Bye bye, KFRC-FM

[Johnnyrockin]

Good to hear somebody mention that terrain in the Bay Area is a major reason AM still does okay here. The Bay Area and Seattle probably have the worst topography of any major markets. As far as the demise of KFRC-FM, I thought the station was a bore, and cutting up the schedule for A's ballgames made it even worse. The oldies format that preceded it on 99.7 was no great shakes, either. Reducing the entire history of rock music to 1,000 cuts and beating "Satisfaction" and "You Keep Me Hangin' On" to death just sucks. And blowing up the station to do the "Movin' format was a dumb idea, too. It's amusing... CBS doesn't even have the expertise/capital to program and promote the stations they own and they had to buy another? If it weren't for KCBS, this market would be a total disaster for them.
I doubt very much that the air staff at KFRC will be retained to do HD programming; this was a cost-cutting move, plain and simple, and I can't imagine anyone "missing" KFRC-FM that much. It's a simple way to "do something" with the FM, and it costs nothing while retaining ownership of frequencies that could be better programmed by someone else. It's the same approach all the big groups use.

[goriajk]

I'm listening to KFRC 106.9 from LA on my iPod Touch (With AOL Radio/CBS Radio appl.)    and while I'm saddened that KFRC is leaving the airwaves (once again) I'm sure Bay Area listeners will enjoy KCBS on the FM Band. My question is if and when KNX will move to the FM (I know they're on KTWV's HD2 already) here in LA - will they take KLSX and simulcast  (only time will tell)  --- Farewell KFRC and hello FM All-News KCBS. Joe G

[djj]

The one thing that I often wondered was why the jocks were never allowed to show a little personality.

It seems too often when a jock tries to do that his/her PD slaps it down and says in effect "shut up and play the damn record".
All the "shut and play another record" years have come full circle. Many listeners are now conditioned to tune out whenever a jock says anything without a ramp under him believing a stopset is coming. Even with the best personality in the world most stations don't bother promoting them, thus setting themselves up to fail. Back to "shut and play another record". Lather, rinse, repeat.

All of the above which leads to this quote:
"I don't think radio is selling records like they used to. They'd hawk the song and hawk the artist and you'd get so excited, you'd stop your car and go into the nearest record store."
--Herb Alpert, A&M Records co-founder (with Jerry Moss)

Says it all...

Since KCBS puts out a measley 500 watts toward the north at night (not even strong enough to kick on the Hybrid Digital signal in Napa, and I'm sure Santa Rosa, also), perhaps the 106.9 simulcast will help maintain coverage for those areas at night. Otherwise, I must agree with the previous posters that the simulcast really is unnecessary (other than being a cost-cutting measure, more than likely)...

And I, too, wonder when KNX and/or KFWB in da Southland will consider doing similar with one of its FM signals...sheeesh!

Anyone out there: Stockton, CA, and San Francisco were considered kingpin markets for AM listenership into the 1980s, with Stockton being the Number-One market for AM-listenership in the entire country. These days, especially in San Fran, how does AM listenership do in comparison, as I have not heard much about this until now? Still up there compared to other markets?
Thoughts?
--jay

[TheBigA]

"I don't think radio is selling records like they used to. They'd hawk the song and hawk the artist and you'd get so excited, you'd stop your car and go into the nearest record store."
--Herb Alpert, A&M Records co-founder (with Jerry Moss)

Says it all...

I don't think that's endemic of radio, but an overall sociological shift in the way we learn about music.  It goes back to Generation X, and has grown to the current generation, thanks to social networking.  They don't get information about music from the media, like Radio, TV, or newspaper reviews.  You can include radio with writers like Ben Fong-Torres or Lester Bangs.  The power of music writers and the rock press is gone.

Regarding radio, there's a sense that the only reason a DJ hawks a record or artist is because he's paid to do so.  This grew out of the 80s when a lot of sub-par music was being pushed on radio for money.  Now, the payola hearings have left a generation feeling that they can't trust anyone in radio for music advice.

So the record labels have simply used the artists as their own promotion devices.  In the old days, it was tough to get artists to visit radio stations unless you were in a major market.  Now, top artists visit stations or do satellite tours.  So the audience can hear it from the artists themselves.  Same thing with TV.  The audience doesn't trust the TV hosts, so the artists come on to market their own music.  There is no new Dick Clark.  Ryan Seacrest is more of a celebrity interviewer than a musical advocate.  All this is because of this sociological shift in the audience.

Some public stations have hosts who attempt to do the old-style musical advocate thing, but it takes a long time to establish credibility.  But in the end, nothing sells music better than peer-to-peer word of mouth.  That was the case even in the 60s.  Even in a music city like San Francisco, only a handful of DJs had credibility with the public.  Today, there is simply way too much media for a handful of radio people to get that kind of power. 

Back in the day, the DJs were insiders who lived the music and were part of the rock community.  Today, there really is no music community, and DJs are professionals who don't spend their free time with their audience.  The only exception to this I see is in the black community with street music and mashes.  The DJ is a respected leader in that community, setting the beat for the party.  I think those of us in other musical genres could learn a lot from watching that society, and perhaps use it to help grow other types of music.

[Lkeller]

"I don't think radio is selling records like they used to. They'd hawk the song and hawk the artist and you'd get so excited, you'd stop your car and go into the nearest record store."
--Herb Alpert, A&M Records co-founder (with Jerry Moss)

Says it all...

I don't think that's endemic of radio, but an overall sociological shift in the way we learn about music.  It goes back to Generation X, and has grown to the current generation, thanks to social networking.  They don't get information about music from the media, like Radio, TV, or newspaper reviews.  You can include radio with writers like Ben Fong-Torres or Lester Bangs.  The power of music writers and the rock press is gone.

Regarding radio, there's a sense that the only reason a DJ hawks a record or artist is because he's paid to do so.  This grew out of the 80s when a lot of sub-par music was being pushed on radio for money.  Now, the payola hearings have left a generation feeling that they can't trust anyone in radio for music advice.

So the record labels have simply used the artists as their own promotion devices.  In the old days, it was tough to get artists to visit radio stations unless you were in a major market.  Now, top artists visit stations or do satellite tours.  So the audience can hear it from the artists themselves.  Same thing with TV.  The audience doesn't trust the TV hosts, so the artists come on to market their own music.  There is no new Dick Clark.  Ryan Seacrest is more of a celebrity interviewer than a musical advocate.  All this is because of this sociological shift in the audience.

Some public stations have hosts who attempt to do the old-style musical advocate thing, but it takes a long time to establish credibility.  But in the end, nothing sells music better than peer-to-peer word of mouth.  That was the case even in the 60s.  Even in a music city like San Francisco, only a handful of DJs had credibility with the public.  Today, there is simply way too much media for a handful of radio people to get that kind of power. 

Back in the day, the DJs were insiders who lived the music and were part of the rock community.  Today, there really is no music community, and DJs are professionals who don't spend their free time with their audience.  The only exception to this I see is in the black community with street music and mashes.  The DJ is a respected leader in that community, setting the beat for the party.  I think those of us in other musical genres could learn a lot from watching that society, and perhaps use it to help grow other types of music.

I'm not sure when Herb Alpert made that statement, but I think it's been true for a long time.  I remember noticing as far back as the early 80s that DJs on many stations were rarely mentioning the songs or artists at all.  I also remember reading a statement from a K-101 Program Director back then who said his station actually had a policy against discussing the music.  He said clearly that the station was there to sell airtime to advertisers first, and promote the station second. And since they were working from a strict "more music'" less talk philosophy, there was no time to talk about anything else.

Obviously there are exceptions - "new music" is usually identified on Wild, KMEL, Star, etc - and stations like KFOG actually celebrate the music, whether new or old.

[BossRadioDJ]

Following up on Jay and Llew's comments on promoting records and pay-for-play...

Remember back in the 1950s and 1960s when enterprising disc jockeys bought (or "brokered") time on local radio stations, went out and sold the ad time themselves, then played (and promoted) the music they played, or the restaurants they ate at, or the concerts they booked?

It's a model that some stations might consider going to these days. It's essentially what's kept many religious and foreign-language stations going -- selling the time to somebody who goes out and finds his own sponsors.

The best example I know is Wolfman Jack, who bought out the time on XERB in Rosarito Beach, sold the spots, plugged the music, promoted nightclubs and Oldies collections ... and made a pile of cash. Locally, you could hear guys like Sly Stone doing it on KSOL ("...that record was brought to you by Tony's Record Shop, where you can buy it this week for only 35 cents"), and Bouncin' Bill Doubleday on KWBR promoting bands, records and chicken-and-ribs joints between every song.

Heck, Marty Lurie does it after every A's game, too. It sounds like every other thing he says is a trade-out for some product or establishment. (And I'm not knocking it -- that's a great business model for anybody who has the talent and the hustle, and can go out and get it done!)

[TheBigA]

It's a model that some stations might consider going to these days.

I agree, and it may be the way radio goes in the post-crash environment.   I expect we'll see a lot more stations offering brokered time to content providers who bring their own sponsors, rather than employing DJs who work 40 hour weeks with benefits packages.  If you are passionate enough about what you do to attract sponsors, you will have a place in radio.

I believe the professionalization of radio in the post-payola days of the 60s is what took a lot of heart and soul out of radio.   People did radio as a job, not a lifestyle, and they weren't connected to the music or the community.  All of this has led to where we are now.  There's no point in having a local DJ is he or she doesn't interact directly with the audience in some way.  Some of that can be accomplished online, but it has to continue with in-person appearances.  DJs need to approach their job the same way as a recording artist.  They should build a fan base for what they do, just like recording artists.  Otherwise, there's no point in having local DJs.  If you're just a faceless voice, you can (and will) be replaced by a computer.

[DavidKaye]

It's a model that some stations might consider going to these days. It's essentially what's kept many religious and foreign-language stations going -- selling the time to somebody who goes out and finds his own sponsors.

Frankly, it's the only model left, so I guess it means that radio is going full cycle back to its roots when Sybil True (Doc Herrold's wife) played records and plugged a record store wayyyyyy back in 1909. 

By the way, do you know anything about any plans for KCBS's 100th anniversary in April 2009?  It's only months away.

[Lkeller]

Following up on Jay and Llew's comments on promoting records and pay-for-play...

Remember back in the 1950s and 1960s when enterprising disc jockeys bought (or "brokered") time on local radio stations, went out and sold the ad time themselves, then played (and promoted) the music they played, or the restaurants they ate at, or the concerts they booked?

It's a model that some stations might consider going to these days. It's essentially what's kept many religious and foreign-language stations going -- selling the time to somebody who goes out and finds his own sponsors.

The best example I know is Wolfman Jack, who bought out the time on XERB in Rosarito Beach, sold the spots, plugged the music, promoted nightclubs and Oldies collections ... and made a pile of cash. Locally, you could hear guys like Sly Stone doing it on KSOL ("...that record was brought to you by Tony's Record Shop, where you can buy it this week for only 35 cents"), and Bouncin' Bill Doubleday on KWBR promoting bands, records and chicken-and-ribs joints between every song.

Heck, Marty Lurie does it after every A's game, too. It sounds like every other thing he says is a trade-out for some product or establishment. (And I'm not knocking it -- that's a great business model for anybody who has the talent and the hustle, and can go out and get it done!)

When I was about 14, I stumbled into a small daytime only station in LA - KTYM/1460 - "K-Time in the Daytime." The station was almost exclusively brokered shows, and some of them were very entertaining. I recently found an air check of one at reelradio.com - a soul music program called "The Godfrey Show" - broadcasting from a record store called Sam's and heavily promoting a Saturday night Dance Show in East LA (link below - though you need to pay an annual fee to listen).  Godfrey didn't promote one product, but hunted for sponsors, then bought the radio time.

By the 70s, the fun shows were mostly over on KTYM when most of their time was bought up by Roy Masters - a spiritual-religious kook who is very much alive to this day.

I think I mentioned Art Laboe in another context in another thread - he was the most successful example of this - becoming very affluent buying time at KTYM and XERB to sell his "Oldies but Goodies" records.  Laboe had been a regular DJ in the 50s, and again much later at KRTH - but for at least 2 decades, he made a living on brokered radio, and promoting Oldies concerts.

According to Wikipedia - Bob Smith (Wolfman Jack) turned a profit of up to $50,000 per month in the mid 60s (real money, then) - selling time to Southern California racetracks and evangelists...and finally lost the station when the Mexican owners of the station essentially forced him out, hoping to make that profit on their own without having to split it with the Wolfman.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XEPRS-AM



http://www.reelradio.com/pmaestro/index.html#godfreyktym66

[DavidKaye]

I think I mentioned Art Laboe in another context in another thread - he was the most successful example of this - becoming very affluent buying time at KTYM and XERB to sell his "Oldies but Goodies" records.  Laboe had been a regular DJ in the 50s, and again much later at KRTH - but for at least 2 decades, he made a living on brokered radio, and promoting Oldies concerts.

My mom bought me some "Oldies But Goodies" albums.  They seemes strange to me because the songs were familiar to me, but the versions on the records were all being sung by black people.  I'd heard "Earth Angel" by the Crewcuts (by then an oldie), but I'd never heard it by the Penguins.  I was fascinated by this.  It was later that I heard Art Laboe hawking the records on XERB.  My mom wouldn't have ordered them via XERB, so they must have been available in a record store early on. 

Given that most places in America weren't as culturally diverse as SF, I'd assume that Art Laboe sold way more albums via XERB than via record stores, at least until XERB went away. 
[/quote]

According to Wikipedia - Bob Smith (Wolfman Jack) turned a profit of up to $50,000 per month in the mid 60s (real money, then) - selling time to Southern California racetracks and evangelists...and finally lost the station when the Mexican owners of the station essentially forced him out, hoping to make that profit on their own without having to split it with the Wolfman.

[/quote]

I remember when the Wolfman used to be very crude and told teenage girl callers to get naked for him, etc.  It was quite a listen.  What amazed me was that he recorded these programs the night before and they were hand-carried to Rosarito Beach, since it was illegal to connect to a station outside of the U.S. for rebroadcast back into the U.S.  The shows certainly sounded live, and the callers probably didn't realize that they weren't on the air at the time they called. 

The Wolfman sold baby chicks, "45 fabulous hits for $4.45" and things like fuzzy dice for the rear view mirror.  Who knows, maybe he started that awful fad.  There were, of course, the racetrack programs and the preachers, but I remember a lot of that going away and XERB doing basically music shows in Spanish prior to 9pm each night.  The one I remember with the biggest cadre of preachers was XEROK and XEMO.  (Were they the same station?  I forget.)

For the most part I remember Wolfman promoting music shows, car dealers, and other sponsors in LA.  Aside from a few mail order things I don't recall him promoting things that would appeal to people much outside of LA.  At the time XERB came in hugely loud around here, even with KFAX on the next channel starting at 10pm when they used to sign back on.