Art Bell vs George Noory...

reply to post by Anonymous ATS
I agree totally. In my perfect parallel universe Beta eclipses VHS, Apple triumphs over IBM, Ron Paul is President, and George Knapp succeeds Art Bell.

art bell was the best,,,


i rarely listen now,,,

art could make a lame boring guest interesting...

ian punnet is horrible...

reply to post by dgtempe

I was listening to the 7th anniversay show on C2C and got sick of the endless round of backslapping and mutual admiration and started to muse about the program and why I thought Art Bell in the final analysis is a much better radio presence than George Noory. Figured it out. Hunted for a thread on it and found out that someone else had figured it out too.

George Noory screens his calls. Art Bell doesn't.

Here's my idea of how important this is. Imagine baseball player number one taking batting practice. He squints at the pitcher's mound and tenses up in expectation and gets ready for whatever piece of trickery the pitcher cares to throw at him. Sometimes he hits the ball, sometimes he misses. When it comes to game time, he's ready. It's very hard to fool him and his reflexes are sharp. He does this for years and becomes a great player.

Here's how player number two takes batting practice. He requests that the pitcher announce what every pitch will be before it is thrown. That way the batter will have a moment or two to take the right stance and get ready. His practice average is way above the first player, but come game time he sucks. He's nowhere near as sharp as player number one and never becomes a big leaguer.

George is a sharp and shrewed guy in areas where he is knowledgeable, but I think he is afraid to show his real reactions to both guests and callers and needs as much lead time as he can get so he won't be too deflating to people. I think he takes a lot of drama out of the program in that way.

By screening his calls he is really short circuiting his development as a broadcaster and that's one reason Art Bell is better. With George one is always watching batting practice, never the game.

I'll go one step further. (I think Art Bell owns that program. I think he is George's boss.) I think he should insist that George stop having his calls screened.


[edit on 4-1-2010 by ipsedixit]

ART and George both rock! Its that Ian Punnit guy that I can't stand. He talks too much and is always asserting his views and thoughts so much he doesn't give the person he interviews half a chance to talk, unless he agrees with them but still he answers their questions and thinks he's the worlds leading expert on spirituality and is always spending too much time setting up the situation with too much injection of his own views. May have been redundant there but the guy is just like listening to nails on a chalk board to me. It always pisses me off when they give him really good folks to interview that I want to listen to. Oh yeah Knapp is good as well. I think they keep Punnit just so people will be glad george is back. LOL

[edit on 4-1-2010 by Barkster]

My "opinion" is that they both have their strong and weak points.
George has a great voice that holds your attention, is a great interviewer and intelligent. However, I feel that he has taken the show into more of the "paranormal" area, which he admits he has a passion for.
Art was the king... in the beginning. He was able to take anyone in an interview and explore each corner of the given subject, leaving no corner unexplored. He prepared himself and his listeners for the upcoming interview and explored issues asking for simplicity in the answers for the benefit of the listeners. Personally, I miss the "old Art"... the excitement or static that was in the air as he progressed through the interviews. I admit that I never cared about demons, ghosts, spiritual or para-normal shows... preferring the shows about alien technology, space, physics, Area 51, etc.
I believe that the events in his personal and professional life changed him more profoundly than we knew at the time, continuing to this day.
The terrible revelation in regards to his son, the popularity of the show, the "start-up" of Ramona's station and Ramona's unfortunate death.
Art became distracted , perhaps learning that "a hobby is a hobby till it becomes a job" but more likely having taken too many projects on.
I think it showed in his attitude, sometimes seeming almost bored with the show, his tone and manner of interview.
I do miss him, as a great interviewer and in some ways feel that I have lost a "personal" friend... that ability to connect was his greatest achievement.

I know I'm a dollar short and a day late but I really wanted to throw in my 2 cents and say I miss Art Bell..George is okay and I agree with some of the others Ian Punnit yuck. I want Art to come back..trying Art's mass experiment now and wishing for a new C2C or dreamland (without Whitley) come back Art..

reply to post by itscocobaby


It seems every other month or so I catch Art doing the show. I've lost touch with the show, so I don't know Art's schedule or whether he still has one, but he still does occasionally broadcast from his home in the Philippines.

George does what he does and at least he has kept the format somewhat alive.

Art Bell has officially left the show (again). He will probably come back again. It's hard to say. He has a young family now and doesn't need all the BS that comes along with doing a conspiracy show.

George Knapp was doing Sunday nights and was usually doing UFO shows - but that has also appeared to have been switched up. They are getting other guest hosts in place of Knapp. I don't know if he has officially left C2C or not.

reply to post by verylowfrequency


Art is no longer doing live shows. It was announced sometime late last year. I really enjoyed his occasional shows and his pics of his cute little daughter.

I think George is a good interviewer, but for me he bugs because he is so extremely positive and upbeat. It exhausts me. Ian Punnett drives me nuts also for reasons posted above. I only listen to his shows when the topic is something I am very, very interested in. I really enjoy George Knapp's shows. I wish he hosted more often.

Art was definately better. I still listen to Noory and i don't dislike him but sometimes he does seem to be just going through the motions. He often uses the exact same lines as generic responses to the guest, regardless of what they said. But i guess it would be hard to stay fresh after so many shows and topics.

Yes I heard George during a live chat session say that Art was not coming back, which made me very sad. I agree that George Knapp is a great host wish we could hear more from him I think he's a good interviewer, He also has great guests. I guess I view Art as a leader of sorts a man who brought us so many interesting topics and he was always fully engaged with the guest and the audience. One of my favorite shows he did was with a young woman who if I recall was struck by a car and had a near death experience. She went into so much detail about it, becoming a blue orb where she went and what she saw. I had the show on cassette but over the years it got lost. Anyone recall that show? my other favorite was his interview with Single Seven. Oh yeah another was the caller from area 51. What was your favorite show? Cheers

Originally posted by SystemiKNoory on the other hand, has a rather tenuous grasp of interviewing skills. He FREQUENTLY derails a guest right as he is getting to a point he was making. He tends to ask the most innane questions (not always but often). His tendency to cut guests off in mid sentence to finish the statement himself is copmpletey inappropriate and franky, I find it intensely annoying. I've heard dozens and dozens of times where a guest was building up to an important point and then Noory goes and asks some completely unrelated question and we never get back to the point that the guest was trying to make. After so many examples of this, I've made a choice that the frustration is not worth the reward, I only end up pissed off at George one more time. It's just not worth the frustration he causes me. As far as hosts for C2C go, I'm sure they could have done worse but they certainly could have done better...

Everything you said here. I can't listen to anything with Noorey because, quite frankly, I just want to scream at the radio whenever he interupts a guest or shows that he has little to no interest in what they're talking about.

Knapp on the other hand is awesome.

On the topic of paranormal radio shows though, there is one guy who should quite simply not have a radio show: Alejandro Rojas of Open Minds radio. The guy's got his heart in the right place but wow his voice is like nails on a chalkboard, and they can never balance the levels of the interviewee.

I'm sad to hear that Art is once again finished. Is he doing any ham radio stuff? I look forward to his next special one time broadcast or fill in date - if it ever happens again.

reply to post by itscocobaby


Yeah, I know that show. She was talking about going into different rooms from the cloud or whatever and how there were people that were stuck in certain emotional states etc.

I may have that one on CD, or one of my HD's somewhere. I"ll upload it if I stumble upon it.

Still my favorite show was my first - Victor.

Art was fun back in the day. If the guest was good, he had good questions or would open it up to callers. If the guest was lame, Art also knew how to hook 'em and sink 'em with discussion that only made the person sound more silly. Open lines were also the best back when he knew enough to let people do the talking. Goofballs like J.C. or that Oscar were pretty funny too. (Almost like they had special lines on open caller nights, wouldn't surprise me any.)

As for Snorey... Zzzzz... Oh wha?! (Sorry about falling asleep there.) Oops... I mean Noory... He's ok. But, not quite up there in getting poignant questions in. Also it seems that more of his guests are pitching something rather than discussing a topic. Get some people on that aren't selling books.

Punnet? Meh.

And I haven't listened enough like I did back in the day in order to judge the other guys. If I have insomnia now, I'm doing more internet stuff rather than listening to C2C.

Originally posted by Funk bunyip
He often uses the exact same lines as generic responses to the guest, regardless of what they said.

Oooooo you notice that too. It reallllllly BUGS me! Grrrrrrrr!!!

Punnet? Meh.

I don't care for him.

reply to post by verylowfrequency


Hi verylowfrequency Art gave out his call letters on one of the last shows he did on C2C, I guess he got a license in the Philippines and I'm sure he's doing his own thing. Wish I was HAM operator so I could listen
I got this from en.wikipedia.org...
"Bell is well known in the world of amateur radio. He and many of his ham friends could be heard nightly on the 80 meter amateur radio band at a frequency of 3840 kHz (before he moved to the Philippines). While there he could occasionally be heard on 3678 kHz via EchoLink. When Bell resides in the USA, he can be heard on 3830 kHz. Bell has also run a nightly online amateur radio stream at Smeter.Net from 7:00 PM Pacific time until 3:00 am."

Dang what was her name (the girl who had the NDE) She described being with a mass cluster of minds who were all dancing around a central point in joy (I'm paraphrasing) and yes she was able to observe people that were stuck in certain emotional states. She had a young voice too..

Victor..was one of the best moments in radio I think lol. Didn't Art loose contact with everyone for a few seconds too? I seem to recall that. I'll have to go back and listen again to it.

reply to post by pauljs75

As for Snorey... Zzzzz... Oh wha?! (Sorry about falling asleep there.) Oops... I mean Noory... He's ok. But, not quite up there in getting poignant questions in. Also it seems that more of his guests are pitching something rather than discussing a topic. Get some people on that aren't selling books.

Wow do i agree with that, I am so sick of everyone trying to hock their wares be it books/cd's/food/blah blah really over it

My God George Noorey is an idiot, I tuned in tonight just to hear what they're saying about Osama bin Laden supposed death.... Noorey believes everything the press is saying, he doesn't even question it, he's supporting the propaganda...

I had to turn the show off, as always....

reply to post by imitator


Hi..My feeling as of late is that George Noory has joined the main stream media..I see him getting more and more main stream all the time, not so much with his choice of guests but his choice of questions for his guests, they have become non-existent or follow the MSM type of script..just my thoughts cheers coco