Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Poduty Live Podcast Theater. I'm Jeff, your host. I've got
a special in theater guest today. I've got DJ Sky.
While I'm wandering through the theater trying to find my seat, I don't know where
to go. We've got six stories about live news
podcasting recorded live coming at you after.
What time is it?
What time is.
The only live news podcast about
podcasting from the st.
How do we end the news?
How do we in the news?
The only live news podcast about
podcasting from the stage.
Just requested. DJ sky wants the full version of the
podcast theme song to play at his next gig because you made a big
announcement. It had almost went locally viral.
I think everybody in this town saw your announcement. And welcome to the
show again, DJ sky. Two timing on the show here.
Glad to have you back. And tell us a little bit about what you. What
did you announce last week? Hey, thank you for having me. I actually announced
it's a four bar tour three city between
Tarentum, Lower Burrell and Freeport. I'm going to be at the
Praha Hotel, Barley
Lock Five Tavern and Barrel and Bloom. And all of those
dates are on the screen, so I set them out of order. But as long
as you show up on those right days, you're going to have a good
time. At least I hope you're going to have a good time. I know I
will. And one thing that shocked me, the ticket price.
It's free and you can win some stuff.
So right now, all of these places are putting up a
gift card for you to come back. Marmac is
actually sponsoring Uber rides, so I'm going to raffle off an
Uber ride each night. It's a $50 gift card, so
if you're traveling locally, that's a whole bunch of rides.
Yeah. Yeah. What, what better way to play it safe? You're going to go out,
have a good time. Why not take it safe? Take the Safeway home, Get in,
call a cab. Yeah, get an Uber. Or if you're going down to the draft,
that is from here to Harmarville, because it's going to be
ridiculous to do anything during the draft. Tell us a
little bit about how can people find out more if they want to connect with
you personally, learn about all your gigs. I mean, you're doing trivia.
You're torn to rent them week on a weekly basis. So you're always around here
working. Where can people find you on the regular right now? Facebook,
just Skylor Hayden. It's Skylor with an O and same with my
Instagram. I just try to keep everything simple so that way you can find
me. Because if you like me, you'll remember me.
If you don't like me, you'll definitely remember me.
Well, a funny story about people liking you is,
you know, you did a local high school prom about two years
ago, a school that my daughter goes to, and the next year they hired a
different dj, and she said, man, I really miss
DJ Sky. So if you're out there, you're thinking about events, you want
to get somebody that the kids like. DJ sky was well
missed at my daughter's high school. I miss being there. There was a
weird scheduling thing. I don't know what I did, but I was
probably on vacation or something. Yeah, it's hard to believe because
every time I turn on Facebook, there's a new thing that you're doing. You're always
working, you're always out there and doing two or three trivia nights a
week sometimes. Tell us a little bit about how do you structure trivia? How do
you play the games when you're in pub? So I just like to keep
it interesting. It's not rocket science. We're just supposed to be out and
having a good time. So I don't like themes
because if I do a theme and you're not interested, you're not coming out.
So I try to just keep it random, keep people on their toes,
and I mix it between trivia and name that tune.
So that's a little hard because I have some young kids, but I
gotta bridge the gap and make sure that they can have a good time
to sound. Yeah, but that's what we
have going on. It's pretty cool. I'm having fun.
And for those of you watching at home, you're not gonna believe that there's 90
years of experience up on this stage. I'm turning 50 this year, and
believe it or not, DJ sky is 40 and I
41. 91 years of experience up on this
stage, which is crazy. They are putting something in the drinking water in tarentum.
But every time I hear you're 40, it just blows my mind. It's definitely
not fluoride because they just took that out of brackenry. I miss it.
So do my teeth. Watch it. Watch our healthy. We'll be walking with
walkers by the end of the year. I hope not.
All right, well, are you ready to get into our
stories? We've got story number one coming
your way. This one was a music podcast, so a lot of the times with
my guests, I try to pair the stories with their expertise, with their
knowledge, with what they do on a daily basis. And
this is the classroom to career podcasting, the music
industry playbook. And this was a really interesting concept done at a university
for kids who are studying event production, music
production, the music industry. And this is Emily White, recorded season
five of her podcast live at Northeastern University.
Turning into an interactive in person learning experience.
With a small audience, industry guests and student involvement in
production, the show blends education, networking and
live podcasting into real world training ground for building
a sustainable music career. And this was a smaller event,
15 people, but the industry experts, the knowledge
that you got, being in the smaller, intimate environment, you
don't get that in the classroom. You're not getting that real world experience. You're getting
textbook experience and the knowledge of the professor. But here's
somebody who lived through it, who built an empire, not an empire, but built
something in the music industry. And sharing those with students in real time,
they're able to ask questions and, and really dive in deeper.
And all of these people who show up to these events, they're not getting lost
in the shuffle and their voices are heard. Because since it
is one on one, there's time. And whenever you got
to see more than 15, it gets hard. And
you might not either think your question is valid or somebody else
is going to ask it, but the answer that they get won't be the
answer that you need. Yeah, I mean, I couldn't imagine, you know, I took a
lot of marketing classes, but having somebody like Mark Cuban or Bill
Gates, even a local business
entrepreneur to sit in a room with, you tell their story
and then you can ask them questions. I never got an experience like that in
college. And through podcasting, I think these types of things are now possible.
So I have been to a couple DJ conventions.
One was really huge. Djx. It was amazing because you still got
the top tier speakers of the hour, the top tier people in
your business, but from me to them, I'm
80 people away. But then when I went to the Pittsburgh DJ summit,
it was cooler. It was a little bit smaller scale from me to them.
I'm like 35 people away. And it was just cool because
they took time out and was able to give you the time that you
wanted more than just you needed. So it makes a big
difference whenever you can actually get up close and personal. Yeah. That
intimate experience, one on one knowledge. If you're one of 15
questions that are going to be asked and there's only 15 people in the audience,
you have a good chance of getting that itch scratched of like, what's
that thing burning in the back of your head? Like, how do I do this?
How did you do that? I see that you've accomplished these types of things.
How can I pull some of that knowledge and build off for my own
career? And then even if they do ask a question that you have,
you still have a few other questions in the chamber. So that way, whenever they
do get to you, you still have your opportunity to speak
and get some knowledge. Yeah. And sometimes there's. Even afterwards, after the show
cuts, they got what they needed for the recording. You can hang out,
you can thank them for coming out. You make those connections that you
just, you can't get through an email or just through sending in
a fan mail of, hey, listen to your podcast was really great. Now they know
you and they're able to connect with you on a personal level. Yeah,
well, keep it going. Story number two
is from podcast to festivals turning content
into a cultural event. This is the 2026 Black Effect
podcast Festival in Atlanta is more than live shows.
It's a full scale experience combining live podcast tapings,
panel discussions, networking, a marketplace and an audience
participation. This is podcasting as an event
ecosystem where content, community
and commerce all come together. And this is kind of the opposite of
our previous story. This is big scale. This is
podcasts up on the stage, entertaining a crowd
and built around this network. This idea of podcast
as performance is something I really from talking to me for the
last couple years, I'm very passionate about performing
podcasts live for audience. And this is scaling it way beyond
what I'm doing. It's not that it's scaling it way beyond what you're
doing. People don't know that they can come down to the theater,
they can come sit down, watch, hang out,
interact. So that's another thing. When people realize that
they only got to come 5, 10 minutes, see something that they're listening
to or something that they're interested in, and it's in their backyard.
And this when I was listening to the story and reading it,
I had a few other different ideas that I think could work for
you. Maybe going down to the Trenum Amphitheater and
doing an outside live podcast, kind of sort of like this
where you could interview people on the street or
just do a show. And I think that'd be really cool. Right along the river.
I'll have to show you. One of the original concepts for this space
was I called it theater anywhere. And I built something that fit in
the back seat of my sedan, so I had to travel with it. And you're
familiar. DJ loading in and out equipment. And it was two
speakers, it was a mixer, some microphones, and a podium
all slid in perfectly into the backseat of my car. And my
original concept was to go, like, set up along a river walkway
or the clamshell theaters and parks and just start
ambush. Like podcasting. Like, kind of like Billy in the Streets. But it was Jeff
in the Streets doing this podcast. Anywhere I wanted to be, anywhere
I went, that's where the podcast would be. And I love that idea. So maybe
this summer I'll ambush the. What's it, Miss Doctor, Mr.
Wolf Amphitheater. James. James P. Wolf Amphitheater.
I thought it was Carl Magnetta. Is it Magnetta? Yeah, I thought it
was the Carl Magnetta. Yeah, Maybe Wolf was the skateboard
guys. We can ambush there, too, because they still have
the rinks up. Well, I remember one of them didn't like
skateboarding, and it was ironic that they named the skate park after them.
Oh, yeah, that's before my time. That's an early
2002 Tarentum story. But again,
bringing people together, people who like podcasts, people who like, in some cases,
music, they like entertainment. They're going to come together and
people are realizing that you can get a great level of
entertainment for 10, $20 a ticket.
Instead of going to, like an arena, a theater, you're paying
$80 for balcony seats, you're paying $300 to be on
the floor with a live podcast, you're going to meet people
who are like you. They like the same things that you're interested in. Usually the
topic of the podcast is what people are conjugating around. They're.
They're meeting together, they're thinking about the same things, they're passionate about the same
topics, and you're meeting people for $10. $20. You could have the
worst night of your life. And it doesn't break the bank to hang out with
podcasters. Or even if it's outside, you can still walk
by and still be entertained because you just never know what you're
going to hear at that moment. As long as you put yourself out there,
you can get something. They are doing one cool thing. It's called Pitcher
Podcast, where they're having a stage where you can go up. If you have an
idea, you can pitch it, kind of like a shark tank
or America's Got Talent. You pitch your idea,
your concept, and judges give you feedback and how to put it together.
So if you're kind of on the fringe, like, I like these topics. I love
what these people are putting together. How can I build my own
podcast? Well, here's an idea. You take the stage in front of them
and you get to pitch your idea and see if it has some value. Now,
that would be cool if they turned that into a reality show and like a
legit contest where people could vote on it and the
winner gets their own podcast. Win a podcast at the
Poduty Podcast Theater. I mean, we can get some local
sponsors, at least give them a speaker or two. Yeah,
let's do it. We'll keep going to our next story.
Another story about live podcasting, and this one is
one. Here's a ticket price that it's after. My own heart. This is where I
think the value is for small, independent podcasters.
$13.50. I'm all in turning a local
podcast into a live platform. The Connect the Dots podcast
in St. Louis hosted its first live event after years of
building its brand, offering tickets for just
$13.50 to bring the community together.
The show combined live podcast tapings, performances, and
networking and transforming a digital platform into a physical stage
for local artists and setting the foundation for
future events. And a lot of times we talk about taking your show live
and you don't have to do it as soon as you start your podcast. They're
building up a podcast over six years. By now. They're ready,
they're confident on the microphone. They want to perform in front of people. Six
years later, they're building live shows now and monetizing that for
$13.50 a ticket. And especially if
you do multiple shows where if you can get a
group discount or pay for several shows at
once, I mean, that's just hand over fist right there.
And that's the cool thing they're doing in St. Louis, but we're also doing it
here in Trenum. I say we're. Because I'm on the show. I have
no. The stage is always yours here. Oh,
yeah, you say that now. And that's the thing. The more
you know, the more you can do. And
people just need to know that you can come here and just hang out
and be interactive. Most
podcasts cost between 20 and $100 a month to
run. If they sold 10 tickets at $13,
I guarantee you they covered their expenses for a month. So just think about live
events. How do I. How can I bring in some revenue to make
this hobby, at least pay the bills? I can at least cover my expenses.
I can have a good time doing it, and I'm not worried about
the size of my audience. Whereas most podcasters chase this idea
of if I build a big enough audience, I can read ads for
purple mattress or meundies or Sherry's Berries. They can do
all these things if they get the audience. But you don't have to have a
live audience. If you think getting 1000 downloads is difficult,
how difficult is it to get 10 people to show up right, so you can
cover your expenses without having large audiences? And
I'm looking Now, this is two live podcast tapings for
1350. So we're talking almost what,
$6.75 a pop per show. You get two shows for
1350 and for them that's two weeks of
content that covers half of their month, that those sales
probably covered their expenses for a month or two months. They're ahead of
the game now. They're in the green. They're not operating at a loss or as
a hobby anymore. They're making this a business. And that's the
nice thing about just being able to create that movement to where
you can be there in person and you can interact. And that
just changes the whole grand scheme of things. And
I think that's really cool. Let's
go to the first impressions. Winning or losing
at check in. I love this story we're talking about. DJ sky has an event
coming up at four different locations. And this whole
article here is about how do
we control that process. The check in is part of the experience.
So if you get to a venue and you're waiting to
get scanned in, if there's tickets, if you're waiting to get checked in because they
can't find your email, or in DJ Sky's case,
the process is free. There's no tickets, but you're gonna be
doing these events. You may wanna capture some of that information. So in your mind,
how do I get this information so that I'm not holding up the
experience, but I wanna be able to talk to these people, market
to them after the show and bring them back to future episodes. So that
whole check in process is something great to think about, especially for your upcoming events.
And the success of your event is not decided when the music starts,
it's decided when people walk through the door. Long lines,
confusion and slow check ins can ruin the energy before your show even
begins. The strategy here is simple. Plan the experience
from the first touch point. Registration, staffing and flow
all matter. Because if people walk around frustrated, it is a
lot harder to win. Win them back once the show starts.
And I think I almost said all those things verbatim before I read the
paragraph. But this is part of the experience. And
this is something. When you're hosting a live podcast, a live event,
you gotta think about, how do I get people through the door so their experience
can begin in the most positive way possible? Because I was
thinking about this after I read it, I'm like, wow. Because with
our access passes, whenever you get it stamped,
that puts you in the running for the raffle. And I'm like, how am I
gonna collect all the information? Raffle tickets are cool, but
it's kind of outdated. But this is the route that I have to take,
and then I can't lose them. So it's like little
things that make. I hate to say
my guests, but the people are coming out, make them feel valued,
and it goes a lot.
So this one is really. I'm going to pay attention to this one.
Yeah. We were talking before the show started today, and I think the
best way for you to do this is you'll have the raffle tickets. That's fine.
But part of the entry is they scan a QR code and
they sign up for your newsletter. Then you'll have the people who signed up
pick a number, 1 to 20. Or have somebody randomly pick a number,
and that person's the one who wins the raffle. So you can still do the
raffle, but now you're capturing that information easily and
flawlessly because they just scan it, they're entering, and you're good to go. So
that's something we could talk about. Happy to help set that up and
see what you can do with it. It'd be fun to see you walk away
with 100, 150 names at the end of the four days.
That's a pretty good starting point for marketing for future events.
Yes, that's a great base. And
that also would streamline that process because they're not waiting
for either me or the bartender to scan them. And if it's busy,
the bartender can't punch their card. So it's a great way
to do both. So we have to figure that out.
Yeah, let's do that. Let's figure that out. Keep the event moving. When
I said we, I didn't mean you. I'll be there.
That's true. I'm sure you'd have me.
Yeah. Anything you need to do.
I got you. I got you. That's my favorite saying. I got you.
Let me tell You a story. We were at the Olive Garden, and there's an
Olive Garden up at the Pittsburgh Mills. Here we had
this waitress. She was busy and doing
things and doing 100 things. But no matter what you asked,
she would reply with, I got you. And I love this. And my whole family,
to this day, we talk about this waitress like, roman, what you need?
I need an iced tea. I got you. How about you? I need some more
breadsticks. I got you. I can't get a refill on the salad. I got you.
She would say, I got you. No matter what we said. Like, the same way.
Like, oh, she got everything right. And she would. The same
way. Like, when you say thank you at Chick Fil A, they have to say,
my pleasure. This girl would say, I got you for whatever you
asked. To everybody who asked. She wouldn't wait till we were all done
individually. I got you. That's my favorite thing. So if you ever hear me saying,
I got you, it's some waitress in Olive Garden. Who's my favorite person in the
world? That I have no idea who she is. Well, I think we need to
go back and find her. Let's find her. Well, let's go. This
could be her. This is from stage to stage, from story to
stage. Turning personal conversations into live experiences.
Karen Thorne launched her new podcast, Finding Foundations, with a live
event centered around real unscripted conversations about
overcoming adversity. With tickets around 25 bucks,
the event combined storytelling, audience Q and A and post
show connection, turning a podcast into a shared
emotional experience. And this was our first live event, not just a
digital experience. There was these authentic unscripted
conversations and it included an audience Q and A and
social time afterwards. So when you're putting these types of events together,
you start to think about, okay, what's the experience look like? 1 we're looking
at? Check in. That's going to be an important part of it. People are going
to get seated. We're going to put on a great show. We're going to give
Q and A. So there's interactivity. But then like a
VIP experience, even if it's for everybody, there's a hangout
afterwards. You get to walk by, talk to the host,
take pictures with the host, proof that you were there. That's a big part of
this whole experience that we're trying to build. How do you connect with everybody? How
do you connect with the audience, the hosts, and build a system
that people leave raving about talking? I'm so glad I went to
that. It just Goes back to making them feel
valued because they're not only there for you,
they're also there for themselves to share experiences. And
if anybody can relate, that just helps. And the whole question
and answer part, that's really cool because some people have
a question and they just might need to know how to get through something or
take the right steps on what they need to do just to overcome an
adversity. And that's, that's really cool. I like that. I talk,
I talk a lot about people who put on shows here. And there's
like three stages. There's the, the pre show where most of the people
are, have this nervous energy that's, it's, it's a lot of fun to like,
like lift the mood and make them laugh. But they're pacing, they're going
through scripts, they're. They're going through their notes and they're overly
prepared or overly nervous and there's too much time between what they're doing. So you
get this nervous energy. Then during the show, all that gets released, they
come alive. They're doing the performance. It's amazing. They're having
a great experience. The audience is enjoying it. But the thing that has shocked me
the most about building this type of event space, this type of experience
is getting people out of the theater afterwards. They
have such a good time that they're taking pictures, they're
coming up on stage, getting photos, recording small videos, thank yous,
they're shaking hands, they're telling stories. And
it's always as long as the show was performed is how long
it takes to clear out. Which is something that I didn't expect. But
I also love at the same time that that type of connection on a
small stage like this is happening with just 40 people.
Imagine in larger events and if you're a bigger celebrity
and people get to come in and meet you and shake your hand and thank
you for the things you've done, that's a big part of the experience. And
you're building that and giving that as a gift to the attendees.
Especially if One of these 40 are fortunate to see somebody
who really, really takes off and makes it big, they're gonna remember
where they met him, where they first saw him, the
time that they had, and that's gonna last longer than a
lifetime because those stories will get passed on from generation.
And it's cool that it's taking place here. And
that's just, it's really nice. I remember in
2026, I saw DJ Sky. I was gonna
say I was Gonna go with the comedian Loaf. I was listening to the
comedian, and he told this one joke, and then we hung
out afterwards.
Let's go. Our final story of the day
is south by South. I love this one, because there was a big event that
happened at south by Southwest that happened parallel was called
podcast movement. It happened alongside. So a lot
of people didn't realize there were separate events. But in this case,
this is a substack article, and she's
talking about how podcasts were the center stage of south by Southwest, which I love.
If you needed proof that podcasting has gone mainstream, south by
Southwest made it clear podcasts were everywhere.
Live shows, brand activations, music performances, and major
platforms all leaning into audio. The strategy here is not
about where you post your content. It's about owning your voice and
bringing it to life on stage. Because the future of podcasting is not just
something people listen to, it's something they experience. And I
mean, if there's any proof about how big podcasting has become
as part of an entertainment structure, look at conferences,
events. Part of their big entertainment is now
live podcasts. Where it used to be bands and comedians and
magicians, now podcasts are right in that mix. They're
replacing panel sessions, they're doing a live podcast, they're replacing
comedy, they're replacing the headliner with a live
podcast. And it's becoming a number one
form of entertainment at conferences. Especially since it's
the entertainment base.
Watching something and being there and actually interacting with it
is a whole different experience than just listening to it.
It's so weird because whenever you're there
and they're doing the podcast and they're interviewing somebody that you know
and follow, and they're still right there, 40
people away. It's pretty amazing what they're able to do with
the live podcasting right now. You know, on the
last show, we were talking about, like, podcast conferences, and it's
so weird. You listen to these podcasters for years at home, during your
morning commute, in the background, when you're. You're doing the dishes
or whatever, and all of a sudden you're at a conference and you see them
up on stage, everybody has their badges on, and then you
leave and you're walking the hallways, and you see that podcaster that
you've listened to for 20 years, or you see them over there,
they're approachable. You can talk to them. So when you go to these
events that are centered around the topics that you care about, and you see
the industry leaders, they're almost Always very
approachable. You can thank them. You can tell them how much
you appreciate the content they're creating, how it's helped you in your career or
during your own podcast journey. And they're
right there. It's that surrealness of you're only 40
people away, but they're also approachable. They're not surrounded by
10 bodyguards like a Kardashian.
Yeah, the bodyguards. I'm so glad that they don't have
those when we go to these things because it's the
interaction that lasts a whole lot longer and
that just sets it apart from seeing them, listening to them,
but being able to take that picture. It just shows
that they appreciate you and value as a listener. Yeah. Now I guess as a
watcher, because everything is live now. Yeah, we
went full circle today. We went from putting on events, the check in
process, the experience. These are all things that anybody watching at
home can take for their own podcast, for their own live events, Even some
tips that you may see DJ sky put into place
for his four stop tour starting April 11th right
here in Tarentum. At Barley is the first stop. Praha is the first.
Praha is the last stop. Praha's the headliner. They got those
weed mushrooms. The weed mushrooms, the patio.
It goes lock five barley barrel in
bloom, then the Praha. Yeah. But
all these places are only 10, 15 minutes away. So
that's the cool thing about it. I'm in everybody's backyard.
Yeah. Love to see it. April 11th. Check out Skyler Hayden on Facebook. You'll
see the tour poster. You're going to get a little. What do
you get? You get little punches for each stop. There's the access pass.
You get little punches for each stop. That'll put you into the grand prize
raffle. So whenever we get the QR code, we'll
figure out how to do that. And then the second place is
I'm gonna put together probably a chip of some sort
from each location and then I'm gonna give away
hopefully a whole bunch of swag. So some T shirts, some gear.
So if you are a local business and you do want to sponsor, please reach
out. We'll take whatever you can give. I don't care if it's a shirt, a
koozie. People just like stuff. I'll give a
stage rental as a prize a night. You can come in, use the theater
for whatever you want. I'll give a two hour prize.
That's like $150 value. Does that count? That
count? All right, go see DJ sky, you can win a two hour rental at
the Poduty Podcast Theater at Downtown Tarentum. This has been Poduty
and the News for March 2026. I
don't remember the date. What time is it?
What time is it?
The only live news podcast about
podcasting from the st.
The only live news podcast about
podcasting from the ST.