For over 20 years, Rockline has brought the stories behind the music to millions of fans. Rock radio's first interview program, Rockline delivers legendary acts that discuss and play their favorite music.
Rockline's unique style comes from its callers... Rockline is the only place in radio where fans can call in and talk to the legends of Rock & Roll. Hosted by Bob Coburn for 17 of the show's 21 years, the style of the show is relaxed and conversational, and the artists tell the inside stories of the tours, the music, and the band members.
Each week, Sunday night's show is dedicated to brilliant Classic Rock artists. Rockline is presented live from Hollywood, in a brand new studio complex featuring a specially constructed performance area and separate drum room. Bob Coburn alternates between interview segments and the artist's music, often performed live in the spacious Rockline Studios.
Whether you call in, listen on the radio, or become a charter subscriber to Rockline's soon to be introduced Backstage Pass (visit the official ROCKLINE website by clicking MORE INFO below), get ready to hear the legends of Rock & Roll as you have never heard them before...relaxed and behind the scenes. Rockline delivers great music and great stories, every Sunday night on WAVE 104.1!
MORE ABOUT YOUR HOST BOB COBURN:
For seventeen of the last twenty-one years, Bob Coburn has been the voice of Rockline - a friend to many of the musicians featured on the show as well as the legions of fans around the country who tune in once a week to the ninety-minute show. Over the years Bob has interviewed a kaleidoscope of personalities, from Bill Clinton to Axl Rose. A master at the art of conversation, he is as adept at coaxing insights from the most retiring of guests as he is at keeping exuberant visitors on track. The secret to his success as one of syndicated radio's most popular personalities? Partly his encyclopedic knowledge of a host of subjects - from the Doors to the Dodgers, Robert Heinlein to Robert Johnson. But he constantly amasses more information for more informed interviews.
"I try to ask the questions I think people listening would want to ask," Coburn says, sharing some insights about the art of conducting live interviews. "I also do enough research so that I can ask a real gem that, because I did my research, I would not have been able to ask otherwise. You need to know when to back off and let the artist go when they're on a roll. And you need to know when to step up to the plate and knock one out of the park. So it's a blend of both: What does the average person want to hear, and what can I find out that nobody else will ask."
Coburn, fondly known as "B.C." to his legion of fans around the country, and indeed the world, cultivated his technique studying journalism, and though he left the print world behind years ago, he still takes a reporterly approach to his duties.
"I worked for my high school paper, and I wrote a little for the Dallas Morning News," B.C. recalls. "Then I went to college, and radio and journalism studies were in the same building. It was kind of a media complex and being such a music fan I would go past the radio department all the time and think, 'This is hands-on and immediate -- just talking about it. You're not a slave to a keyboard.' And I thought, 'I'm going to give this a try!' So I started hanging out there, and then I left that college 'cause it was really remote. I moved back to Dallas, where I grew up, and got in the car and drove about a hundred miles outside Dallas. I drove from city to city until I found a station that would hire me. Literally off the street - I walked in without an audition tape."
That kind of persistence came easily to B.C. because he's always been true fan. He was journalism major during his college days at Texas Tech, but was a hardcore music lover since he was a kid. Among his earliest inspirations was a Texas program called The Night Train, which featured a mesmerizing mixture of genres -- deep blues interspersed with current pop hits and seasoned with exotic jazz by artists like Rasshan Roland Kirk. Adding fuel to the fire, one of B.C.'s sisters gave him Gene Vincent's classic "Be Bop A Lula." His other sister bought her pre-teen brother a copy of "Serendipity Singers," which he quickly traded in for a Stones album. He's been rockin' like a hurricane ever since.
In the years that elapsed since he landed his first radio gig at the tender age of 21, the honors and adventures bestowed on B.C. continued to accrue. He hosted the international broadcast of "Live Aid" as well as "The Wall" live from Berlin and "Queen's Tribute to Freddie Mercury" at London's Wembley Stadium. His television work for KABC-TV made B.C.'s face as recognizable as his voice, and his five-year tenure as the station's rock reporter landed him in a slew of scintillating situations, from hanging in a plane hangar with Van Halen to shooting the breeze in a local hotel with New Kids on the Block. B.C. was also voice behind "Nightrax," and his distinctive, resonant sound has made him a hot commodity as a voice-over artist for network television and music narration, with credits that include the "Billboard Music Awards," the recent European Beatles documentary, a Lynyrd Skynyrd interview disc, a Tom Petty EPK, Michael Jackson's "Thriller" video, and much more.
But despite his illustrious career, B.C. remains an easy-going, down to earth character, and that's one of the reasons he connects so strongly with people. He attributes this to his upbringing in the Lone Star state.
"Texas is a great place to be from, and I wouldn't trade my childhood memories for anything," he says, reminiscing. "We had no money but I had really a great time. I was always playing sports with kids in the neighborhood, and I loved music. I got a job at age 15 and worked at Safeway grocery stores for about six years. I pretty much put myself through school and was able to buy a car in high school and pay for it myself including gas and insurance. I look at that as a really good upbringing. It taught me a lot about work ethics. You have to learn how to do things for yourself, take care of yourself."
That independent spirit is one of the corner stones of rock'n'roll, and the fact that B.C. appreciates what it means to work hard is another reason why he connects so strongly with the musicians he meets.
"On Rockline, I hope I come across as a knowledgeable friend, the liaison between artist and fan. Plus we have a lot of live performances on the show, and to sit in the room while great artists play is truly an honor."
B.C. has been a fixture on the Los Angeles radio landscape even before he took over Rockline. He entertained listeners during the afternoon drive at both KZLA-FM and KLSX-FM; between 1980 and 1994, he worked at KLOS-FM in various capacities including Acting Program director and afternoon drive personality; he was Music Director at the influential L.A. station KMET, during the Mighty Met's late-'70s halcyon days and also served as the station's Afternoon Drive Talent. Taking his skills to Chicago's WMET, he created a staff and station from the ground up. "One of our hallmarks there was exposing new artists, something we still do at Rockline," he notes. B.C. is also proud of one of his earliest radio gigs at KPPC [now KROQ], the second-ever FM rock station in the country. "It was a thrill to be right there from the beginning of freeform rock radio," recalls Coburn. "Going from John Coltrane to the Beatles to Mingus to the Stones. It was seminal stuff."
In autumn of 2001, B.C. took on the morning show on San Francisco's KSAN 107.7, "The Bone," a gig that has given B.C. the opportunity to exercise his both his comic sensibilities and his interview skills. "We have every play on words imaginable," he chuckles. "The lunch time special is Bone Appetit, and the request line is the Bone Phone and when we play "Wanted Dead or Alive," it's by BONE Jovi. It's actually a well-researched handle and a really fun radio station. I'm having a blast working mornings 'cause one minute I've got a comedian like Bob Sagit on and the next minute I'm talking to Michael Josephson from the Institute of Ethics. So I get to do a lot of different things."
While music remains a consuming personal and professional interest, B.C. still finds time for a host of other pursuits, from keeping tabs on the Dallas Cowboys to hanging out with his three children, to supporting his favorite charity (the Make-A-Wish Foundation), to playing and following baseball. B.C. is always on the go, working for family and community, and the soundtrack to his endeavors is as diverse as he is, encompassing everything from Incubus to Dylan to Third Eye Blind to Genesis. "After I'd been in radio a decade," he confides, "I made myself a promise that when the music didn't excite me any longer, I would walk away. But I'm still there! I still feel the passion. I just love being the guy who turns everybody else on to cool music."
