By MATTHEW VARI
Sunday, May 3, 2015 (Sunday Weekly Magazine, PNG)
Brand New
Rait Breakfast Show: Putting the fun into your mornings
By Matthew Vari
Sunday, May 3, 2015 (Sunday Weekly Magazine, PNG)
THE weekend has just ended and your mind is still asleep on that dreaded Monday for school, work, or play. A turn of the tuning knob or click of a button, try getting that dial to 99.5 RaitFM and you are guaranteed have 3 long hours of a distraction that is guaranteed to make you smile and laugh more than once.
That’s right folks; breakfast radio will never be the same again. The guys at RaitFm have found the answer in the secret formula to making mornings seem brighter. That is when you get a bit of “Elton” Kili with a dash of Aaron Lachlan “Locky” Ani to get one of the funniest radio shows in the country at the moment.
The Brand New Rait Breakfast Show on RaitFM 99.5 has gathered a growing following every weekday mornings from Monday to Friday every week with their array of segments with Locky in the driver’s seat and Elton the screamer of the two with his well known imitating talent in full disposal for listeners.
The Sunday Weekly Magazine team braced itself for an interview full of distractions as the larrikin pair gave us the rundown of the show that puts the fun into morning radio these days.
“It is a new revamped, new sound, and new feel that is about the most important thing, which is Fun! That is realistic fun, and a bit if giaman (fake) news also,” Locky laughs explaining.
“This is a concept thrown to me and Elton over a month ago- they asked us what we thought about it, and we asked them what they wanted us to do with it, and that was for us to be free to express ourselves.”
“RaitFM is always targeted to the grassroots mainly and we want to keep the grassroots and skew more towards the modern and also not most of the elders but the younger generation mainly, along with the affluent market.”
Funnyman Elton referred to the new blend as a shift in society as a whole where the term grassroots is now being used loosely for a segment in society that may technically be non-existent in the distant future.
“Those we now call grassroots, ten years down the line that word will cease to exist, in terms of the amount of influence in technology and social dynamics have also been altered- so we are also moving in that trend also as a show and a station,” Kili says.
The breakup of the New Rait Breakfast Show consists of the segments of “Giaman News” presented by Anchorman Mr Full Ov Bulls, “Prank Calls”, “Conch Shell” (topical segment), “Tngting blo ol Soti Mobs”, and many others on the drawing board. Not to mention the array of characters from various walks of life being brought to life through the imitating prowess of Mr Kili.
“Me, I am the funny hilarious and loud guy- he (Elton) does all the hilarious characters we have here like Uncle Wang, Himaimah, we will also have the two brothers from Bollywood India Sahhim and Rahidd with our soon to be introduce African friend Rudolph will also be coming in along with other characters,” Locky adds.
One segment that is a must listen for those of you that have not tuned into the show as yet is that of the Prank Call segment. “Listeners are warned as you may never know it is us until it is too late,” Elton says laughing.
“We call up random numbers, and you will never know that we might prank you next. We call anyone like say for instance we called a car dealer and told the lady that we bought an automatic car that only works in the day time but doesn’t work at night,” Lockey chuckles recalling the prank.
“She says why? And we tell her that when we put it on D (Drive) for daytime it works, but when we put it in N (Neutral) for Night time is doesn’t work- when we put it to R (Reverse) for Racing it only goes backwards.”
“I am pretty sure that a lot of people would love to do these prank calls but they don’t have the guts or the wit to actually do it- we are here to say hey you can do this and have fun with your life- because sometimes you give those people a really good time.”
“That was funny- the concept is to have fun and our listeners to want to hear things like this that have never been brought to them,” Elton adds.
“Eventually the lady we pranked at the car dealership- we called her up to tell her that we just pranked her, she told us that we just made her day.”
They even went to an extent that particular call was made to Airlines PNG with them asking how much it would cost to fly from Boroko to Gerehu in the nation’s capital. Something they say they are after in doing the out of the normal stuff. Other segments like Conch Shell are now creating hilarious debates on somewhat serious topics. Conch Shell is now set to have a new even funnier twist as Lockey explains.
“We are looking at bringing in other big artists- we have spoken to Prote J, Dadiigii, we want to bring in most of our artists, but we wanna add a little twist to it, because interviewing an artist yeah that is fine- with the Rait Breakfast Show we want to do things that have never been done before in the country.”
“You listen to the show your imagination of funny radio comes to a reality, for example we one day want to get any big name artist, get a bottle of helium and tell them we only inhale helium to conduct our interviews to sound like chipmunks having a conversation,” laughs Locky at the thought of if.
“With the show we allow for a more elevated version of our personalities. Elton is a craftsman with his personalities and I am just a funny old guy.”
“We also are looking at getting out there on the road, with Elton going out there to doing traffic reports. We want to be in person with our listeners.”
Tingting blo ol Soti Mobs take the same direction like the conch shell, but the catch to the initiative is where they have children giving their thoughts on anything. Elton points out that the views of children have really advanced of the world today that is somewhat very different and unique.
Credit wakeup calls give listeners the opportunity to win free mobile credits, that are somewhat of a important commodity these days.
“It runs from 6am to 9am until somebody wins- and if no one wins it jackpots, but we would like to encourage that no one wins the jackpot until it reaches a K1000 worth of credit,” Lockey smiles.
With so many ideas and segments to come onboard, both announced that the show would officially launch its Facebook page along with its major launch coming soon, along with their 1655 number to register for their various segments and competitions run daily.
“We are great mix, basically mixing English, Tok Pisin, Grass Root humour altogether as one, and we go on air weekdays 6am to 9am Mondays to Frdays and on Saturdays from 10 to 12 you get the best of the Week,” Lockey adds.
Asked how the marriage has been between the pair, Locky jokes optimistically that they were a perfect match made for radio.
“It’s great, my parents love him and his parents love me, (Elton) we are loving each other deeper every day.”
“Doing a breakfast show is really different to what Elton does as a standup comedian- with the show it is the real us at a different level.”
“Lockey and Elton we are not the stars of the show, but our listeners are the stars. We get their views on what they are talking about and just have fun with them because their thoughts are more important than ours.”
“We are here to brighten up your day. We know everybody have ups and downs, and all we want to be about is be Ups for you. Give us the downs and we will turn it “Downside Up for You”.
