| Genre | Top 40/CHR |
|---|---|
| Running time | 2 hour minimum |
| Home station | Premiere Radio Networks |
| Starring | Dawson McAllister |
| Website | TheHopeLine.com |
Dawson McAllister Live is a talk radio show hosted by Dawson McAllister where teenagers and young adults talk about problems in life including divorce, depression, cutting, suicide, drug addictions, eating disorders, homosexuality, and family issues. The radio show operates as a nonprofit, although it airs on commercial radio stations along with noncommercial Christian radio stations, as well as XM's Mix (XM) channel.
The program first aired in 1991 on Christian radio stations. In 2005, several Top 40 radio stations, most of them owned by Clear Channel Communications, began airing the show. On June 26, 2007, Premiere Radio Networks announced that they had signed the show to a syndication deal, and assumed responsibility of the broadcast on July 1, 2007.
The broadcast is aired each Sunday night from 9:00pm until 2:00am central. Affiliate radio stations are required (as of November 28, 2007) to broadcast two concurrent hours of programming. There are three versions of the show that are produced. The first, and most common version, is an all-talk version that has a mix of live and pre-recorded content, as well as elements where listeners can participate. The second is a CHR-hybrid version, which is entirely pre-recorded and contains nine songs, eight calls, two features, and one talk break from Dawson. It's not carried on as many stations as the talk version, but stations in larger cities tend to opt for this version of the show. The third version of the show is a Hot AC version which contains seven songs, eight calls, and all talk breaks from Dawson. This is the version carried by the fewest number of stations.
Starting March 31, 2008, Dawson McAllister began running a weeknight version of the show called Dawson McAllister Late Nights in which listeners could request songs and talk to Dawson in the middle of the night.