Jim Trenton - Other Radio Jobs

Other Radio Jobs

After working for KROQ, Jim Trenton was working for some time as the "morning drive" host on GrooveRadio 103.1 FM.

"The Poorman", notorious for upsetting his employers with his speech on-air, has been through many Los Angeles-area radio jobs. In addition to his work at KROQ and GrooveRadio, he had his employment terminated by KIIS-FM (102.7), KYSR-FM (98.7), and KPWR-FM (105.9). At KYSR, Poorman was only employed for one night. Without station management's permission, he ran a contest that awarded a new car to the listener who destroys the most valuable object on the air. Many outrageous acts of destruction were subsequently perpetrated, including one caller who purposely drove his own car into a wall. The caller who totaled his car did not win the contest, and sued the station. KYSR management immediately terminated Trenton upon learning of this contest, but settlements and legal fees as a result of the unauthorized contest topped $100,000.

In 1999, Poorman found himself unable to find employment in southern California radio. Instead, he purchased airtime and hosted his own music program in 1999 called Anti-Radio, specializing in independent bands. It ran on various small stations with weak signals, and never established a large listenership. When requesting call-ins from listeners, Trenton would often get no calls at all, prompting him to go on long rants about how the show was a failure. The radio station had no screeners or 7-second delay for phone calls, so the show was also the victim of prank callers who purposely called solely to utter profanity on the air. The program's run ended when the station badly needed Trenton's air slot, and bought him out for $300,000. This large payment led to tax problems for Trenton after a 2010 IRS inquiry.

He returned again to radio in 2005 with a Loveline clone known as Love Calls, which aired on sports station KMPC 1540. Like Anti-Radio, Trenton also owned this show, but KMPC required him to utilize one of their employees to screen calls and monitor for inappropriate content. Within a short time, KMPC decided it was unhappy with the raunchy nature of Love Calls, and abruptly yanked it from the air. Trenton threatened to sue the station for lost revenues, stating that their agreement stated that the KMPC-employed board operator was responsible for monitoring and dumping inappropriate content. Therefore, Trenton argued, he was not to blame for anything foul that reached the airwaves. The station realized they were indeed vulnerable to such a lawsuit, and reluctantly let the show continue. After running for about five months, Trenton discovered that the show could not bring in enough money to support KMPC's studio and airtime fees, and he would have to close it down. He reached a mutually beneficial agreement with KMPC, where they bought out the remainder of the show's contract, and the show terminated.

From the end of Love Calls in 2005 until late 2010, Trenton was unable to find a paid position in radio, and was unwilling to continue paying for airtime himself.

He finally appeared again on the radio in November 2010, on San Bernardino, California station KCAA 1050 AM. His new program was initially called Poorman's Radio Invasion, airing for an hour on weekday afternoons. One notable feature of the show was a medical marijuana giveaway—the first of its kind on terrestrial radio. However, the format failed to attract many listeners, causing Trenton to spend much of the time complaining about the show's apparent failure. The medical marijuana giveaway was dropped after the show's primary sponsor, a medical marijuana dispensary, canceled their advertising contract. He changed the format several times, including abandoning the show's name and theme music. One of the attempted changes was a revival of his original Loveline format. However, his problems of receiving few telephone calls persisted, and Trenton abandoned that format, as well. The program was removed from the lineup in late September 2011, while Trenton prepared for a new syndicated radio program based out of New York City.

On October 10, 2011, Trenton began his syndicated show, called Poorman's Nation. Despite originally being promoted as a live call-in show, Poorman's Nation instead consisted solely of taped interviews from Occupy Wall Street. The program was syndicated by the Genesis Communications Network, but had just one affiliate – KCAA, which carried his original Radio Invasion program earlier in the year. Trenton conducted his on-the-street interviews while wearing only a Depression-era-style barrel, which earned him some degree of media attention, including an appearance on The Young Turks. However, the show failed to pick up any additional affiliates or local sponsors, and was canceled by the syndicator on November 7, 2011.

On June 4, 2012, Trenton returned to KCAA, occupying the weekday 12-1pm slot. His program replaced syndicated host Kevin Trudeau. Similar to his previous show on KCAA, Trenton is not paid for his broadcast, but instead sells his own advertising spots and splits the revenue with the station. The name of his show started as "Haters Radio", aimed at discussing the things Trenton and his audience hated, but failed to get much of a response. Trenton abandoned the format and tried several others, including a showcase of 1980s punk music. Trenton left KCAA on October 12, 2012, shortly after losing all of the show's sponsors due to lack of audience response, as well as several on-air spats with the new KCAA board operator.