Changes for KXBL-Big Country 99.5

[NightAire]

Well, I'll say that it WAS the sat jock, it was the BEST segue I've ever heard, tight and smooth.  The rest of the time, it's...  well, it sounds about like expect from satellite: most listeners won't be paying that much attention, but the "radio people" pick it up pretty easily.

I've been listening when I can since my last post, and while I really didn't WANT to like it, and I am FOR local jocks / content...

...darn it...

It sounds pretty good.

I like the music mix, in fact like it better than what they were doing before because it seems to go deeper and older.

The jocks are fine to good, no academy awards or anything yet but they do seem to speak affectionately about the music and that means a lot to a listener.

They do the weather regularly.  Actually, they do the weather a LOT.  Do they do the weather 3 times an hour?  4?  Holy crud, I'm getting a lot of weather updates!  Oh, well, that does qualify as "local" content.

This morning during the 5am hour I heard an Oklahoma ag-business update / report thingy.  Actually, I heard the report in one break and the sponsor tag in another...  not sure that was supposed to happen the way it did...  still, it was good content.

It appears somebody is genuinely trying to insert relevant content into the programming, not just leaving the station on auto-pilot.

I did hear an ID in the middle of the stopset (between national & local spots maybe?) which seems goofy ("remember, the station playing you all these commercials is..."), and they did a tribute to those in the military (good) into a clearly local ID (a little painful), into Stonewall Jackson's "Waterloo" (a tough stretch!).  I assume the idea was to tie the tribute to the song...  but the song has next to NOTHING to do with veterans (LYRICS: http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/classic-country/waterloo---stonewall-jackson-14944.html).

However, and it pains me to say this, I...  really do like the station, and figure I'll be listening MORE, not less.

*sigh*  I feel like I'm betraying my broadcasting brothers & sisters...

[NightAire]

(I seem to have lost the ability to edit posts...)

Nevermind about the local breaks; I had a guy at work who had some experience with them and said they do breaks, and I heard the midday girl do one a little bit ago (sounded like she was reading it cold!).  I'm sure that's what I heard Sunday.

That's pretty effective!

[radiosharpie]

The system is very slick.  The breaks are all voice tracked ahead.  Everything is laid out on the log so it flows together without the "local" stab delays that plague satellite programming.  The STORQ sytem is good that way.  I've not had a great concern with the programming, all though I think it will get tired.  My concern lies with the inability of the local audience to talk to the jocks.  Another local element has been removed from the market.  We'll see how it's recieved in the long run.  Ultimately, it doesn't matter what we write about.  What matters is how the audience enjoys it and gives back to the station.

[Bob Oshea]

The system is very slick.  The breaks are all voice tracked ahead.  Everything is laid out on the log so it flows together without the "local" stab delays that plague satellite programming.  The STORQ sytem is good that way.  I've not had a great concern with the programming, all though I think it will get tired.  My concern lies with the inability of the local audience to talk to the jocks.  Another local element has been removed from the market.  We'll see how it's recieved in the long run.  Ultimately, it doesn't matter what we write about.  What matters is how the audience enjoys it and gives back to the station.

KXBL is considered to be a second tier property, probably tertial at the corporate level.  Big Country was never going to be anything more than a niche format with no serious promotional dedication.  It was my and others experience that Big Country was only going to be allowed to flourish as long as it did not encroach on KVOO FM's listening audience.  Whenever we began to see numbers that were perceived to be a threat to KVOO FM, they would come rushing in and trash our music library either by dropping it down to about 250 songs or by making the library so old that the audience was over 65 years old.  Now people in their 60's spend money too, but the 35-64 crowd was pretty well driven back to KVOO FM at our expense.  I will never forgive them for it.  The disparity in pay alone was an insult.  Understand, I don't wish any of my former co-workers any bad luck.  I hope they all get rich.  Journal Broadcasting is an oxymoron.  They're primarily a newspaper publisher  conducting business like a bunch of radio wannabee's.

KXBL will continue to clickity-clack along because when it come right down to it, "it's about the music, stupid"!  I'm listening because the music is still fun to listen to.  At my age I don't really care about much of any of the rest of it.  So far I have no problem with the 'bird' broadcast.  Sounds good to me.  As far as KVOO FM or K-95 are concerned, I have never seriously listened to either station.  When I worked on KVOO-FM I listened because I had to.  I hated the music because it was about as country as Wayne Newton.  The girls either dress like rag dolls or hookers and the guys, with rare exception, all look like a bunch of drunks.   Maybe I'm being too harsh or maybe I just became bitter wtih the industry, I don't know.  I'll leave that for others to judge.

The Lyin' King,
Bob O'Shea 

[Zero Zagnut]

Bob, you're right, "Today's Country" isn't really "country" at all. It's a bad, weaker rehash of 80's pop. The worst kind of 80's pop, that lame Richard Marx crap and cheeseball 80's soundtrack nonsense. Think mid to late 80's and you get the picture. The chicks look like bag ladies most of the time or Cosmpolitan cover wannabes. The guys either look like Hank Jr. burnouts or prissy sissy boys. How many of these "men" wear what appears to be womens blouses in their videos? (Rascal Flatulence comes to mind, as well as Ty Herndon - and we all know what he turned out to be.) Then there's Toby Keith who looks just like the fat guy from Insane Clown Posse! And most of his catalog is that "celebrated ignorance" BS! "Yeehaw, I'm a goin' mud boggin' and noodlin' while I drink some beer and show my buddy's how to git R done"!  A few well-written songs pop through from time to time, but NONE of them will be classics and still be seeing air time in 20 years. It's like my dad always said, if you feed a prisoner rotten meat long enough, he'll begin to develop a taste for it. Sadly, this is what has happened to country radio and it's listeners at the hands of the buffoon gatekeepers in Nashville - young punks in their 20's who HATE country music in the first place and are embarrassed by it's rural roots.

[NightAire]

Zero, I agree with at least some of your description of today's country radio.  It's interesting to me because it feels that my age group is the one being programmed to.

Those who grew up in the 80s loved a mix of soft rock, harder rock, southern rock, dance, and a little urban influence.

By the end of the 80s / early 90s, rap was making serious inroads into the top 40 charts (and a few years after that gangsta rap would dominate) and grunge came in and took away our "shiny happy" pop / rock most of the children of the 80s loved.

Enter modern country.  By the mid to late 90s those teens of the 80s are becoming 26 - 34.  What's a format to do?

They start playing artists and songs that remind listeners of the 80s country crossovers, becoming slick pop / rock tunes with (maybe) a fiddle and a twang in the singer's voice...  and not much else to call the song country.

How do ACs respond?

By playing them, too!  Shania Twain, Faith Hill, LeAnn Rimes, even Garth Brooks (remember his KISS remake?).

So the youth take over top 40, 80s pop fans move to country...  but where do the country listeners go?

10 years ago they went to Big Country 1170.   Today I guess they go to Big Country 99.5.

I would have to disagree about the clothes, though...  take ONE look at The Porter Wagoner Show reruns on RFD-TV, look at all those sequins and pastels and tell me country men looked more "manly" 30 years ago!  loll...   

[cooptulsa]

NightAire:

I'm devastated! Wanted Porter to leave me one of his suits when he passed...never returned my e-mail!!

The paradigm is always shifting...every ten to fifteen years some major shifts happen and people bemoan "country isn't country anymore". Not to fear.
Remember...at one time it was Jimmie Rodgers paving the way!  Would you like that to be the prevalent sound?

Heard it when I got here in 81..."K95 really NOT country...plays Kenny, Anne Murray, etc..." Guess they didn't hear the early Reba stuff with John Conlee, Gene Watson and a rookied named Strait. Paradigm was shifting. Alabama changed the group/band thing forever in the early 80s. These detours are healthy. When all is said and done...look at country...there are and will always be foundational artists like Strait and Jackson...and new foundationals...like Keith Anderson, Trace Adkins, Toby Keith...plenty country for me! The roots are deep and won't die.

Bob O: regarding the "girl singers" (as Porter used to say!)...since when did Hooker dress ever bother you? The story I get from Miss Saigon, Ocean Dream and Chinamoon on you is quite the opposite! 

Personally...I think Taylor Swift is smokin'...and if she donned Minnie Pearl's dress and hat w/ price tag...a fantasy would be realized!!

[Bob Oshea]

Coop-
  Who told you about Miss Saigon?  Is no secret safe?  Clearly, NOTHING is sacred!

O'Shea
 

[cooptulsa]

And may this thread come to a happy ending!!!!   

[radiosharpie]

This thread may come to a happy ending but things are not through at the Journal cluster of stations.  There is more destruction to come.