to first.
- So the next morning I get up,
I go to work.
- He just went nuts.
- I don't say a word
to the members of the Zoo.
Long about 8:00
I pull out that Associated Press
list of radio stations
just rolled up.
I unroll it like this
all the way down to the ground
and I'm gonna read them
on the air.
- He was reaming out
the entire team.
You know, this is not working.
You know,
we got to raise our game.
We might as well just pack up
our things and leave
and let the station
go to dead air.
- I started reading
from number one
and I get down to 20.
I said, "No Z100 and guess what?
We're number 51."
I came here from Tampa, Florida,
to build a great radio station.
And guess what? We suck!
- In the background,
you hear the little
"Saturday Night Live"
Debbie Downer sound effects.
- I almost fell out of my chair.
No one ever says that.
No one ever says you're doing
poorly in radio.
- We are going
to build a great radio station
and I'm talking to you,
the listeners.
You have to get on board
and help us.
- He recruited the audience
to build our audience.
- You know, that's a genius.
- Scott said, send in your name
and the name
of 25 of your friends
that you have turned on to Z100.
- Let people know
that this station is on.
Take out an old sheet,
get a magic marker,
write Z100 on it
and a hanging out your window
in Brooklyn, the Bronx,
Staten Island, Long Island,
wherever you are.
We need your help.
- People would hang signs
out their windows
and people were wearing
their Z shirts.
If they had jackets,
they had pins on them,
you know, for the station.
- They became our advertising
agency.
- Take a piece of paper,
make a homemade bumper sticker.
Put it in the rear window.
"I listen to Z100."
I want our listeners
to be a part of our trip.
We're going to play more music.
We're going to play better.
We're going to give away
the most money.
- You could win $20,000.
$25,000.
$30,000.
We will build
a great radio station.
I promise you, I guarantee you
it's going to happen.
- Then you hear the little
"Rocky" music coming up.
- We're going from
worst to first.
Nothing's going to stop us.
- So he got the audience on our
side, made us the underdog.
- And long by that time,
I noticed Claire had already
evacuated the room.
She was scared.
She thought I was having
a heart attack or something.
John Bell says, "Your muscles
in your neck are all stuck out.
You're okay?
You need me to call a doctor?"
I said,
"We're going to be fine.
We just have to go from
worst to first."
- We're going
from worst to first.
- And then he told all of us,
take a case of Z100 t-shirts,
put it in the trunk of your car,
and every time you see somebody
walking by with one of those
worst to first signs,
give him a t-shirt.
I drove through the streets
of New York
and saw people hanging sheets
out of office buildings.
"Z100 worst to first."
- We built that up step by step
by running contests.
- [ Speaks indistinctly ]
$1,000 all day long,
you're the second one today.
- And being at everything that
went on in New York City,
you saw the Z100 can.
- We're at 51st
at Avenue of the Americas.
It has tons and tons of
t-shirts,
hats, buttons, and more.
- The fact that it was -- that it
grew at this lightning pace
was a remarkable tribute to,
you know,
viral growth at the time
when there was no viral.
- This could have been
the first viral campaign
10 years before the Internet
even was invented.
- It showed a sense
of determination,
a sense of ambition,
and people always root
for the little guy.
It's just human nature.
It's the "Rocky" movie.
That's exactly what Z100 was.
- Here is this new station
and we were doing something
nobody else was doing.
This hodgepodge
of people and personalities
that nobody had ever heard
of who were suddenly challenging
the monsters of New York radio.
- And it wasn't just us.
It was the power of the people
who love that radio station.
A great radio station
has emotion, it has a soul.
And that day that radio station
got that effing soul.
- It was a rant.
It was, and I'm sure,
a calculated rant, of course.
- And next time,
the book came out...
- What I have here are
the advanced ratings,
and this envelope hot off
the presses
has been hermetically sealed
in a mayonnaise jar
on Funk & Wagnalls'
front porch.
Okay, here's the scoop.
[ Laughs ] They did it.
They went from worst to first.
- Scott Shannon's next up.
- That's right, he's going to
tell us how his station
went from worst to first.
- Scott Shannon's Morning Zoo
took the station
from worst to first
in 74 days.
- And in that short time
lived up to its slogan
from worst to first.
- And took the station
from worst to first.
- After the 74 days, we had
caught the market flatfooted.
We had run over everybody.
These were wonderful
radio companies.
This was Infinity.
This was Doubleday,
this was CBS, ABC, NBC,
Westinghouse.
- I had a test.
I call it the Ray's pizza test.
There was an Old Ray's pizza,
which is now closed
on 6th Avenue and 11th Street.
They always had WKTU on.
All of a sudden,
sure enough,
I went into Ray's pizza
and I heard Z100,
and I knew
that was an indicator.
They found us that we were --
we were passing
the Ray's pizza test.
We were on our way.
- They started
at the very bottom of the barrel
and it was like lightning.
Z100 became the biggest thing
in New York radio
and therefore,
around the world.
- That is Scott's
marketing genius.
- I obviously was popular in
Tampa and was on TV
and in the newspaper
and all that,
but nothing could have
prepared me for what hit me
when we got to first place
in New York.
- They're the hottest duo
on your radio dial.
- Joining us now with the wizards
of the hit radio.
- A relative newcomer
is the king of morning drive.
- Helping bring this music
our way
is Z Morning Zoo deejay
Scott Shannon.
- The wizard of Z100
program director
and disc jockey,
Scott Shannon.
- It was all a blur to me.
I mean, one minute
I'm flying into Chicago
to be on Oprah,
and the next minute I got
"Good Morning America"
in the studio with us,
cameras everywhere.
- The Zoo is a Molotov cocktail
of call-ins, characters,
contests.
A lot of clowning.
And, of course,
the Top 40 chart busters.
It is the number one radio show
in the nation,
and we join zoo crew deejay
Scott Shannon and Ross Britton
in the Z100 control room
and live on the air.
Hi, guys.
- 10 minutes after 8:00
in the morning.
Good morning, how are you?
- I'm just fine.
How are you guys?
- I did Regis's show
probably 10 times
I was on with Geraldo Rivera.
I was absolutely blindsided
by all that.
I mean, it was on the cover
of "New York Magazine."
The guy sat me down
and did like five pages on me.
There's not five pages in me.
That's not why I got into radio.
I got into radio because I love
turning the microphone on.
I love putting the headphones on
and talking to people.
Wait a minute.
Good morning, Z100. Guess what?
You got $1,000.
[ Cheering ]
- I can't believe it.
- It's our birthday,
but you got the present.
I love that part of it.
That kid is still there in me.
I still feel that way
when I get up in the morning.
I can't wait to get to work.
- I love Scott. He's always been
really wonderful to me
and very friendly to me
and, you know,
but always wanted me
to do that shtick stuff.
But, you know, Scott,
I like my rock and roll serious.
- There's a reason people
are switching to Z100 because...
we're serious.
- We're serious.
- My mother will never,
ever speak to me this is...
- Hello.
[ Explosion ]
- One of the brilliant things
about Scott Shannon
and the Morning Zoo
was his ability
to ferret out a pop culture.
What was the hippest thing
happening?
He saw where the trends were.
- One day our music director
came in and said,
"There's a lady out front
who won't go away.
"She comes every Tuesday,
and she insists that we have
to play her record."
- Borderline
Feels like I'm going
to lost my mind
- Madonna used to call us
on a regular basis.
She was not Madonna then.
She was just a woman
who was trying
to get her record played.
So I quizzed him, I said,
"Is anybody else playing it?"
"No, no. But she says
it's big in the clubs."
I said, "Well, this isn't
a club, it's a radio station."
He said, "She's very insistent
she wants to see you now."
She would say to Scott,
"That if you play my music now,
I will do something special
for Z100 when I'm a star."
- So I said to her, I said,
"If we play your record at night
"a couple of times,
will you stay home next week?
You don't have to come back,
right?"
She said, "Right."
And she said, "I promise
I'll make it up to you."
Now that particular song
was called "Holiday."
We put it on at night,
it got a couple of phone calls,
I think it was her calling.
And -- and so we moved it
to daytime
and it became
a pretty big hit for us.
- Madonna decided to be
a movie star
with a soundtrack, obviously.
The name of the movie,
and the name of the single was
"Who's That Girl?"
We make a deal with Madonna that
the world premiere of the movie
in Times Square
will air on Z100 live.
- On the way to the Madonna
appearance at Times Square
with a rabid audience
of about 15, 20,000 people.
I'm sitting there
with Scott Shannon
and just him and I in the limo.
He insists on
wearing a Z100 t-shirt.
I was all dressed up.
I had the blazer. I thought
I was looking pretty good.
We fought all the way there.
I ended up wearing his shirt.
- We had like 10, 12,000
people gathered together
in Times Square.
They built a big stage up there.
They had like 50
or 60 photographers
and videographers
down in the bullpen in front.
People hanging out of windows
all up and down the street.
Madonna fans
as far as you could see.
She arrived in a limousine,
jumped up on stage
in a beautiful gown
and welcomed everybody.
Told the whole story
of how she arrived in New York
for the very first time.
It was one of the best days
in the history of the station.
- You started broadcasting
from the top
of the Empire State Building,
and now Z100 heard
all around the world.
That's something.
- It's just what I do.
I mean, that's my job.
My job is to build
radio stations and to do radio,
and ever since I was a kid,
that's what I wanted to do.
And, you know, it just comes
with the territory.
- The Z100 New York Morning Zoo
with Scott and Ross
the last time around.
- It's the 2019 iHeartRadio
Jingle Ball,
the biggest holiday
music event of the year.
- Alarm clocks ring
in my head
My body's still screaming,
it's dead
The legacy of Z100 from
inception
was David and Goliath.
- Scott set a tone.
He set an image
that transcended hipness,
and he was just by himself.
- Scott Shannon is probably
the best program director
in the United States of America,
as well as being
one of the finest
air personalities in the world.
- New York is a place where
radio personalities are bigger
than the music they're playing.
For me, you know, he'll always
be one of those guys. Giant.
- Scott had these incredible
personal relationships.
He made it a point.
Don't just play the song.
Get to know the person.
You know? What's making
that person tick?
It really sets the tone
for the radio world.
- He created something
that could keep going,
that Elvis could come
and continue that legacy
and create something
a little different
and continue that.
We've all
seen those whether it's shows,
whether it's radio or television
or whatever,
that has a quick rise
and a quick fall.
Didn't happen with Z100.
You're talking about
almost 40 years.
- Scott was -- was a renegade,
an outlier who just had it
right here in his gut.
- How do we hold hands
and win together?
And that was what
Scott solicited from everybody.
- We may not have agreed
on everything,
but at the end of the day,
the amazing thing that happened
was that the right thing
came out of the center.
- Z100 was more
than just a radio station.
There was something about
what was being broadcast
over that radio frequency
that united millions of people.
- When I walked down the hall
and look in the window
at the radio station
that used to be my dreaded enemy
and is now among my best friends
and I see that group of people,
I understand that
Scott Shannon's influence
is still very much there.
Understanding your audience,
who's listening?
What do they want to hear?
What do they not want to hear?
And that was always
the importance with Scott
and his reign at Z100,
and it's definitely
the importance with us.
We've got to keep an eye
on where we're going.
We have to listen.
We have to learn.
Z100 is New York City.
It just always has been,
and it always will be.
- Surveying the universe
From the top
of the Empire State Building.
Z100 -- the flame thrower.
- The alarm clock's
ring in my head
My body's still
screaming it's dead
When you can't get to sleep
it's so rough
Getting up in the morning's
so tough
Zoo
Aah, aah
When I cut myself
when I shave
And my hair
won't even behave
There's only one thing left
for me to do
Crank it up
to the Z Morning Zoo
Good morning
on the Z Morning Zoo
Rise and shine with
folks like you
Get up with
the Morning Z Zoo
Well, I'm ready
to give up the ghost
'Cause I'm burning
my coffee and toast
But I'm doing
the best I can do
Getting up with
the Z Morning Zoo
Good morning on
the Z Morning Zoo
The Z Morning Zoo
Aah, aah
Good morning from
the Z Morning Zoo
Rise and shine
with folks like you
Good morning from
the Z Morning Zoo
Get up with
the Morning Z Zoo
Get up with the morning,
get up with the morning
Get up with
the Morning Z Zoo
- Something in your eyes
is making such a fool of me
When you hold me in your arms
and love me
Till I just can't see
But then you let me down
when I look around
Baby, it just can't be found
Stop driving me away
I just wanna stay
It's something
I just got to say
Just try to understand
I'll give it all I can
'Cause you got
the best of me
Yeah
Borderline
Feels like I'm going to
lose my mind
You just keep on pushing
my love
Over the borderline
Good job, dad.
is Michael Scott Shannon.
I'm a radio programmer
and radio deejay.
I'm standing in
333 Meadowlands Parkway
in Secaucus, New Jersey.
Why?
Because this is where
the story began.
- Serving the universe.
- Good morning, everybody.
- The top of
the Empire State Building.
- It's on the air everywhere.
- WHTZ.
We're going from worst
to first.
- Z100, babe.
- Top hits.
- Pop/rockin'.
- Z100!
- They did it.
- They've gone from worst
to first.
- They went from worst to first.
- Worst to first.
- The winning formula
is wild and wacky.
- Happy birthday.
- You made my monkey weird.
- Z100!
- Z100, New York.
[ "Wanted Dead or Alive"
by Bon Jovi playing ]
- All right
- Every kid dreams of being heard
on the radio.
I was driving across
the Driscoll Bridge
in New Jersey on my way back
to my parents' house
and I was alone and it came on
and I started to drive fast
and turned it up louder,
hoping to really
to get pulled over
just so you could tell the cop,
"That's me on the radio!"
Wanted
- Wanted
- Dead or alive
- It was the summer of 1983.
Back then, the radio ratings
came in on
the Associated Press Newswire.
People would stand
around the machine
waiting for it to come off.
If we had taken this format,
if we'd taken this show
to Des Moines, Iowa
or to someplace out in Kentucky,
we would have had a great shot.
I see the number one station,
the R&B station, WRKS.
I didn't expect
to be in the top 10.
So I look down in the next 10,
no Z100.
- But in New York, we're going
against the best.
- And I get down to like 40
and 45.
- The biggest radio stations
had a reputation that went back
20, 30, 40, 50 years.
- There are stations
from Philadelphia
that are leaking
into New Jersey,
but just had enough listeners
to get in the ratings.
- A good rating is somewhere
like over five close to a 10.
- And at number 51, W-H-T-Z.
- We had a two.
A two rating is lousy.
- We were in last effing place.
I went home that night.
I couldn't sleep.
My wife said, what's wrong?
We suck. That's what's wrong.
- In 1983, I was vice president
of radio programming from
Malrite Communications Group
based in Cleveland, Ohio.
Malrite's chairman and CEO
was Milton Maltz.
One day he popped his head
in my office and said,
"Jim, we're going to buy a new
radio station for New York City.
"Just outside the city limits
just across the river
in New Jersey."
And that radio station
had the approval of the FCC
to move its tower
and transmitter
to the Empire State Building.
Now it was time to go find
just the right person
to oversee the programming,
the talent, and the marketing
of the radio station.
This person had to be
just a little bit screwed up
because they were going to take
on the biggest
broadcasting companies
in the world,
and that person
was in Tampa, Florida.
[ Static ]
- General on the Q Zoo,
final chapter.
- Today, it was a time to cry.
Scott Shannon was leaving.
- Some may say goodbye
and good riddance.
- New York was calling.
- Well, for thousands, others,
it was an emotional,
sad farewell.
- I really think that...
[ speaks indistinctly ]
- Come on, ma'am, perk up.
- As co-keeper of the Q Zoo,
Scott Shannon bid final
farewell to radio fans.
- Well, let's laugh right now,
okay?
- He, indeed, will be missed.
- And we'll miss him.
- Boom, I'm out of here.
- New York City was an impossibly
saturated media market.
It is the toughest market
in the world to break into.
If you want to be on radio
in New York,
particularly in that era,
you were facing
the giants of the business,
the Goliaths of the business.
- This guy kept
calling me from Cleveland
and I had a stack of, you know,
those pink callback pads,
you know?
So then I got a call
from a buddy of mine
who is a program director,
and he says to me,
"Why don't you call
these people back in Cleveland?
"I just interviewed up there.
Then I realized that they kept
asking me questions about you."
I said why don't you
just call him?
And they said, "Well, we did,
but he won't return our calls."
- And to come from the south
with,
you know,
kind of a funky accent.
I don't even know
what Scott's accent is.
It was really a daunting task,
to say the least.
- There are a lot
of golden retrievers
in New York in the early '80s.
You had the traditional
talk radio audience.
Listen to John A. Gambling
at W-O-R.
And you still had WBLS and WKTU
being very popular.
You had WPLJ,
which was a rock station
with some pop tendencies.
You are WNBC,
which had Imus in the morning,
Stern in the afternoon,
and really Top 40 music
in between.
But those personalities
were so powerful
that they overwhelmed
the image of the station.
- Well, to understand what was
going on in 1983,
you really have to go back
to the mid to late 1970s
because a lot of
very significant changes
in the media marketplace
took place.
See, in 1974,
when I started at WPLJ,
which became New York's dominant
rock station on FM,
rock had a very
broad definition.
It encompassed Led Zeppelin,
but also Carly Simon
and Carole King
and Joni Mitchell
the great Motown catalog.
Then came 1977.
Then came disco.
- Oh, freak out
- And the rock community
fragment.
- Basically, what wound up
happening at radio
from the way I saw it was
they could extract one lane
that they thought
was really working,
and they could just format
a whole show or a station
like that.
- About the new dance craze
- I get out there and I got this
really carefully
prepared presentation,
you know,
so I could pass them out
to all the goobers in the room.
And I play a tape
of our morning show.
- The Q Zoo in the morning
- This is Elmer Smud Pucker.
- Shannon, Cleveland,
Brooks, and Tedd Webb
Billy Bob, Phil,
and Johnson's the latest man
Good morning from the Q
morning Zoo
- And finally, there's
one wiseacre and he says,
"Well, what makes you think
that you're ready
for the biggest market
in the country?"
Then I just snapped,
I don't need this job.
And I threw my little booklet
at him
and I got up and I walked out.
So I'm at the elevator bank
and out comes Mr. Malrite.
He's the guy
who owns the company.
And he said,
"Where are you going?"
I said, "I'm going home. I don't
want to work for that idiot."
So he said, "No, no, no, no, no,
no, no, you're our guy."
And I said,
"I got to make my plane back."
He says, "Oh, but you're still
going to take the job, right?"
I said, "Yeah, yeah,
I'll take the job."
Then I realized...
[ Horn honks ]
...I don't know anything
about New York.
- Serving middle Tennessee
with 5,000 watts of fun power.
This is 7:30 in the...
[ speaks indistinctly ]
Capital city!
- I originally met Scott in 1972,
when he was Super Shan
at WMAK in Nashville.
- Super Shan, WMAK
- I didn't know
if it was him or Elvis
because he tried to look
exactly like Elvis Presley.
He had big hair, that big chin,
and he was bigger than life.
Privately, Scott is very demure
and very quiet.
And as soon as that
microphone goes on, he's on.
- Scott's passion
is being on the air.
He will do anything
to be on the air.
Scott was hired
to be program director
of WPGC in Washington, D.C.,
the Marriotts own
the radio station.
No disrespect to the Marriotts,
but there were Mormons.
They are Mormons.
They're still Mormons.
The Marriotts didn't like him
on the air.
You know,
they basically said to him,
we don't want you on the air.
Scott was driven out
of the WPGC
because he wants to be
on the air
more than he wants to program
a radio station.
- WPGC FM and AM morningside.
It's 12:01.
Good afternoon!
- The day he left to interview
in Tampa,
he drove his car
to the Baltimore-Washington
airport
and he gets on a plane
and he goes, has the interview.
A few days later,
he calls me and he said,
"Hey." I go, "What's up?"
"I think
I left my car at the airport."
I go, "Okay,
like in short-term parking?"
"No, I think I left it like up
against the curb
in front of the airport and if
I did, the keys are in it."
And he was hired
for the morning show,
which was his dream, and that's
when he started the Zoo concept.
- Good morning from the Q
Morning Zoo
Rise and shine with
folks like you
- So I teamed up with another guy
by the name of Cleveland Wheeler
and I told him
I had this plan to do this show
called The Morning Zoo,
and it had deejay shenanigans,
craziness, parody songs,
crazy phone calls, just kind of
a free-for-all morning show
that sounded like nothing
was planned.
Two and a half years later,
we had the highest morning
show ratings in the country.
- Shannon has taken Q 105
and made it
the number one station
in Tampa.
He's won an award for being
the top deejay in the country.
- Scott and I were working
in Tampa, Florida.
He calls me into his office
one day and he goes,
Nobody can know this.
And he proceeds to tell me
that he's developing
a brand-new station
called Z100 in New York City
and would I like to join him.
- I go in and I tell my manager,
I'm going to have to go.
I got to go to New York.
I signed a contract.
What? What are you doing?
You're number one.
You're making good money
and you just met a girl.
I said, I'm a try to see
if she'll go with me.
- We weren't living together.
We were dating maybe a year.
I traveled to New York
for business, which was great,
and I love to come to New York
and go shop.
And I loved everything
that New York City had to offer,
but was not an aspiration
to move there and live there.
I was a southern girl,
grew up in Louisville
and then was living in Florida.
- She did agree to go with me
on my first trip
to New York City,
and that is another story.
- We flew into Newark
and Scott's so excited.
There's tons of traffic
and he's looking.
It's nighttime and he looks up
and he goes,
"Oh, my gosh, look at that.
I'm going to be talking,
that city,
that's New York City."
And I said, "Honey,
no, that's Newark."
I hate myself
for loving you
I definitely remember hearing
the Blackheart stuff
and what it felt like
to hear your song
coming out of the radio.
It's always --
I get a big kick out of it.
It's like, hear one of our
records come on, I crank it.
Because that was the dream,
you know,
when you're kid
is being able to be in a band,
make music
that other people want to hear
and actually get it played
on the radio.
I hate myself for loving you
- Serving the universe
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
- When we made that transition
on WPLJ
from a pure rock station
to a Top 40 station.
- It's time to make a change,
the people are changing.
Let's do it.
We were about to enter Top 40's
second golden age in 1983
and ready for our climb
right to the top.
And then out of nowhere
came Scott Shannon.
- Live from the penthouse studios
of WWHTZ, the flame thrower,
it's a nearly famous,
highly outrageous,
but never, ever contagious,
Z Morning Zoo!
- Yeah.
- Along about the time
I was 13 or 14,
my dad was transferred
to this place called
Fort Benjamin Harrison
just outside of Indianapolis.
And I ran into two new friends
down the block. Two brothers.
And they had a big sister
who loved music,
and she had this little
record box,
had a handle on it
and had 45s in there.
And one day we just got into it
and I said,
"Holy crap, what is this?"
And it was rock and roll music.
It was love at first sight.
Or listen.
[ Record scratches ]
So every week, I would pedal
my little Schwinn bicycle
down the road
to this electronic store,
and he had a little
record section
and I would go through there
and pick out one or two songs
every week
that a guy could afford.
I notice he got in some new
radios and I said,
"What's that right there?"
He said,
"That's a transistor radio"
So I had in my hands.
Oh, my God, I got to have it.
"I'll put it on layaway
for you."
I said, "Really?"
"Yeah. You give me
a couple of bucks every week.
When you get enough money,
you can have it."
Finally got that radio
and I took it everywhere.
I still have that radio.
Then one day, one of my friends
tells me about WIFE radio,
the station we all listen to
Top 40 for teenagers.
- Indianapolis
WIFE
- They have a big window
right on the street,
on Meridian,
when you're going into the city
and you can stand out there
and watch the deejay work.
I'd stand there
and look through that window
and see the disc jockey with
the headphones and microphone,
the records, the turntable.
I said, "Holy crap,
that's what I want to do."
- Wait a second.
Did Scott Shannon create Z100?
- That's what I'm doing
the movie about. Boom!
And you're in it.
- Holy shit.
- So this is gonna be massive,
dude.
- I didn't even know that!
- The station was basically
designed and planned
to be the successor
to 77 WABC,
which was the huge
New York radio station,
and it covered half the country
from the '60s.
I even had a jingle cut that
brought back memories of WABC.
Theirs was...
77 WABC
Whee! Had this little chime
time at the end.
And I had one made
that went...
Z100
WHDZ
Whee!
I didn't sing it
that good, did I?
- Z100 WHTZ
- There was nobody doing Top 40
radio back in the day.
WABC, which had been doing it
for years and years and years,
which is where I came from,
was now all talk
and played no music.
- There were several attempts
with a few stations
WXLO 99X, WWDJ in New Jersey.
They did not have
the brainpower behind them.
They were just playing records,
so they failed.
- There were openings
for small -- well, at the time,
they're small niches,
Hispanic stations, for instance,
niches that were not
unimportant
and would continue to grow
as time went on.
The odds of any mainstream
format coming in to --
to become a major player
in the market were minuscule.
- There was a segment of New York
radio that had gotten lazy.
They just gotten kind of,
you know, we're number one,
so it's okay.
There's enough money
to go around for everyone,
there's enough audience
to go around.
- I didn't like New York radio
at the time.
There were no real sort of
adult contemporary stations
at the time.
Obviously, the couple
of the greatest R&B stations
in America were here,
but Larry Berger and PLJ
were the the coup de grce,
if you will,
but it was soulless,
it was uninspiring,
and it was ready for a takeover.
- So I walk into the fifth floor
of the Meadowlands Hilton
and it was
a beehive of activity.
But what stopped me
in the middle of the room
there was this giant window
facing
the Empire State Building,
and there was this mountain
of a man kind of walking back
and forth matted hair, beard,
khaki shorts, biting his nails,
talking to no one in particular,
writing notes,
scribbling things furiously.
And this was Scott Shannon
planning out Z100
and the Z Morning Zoo.
- He got not only
the soul of New York,
he got the beat of New York,
but he also got New Jersey,
got Long Island,
got Connecticut,
got all the surrounding areas,
not just Manhattan.
- So I come up with this plan
because I really don't know
the five boroughs.
Well, that's good because
there's about 10 million people
in Long Island, another eight
or nine in New Jersey,
and two to four million
in Westchester and Connecticut
that picked up our signal.
I said,
"That's what I'm going to do."
- He wanted to
come up with music that he felt
could come and thread rock
and rhythm and pop,
and the music was unlike
any other mix at any
Top 40 had ever done.
It's at that point that I knew
this was going to be something
that New York radio
had never seen before.
- I'll tell you what, babe...
[ speaks indistinctly ]
...hippest game in the city,
baby doll.
I'm looking for
the 100th caller.
I flew to New York City,
brought me over to this hotel
Meadowlands Hilton.
It was a real dark room,
and I couldn't figure out
why am I sitting in a room
that looked like
it was just dark?
So he walks over
and he turns the chair
against this big bay window
and he goes, whoosh.
And he opens up
this big bay window.
And it was the skyline
of New York City
and goes, "I'm going to give you
a microphone to talk to that."
Obviously, I knew Scott Shannon
liked the song
"Hate Myself For Loving You."
I also knew there was
a possibility
he would play the record,
and we get this idea
to send a plane
with a tail over Secaucus.
And the plane says "Dear Scott
play Joan Jett."
First day, the guy flies over
the wrong part of Secaucus,
and Scott doesn't see
the plane.
I'm having a heart attack.
- This is the room
where it all started.
It was -- I don't know,
it was a magic place to me.
I remember when we first were
getting ready to go on the air.
I remember one day
I'm standing here
and I'm just
looking out the window
and all of a sudden,
something hit me in the feet.
And it was our chief engineer,
Frank Foti.
Rolled that little dolly out
and he's,
"Huh, what are you doing?"
I said, "I'm just kind of
soaking up the atmosphere, man.
I'm just --
I'm just feeling it."
I said, "Frank, I truly believe
that radio history
is going to be made
in this room."
He's still on his back
and he said,
"Man, you just
gave me goosebumps."
He said, "Let me get up there
and look out
the history window."
Before we ever
even signed on the air,
they were working
on building a studio,
and I was promised by Mr. Maltz,
Mr. Malrite,
that it would be
a Rolls-Royce radio station.
So I went over
to take a look at it one day
and I found out we weren't
getting a Rolls-Royce.
We were getting a Volkswagen.
They had this fella in there
and he said,
"You must be the new punk,
Scott Shannon."
And I go,
"Yeah, yeah, who are you?"
He said,
"Well, I'm your boss.
I'm the chief engineer."
I went, oh, boy.
And I got a hold of Jim,
and I said,
"Jim, we've got a problem here,
"and unless I get
another engineer in here,
I'm going to have to
go back to Tampa."
I need somebody maybe
a little hipper,
a little younger, someone who
understands my language.
When he got through
with the litany
of different engineers
that they had describing
each one, I said,
"Is that all you got?"
And he says, "No,
there is one more fellow,
"I don't know, though he's --
he's very hard to deal with.
"He sits in his office
and cranks The Who up
at full volume all day long."
Well,
is there another problem?
He said, "Well,
he's a little crazy."
I said, "A little crazy?"
He said, "No,
he's a whole lot crazy."
- I'd been told by some
corporate folks,
they said, you were lucky
to have worked around
some pretty intense people
in Cleveland at WMMS,
which was the station
I grew up on.
They said, Scott's like
the people at MMS,
but on steroids.
- Next day, in comes Frank Foti.
Oh, my God, what a mess.
- And I hear this voice.
So I go, "Is that Frank-o?"
Yeah, he goes, "Hi,
my name's Scott Shannon."
- I told him, I want
a radio station that pounds,
that jumps out of the radio.
[ Explosion ]
I want a flame thrower.
- The flame thrower, Z100
- He said, "I'm your guy."
- The best way I could sum it up
is if I may borrow a phrase
from Roger Daltrey of The Who.
You know, he's always
talked about The Who's music
as somebody's punching you
in the nose
and saying, I love you.
- It's like songs sound different
on this radio station.
I don't understand how,
but they sound different.
There's like a magic there.
From a technical standpoint,
the sound of the station
was booming and loud,
and from an engineering
standpoint, it was compressed.
It just sounded really,
really cool.
- It was only in my dreams
Well, my music started
getting played, I was just like,
"Oh, my God, if I'm hearing this
in my car right now,
like millions of people
are hearing in their car, too,
to or in their bedrooms
or the...
And it was really like
this communal experience.
And I guess that's why it was
so magical to me.
It just felt like
a connectedness.
And I really put everything
behind that dream
of being played on the radio.
It was only in my dream
- I would stand right here
and then Ross Britain
would be over here
and have the bells and the drums
and all that stuff.
Claire Stevens would be back
in the newsroom over there
and then she would
move over here.
Jonathan B. Bell would be there
until the stars came in,
and he had to move over
next to Claire.
One of those Professor
Jonathan B. Bell reports.
What's going on, professor?
- Well, we got lots of things
happening around town today,
Scott.
I had heard about Scott Shannon
before I actually met him,
and he had been described to me
as a nut case
from Tampa, Florida,
who walked around wearing shorts
all the time
and was somehow going
to revolutionize New York radio.
And I thought,
you got to be kidding.
- Scott came in not knowing
anything about New York City,
and I think that
gave him the edge.
He wasn't frightened by the city
and intimidated.
You could tell he wasn't
from these parts.
And I think that's
what made him stand out.
He surrounded himself
with a lot of caring,
trusting people
who not only communicated well
with the audience,
but they elevated him.
- 6:27 in the morning
it's time for Claire Stevens.
- Good morning, it's 35 degrees
at this hour.
- Well, I must tell you,
Scott Shannon
meant nothing to me.
I was so new in radio
and I was so naive
and I was working
at this little tiny station
that was kind of isolated.
I got a call and they said,
"We were not able
to get you in Scott's office,
"but my wife got you
on our home radio
"and played it over
the speakerphone
"to Scott Shannon.
How soon can you get out here?"
I sat in Scott's office
and he's saying,
Well, you'll say this and you'll
do that and bah, bah, bah.
And I'm going, "Time out."
I said, "Don't you want to
interview anybody else?"
And he said, no.
"When I hear what I want,
I know it."
- Yes, Ross Britton and Scott
is going to be a rotten day.
Thank you very much.
- I was a talk jock at WABC.
I started there
when they were still music,
and then I was fired
pretty much the week
that Z100 went on the air.
So I went over to Scott a couple
of weeks later and I said,
"Hey, you know, good to see you.
I'm looking for a job.
I know you have
an afternoon opening."
And he said,
"Nah, you're a morning jock.
No, I want you to work with me."
- So I get to the Meadowlands
Hilton and I'm dressed up
like the former Madison Avenue
person that I was.
And there he is
with the big voice,
and he's Scott Shannon.
- And I said to myself,
"This is a nut house.
"And the guy that's running
the place is wearing
a Hawaiian shirt and shorts."
- Oh, my God,
what have I got myself into?
- He was able
to create deliberately
and hilariously
dysfunctional family.
At the same time,
it was an endearing family.
- Eddie Grant was a lead singer
of a group --
- The Supremes.
- Not the Supremes, you nitwit.
Let me take you to
the production office
right here.
This used to be the home
of the late J.R. Nelson.
J.R. would be here.
He was a big guy.
He didn't take any crap
from anybody, especially me.
And he had a little
like a table here.
And then I would come back
from lunch,
I have a bunch
of notes on the napkin
that I came up with
while we were having lunch
and maybe a cocktail or two.
And -- and I would say,
turn the mic on, J.R.
Z100 wants you to help us go
from worst to first.
We need your help.
And then he would put it
to music
and sound effects and all that.
And then within 30 minutes,
it would be on the air.
- Any broadcast or duplication
of this material
without the expressed
written consent
of J.R. Nelson Productions
will cost you a fortune.
- With J.R. Nelson in sports
the lion's mug, the Steelers,
the Cowboys beat the Cardinals.
The Giants are going to a one
back offense
for the Raiders' game on Sunday,
and Marvis Frazier doesn't have
much of a chance
to beat Larry Holmes tonight.
So say the experts.
Z100 weather looks like this.
- Now in addition to
the Morning Zoo,
which was crazy enough...
- The deejays here at
the Z Morning Zoo are up
and getting ready
to entertain you.
- Heigh-ho!
- We also had deejays named
Jack the Wack.
- Oh, Jack the Wack here getting
ready to go commercial for...
- Hollywood Hamilton.
- At Radio Z100
with Hollywood Hamilton.
- Dr. Christopher Reid,
Janet from another planet,
and one of the most incredible
deejays I've ever heard,
Shadow Steel.
- [ Speaks indistinctly ]
...just about 5:00.
It's been a long, hot,
nasty week.
I think it's time
we kick this sucker
in the head and get out of here.
- But there was one other
character who was very popular.
His name was Mr. Leonard.
- Mr. Leonard is sicker
than a dog this morning.
- I apologize for trying
to call up and guess
that I know I'm unintelligible,
but I'm a desperate, Scott.
- He drove a lime green pinto.
He had a matching lime
green leisure suit,
complete with cherry red shoes.
- What in the hell
is Mr. Leonard doing? Leonard!
- Back there, weaseling around.
- The guy comes to work.
He's been in the control room
one time since he's been here.
- And he was like
the common man,
well, he was below
the common man.
- Well, what about 8-3-7-5
on the telephone line?
- No, that's Tommy Tutone.
- That was Tommy Tutone.
- Well, who the hell
is this Tommy?
[ Laughter ]
- The problem was he had trouble
waking up in the morning
and many times
didn't even show up for work.
- Where in the world are you?
Everybody's here.
- Happy birthday to me.
Happy birthday!
- Hey, stop, stop all that.
Where are you?
- What do you mean
where am I?
I thought this was a holiday.
It's our birthday.
- Scott was known
to use the hotline.
He called me one day
and he said, "Magic Matt,
"there was some dead air
between commercial number three
and commercial number four."
And I said, "Not on this show.
There wasn't."
I said, "You must have been
listening to
our competition, WPLJ."
- He said, "Well, let me look
at my digital.
No, says 100.3."
He said, "No, that's my --"
I said, "Absolutely not
on this station."
I said, "I would never,
ever commit a felony,
"such as dead air on Z100,
the biggest station
in the world."
And he said, "Yeah,
looked again. It says 1-0 --
That's Z100. Don't you
[bleep] up my radio station."
Click.
[ Radio stations changing ]
- It's eight minutes
after 6:00 a.m.,
August the 2nd, 1983.
[ Ring tone ]
Ladies and gentlemen,
at this time, radio station
WHTZ signs on the air.
WHTZ is owned and operated
by Malrite Communications
Cleveland
and operates
on an assigned frequency
of 100.3 megahertz,
with studios and offices
in Secaucus, New Jersey.
Signing on the air,
this is WHTZ, the Newark,
the new Z100.
New York, it's time to wake up.
- The kids are telling everybody
about this great new station
that was broadcasting from
the top
of the Empire State Building.
- Serving the universe
from the top
of the Empire State Building,
WHTZ.
- Live from the top of
the Empire State Building,
the flame-throwing
hot rocking Z100.
- Everybody broadcasts
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
There's a master antenna on top
of the Empire State Building
that all the stations
share the rental on.
We're all there.
There was nothing unique
about what he was really doing,
but everything unique
about the way he was describing
what he was doing.
- Serving the universe
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
- Well, it's true.
- Every radio station comes
from the top
of the Empire State Building.
- They give you the impression
that they were broadcasting
from high on top
of the Empire State Building.
But in truth,
it was across the way.
But that is the plight
of New Jersey, right, everybody?
We do all the heavy lifting
and get none of the credit
for it.
They made of that nothing
defy its geographic reality
and instead,
transfer the whole ethos
to Manhattan,
to the heart of Manhattan,
and then not
only to Manhattan,
but to the --
to the gorilla building,
to the --
to the top of the top.
- We claimed
the Empire State Building
and everything that emanated
from the Empire State Building
over 27 counties
in the New York metro area.
Our goal was to be larger
than life.
- Serving the universe
from the top of
the Empire State Building.
This is the new Z100.
And then there was
a little pause
and then it was Scott's way
of telling other radio stations
we were in town.
- Get out of our way.
- I couldn't believe it.
This guy is crazy.
He's going after other
radio stations in town.
He's literally calling them out
and telling them
to get out of the way.
And here we come.
- Z100 was the rebirth
of that Top 40 mentality.
It existed
on some of the AM stations,
but to have an FM radio station
playing all the hits,
that was a novel concept
at the time.
And PLJ and Z100
both basically did it
at the same time and created
the ultimate radio war,
which for those of us
who are students of it,
we were all about that.
- What station did we rescue
you from?
- CBSFM.
- Oh, my God.
- New York radio stations
had indirectly referenced
other radio stations
in the past.
In the '60s, famously WMCA
and WABC, the good guys.
- Ringing with the good guys
WMCA
- They had a great rivalry
going on,
but they never directly
referenced each other.
When Scott started calling out
other radio stations on the air,
particularly WPLJ,
he got phone calls
from people saying,
"You can't do that,
that's illegal.
Won't the FCC fine you
for doing that?"
Said, of course they won't.
It's not illegal.
- We always like to take
personalities from the market,
not just radio, but, you know,
everybody and make fun of them.
- Could you do us a favor?
- Sure.
- Could you tell Roger Grimsby
something for us?
- All right. As long as it
doesn't get me fired.
- [ Blows raspberry ]
- When one
of the ratings came out
and Imus
had fallen in the ratings,
Scott offered to start
a fundraising campaign
to bail Imus
out of his -- of his problems.
- My friend Don Imus.
- Yeah.
- Hey, watch this. Aah!
- Basically Scott is
the ultimate radio attack dog.
He does his best work
when he had a target and WPLJ
saw what was happening at Z100.
They changed the Top 40.
But it was a wimpier,
more corporate version
of Top 40.
And so Scott called them
what they were -- wimpy radio.
- What we suddenly faced
was like nothing
I had ever experienced before.
- We have a radio station here.
They used to be album
rock and roll station.
- Mm-hmm.
- And they changed
their format recently
and their program director,
Larry Booger has a song out.
It's called,
"We're Going Wimpy."
It's their new call letters
WIMPY.
We'll get that on right now.
Here's Larry and the Wimps
and we're going wimpy on Z100.
- We did a skit about
the program director of WPLJ,
and Scott said,
"Make it Larry Booger."
And then it just went wild.
- They start their tape recorder
just like Larry Booger at 5:59
so they don't miss a single
second of the Z100 Morning Zoo.
- The name became so stuck
to poor Larry Berger
that all around New York,
people were calling him
Larry Booger.
- The audience loved it.
The clients? Not so much.
- This television station
has refused to accept
your commercial
advertising for Z100.
- And it's breaking my heart.
- Is it really?
Now there is a federal law
that limits how much level
you can put
into the transmitter.
And I know for a fact
because I measured it myself
that our competition, WPLJ,
that they would break that law.
It's called over modulation.
It would be like, you know,
speed limit's 55 miles an hour
and they want to drive 75.
Okay, you guys want to drive 75?
We'll drive 75.
Well, Larry Berger
was so competitive himself,
he had the technical
measuring device on his desk
that would -- where he could
look at Z100 and PLJ.
Well, one time he would --
he was looking at his monitor,
thinking we were breaking
the law and he called me.
I had my assistant, Steve Pepe,
go and flip some switches
so that his monitor
would look all crazy.
He was like, "Frank,
I got to call you back.
Something's not right here."
"Yeah, Larry, you're a dumb
ass." And I hung up on him.
So there was a writer
for "The Daily News"
in those days
named George Maksian
and for whatever reason, he just
wasn't a believer in Z100.
- George was a great guy,
but he was old school
in his radio taste.
He loved John Gamblings.
So when when Scott started,
he wrote a column about it
in which he pronounced
the new Z100 to be vulgar.
- Coming home one day
and opening up "The Daily News"
and seeing this article
by George Maksian
saying I hope he has
a roundtrip ticket back to Tampa
because this guy's the worst.
- My first comment says this
product hillbilly from Florida.
Remember that?
- Yeah.
- And he would write all of these
negative articles on Z100,
and it would drive Scott crazy.
- Take his ways
back to Florida.
- Yes, there's hope he's got
a one-way ticket --
- Roundtrip ticket.
- A roundtrip ticket.
- Go home.
- Boy, I was broken down.
If you ask most experts
or self-proclaimed experts,
it was destined to fail
this hillbilly from Tampa
going to launch a concept
that had worked in Tampa,
but hadn't worked anywhere else.
- And finally, I just got mad
and said, I'll tell you,
I'll just show that idiot.
And he's still that. An idiot.
- So Scott made up these stickers
that said,
"I break for George Maksian!"
So I hear it.
Kenny Lane, get in here.
Go to the office.
Sit down, close the door.
"I need you to do something
with these. Go figure it out.
Earn while you learn.
Figure it out."
- In a way it was --
It was kind of cool
to have so many people
talking about you,
even if it was bad.
- So I figure maybe I can go
put the stickers all over
"The Daily News"
delivery trucks.
- The newspapers hated it.
- I see a guy who's sitting
by one of the trucks
having a cigarette and I said,
"Excuse me, I've got some
stickers here
for George Maksian."
- That guy's terrible.
- Do you think I can put them on
some of the trucks?
- Other program directors
hated us.
- I must've hit 20, 25 trucks.
- He's a horrible disc jockey.
- Now I see the door wide open
and I go in and it's
a security guy sitting there
and I said, "I've got a package
for George Maksian.
Can I drop it off?"
- The ad agencies hated us.
- I go up to the third floor.
I find a couple of people
who are up there working,
and I said, "Hey,
I've got a package here
for George Maksian."
- He doesn't sound like New York.
- Would you mind pointing
out his desk?
- Other deejays hated us.
- First, I was thinking,
I'm going to put one sticker
down, and then I thought,
Why do one?
I've got a box of stickers here.
I don't want to
come back with them.
- Everybody made fun.
- And I start
putting them all over.
And I know when he comes
to work in the morning,
he's going to see I break for
George Maksian stickers
all over the office.
- You know how
bumper stickers are.
You don't get them off
as easy as you get them on.
- Tell it to my heart
Tell me I'm the only one
Is this really love
or just a game?
I'll never forget
when Z100 hit,
because there was this moment
that I said, who is this?
And it was Whitney Houston.
Who is this?
And it was Aretha Franklin.
They started playing pop music
like I remember WABC,
but it was more than that.
It was polished. It was pure.
Tell it to my heart,
tell me I'm the only one
- I wanted it to be
about the music,
the music was
the most important part of it.
And we were the conduit
from the people to the music.
I wanted to have the people
who made the music on the radio
talking about the music,
and I wanted our disc jockeys
to know what they were playing.
Very few record promotion guys
would bring us records.
We had to go buy our own records
at Tower Records.
We couldn't get any celebrity
guest on The Morning Show.
They didn't want
to come to Secaucus.
They didn't know
where Secaucus was,
and we had an intern by the name
of William Brownstein.
William heard me complaining
about not having
any famous people on the show.
He said, I can get you a guest,
a famous guest.
I said, "William,
who do you know that could
possibly be famous?"
He said, "Well,
because every year
"I volunteer
for the Jerry Lewis Telethon.
And here in New York, Tony hosts
that and he likes me."
- Whoa, tie a yellow ribbon
'round the ole oak tree
- So Tony Orlando comes by.
He's our very first guest
on Z100.
- I walk in
and there's this energetic,
unbelievable young man
introducing me
to someone who I already knew.
I knew Scott from being on
the road when I had Candida out,
he was the first person
to ever play a Dawn record.
Oh, my God, Scott.
Well, come on.
Let's do the interview.
- Whether it was an artist
or an author or an athlete,
they would stop at MTV.
They would stop
at the "Today Show."
They would stop
at "Good Morning America."
He and I sat down
and we decided that Z100
has to become a destination
for all things music.
- Ladies and gentlemen,
let's welcome, Mr. James Brown.
Good morning, Mr. Brown.
- Ow!
- Z100 really was a major factor
in what was
a really a renaissance
in a sense of a musical culture
in the city.
'83, '84,
'85 in the mid-'80s, then.
It was a catalyst.
You had
this great music going on,
but Z100 brought it together
in a way and a form
in a -- in a package
that others had not.
- I have met a number
of radio guys in my career
who -- their attitude was
I don't care.
Is it a hit? Is it not a hit?
Is my listener going to care?
Because I don't care.
You know,
and that would break your heart
because you worked so hard
to write a song,
record a song, promote a song,
and you go out there
and the attitude was like,
what does it matter to me?
It's all widgets.
So you needed guys
that loves music.
You know, he loves the music,
and it doesn't have to be
rock and roll.
But he also -- he gets
the rock and roll thing.
He played new music,
he played hit music,
and he would fall
in love with songs
and play them no matter
what the chart position was
at any given time,
which was unique.
When you're really using
the phrase to be a great
radio person, love of music
allows you to be different
to not be totally predictable.
And for that contagious spirit
to come through.
- One of the most amazing things
for me is to remember the people
that walk through our hallways
and these people got up
really early in the morning
and they came to Secaucus.
And I was promoting
"Johnny Dangerously"
or "Wise Guys" one of the films,
"Would you go on
The Morning Zoo?
Would you go on
with Scott Shannon?"
I said, "Are you kidding me?"
This guy wrote the book.
- Oh, my God, I got through
finally, my first time.
- Oh, how do you like that?
Oh, it's your first time,
I'm so excited.
- Stations like Z100
made me feel like
I had the freedom to do really
experimental projects,
and if we somehow nailed it,
that it would wind up on Z100.
We didn't -- we didn't --
we didn't try to say,
"Oh, let's make a Z100 record,
"let's make
a record from our hearts
"that we think is really cool.
"And if they think it's cool,
home free."
- When Z100, when those deejays,
and they got behind it
and when people were pulling
for you and pushing and --
and the radio
was on fire for you,
you just never got higher.
Everybody was in it together.
It was a beautiful feeling.
It took Top 40, Top 20 music,
and and turned it
into a lifestyle.
You know, it became a brand.
It was really interesting.
It was a marvelous time
to be on radio and to break.
- You know,
you're looking for signs.
Do I have a hit record?
Do I have a record that is not
just going to be a local
or regional hit,
but do I have a record
that's a national hit
that likely couldn't go --
let's say to the Top 10
of the charts.
So that in memory,
it's hard to think
of a more important ad
than Z100, which says to you,
okay, you have a hit record.
When it came to my career,
you know,
when I started to pay attention,
in essence,
when I was born in 1983,
that's when
I would pay attention to --
to what a radio station meant
from a business standpoint,
not just, you know, a kid
with his ear to the speaker.
And so the reach of Z100
was felt from coast to coast.
- It was a tough ad to get.
But if you got it and it went
on the radio and it worked,
it was exciting
and it was more exciting
because it wasn't cookie cutter,
all of the same sound.
It wasn't all rock or pop/rock
or dance.
It was the best of the best.
- If you were an artist
and you know
that you wound up
on the Z100 playlist
because that's what
we all wanted to do.
We want to crossover because
crossover means that the person
that you don't expect to love
your music, loves your music,
and I don't care
what people say.
If they tell you something
other than this, they are lying.
They are lying. They are lying.
One of my fondest memories
of going up to visit
with The Morning Crew
was a Christmas special,
and I was in a sweater
and a scarf.
And Michael Damien, who's still
a friend to this day,
was up there and he was wearing
a hat, a black round bowler hat.
And I said, "Oh, I love hats.
Can I try that on?"
And took the hat off his head,
put it on, walked out with it.
That was the black hat
that you've seen
throughout my entire career.
It was given to me
by Michael Damien on The Z100
Morning Show
with Scott and the crew.
- We signed on the air
in New York,
a brand-new radio station,
a little mini radio station
that wanted to go
from worst to first.
- So the next morning I get up,
I go to work.
- He just went nuts.
- I don't say a word
to the members of the Zoo.
Long about 8:00
I pull out that Associated Press
list of radio stations
just rolled up.
I unroll it like this
all the way down to the ground
and I'm gonna read them
on the air.
- He was reaming out
the entire team.
You know, this is not working.
You know,
we got to raise our game.
We might as well just pack up
our things and leave
and let the station
go to dead air.
- I started reading
from number one
and I get down to 20.
I said, "No Z100 and guess what?
We're number 51."
I came here from Tampa, Florida,
to build a great radio station.
And guess what? We suck!
- In the background,
you hear the little
"Saturday Night Live"
Debbie Downer sound effects.
- I almost fell out of my chair.
No one ever says that.
No one ever says you're doing
poorly in radio.
- We are going
to build a great radio station
and I'm talking to you,
the listeners.
You have to get on board
and help us.
- He recruited the audience
to build our audience.
- You know, that's a genius.
- Scott said, send in your name
and the name
of 25 of your friends
that you have turned on to Z100.
- Let people know
that this station is on.
Take out an old sheet,
get a magic marker,
write Z100 on it
and a hanging out your window
in Brooklyn, the Bronx,
Staten Island, Long Island,
wherever you are.
We need your help.
- People would hang signs
out their windows
and people were wearing
their Z shirts.
If they had jackets,
they had pins on them,
you know, for the station.
- They became our advertising
agency.
- Take a piece of paper,
make a homemade bumper sticker.
Put it in the rear window.
"I listen to Z100."
I want our listeners
to be a part of our trip.
We're going to play more music.
We're going to play better.
We're going to give away
the most money.
- You could win $20,000.
$25,000.
$30,000.
We will build
a great radio station.
I promise you, I guarantee you
it's going to happen.
- Then you hear the little
"Rocky" music coming up.
- We're going from
worst to first.
Nothing's going to stop us.
- So he got the audience on our
side, made us the underdog.
- And long by that time,
I noticed Claire had already
evacuated the room.
She was scared.
She thought I was having
a heart attack or something.
John Bell says, "Your muscles
in your neck are all stuck out.
You're okay?
You need me to call a doctor?"
I said,
"We're going to be fine.
We just have to go from
worst to first."
- We're going
from worst to first.
- And then he told all of us,
take a case of Z100 t-shirts,
put it in the trunk of your car,
and every time you see somebody
walking by with one of those
worst to first signs,
give him a t-shirt.
I drove through the streets
of New York
and saw people hanging sheets
out of office buildings.
"Z100 worst to first."
- We built that up step by step
by running contests.
- [ Speaks indistinctly ]
$1,000 all day long,
you're the second one today.
- And being at everything that
went on in New York City,
you saw the Z100 can.
- We're at 51st
at Avenue of the Americas.
It has tons and tons of
t-shirts,
hats, buttons, and more.
- The fact that it was -- that it
grew at this lightning pace
was a remarkable tribute to,
you know,
viral growth at the time
when there was no viral.
- This could have been
the first viral campaign
10 years before the Internet
even was invented.
- It showed a sense
of determination,
a sense of ambition,
and people always root
for the little guy.
It's just human nature.
It's the "Rocky" movie.
That's exactly what Z100 was.
- Here is this new station
and we were doing something
nobody else was doing.
This hodgepodge
of people and personalities
that nobody had ever heard
of who were suddenly challenging
the monsters of New York radio.
- And it wasn't just us.
It was the power of the people
who love that radio station.
A great radio station
has emotion, it has a soul.
And that day that radio station
got that effing soul.
- It was a rant.
It was, and I'm sure,
a calculated rant, of course.
- And next time,
the book came out...
- What I have here are
the advanced ratings,
and this envelope hot off
the presses
has been hermetically sealed
in a mayonnaise jar
on Funk & Wagnalls'
front porch.
Okay, here's the scoop.
[ Laughs ] They did it.
They went from worst to first.
- Scott Shannon's next up.
- That's right, he's going to
tell us how his station
went from worst to first.
- Scott Shannon's Morning Zoo
took the station
from worst to first
in 74 days.
- And in that short time
lived up to its slogan
from worst to first.
- And took the station
from worst to first.
- After the 74 days, we had
caught the market flatfooted.
We had run over everybody.
These were wonderful
radio companies.
This was Infinity.
This was Doubleday,
this was CBS, ABC, NBC,
Westinghouse.
- I had a test.
I call it the Ray's pizza test.
There was an Old Ray's pizza,
which is now closed
on 6th Avenue and 11th Street.
They always had WKTU on.
All of a sudden,
sure enough,
I went into Ray's pizza
and I heard Z100,
and I knew
that was an indicator.
They found us that we were --
we were passing
the Ray's pizza test.
We were on our way.
- They started
at the very bottom of the barrel
and it was like lightning.
Z100 became the biggest thing
in New York radio
and therefore,
around the world.
- That is Scott's
marketing genius.
- I obviously was popular in
Tampa and was on TV
and in the newspaper
and all that,
but nothing could have
prepared me for what hit me
when we got to first place
in New York.
- They're the hottest duo
on your radio dial.
- Joining us now with the wizards
of the hit radio.
- A relative newcomer
is the king of morning drive.
- Helping bring this music
our way
is Z Morning Zoo deejay
Scott Shannon.
- The wizard of Z100
program director
and disc jockey,
Scott Shannon.
- It was all a blur to me.
I mean, one minute
I'm flying into Chicago
to be on Oprah,
and the next minute I got
"Good Morning America"
in the studio with us,
cameras everywhere.
- The Zoo is a Molotov cocktail
of call-ins, characters,
contests.
A lot of clowning.
And, of course,
the Top 40 chart busters.
It is the number one radio show
in the nation,
and we join zoo crew deejay
Scott Shannon and Ross Britton
in the Z100 control room
and live on the air.
Hi, guys.
- 10 minutes after 8:00
in the morning.
Good morning, how are you?
- I'm just fine.
How are you guys?
- I did Regis's show
probably 10 times
I was on with Geraldo Rivera.
I was absolutely blindsided
by all that.
I mean, it was on the cover
of "New York Magazine."
The guy sat me down
and did like five pages on me.
There's not five pages in me.
That's not why I got into radio.
I got into radio because I love
turning the microphone on.
I love putting the headphones on
and talking to people.
Wait a minute.
Good morning, Z100. Guess what?
You got $1,000.
[ Cheering ]
- I can't believe it.
- It's our birthday,
but you got the present.
I love that part of it.
That kid is still there in me.
I still feel that way
when I get up in the morning.
I can't wait to get to work.
- I love Scott. He's always been
really wonderful to me
and very friendly to me
and, you know,
but always wanted me
to do that shtick stuff.
But, you know, Scott,
I like my rock and roll serious.
- There's a reason people
are switching to Z100 because...
we're serious.
- We're serious.
- My mother will never,
ever speak to me this is...
- Hello.
[ Explosion ]
- One of the brilliant things
about Scott Shannon
and the Morning Zoo
was his ability
to ferret out a pop culture.
What was the hippest thing
happening?
He saw where the trends were.
- One day our music director
came in and said,
"There's a lady out front
who won't go away.
"She comes every Tuesday,
and she insists that we have
to play her record."
- Borderline
Feels like I'm going
to lost my mind
- Madonna used to call us
on a regular basis.
She was not Madonna then.
She was just a woman
who was trying
to get her record played.
So I quizzed him, I said,
"Is anybody else playing it?"
"No, no. But she says
it's big in the clubs."
I said, "Well, this isn't
a club, it's a radio station."
He said, "She's very insistent
she wants to see you now."
She would say to Scott,
"That if you play my music now,
I will do something special
for Z100 when I'm a star."
- So I said to her, I said,
"If we play your record at night
"a couple of times,
will you stay home next week?
You don't have to come back,
right?"
She said, "Right."
And she said, "I promise
I'll make it up to you."
Now that particular song
was called "Holiday."
We put it on at night,
it got a couple of phone calls,
I think it was her calling.
And -- and so we moved it
to daytime
and it became
a pretty big hit for us.
- Madonna decided to be
a movie star
with a soundtrack, obviously.
The name of the movie,
and the name of the single was
"Who's That Girl?"
We make a deal with Madonna that
the world premiere of the movie
in Times Square
will air on Z100 live.
- On the way to the Madonna
appearance at Times Square
with a rabid audience
of about 15, 20,000 people.
I'm sitting there
with Scott Shannon
and just him and I in the limo.
He insists on
wearing a Z100 t-shirt.
I was all dressed up.
I had the blazer. I thought
I was looking pretty good.
We fought all the way there.
I ended up wearing his shirt.
- We had like 10, 12,000
people gathered together
in Times Square.
They built a big stage up there.
They had like 50
or 60 photographers
and videographers
down in the bullpen in front.
People hanging out of windows
all up and down the street.
Madonna fans
as far as you could see.
She arrived in a limousine,
jumped up on stage
in a beautiful gown
and welcomed everybody.
Told the whole story
of how she arrived in New York
for the very first time.
It was one of the best days
in the history of the station.
- You started broadcasting
from the top
of the Empire State Building,
and now Z100 heard
all around the world.
That's something.
- It's just what I do.
I mean, that's my job.
My job is to build
radio stations and to do radio,
and ever since I was a kid,
that's what I wanted to do.
And, you know, it just comes
with the territory.
- The Z100 New York Morning Zoo
with Scott and Ross
the last time around.
- It's the 2019 iHeartRadio
Jingle Ball,
the biggest holiday
music event of the year.
- Alarm clocks ring
in my head
My body's still screaming,
it's dead
The legacy of Z100 from
inception
was David and Goliath.
- Scott set a tone.
He set an image
that transcended hipness,
and he was just by himself.
- Scott Shannon is probably
the best program director
in the United States of America,
as well as being
one of the finest
air personalities in the world.
- New York is a place where
radio personalities are bigger
than the music they're playing.
For me, you know, he'll always
be one of those guys. Giant.
- Scott had these incredible
personal relationships.
He made it a point.
Don't just play the song.
Get to know the person.
You know? What's making
that person tick?
It really sets the tone
for the radio world.
- He created something
that could keep going,
that Elvis could come
and continue that legacy
and create something
a little different
and continue that.
We've all
seen those whether it's shows,
whether it's radio or television
or whatever,
that has a quick rise
and a quick fall.
Didn't happen with Z100.
You're talking about
almost 40 years.
- Scott was -- was a renegade,
an outlier who just had it
right here in his gut.
- How do we hold hands
and win together?
And that was what
Scott solicited from everybody.
- We may not have agreed
on everything,
but at the end of the day,
the amazing thing that happened
was that the right thing
came out of the center.
- Z100 was more
than just a radio station.
There was something about
what was being broadcast
over that radio frequency
that united millions of people.
- When I walked down the hall
and look in the window
at the radio station
that used to be my dreaded enemy
and is now among my best friends
and I see that group of people,
I understand that
Scott Shannon's influence
is still very much there.
Understanding your audience,
who's listening?
What do they want to hear?
What do they not want to hear?
And that was always
the importance with Scott
and his reign at Z100,
and it's definitely
the importance with us.
We've got to keep an eye
on where we're going.
We have to listen.
We have to learn.
Z100 is New York City.
It just always has been,
and it always will be.
- Surveying the universe
From the top
of the Empire State Building.
Z100 -- the flame thrower.
- The alarm clock's
ring in my head
My body's still
screaming it's dead
When you can't get to sleep
it's so rough
Getting up in the morning's
so tough
Zoo
Aah, aah
When I cut myself
when I shave
And my hair
won't even behave
There's only one thing left
for me to do
Crank it up
to the Z Morning Zoo
Good morning
on the Z Morning Zoo
Rise and shine with
folks like you
Get up with
the Morning Z Zoo
Well, I'm ready
to give up the ghost
'Cause I'm burning
my coffee and toast
But I'm doing
the best I can do
Getting up with
the Z Morning Zoo
Good morning on
the Z Morning Zoo
The Z Morning Zoo
Aah, aah
Good morning from
the Z Morning Zoo
Rise and shine
with folks like you
Good morning from
the Z Morning Zoo
Get up with
the Morning Z Zoo
Get up with the morning,
get up with the morning
Get up with
the Morning Z Zoo
- Something in your eyes
is making such a fool of me
When you hold me in your arms
and love me
Till I just can't see
But then you let me down
when I look around
Baby, it just can't be found
Stop driving me away
I just wanna stay
It's something
I just got to say
Just try to understand
I'll give it all I can
'Cause you got
the best of me
Yeah
Borderline
Feels like I'm going to
lose my mind
You just keep on pushing
my love
Over the borderline
Good job, dad.