Leveraging star power

A country music powerhouse is helping Lee and Angie McVey make a splash at one of the three north central Idaho radio stations they just purchased.

Garth Brooks recorded an invitation for listeners of Canyon Country 106.9 KMOK FM to call in to win an all-expenses paid trip to a Brooks concert in July in Salt Lake City.

Lee McVey, a managing partner of McVey Entertainment Group, downplays the effort he put into convincing Brooks to participate in the promotion.

“I just asked,” he said. “On contests and things like that, I never want to be limited by market size. I like to dream big. Sometimes it happens. Sometimes it doesn’t.”

That approach has allowed Lee and his wife, Angie McVey, also a managing partner, to establish a growing foothold in the radio market in north central Idaho.

Including KMOK, McVey Entertainment Group now operates seven frequencies that focus on local content, such as their broadcasts of Lewis-Clark State College baseball games and men’s and women’s basketball games on TalkRadio KOZE AM 950 and FM 95.5.

“It’s more fun to listen to your friends and neighbors be on the radio, calling in with requests and telling stories,” Lee said. “To me that’s better than any syndicated type of programming. If it’s live and it’s local and people are having a good time, then you know you’re doing radio correctly.”

The McVeys bring almost 60 combined years of experience in radio to their ventures.

Lee’s interest in radio started when he had been sent to the office of Ron Karlberg, an assistant principal at Lewiston High School at the time.

His offense was disrupting a class with a joke, and Karlberg suggested that Lee take a radio class because it was a place where making people laugh was encouraged.

About five years after he finished high school, Lee landed a job at Z-Rock 96.5 FM as an overnight disc jockey.

Angie joined the station a few years later, when she was seeking a new challenge in her career.

“I just kind of fell into it,” she said. “I worked at the MoneySaver selling advertising. I ran into a sales person from KOZE (when they were both calling on a client). She said they were hiring and that I should apply for the job, and so I did.”

It didn’t take long for them to notice each other.

“(Lee) was so amazing,” Angie said. “I could tell way back then that he wasn’t just going through the motions. He always had great ideas and wanted to do crazy things to make it entertaining for the listeners, and that made it easier to sell and more fun to create promotions.”

Lee had a similar view of Angie.

“She had fun with writing commercials,” Lee said. “We’d go out and do live broadcasts, and she was really into the job.”

Both of them moved up the ranks at KOZE, absorbing everything they could from the owners, Mike and Sharon Ripley, gaining so much knowledge about the industry that acquiring the KOZE frequencies in 2016 didn’t feel like that big a step.

“We learned from the best,” Angie said. “We weren’t done yet and they were. It was a natural progression.”

Along the way, their business, Northwest Best Entertainment, which is separate from the radio stations, has brought George Thorogood, Blue Oyster Cult and “Weird Al” Yankovic to Lewiston.

But neither of the McVeys profited from two of the biggest names that played the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley in recent decades, even though Lee worked behind the scenes to bring them here.

Ted Nugent agreed to come to Lewiston at the last minute, when a venue canceled on him in 2005.

With less than 48 hours notice, Lee arranged for Nugent to appear on the outdoor stage of Jay Starnes’ Boomers’ Garden in Lewiston.

Lee was on the committee of Rockin’ on the River when he booked Joan Jett and the Blackhearts for the not-for-profit concert in 2010. She discounted her usual rate after Lee assured her the proceeds were going to charity.

“I love the feeling that people don’t have to go to a big city to see a huge show if I can bring that to their backyard,” Lee said.

More recently, Lee and Angie have turned their attention to Brewfest, organizing the event three times a year.

“We’ll give smaller, national acts a chance to play at that,” Lee said. “(There’s) just less risk. That’s not to say we won’t do a concert again someday. We’re just being patient.”

Moving forward, the McVeys plan to build momentum at all of their stations.

“I always tell people it’s still as much fun as it was when we started,” Angie said. “It’s a little bit more work than it used to be, but it’s just as rewarding, if not more.”

Williams may be contacted at ewilliam@lmtribune.com or (208) 848-2261.