Stern's First Month On Sirius

Howard Stern began broadcasting on Sirius one month ago today. I never intended to get Sirius but my new car came with it, so I've been following Stern's second act. And I am impressed. I'll even go so far as to say I think he's well worth his $100m annual income and his King of All Media title.

The reason is simple: Stern is entertaining.

As a pure radio DJ, he's compelling with unscripted banter, lightning fast with his commentary, and -- huge as he is -- he still lets user calls and emails drive a lot of the show. As a creative force, Stern is on par with the gold-standard Daily Show/Colbert Report crew – his show's skits and songs and other scripted material are all funny.

This is from my perspective as someone who was never a devout Stern fan in his pre-Sirius era. Over the years I only listened to him on a cursory basis, but my accidental Sirius acquisition has given me a renewed interest. And I'm glad to be judging for myself because it's easy to listen to all the negative hype.

Even the most credible detractors still chide him for the same old thing; that he's too reliant on raunchy content. Here's what Slate's Bryan Curtis had to say about Stern in March 2004 (in a piece Slate re-published in December 2005):

"Stern's trademark brand of public lechery--alternately focusing on strippers, porn stars, and dwarves--has been swallowed up by a wider culture of public lechery. Stern's problem is too much success: He helped create a shock culture that makes him seem harmless by comparison. He's a provocateur whose time has passed, a shock jock who shocks no one."

Curtis is eloquent indeed. But wrong.

The argument isn't about whether or not Stern shocks people. It's about whether Stern entertains people. And looking forward, I think Stern's creative control at Sirius easily gives him the fuel he needs keep entertaining people through his five-year contract.

Yes, there is still plenty of trademark lechery, like today when two Penthouse Pets got crazy with each other while riding his Sybian machine. But there is also a renewed commitment to media watchdog-ism, like in his first couple weeks when he spent days exposing FoxNews' Neil Cavuto and Bill O'Reilly for the lying hypocrites they are.

If you like hot lesbians, Stern is more entertaining than ever. And if your taste is more attuned to the Jon Stewart/Stephen Colbert approach, you'd definitely be entertained by the Sirius Stern. He's deadly precise and unflinchingly direct during his media soliloquies, and listening to them gives you the same feeling you get watching the Comedy Central power hour -- the comfort knowing that there's at least some media players that get it, and who are crusading to expose the 'No Spin' world for the spin that it is.

For people who stick to their cliched Stern attack based on his proclivity for sexual content, allow me to offer my equally cliched retort: Sex Sells.

And for people who claim Stern will be the same on Sirius as he was on terrestrial radio, remember that much of his media commentary was censored on terrestrial radio because his direct approach (rather than the satirical approach used by Comedy Central) was deemed too risky by his bosses. So when people like Curtis say Stern's time has passed, they're either dead wrong, haven't listened to the Sirius broadcasts, or both.

So far, Stern's second act on Sirius has shown me he's far from relinquishing his King of All Media throne. He's not harmless in a shock culture he created. Nor lecherous. Nor shocking. Nor a sell out. He's just entertaining. Pure and simple.