107.7 The End’s Gregr is Building Community Through Shared Interests

Gregr is the Morning Show Host on 107.7 The End in Seattle. Fifteen years ago, he moved to the city to host Afternoon Drive and then worked his way to AM Drive. The Albuquerque, NM native got his big break in the business on air first, at KPEK on Thanksgiving morning, “Meredith Brooks and the ‘B’ Song on 100.7 The Peak…” he tells us.

Soon after, Skip Eisley hired him to do Saturday nights and fill in on KTEG, then 107.9 The Edge. He was Sixteen. In college, he applied at KFMA in Tucson, which was home for him for the next eight years, eventually adding MD/APD and Afternoon Drive stripes. He spent a short four months at X1075 KXTE in Las Vegas, but after the 2009 financial collapse, it ended, but it opened the door to KNDD.

“When I first moved to Seattle, I noticed how cute our audience was – just sweet fun kids and adults who loved music (and weed) and going to shows and supporting art,” he explains. “So many smiles and good vibes all the time. This was right at the time the nationwide purge of nü-metal happened – don’t get me wrong, I loved playing System of a Down, but sonically everything changed, and Seattle ate that up.

“Pre-tech-transformation, Seattle felt impossibly far away and thus has its own vibe. Seattle is well-read and educated, and it is curious about life and culture. It’s the best. I love it. Also, so many of the listeners have grown up with me and that feels special that I get to be part of that journey.”

Gregr created “Nerd Talk” on-air for Audacy, including a podcast, “Nerd Talk+”, he also hosts which targets people who are considered “Nerdy.”

It came about, according to Gregr, because “The method of Seattle leadership was to help with character development – our morning host was ‘everything Seattle,”‘

“Andy Harms was our music guy, and as the meme-internet exploded, I ate it up,” he says. “Combined with a huge presence of nerds at Microsoft, Boeing, etc., I could make silly jokes about nerdy stuff and get a good response – so my niche was internet culture summed up as ‘Nerd Talk.’”

“When I started mornings, I made it an hourly feature making fun of billionaires and playing Terminator sound effects while talking about dinosaurs and the newest overpriced Apple product. Seattle is so STEM-y that I got a lot of support from the people my age who were having kids and as we say today, I helped to grow the next generation of nerds.”

As far as his on-air show, Gregr uses a Google doc run sheet he created as a template. “I read every news website for headlines and find some common themes or stand out weird stuff. From there I have a half dozen websites from iflscience.com to Futurology on Reddit that I comb for ‘Nerd Talk’ content. Then it’s the doom scrolling to understand what we’re doing online. I go through this process every night after dinner and then again in the lead up to my show in the morning.”

When it comes to Ratings strategy and PPM, I wondered how much of Gregr’s prep was based on that. “Strategy a ton,” he insists. “Ratings hardly at all. The nice thing about the strategies that we’ve used since its inception is that they’re just good advice regardless: talk about one subject, prep ahead to cut down on excess language, focus on the emotion and not the details, AND tease tease tease!”

“I love writing and producing content. In the beginning, my mentor, Dave Richards, got out the company credit card and paid for a couple of improv classes for me, and I learned to get out of my own way and let my weird brain do its thing. As I got better at capturing my own voice, I’ve become so fond of making absurd content (Only juuuust steps toes in a little bit, but nothing that anyone usually wants to yell at me about). In my personal life I love photography (holler if you want portraits) and after nine years I just got my 1st degree black belt in Kenpo!”

As for Gregr’s thoughts on the use of AI in the industry, “Look, I mean no one any disrespect (here comes the disrespect) if you think you can replace your own creativity or someone else’s with AI, you don’t engage with humans enough,” he says.

“Everyone is struggling, and AI is accelerating the demise of industries, sure, but also, when no one has jobs, what are we supposed to do? That being said, my group chat is 100% when someone puts some absurd cue into IG's AI to generate an image for a giggle. Just don’t be fooled. Regardless of AI’s quality imitating humans,  someone chasing a spreadsheet balance will see this as a justifiable gamble at the expense of human purpose. Humans are the economy; if you hand it to AI, what will happen to us?”

For the younger generation, Gregr has some advice. “The lesson I’ve learned about radio is that I get to be by myself and let my creative brain wander in amazing places and create a bit of fun for a group of people who choose to participate. If building community through shared interests – common ground – is your jam, then radio is an amazing space for that. If you want to be famous and get attention for it, you’re probably looking at TikTok (which I love as a consumer).”

As for what’s ahead for Gregr, “The Rubik’s Cube World Championships are in Seattle this summer and I’m a former competitor who went to the championships a decade ago, so finding a way to own that is going to be a blast!”

Follow Gregr @heygregr on IG, TikTok or linktr.ee/heygregr