Drex is leaving The Shift

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Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby Rocky » Thu Jun 25, 2020 9:15 am

Last night, Drex (Justin Wilcombes) announced on The Shift that he has resigned his position with Corus Entertainment to explore other opportunities. He will continue to host the late night show until a replacement host is in place.

I'd love to see Corus give the show to regular fill in guy Shane "Zack" Hewitt. Shane does a great job and is totally capable of doing it without having to rely on added "content" from producer Bob who sounds like he's asleep and doesn't really know what's going on. He adds nothing to the show and really isn't anywhere near as funny as he thinks he is.

Another potential host could be Richard Syrett from Toronto who is a frequent Weekend host on Coast To Coast AM.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby drex » Thu Jun 25, 2020 9:44 am

Your comment about my producer Bob Addison are out of line and shows just how much you don't know about developing characters for radio shows.

Every late night radio show Bob has produced over the years has rated #1. David Berner, Dan Russell's SportsTalk...and the shift.

It actually shows he knows exactly what he's doing and he knows exactly what's going on.

Thanks.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby groundskeeper willy » Thu Jun 25, 2020 11:02 am

Hmmm, maybe I'll be able to listen to some overnight radio again. Drex's speech impediment and Bob's delayed reactions & inability to sound like he was paying attention to what was going on quickly became a tune out. Drex, if Bob's schtick is your definition of "developing characters for radio shows", perhaps this shows how little you know about the biz. Here's hoping the new host will be more interesting and listenable.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby freqfreak2 » Fri Jun 26, 2020 2:07 pm

Hopefully Mr. Wilcombes won't trip over his ego while strutting out the door on his way to a market where people can actually understand him.

And I think Corus did the right thing (for once) by not talking him out of his decision.

The Drex studio door is closed and the on-air light is off. Thank goodness.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby WheresFredTaylor » Fri Jun 26, 2020 2:48 pm

drex wrote:Your comment about my producer Bob Addison are out of line and shows just how much you don't know about developing characters for radio shows.

Every late night radio show Bob has produced over the years has rated #1. David Berner, Dan Russell's SportsTalk...and the shift.

It actually shows he knows exactly what he's doing and he knows exactly what's going on.

Thanks.
drex


Right or wrong, it just shows that criticism can't be taken in today's world. If that comment was out of line (and it wasn't compared to following one), you need to thicken your skin.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby drex » Fri Jun 26, 2020 6:48 pm

Yes, criticising a grown adults actual stutter which they don't have control over is totally normal. Real classy stuff.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby Tom Jeffries » Fri Jun 26, 2020 9:47 pm

Taking a cheap shot at Drex, because he has a stutter - shows your ignorance for all to see.

Like or dislike Drex, that's your choice - but sliming him like that reminds of another twelve year old -

He lives in The White House.

Best of luck, Drex. Ignore them.

Now I await some cheap shots, which I could care less about; considering the criticism is from people with an IQ of about 87.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby freqfreak2 » Fri Jun 26, 2020 10:22 pm

drex wrote:Yes, criticising a grown adults actual stutter which they don't have control over is totally normal. Real classy stuff.


FYI, this is the communication business and there are standards at play here - one of them being comprehensibility.

Unless this thread has been edited (and I suspect it has), I haven't seen any accusations here of a stutter (or more correctly, a stammer - one would know unless one has never consulted a speech therapist).

Also, to be grammatically correct, it should have been written "a grown adult's actual stutter" to properly indicate possession.

Pesky apostrophes often make a big difference. I know - it's a minor journalistic detail, but anything goes with young know-it-all professionals these days. And you can blame that on poor education and not unfortunate genetics.

It's not so much a stutter, a stammer, or an accent, that makes folks unintelligible - it's rate of speech.

Some nights I've clocked Drex diatribes at over 300 words per minute, with competing voices often talking over each other. The average comprehensible rate of human speech is around 150 words per minute (200 max if the speaker has great enunciation skills).

Couple speech impediment, rate of speech, accent, and production techniques that slams audio elements together without a hint of listener-sympathetic preparedness, The Shift With Drex is more accurately perceived as The Shift With Audio Train Wrecks.

If you want to be in a business where being heard and understood is essential, one would think that great effort would be taken to overcome known shortcomings and ameliorate them as best as possible.

But to not acknowledge faults and simply counter with the bluster of ego and bullyisim ... well, good luck with that.

It's one thing to make a living as a "personality" ... but it's pointless if no one can understand what you are saying.

And it might be a time for some people to seek the advice of a career guidance counselor if they want to make a success out of life.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby DonovanTildesley » Sat Jun 27, 2020 1:13 am

While by no means a daily listener, I have continued tuning in Drex's show over the past two and a half years, especially during COVID when The National was a tough watch prior to going to bed. Admittedly I wasn't at first a fan of the multiple voices, but when Drex explained it to me once as being similar to what you might hear on most morning shows, the rationale made perfect sense, and showed it to be an innovative way of constructing a late night talk show. As for Bob's sometimes "delayed response", it can't be all that straightforward to have two different people working from home with two very different setups, not to mention the lack of eye contact. Way to go, mate, and looking forward to your next endeavour!
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby Baxter » Sat Jun 27, 2020 6:04 am

Mr. Jeffries

You could have left the comment about stuttering right there but decided you needed to add the Trump comment. Really?
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby groundskeeper willy » Sat Jun 27, 2020 3:16 pm

freqfreak2 wrote:Unless this thread has been edited (and I suspect it has), I haven't seen any accusations here of a stutter (or more correctly, a stammer - one would know unless one has never consulted a speech therapist).


Nope, no editing, I stated that Drex possessed a speech impediment, after which other posters, including Drex, then started on the stutter thread.

freqfreak2, thanks for expanding and clarifying the underlying issue as to why the show was always a challenge to listen to. Ultimately, it rests at the feet of the PD, who may/may not have put any effort into directing & correcting the obvious issues. After four years, one could readily make the assumption that management either didn't know or simply didn't care about what was being pushed out the transmitter each night.

Here's hoping the next host will be a better communicator.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby freqfreak2 » Sat Jun 27, 2020 4:15 pm

Thanks groundskeeper willy.

I wasn't exactly sure where the stutter topic started, other than by Drex himself (which I find strange and overly-defensive), so I jumped to the assumption of an edit.

I've got nothing personally against Drex, or any person with a speech impediment. Lord knows we all cringe when hearing our own voice (the countless airchecks I have suffered through ...).

But there is the matter of choosing a profession when such things pose a liability, compounded with the nonsense chosen to create an audio version of whack-a-mole for four hours a night.

It all sadly reminds me of a sketch from Beyond The Fringe, the British comedy revue that bridged the years between The Goon Show and Monty Python.

A man missing his left leg applies for the role of Tarzan for an upcoming movie.

The talent agent is perplexed by the man's choice of role and has a hard time breaking the news that Tarzan is usually played by two-legged actors.

After dancing around the topic for a while the talent agent finally says, "I've got nothing against your right leg. The trouble is – neither have you."

Broadcasting is not a business for everyone despite how great you think you are. You either got it or you don't.

As Dirty Harry once said, a man's got to know his limitations.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby groundskeeper willy » Sat Jun 27, 2020 4:34 pm

"One Leg Too Few", terrific Beyond The Fringe bit, great version of it on their box set "The Complete BTF" out about 15 years ago. Moore & Cook's word play and comedic timing were amazing.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby freqfreak2 » Sat Jun 27, 2020 4:40 pm

Glad to know there is still at least one person alive to appreciate the reference :)

Hopefully Corus won't replace Drex with someone that causes us to dive into Moore & Cook's "Derek and Clive" stuff.

That would be ugly territory.
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Re: Drex is leaving The Shift

Postby Broadcast Babe » Sat Jun 27, 2020 6:08 pm

PD Gifford is a smart guy with a lot of experience. I'm sure the show was an experiment, and as we know, they don't always work. In this case, as in most, it boils down to talent, content, execution, and in my humble opinion, the show needed more of each. Talk radio is a tricky set of skills. Kinda like a car---thousands of moving parts moving in one direction. The few times I checked it out, and not for long, I found it immature, including way too much radio navel-gazing, grabbing low-hanging fruit for issues, ill-prepared, without the education, intimate knowledge of the issues and experience to bluff their way through. I'm sure Mr.Gifford recognized this, allowed it to slowly disintegrate, and will not make the same mistake. I'm afraid Drex and crew simply did not have the format skill set and experience (life and otherwise), to pull it off.
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