Steve Gorman Reinvents Himself as Minneapolis Morning Radio Host

Steve Gorman’s loudest post-Crowes platform is now a Minneapolis morning show, and it has given the drumming world a clean example of how a player can stay relevant after the road. At KQRS, Gorman fronts weekdays from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. with Paul Fletcher and Ryder Bue, turning a classic-rock staple into a new identity that still leans on the same instincts that made him a respected drummer.

Gorman’s move into radio was not a sudden pivot. He grew up with a father who ran a music station, thought about sports broadcasting in college, and began thinking seriously about life after The Black Crowes around 2008 or 2009. He launched Steve Gorman SPORTS! in Nashville in 2011 at 102.5 The Game, then took the show national on Fox Sports Radio from 2014 to 2018. By the time he began hosting KQRS mornings in January 2023, he had already spent years learning how to work a room without a drum kit in front of him.

That background matters because KQRS did not hand him a ceremonial slot. The station kept Gorman in mornings during its 2025 relaunch, added Fletcher and Ryder Bue to the lineup, and pushed a refreshed rock mix that stretched from the mid-1980s through the early 2000s. Minnesota names sat near the center of that reset, with Soul Asylum and the Replacements getting emphasis as the station worked to reconnect with Twin Cities listeners after Tom Barnard left in 2022 and ratings slipped. Before the April 3, 2025 reboot, KQRS even staged an Under Construction stunt, looping songs like Soul Asylum’s Somebody to Shove and R.E.M.’s It’s the End of the World as We Know It.

For drummers, Gorman’s second act lands as more than a side story about a former rock star with a microphone. KQRS calls him a founding member of The Black Crowes who toured the world for 27 years, and he has also written Hard to Handle: The Life and Death of The Black Crowes. That credibility still matters, but the real lesson is broader: timekeeping, patience, timing and personality can translate into another live format entirely. Gorman has built a morning-drive career on the same core skills that once carried a backbeat, and in Minneapolis, that has become its own kind of headliner.