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Straight From The Mouth
The Morning Mouth's February Interview with Dana and Big Randy
(Reprinted by permission; Copyright © 2007 Talentmasters Inc.)

First, lets get some background?

Dana: I grew up in Jersey listening to the New York stations -- always wanted to be on a morning show. I started my radio career during my senior year of college at Virginia Tech. One day I drove to K92 (WXLK) in Roanoke, VA, and asked the receptionist how I get to be on the radio. One of my favorite people Kevin Scott (still PD at K92) gave me the overnight gig and 7 months later told me I was getting a shot at doing mornings with Danny and Zack who had just come down south from Philly. I moved onto Greensboro, NC, did 2 years with The Jeff Wicker Show. They flipped to Simon (a Jack format) and I wanted to get back into CHR mornings. Got the job at 'BLI and 6 months later the station went through some changes and I've been hosting the show with Randy by my side ever since. night. I lived in Dallas and was a dedicated listener to Wild FM (formerly

KRBV). JB and Sandy put me on the air and I became a regular character. I had so much fun in the morning I started calling the night show too and Billy the Kid put me on every night! The mistake they made was when they started inviting me down to the station. Fitz (now at The Wolf in Seattle) took over the night show and just expected me to show up every night... and I did. When he moved to mornings he asked me to come with him and they actually started paying me! When they flipped to Jack I moved to Colorado and scanned granny panties at Kohls. One day the phone rang and it was Jeremy Rice from WBLI and now I co-host with Dana.

Let's start with the name thing -- is it AJ or Dana? And "Big Randy? What's that about?

Dana: When we came to BLI we were both stripped of our identities and given new ones. AJ was my name at my previous stations... it stood for Apple Juice (my fav drink). When I started at BLI my co-host was obsessed with the name Dana and petitioned heavily for the change.

Randy: I used to be Big Gay Steven but when I came to BLI there was already a Steve... so the Steven part went away and I guess they didn't want to offend all the homophobes so the Gay part went away too. All I was left with was the Big. My choice for a name was Richard... but one day I came into work and they told me "You're just going to be Randy."

Actually, Dana you're much bigger than "Big" Randy. If you duked it out, who would win?

Randy: Well you know how strong lesbians are.

Dana: I'm not a lesbian!

Got to bring the news into the interview. Last month a contestant died following a stunt. How did your station react? Any memo's? Your thoughts? Will you approach stunts differently in the future?

Dana: I can't even tell you how much I have thought about the situation at

The End -- all sides of it. About the family. I wondered could that have been us? What are the guys from The Morning Rave and Steve Weed going through personally? How they must be feeling? I think about their families. I hate seeing anyone from our industry have to go through something like this. Seriously I was consumed by it when I first heard. I've tried and feel for what they must be going through but it's probably nothing compared to living the reality of such a terrible tragedy. Management didn't say much -- what they're thinking kinda goes without saying.

You've had your share of outrageousness on the air. Share some.

Dana: By far I have never laughed as hard as I did when we put a snake down Ran's underwear for the "Snakes in Your Hanes" stunt we did back in August.

Randy: I was scared to death -- I was blind folded, dressed in drag, wearing a diaper.

Dana: Sweating profusely... with tears rolling down your face.

Randy: And screaming and screaming and screaming... finally it dropped out after 56 seconds of torture!

Dana: Then there was the time Ran wanted to give our PD Jeremy Rice the best Christmas present ever and showed up in a little Santa Claus negligee on his door step at 6am wanting to draw him a warm bath. I also enjoyed when Ran was out exploring the Seven Wonders of Long Island. My favorite was when he was giving out bag lunches to the illegal immigrants of our area who were waiting to be picked up for their day of work... and his freakin Bar-B-Que caught a shrub on fire?

Randy: And as usual the police came! What about when I got laser hair removal on every inch of my body?! And what 44-year-man gets both nipples pierced? And what about when you gave me a Brazilian Wax?!

Dana: I'm not sure who suffered more.

Who else does the show with you?

Dana: We have an amazing producer. Amanda started as an intern at BLI in '05 and has proven to be one of the most driven females I've known. She's been filling in as our producer since June of '06 and just became fulltime with us 2 months ago. In the time it took to get her some real money she turned down two other job offers including one to produce the Morning Show on Sirius's Cosmo Radio Channel in order to stay with Ran and myself. We also have the wonderful, talented, self-absorbed Orphan Andrew who runs our board and when he's not hooking up with strangers or being a waste of space Steven the Promotions Hottie helps us too.

Describe a typical day?

Dana: Well on a daily basis my voice hits the airwaves from our station in the middle of the island (West Babylon) at 5:30am. Randy is there at least 65% of the time. Sometimes he'll send me an email telling me he has other plans, other times it's a text message saying he won't be coming in, maybe he'll call in the middle of the first break to explain himself. There are no guarantees about anything when it comes to Randy. Planning: Planning for the next day's show is a whole experience... we meet after the show everyday. We sit on the floor in a traffic studio! And I'm a big girl... it's hard to get up once you sit down on the floor. But we just earned ourselves a basement closet as an office! We're looking forward to moving the boxes and broken

Whose professional feedback matters to you most?

Dana: I should probably send a monthly check to my close friend and former co-host Danny Meyers (WXLK) for all the hours I've taken up of his evenings. I view what he does on the radio as genius (he'll get mad at me for saying that) but he's given me so much of his wisdom -- he's been the best mentor I could ever ask for in this business. My former PD Michael Bryan (WNVZ) is another person whose opinion I highly value. He always has honest answers and a creative take no matter what the situation. I appreciate all of his encouragement and professional guidance.

Randy, how much of your life do you share on the air? Why is it I feel I know the answer already?

Randy: I say it every day! Nothing is sacred!

Dana: I'm seriously laughing right now because sometimes I wonder if the listeners know too much about Randy. I tell them everything.

Oh yeah, this is our Valentine's Day issue. What are doing on the show this year?

Dana: We'll definitely give away last minute dinner reservations to the loser guys who forget to make them after a significant amount of groveling takes place. We're also bringing in couples to see how much extremely personal info they know about one another... the more they know, the more Valentine's Days essentials they'll be able to win. We'll play Predict the Parental Passions... it'll be festive and love filled. Can't wait for my Valentine from Ran.

Randy: I wanna be cupid.

Dana: Okay Ran.

Final thing, Dana, at last year's Morning Show Boot Camp, you lost your purse. Did you ever find it?

Dana: No, I definitely didn't find my purse, wallet, cell phone, camera... and I've come to terms with the fact that it wasn't stolen. I was smashed at the hotel bar and left it behind. The odd thing is I can totally see it happening again this August. I'll be back!

Read previous Morning Mouth interviews.

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