Podcast Visionary "A-King" Surveyed and Drew Up the Landscape for Black Podcasting Land Before It Was A Thing.
Podcast architect A-King laid the blueprint for Hip Hop Podcasting almost fourteen years ago. Now's he speaking on how it started and where it has to go.
Some people never miss a chance to tell others about their role in an invention, finding new ways to toute their accomplishments and present themselves as self-made. Others tend to shy away from self-inflation, opting to remain on the front lines where others can see their work themselves.
Aaron “A-King” Howard is an example of the latter. Most known for his work as the co-founder of the Combat Jack Show, he’s helped cultivate the soil of black podcasting, doing everything from aiding in the creation of the Loud Speakers Network to elevating the voice of creatives and artists in that same space. Planted firmly in the culture, he’s comfortable and content with sharing some of his hard-earned insight with those who know and don’t know of his significance.
Is Brooklyn in the House?
Born and raised in East New York, King saw and felt the hunger that kids from the inner city experience especially growing up in the projects. The youngest of his brothers and sister, he circumvented the traps that caught his peers through community concern and high expectations from his parents who invested in his schooling.
“I grew up in the projects and even with the sense of community, it was rough. But I noticed in my teenage years that the OGs wouldn’t let me get into trouble. The people in the community knew my brothers and felt that they had to shield me from it. On top of that, I was a project kid in a private school. My parents did what they could to create a different narrative for me.”
Despite the violence around him, King looks at the culture of New York and Brooklyn in particular as a special experience that sets it apart from other areas, including the culture of hip-hop.
Fostered in an era of rap where disc jockeys like Funkmaster Flex, Kay Slay, Angie Martinez and more ruled, the radio inspired everyone including him to want to be someone people knew. However, at the time, the only viable way to make his parents proud and himself successful was to go to college and get a job.
A Dollar and a Dream
A-King attended Long Island University and studied Business Management, but he found his life passion when a friend of his invited him to view an episode of his show on college radio.
“I had no intention of doing anything media-wise I was a business major. The standard was you had to go to college and get out of the house. Then figure it out. It wasn’t until the second semester of my first year that media occurred. That was the portal and everything changed.”
After seeing the inner workings of radio firsthand, he was sold on the idea of what it could offer for him. The two of them began making a name for themselves on campus, interviewing local artists on the station and bringing their brand of hosting to the dynamics of the show.
Inspired, but not solidified just yet, he began applying to work for local radio stations in the NYC area after college, but found that passion and talent had to merge with softer skills such as networking and relationship building.
I’m a Hustler
Unwilling to give up on his dream, A-King began looking for jobs in the NYC area, eventually finding his way to PNC Radio, a digital media station started by entrepreneur Alex Norman, who was focusing on internet radio and music distribution.
I found an opening for a host for a radio show in Brooklyn on Craig's List. They hit me back and so I came down. I got there expecting the worst, but it was legit. Alex ran the radio portion and put me up on game. He agreed to allow me to do a pre-recorded program three times a week. This was a way for me to sharpen the tool.”
At the time radio and the internet served as the conduit for musicians, guided by blog-era journalists. Seeing an opportunity, A-King dived headfirst, seeking out talent that could help enlarge the PNC brand. Although it was unpaid, he stayed faithful, working odd jobs while working for a distribution deal.
Not long after coming on board, he became program director for PNC Radio and began looking for people who could contribute segments to the network. One of the major personalities he stumbled across on social media came from two blog-era journalists, Rafi Kam, and Dallas Penn.
Their YouTube channel, aptly titled, InternetsCelebrities, provided a proper mix of humor and honesty for their viewers, and in A-King’s case, convinced him of their value to their growing brand.
“I would go on YouTube and see this platform InternetsCelebrities on the homepage. Dallas Penn and Rafi Kam were funny as shit and both bloggers, but I didn’t think that. I thought this could be the thing.”
A-King began campaigning to get Dallas to work alongside them, originally seeking an interview with him before coming up with his master plan. The plan originally involved a show around Dallas, but everything changed after they met his journalist friend, Reggie Osse’.
Combat Jack
A seasoned entertainment lawyer turned journalist, Reggie Osse’ began blogging under the pseudonym Combat Jack after spending years on the corporate side of hip-hop. A-King, a newbie to the blog era, wasn’t well versed on Jack at first.
After meeting Reggie through Dallas, the two became close, exchanging information, and in the case of Reggie, exchanging his work which he published on his blog site, Daily Mathematics. Time elapsed and with help King soon put the pieces together, deciding to work hand in hand with each other.
“We brainstormed on how we could work together and after he discussed it with family, he hit me and said let’s do this shit. I said how when there is no money? Initially, the show was envisioned with Dallas. It was the Combat Jack featuring Dallas. I didn’t want to be a part of it at first, but after starting with them, that was it. The rest is history.”
The show’s first experiment grew from an initial attempt alongside noted blogger, Ahsmi “Eskay” Rawlins, whose site, NahRight sat at the helm of internet notoriety. King described the scene, stating, “In that interim phase of figuring things out, we were excited to get with Eskay and do an episode of NahRight Radio.”
The chemistry and magic that stemmed from that moment allowed the show to be and blossom into the finished gem we know now as the Combat Jack Show.
Originally conducted in live time, the show began in 2010. Recorded at PNC Radio originally, the show’s location and acclaim grew as more and more fans from all walks of life tuned in, including Brooklyn journalist, Chris Morrow, and another cultural contributor, sneaker aficionado Premium Pete who joined as another host.
A longtime fan of the show, Morrow’s partnership with the show helped them secure a location and later led to the collective choice to start a podcasting network affectionately known as The Loud Speakers Network in January 2013.
“During that transition from live format, that’s when we knew it was serious. We told people to do podcasts and told them we would produce it. We got input from the fans, but we settled on the Loud Speakers network. That set off the blueprint on the urban side for the podcast space.”
One Mic
King’s efforts with Loud Speakers eventually helped lead to the creation of a whole ecosystem of urban podcasts and podcast networks that we see today.
For King, who saw the beginning of the black podcasting market, the world we see now owes a huge debt to his comrades' experimentation and innovation, especially Reggie Osse.
Referring to the Loud Speakers Network as the “Def Jam of podcasting”, he’s unflinching in his stance that he and his peers created the blueprint for what we see today.
“We have an issue in our culture with giving people their flowers sometime. But you can’t mention this podcast space without us. We weren’t the first to do it, but we set the tone. Looking at the space today, something had to happen to allow a subculture to become the culture. Imagine what journalism and black voices would be without podcasting as we transitioned out of the blog era. This is the new space.”
Grateful and inspired, King is aware of his responsibility to keep the podcasting space moving forward, especially after the untimely death of Combat Jack in 2017 to cancer. Tightlipped on what his next invention will entail, he is confident that it will honor all of the aspects of storytelling we see around us from the visual to the audio.
“I am just getting started. There are a lot of things I plan to get off in the podcast space by using things used in other spaces. You have to be a student of this. We are going through a cultural reset and that’s where we as creatives have an opportunity to reset this.“