In this week’s issue… Howie Carr: The Next Chapter – Philly FM goes “Boom” – Farewell, Tom Magliozzi – NYC translator tries again – “Mr. G” leaves radio – Buddy’s back in town – Champlain Valley move-in on the air
Jump to: ME – NH – VT – MA – RI – CT – NY – NJ – PA – Canada
Remember when talk radio ruled the roost? If you needed any further evidence for the decline and fall of the format beyond the takedown that former Clear Channel talk honcho Darryl Parks delivered a few weeks back, you’ll find a textbook case for talk’s near-irrelevance along the banks of the Charles River in MASSACHUSETTS.
Once upon a time, WRKO (680) set the tone for political dialogue in greater Boston. Back in 1986, “THE Talk Station” was such a potent political force on Beacon Hill that it very famously drove a referendum repealing the state’s seat-belt law to success, led by the dean of talk in town, the late Jerry Williams.
So there’s a tremendous irony in the good news that Williams’ successor in the WRKO afternoon slot, Howie Carr, had his belt on when he flipped his car on the Mass Pike on election day last Tuesday. But the fact that Carr walked out of Mass General a few hours later with just some bruises may well be the only good news to be found in Carr’s world, or in WRKO’s, at the moment.
As we’ve been noting for some time now, Carr’s contract with WRKO has finally come to the end of its most recent extension, leaving him free at long last to…well, that’s the problem, isn’t it? Unlike the last few times Carr has flirted with a break from the station that launched his radio career way back in 1994, the landscape into which a newly-independent Carr now drives is remarkably barren. It’s been almost two years since Greater Media pulled the plug on its FM talker, WTKK (96.9), arguably the result of its inability to extricate Carr from what proved to be an iron-clad WRKO contract. The only commercial spoken-word stations now on the Boston FM dial are talking sports, not politics – and both WRKO’s Entercom clustermate WEEI-FM (93.7) and CBS Radio’s competitor, WBZ-FM (98.5) now draw far more revenue, profit and attention than WRKO has pulled in for years.
Consider Tuesday’s election returns: while Republican Charlie Baker pulled ahead of Democrat Martha Coakley for the governor’s office, Baker’s relatively moderate social views are a world apart from the hard-edged politics WRKO churns out daily on Jeff Kuhner’s local morning show, Carr’s afternoon show and the syndicated Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin shows that fill much of the weekday schedule. Of the ballot initiatives that passed, the largest margin went to a paid sick-time mandate – and at the statehouse and Congressional levels, whatever influence talk radio once wielded is hard to discern amidst a sea of blue.
There are, in short, no real winners to be found in the next chapter of Mr. Carr vs. Entercom. After a few days of recuperation, Carr is set to launch his new syndicated show today, via Global Media Services, but it doesn’t appear the show will be carried by WRKO. Without WRKO, even in its present diminished form, Carr loses much of his ability to reach a Boston audience. Sure, there’s streaming (and we’d be more than a little surprised if he doesn’t at least appear on his other employer’s BostonHeraldRadio.com pretty quickly), and there’s rimshot coverage from his Worcester affiliate, WCRN (830), and even the potential of buying time on a third-rate signal such as WUFC (1510). But as much as Carr belittled WRKO’s signal over the years, it’s the only game in town for AM talk in New England’s biggest market, and Carr’s voice won’t be heard very well without it.
Carr at least appears to be keeping his dozen or so affiliates around New England, including fairly prominent talkers such as WGAN in Portland, where he can at least claim one Election Day win with the re-election of Republican governor Paul LePage.
And for WRKO, the options for replacing Carr are bleak at best. The station hasn’t had much luck launching talk careers of late. Michele McPhee came over from WTKK, but decided to pursue print and TV instead of radio. Kuhner is an acquired taste, at best. Might WTKK retread Michael Graham return to New England from his current gig with Cumulus in Atlanta? Will Barry Armstrong’s Financial Exchange programming take over more of WRKO’s airtime by assuming Carr’s afternoon slot? Or will WRKO go syndicated, perhaps picking up Sean Hannity if Carr displaces him from his current slot on WUFC?
(And it’s not a very good week for the folks behind WUFC’s current talk format, either: “Dr. K” and his lineup vanished abruptly from what had been their flagship station, WILC 900 in Laurel, Maryland, apparently because of an inability to pay for the time they were leasing there. How much longer can they afford to remain on the air at Boston’s 1510, with or without Carr?)
In the end, it’s hard to really imagine any of these decisions mattering much in the long run. While Williams and his colleagues in their heyday (and yes, even Carr in his earlier years) commanded millions of dollars in revenue and top slots in the ratings, the next chapter for both Carr and WRKO is likely to be where New York’s WABC and WOR now live: somewhere down around a 1 share.
As Carr himself wrote in his election-night obituary for the career of Scott Brown (another of the losing candidates he supported on the air):
There’s an old saying that it’s better to be lucky than good. Which is true, right up to the moment that your luck runs out.
For Howie Carr, that moment appears to be at hand – and for WRKO, it seems to be approaching pretty quickly, too.
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*Winter means winter weather – and this winter, we have something special for you. Come back to fybush.com tomorrow for our exclusive Winter Weather Preview, a new feature from a new contributor to the site, WHEC-TV chief meteorologist Kevin Williams. Kevin’s part of the radio landscape around here, too, and on Tuesday he’ll offer up his expertise and tell you what your listeners will be experiencing, weather-wise, in the next few months.
Winter also means the arrival of a new Tower Site Calendar, which is why we once again take a pause from the news to draw your attention to the Fybush.com Store, where Lisa’s been busy filling the virtual shelves with some goodies you’re sure to enjoy this holiday season.
The calendar, of course, is the star of the show, and the upcoming 2015 edition will enliven any wall. We’ll begin previewing some of the highlights in a series of Tower Site of the Week Extras, starting this Wednesday here at fybush.com. It’s about to come back from the printer, and we’ll be shipping yours to you by mid-November if you get your order in now. (Don’t forget to check out our special signed, numbered limited edition!)
But don’t stop at the calendar when you’re checking out the store this year – we’ve got a great selection of Arcadia Publishing’s photographic history books from all over the region, including Dr. Donna Halper’s “Boston Radio,” Peter Kanze and Alec Cumming’s “New York City Radio” and a small number of copies of the recently released “Ithaca Radio” personally signed by co-author Peter King Steinhaus during his recent visit to Rochester. (That’s Peter and yours truly at the book-signing event – and yes, that’s an actual 2015 calendar in the flesh!)
We’ve also got the National Radio Club’s always timely AM Radio Log, back issues of the calendar you might have missed, and we’ll soon be offering enlarged prints of popular calendar images, too! And the best part? All your purchases at the Fybush.com Store go right toward helping us keep doing what we do here at NorthEast Radio Watch and Tower Site of the Week (and toward recovering from what’s been a difficult year behind the scenes!)
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*The week’s other big story came from eastern PENNSYLVANIA, where Radio One’s surprise Philadelphia-market format change on Thursday may be just the first chapter in a bigger story.
As usual, our content partner RadioInsight was first to catch Radio One’s domain registrations for “Boom” in Philadelphia, which came just as the company was dismissing the entire airstaff at what had been straight-ahead urban “Hot 107.9” (WPHI Pennsauken NJ) and just a few hours before the station’s flip to classic hip-hop as “Boom 107.9.”
This is Radio One’s second “Boom,” hot on the heels of its Houston launch at KROI (92.1) when that noble attempt at all-news collapsed earlier this fall – and RadioInsight has been one of the few places to note that “Boom” isn’t Radio One’s trademark in the US. The rights to that name belong to CBS Radio, and Radio One is reportedly licensing them for use in both Houston and Philadelphia.
So what’s the bigger story? Here we enter speculation mode, but it’s an informed sort of speculation: with the CBS/Beasley swap set to close by year’s end, did the end of “Hot” just clear the way for a big move at one of its two big urban-flavored competitors? More specifically, is the intellectual property of Beasley’s rhythnic top-40 “Wired” (WRDW-FM 96.5) heading into Radio One’s hands?
If that happens – and it’s far from certain at this point – it would accomplish two goals: for Radio One, it would return some current nusic to a cluster that’s now mainly aiming at older listeners, via “Boom” on 107.9, “Old School 100.3” (WRNB) with R&B oldies on the biggest signal in the group, and black gospel on “Praise” WPPZ (103.9). Would Radio One sacrifice one of those formats to pick up “Wired”? It wouldn’t be the first time Radio One has salvaged a top-40 format from another group’s castoffs – in Indianapolis, WNOW-FM (100.9) carries on the “Now” format that used to be on Emmis’ WNOU (93.1).
And just as Emmis ditched “Now” to move news-talk WIBC from AM to FM, the likely move for CBS would be to install its KYW all-news programming on 96.5 when (and if!) it casts Wired aside. Can it make that happen before the winter weather that’s usually KYW’s bread and butter?
*Elsewhere in the Keystone State last week, there are Radio People on the Move in Pittsburgh, where CBS Radio has moved “Wookie” from nights/assistant music director to afternoons/music director/assistant PD at WDSY (107.9), filling the void left by the retired Stoney Richards. Replacing Wookie at nights on Y108 is Elista, who was handling nights and assistant MD duties down the hall on WBZZ (Star 100.7) and had been doing some weekend airshifts on Y108 as well.
Lots of LPFM and translator news from around the state: in Erie, “Hand Up” has been granted a construction permit on 95.5. Montgomery County has picked callsigns for three of its new low-power FMs: WEMQ-LP is a new call for 92.1 Horsham, while WRDY-LP (106.5 Eagleville) and WEMZ-LP (105.7 Plymouth) have swapped their originally-assigned calls. Those are just three of the five LPs that will be part of the county’s emergency network when it’s all done.
On the translator front, W278BR (103.5 Pottstown) has been granted a license to cover, relaying WPAZ (1370 Pottstown). At the other end of the state, Colonial Media + Entertainment has taken W259BO (99.7) silent from Farmer’s Valley (at the site of parent WXMT 106.3, between Smethport and Port Allegany) and has applied to move it westward to Bradford, south of Olean, where it would operate on 99.3.
*Aside from Howie Carr, the week’s big news from MASSACHUSETTS came on Monday with the news that Tom Magliozzi, half of the Car Talk team of “Click and Clack,” had died of complications of Alzheimer’s disease, at age 77. Magliozzi and his brother Ray were just a couple of guys running a garage in Cambridge back in the 1970s, when WBUR (90.9) needed hosts for its unassuming little weekend advice show, and you don’t need us to tell you what an institution they built, first locally and then nationally.
NPR offered up a special memorial “Car Talk” show over the weekend, and they’ll continue to offer “Best of Car Talk” installments (as they’ve been doing since the Magliozzis semi-retired back in 2012) for as long as public radio stations want to keep carrying the show.
In Worcester, it’s a big autumn for former WSRS (96.1) morning host Heidi West: in September, she married John Dowd Jr. (aka longtime programmer Jay Beau Jones), and now she’s joined the airstaff at Christian top-40 WYQQ (90.1 Charlton).
One that slipped by us back in October: storm damage on Mount Tom took down the pole on which Entercom’s WEEI relay, WWEI (105.5 Easthampton), has its tower. The station operated from an auxiliary site temporarily while putting up a new pole and antenna, and all is back to normal there now.
*If Buddy Cianci isn’t (a) in office or (b) behind bars, he’s living on the air in RHODE ISLAND – and since (a) turned out not to be a viable option after Providence voters rejected his latest bid for mayor and (b) he’s keeping his nose clean for the moment without a political office to get him in legal trouble, Cianci’s back on Cumulus talker WPRO (630)/WEAN (99.7 Wakefield-Peace Dale) in the afternoons, until and unless he finds a way to put (a) and (b) back together.
*In CONNECTICUT, Revival Christian Ministries doesn’t have many listeners to its main signal, WSGG (89.3 Norfolk), but that small signal feeds translators in bigger markets around the state, with two of them now seeking upgrades. W252AV (98.3 Meriden) has applied to move from low-lying downtown Meriden up to the nearby West Peak tower farm, where it would shift to 98.5 with 250 watts aimed at Hartford. In New London, W283BW (104.5) would go to 250 watts DA from the site of Red Wolf’s WBMW (106.5 Pawcatuck CT), its parent station, with plans to relay WICH (1310 Norwich) having apparently been abandoned. The 98.5 application from West Peak calls for the use of Red Wolf’s WMRQ (104.1) as a primary – is there a deal here to give Red Wolf’s “La Bomba” (heard on WMRQ’s HD2 and several translators) a new powerful West Peak home, perhaps in exchange for putting 104.5 in New London on Red Wolf’s tower there?
*In MAINE, Randi Kirshbaum adds a new job to her business cards, picking up “brand manager” duties at Saga’s WCLZ (98.9 North Yarmouth) to go with that same job she’s been holding at sister station WMGX (93.1 Portland). Kirshbaum takes over from Ethan Minton, who’s leaving radio to work for the Midcoast Hunger Prevention Program.
*It took a few years to make it happen, but a VERMONT FM station has relocated to the Burlington market. WECM (104.3 Hartford) has been silent on and off from the Upper Valley for the last few years since changing hands from Nassau (where it was operating as oldies WWOD) to Vox to the Electromagnetic Company.
After some protracted FCC battles with Hall Communications over its plan to move to 104.3C3 from Keeseville, New York, across Lake Champlain from Burlington, WECM finally signed on last week from its new Burlington-market site, up on the same hill just northwest of Keeseville where Hall’s WKOL (105.1 Plattsburgh) transmits. The new WECM is stunting with Christmas music right now as “Ho-Ho 104,” with a 25 kW/289′ DA signal that’s reportedly getting across the lake into Burlington quite nicely.
*Another longtime morning voice is off the air in NEW YORK City. Irv Gikofsky has been doing the weather as “Mr. G” on both radio and TV for decades. But while he’s still being seen on WPIX (Channel 11) weeknights at 10, his 37-year run at WCBS-FM (101.1) came to an end Tuesday, when he announced his departure from the radio station’s Scott Shannon morning show.
“Mr. G” says the move is his own choice, simplifying a schedule that found him working nights at channel 11 and getting just a few hours of sleep before going on the air the next morning at CBS-FM.
Meanwhile in translator-land, River Vale Media Foundation is trying again to squeeze its application for 101.5 in Manhattan around interference protests from Townsquare’s WKXW (101.5 Trenton, NEW JERSEY). “New Jersey 101.5” has been aggressive about keeping its channel as clean as possible in the fringe areas of northern New Jersey where it gets listeners even on a spotty signal. It’s been protesting every attempt from River Vale to get a CP granted on 101.5 across the Hudson – but in its latest attempt, the translator says it’s found a way to avoid putting any interfering signal into New Jersey at all. The new plan calls for 10 watts into a very directional antenna array mounted atop the Trump World Tower near the UN Building. Most of that signal would be aimed out over Queens and Brooklyn. On paper, the translator would relay WVIP (93.5 New Rochelle) or one of its HD subchannels; in the real world, similarly small signals have been selling for seven-figure amounts in the smaller market of Chicago, and so the stakes are high for River Vale if it can get the 101.5 signal granted and then sold.
*In Westchester County, Mary DeSilva has been promoted to PD at “WFAS-FM,” aka W232AL (94.3), the translator replacement for the former 103.9 in White Plains. DeSilva had already moved over from Pamal’s WHUD (100.7 Peekskill) to take over mornings on 94.3.
*LPFM news from upstate: in Binghamton, Mt. St. Francis Hermitage, now a singleton on 97.7, has been granted a construction permit for an LPFM there. In Rochester, New Day Global Mission has picked WARI-LP as its callsign.
(And while we’re running down the list of broadcasters-turned-Election Day contenders, we note that longtime WHEC-TV anchor Rich Funke easily won his race for New York state Senate against Democratic incumbent Ted O’Brien; downstate, Rob Astorino’s consulting ties to Townsquare Media in the Hudson Valley briefly became an issue in his race to unseat governor Andrew Cuomo, but Astorino’s radio connections (including a stint as PD of SiriusXM’s Catholic Channel) didn’t appear to be the deciding issue in his loss Tuesday.
*My Broadcasting wasted no time putting its latest small-market signal on the air in CANADA. Northwest of Toronto, CKMO (101.5 Orangeville) began testing last week with Christmas music. It will become the latest “My FM” outlet on December 26 when it makes its official debut.
Not far away in Scarborough, on the east side of metro Toronto, “8041393 Canada” won out in a battle for the 102.7 frequency in the region. Its application for a multiethnic (mostly South Asian) station to be called “East FM” won CRTC approval last week. The new signal will run 472 watts average/1.2 kW max DA/72.6 m. Its approval means that several other 102.7 contenders are out of luck, including applications for power boosts at CIWS in Stouffville (“Whistle”) and CJVF (102.7 Scarborough). As an unprotected low-power license, CJVF may have to look for another new frequency now, after having already been displaced from 105.9 by the new CFMS.
In Montreal, Groupe Medias Pam (aka CPAM Radio Union) is unveiling a new identity as it gets ready to take over troubled CJMS (1040 St.-Constant). While it has committed to retaining the country music on 1040, the new branding for the station, reports Canadian Radio News, is just “The Original 1040 AM.”
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WE’RE WELL INTO 2025…
Do you have your Tower Site Calendar yet?
Now is the time to get it — and we have reduced the price. It’s now 20 percent off!
This year’s cover is a beauty — the 100,000-watt transmitter of the Voice Of America in Marathon, right in the heart of the Florida Keys. Both the towers and the landscape are gorgeous.
Other months feature some of our favorite images from years past, including some Canadian stations and several stations celebrating their centennials (buy the calendar to find out which ones!).
We have quite a few calendar left and are still shipping throughout the week.
The proceeds from the calendar help sustain the reporting that we do on the broadcast industry here at Fybush Media, so your purchases matter a lot to us here – and if that matters to you, now’s the time to show that support with an order of the Tower Site Calendar. (And we have the Broadcast Historian’s Calendar for 2025 ready to ship, too. Why not order both?)
Visit the Fybush Media Store and place your order now for the next calendar, get a great discount on previous calendars, and check out our selection of books and videos, too!