Most guys like to lie around, smoke cigars, drink a little whiskey, and talk about their day. Tony Katz does that, but the guy is lucky enough to get paid to do it.
“You smoke what type of cigar you like,” Katz said. “I like bourbons, but I’m a rye guy. I love the creation concepts of whiskey.”
Katz gets to talk like that for his nationally syndicated radio show Eat! Drink Smoke! It’s available via podcast on all podcast platforms. There are some stupid ideas and concepts for podcasts, but this idea was pretty cool.
“What I like about whiskey is the personality of each distillery,” Katz explained. “Your idea of what your mash is supposed to be, how much barley do you add, or how long do you keep it in a barrel. Do you move it to another barrel?”
At least he’s not talking about algebra or stamp collecting.
“If a cigar is making you feel a bit off, try something else.”
Katz said he’s been searching for an opportunity to add on to his house. However, I get the feeling that he really wants a ‘smoke cave.’ “We could really use a studio space,” Katz said.
Yeah, right.
He records the podcast at Blend Bar Cigar with four locations: Indianapolis, Nashville, Pittsburgh, and Houston. “We’ve been able to do some video work there as well,” Katz said. “I made a cigar video for the Indy 500. I highlighted ten cigars, but don’t think you should smoke that many in a day.”
His first cigar was after a shift as a manager at a restaurant in Tyson’s Corner, VA, about 30 years ago. “The restaurant was next door to a cigar shop, and I tried one. I don’t remember a lot of the different cigars I smoked in those days.”
Katz lived in Tampa Bay and later in the San Fernando Valley when cigars became a regular thing for him.
“There’s a lounge aspect to our show. Normal people lounging around talking. Fingers and I host the largest cigar and bourbon radio show in the country, we think.”
He said they talk about supply chain issues, pop culture, parenting. His co-host is Fingers Malloy. (I know. Sounds like a character in every 1940s gangster movie.)
“Fingers also hosts a weekend show in Michigan,” Katz said. “We’ve known each other for a lot of years, and we’ve been friends for years. He’s very funny. Fingers is someone who knows a role on the show. He’s a great radio partner.”
Katz said the podcast has been worth his time, and they’ve stuck with it. “We have turned the corner and are starting to build it financially.”
He’s a renaissance man, finding joy and beauty in just about every artistic venture. Katz cites the importance of art in our culture, whether it’s a painting or a cigar. “I don’t care if it’s a Edward Hopper or a David Hockney painting on the wall, I like creation. Each cigar is a creation with talented hands that created it.”
Before all the cigars, bourbon and paintings, Katz had a childhood. He grew up in Middletown, New Jersey in Monmouth County, not far from the Jersey Shore. Katz has two brothers, one older and one younger. He grew up in a normal kind of life. A middle-class lifestyle.
“I had a group of friends as a teenager, but I guess I wasn’t the happiest kid in the world,” Katz explained. He said the friends he had were of good character, and they had their regular hangouts. Katz said he tried to keep in touch over the years with old friends, but people move on, and you fall away from them sometimes.
“I was a pretty fat kid. I spent a lot of years not liking myself. Things changed when I stopped lying to myself. There are things I can’t believe I allowed to happen, treating others in a certain way.”
Katz wasn’t a broadcast major in school and never had any broadcast experience. Then he got a career in radio. I imagine former journalism majors working in fast food, believing something is inherently unfair about that.
“I was doing some activism with the Tea Party in California,” Katz said. “After a year, I decided I wanted to have more conversations. I was broke. I took the last two grand I had and purchased time on a station in Clearwater, Florida. I bought time on a small radio station to do a show. A very small station.”
He said the two-grand got him a month of radio show.
Katz said his show started to get some traction when he focused on the happenings with legislation in Arizona.
“Let’s say the police were involved in a traffic stop. The police were allowed to ask for proof of citizenship.”
Surprisingly, this didn’t go over well with a lot of people, but it certainly stimulated some areas of the populace.
“Basically, Arizona politicians were saying, ‘don’t come to Arizona,’” Katz explained. “I don’t think there is anything wrong with that kind of legislation. That became Boycott Arizona. So, I started giving free advertising on my show for Arizona businesses. It was the story I got out there. People picked up on that. I was a guest on Neil Cavuto on Fox. I started filling in for Dana Loesch, and that led to a weekend show.”
Katz said he’s always been talkative, comfortable in conversations. He said he presents well. He likes the camera and the camera likes him back.
“You have to learn to cultivate your personality. I wasn’t very good when I started in radio.”
He said there was more to learn about the whole radio thing than he may have guessed.
“It took a while to get comfortable with time frames until it became muscle memory. Hitting my marks and commercials. Learning to become a bit more expressive with sharing stories. I did have to learn clock management, keeping people’s attention. I had to learn the business side of this thing. Providing people what they need when they need it. I’d better give them the best I can.”
His radio producer Allison Lemons takes care of the morning show. Katz explained he recently went on a hunt for a proper producer, and that isn’t always easy.
“You want a producer who can allow you to be challenged in the take,” Katz said. “You want someone who can give something to you, sometimes opposing your ideology. I don’t mind if you’re a centrist if you want to help me build the take. That’s the thing I like. Someone who can help you sharpen your argument.”
His morning show on WIBC is Tony Katz and the Morning News. His midday show is Tony Katz Today. The midday show also airs as a Best Of on weekends in Atlanta (WSB), Tulsa (KRMG), St. Louis (Newstalk STL), Ft. Wayne (WOWO), and South Bend, IN (MNC)
Katz said on his shows he brings on remarkably few callers.
“I don’t know if a lot of news talkers do take callers,” Katz said. “If the show is working, why add something to the mix? I think the real thing is finding the connections between politics and culture to balance the show.”
Katz said he spends a lot of time on making the show successful. There are times he’s not afraid to go on a tangent or break in a news topic.
“I like to have the feeling of something heavier here, something lighter here. Notice I didn’t say ‘fluffy.’ I don’t like ‘fluffy.’ An audience knows when they’re listening to garbage.”
Katz believes you’re only as good as the last few minutes of your air shift.
“By the fourth segment of the third hour, you’d better still be delivering the goods. Some hosts may be mailing in the last half hour, thinking about plans that night or something the next day. I don’t think that way at all,” Katz said. “If someone is just tuning in, they deserve the full effort, regardless of when they come into the show. You better have something ready to go.”
The show is natural, Katz said. Also citing, he doesn’t talk politics throughout his show.
“It’s a wonderful mix,” Katz explained. “During our morning show, I’ll actually play music. That’s the “TK Music Moment.” You need to break it up. That isn’t the way some talk shows operate. Some stations super-serve the politics. I’m a believer in mixing things up.”
Katz intentionally avoids listening to many podcasts or other talk shows, mostly because he doesn’t want someone else’s thoughts in his head.
“That doesn’t mean I won’t hear anything new. I will react when somebody does something cool or smart. As I said before, it’s an art form. You have to hear the music of something.”
Cigars, music, and bourbon have an excellent musical ring to them. Right?
Jim Cryns writes features for Barrett News Media. He has spent time in radio as a reporter for WTMJ, and has served as an author and former writer for the Milwaukee Brewers. To touch base or pick up a copy of his new book: Talk To Me – Profiles on News Talkers and Media Leaders From Top 50 Markets, log on to Amazon or shoot Jim an email at jimcryns3_zhd@indeedemail.com.
