Radio Days: That One Time When Country Music Star, Joe Nichols, “Attacked” Me

Image Source: joenichols.com

OK, so I lied, country music star Joe Nichols did not attack me however; I do have a picture of the two of us together where it looks like I am trying to get away from him.

Here’s what happened…

Before Joe was a “star” he was what’s called an “up-and-comer” in the radio world; which basically means he had a song that was getting some airplay on a few radio stations, including the one I worked for.

One of the radio stations I used to work for was a country music station called KWJJ in Portland, Oregon (it was Fisher Broadcasting and is now owned by Entercom Communications and is called “The Wolf”)…

While I was visiting with another client at his place of business, a downtown “supper-club” called El Gaucho, I met a man who happened to own what was at that time the hottest night club in town. It was called Banana Joes and is no longer in business. The guy wanted to know why I was getting so much attention from the El Gaucho staff so I explained they were long-time clients and I was there to drop of a cut of their most recent spots for their records.

This began a conversation about this man’s night club. Me working for a country music station didn’t quite jibe with him as something that would be beneficial for his business or a match for his clientele…

Cheers!

After a couple of drinks and many words later I had him convinced I could do something extraordinary and generate an entirely new and different clientele, at least one night a week and proposed the idea of a weekly event called “Country in the City”.

After some negotiation I picked up a check for $12,000 to get the ball rolling.

Country in the City

The premise was I would bring in a country music “up and comer” to do live concerts at Banana Joes every Wednesday night and I did. For the first event Joe Nichols was my catch and he [country] rocked the house. He was also a very good-looking man clad in some tight ass black leather pants. Whew!

Of course the ladies went nuts for him and surprise surprise the other country radio station in town also showed up to check out their new competition (me). It was actually pretty damn cool and certainly a feather in my burgeoning “sales cap”.

The Attack!

Anyhow, at the end of the concert Joe agreed to stick around for a meet and greet with listeners and attendees. Everything was going great and after a while the line for people to meet him was finally dwindling down. I popped over to that side of the building to see how many more people were left as I gathered station props and swag, etc. As I went to leave the room someone grabbed my shoulder from behind and spun me around…

It was Joe Nichols and he wanted to know why I wasn’t getting my picture taken with him along with everyone else…

…truth be told he made me a little nervous – he was just way too cute and sexy in those leather pants, he sang like a dream and he was a really nice guy…besides, I was relatively new to KWJJ and I wasn’t sure if it would be OK…

My response was polite and business like. I told him the meet and great and picture-taking was for our guests/his fans and not for me the “staff” [even though it was my show]. This was completely unacceptable to Joe as he had taken a liking to me (we had done quite a bit of goofing off pre-show and at the intermission) and so he demanded someone to take our picture…

…and someone did.

As you can see it looks like I am desperately trying to get away from him and it became a bit of a joke for a while at the station. I actually stayed in touch with Joe for a little while after that, but eventually his star got too big and I think and he simply forgot about his radio pal in Portland.

It was a fun time!

I hope you enjoyed my story and I would love to hear some of yours too!

Have you had celebrity encounters? How’d they go? Were you star-struck or nonchalant?

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