Radio is full of arranged marriages.
Most hosts are thrown together into a studio by executives desperately hoping for “radio gold,” but the chemistry rarely translates.
For Loren Barry and Nic Kelly, however, the gamble paid off.
In January last year the two were hand-picked to host The Hot Hits, a national show on the Hit Network from 7-10pm weeknights.
Together, they’ve defied the odds, and just over a year later their program is the most listened to national nights show in the country.
In a time when radio is battling streaming for the attention of younger listeners, and is at risk of losing older listeners thanks to the end of heritage shows like Kyle and Jackie O, the success of their relatively new show isn’t just impressive … It might be exactly what the industry needs to survive.
Friends from afar
Nic and Loren’s recent ratings result is remarkable given how little time they’d spent together before they started on air.
“In the entire time we’d known each other, which would be about six years, we had spent max four hours together,” Loren told news.com.au.
Despite both being in the industry for more than 10 years, their paths only crossed at the annual radio awards known as the ACRAs.
“I was such a big Loz fan for so long,” Nic said about his co-host who used to be a part of Triple M’s The Marty Sheargold Show.
When network bosses came knocking in early 2025 and asked him to co-host TheHot Hits, Nic said there were only three people he’d actually consider working with.
“Loren was at the top of that list,” he said. “I got so lucky. It makes me a little bit emotional because she is one of my best friends now.”
The “all equal” rule
It may be a national show, but The Hot Hits doesn’t have a big team.
It’s just the two hosts, an executive producer, an audio producer and a digital producer.
But from the show’s outset, the hosts have made one thing clear to their team members … “we are all equal”.
“Nic and I have both come up in the industry … we’ve been the producers, we’ve been the coffee makers, all that sort of stuff,” Loren said.
“We are so collaborative in everything that we do and when we sit down in that meeting room, it’s all of us together.
“They make up just as much of the show as we do,” she said about the producers.
As a team they’ve prioritised openness and honesty.
“We have a rule,” Loren explained. “If you come in and you’re feeling a bit s**t, you’re not feeling it, just go, ‘guys, I’m having one of those days.’
“You don’t have to tell us what’s going on,” she continued. “But it’s better than keeping it inside.”
Bizarrely, Nic says it’s often those shows when someone’s feeling flat that turn out to be the best ones.
“It’s an escapism kind of thing,” he said. “When the lights are on and we’re just kind of vibing, it’s so much fun that everything else sort of dissipates into the background.”
Chalk and cheese
Loren and Nic are two very different people.
As one of their bosses, Tim Lee, told news.com.au, “they’re chalk and cheese; different musical tastes, different personal interests, different life stages”.
But it’s those differences that make them work.
For example, Nic is obsessed with music, like, really obsessed.
Loren jokes that her co-host is like “rain man”, whereas her music knowledge is slightly more limited.
“I think that helps in balancing out the show,” she said.
“I feel like I sort of represent the listeners in a way, and I am not afraid to ask those dumb questions, like ‘what is tempo?’” she laughed.
Nic added that Loren cares about music just as much as he does, but in a completely different way.
“You care about it from the way it makes you feel, which is what most people are like,” he said.
“I get super nerdy about it. I look at the credits and I go, ‘oh, Julia Michaels wrote this. I wonder if they connected in LA or Nashville?’”
Ditching the “stunty bulls**t”
As the show bio says, “The Hot Hits with Nic and Loren is your go-to show for the latest music news, hottest new tracks and interviews with the industry’s best up-and-coming names.”
I know what you’re thinking … that sounds like every other nights show you’ve ever heard on FM radio.
But from the beginning, Nic and Loren set themselves a challenge of doing things differently.
“People have this perception of commercial radio of being like stunty bulls**t and zany whizbangs,” Nic said. “But come to us if you want a commercial radio show that doesn’t sound like a commercial radio show.”
The duo says their top priority is being authentic and making a show full of heart.
“The whole point is that we are just doing what we want, we’re only talking about stuff that’s actually interesting to us,” Nic told news.com.au. “Whether it’s from the music world, the pop culture world, or personal life, or a story that’s touched our hearts.”
Doing interviews differently
That quest for authenticity hasn’t just won over listeners, it’s winning over the stars, too.
After a recent chat, global hit maker Charlie Puth turned to his team and said, “Can we start with interviews like this next time?”
Nic and Loren’s interview approach is all about having “genuine conversations” rather than forcing artists to play games or participate in stunts.
“One of the first chats that Nic and I had about this show, we said we want them (artists) to walk in here and it’s like they’re just sitting down with two friends,” Loren said.
It’s something listeners have noticed and are grateful for.
“The best feedback we get from fans in the YouTube comment section is when they go, ‘thank you for asking thoughtful questions,’ or, ‘it looked like these artists really enjoyed themselves,’” Nic said.
Loren rejects big offer
It’s clear from chatting to Nic and Loren that they feel like they’re building something pretty special together, so it’s no surprise that Loren rejected an offer to jump ship after just four months.
“I had an opportunity last year to shift to another show,” she said, adding it was in “a really good timeslot” and would have come with a big pay increase.
But Loren said no immediately.
“Why would I spend this time telling my team that we’re going to build this show and it’s going to be incredible, for me to then go bye? It was never even a question,” she said.
The future is bright
Talk to anyone in the radio industry, and they’ll undoubtedly tell you that one of the shows they’re most excited about is The Hot Hits.
“It is a brilliant show,” Craig Bruce, host of the Game Changers Radio podcast, told news.com.au. “Nic and Loren have genuine chemistry. They are both natural communicators and you can hear their passion for the music every time they turn on the mics.”
And inevitably when there’s buzz around a nights show, speculation creeps in that perhaps the hosts will be moved to a bigger timeslot such as drive or breakfast.
“Like all good shows, I’m sure Southern Cross Media (which owns the Hit Network) will be happy for them to evolve over time, but there’s no reason why they can’t move into an earlier day-part in the future,” Mr Bruce said.
Nic and Loren say they’d be open to new opportunities in the coming years, but only with each other.
“It would be very unlikely that I would end up doing a radio show with someone else,” Nic told news.com.au.
Turning to Loren, he said, “You’re my radio person.”