John O'Brien

Born in 1957; I was raised in the Boise, Idaho area.  I consider myself a "classic" like so many products of that year. From the timeless '57 Chevy to the unforgettable music that shaped the rock & roll era, who could ask for a better year than that?

Jumping ahead 17 years, my first radio job was offered to me before graduating high school in 1975.  Over the next few years, I working at various major stations in the Boise market including (but not limited to) 50kw KBOI, at KFXD AM & FM under Wayne Cornils as general manager, and rebuilding a "sick" KBBK FM to a dominate and powerful CHR product in the market.
 

After 7 years in Boise radio, I took a break in 1982 and moved to Honolulu for some long needed R&R. Shortly after hurricane Iwa (Thanksgiving eve), I came back to the mainland and wound up at KYJC in Medford, Oregon.  A couple years later I moved 6 hours North to Portland. I joined the staff of KISN-AM*.  Hired as Music Director, I built their oldies format from scratch. (The original music list will be posted here soon).  The year was 1987, and something great was soon to happen!  KISN has a lot of history in the Portland market, so it wasn't a surprise that it became an overnight success.  The public embraced the return of an "old friend", and it showed in the ratings.  The success was so great that management decided to convert the sister FM, KKLI, to KISN-FM* and simulcast both with the winning format.  I did afternoon drive and to this day it was one of the best experiences of my career.  I'm currently writing a screenplay loosely based on that time.

The only other station in Portland that I had the privilege to work for was the # 1 country outlet KUPL AM&FM.  Ed Hardy was GM and Bill Bradley was Operations Manager.  During my time in Portland, I taught at National Broadcasting School.

Like many in this business, we'll go the extra mile for a new and exciting challenge.  My "extra mile" was literal.  Each weekend I was driving to Seattle to work on a satellite music service hosted by Braiker Radio Services.  I had the thrill of being hired and working with radio legend Rick Sklar of WABC fame.

In the 90's, I did a number of personal projects.  First, I started a company called Format Productions.  We developed custom music packages for broadcast (see "Oldies, the Next Generation").  In 1997 I started the first ever Web based DVD rental site called Magic Disc Entertainment.  Some of our ideas were used and copied with a later competitor know as Netflix.  In  addition to small projects in broadcasting, I added 13 years of financial background to my resume.

Today, I own a Web hosting company called iVIEW Hosting, Inc.  This site along with many others are hosted on high speed servers in Houston, Texas.  I have a great support staff in Florida and Washington states.

Opportunities knock frequently and I'm always there to take on the challenge.  "The roads are built and paved, we just have to travel them."

Other notable experience

• Coordinated a "lite-talk" segment, increasing ratings from 3.5 to 7.3 in 9 months
• Wrote hundreds of creative commercials
• Taught radio courses at National Broadcasting School
• Acted as Music Director at various stations, including creating and developing KISN*
  AM & FM's original oldies format in 1987. It's still airing today with very little change.
• Assistant Program Director accepting total executive responsibility of daily
  programming/personnel
• Served as "the voice" of KFXD-FM (know as XDFM)

* (legal calls are KKSN)

  (This bio was taken from John's website with John's permission)

You can find John's website here.