Radio One

[Scott D Fybush <fybush@world.std.com>]

How ironic to have all this discussion of Radio One (and of WBAL,
for that matter) on a day when I've just returned from a visit
to Washington and Baltimore...

On Radio One: Don't expect a simulcast on AM and FM.  It's just
not the way this company plays the game.  In Washington, they're
running no fewer than four urban formats:

WYCB 1340 - black gospel
WOL 1450 - black talk
WKYS 93.9 - mainstream R&B, some rap (but nothing too hardcore)
WMMJ 102.3 - softer R&B aimed at an older, female audience

(And mind you, that's just *half* the market's black-oriented
stations -- Howard University's top-rated WHUR-FM, Infinity's 
gospel WPGC and rhythmic CHR WPGC-FM, and Clear Channel's 
jammin' oldies WJMO are all players, too)

As for Bawlmer, Radio One owns:

WOLB 1010 - talk // WOL 1450
WWIN 1400 - gospel
WERQ 92.3 - rhythmic CHR
WWIN-FM 95.9 - softer R&B

I wouldn't be surprised at all to see WILD(AM) go to some
combination of talk and R&B oldies, with WILD-FM (no, I don't
know for sure, but why buy AM 1090 if you don't make better 
use of the "WILD" brand name?) going for the younger audience.

As for WBAL, I had a chance to see both its studio building 
(on Television Hill, beneath the old 2/11/13 candelabra and
the mammoth new tower for DTV -- it's hard to miss the huge
"W B A L" letters on the roof as you drive by on I-83) and
its transmitter, complete with the WBAL sign on the old white
building and the three towers out back.  (Not quite the nicest
site of the trip, though; that honor goes to WTEM 980, whose
Art Deco brick building still says "WRC" on the front, just
as RCA intended it to!)

Unlike previous trips, sunset listening to 1030 this time
produced nothing but a bunch of noise at first after WWGB's
sign-off (which consisted, naturally, of turning off the 
transmitter mid-song with no ID...)  WBZ didn't come in for
another half-hour or so, and not well even then.

More on the DC trip next NERW...

-s