WBZ changes

[Laurence Glavin]

>----- Original Message -----
>From: Garrett Wollman
>Sent: 01/22/12 01:43 PM
>To: bri@bostonradio.org
>Subject: WBZ changes

 >I've noted some changes on the air at WBZ that seem to have escaped >note here.... >1) It looks like Rod Fritz and Laurie Kirby are now the permanent >anchors of the mid-day shift. I think this is the first time they've >actually had a sufficiently consistent anchor team on middays to make >promos for that shift since Jay McQuaide left some years ago. >2) They are no longer using the Gary LaPierre-voiced legal ID, >although the new ID (about half a second shorter) is still being >buried between two spots about a minute before the top. >3) They are running the "CBS Evening News" audio from 6:30 to 7:00 -- >a move so idiotic it must have come from CBS corporate. Not only is >the TV nightly news not written or produced for radio, 6:30 is still >well within the bounds of PM drive-time for many of us. If I'm lucky >enough to get out of work early, I want to hear traffic, weather, and >news, in that order, not some four-minute thumbsucker piece on the >economy that I can't even !
 properly understand because of the missing >pictures. >4) In general, I feel like I'm hearing a lot less of Mike Coleman's >voice and production style. >Thoughts, anyone? >-GAWollman A few tiumes this past week, Mary Blake did the midday news and stated that she was sitting in for Laurie Kirby. (If a person stands while he or she delivers the news, is that person still "sitting in"?; well you said you wanted "thoughts. You didn't say they had to be cogent). On a station with a primarily "news reader" format, who cares who the "reader" is? A couple of months ago, I mentioned that the great Dave Faneuf is now doing weekday mornings at WBUR most of the time. But on days when somebody else is doing the news inserts and other work during that shift, people don't ordinarily say they're sitting in for Dave. Another development\non-developmeent at WBZ-AM: first they went non-IBOC, and then a few days later, they're at it again. Some have reported that the station sounded better dur!
 ing the period when it was off. Maybe marginally on my BEST AM radio, the GE portable that doesn't seem to be a Superradio, but behaves like one; it's the receiver I used to pick up LTAR on WJIB eons ago (sigh).