Annual O&A census

[captain_kamala]

we always listened to o&a at work. there was this one jewish kid who lived with his parents who did not understand why we couldn't afford to go to all the comedy shows with him. like dude it takes more than one paycheck to pay rent. fuck.

 

[BillyCorgan'sFallenTree]

This was the first clip I ever heard.

 

[Meownaw]

First bit I heard was the Norton roast and the fart game. I remember my brother playing it for me and laughing. The rest is gay history.

 

[LockedHDD__Pot]

if we're dropping 1st clips it's this (below). Coming from UK radio I was aware of Stern but hearing this language, format, content, etc. Intrigued me. Probably listened to most of their stuff now, & the fact I'm here now means it's been hella arc.

 

[FrogmanKurlan]

I started listening in 2004. My dad got a new truck that came with XM and he was familiar with da show from traveling for work and catching them on whatever stations they were syndicated on. We would listen every morning when he drove me to school, I was in 7th grade at the time and a couple times I was late to my first class cause I had to stay and listen to the end of the bit they were doing.

 

[Meownaw]

Before the YouTubes where would you get the show? I remember one site being spreadtheoandavirus dot com or something gay like that.

 

[Riccardo Bosi]

Before the YouTubes where would you get the show? I remember one site being spreadtheoandavirus dot com or something gay like that.

Yeah, there were sites that uploaded the full shows. I started in 2008 and one site would upload each show in a folder with the audio being in separate 30 min files with ads. Later, people would just upload the full shows ad-free, and some people would upload it to a torrent site. I did this for a good six years.

There are channels on Youtube that have an entire year's worth of episodes, but they're not labelled with anything other than the date. I remember labeling episodes for my own sake, like "2008-04-08 Bob Kelly, Jesse Ventura" or whatever. I bet that date is accurate, too.

 

[Mick_Mickerson]

I also remember the WOW shit all over the place and on the back of box trucks.

They seem to exclusively only show up on white panel work vans and box trucks in the northeast

 

[LingerLonger]

I remember hearing Anthony on Stern in 1994 doing his Jackie and Kinison impressions. I started collecting bits that people had recorded of O&A when it was just the 'Opie Show' because of that. Their early stuff like Demented World or Rotgut parodies are awful now and are Jocktober level material but at the time it was not bad. When they went to Boston they became obscure for a while until they started gaining momentum enough for major markets to being courting them. That it is when they tanked their contract with the dead mayor bit and came back to New York.

For years they were nothing but rock jocks and it took them forever to become a talk show. And by the time years later their show had some real traction it was Sex for Sam III where they lost their show once again. Finally they signed to XM and I listened literally every single day. Almost from the first day of XM you could tell that their show was going to be the best talk show on the market. And it basically stayed that way until today. I can listen to old O&A shows easily every day. I listen virtually no podcasts or talk shows anymore now.

For those who never listened live you missed some amazing days for the O&A show. They would cover news topics as they happened. Had tons of contests that would drag on for months. They had tons of interactions with the fans with assaults on the media, homeless shopping sprees, and live events. Contrary to the new fans ragging on Opie for taking callers, old school fans know that the callers were some of the best parts of the show. The pests practically produced entire weeks of content sometimes like when they attacked other radio shows.

 

[LingerLonger]

Before the YouTubes where would you get the show? I remember one site being spreadtheoandavirus dot com or something gay like that.

The binary/usenet groups had the show every day. Multiple blogs carried the show every day. Someone would stream the shows live on a site through mp3/m3u every single day. There were pirate O&A stations that would broadcast old bits and fan made compilations. Some of the biggest shared comedy files on Napster/Limewire/Kazaa back in the day were O&A files.

It was very easy to get the show. Fans would make commercial free edits as fast as the ones for major television shows. And Opie told management to stop copyright striking those sites because it was their best marketing. Pretty much every hardcore fan would listen live on XM but still download the show later to relisten to the best bits and pull clips for later compilations.

 

[Mc.Faggot]

when perez hilton got punched by will.i.am’s manager the story got reported on wwtdd and they posted a clip of patrice talking about the situation on O&A

 

[Jizz]

I caught the virus when I was 12 years old back in 01. Me and my uncle were watching the XFL show and the boys were interviewing the equipment manager in the locker room and Opie picked up a jock strap and started sniffing it. We were howling laughing and I spit my mountain dew onto the ground. I bought an XM in 04 and was listening on their first day and that was when I became a pest. Started going to pest events in 05 and was at the million pest march and got to meet the bbboys for the first time at the J&R music world signing.

 

[SoloJoeAcousticShow]

I caught the virus when I was 12 years old back in 01. Me and my uncle were watching the XFL show and the boys were interviewing the equipment manager in the locker room and Opie picked up a jock strap and started sniffing it. We were howling laughing and I spit my mountain dew onto the ground. I bought an XM in 04 and was listening on their first day and that was when I became a pest. Started going to pest events in 05 and was at the million pest march and got to meet the bbboys for the first time at the J&R music world signing.

What'd they smell like? Asking for a friend.

 

[Stent]

So much going on in that photo. It's like a Rembrandt.

 

[Jizz]

Before the YouTubes where would you get the show? I remember one site being spreadtheoandavirus dot com or something gay like that.

The biggest torrent site in 04 was called suprnova or something and the show was posted daily. There were always different websites posting it that would come and go. It was way better to download the mp3 and listen on an ipod or zune mp3 player than it was trying to use the shitty xm myfi radios.

 

[SoloJoeAcousticShow]

It was very easy to get the show. Fans would make commercial free edits as fast as the ones for major television shows. And Opie told management to stop copyright striking those sites because it was their best marketing. Pretty much every hardcore fan would listen live on XM but still download the show later to relisten to the best bits and pull clips for later compilations.

Didn't Anthony even claim at some point he uploaded uncensored (?) videos from da show on his website but it cost him like 10k the first month because he uploaded uncompressed? Always wondered what that was that all about.

 

[satanssockpuppet]

Yup, WNEW here. Listened at work. Howie in the morning, O&A at 2. On WNEW the first two hours were always way funnier than the second two, as they saved all the "wild" gimmicky shock-jock stunts for the PM drive. I was so happy when WNEW finally ditched their longtime "where rock lives" format, because let me tell you, that fucking station sucked balls. Ancient 1960s era DJs playing "double shots" of "Bruce juice", Southside Johnny and CSNY every single day, that station was just unbearable.

 

[Snake]

Never heard of them until senior year in High School in 04. A black friend (I know) who was the Whitest black kid I knew, had a bunch of WNEW tapes of when Vos and Dice were in. I started listening to their terrestrial side before the walk over and started subbing right after that ended.

 

[Ramooooonnnneeeeee]

So I live in Alberta Canada, never heard O A or Howard for that matter. I purchased a 2008 Cadillac STS in 2014 and it came with a XM subscription, happened to hear the Scott & Todd Jocktober episode where Bobo called in. Funniest shit I ever heard. Even subscribed to Compound radio for about 2 weeks before I tapped out (though the fuckers kept charging my card). Too bad, pieces of shit or not those guys were funny.

 

[TorqueWheeler]

WNEW after school. Somehow they convinced everyone they were these cool young guys who would eventually push old man Howard’s shit in. Fuck knows what we were thinking.