Syracuse University’s WAER-FM, with a history of on-air personalities including the young Lou Reed and sportscaster Bob Costas, was one of the few college radio stations in the country reporting their playlists to Billboard Magazine in the early seventies. As such, music director George Gilbert became a key target of promotions departments at every record label, big and small. After graduation, George used his network of industry contacts to procure the newly-created position of Radio Promoter of Southern New England at Elektra/Asylum Records.
Listen to part one of George Gilbert’s two part interview as he discusses the advent of the AOR format, learning to use leverage to convince disc jockeys to play albums, and rising to become one of the top radio promoters in the Northeast. Exclusively on Between the Liner Notes.
Jerry Rubino is a radio man who has seen the broadcast industry from every angle. Landing his first job on commercial radio at New York’s WPLJ, then moving to producing/hosting shows for Z-100 & WLIR (two of the largest rock stations in the nation’s largest radio market), he then went to Bar/None Records where he learned the promotion side. Moving to indie giants Rough Trade, Chrysalis, and Radioactive Records, Rubino experienced the alt-rock explosion from the inside, seeing how the industry reacted.
