Whatever happened to ... the Junkies?
Still on the rush-hour dial
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In December 2005, millions of radio listeners found themselves in uncharted territory on their morning drive. Howard Stern, the shock jock who got his start here in the early '80s and then dominated nationwide ratings for two decades, had left the FM dial for satellite radio.
Who would fill the void?
In the Baltimore-Washington market, the opportunity went to a quartet of sports-obsessed dudes who call themselves the Junkies: J.P. Flaim, Eric "E.B." Bickel, Jason "Lurch" Bishop and John "Cakes" Auville. They grew up together in Prince George's County, got their start on cable access television in 1995 and not long after were on the radio with faithful listeners. In early 2006, Tyler Currie profiled them for the Magazine in "The Accidental Shock Jocks" as they took over Stern's slot on WJFK (106.7).
Nearly four years later, none of the other hosts whom CBS Radio originally appointed to replace Stern are still on the air.
"These are guys who are really talented," E.B. said recently. "Guys like Adam Carolla, like Steve Dahl, like Opie and Anthony -- icons in the industry. I am real proud of the fact that this show survived and is thriving."
The Junkies are thriving on unabashedly lowbrow material. Sports, their bread-and-butter subject, is served with generous helpings of pop-culture riffs, toilet humor and, of course, sex talk. The hosts made headlines in June 2008 when a guest, tennis pro Justin Gimelstob, threatened and derided fellow player Anna Kournikova.
(Gimelstob, who earned a one-match suspension for the outburst, later apologized.)
The Junkies' audience is -- no shock here -- overwhelmingly guys, but the hosts know that sustaining and increasing those numbers will determine the survival of their show. They think they can do it.
"We started out when were 26 or 27. Three of us were single at the time, and so people kind of thought of us as frat boys. Now we are all married with kids, and our audience has grown with us," J.P. said.
"We really don't know how to do anything else," E.B. said, "and the only job that could possibly be better is to be paid to sleep."
