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June 29 & July 6, 2009 -

• Remember the days when radio was a vital part of the national conversation? When a station like WABC or WIBG or WRKO could cut across demographic boundaries to bring entire communities together with music and personality? The radio industry spends a lot of time wondering where those days went - but for a few days late last week, it regained a bit of that old relevance in the wake of the death of one of radio's biggest stars.
• At the height of his own career in the eighties, of course, Michael Jackson transcended radio; it can even be argued that the boost his groundbreaking videos gave to MTV in its early years helped the TV network usurp the role that top-40 radio had long played in shaping America's musical tastes. None of that mattered, though, on Thursday evening. As word spread that Jackson had suffered a heart attack - and, not long afterward, of his death at the age of 50 - many radio stations all over the region, and the nation, quickly crossed format lines and dug out old CDs and even LPs as they launched into nonstop hours of Jackson's music.
• "Many" stations, mind you, and not "all," because the timing of Jackson's death, especially here in the east, pointed up the new reality of radio, circa 2009: when the music and the voicetracks on a radio station were programmed by someone miles away and hours before, it's much harder for that station to rise to the occasion by providing listeners with the music and the information they didn't know they needed ahead of time. (Note the demand for Jackson music in record stores and at online sites - a demand that radio was uniquely positioned to meet, immediately and efficiently.) But our purpose here this week is not to call out the stations that found themselves ill-prepared to react to the breaking news from Los Angeles; instead, we note just some of the ones that rose to the occasion:
• -In New York City, Jackson's music was all over the dial within minutes of his death. Urban stations, including WBLS (107.5) and WRKS (98.7), went wall-to-wall Jackson through the weekend; classic hits WCBS-FM (101.1) offered several all-Jackson hours on Thursday, followed by several songs an hour thereafter; we're told that even a few of the city's Spanish-language stations were playing Jackson's songs Thursday night.
• -Boston's WXKS-FM (107.9) and WJMN (94.5) are the descendants of two of the stations that played Jackson's music most heavily in the "Thriller" era, and both were heavy on Jackson's music after his death. So was WODS (103.3), where Barry Scott devoted his weekend "Lost 45s" show entirely to Jackson.
• -In Philadelphia, most of the FM dial was full of Jackson's music Thursday night, spanning the format spectrum from AC (WISX 106.1) to adult hits (WBEN-FM 95.7) to urban (WUSL 98.9, WDAS-FM 105.3, WRNB 107.9) to oldies (WOGL 98.1).
• -In Pittsburgh, PBRTV.com's Jason Togyer reports that Jackson music also crossed format lines, though it was oddly absent at young-skewing top-40 competitors WKST-FM (96.1) and WBZW (93.7) and in short supply early on at several of the city's voicetracked FMs. (Little WKHB 620 was live-and-local with nonstop Jackson tunes starting at 7:15 Thursday night, reports PD Clarke Ingram...)
• -Syracuse's WLTI (105.9) blew out the syndicated Delilah show to go wall-to-wall Jackson, reports CNYRadio.com, with PD Tom Mitchell and APD Brian Phillips rushing to get the songs loaded into the automation system at the last moment.
• -Here in Rochester, stations were oddly slow to start playing Jackson's music as the news broke on Thursday, but the spotlight (and the local TV news) was soon firmly focused on locally-owned urban WDKX (103.9). There was no need to go scrambling for songs there; Jackson tunes have been a staple on WDKX from its earliest days 35 years ago, and the station's phone lines were ringing nonstop with remembrances and requests all weekend as WDKX went wall-to-wall Jackson. (Buffalo's WBLK was also wall-to-wall Jackson, at least on Friday.)
• As your editor observed in a Boston Globe article Saturday, there aren't likely to be many other moments quite like this in radio's future, if only because it's hard to imagine any other artists who crossed rigid format boundaries to appeal to so many listeners for so many years. But for a few days, at least, it was refreshing to hear radio doing what it does best: being a true mass medium in a way that no MP3 player or webcast or cellphone can do. Is it too much to hope that some of that spark might last?
• In upstate NEW YORK, the Utica market's "River" is changing directions: Mindy Barstein's WXUR (92.7 Herkimer) is segueing from classic rock to active rock, and dropping Don Imus from morning drive in the process. While Imus moves to sister station WNRS (1420 Herkimer), Bill Keeler returns to morning drive on WXUR, with Frank McBride taking over Keeler's afternoon slot, followed by Justin Cortese at night. (And CNYRadio.com reports that WXUR's transmitter move to Smith Hill in Utica, giving it a class B1 signal that will make it a full-market player, is due to become a reality as early as mid-July.)
• Another Utica-market FM station received some vindication late last week, as FCC investigators reported they could find no sign of excessive RF radiation around the new tower site of EMF Broadcasting's WOKR (93.5 Remsen) in the town of Floyd, north of Rome. Town officials say they're still trying to get some answers about what's causing the mysterious illnesses in several homes near the tower, which residents blamed on WOKR's April move to the site. Neighbors tell the Utica Observer-Dispatch that they saw workers at the American Tower-owned facility shortly before the FCC's visit, and they remain suspicious.
• While he achieved fame in New York and later California, Ed McMahon never forgot his roots in the Merrimack Valley of MASSACHUSETTS, and so we remember him this week not only for his many years alongside Johnny and Doc, or for his career as a TV pitchman and host, but also for his earliest years in the business at Lowell's WLLH. McMahon's voice was heard on WLLH doing station IDs in the 1980s, and he returned to Lowell in 1994 to be honored with a live broadcast on WLLH (alongside then-morning host Paul Sullivan) - and with a park bench at Middlesex Community College, too. McMahon died last Tuesday (June 23) at 86.
• Another obituary overshadowed by the week's big celebrity deaths leads our PENNSYLVANIA news this week: Irv Homer began his talk career by leasing time on WXUR (690/100.3) in Media in the late 1960s, then moved on to WEEZ (1590) in Chester before hitting the big time in 1975 with a slot on WWDB-FM (96.5), where he became a staple of Philadelphia talk radio for a quarter of a century. After WWDB exited the talk format, Homer continued to host a show on suburban WBCB (1490 Levittown-Fairless Hills), where he was still working at the time of his death last week. Homer, 86, suffered a heart attack while speaking at Eastern University Wednesday night. He died shortly afterward at Bryn Mawr Hospital.

June 27, 2005 -

• The latest chapter in the ongoing saga of one of New England's longest-running unlicensed stations unfolded early last Wednesday morning in Brattleboro, VERMONT, when federal agents entered the unoccupied Main Street studios of Radio Free Brattleboro (or, as they prefer, "rfb") and seized much of the station's equipment, silencing the station's signal at 107.9 and its web stream.
• The move came amidst what amounts to a turf war among federal officials in the Green Mountain State. In Brattleboro, Judge J. Garvan Murtha has been slowly working through a civil case filed against the station by the FCC, and it appears that the Commission grew tired of waiting for action there. The FCC filed a motion for summary judgment in that case last month, but in the meantime, the assistant U.S. attorney handling the case obtained a warrant Tuesday from a federal magistrate in Burlington to enter the station's offices.
• Photos posted later that morning on the community website ibrattleboro.com showed the studio missing its control board and other equipment, with scattered wiring and a lone microphone left behind.
• In Bellows Falls, the Great Falls Community Broadcasting Company put WOOL-LP (100.1) on the air Saturday, providing a community voice to a town whose only licensed full-power signal is a simulcast from White River Junction. Check "Wool Radio" out - they stream, too - at www.wool.fm.
• A small NEW HAMPSHIRE AM station is changing hands again, as Bill Sheehan's Balance View LLC files to sell WSNH (900 Nashua) to Absolute Broadcasting LLC, headed by Tom Monaghan, for $925,000. Absolute has been programming the "ESPN 900" sports format on WSNH since last year.
• As the construction permit for a Down East MAINE FM station approaches expiration, owner Lyle Evans is trying to salvage his WRMO (93.7 Milbridge) in at least a reduced form. WRMO's construction permit was granted July 17, 2002, calling for a class B facility with 50 kW/64 meters. But with the CP set to expire July 17, 2005, Evans is asking the FCC to approve a much smaller WRMO, just to get the station on the air. As a minimum class A facility, WRMO would sign on with 130 watts at 2 meters from the center of Milbridge, just to get on the air before the deadline and to buy some time to build out a more powerful facility.
• In MASSACHUSETTS, rumor became reality as WRKO (680 Boston) announced a multi-year deal with the Boston Celtics, who'll move over next season from WWZN (1510), their flagship for the past four years. Meanwhile, WRKO and executive producer Rich Carbery have parted ways after several years together; no word yet on his next move.
• We're now hearing "mid-July" as the projected launch date for ESPN radio on WAMG (890 Dedham) and WLLH (1400 Lowell & Lawrence); new owner J Sports closed on the $9 million purchase from Mega last week, but Mega's Spanish programming continues to run while the new ownership gets its programming ready to roll.
• In the Catskill Mountains of NEW YORK, a venerable pair of community stations is changing hands, as the Blabey family sells WVOS (1240 Liberty) and WVOS-FM (95.9 Liberty) to Scott Kaniewski's Watermark Broadcasting for $1.7 million. The sale will put the WVOS stations under the same roof as longtime competitor WSUL (98.3 Monticello), which Watermark bought last year; the three are the only commercial stations originating programming in Sullivan County.
• In New York City, fans of the oldies at WCBS-FM (101.1) aren't going quietly - about 150 of them turned up outside the station's Times Square studios last Tuesday to call for a return to the format.
• A station sale leads off our PENNSYLVANIA coverage this week, and it's once again in the State College market, where Nick Galli's 2510 group sheds WBLF (970 Bellefonte). The station, formerly a simulcast of talker WRSC (1390 State College) and more recently simulcasting oldies WOWY (97.1 University Park), goes to Magnum Broadcasting, which owns WPHB (1260 Phillipsburg) and WUBZ (105.9 Phillipsburg).
• And we're delighted to report that the oldest high school station in the country, WHHS Havertown, is back on the air at its new home of 99.9. WHHS was displaced from its spot at 107.9 by the debut of WRNB (107.9 Pennsauken) last year, but with the help of WRNB owner Radio One (and alumnus Steve Hemphill, the engineer who built the WA2XMN transmitter at the Armstrong Tower), it's won special temporary authority from the FCC to get back on the air at 99.9 while it waits for its application for a license at that frequency to be granted.
• The big news out of CANADA came from Ottawa, where the CRTC is granting four new licenses in the National Capital Region. Newcap, which already has top 40 CIHT ("Hot 89.9"), gets 5.2 kW on 88.5 for a modern rock station. Evanov (aka "CKMW") will put "The Jewel" on the air with 700 watts at 98.5, playing a mix of standards, easy listening and folk that's supposed to be similar to the company's "Foxy" CKDX (88.5) in the Toronto market. Radio Nord (which has CHOT-TV, CFGS-TV and CHLX-FM) gets a French pop-rock/urban station, with transmitters at 96.5 (1750 watts) in Gatineau and 107.5 (250 watts) in Buckingham. And Jack McGaw and Robert Stopells were granted a low-power tourist information station, though they need to find a new frequency. (It's getting to be a crowded dial up there...)

June 30, 2000 -

• (no issue)

New England Radio Watch, June 22-23, 1995

• From our "Huh?!??!?" file this week: Wednesday morning (6/21), WCLB 105.7 Framingham-Boston switched calls very abruptly...to WKLB. Nothing has changed with the station's country format, or with the on-air team (though they are running the satellite-delivered "After Midnight" all-night show now). A call to WCL-- er, WKLB late last night produced the response, "We did research that found out people were getting confused by the "C," so we changed it to "K."" Mm-hmmm. My guess is that the confusion was in the ratings diaries, between WCLB and classical WCRB...and maybe even with similar-sounding suburban country WCAV-FM. The official calls, btw, have to be WKLB-FM, since WKLB(AM) is 1290 in Manchester KY.
• AM 550 in Pawtucket (Providence) RI remains off the air. I last noticed them on the air around May 30, so that means they're coming up on 3 weeks dark. Back Bay Broadcasters (WBNW 590 in Boston, WARA 1320/WWKX 106.3 in the Prov. market) is buying 550 and reportedly plans to change calls from WICE to WPNW,
  simulcasting WBNW's Bloomberg news/biz talk format. WMBR (88.1) in Cambridge was briefly off the air early this week, but returned Tuesday afternoon June 20 from its new directional antenna on the MIT campus. The power increase from 360 to 720 watts will reportedly happen very soon.
• WUAE 99.7 Wakefield has applied for the WDGE calls, to fit their tagline "The Edge." I have a WUAE legal on tape, so they're welcome to change whenever they'd like :-)
• Just barely off-topic: WSBK-TV in Boston is ending its 10pm newscast effective August 6. The newscast debuted in 1993, and was produced at WBZ-TV. WSBK is now a UPN affiliate, and owner Viacom thought the presence of a WBZ-branded newscast was diluting the station's new "UPN 38" identity. Rumor has New England Cable News switching from producing a 10pm cast for WFXT-Fox 25...to doing one
  for WSBK, bearing the "UPN 38 News" identity.
• And finally, a death to report: Many of you have heard or heard of John Garabedian, the host of the syndicated "Open House Party" and one-time owner of WGTR Marlboro MA. His father, John N. Garabedian, died June 8 at age 94. John N. worked for his son at WGTR as the station's treasurer, after retiring as vice president of John H. Pray and Sons.