BEZ in the morning
December 2002
by Stephan Finch

Frustrated at work. Can't really talk about why. So instead, I'll try to work out my angst by ranting a bit about our local public radio station, WBEZ Chicago Public Radio.

I'll admit I've always liked National Public Radio. Why? Mostly because it's commercial free. Not much more to it than that, really. Yeah, some of the programs are pretty good. But mostly, it's just nice to wake up in the morning and have something to listen to while I'm making my coffee. Radio commercials are obnoxious and tiresome. NPR's morning news program isn't. So I listen. It's not exactly the love affair that some people have with NPR, but it's part of my subdued morning routine for more than a decade. And in this way, NPR has become something like an old acquaintance.

Alas, in Chicago, we have WBEZ. More specifically, we have WBEZ in the morning. In all of public radio-dom, there's no more sadistic a morning news crew than WBEZ's. I've begun to believe that these people aren't just trying to get me to turn off my radio, they're deliberately trying to drive me barking mad.

Okay, just to start: A traffic report every ten minutes. That's right, every ten minutes, somebody comes on and tells me every single detail of every single accident and every damn drive time up and down seven different major routes to and from Chicago. This crap starts at 6 a.m. and doesn't let up until about 9:30. Traffic reports are ridiculous! For god's sake, if you drive to Chicago during rush hour, it's going to be slow. We know this. What's the point? Sure, if it's snowing like hell out there, tell us how bad the drive is. But don't bother us with this stuff every ten minutes every day of the work week. For chrissakes, most of us take the damn trains anyway.

Onwards: Commercials. No, I'm not kidding you. Commercials every ten minutes. Oh sure, they try to candy-coat it with all this "with the support of" and "sponsored by" mularchy. But every ten minutes, we get two solid minutes of advertisements and traffic reports. Isn't this what I was trying to get away from when I abandoned commercial radio?

Next: Lisa Labuz. Known to we Chicagoans at Stuttering Bob. This woman cannot read a sentence without screwing it up. It's like every morning is the very first time she's ever been on the radio. United Airlines? For her, that's "untied, I mean United Airlines." Mayor Richard Daly? That's "May or, I mean Mayor Rich, Richard Daly." I've been listening to this woman misfire every sentence in every story she reads for three years. Memo to Lisa: Try reading over the copy before you go on the air. Get familiar with it. Rehearse. And if you still can't get it straight, go get a different job!

One more gripe (I told you this was going to be a rant): The constant, incessant repetition of the word "Chicago." You'd think most people would know where the hell they are. I sure do. But Lisa Labuz feels some inexplicable need to say every fifteen seconds or so that we're in Chicago. As in "this Chicago Public Radio program is brought to you by" and "You're listening to WBEZ Chicago Public Radio" and "the weather in Chicago will be cold" and "let's check the roads in Chicago" and "I'm Lisa Labuz, Chicago Public Radio." I mean, we must hear that we're in Chicago 30 to 40 times an hour. Hint to Lisa: We know we're in Chicago. We're happy we're in Chicago. Our hearts swell with pride for Chicago. Now... shut... up.

The end result of all this noisy local advertising and traffic and weather (oh yeah, we get four or five weather updates every half hour, too) is this: For every 30 minutes of NPR's Morning Edition, we get only two thin, 8-minute slices of reporting from NPR and as few as two minutes of national headlines. The other 14 minutes are just... wind.

I suppose it gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "Windy City." What really sucks is that it's every bit as cloying as commercial radio. With increasing frequency, I find I'm too fatigued to even bother anymore. I'm happier with silence. Or classical music from the other public radio station in town, Network Chicago. But when I travel to other cities, I listen to their local public radio broadcasts and seethe with jealousy. No public radio station is as aggressive about pushing ads and interrupting NPR's feed as WBEZ is. If you happen to listen to Morning Edition one of these places, count your blessings.

Rant over.

(Stephan Finch is a volunteer staff writer for 2 Walls Webzine)

Response from: Brandon Copple
December 2002

I like Chicago Public Radio. I like weeknight Jazz from 8pm to 4am. I listen to ‘Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me’ on Saturday mornings. I think ‘This American Life’ may be the best thing ever to ride an electromagnetic wave.

And I listen to ‘Morning Edition’ every day while I shave, wax, put on my lingerie and otherwise prepare to face the day. I don’t have a problem with Lisa Labuz. She comes on, she reads the local news, the weather, the sponsorships/ads, she introduces the traffic reports. I don’t find her inarticulate, but maybe that’s because I often tune her out. If the local news lacks interest—school boards fighting over attendance policy and so forth—I stop listening. Maybe I put on some music, maybe I just retreat into my head (you want to hear some annoying voices, step inside this head).

The sponsorship announcements are tiresome, but necessary. WBEZ has managed to pare down to one pledge drive a year. I’ll trade a few more ads for a few less pledge drives. Besides, they’re not nearly as irritating as the jingle-laden crap on commercial radio.

And then there’s the traffic. I love the traffic. Listening to the traffic report in Chicago is like listening to old World War II radio chatter—a rat-tat coded message to comrades doing battle on the Chicago freeways. I’ll never forget hearing it when I first moved here. "Dan Ryan twenty five minutes to the interchange. Ike 50 minutes from the North-South. Bishop Ford 30 minutes outbound to Kingery. Southbound Stevenson backed up with gawkers at an accident near the circle." I felt so cool. I had a big-city job, a crappy big-city apartment and soon I would know all the big-city traffic lingo: who was this Dan Ryan, and how did he get a freeway named after him?

Four years later I listen to the traffic just for the sonic pleasure, even though backed up traffic on the Kennedy affects me no more than a backed up toilet in Milwaukee. Now I know the code. Dan Ryan was on old crony of Mayor Daley (the First). I’m in. And every morning, I’ve got WBEZ to remind me.

(Brandon Copple is a volunteer staff writer for 2 Walls Webzine)

Response from: Elaine Patricia
June 24, 2004

I think the "rant" on Lisa Labuz and WBEZ's Morning Edition is one man's opinion. I'm surprised that the opinion presented is written in such a "snarky" tone. I suppose we should call Stephan Finch, "Bitchy Stephan."

I do not think of Lisa Labuz on Morning Edition as "Stuttering Bob" and this is the first place I've ever heard anyone in Chicago refer to her as such. (I've lived here for 16 years.) I find her to be human and real and I like the timbre of her voice. I find all of the BEZ correspondents to be pleasant and real. A welcome break from the tinny-voiced, hysterical newscasters on other stations. I appreciate the traffic reports in the morning (I commute). I've noticed that BEZ has been mentioning more corporate sponsors in the past few years and I'm not happy about that. I don't want it to affect their reporting. But I'd rather have the anchor read these short spots than have a string of screechy jingles like those on other stations. Actually, I'd prefer that listeners pony up more contributions (so many listeners never contribute). That would enable BEZ to lessen their reliance on corporate support and still be competitive in their programming.

I work as a media consultant in the documentary arts and I am a vocalist. I consider myself to listen more closely to the spoken word than the average person. I find Finch's comments to be confusing and more of an attack than a critique. It might help him to return to a few writing classes and learn the difference between the two before he continues in his correspondence.