I certainly don't know the answer to your question, RA, but I'm chiming in here just to offer my appreciation of his skills and the amazing way he carved out a career for himself.

Again I find it odd that in this country we act like one person knows every single thing about every single song and artist in history and no one else knows anything.

He Googled her today just like everyone else did.

I agree he's an excellent interview and he's accessible. I just wonder why Bell would want one of their competitor's most prominent personalities to get exposure on their airwaves. (Ironically, Alex Pierson had Eric Alper on her AM640 show Thursday morning to talk about O'Connor and not her own teammate, Cross.)

That would never have happened in the old days of radio, where you refused to even acknowledge that another station existed. (Dumb yes, but that's the way it used to work.)

It was such a hard and fast rule that it led to one of the funniest things I ever heard on air. It happened back in the late 70s, when Bob Vernon (aka "Vernon With A V") had just done a station ID on WNBC New York, which at the time was in a huge ratings fight with WABC and Vernon's afternoon drive competitor, the legendary Dan Ingram.

Suddenly, and without any notice or apparent reason, NBC played its rival's jingle. "Dan Ingram!" the PAMS singers sounded, "77 WABCeeee!" 

There was a short pause, and then Vernon came back and said in that deep announcer's voice he had, "Dan Ingram is not here. Nor do we know where you can find him. Thank you." And into a song. I have no idea why he did it. But to this day, I still remember it and it still makes me laugh just thinking about the sheer gall of it.

Great stuff and I think viewers love it. (At least viewers in the know do.) The late Jay Marvin when he was doing a talk show on WLS, used to phone his competitors over at WGN, talk to and taunt their producer live on air, and then hang up on him. Juvenile, yes, but I have to admit it was hilarious. 

Contractor for CORUS.  And no, apart from a possible Google refresher, like we all would do, he actually lived through, researched wrote and talked about Sinead's career over the past 30 years. He had files on artists well before the internet. I find that comment highly disrespectful. He's not a talking head. He is a music historian, and that is his legacy.  Stop shitting on talent.    

Tomas Barlow wrote:

     If Britney Spears was abducted by aliens tomorrow, never to return, who would get the call to give his thoughts on her? 

Too important an event to trust to disc jockeys; I would turn to print media and Brad Wheeler specifically

Just a Radio Fan wrote:

My only beef is the title of "musicologist."   What is a musicologist exactly?  Is there a post secondary course that must be completed and test passed ?  Do you have to complete an internship ?   If Alan Cross is a musicologist, what about John Donabie, David Marsden, old friend Ivar Hamilton, and so many others ?

I had an actual Musicologist on Toronto Mike'd to talk about this. His name is Dr. Mike Daley, and he has a PhD in Musicology. Coincidentally, I had Alan Cross over two weeks later, and asked him about this. Alan says he doesn't use that term to describe himself, even though I've noticed his official bio states "he's also known as a musicologist" as opposed to "he's a musicologist", because he isn't and he knows it.

But he's a great broadcaster and a solid citizen and as pointed out already in this thread, he's an independent contractor and not a Corus employee.
 

Last edited by torontomike (July 28, 2023 12:53 pm)