Does the current absence of the “B” on youthful Rhythm & Blues radio mean that blues music doesn’t attract a younger constituency?
“On the contrary,” says Phil Anderson, who tells of good ratings among listeners ages 18 to 25 when his programming graced the airwaves of the old WMCS, now the AM signal for sports talk station WSSP The Fan. “I had two blues shows: Monday through Friday, ‘Blues After Dark,’ and on Saturdays, ‘The Saturday Blues Brunch,’” he recalls.
Anderson’s radio days ended, at least for now, when WMCS changed its black talk-and-music format to an adult contemporary hybrid in 2013. However, he still holds crowds of people 30 and older rapt with blues, new-fangled and electronically enhanced Southern soul and the occasional foray into old school R&B hits he spins every first Saturday of the month at Mr. J’s Lounge (4610 W. Fond du Lac Ave.).
“I still have the support of my radio audience that will come out and listen to the blues that they miss when I was in radio, he says. Blues aficionados who wake up hungry on weekends are advised to get to Mr. J’s earlier in the day to satisfy their stomachs as well as their craving for music. “I start the music at 10 a.m.” says Anderson—an accompaniment to Mr. J's Saturday brunch, "and will continue until 4 p.m.”
Anderson is the same smooth-voiced announcer who relished the grind of live radio six days a week. That lengthy weekly stint mirrors in miniature the longevity of his radio career overall, extending back nearly a half-century.
“I actually got started in radio in the year 1971 at WAWA,” he recalls. “Before I got to be a radio personality, I would be an engineer running the control board for a legend in his own time, the late, great Dr. Bop,” referencing the colorful air personality who made public appearances in surgical scrubs and other medical accoutrements. And just as Anderson was mentored, so he lent other Milwaukee radio jocks the wisdom stemming from his experience.
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Anderson is as laudatory of the founder of Mr. J’s, who passed in 2017. “Please let me give all the credit to Mr. Arlis Jones for continuing to have the blues at his establishment. Arlis Jones kept the blues breakfast brunch going for me to play blues every Saturday with some old-school jazz, I feel overall his contribution to entertainment has been sorely missed, and Arlis Jones has been missed as well."
As for the possibility of returning to radio alongside his monthly Mr. J’s residency, Anderson states, “Only if there were more than two urban radio stations in the city of Milwaukee. It would be fun to get back doing what I did on the radio.” Whether that ever occurs, he's still happy to serve up the music he enjoys where he can.
“I feel that people who really likes blues, they don't get tired of it. They just come out to hear more of it, and I'm glad to play what they like to hear.”
Phil Anderson celebrates the fourth anniversary of his Mr. J's residency on Saturday, Feb. 1.
