Last week Stern was on Letterman.

I gave up watching Dave fifteen years ago, when he put on the suit and started catering to a theoretical demographic which I did not belong to.  Old people.  The irreverence was gone.  Paul Shaffer’s group went from being the World’s Most Dangerous Band to the CBS Orchestra.  Need I say more?

Now don’t e-mail me to say it’s a question of intellectual property, that they couldn’t use the name, couldn’t they come up with something better?

And the show’s always the same.  Nitwits coming on to sell.  Who are so pre-screened that it’s like watching a high school play as opposed to experiencing something fully alive.

For that you have to go to radio.  That was its selling point.  The immediacy.  Before Clear Channel programmed all the stations from a central location and they hired metrosexuals like Ryan Seacrest as opposed to potheads.  Now the only life emanating from the dashboard is Howard himself, on Sirius.

So I see a link to Howard’s Letterman appearance on the Huffington Post.  I’m not only a whiner, I’m a reader!  But I’ll go wherever the links are best, I’ve got no loyalty to the HuffPo, the same way I switched from Perez Hilton to TMZ.

But the clip was only two minutes long.  I enjoyed seeing Howard needle Paul, like that he chided Rob Burnett for directing a movie while he’s still producing the show, but I needed to see the entire thing.

So I took to YouTube.

And that’s where I found a clip of Howard on Letterman from the eighties.  And I won’t say he was bad, but he wasn’t great.

He looked like a clown.  With a big bushy moustache, this was before he had the end of his nose snipped off.  And he was playing to the audience, but he wasn’t quite sure it was with him.  He was still the high school outcast as opposed to the ringleader.  Trying to worm his way in as opposed to wearing the crown.

And the other night I heard a tape from Howard’s early days on Sirius.  And he wasn’t fantastic then either.

Howard Stern is now so good that everyone listening to him testifies, the same way you spread the word about a great new act, not because you’re getting a check, but because the music makes you feel so good you can’t help but share it!

All those schemes to incentivize people to become mini-moguls…  You know, sell my music for me and I’ll give you a cut? Those are wrongheaded.  Because people sell great without being compensated, and people can smell a rat from miles away.

So all those years I was ignoring Howard Stern?

I was right.

He just wasn’t good enough.  Not good enough so he could close anybody, like Prince.

But now he is.

Thirty odd years later.

Think about this.  We want our musical stars to be instant.  Isn’t that what "American Idol" is all about?  And if you don’t know this is the situation at the labels, you don’t know shit.  They want it fast and furious.  And they don’t care if it’s disposable. Because they’re not gonna stick around for ten years to find out.

All those MTV-era stars?  Hits overnight, forgotten today.  Whereas the classic rock acts are not only touring, they’re filling thousands of seats.  Because to make it back then not only did you have to practice and be good, but you had to grind it out and get better, waiting for the moment when excellence meets opportunity.

Howard Stern does his radio show four days a week, for four plus hours each morning.  Most of it evaporates.  Like that show you did in Cleveland.  You’re doing it for the audience that’s at the gig, not the scout who didn’t attend, not for those who might discover you two years down the road.  Can you play to your core audience, constantly honing your skill, getting better all the while?  To the point where new fans can be closed?

No one’s great out of the box.  As for those instant hits?  Check the credits.  See who wrote and produced them, the star is just a face.

It takes time to get good.

But in this business, no one cares about you down the line.  Hit driven, its main feature is obsolescence.

Hits are fine, but they’re overrated.  It’s about the main act.  Doing it every day.  Getting better and better.

Today Howard interviewed Mario Lopez.  You know, the guy from "Saved By The Bell".  Who gives a shit?

Certainly not me.

But I found out Mario got sued three times for punching guys.  He stopped after the last time, when it cost him sixty grand to settle, even though he only made $3500 a week on that Saturday morning TV show.  Wow, I always wondered what it cost to settle a bar fight if you’re a celebrity.

And then Howard brought up the fact that Mario screwed a woman at his bachelor party.  Huh?  Corbin Bernsen told Howard that he met a woman on the beach and had sex with her during his HONEYMOON!

Who else is asking these questions?  Who else can get people to answer them?

You can dress up a hottie and put her on the red carpet and have her ask what designer the nominee is wearing.  You can put Stuttering John on the same carpet to ask gross questions that go unanswered.  But asking questions that elicit interesting answers that are on the edge of privacy?  That’s a skill.

Not the only one Howard Stern has.

But now that he’s comfortable in his skin, he can not only ask them, but get them answered.

I don’t care if you listen to Howard.  You’re missing out if you don’t, but the point is I’m writing this because Howard got better, and in the world of popular music acts hit a point early in their careers and stay there, or go backward.

And you wonder why no one gives a shit.