KUFO (101.1)'s "Kidd Chris" Foley criticized the radio business on-air Friday, which this morning led to a 15-minute conversation with Tara Dublin, local radio advocate and music director for KZME, a community radio station set to launch in July.

The two were unusually candid for an on-air exchange. Foley, who came to KUFO in October following a mass firing of talent there, called radio "a terrible industry," adding, "They're all snakes that run this business." He said major radio companies like Clear Channel and Entercom don't really care, that they're "just getting ready for the next guy to come in and go, 'Hey, we'll buy those from you.'"

Dublin revealed that, after she was fired from KNRK (94.7) in May, the station replaced her with "two hours of automated music, and then Gustav comes on at noon and is on until 7." Foley's on-air partner Porkchop was in disbelief: "Wow, someone goes on from noon till 7?" Foley suggested there might be some voice-tracking, but Dublin assured him that Gustav was in the building.

"What's the radio cycle, six months?" Dublin asked. "My friend Jaime Cooley, who got fired from 94.7, went down to Phoenix to do morning radio and she just got fired." Foley, who held that you're not in radio until you're canned, said, "I don't have to quit this job. This job will become available soon enough, the way our track record goes."

But the show wasn't all commiseration. When Dublin asked how much of KUFO's music was local — pointing out that DJs have "no control over the playlist" — Foley said, "Local radio stations have always tried that whole thing of playing all local music, and then they die." Porkchop added that, "When I listen to the radio, I don't know if I want to try to figure out who this band is or if I like it." Foley put it bluntly: "I want to hear what I know and that's it."

But Dublin insisted that, "Just because it's free, doesn't mean it has to be lame and mediocre and pandering to Middle America." Foley, who tried later in the conversation to introduce T&A talk, rebutted that, "When we came here, everybody was like ... you can't be doing that, we're a high-brow town, and then we picked up the phone, and it's all stoner dudes."

With the same tastes in TV shows and the same Starbucks on every corner, Foley said, "Portland's just like every other city."

The Kidd Chris Show airs weekdays on KUFO from 5 to 10 am. Dublin can be found on Twitter and on her website.