About Me
I am an independent publicist who creates and conduct publicity projects for select music (artists and recordings), radio (terrestrial, satellite and Internet), and other entertainment clients (companies and individual personalities/authors), as well as for innovative small companies including an environmentally responsible electronics recycler. Drummer PR (www.drummerpr.com) was born in Spring 2007 after I left Sirius Satellite Radio as Director of Public Relations, where I primarily publicized its artist-driven programming/channels and such involving The Who, Rolling Stones, Bruce Springsteen and Steven van Zandt, the Metropolitan Opera, Frank Sinatra estate, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame + Museum, Elvis Presley Enterprises, David Johansen, Cousin Brucie and Eminem (to name a few), and non-music programming/personalities such as Howard Stern, Bubba the Love Sponge®, and many others - in addition to general company communications. I'm a bit of a radio junkie who's been on-air since I was 17; at Sirius, I could be heard on channel 18/The Spectrum and voiced lots of promos, ads and intros (you can still hear me bellowing, "NOW, FROM SIRIUS! FIRST TRAFFIC FOR PHILADELPHIA!" every 4 minutes on channel 149).Prior to joining Sirius, I created and marketed music products for Q Records, a former division of QVC, Inc., including two early rock & roll collections with Dick Clark, a 17-volume classic country music collection with artist/club owner Mickey Gilley, and two Broadway cast albums, one of which was nominated for a GRAMMY. Earlier, I was the first Director of Public Relations for the New Jersey State Aquarium in Camden, NJ (now called the Adventure Aquarium), and was PR manager for Ben & Jerry’s Homemade, Inc. in Waterbury, Vermont in its early years; I promoted the launches of Cherry Garcia, Chunky Monkey and lots of other cool company innovations. In addition to my experience in corporate PR and creating and conducting publicity campaigns for a variety of clients on an independent basis, I developed agency experience as Senior Associate for Philadelphia PR agency Resnick Communications in the early '90s.Elise Brown is my real name, which I also used on-air as a radio host: I held simultaneous positions as drive-time on-air host and Promotions Director at WIZN-FM/Burlington, and later at WHEB-FM/Portsmouth, NH, and in Philly, I was afternoon drive host and Promotion Dir. at WXPN-FM (where I started the popular “Funky Friday†program in 1993, which still airs today). I was also a full-time on-air host at WMMR-FM (1995-97) and a weekend host at modern rock WPLY-FM/Y100 (1997-2001), also in Philadelphia. Beyond the US, I briefly hosted mornings at English-language KLOV-FM in Paris, France during the 1980s. I got into PR by doing it for my college radio station, WRUV-FM/Burlington, VT, and did PR internships for my alma mater (UVM) before joining the university full-time right after graduation as a writer/editor. (I went to college with Phish; Mike Gordon was in one of my film classes, but they weren't very good then, and I was prejudiced anyway because I was promoting two "hotter" bands at the time: The Decentz and Pinhead.) While working in concert promotions, I also worked on Bob Marley's last tour and dozens more great shows, and sold VINYL RECORDS AND CASSETTES on weekends at a great record store, Pure Pop for Now People. Also waitressed my ass off.Back to the present: A few of the organizations that have had me speak about radio (both terrestrial and satellite) and/or music promotion and publicity, include SXSW, GRAMMY® Career Day, Broadcast Pioneers of Philadelphia and Delaware County Community College.I have a BA in mass communications from the University of Vermont and also studied communications for 2 years at Syracuse University. Currently, I'm a member of the Philadelphia Chapter of NARAS/The Recording Academy, am on the Advisory Commission for the Radio & TV Program at Mercer County Community College in New Jersey, and am a charter member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum.I don't really get into the "be my friend" MySpace thing, and don't look for me on FaceBook... LinkedIn, no problem -that's for us "mature, professional" folks, right?! But I certainly do appreciate the friends I have, and am not against meeting new ones; it's the accumulation aspect I don't get into. That said, feel free to reach out any time... I'm not really as grouchy as this sounds.
