CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: 1997 - 2001
Back to Radio – Icelandic Radio
The break I really wanted came as we entered the fall of 1997. I settled on trying to go back to radio. Problem was the only English speaking radio station, was the Armed Forces radio and Television station, it was on what was left of the Keflavik NATO base near the International Airport. That was nearly 40 miles from where I was living in Reykjavik. A volunteer if they even needed or took them would not be paid any salary.
So using a few contacts I knew and had established in the past year, I tried a different approach. I went to a station downtown that was essentially oldies, Adalstodin, 90.9 FM and approached the program director at the time. Quite honestly, I was a bit surprised. He really liked the idea and the possibilities it presented and we went to the station manager.
Another surprise, he loved the idea too, but we had to be cognizant of the existing Icelandic laws in broadcasting. To this day, it is both law and policy and still in practice, but I don't think anybody really understands why.
The law says that any language was OK (not encouraged mind you) on radio, provided it was "live."
A taped program had to be either translated completely to Icelandic, or a person would translate as it ran. Then you have a person and a tape both speaking at the same time and it's very difficult to understand either one speaking.
You can imagine the confusion with people trying to listen to a program in any language on tape or record and having it simultaneously translated "live" as it ran. This law is quite old.
English is now mandated to be taught in schools and at least 90% of today's Icelanders speak and understand English. But under the law then, any show I would do, had to be live. That is what I wanted anyway.
We settled on a SUNDAY afternoon only program starting at 4:00 PM called "40 Years of Rock and Roll." We started at 1955 with the plan to go one week forward each week for 40 weeks. As you might imagine, a Sunday afternoon show on any station would never be considered prime time, so my work was clearly cut out to get any number of listeners at all.
I became the very first American with a music show of my own, completely in English, on an Icelandic radio station.
To my great advantage though, I had a great "lead in" in to the show before me. This was a gentleman named Raggi Bjarna (nickname) who had an extremely popular Sunday afternoon talk show. He was one of Iceland's most popular singers and showmen as well.
The show was a good success and soon the station wanted another show on Friday nights from 8:00 PM to midnight. The Friday Night Party was born and this WAS in Prime Time. We did requests and dedications, interviews on air live with some of the young popular singers in the country and things went well, quite well.
But along with all of that, good show or not, there were a few detractors.
One fellow who wrote a column in the local Icelandic daily newspaper had an article or two basically asking the question "What is this American speaking English doing on an Icelandic Station."
But we weathered that storm or I guess I should say the owner of the station did. Then one Sunday afternoon completely without any notice at all, the government TV station news department, showed up to do an interview for that Sunday night newscast.
I joked that it must have been an extremely slow news day.
But it all worked out quite nicely. The audiences were getting bigger almost every week.
As this was going on, I did what turned out to be a series of commercials for a telephone sales service.
It was for selling a particular new model of mobile phone at the time that were edited from one shooting period. I was contacted by a good friend of mine, Mike Handley, who had the premiere bass voice, who had been in Iceland quite a number of years. He owned and operated the English Language Center in Reykjavik. He would write, more often correct, language flaws in presentations, flyers, books, pretty much everything for businesses that wanted to do something with correct English. In addition, he did announcing, pretty much as I was doing.
He was contacted by an Icelandic agency to see about doing a Christmas television commercial for this mobile phone company in Iceland. Mike declined to accept the job because at the time and the requirements of the commercial shoot, he simply could not bring himself to do it. It was an image thing more than anything else. They required him to become a "hip Santa Claus"
He told them no thanks but that they should call me to see if I would be willing to do the commercial for them. He also told me what he had asked for monetary reimbursement.
It was to be a pretty phenomenal payday.
I was in fact contacted and I agreed. On the day of the "shoot," I was directed to a residence that was chosen because it had a fireplace.
It required being dressed up as I guess a modern hip country Santa Claus of the day, a goatee but no beard, a suit but not a Santa suit, a pair of cowboy boots and of course the base make-up for the best camera effect. I think that was the reason Mike turned them down. He was more of a professional announcer. He didn't have stage or acting experience, I did.
I was also going to be working with an agency model who was going to be dressed as a playboy model and she was supposed to be Mrs. Santa Claus. I mean in my opinion the entire idea was all over the map. I think they were trying to reach every teenager in Iceland and wanted to cover all the bases. They said the target audience were young men 14 years old and up.
When I saw and met the model, I understood the target audience sure enough.
I also thought to myself that any young man 14 or even up to and beyond 61 would have no idea what I was selling when they watched the commercial. I don't think I have to tell you why. There was also a black cat in the commercial, a part of the Icelandic Christmas traditional stories.
This was a Siamese cat who didn't really like strangers, nor bright commercial lights or anything else.
We finally got it done after several takes when the cat bolted from where I was sitting in this easy chair, the model on the arm of the chair on my right side. Finally, however, we succeeded, the entire shoot with the prep took about 4 hours.
The payday, I know you're all wondering was just about $350.00 per hour. Sweet !!
The contract called for television release on November 1st to run through mid-December on TV ONLY. There was also an agreement for "one" newspaper article and picture to be used one time.
It's amazing sometimes how you find things out. My wife's daughter took her children to the university theatre in Iceland to see a movie for young kids. As in most theatres, trailers of coming attractions and even commercials aired before the main feature.
Low and behold suddenly on the theatre screen was the commercial I had made about a month before. One of my wife's daughter's young children seeing the commercial and me as the " hip Santa" yelled "AFI," (This means grandfather in Icelandic).
That echoed around the theatre and brought quite a bit of laughter from many in the audience. I was told however that the company was very pleased that the offer sold quite a number of phones. I was quite surprised to be honest.
I was becoming fairly popular I guess with two requests for interviews. I accepted one from a lady who asked if I would come to her home to do it as she said the recording equipment was too bulky and heavy to bring to the studio where I insisted it be done. We still had cassette recorders at the time so reading between the lines should we say, I politely declined.
I also got flowers one rose on a Friday night delivered to the station and another delivered on a Sunday afternoon. I thanked "whomever" had sent them on the show but heard no more. About a year later, the station was sold to of all places an American network.
By then there were like five stations in the conglomerate.
This is just my opinion mind you, but their official "roll-out" was both bizarre and strange. They played one song, 24 hours a day the week-end before they officially took charge on the following Monday.
We also moved to a much nicer and newer location. I continued working until the very end of century. In fact, my last day was December 31st 1999.
Other opportunities were being presented that year as well. In the summer on one of the other stations owned by this group, the easy listening station, I pitched a show for the tourists that would be broadcast on air of course, but also available in the hotels in room service to give visitors very easy access to information on things to see and do in Iceland. It aired for one hour every morning at 9:00 AM. I think it was a minimal success because while there was some movement in the surveys from Gallup, it really wasn't that much different than those who might have already been listening to the station anyway at that time.
So as the summer progressed, management thought it best to do it only twice a week instead. I agreed but under the contract I was paid the same as if I were doing five shows. Nobody said anything about it so I didn't either.
In the fall of 1999 another interesting prospect came along. The wife of one of the NCO's (non-commissioned officers) at the NATO base, had started a magazine for the people stationed there called Iceland Explorer Magazine. It was only 16 pages but it was stories and notices of things to do in Iceland for the people stationed there.
It was co-owned by her and an Icelandic civilian who worked on the base.
Then, her husband got orders as we all did from time to time in my military days and she gave her co - owner the rights to it all. Shortly thereafter as I understood it, he decided to retire as well. An MWR (Morale, Welfare and Recreation) tour manager thought it would be good idea to buy it and turn it into something bigger.
I tell you all of this so you can see how sometimes things work for you when you're not even aware it's happening. You never expect to be a part of what occurs, but in the end you are. At any rate, he purchased the magazine rights for almost nothing and then sold the idea to a bus company near Reykjavik. From that, a tour company was born also named Iceland Explorer. The thinking that the combination of the two entities would do good things for tourism in Iceland and the bus company wanted to cultivate. About two weeks later, I got the call.
Would I be interested in a job at the company writing the magazine? I said yes and the next thing I knew I was working full time at the company, writing, selling ads for and laying out each issue. So at the end of 1999 I was employed in a full time and a part time position.
Then the company that owned the stations and especially the one I was working for decided that they should go to a mostly taped format, nights and week-ends.
As my contract ended at the end of the year, they offered to keep me aboard but could only pay about half of my current contract salary in wages. They were not doing as well as expected in commercial revenues. I declined and left at the end of that year. The turn of the century saw me doing fairly well with the magazine and not to long after that, actually doing a lot with the tour company as well. The job was now full time plus.
Then one morning, September 11th, 2001, we all watched in horror as commercial aircraft hit both towers of the World Trade center play again and again on the local TV station. Then the Pentagon and later the field where United 93 was intentionally brought down by the passengers. The thinking was that this plane was headed for the capitol or even the White House. We were in stunned silence certainly for that day and of course something like that never really leaves you.
Then, circumstances dictated that Iceland Explorer be sold to an independent buyer.
The CEO of the bus company said he would allow that IF the individual would guarantee I would go with and manage the companies. The agreement was reached and I moved to another location with the new owner.