10 Questions with ... Charlie Buchwald

BRIEF CAREER SYNOPSIS:

I started working on WHBQ's street team in Memphis when I was 25. I put in my time and jumped on the opportunity to start training on air. After working weekends in Memphis for a year, I took my first full time gig at WKBE in Glens Falls, NY as the morning show personality, and was eventually promoted to MD. I spent a year in Glens Falls then transferred to the Albany, NY office where I began co-hosting the morning show on WAJZ. Last year, without training or assistance, I spent six months as "interim" PD/crazy person. A proper PD was finally hired, and I happily took my spot in the afternoon as MD... and I love it.

1. Why Radio?

My pops always told me to choose a career that I enjoyed, so I did! Radio is fun. I get to entertain, inform and get involved with my community. I am surrounded by music and music people. Radio also gives me the chance to experience things the typical 9 to 5er only dreams about. Most of all, I'm allowed and encouraged to be myself.

2. To date, what is the highlight of your radio career?

It's a tie between:

a. Successfully pulling off (with the help of an awesome staff) a HUGE, first ever, summer concert without a proper PD or support from the building. It's an amazing feeling to succeed when others expect you to fail.

b. Pranking the morning show in Memphis. Ask Karson if he'd like to buy Three 6 Mafia a shot of Patron.

3. Did/do you have any female radio role models?

Kennedy currently at WBMX in Boston.

4. If I weren't APD/MD/afternoons at JAMZ, I would be....

I'd be a bartender making a lot more money. Or maybe a tattoo artist in Amsterdam.

5. When you've had a rough day, what do you do to get back to your happy place?

I watch devastating television... something with really messed up situations, like Criminal Minds or Law & Order SVU. Homegrown plants are helpful as well.

6. If you could be on any TV reality show, which would you like to be on?

I have always HATED "reality" TV... until Ice Loves Coco. It's the only reality show I enjoy watching! I want Ice T and Coco to adopt me as their already grown child.

7. Think back to being 10 years old. What did you want to be when you grew up?

I wanted to be a marine biologist until I took AP Biology my senior year in high school. It's the only class I ever came close to failing. The next year, I enrolled as a journalism major at USM.

8. What makes Albany special in the summertime?

It's not buried under 10 feet of snow.

9. When you're not at the station or a station event, where should we look for you?

I'd rather you didn't look for me.

10. Do you have any musical guilty pleasures?

I don't feel guilty about it, but I do love the Big Band...anything from the 30s or 40s really.

If you were to leave Radio and music today and you could choose any other occupation, what would it be?

A writer for SNL or a chef and restaurant owner.

If you were on a deserted tropical island and could only watch one movie, one TV show and listen to one CD, which would you choose?

Bringing Up Baby, Arrested Development (RIP), Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band