Roberts says his biggest challenge as a father right now is balancing the need to be present with his kids with his work commitments. Photo / Supplied
Roberts says his biggest challenge as a father right now is balancing the need to be present with his kids with his work commitments. Photo / Supplied
ZM announcer Clint Roberts has built a reputation as an accomplished broadcaster, having worked at some of the country’s biggest radio stations on his way to TV hosting, building an impressive social media following and launching his own podcast.
But his path to radio stardom got off to a rocky start when, as an inexperienced Broadcasting School graduate, he narrowly avoided a fight with British rapper Dizzee Rascal at the Big Day Out festival in 2010.
“I was 20 years old and I’d been given the chance to go and interview the big names backstage,” Roberts recounted on Newstalk ZB’s Real Life with John Cowan on Sunday night.
Taking issue with Roberts’ line of questioning, Dizzee Rascal became aggressive and came eye to eye with Roberts, prompting the hip-hop artist’s security guards to step in and separate the pair.
“I was cacking it,” Roberts told Cowan. “I was more scared with Dizzee Rascal than when I swam with great white sharks in the Foveaux Strait – there was an apex predator in front of you, but at least there was a steel cage.
“[With Dizzee Rascal], there was just a very early version of the iPhone [between us], which was not recording very well, and him getting the wrong end of the stick and leaning in and actually physically posturing for a fight.
“The interview got really bad after that. I was like, ‘This guy hates me, that’s the worst interview ever.’ But then when he came back through the tunnel after his show, he goes, ‘Hey, radio guy, did you like the show?’ And I was like, oh okay, he’s [fine].”
“We present an unpolished, real take on parenting … but we try to do it with a laugh,” says Clint Roberts of his new podcast. Photo / Supplied
Roberts now co-hosts ZM’s highly popular drive show Bree & Clint alongside Bree Tomasel, and earlier this year launched a podcast on iHeartRadio called The Parenting Hangover, with How To Dad’s Jordan Watson.
Drawing on his experience of raising two girls, the podcast isn’t Roberts and Watson posturing as parenting experts. Rather, the idea for the podcast was borne from a frustration at the lack of parenting content made specifically for fathers.
“We present an unpolished, real take on parenting. We talk about the things that are most topical to us at that moment… but we try to do it with a laugh.”
Roberts says his biggest challenge as a father right now is balancing the need to be present with his kids with his work commitments.
“I personally feel a really big need to provide for my family, and to set them up as best I can and give them financial security. But then every job that I take and everything that I do takes me away from my family for a little bit longer.”
He says that seems to be a common experience for a lot of parents, as is the tendency to feel “like you’re not doing enough”.
“Isn’t that strange? It’s parenting guilt. Maybe that’s the comparison thing – you’re constantly bombarded by perfect families on Instagram and these beautiful holiday shots of wealthy celebrities who are taking their kids to Disneyland all the time.
“It’s not real, but it’s there. It’s kind of ever-present.”
Real Life is a weekly interview show where John Cowan speaks with prominent guests about their life, upbringing, and the way they see the world. Tune in Sundays from 7:30pm on Newstalk ZB.
