But You Can't Silence Them

You can screw them out of their jobs at a Toronto radio station, but you can't silence the hilarity of Humble & Fred. That's right. They're back. This time in podcast form. And they're better than ever.

Some time ago, I blogged about how pissed I was when Mix 99.9 (or whatever the hell they call themselves now with their most recent redesign) fired one of the best morning show crews they had. I continue to get a lot of hits to this site when people are searching out Humble and Fred, Humble Howard Glassman, Fred Patterson, Judy Croon, Bingo Bob and Mix 999. I'd thus like to perform a public service announcement here to let people looking for them find a link to some recent podcasts that Humble and Fred (and Bingo Bob and Dan Duran and Mike Boon and funny guy musician Scary Pete) have recently put together.

I, of course, listened to this podcast while driving to work in the morning, delighted to hear these friendly voices (harking back to the memories of the original Toronto radio station these guys were on, the station which inspired the Rush song "The Spirit of Radio" in which they sing about the wonder of the connection a listener can make with a radio station and that "friendly voice, a companion unobtrusive" who "plays that song that's so elusive and the magic music makes your morning move.") As I drove along, it was a good feeling, almost like it used to be, like they were never screwed out of their morning radio jobs at all.

But in one simple way, it was better -- much better than ever before.

Because the best thing about this new podcast is you get Humble and Fred and the witty banter and hilarity. And you don't get that same old same old crappy top 40 continually repeated over and over which 90% of the radio stations out there shovel out. Instead, you get a few finely selected bits of music that fits wonderfully in the context of their show.

If you ever listened to these funny gentlemen during their radio career, you simply MUST download and listen to their podcasts. If you've never listened to them chances are you're still going to have fun if you enjoy their "nothing too fancy" approach, the fact that there's a mix of genuine low brow fart and giggle humour to go along with some poignant moments.

It's a free download after all. What have you got to lose? Check them out. (As of the writing of this there are 2 -- but I can't wait to hear more from them). In the meantime, at least I'm not in Toronto, but in Hamilton and have Chris and Jody in the morning on Y108 -- good times there and an actual real mix of great rock music that isn't always repeated.