n c or
©1E01 1.1
vening with
uitar
uartet
aturday,
1, 1997 at the
rake Jewish
unity Center
`Ticket 3n
General A
Seniors/
5
10
Seati
For more in
Non-Members $20
Non-Members $15
or tables will be accepted.
ickets, please call (810) 967-7649.
Coffee will be available at
Ta270! Coffee douse
Jewish Community Center of Metropolitan Detroit • 6600 W. Maple Road • West Bloomfield. Ml • 48322
EASTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY
Per orminG arts Series
arvin gramti'scli
Conducts the EMU Orchestra
Three time Oscar winning composer of 'The Way
We Were, " "The Sting," and "A Chorus Line."
"Brilliant! Clever! Had the audience in stitches
- New York Times
Ticket prices: 528/525/522
Discounts available for seniors,
EMU students and children under 12
For more information call
the Office yrampur Life
at 313/487-3045
31 3/487-1221
Ticket Information:
EMU Box Office
oon to 5:30 p.m.,
onday-Friday
13 / 487-1221
(,)
LU
0
/
A
subscription
to
February 7, " 8pm
Give your heart
an extra helping.
Say no to high-fat foods.
CC
I-
w
0
LLI
g a American Heart
88
ALr
perfect
gift...
Association
THE
JEWISH
NEWS
1-810-354-6620
JAI Entertainment
RADIO RABBIS page 87
heard on 18 stations across the
received
nation.
hisBm
illare
ste
turn
r's ed
th M
degree
"When we declared to the Sa for a short time, then
Un'drece
moved to
world in 1988 that we felt mod- New York for research jobs tau
at the
em rock was going to be the next USA cable network and Eastman
big thing, we were the least like-
ly consultants to be getting on Radio
h I needed an assistant,
"Wen
that bus," Fred recalls. "The in- I was talking to another
guy and
dustry had very much typecast called a Michigan State professor
us as The Classic Rock Compa- f or reference,"
a
Fred recalls. "He
ny.' But the modern rock thing is s aid, 'Well, he's OK, but Bill is
interesting, because it has grown much better.' My reaction was
massively as a format. It's prob- `You're kidding me!' And he said
ably 40 percent of our core busi- No, your brother's far more tai-
ness."
nted.' I hadn't really thought
As the brothers' ears admit- a bout it."
tedly have grown older, younger
Fred believes that Paul, the
consultants have been hired in 1 ast brother to join the firm in
New York and Los Angeles to 1 991, is a key to Jacobs Media's
keep the company's alternative- s uccess because of his sales and
rock suggestions on the cutting m anagement experience.
edge. Such flexibility, and a track
"When I was still working off
record for sensing broadcast o f my dining room table and
trends before they occur, have en- cruising along with seven or eight
deared Jacobs Media to its clients. cli ents, I came to a fork in road,"
"Consultants normally have a sa ys Fred. "My sense was that if
bad name — certainly in radio," th e company was going to con-
notes Tom Bender, vice president ti nue to grow, and clients were
and general manager of WCSX go ing to stay with us for nine, 10
and WRIF. 'The fact that [Jacobs ye ars, we would have to develop
Media] has had a relationship se rvices and add more compo-
here that's lasted for 10 years ne nts than 'Just play these songs.'
speaks for itself. And on a per-
"Paul has made the company
sonal level, they've proven them- really work, because most people
selves to be bright, aggressive, like me or Bill don't think in
ethical people who are trying to terms of [radio] management,"
do their craft at a high level, and Fred says. "He brought a sales
are still good family men."
component to help stations con-
A harder task was getting the vert their ratings into revenues,
brothers to endear themselves to which is especially important in
each other professionally. Grow- the modern rock format where
ing up on the northwest side of stations are attracting a younger,
Detroit, the sons of the late Sid- 18-to-34 audience and may not
ney Jacobs never intended to be be savvy enough to market that
working in radio, much less with group to advertisers."
each other.
And the fascinating thing, Paul
"This was definitely not the says, is that "selling alternative
plan," insists Paul, 42, even rock [radio] today is virtually
though each of them followed the identical to when I was selling
initial path of attending Michi- WRIF in the late 1970s. You get
gan State University.
the same objections, the same
Fred went on to teach Radio lac k of understanding for youth
201 at MSU while earning his radi o. Where it used to be 'I don't
master's degree. "I got a bache- get these weird new bands like
lot's degree without really know- Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd," to-
ing what I wanted to do," he day it's These new bands Smash-
remembers. "We were blessed ing Pumpkins and Garbage have
and cursed with a father who en- f unn
. "an
'
couraged us to find something we
ver evolving, Jacobs Media,
would enjoy as our life's work, be- w hi ch is also doing work for Sony :
cause he sold paper and plastic Wo rldwide and Playboy, is cui
products most of his life and was ren tly developing a new radio for
not always happy with what he mat ts
that's an alternative rock for
did." (Their mother, Joan Stein, adul
is living in Florida.)
We don't have a name for it
Paul inherited his father's yet,' ' says Fred. "It's kind of like
salesman genes, selling adver- an a dult contemporary station for
tising time for Detroit's WNIC- peop le who still wish to be con-
FM (100.3) and WRIF before side
red hip — `People who think
becoming the general manager of Hoo tie [and the Blowfish] are
several stations in Texas. cool, ' is the way we're describing
And Bill, 36, hung around it."
WRIF as a teen-ager when his
Wh atever their next radio
older brothers worked there. He tren d becomes, it will be devel-
was a pre-law major.
oped out of suburban Detroit.
"I was accepted to a couple of
"0 ne of the most asked ques-
[schools]," says Bill, "and within tions we get is, 'Why do you live
a few weeks of leaving, looked at here ?' " Fred says. "We deal with
myself in the mirror and said 'I peop be in all parts of the country,
don't want to go.' I saw what [my and we could live anywhere
brothers ] were doh?, .a.n.d..
;
felt tiler4 's a big airport. But we love
maybe I was denying atiiiKe'd • 4t re: It's home. We have no de-
it."
sire to be anywhere else."
-