Q100/V103 Unity Mixer (Part 1)

I listen to "The Bert Show" on Q100 (100.5FM) every morning on the way to work. Q100 is the most musically diverse station that we currently have in Atlanta. I believe that this is what draws listeners of a variety of musical tastes, nationalities, and races to the station. I also feel that the listeners continue to tune in to Q100 every morning because "The Bert Show" is completely hilarious, informative, and objective with commentary. I would venture to guess that it is the most listened to morning show in Atlanta.

Well, during all the hype last year surrounding CBS primetime reality show "Survivor", Q100 host Bert Weiss decided to get Frank Ski, a black local radio host from V-103, to weigh in and share his feelings about CBS and their decision to divide the Survivor tribes based on race for the first time. V-103 is a R&B/Hip-Hop station that caters mostly to blacks in their late twenties and older (I'll explain why I used the word "caters" shortly).

During the conversation with Frank, Bert decided that they should promote an event for listeners at both of their stations that would bolster diversity. Frank was obviously put on the spot, but agreed. I mean, what was he going to say? I used to listen to V-103 from time to time back in 1998 when Frank first became host of V-103, and there's a lot of race-baiting that goes on during their 4 hours on the air every morning. I stopped listening all together because it just got old very quickly. (i.e. Frank went on a tirade one morning in particular asking the listening audience "Why is it that in the black neighborhoods, they sell beer by the six-pack with no option to buy individually...but in the white neighborhoods, the option is available to buy beer individually?" First of all, Frank, whites buy wine, vodka, and enough other alcoholic beverages in huge numbers so that the package stores/bottle shops in mostly white neighborhoods generate enough capital without depending on beer sales. These same types of stores in mostly black neighborhoods mostly make money off of beer, so to turn a profit and continue meeting the monthly rent of the store, they need to be sure to sell the beer off in bulk.) Personally, I'd like to see more concern with why the students at black schools have SAT scores that are consistently lower than students that attend white schools. Or why the rate of crime continues to soar to new heights in the black neighborhoods. But I guess that's just me. :-s)

So of course I smirked to myself when Frank went along with Bert's idea to throw the "Unity Party" on the weekend of the MLK Holiday, because this doesn't sound like the kind of thing that Frank Ski would go along with in normal circumstances. But again, what else could he say with both his listeners and Q100's listeners all tuned in to the same conversation on both dials at the same time?

Also, among all of the DJ's on both Q100 and V-103, Bert is the only one with a racially diverse group of personal friends. He was the only one that felt certain that the mixer would be a great idea and a success. As the weeks went by, he started getting a lot of resistance from different club owners, and even from several emails that he received. Something occured to Bert the week before the event. "What if V-103's listeners, and only the black listeners from Q100 show up? What if the whites don't come out at all?"

The party happened on Sunday, January 14, the day before the official MLK holiday. I'll post tomorrow about how everything turned out according to one Bert Weiss.


Picture courtesy of sandrarose.com