Within these restrictions, however, Abrams gives Boog a modicum of freedom, letting him play music from the '50s and pre-Beatles '60s weeknights from 10 p.m. to midnight. Most other oldies stations across the country are retiring such fare for demographic reasons. "I'm charged with getting the best 25-54 numbers I can," Abrams says, "and if you graduated from high school in 1968, smack-dab in the middle of this music, you're 54 years old now. That's why you see stations adding newer music, hoping to recruit younger listeners. The problem is, a musical wall exists for a lot of people who love the Beatles and the Dave Clark Five and Elvis and the Supremes; their tastes run up to about the middle '70s, and then they stop. So we're trying to strike the right balance by playing some older things, too -- and Boog's numbers speak for themselves."
As long as his digits remain strong, Da Boogieman will continue to announce vintage hits, not the names of intersections, and he couldn't be happier. "Being away from radio and then getting back to it made me realize that this isn't only what I want to do; this is what I'm supposed to do," he says. "And I want to keep doing it as long as I can."
Mark Manger
Da Boogieman stays upbeat.
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Museum quality: For proof of how capricious radio can be, look no further than Raechel Donahue. As the evening host for the Mountain, Donahue provided Denver listeners with a killer combination: great pipes, terrific taste in music, and incomparable knowledge gathered in a career that literally spans the entire history of FM-rock radio (Message, January 8, 2004). Nonetheless, relations between her and the station went sour, and on June 21, this deserving winner of a 2004 Best of Denver award was handed her hat. Details are hard to come by. Mountain program director Dan Michaelssays he can't comment on the split, and Donahue refers to "creative differences. There are no hard feelings," she says. "We just agreed to disagree."
Don't shed any tears for Donahue, though. Her future's so bright that even shades won't cut the glare. Just prior to being banished from the Mountain, she received an offer to serve as operations director for Moonlight Groove Highway, a new radio service affiliated with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland. "I was desperately trying to figure out how to get out of my contract, so when they told me I was fired, I burst into hysterical laughter," she crows.
Moonlight Groove will broadcast from the Hall of Fame starting around Labor Day. Donahue says the mix of sounds will range "from Leadbelly to Sheryl Crow" and include conversations with plenty of living legends. "I'll work as a producer Monday through Friday, then hop on an airplane to go interview rock stars." In mock distress, she cries, "Please, Brer Fox! Don't throw me in the briar patch!"
That's not all. Donahue and co-writer Judy Steinberg just received a six-figure advance from the publishing giant Dutton to write a book "that's like Sex and the Single Girl for older women." She chortles as she reveals, "The working title was Sex and the Single Sexagenarian." Steinberg is the former wife of comedian/director David Steinberg, "who dumped her for a younger woman, so it'll partly be a revenge book," Donahue says. "But it'll be funnier than heck."
Donahue plans to keep her place in Denver for the time being, but the Hall of Fame offer was too good to refuse. As she puts it, "Now I won't just be old; I'll actually be in a museum. Isn't that great?"
