When, if ever, did Casey stop liking the Top 40?

[skuncle]

I'm wondering if there was a point when Casey stopped liking the songs on the Top 40. I ask because there is a local Top 40 morning DJ who has been on for about thirty years. the station started off as a Top 40 format, but morphed into an AC station when the Top 40 format died off. Maybe 15 years ago I was listening and after playing one of the songs said "Wow, can't believe this is actually a hit". I sent him an email asking if he likes any of the music he plays during his show. He said that he doesn't pick the songs, the programmer decides what is played, but no, he doesn't like what the station plays. He said he hasn't liked it much since the early 90's or so. Said he liked the job, doesn't care for the music.
So I wonder if Casey ever got to a point where it was a job, but he didn't like the songs much anymore.

[chrislc]

I sense that listening to early-mid 80s, but maybe it is just Disco Casey calming down. Then again it would be hard to find a DJ sounding as genuinely excited about the music he was playing as Disco Casey. He might not have been sincere, but he sure sounded sincere and excited. He was absolutely great in 1979. That, along with the #1 songs at the end of each hour and that logo going into that feature, made the show sound the best it ever sounded, IMO.

[BrettVW]

I think it is fairly common knowledge that Casey actually had very little interest in the music he played. Based on interviews and first hand accounts, I sense he read the script, listened to the incues and outcues of the music, and that was that. I feel this was especially the case in the second half of his countdown career in the 90s and 00s

[snarfdude]

Jul 15, 2013 8:21:01 GMT -5 BrettVW said:

I think it is fairly common knowledge that Casey actually had very little interest in the music he played. Based on interviews and first hand accounts, I sense he read the script, listened to the incues and outcues of the music, and that was that. I feel this was especially the case in the second half of his countdown career in the 90s and 00s

no doubt. It was all voice tracked, he never sat through a full show playing the songs after dick clark explained the wonderful world of voice tracking your lines, and having an engineer piece the show together.

Thanks to computer automation, even local radio stations do that now.

[hothitzdj]

Incredible question, does a DJ actually like the music they play? The morning DJ story is priceless and at the same time incredible piece of honesty that he confessed. The question is at one point does it become about the money and not about the music. Hardcore listeners in some cases would make better DJs than what's on-the-air. Then again, that wouldn't go far with management. If Casey read the fan mail, he knew it was more than a job (playing music) as his listeners considered him a friend and turned to him often to tell their life stories.

Music and the chart was the connecting piece. The current crop of countdown shows on Pop radio sometimes forget the P-1s do follow the chart just as much as their DJ personality.

[quatermass]

I enjoyed the music I played when I was in radio, but then again I played everything from 1955-1989. I got out of radio in 1996 after the industry went down the toilets as well as the music.

[Mike]

Jul 15, 2013 8:04:50 GMT -5 chrislc said:

I sense that listening to early-mid 80s, but maybe it is just Disco Casey calming down.

Probably this, because he was certainly more upbeat again for the last year or so before leaving AT40 in '88.

[skuncle]

Jul 15, 2013 11:50:11 GMT -5 quatermass said:

I enjoyed the music I played when I was in radio, but then again I played everything from 1955-1989. I got out of radio in 1996 after the industry went down the toilets as well as the music.

I used to DJ local birthday parties, retirements, holiday parties etc. My thing was "if you want to hear it, I have it!". As a result I have a huge music collection. I started doing this in the late 80's while I was still in high school. The years I covered was stuff as early as the 40's up thru the then current hits. I stopped doing this in the mid 90's because people started requesting stuff (current hits) that I didn't have because I didn't like the songs. It was hard for me to get pumped up when I'm being asked to play garbage like "I'm Too Sexy" for instance. The very last party I did was for a 50th birthday party so the bulk of my collection 60's, 70's and 80's worked out well. By then I did add late 90's country stuff. I distinctly recall this last gig because I played Shania Twain's "Man, I Feel Like A Woman" and everyone was up dancing, and I totally forgot the song has a cold "Man, I feel like a woman!" ending and before it got to that I ended the song and went straight into the next song. Everyone on the dance floor heard my mistake. I'm sure no one who was there remembers this, but I can not forget it because I totally screwed it up, and I was great at fading out one song and going into the next. But I stopped DJ-ing after that because I didn't have very many current hits anymore.

[mkarns]

It seems to me that after the early 1980s, at the latest, Casey seemed less likely to express liking for some of the songs he played, though he still did so on occasion (speaking of late 90s country stuff, Casey said in his last countdown four years ago that he likes Faith Hill's "This Kiss.")

It may not be a matter of him not liking the music as much as simply not following it so much, whether because he was getting older, was too busy with other activities and work to pay much attention to it, or whatever reason. While his method of counting down became very efficient, allowing relatively little time to get familiar with the songs (as mentioned, in his later years it's been said that he mostly just read the scripts given to him and listened only to the beginnings and endings of songs, adjusting his delivery accordingly), he was probably familiar with quite a few of them from life in general (maybe his kids helped there). In any event, it wasn't his, or really any countdown host's, job to critique the songs, though it is nice for him to express his appreciation for them occasionally (he rightly refused to express dislike for any on the air, whatever his opinion.)

[matt]

My question is: did Casey stop liking the top 40, or did he just lose interest in the majority of songs? I could see the latter, as I started to lose interest in the top 40 around 2001 or so. There were still songs that I liked, but too much unlistenable dreck (including most rap and hip hop). About where I am with today's top 40...