Donald Fagen visits my K-ROCK show late 1980s.
I stopped being “The Rock and Roll Madame” on WXRK/K-ROCK in New York City a long time ago, yet friends and strangers remain curious about her. So I sifted through my long radio career and plucked out some highlights. It is what it is, I was who I was.
It all started with a guy. Of course.
I was 16, a clueless Miami hippie, with a mad crush on Criteria recording engineer and producer Karl Richardson. Karl would go on to work on many classic albums, including a little one you may have heard of called Saturday Night Fever. Hanging at Criteria released a dormant jones in me for cold studios, hot multi-track tape recorders and dozens of faders and bouncing V.U. meters.
Wanting to speak Karl’s language, I enrolled at Miami-Dade South Community College and started hanging out at the “radio station.” It was actually a P.A. system broadcasting to the snack machines. When the student running WMDS refused to let me be a DJ because “Chicks can’t do Top 40 radio” I added “disc jockey” to my techno geek aspirations.
In December of 1977 I became the first female DJ on South Florida’s #1 hit music station, Y-100. The station already had JoJo Kincaid on the air so I couldn’t use Jo. Nor could I think of a real fake name (or fake real name?). My boss, Bill Tanner, suggested I call myself Madame Midnight until I came up with something. I’d been raised in a conservative home (father a retired Marine lieutenant colonel) and was rather introverted until I realized I could talk to anyone if I was speaking into a microphone.
I was moved to the noon-3pm shift (one of the first females in the country doing Top 40 in the daytime), and Madame Midnight became The Madame. With a name obviously made-up it was much easier to be outrageous. And people remembered it. In a medium you can’t see, where ratings rely entirely on listeners’ recall, it served me well. It’s always an honor to hear a female DJ say I was her role model when she was young.
Karl, however, remained unimpressed.
There are more airchecks on my Soundcloud page. Each station is under Playlists.
Bee Gees Special. This aired on Y-100 October 6, 1979, before their sold-out show at Miami Stadium that would wrap-up the Spirits Having Flown tour. Jimmy Carter was President and America was in the throes of the second oil crisis in the 1970s (a gallon of gas averaged 86 cents, the equivalent of $2.82 today). Inflation was in the double digits, public confidence was reeling. Saturday Night Fever was still huge, though. The album would stay on the charts from January 1978 until March 1980. This interview was run commercial-free with no station I.D.s. Only Y-100 could pull off such a thing. What other station could you possibly be listening to? Produced by Alan “Herr” Leininger. New introduction recorded June 20, 2011.
Michael Jackson, circa the “Off the Wall” LP, 1980. It was a bad phone connection. I was too intimidated to ask him if I could call him back. I figured we could “fix it in the mix” (the last words a sound engineer wants to hear). Bill Tanner, my boss, yelled at me later, “You should have called him back!” Oh, well.
One interview I wish I had was the one I did with singer/songwriter Bobby Caldwell (“What You Won’t Do For Love”) on Valentine’s Day, 1979. Probably for the best. I was already smitten and probably sounded like a fool. Within five months we were engaged. We were together five years.
I-95/WINZ-FM South Florida. 1982-1984. The “Up and at ’em with the Madame” glory days
From January 1983 to July 1984 I was the morning show host on I-95 (WINZ-FM), a first for a woman in that time slot in South Florida. Rounding out the “Up and at ‘em with the Madame!” show was wise-cracking Jeff DeForrest doing news/sports/traffic and George Streapy producing. I had a great time – even if I had to get up at 4 a.m. and pretend I wasn’t remotely stressed out. After beating my direct competition, Y-100 – another first – I asked for a raise and was fired. I was replaced with Don Cox (famous for handing out Cox Sucker lollipops to his nubile fans). Don passed away in 2003. The firing was a blessing. I was soon offered my dream job: DJ-ing in the Big Apple.
The late, flamboyant Sunny Joe White brought me to WKTU when it was at 92.3 FM on the radio dial (now it’s at 103.5FM). It had lost its disco heyday bragging rights as the city’s number one station mainly due to the new kid in town, Z100, pulverizing it rather quickly. Co-hosting the morning show with the hilarious Jay Thomas, then doing my own show after, was fun while it lasted.
K-ROCK/WXRK, New York City, July 13,1985-November 1991
On July 13, 1985, WKTU vanished. 92-3 K-ROCK was born in its place. Eventually Howard Stern would reign over mornings and begin his steady ascent to “The King of All Media.” At first, my show followed his. Management thought “The Madame” was too “hit radio”; I needed a hipper, more rock and roll name. I became “The Rock and Roll Madame.”
November 1989, when I was on 10pm-2am. (Unbeknownst to me, not for much longer.) This show has my John Lee Hooker interview. I couldn’t understand 75% of what he said. Hearing me talk about him showing up at the Van Morrison shows, K-ROCK broadcasting from the Paul McCartney concert at Madison Square Garden, and a benefit with celebrity DJs like Laurie Anderson and Lou Reed, brings back how exciting it was to be in New York City. Everyone, eventually, came through town.
A big shot at Rolling Stone once told me their typical reader starts subscribing in college and stops around age 32. They just don’t care what Bruce Springsteen or U2 had for lunch anymore. Neither did I.
In the fall of 1991, I started the Executive M.B.A. program at Columbia University and quit being a D.J. for good, I thought.
Z100/WHTZ, New York City, 1995-2003
When then PD, Steve Kingston, first asked me to join Z100 as a part-time DJ, I said no. But his offer had the effect of a time-release capsule slowly coursing through my brain. I was soon on Z100 in my head. I had to do it. It was one the best stations on the planet. I sensed it would be my last stop as a DJ. Why not end my career at the top? I was also finally able to use my name, Jo Maeder, on the air. No more Madame.
My last show was in January 2003 when the #1 song in America was Eminem’s “Lose Yourself.” I moved to North Carolina to care for my declining “Mama Jo.” By losing “DJ Jo” I found a new me, and home.
I spoke to the program director at the Greensboro hit radio station about working there part-time. When I was told they paid $10 an hour before taxes, no benefits, and I would have to pay $15 an hour to an aide to watch my mother while I worked, I was 100% done with DJ-ing. It felt great to move on.