Excellent Kev Story

Posting this so I can read it again later without losing it. This comes from Chicago's DJ Headlines (link at bottom of article) eMail.

Kev is a legend in the upper midwest, very well respected, and got a seriously raw deal when his time ended at 'CKG. I used to listen to him in the early 90s when I first moved to SW MI and he was doing middays on AM 1000.

With future up in air, Matthews stays unfazed
BY PATRICK KAMPERT, The Chicago Tribune, 07.03.05

It's not the cigar in his mouth that's lighting up Kevin Matthews' face; he's quit smoking, for now, though he can't resist chomping on it a bit. No, it's the smile curling across his boyish, 49-year-old features that's causing a glow as he sits with friends at a suburban cigar shop. For a guy who's been unemployed for more than three months since contract talks broke down with WCKG-FM 105.9, the longtime Chicago radio personality seems awfully content.

Blame it on the company. He is a regular at the place, playing backgammon and cards, ordering pizzas and filling the air with the smoke of Dominican cigars. He trades stories and quips with buddies like Tim the Painter and Sam the Cigar Guy.

"This is kind of like `Cheers' but with cigars," Matthews said.

He has a hard time with last names -- he blames it on his "huge" attention deficit disorder -- and refers to people by their occupations. Tim the Painter says he didn't know who Matthews was for a while -- he just knew him as Kevin -- until a listener wandered in, recognized Matthews' voice and started fawning all over him.

"I couldn't believe it," said Tim, who had been a listener over the years.

Now, Matthews and Callarman -- that's Tim's last name -- go bass fishing together and help each other out with charity work. (Callarman and his wife helped establish the CoACH Care Center in unincorporated Naperville that provides respite care for families with medically fragile children.)

Matthews says he's taking care of himself, laying off cigars and his beloved Budweiser -- along with Ford, the brewery is a major backer of Matthews' charitable work -- until he finds another job. "I think that's impacted St. Louis and Anheuser-Busch," he teased. "They want to crank production back up. When I get a gig, they'll be at full strength again."

In the interim, he's continued to work tirelessly with fundraisers--five in the last two weeks raised an estimated $83,000--through the Kevin Matthews Clause Foundation he established three years ago. Since it began, Matthews says more than $2 million in funds have helped developmentally disabled children, U.S. soldiers, juvenile diabetes research and infant welfare groups, to name a few. (An accomplished chef, he has even cooked dinner parties in people's homes to raise money for charity.)

Matthews said the foundation was established to cement his relationship with Turhan Clause, an Iroquois Indian who adopted Matthews as his grandson in a Native American ceremony. Though Clause has since died, Matthews said his principles guide him to this day.

"You can't outgive God and every child is your child," Matthews said. "It's more than a motto; it's a challenging way of life."

The spiritual side of Matthews is a continuing evolution from the carefree prankster who turned Chicago's airwaves upside down when he hit town 18 years ago. His dexterous voice and off-kilter humor spawned numerous characters, like sports buffoon Jim Shorts.

"Kevin's quirks have quirks," smirked Q-101's Mancow Muller, a friend.

Over the years, his loyal audience, known as Kevheads, have heard a more serious side emerge as well. They have listened to his support for U.S. troops, his love of the outdoors, friendships with Chicago cops (he coaches their hockey team for charity too) and his bowhunting for bears with friends like gonzo rocker Ted Nugent. Matthews remains a complicated character both on and off the air, a sharp businessman who retains a streak of innocence.

But, aside from periodic Internet broadcasts at his website, http://www.kevhead.com/, he's been silenced in Chicago since March 25 when he was pulled off the air on the last day of his contract. It remains to be seen whether he'll stay in Chicago.

Muller is openly lobbying his bosses at Emmis Communications to give Matthews the afternoon show at WLUP-FM 97.9, Q-101's sister station.

"It's one of the worst-kept secrets in town that he has an interest in us and we have an interest in him," said WLUP program director Tim Dukes. "But at this point, it's too early to say who will wind up being in that position permanently."

Matthews' agent, David Brady, said negotiations are heating up as Matthews weighs his next move, with "serious conversations going on" in Chicago and another city. Matthews says Brady, whose primary clientele is actors, has lined him up for voice-over and animation work, as well as reality TV shows.

Matthews' early years in Chicago were the golden age of comedic talk radio. He, Jonathon Brandmeier and the team of Steve Dahl and Garry Meier could do no wrong.

But that was then. Today, Dahl is the only one of that quartet who has a radio job. Matthews was out of work for seven months until he joined `CKG in 2002 and was handed a time slot between Howard Stern's syndicated morning show and Dahl in afternoon drive.

While his ratings were better than his previous gig, at the ill-fitting WZZN-FM 94.7, they were not dazzling -- fifth place among male listeners between the ages of 25 and 54 -- and less than Stern and Dahl. Some Chicago executives say Matthews needs a stronger supporting cast around him, noting how the addition of sidekicks Buzz Kilman and Wendy Snyder has re-energized Dahl.

Yet despite the public divorce between Matthews and his employer, the radio star's numbers found an unlikely defender.

"Talk radio in middays is a challenging position," said Terry Hardin, vice president and general manager of WCKG, who has been blasted by Matthews since their parting. "If you're at work, it's hard to listen because talk radio is so engaging, so powerful. It would be hard for anybody in middays to match the numbers Stern or Dahl generated."

As his contract ended three months ago, sources say Matthews was offered a deal with a 30 percent pay cut to about $300,000 per year. Incentives would have recouped at least some of the money, but Matthews was stung.

Radio insiders say a 30 percent pay cut would be unlikely to come from station management and probably came from higher up in the Infinity radio conglomerate. Dahl, Matthews' former co-worker, said on the air that he thinks Matthews got some bad advice. In an e-mail, he didn't back down.

"I stand by what I said," Dahl said. "It was one of the most poorly handled negotiations I have ever seen. I think Kevin honestly made a bad choice."

Matthews has mixed emotions about Dahl. He has used his alter-ego Jim Shorts to poke fun at Dahl in his Internet broadcasts.

"I'm not going to change Steve," shrugged Matthews as he sat in his west suburban living room decorated with Indian and southwest motifs. "I put closure on it. Do I hate Steve? No. I've made the right move. I could not go back to that radio station."

Matthews said he wants to invite Dahl to join him as a guest on an Internet broadcast. A couple weeks ago, Muller, a former bitter rival, showed up in Matthews' basement to sit in on a taping.

Muller said he sent a note to Matthews last fall when some heart tests initially indicated Matthews might have some cardiac problems. (It was a false alarm.) When Matthews and WCKG parted ways, Muller called again. The friendship clicked, Muller said, because of the unique pressures of the radio business.

"It's somewhat of a lonely life because it's so competitive," he said. "It's so cutthroat that I never really had a chance to sit down and talk with anybody. It's been great talking with a guy of his caliber and tell him what I've been going through. It's really been a blessing."

"At this point in my life," Muller added, "I'm more interested in building things up than tearing things down."

And while the imminent departure of Howard Stern to satellite radio will have scores of U.S. stations looking for a morning-show replacement, one Chicago radio executive said afternoons remain the best fit for Matthews.

"He needs time to lay out his show and his characters, and you don't have time for that in mornings," the broadcaster said.

Matthews claims to be unperturbed by the time off.

"This is the best thing that's ever happened to me," Matthews enthused. "As the weeks go by, I'm meeting some brilliant people. I'm not sitting at home watching `Jerry Springer.'"

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