Memorandum
From: Bud Veazey
To: Reporters, producers, anchors, promotions
Re: “the very latest,” et al
A good writing teacher will tell you, “Never use two words when one word will do.” TV reporters and writers turn that rule on its head. Take “very latest” for instance. How many times have you heard an anchor tell you he or she will have the “very latest” on a story after the commercial break or that reporter John Doe has the “very latest” from the scene?
Shouldn’t “latest” be enough? What’s the difference between “very latest” and “latest?” Am I getting my money’s worth when I’m getting only the “latest” information?
I recently heard a reporter refer to a “brazen and bold” robber. Why not just “brazen?” Why not just “bold?” Aren’t the two words synonyms?
Get yourself a six-pack and take a sip every time you hear an unnecessary or redundant adjective in a TV newscast. You’ll be knee-walking drunk by 7 p.m. (Okay, I exaggerate. I once wrote TV news and habits of hyperbole are hard to break.)
In another place: Bud Veazey
After decades of reading and correcting TV news copy, I came to the conclusion that it must be a rhythm thing, sort of like the iambic pentameter of reporter tracking. Perhaps reporters and writers throw in superfluous adjectives and adverbs for the same reason producers insist on three teases on a break—it just feels right. That’s the reason you’ll see a tease for a 15-second video of a car wreck in Seattle. The story is hardly worthy of advance promotion, but a producer needed a third tease to maintain the rhythm.
Don’t get me started on “young child,” “very unique,” or “completely destroyed.”
Until his retirement in 2007, Bud Veazey was assistant news director at WAGA, where he wrote memos like this regularly (minus the “take a sip” challenge, unfortunately…). Veazey now creates and restores guitars. Visit his ebay page here.
The Weight (Bud Veazey)
(starts on C, originally in A [capo 9 or detune])
C Em F C
I pulled in to Nazareth, I was feeling about half past dead.
C Em F C
I just need some place where I can lay my head.
C Em F C
Hey, Mister, can you tell me where a man might find a bed?
C Em F C
He just grinned, shook my hand, “No” was all he said.
:
C G F
Take a load off, Fanny.
C G F
Take a load for free.
C G F
Take a load off, Fanny.
F C
And… you put the load (put the load) right on me.
|C C/B |Am Am/G |F % |% % | x2
Bud, I never asked before, but Any Aversion to Alliteration?
Dedicated, Determined, Dependable
Just make sure you tune in tomorrow morning at 5am.
“An autopsy will be done.
to determine the cause of death.“I should have read this article before I wrote my copy for the six. My package included the phrase “white snow”… duh?!
Boy, we miss Easy Veazey around here!!!
Nice to see that someone is playing “The Weight” on a guitar these days. Talk about redundant… let’s hear it for a news director who can play.
Maybe news could use a little James Blood Ulmer.. or Doc Watson. (save… Chet Akins or McLaughlin for the weather departments….). Me? I always thought i drew my news style from Cheetah Chrome and Brother Wayne Kramer… (too bad i came off more like Ace Frehley… all flash and smoke… little substance!)