What if laughing off abuses hurled at you was a part of your job description? Big FM's RJ Balaji deals with just that pretty much most of the days and what's more? You can be privy to it!
Talking nonsense
His evening primetime radio show “Take It Easy” (6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.) was started primarily to give the youngsters and office-goers a break from the serious stuff that they have to deal with during work hours and relax with the nonsense. If you have heard RJ Balaji during the show and otherwise, you'll know that am not exaggerating.
From reading time from a “27 crore digital watch” or chiding you with a “what is this nonsense behaviour exhibition!”, sense is not what you will get from the show. But nobody's complaining. In fact, they love it!
What they love more is the show's most popular segment “Cross Talk”, where Balaji makes prank calls to unsuspecting victims, nominated by a friend/cousin/co-worker or neighbour. A rather unique way to take revenge, I would say.
There are crazy instances where Balaji calls up as a customer care official asking the victim to press random numbers for services like “If you want to ask another question press…” or “If you want to beat me press…”!!
RJ Balaji also has the social media to credit for his success. Once the radio officials agreed that all the station RJs could upload links to their shows on their Facebook pages, Balaji wasted no time in doing so.
Using the Sound Cloud application, he uploaded audio clips from “Cross Talk” and since then it has gone viral.
Beeped!
The most popular clip has to be the “Penin Naara Vaaiyum and Naari Pona Naanum!” (If you didn't laugh at that, you should probably ask a Tamil-speaking friend to translate it for you, though it might not have the same laughter-inducing ring to it.)
Right through this almost-three-minutes *beep*-filled audio, the victim, a young girl, starts hurling abuses at Balaji for accusing her of pelting stones at “his son”.
“What drives this show is spontaneity of the callers and their reactions. The more they abuse me and get frustrated, the more I enjoy it. Because at the end of it when they come to realise what's actually going on, I end up having the last laugh,” says Balaji. It is not just the callers', but Balaji's spontaneity is the show's selling point.
For this former Coimbatore-based RJ hosting a serious breakfast show on air, breaking his image was a priority when he started work with Big FM.
“I didn't want to be categorised, saying this guy can do only serious stuff. I wanted to show that I have different colours to my personality.” He has succeeded and how!
For sheer ROTFL times, check out: >http://soundcloud.com/balajipatturaj
