Widely known for their peppy breakfast show ‘Kasa Kai Mumbai’, RJ Salil Acharya and RJ Archana Pania have today become synonymous with Radio City. Their constant chatter mixed with a hearty doze of fun, music and infotainment is the accompaniment of most Mumbaikars during morning breakfast or as they travel to work. Salil and Archana take over the ‘Musical Rendezvous’ segment to share their musical diaries…
Inside stories of Musical-e-Azam (Mon-Sat, 7-11am)
Salil: It was very tough for us to get bollywood singers to studios early in the morning for ‘Musical-e-Azam’. Most of the song recordings happen late in the night, so it involved a lot of hard work but we must say all our guests have been very participative making the journey smooth. For eg KK is someone who likes to wake up early in the morning and does not prefer recording after 10 pm, so that way it worked well for us.
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Archana: ‘Musical-e-Azam’ broke the trend of celebrating only bollywood stars and films on radio. This is a novel concept on radio and we are really proud of it.
Salil: A unique feature of ‘Musical-E-Azam’ is that artists come purely on the basis of their relationship with Radio City. The goodwill created by Radio City through 11 years of its existence has been instrumental in making ‘Musical-E-Azam’ a super success.
Archana: Radio is also where a musician gets to speak. How many times have you seen a musician talk about his music on TV or even on a music channel? It’s very rare. Even on live shows they can’t talk as it’s just about music and them singing.
Preparation…
Archana: Every year we have a peg. This year we wanted to mix songs and food as most singers have told us that they love food. We paid an ode to the food that enables them to make such beautiful music.
Salil: The most important thing is interaction with listeners as they don’t get to speak to singers/musicians.
Archana: We believe every musician has a journey that involves a struggling period, so we take all the interesting anecdotes from their lives and put them in a ‘filmy’ format. Preparation involves a thorough research on them, their songs, likes and dislikes.
Industry secrets…ssshhh…
Archana: There is a radio jockey who apparently once hit on an office boy and got spanked on his eye.
Salil: There is another jock who has in front of me and others, dropped his pants. He was wearing his shorts under his pants though.
Celeb gossips….
Salil: There’s an actor who wears a corset all the time. He does not suck his stomach in but wears a tight corset which were used in Victorian days. He wears it to keep the fat sucked in and doesn’t leave the house without it. So you will never see him wearing a t-shirt.guess who???
One unknown fact about your profession/show…
Archana: Half the content we get for our show is from our listeners. We get a lot of interactive information from our listeners. Another important fact is that a radio station is not only about RJs, there are producers, bosses, marketing and other departments in the backdrop. There is a lot that goes into private FM.
Salil: The most unknown fact about radio is that people think there is no money. The industry has a lot of money and radio jockeying is a very viable profession. Another unknown fact is that you need education. If you are not a graduate, you will not get a big pay scale. Radio respects all the knowledge that you get.
Important things to co-host a radio show…….
Salil: I honestly believe that we have the best breakfast show as the amount of knowledge and experience that we have is immense. We have pure content and have broken competition’s stronghold. In the last three years, we were at number one position in a row as per RAM.
Radio City has the best content; When I started I was aware of the extreme competition around. I feel we have climbed Mount Everest and jumped long time back.
About working with Archana I would say, we fight but there is no ego between us. And we make sure that after the show is over we will not discuss what transpired during the show. I think this is what translates into a great show which has been complimented time and again even by our competiton.
Archana: We had Jaggu-Tarana which worked because of their chemistry. Dual jocks were not as popular then apart from these two, and I feel they had a killer formula. I think I will have a better marriage because of Salil, he is such a pain that now I have learnt to deal with such men (laughs).
Tips:
You must be happy with your job. Everyday is not Sunday, we also fight but the relationship should be positive.
It’s important to really love the job to wake up so early for a show
There is always a sense of responsibility; you must always trust each other.
We have different tastes but it doesn’t matter as we find common grounds.
The beauty about Archana is that she is always fresh, happy and colourful.
Acceptance. One has to value other’s views.
To understand that there are two people talking on radio and there is a time limit with ads and songs. Sometimes you have to learn how to be the underdog as well.
Top 5 RJs in India….
Archana: I think if you gauge an RJ as per his knowledge of the city, I don’t think anyone comes close to Jeeturaj as he knows everything about the city. So I would give all the five positions to him. We are on top of a balloon above him and all the others.
(Radioandmusic.com has been constantly trying to innovate and provide readers with the best information about the goings-on in the industry. We are happy to introduce the special section titled ‘Musical Rendezvous.’ The objective: delve deeper into the minds of senior professionals from the radio and music industries, to understand trends and developments and get other insights about the way forward. A big thank you to those who are supporting us in this endeavour and giving our reporters the time, and knowledge so that it can be imparted further to our readers.)
