Listeners and friends took to country music station WQYK-FM 99.5 on Thursday morning to mourn the man who spent years entertaining them during that time slot.
Fans knew the big, irreverent personality as Dave McKay, the co-host of the "Dave & Veronica Morning Show."
According to the Tampa Bay Times, he was found dead in his Second Street S apartment around 6:30 a.m. Thursday after he didn't show up for work. He was 55.
His colleagues said on the radio Thursday morning that McKay died in his sleep. His death is still under investigation, police said, but they do not believe there were any suspicious circumstances.
"I don't know that there's any radio jock that ever cared as much about his listener as Dave did," said Cledus T. Judd, McKay's former on-air partner.
Marianna Ehmke said her son was always seeking attention. When he was in the second or third grade, the mother recalled his teacher calling home and telling her: "Come on down here. Because according to New York law, I can't spank him. You have to come here, and you have to spank him while I'm watching."
His mother explained that her son didn't so well in school "because he needed all the attention, and he was disruptive."But everybody loved him. We all loved him."
A native New Yorker, McKay was on the air since the early 1980s, spending two decades at WQYK and a few years before that at WRBQ 104.7 FM Q105.
He was a big, irreverent personality who worked rooms the way big, irreverent personalities tend to do, always finding a way to be close to the center of attention. When he hooked up with former partner Randy Price, he described himself as the "cocky little brother" to Price's "meat-and-potatoes kind of guy."
"I was the good cop, he was the bad cop — and it worked," Price said. "He would say things to get people's attention. He'd grab that headline, and if he made you mad in the process, he'd spend 10 times as much time making it up to you. But in the meantime, he got your attention."
"We were from different breeds, different sides of the tracks, with him a New Yorker and me a southern boy," Judd said. "We went 'round and 'round and butted heads, but when them ratings came in, we always had 'em. That's all that mattered. I think the listener loved that. As a personality, he's by far one of the most popular disc jockeys I've ever seen in my life."
"Dave understood that successful local radio is all about being just that — local, local, local," Price said. "Talking about people and their lives, and not just giving time and temperature and playing a song, but getting yourself embedded into their everyday lives. And Dave was excellent at that."
In 2008, McKay and Price were named On-Air Personalities of the Year by the Country Music Association; McKay was a four-time finalist for the same honor from the Academy of Country Music. During his stint at the station, both groups named WQYK the best major-market radio outlet in America.
Condolences poured in on social media.
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