Could we do these shows for four or five hours? We could, but we want to keep the emphasis on the music. RON: They offered an hour and to have it directly promoted to our audience. Was there pressure then to keep it just to an hour? But what really got us started on this idea of GPS is not just the music but the scene that was around the music.įor cities like New York or London there’s so many different scenes you could focus in on, are you considering revisiting any of them? We would just be discussing different songs and people would call in and give their opinions and then people would call in and give their opinion against us. They were already kind of music heavy, but because we played a couple of tracks which usually either had a theme or would just focus on one artist-and we’d start it at the beginning of the show-it wound up being a music discussion that was usually fluid. People would call and that section of the show took off on its own. GAIL: It was already what we had been doing on those early morning shows.
We were doing the Bennington show on Opie Radio and we would use a different band as bumper music, and Gail and I would start discussing that, and then we got a call from management who basically said, “Hey, is there any way you guys would interested in talking about music and playing music?” You’ve been in the radio business for a long time-why did now seem like a good time to start doing a music show? In October 2015 after years of talking intelligently about music, the Benningtons launched “GPS,” an hour-long show that features the music of one scene from a particular city.Īnyone who’s listened to you on the radio knows that music is a big part of your life, Ron. Initially airing sporadically on Fridays when Ron’s longtime on-air partner Fez Whatley retired in April of 2015, “Bennington” replaced the “Ron and Fez” show on Sirius XM’s Raw Dog Comedy channel in the 12PM-3PM slot. In 2014 Ron began the “Bennington” show with his daughter Gail Bennington who brought a fresh perspective and unique wit of her own and quickly showed she was not only more than capable of contributing to any of the wide spectrum of conversations the show veered into, but she could also carry them. So what does all of this have to do with talk show hosts Ron and Gail Bennington? Well, anyone who has heard Ron Bennington on the radio, whether it was his early days on the “Ron and Ron” Radio Network in Florida, or the hugely popular “Ron & Fez” show in New York City during the dying days of the rock format at WNEW, or later in Washington, DC, or finally all over the world on Sirius XM, knows that music is something he can-and often does-discuss with the depth of a serious fan. The psychedelic scene in the mid-to-late ’60s for instance, is held in higher regard than say, the largely forgotten American Legion scene of Ridgefield Park, New Jersey in 1993. Music has had countless different scenes bubble up over the years and spill their way in to the national spotlight, many of which are now spoken of in hushed tones of reverence. Others-most really-flicker out like a flare in the night sky.
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