10 Questions with ... James Howard

1. What was your first job in radio and who were your early influences and mentors?

Intern and then eventual weekend/swing shift on WJRR in Orlando FL. Pat Lynch, Rick Everett, and the amazing team there showed me what it meant to deliver on brand content and how to execute war time radio. Chris Kampmeier and Linda Byrd asked me what I wanted to do with my career, I told them I wanted to run radio stations like them and they said “Awesome, you won’t do that here just yet but you can start learning in Albany GA” and off to Albany GA I went. After making a ton of mistakes and learning from amazing broadcast pros in Albany like John Richards, Marc Chase at iHeart Corporate brought me to Atlanta to learn from him, the Critical Mass Media team, and his awesome RSVPPs. Brad Hardin was one of those elite RSVPP’s and took a shot on bringing me to Tampa Bay, and he continues to be an ever-important mentor in my career. Thea Mitchem, Tony Coles, Brian Olson, Meg Stevens, Mike Preacher, Matt Scarano, Scott Hopeck, Lainie Fertick, Elizabeth Falke, and so many others have helped to guide me with their invaluable skills and talent.

2. You have quite a varied background of Radio experience. Can you give us a quick list of station’s and positions you held at each station prior to the launch of WCHI?

WJRR- Orlando, FL Weekends/Swing
WRAK- Albany, GA Mornings and PD
EA to Marc Chase- ATL
WBZY- Atlanta, GA Overnights Weekend Swing
WXTB- Tampa, FL Nights/PD
KYRK- New Orleans, LA Afternoons PD (from TPA)
WTZB- Sarasota, FL PD (from TPA)
WWDC- Washington, DC PD
WQSR- Baltimore, MD PD
WBIG- Washington, DC PD
VP Programming Washington, DC
RSVPP- Chicago, IL
WKSC- Chicago, IL PD
WCHI- Chicago, IL PD

3. Now let’s talk about WCHI and its format flip from Country WEBG (Big 95.5) to Rock 95.5. What were some of the main factors in deciding to flip to the Rock format in Chicago?

Chicago needed to hear music and content from their formative years. WLUP had a profound impact on the Chicagoland listening area, and its vacancy left an opening to deliver a true lifestyle content brand to the city.

4. You made the change in early September of this year and now nearly three months later, what has been the response from Rock listeners in the market?

The response to this brand has been the most exciting launch of my career. The engagement has been immediate, resulting in a passionate underbelly of misfits, all finding a home here.

5. One of your first big personality additions on Rock 95.5 was The Angi Taylor Show in mornings. For those not familiar with her background in Chicago radio, give us her history and how has the response to this new morning show been?

Angi Taylor is a force, lifting and challenging every environment in the best ways and also has great market equity she built with her 12+ years at 103.5 KISS-FM. Angi was a no brainer to lead a rebellious radio station like ROCK 95.5. Abe Kanan is also a producer and personality I’ve wanted to work with for a long time and the two of them have developed mad chemistry quick and the audience is already rallying around the fun we are having each morning.

6. Outside of Angi in mornings, what’s the rest of the Rock 95.5 on-air lineup?

As you know, there are some many talented people looking for work right now in our business, so the team we assembled have the talent, experience, and skill to win at ROCK 95.5.

Walt Flakus, our resident Rockstar also has terrific market equity and an incredible musical ear to helm our middays and APD/MD leadership.

Klinger, our new Afternoon talent is not new to iHeartRadio, providing insane value across the country for our rock formats and left a successful six year run at night in Washington DC at the iconic DC101.

Maria Palmer is bringing a new brand of lunacy at night and has as much raw talent as anyone in the business. It’s going to be exciting to see what she will do with this massive platform at WCHI.

We also added local Chicago personalities Shark and Pat Capone to lead our weekend and swing shifts. I’ve been wanting to work with them forever!

Each show provides a different perspective under the umbrella of the brand.

7. Now let’s talk about the music on Rock 95.5. How would you describe it and how is it positioned in the market against the Rock (WDRV) and Alternative (WKQX) competition?

Well… I’m not going to lay out our strategy in this well-read industry resource, but the hole was obvious, and we filled it.

8. I’ve noticed Rock 95.5 has played a handful of currents like new Foo Fighters and the Mammoth/WVH single. What’s the status of possible current Rock being played on the station?

Gold based formats tend to shy away from highlighting the new releases which I believe is a mistake. We’ve had large rock releases from giants in our library and we will continue to promote what’s next from them because our audience wants to know.

9. While WCHI is listed as Classic Rock in Mediabase, I’d love your take on current Active Rock music and that format overall?

I’m loving music from Greta Van Fleet, Three Days Grace, AC/DC, Foo Fighters, Mammoth WVH, Bush, Royal Blood, and many more. Some dismiss new rock music because we all look at streaming consumptions and don’t see the scale level Hip Hop and CHR produce, but guess what…rock fans don’t stream as much, because they love radio, how about that for a target audience?

10. Finally, what’s it like launching a new format during a pandemic without the benefit of doing live station promotions in front of actual listeners?

We’ve adapted all of our iHeartRadio Chicago stations since the pandemic, and with our continued focus of being ever present where our audience is spending time, we’ve positioned our brands to be even more visible then when we were executing traditional events. Our content has never been more consumed, and now we are doing it without a tent in a parking lot. Launching a new station in any environment is challenging but loading an entire library and imaging package from my basement to air, was an experience I will never forget. ROCK 95.5 WCHI has really developed over the last three months, which is 100% attributed to the incredible team that we have assembled to make an impact to generations of rock fans in Chicago.