Re: Boston's Newsradio Void

[Steve & Barb Sawyer <steve5@tiac.net>]

Bill Piacentini wrote:

2) Given WBZ's impressive numbers I am surprised a competitor (who's left?)

> doesn't try to eat away at those numbers instead of chasing formats that
> don't work (read: don't produce double-digit numbers). It's a perfect time
> to have an FM news and information station in Boston playing AC-type music
> interspersed with news every twenty minutes, 24/7. I am sure it would blow
> WBZ out of the water (at least the water that fell this past weekend!). Why
> not team up with WB56, Fox25, (Ch. 5(?), Ch. 7(?)), or even NECN to enhance
> their stature by promoting their full-time commitment to news?

WROR (98.5) circa 1980: Joe Martelle Mornings, Jim Roberts 10-2, Larry Justice
2-6 -- Jeanette Curr w/news...  Didn't they have Harvey Leonard's weather?  I
thought WROR's A/C format was fantastic, far better than WVBF (at least AFTER
that switch to fM 105 from F-105.  What an abortion that first AC format sounded
like..... Jockless) or Majic 106.7 (Ok, was majic on the air then, or was it
still 'BZ-FM?)

That format.  That's what would work to beat WBZ today, although I don't think
any station would touch that format with a 10 foot pole.

>From a music standpoint, traditional AC as we remember it from the 70s & early
80's was a very mellow sound, with a heavy MOR gold rotation (Herb Alpert, Dionne
Warwick, Jim Croce and the like).  To duplicate the format today, musically, a
station would have to play The Wallflowers on the same plate with Barry
Manilow.   Yuk!.  (Somebody get me a Copacabana!!!)

As far as the news goes, I think the point has been made that most stations don't
have the budget to spend on a full time local news staff, even if it were only to
support an AC music station.  However, I do think that if a station were to
attempt this kind of well-rounded AC format, it would bury anything else playing
in Boston, including "If it's happening Now..."

Steve Sawyer

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