KMLE Phoenix morning team Tim Hattrick and Willy D. Loon claim to have the only morning show in North America with its own branded Snuggies. Pressed for details, however, they’ll admit they’re just sewing the logo from their Tim & Willy t-shirts onto the Snuggies. Says Tim, “Money’s no object.”

Welcome to live and local radio, 2009 style, and few jocks do it better than Tim & Willy. In addition to being two of the most quick-witted and naturally funny people working in radio, they also have the distinction of being genuinely nice guys. Says KMLE morning team member Andrea, “They are every bit the same off the air as they are on the air. Just funny and fun to be around.”

The two men first met at a dinner party in 1988 when they were separately working for other stations in the Phoenix market. They became golfing buddies, began writing songs and funny bits together, and soon landed a show together on CHR KRQQ Tucson, Ariz. From there, they moved to KMLE in 1993. After a brief stint at Chicago’s now defunct country station Kicks 94.7, they returned to Phoenix for a 10-year run at country KNIX. After sitting out all of last year off the air, they re-joined KMLE in January. The pair recently added television to their repertoire, becoming part of the morning show on the local ABC affiliate’s “Daybreak” show.

R-I: So, how many years have you two been together?

Willy: This February it will be 20.

Tim: We went on the air Feb. 12 of 1990. It feels more like 25 or 30.

Willy: And then there are times it feels like we just started six months ago.

R-I: So, after 20 years together, who’s funnier?

Tim: Definitely Willy.

Willy: Definitely Tim.

Tim: I’ll put an asterisk next to my answer. Willy’s funnier, but I just found out he’s on steroids. So his jokes are way funnier because he’s on performance enhancing [drugs]. And actually, we got cracked down on this by the FCC. They came to us and said, “Your show is too good, and many of the other stations are complaining,” So that’s when we had to back down. Now, Willy is completely natural. He’s clean, and he’s never going to take those again, are you Willy?

Willy: Oh no, certainly not.

R-I: Did you get bumped out of the Olympics for that too?

Willy: Yea, the radio Olympics.

Tim: We’ve not been invited to participate in a local event here called Mighty Mud Mania, ever again. We’re not welcome.

R-I: What would you say each other’s strengths and weaknesses are?

Tim: Willy, where do you see yourself in five years?

Willy: What I would say about Tim is, unlike a lot of radio people, and we’ve both been around enough of ‘em, Tim is extremely generous [in] allowing the people around him to have the spotlight. Whether it’s me or the ladies on our show, Andrea and Becky Lynn, if we have something to say he doesn’t care if he’s always getting the zinger or getting the laugh or the slap on the back.

[Dog starts barking in the background] Tim: Phyllis, we’re going to need these questions in English.

Willy: I’m going to keep going. Tim has really good instincts for what would make a really great radio bit. That just comes from him not having any fear of trying things. He observes everyday life and comes up with some good stories of things that happened to him, which a lot of jocks do, but they’re always really good and really relatable. He’s constantly thinking about the show and how we can do things a little bit different and outside of the box so we can be a better than average show. He’s very, very quick witted. One of our favorite jocks in the world is Jonathan Brandmeier. Johnny’s funny, but Tim, I think, is even quicker when we’re talking about something [and] being able to come up with some joke about it.

R-I: What about a weakness?

Tim: Oh dear.

Willy: I’ve seen Tim try to do pull-ups and it wasn’t pretty.

R-I: OK, Tim, your turn.

Tim: Willy is the perfect yin to my yang. He is great at everything I’m not good at.

Willy: And vice versa.

Tim: For instance, I think about funny songs all the time, and then Willy is just a brilliant, gifted musician. He can play every instrument I’ve ever seen him pick up, and he’s really good on guitar, keyboards, and saxophone. So we think of these goofy songs, and then not only can he play them, he’s got a really good voice for singing and he’s a brilliant writer. I can say, “Willy, a truck carrying nothing but jars of pickles just turned over on I10. We need a song in the next break.” And in, like, two minutes he’ll write a hilarious little song.

Willy: [breaks into song] Cucumbers on the highway …

Tim: He’s also just very witty … That makes my job so much easier because the more funny he is, the less funny I have to be. And he is brilliantly funny.

Willy: Thank you Tim.

Tim: And he’s a good kisser.

Willy: That’s why we have such a wonderful marriage.

R-I: You probably see each other more than you do your real spouses.

Tim: I call Willy my ugly wife.

R-I: Your wife with a mustache?

Tim: Yes, exactly. By the way, this is shocking revelation. I’ve worked with the guy for nearly 20 years. He kind of looks like Dale Earnhardt, Sr., you know, this Kix Brooks looking mustache. I did not know until just months ago that he’s got these two ugly, gross warts underneath that mustache.

Willy: They’re actually moles. Some people would call them beauty marks.

Tim: So the mustache is actually a mask to hide this hideous disfigurement on his face. Isn’t that cool?

R-I: I don’t think I needed to know that.

Tim: You need to let your readers know that that’s what’s going on. There was a time when I thought maybe he was just keeping that mustache alive for the Village People, because it’s very ’70s porn star.

Willy: [sings] Boom chick a wow wow.

R-I: So, would that qualify as a weakness then?

Tim: Yeah. That’s his only weakness.

Willy: [sings] He was my only weakness.

R-I: You recently added a new gig doing TV segments for ABC 15 “Daybreak.” When did that start.

Tim: We started that about [two months] ago. We’re on a couple of times in their morning program that precedes “Good Morning America” every morning. And pretty soon we’re going to start filing a brief report in the afternoon news as well … It’s going well. We like it.

R-I: What kinds of segments do you do? Humor pieces?

Tim: Yea, [before Halloween] we did Tim & Willy’s costume suggestions under 20 bucks. We just scoured the Internet and found goofy costumes. We want to do little video clips, little funny bits we can show on there, a little bit like Conan OBrian or David Letterman when they show little video vignettes at the start of the show.

R-I: And you do your morning reports right there in your radio studio, right? They just installed some TV lights?

Willy: TV lights and a nice camera. Andrea runs the camera.

Tim: It’s kind of a funny little drill we’ve got going on here. When they call and say, “We’re ready to go,” we open up a cupboard, flip a switch, dial a number and all these big lights come on. We’ve got the camera set up and it’s instant TV studio.

R-I: So you have to show up for work wearing makeup now?

Willy: Not just yet.

Tim: Though the station is in HD, our camera here is not HD until the first of the year. Did you know this—this is going to be another stunning fact in this article, which is going to be a Pulitzer Prize winner for you—on TV in HD you need LESS makeup.

R-I: Even if you have beauty marks under your mustache?

Tim: You need more mustache, but less makeup.

Willy: Hey, take a look at Dr. Phil in HD sometime. He’s using, way, way too much makeup. When he furrows his brow you see little crusts of makeup falling off.

R-I: You previously did a similar TV gig for “Good Morning Arizona” on another station. How long did that last?

Tim: For about 10 years. We had a lot of good times. They were an independent station. They didn’t have a network show to go to at 7 a.m., so there was lots of time to fill and they typically let us do whatever we wanted. But we’re a little more refined now and it’s kind of fun.

R-I: How is TV different from radio in terms of how you have to convey your humor?

Tim: We always have a lot less time on television than we do on the radio show.

Willy: So we have to start it and get to the point or get to the funny quick.

Tim: Another thing is because it’s TV, it’s so many people [involved]. Today we had 11 steps and 15 people we had to fill in what we were going to do, and typically we don’t think about what we’re doing on the radio, even as we’re doing it. It’s sort of hard to have to think about what you want to do, write it down, explain it, and then do it like you said you were going to. Oftentimes it never matches up, but that’s television.

Tim: I think television, honestly, is a fad. It’s just radio with pictures. Who has time to watch their radio? People are busy. So television is going away, you can quote me on that.

R-I: The trend in radio—and KMLE is no exception—is for stations to make due with many fewer live and local jocks than ever before. Is that difficult for you to watch happen to an industry you love?

Tim: I have a theory. I believe this is actually a season of “Survivor” we’re on. One by one we’re all being voted off this radio island.

Willy: But we still haven’t seen Jeff Probst yet.

Tim: I’m going to be the last disc jockey standing. I swear to god, I will fight you to the death Willy.

R-I: That’s funny, but kind of a sign of the times statement about radio.

Tim: I don’t want to see anybody lose their job, and yet this year has been so bizarre that we just feel really fortunate to still have jobs and be around [to see] if maybe they’ll put us on in other markets and try to save money that way. I have no idea. We don’t seem to be able to control that end of it, but we just try to come in every day and make sure that we keep this one.

Willy: Someday it could end up that there’s only 50 on-air jobs in radio and we want two of them.

Tim: Yes, that’s all we ask.

R-I: You’ve tried syndication before at Clear Channel. How did that work out?

Tim: We did, for about four years at KNIX. We would do a voice tracked show after our live show on KNIX. At one point we were in 14 other markets, just all over the place, from upstate New York to Alabama to Puyallup, Wash. We had a blast doing it, but it sort of lost momentum after about the second or third year. The company seemed not to be pushing it that hard at that time. Now they seem to be pushing [syndication] a lot harder.

R-I: So syndication is something you’d like to try again?

Tim: Oh yea.

Willy: I’ll say “si’ in Spanish.

Tim: We would love to. The TV affiliate here is on all around the state. We would love to be on in Flagstaff and Yuma and down in Tucson. That’s were we started together.

Tim: Our [Clear Channel] show did work everywhere from Alabama to Salt Lake City to Sarasota, Fla. It wasn’t like people were saying, “Where are you guys from again?” People seem to respond the same way to us. The weird thing is, now, we get so many e-mails and calls. People are listening to us all over the country anyway on the Internet, and all around the world.

R-I: Sounds like you’re still optimistic about radio’s future.

Tim: In the year we took off we really tried to examine the state of the business and where it’s headed, and I think the future is really bright. I hate to be so darned optimistic, but I just am. It’s weird. In the worst of times, both Willy and I went, “Things are going to be OK when we get through this choppy water.” Wear you’re life vest and I think we’re going to be all right.

R-I: You have a very good Web site that includes a podcast, and you both blog. How important are those kinds of things now for keeping in touch with your listeners?

Tim: We don’t cut up our show and send it out [now], we take our show and smash it like a walnut and send it out in a million different pieces: Twitter, Facebook, the Web …

Willy: Smoke signals.

Tim: We do actually have smoke signal versions of our show available for download. It’s phenomenal … It’s important, but it’s part of why we’re so excited about the future. There’s more ways to hear us, not less.

R-I: Your big live event, Tim & Willy’s Christmas Breakfast Show @ Night, is coming up Dec. 5. What do you have planned this year?

Tim: If you’ve never seen or heard it, it’s like the best version of our show done live in front of an audience of about 3,000 people, and we throw everything and the kitchen sink into it. It’s a variety show. It features us and our band; it’s got a top-level musical performer, lots of surprise guests, skits, a comedian and just a lot of cool things. It’s sort of like our version of “A Prairie Home Companion” meets “Saturday Night Live” hosted by Tim and Willy. We do it at a theater here in the round, record everything, mix it down and then play it back as kind of our annual Christmas special on KMLE … Every year it just about kills us to put it on, but as soon as they introduce us and we walk out on stage it just gives us the best feeling. It’s become a bit of a holiday tradition for many families, so we love it.

R-I: Who do you have booked for this year?

Tim: Little Big Town is going to play with us. We always try to pick a musical entertainer who we have some history with.

Willy: And chemistry

Tim: They like to play around and get the Tim & Willy way of doing things. Little Big Town has just been one of our favorites. [Even] if they were horrible musically, we’d still have them on because we get along with them so great, and they’re so good looking, and that matters more than anything.

Willy: And the girls aren’t bad either.

Tim: We’ve had past guests that have included Rascal Flatts, Steve Wariner, Phil Vassar, LeAnn Rimes, Clint Black

Willy: Blake Shelton, Wynonna. We include the artists in some skits and stuff so they not only come out and sing their songs, but they also kind of get caught up in our hysteria as well.

R-I: And it’s all a fundraiser for the Tim & Willy Kids Fun-Dation. Tell us a little bit about that charity.

Willy: We decided that because we had so much success here in the valley that it was time to start giving back to the community. It’s pretty easy to attract a crowd when it’s for a kid. And we’re just kids at heart.

Willy: There’s a place here in inner city Phoenix, in one of the worst areas of town, and it’s kind of an oasis. It’s called the Neighborhood Center.

Tim: They provide education, medical care, dental; they have a food bank, a clothing bank, and toys for the kids.

Willy: So we give most everything that we raise to them. We have a few other kids charities that we do donate to, but that’s one of the places that’s nearest and dearest to our hearts.

R-I: I’m going to wrap up by having you each tell a little known fact about one another.

Tim: I’ll give you one. Willy D. Loon was nearly a national junior roller skating champion.

Willy: When he says “nearly,” that simply means that I was qualified to go to nationals, I showed up and (sighs) … Back in the day they had these preliminary figures you had to skate, and my coach taught me the wrong one. If I had done the right figures, I could have come back a national champion. Who knows?

R-I. They weren’t impressed with your figure nine?

Willy: No!

R-I: What about Tim? I know he’s taken up ballroom dancing.

Willy: Yea, but that’s not a secret. He participated in a local version of “Dancing With The Stars” for charity, and he did quite well.

Tim: I thought I was a pretty good dancer. At a wedding, I’m the guy that everybody goes home and talks about.

R-I: In a good way?

Tim: Well, nine out of 10 times, yea. So when they asked me I [thought], “I’m a good dancer. I’m funky thunder right here.” It turns out ballroom dancing is extremely hard. They paired me with a beautiful, sexy, 24-year-old professional Latin dancer, and that made me look even worse. We had about six lessons for free, and that only let me know I needed about 20 more. We did the event. I was unhappy with it and wanted to do it better, so we did it at the Breakfast Show @ Night. I think you can find that clip on YouTube.

R-I: You’re at a disadvantage as a dancer because of your height.

Tim: And my low center of gravity.

Willy: OK, here we go with the little known fact: his middle name is Lawler and, his nose has been broken about five times.

R-I: All those bar brawls?

Tim: See my previous answer about being the guy at a wedding everybody talks about.

R-I: I never saw anyone get their nose broken from dancing.

Tim: Then you don’t know how to correctly do the Worm.