Famous Firsts with Brian “Hammer” Panerali
Brian "Hammer" Panerali
Afternoons
KXTE (X107.5)/Las Vegas -- (Bonus Stations: KFRR (New Rock 104.1)/Fresno Afternoons & WMTE (Eagle 101.5)/Manistee, MI Weekends)
Promotions Assistant at WXRK (K-ROCK) in NYC
Weird Al @ The Bottom Line in NYC (It'll also be my son's first concert in June here in Vegas)
Well, it was a cassette... Weird Al’s self titled debut, (notice a trend?) which was already four years old at the time but it was brand new to me! I ended up listening to it so many times I had to get a replacement.
By the time I got to Phoenix I had already interviewed a lot of "up-and-coming bands" but my first big "real interview" was easily Kurt Hammond from Metallica... They were doing a show down in Tucson and my PD at the time (the great Steve King) asked me if I wanted to go down there and talk to him... a question to which the answer is always “YES!”... the venue didn’t have a lot of room for us to sit down and talk so we ended up having to go to a supply closet sitting down about a foot away from each other... Ended up talking to him for a good 45 minutes, easily one of the top 5 most down to earth, laid-back coolest, artists I’ve had the pleasure talking to.
WBAB/Long Island, NY... first time cracking the mic during the weekend overnight shift. Talking up the ramp of a Led Zeppelin song and ended up running over the vocals... I was so pissed at myself that I threw together an epic string of curse words, only to realize that I had accidentally left the mic on... 2AM on Monday morning... no phone calls, asking me what I just said, no listener reports to the program director. Talk about the luck, I ended up working there for another two years, thankfully. Dead Air? No, but it could’ve possibly turned into a dead career for me! Sorta the same thing, right?
