With YouTube and music apps everywhere how does radio still stay relevant? Is traditional media dying? Should we let it?
This week for Mono Career we catch up with Fresh FM’s UrbanFix hosts Kaycee the Big Home and Whilzahn. They shed a little light on how radio stays relevant with the changing times.
WHO THEY ARE..
Kaycee The Big Homie has been in the radio industry as an on air personality since 2007 when he started at Radio 99, then he went to Radio Wave and then FreshFm. Well known in the Namibian music circles Kaycee is an Emcee as well as A&R consultant, founder of Namibia Rap League and all round creative.
Whilzahn A.K.A “Dubz” is a vibrant multi-talented Namibian Actress, Poetess, songstress, Radio Personality, MC and beatboxer. Whilzahn has acted in two internationally recognised feature films “Katutura” and “The Hidden Sky’. A sultry opinionated voice paired with basically any form of art makes her a personality to look out for.
What are your thoughts on the creative industry right now?
Kaycee: It’s a tough space to be in as rewards do not match up to the effort at the moment so I actually marvel of the persistence of those in the industry to keep going when it literally does not pay as well as other careers like tenderpreneurship. Respect has to be shown for the tenacity of creatives that seem undaunted by the unforgiving space within which we are forced to operate but surely at some point something will give.
Whilzahn: I really think it is growing, some more than others. The music industries has got all these new and old artists pushing boundaries and breaking onto the continental/international scene with regards to collaborations etc. Namibia has become more welcoming to international acts, and the film industry is growing at such an immense pace.
Thoughts on New Media vs Traditional Media?
Kaycee: New media is THE Media now and unfortunately Traditional media is fast becoming an endangered species. The peer to peer sharing that is available right now is unprecedented and offers a lot of opportunities as well as snags. For example for one to get a message out there it’s a lot easier and cheaper, however, as Malcom Gladwell put it in Tipping Point a lot of these messages are becoming spam, people are going through a “notification fatigue”, where they are tired of reading invites to events they don’t care about, because now its too easy to “blanket market”…I don’t know if I should coin the last phrase, so in essence messages are sent to those who do not care for the messages and then become spam.
Whilzahn : New media with regards to social media is undoubtly the biggest influencer, but that doesn’t mean that old media gets disregarded. Old media for example radio still has the biggest reach by far. They actually can go hand in hand, and if used correctly would always come out as a success.
How is Radio staying relevant in the Digital Age?
KayCee: By embracing it in various ways; online streaming, having a presence on social media and using that as a platform to engage directly with listeners and giving them a platform to give their opinions on particular issues.
Whilzahn: By making radio more easily accessible through mobile apps, online streaming, making a huge presence felt on their social media platforms.
Talk to us about UrbanFix?
UrbanFix airs Monday to Friday from 9am to 12 midday. The name says it all, we cater to young urban listeners. We have segments like 140c’s where we take the most interesting or funny tweets from twitter and read them out. Another segment we have is called Fresh16s, every Friday, where we invite local Hip Hop artists to come on and do a 16 bar freestyle. Hip Hop is not getting a lot of love from corporate or otherwise so we do our little bit to help the cause. The UrbanFix also has a Social Media segment called Ponderers Box where we post a thought provoking meme and ask listeners to comment and the listeners can be hilarious. The listeners are a minefield of funny anecdotes you gotta love em.
Are there any specific goals you intend to reach for/with your show? Message you want to get across?
No we do not try to push a major agenda, we just want the listener to have fun and maybe, just maybe, give them some water cooler talk. If a listener can think critically about something that’s a bonus but mainly we want our listener to have a good time.
What’s your favorite thing about what you do?
KayCee: The hours are dumb nice, I love music so that’s like a total bonus, I also love language and words so that comes in handy…like a lot.
Whilzahn: My voice and what I say might make a difference to someone , somewhere. Plus it’s the coolest job on Earth, I get paid to sit, talk, listen to music and meet awesome people.
But, how did you get into radio?
KayCee: I was working at a restaurant called Luigi and the Fish whereI met a Lady called Claudia whose parents had a restaurant on Independence ave, she asked me what I would love to do with my life, I said radio, she said “ Say no more fam”. She put me in touch Glenda Locke Strause at 99fm and the rest is history…Ok I had to make a demo but yea that’s how it happened.
Whilzahn: I’ve always wanted to radio as a child, but studied Finance instead. A friend of mine Lynn Strydom, gave me a call one day in 2015 saying they were looking for radio presenters at 1Fm, so I went in and did a voice test, 2 months later I got the job.
Plans for your individual brands?
KayCee: I am into emceeing as well as A&R work. I have low key consulted with a lot of artists like KP Illest, Lioness, Phred Got 1, Super producer Willy Paradox etc. So my plan is to formalize that because at the end of the day I think I could help a lot more people and intellectual property is a commodity. I plan to get full swing into Emceeing because I just love public speaking. Ultimately I feel that the Namibia Urban Sound space has diamonds that need to be taken to Africa and then the world, my brand will take them there. I have already sent records to contacts in neighboring countries and as far afield as Nigeria, it is slow work but you eat an elephant one bite at a time right?
Whilzahn: Well other than radio, I am a professional actress so I am currently working on a new Namibian horror/suspense feature film titled “Break”. I also do MC work, and will be looking at a few corporate events in the near future. I have recently branched into music, so I’m looking forward to working on my album next year. That’s as much as I’ll say for now.
Hopes for the creative/entertainment industry?
Kaycee: That we put our feelings aside and become professionals, that maybe we put our egos aside and ask for advice from those who have been there before and maybe stop taking things personally.
Whilzahn: Our industry is very small, we need one another to grow, so all egos aside and a lot of standard pushing. We have the potential to become a very powerful industry.
Catch the UrbanFix on Mon-Fri from 9 am – 12 midday on Fresh FM (102.9)
Follow Kaycee and Whilzahn on Social Media to see what else they get up to.
