Everyone knows the story of Buddy Holly.
Most remember the legend of Ritchie Valens.
But on a freezing night in 1959, there was a third voice on that doomed flight…
a DJ… a jokester… a Texas-sized talent whose laugh once echoed across America.

This is his story.

Told as a ghostly broadcast from the great beyond, The Final Broadcast is equal parts biography, radio drama, and afterlife confessional.
It’s the forgotten chapter of “The Day the Music Died”—a story overshadowed by giants but carried now by the man himself, with humor, heart, and a heaping dose of Texas soul.

A tribute.
A reckoning.
A signal cutting through time.

Tune in…and if you listen close, between the static and the stars…
you might just hear him say it one more time: “Helloooooo, baby.”

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

He was a genius with a guitar in his hands—raw, fearless, untamed.

His band changed the sound of American rock, blending beauty and power in a way no one had ever heard.

He should have had a lifetime of music ahead of him. But one night, in a haze of laughter and whiskey, brilliance met tragedy. And the silence that followed still echoes decades later.
This is the story of the man some called “better than Hendrix.”

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

It began as a whisper: Paul is dead.

But the deeper investigators dug, the clearer it became… they’d been listening to the wrong word.
This is the lost BBC report that uncovers the real story — Paul is Fred.

A haunting, hilarious mockumentary full of suspicious accents, unhelpful witnesses, and an unstoppable married couple who somehow saw everything.

The mystery that fooled a generation… and a parody that’ll fool you twice.

(A 100% spoof episode of Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast — listener discretion and a sense of humor advised.)

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

He was a voice that could move mountains — raw, sacred, and unstoppable.
A preacher’s son with a sound that carried the weight of every hymn and heartbreak in America.
Just as the world began to listen, fate silenced him in a storm over the Midwest.
But one unfinished song would rise from the wreckage to define him forever.

This is the story of a man who gave everything to his music…and left behind a melody the world still hums without knowing why. Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast presents: The King of Soul.

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“Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast — The King of Soul — was written and narrated by Jonny Hartwell.
While inspired by real events, certain dialogue and scenes have been dramatized for storytelling purposes.

Special thanks to Stax Records, Concord Music Group, and the Otis Redding Foundation for preserving the legacy of one of music’s greatest voices. Historical sources include interviews with Steve Cropper, Ben Cauley, and archival reporting from Billboard, Rolling Stone, and local Macon newspapers. This episode is dedicated to the fans who keep the whistle alive — every time they sing along.”

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

He was the lightning that gave KISS its spark — a Bronx kid who turned distortion into escape and space into sound. In this haunting Jonny’s Dead Air tribute, we trace the life, rise, fall, and final flight of Ace Frehley — The Spaceman. From the cracked sidewalks of New York to the blinding lights of the world’s biggest stages, his journey is one of chaos, creativity, and cosmic destiny. When the amps finally went quiet, his music didn’t die — it just drifted into the stars.

A poetic requiem for a man who taught rock ’n’ roll to dream beyond Earth.

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

Part II of Jonny’s Dead Air picks up on the Master of Puppets tour, where momentum feels like destiny—and the schedule feels like a sentence. Inside the machine: Cliff Burton—red hair like a warning flare—holding the center while James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, and Kirk Hammett drive Metallica across Europe on diesel, adrenaline, and denial. Load-ins, soundchecks, the soft sermons—earn the heavy, make the pretty cost—and the quiet foreshadow that rides in every night bus.

Then Sweden. Fog like a possession. A deck of cards. A window bunk. What follows is the moment that scarred a generation of fans and musicians—the crash that took Cliff at 24, and the aftershocks that still ring. Through eyewitness texture and reverence for the music—“For Whom the Bell Tolls,” “Fade to Black,” and the immortal “Orion”—this episode walks the road from triumph to tragedy, and into the chapel of what remains.

It’s not gore. It’s gravity.
It’s not myth. It’s memory.
And in the hush after the noise, you’ll hear him—still—carved into forever.

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

Before the fame. Before the chaos. Before the name became legend. This is the story of a young musician whose genius outgrew the world around him — a rebel philosopher with a bass in his hands and lightning in his veins.

 From smoky bars and dirt roads to roaring crowds and endless highways, his journey was fueled by raw talent, deep conviction, and a sound that seemed to tear through the earth itself.

But behind every note was a warning — whispered by fate, drowned by volume.

Part One of “The Last Ride” pulls you into the birth of a movement… and the rise of a prodigy who refused to follow anyone’s rules but his own.


Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.


Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

Jonny’s Dead Air Mini takes the dark, atmospheric storytelling of Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast and condenses it into powerful, bite-sized stories—shorter episodes that explore the moments where fame fractures, where success spins out, and where legends meet their breaking point.

In this Mini installment, a world-renowned soul icon—once the very heartbeat of a generation—finds himself at the center of chaos. A shotgun. A high-speed chase. A fall from grace that played out in real time across state lines and television screens.

He built his empire on rhythm, power, and pride.

But one fateful morning, that rhythm crashed headfirst into the law. It’s the night the music stopped—and the sirens took over.

Jonny’s Dead Air Mini: The Godfather on the Run.

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.

Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

At a lonely crossroads in the Mississippi Delta, a desperate guitarist made a midnight bargain that would change music forever. His fingers learned secrets no mortal should know, his songs carried shadows that couldn’t be silenced, and his fame burned as fast as it rose. But every bargain comes with a price. Betrayal, poison, and whispers of the Devil himself followed his every step. Nearly a century later, his story is legend — a chilling reminder that dreams can come true… if you’re willing to pay the cost.

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production

DISCLAIMER: This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.



Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.

This podcast contains discussions of sensitive topics...Listener discretion is strongly advised. While the stories you’ll hear are rooted in real events, not every detail is strictly historical—some moments are dramatized with creative license to bring the narrative to life. Please keep this in mind as you listen.
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He was a quiet prodigy—soft-spoken offstage, but a storm when his hands touched a guitar. From smoky clubs on the Sunset Strip to packed arenas around the world, his sound reshaped heavy metal and lifted a fallen icon back into the spotlight. In just a few short years, he left a mark that still burns today. But one reckless morning, a flight meant for thrills ended in fire and silence. His life was over at 25—but his ghost never left. This is the haunting story of a genius gone too soon.

Written by Jonny Hartwell
Voiced by Jonny Hartwell
Music Credit: Reel World Audio.
A iHeart Radio Production


Jonny’s Dead Air Podcast
Written, hosted, and produced by Jonny Hartwell.
A production of iHeartRadio Pittsburgh.

Thanks for listening—and for keeping the light on.