On June 17, consultant Gary Berkowitz posted this on Facebook and got a lot of attention:
“Everybody talks about doing this, and now it’s going to happen. The return of classic Top 40! For my radio friends. This is a remote opportunity. Classic Hits playing ’70s-’80s (a few ’60s and ’90s too). We are looking for middays (think Ron Lundy type) and nights (Big Ron O’Brien, Banana Joe types). Shifts are 4 hours M-F and an occasional weekend.
“This station is designed to have classic Top 40 jocks. Station uses Zetta, so you’ll be able to do breaks over the intros. Jingles & reverb too. It worked then and we think it will work now. Are you ready to join us? Do you get Top 40 delivery? Prior Top 40 experience required. Scoped airchecks and resume to onairjobs2@gmail.com.”
Radio station job postings don’t always produce a ton of usable responses these days. Berkowitz’s Facebook post alone got more than 150 responses, many of them from applicants. (There was likely a larger contingent not willing to announce their intent on social media.)
On July 2, Berkowitz posted a picture with former WPRO-FM Providence, R.I., morning man Giovanni and JAM Creative Productions’ Jonathan Wolfert asking, “Wouldn’t you like to know what we were talking about?”
On August 21, Berkowitz posted again:
“Classic Top 40 is back in N-E-P-A on Times-Shamrock’s WQFM [Scranton/Wilkes Barre]. Welcome to the New 92 Mix-FM: the Best Variety of the 70s, 80s & 90s. Rick Shockley, mornings. Logan, middays. Jack Diamond, afternoons. Giovanni, nights. John Ray, music. My dream team is on the air. Jingles from JAM Creative Productions. Voiceover: Earl Mann and Jen Sweeney. Check it out!” (Mann is also the voice of Canada’s CKHD, profiled earlier this year, for channeling the ‘80s in a similar way.)
The WQFM launch is a feel-good that veteran radio people needed now, coming on the heels of both the loss of WCBS-AM New York, and the previous day’s announcement that Beasley’s Classic Rock WBOS Boston was swapping frequencies, moving onto the translators of Bloomberg Radio’s local programming. It wasn’t the only good news this week. CINA Radio Group kept Classic Hits (although a newer version) on its newly purchased CKWW Windsor, Ont., and brought it back to CKOC Hamilton, Ont., with some local airstaff in each case.
92 Mix-FM arrives in a market of anomalies, including the lack of a single major-group-owned Classic Hits powerhouse. The biggest Classic Hits station is the top-five WWRR (The River), nominally Classic Rock, but really closer to Classic Hits in the original “Classic Rock, but deeper and poppier” sense of the term. WGMF (Gem 99/100) is pulling a 2.6 with a Classic Hits format heavier on the ’70s than most current stations. WQFM’s own sister, WEZX (Rock 107), is No. 2 in the market with Classic Rock, sometimes a stopper when it comes to launching Classic Hits next door.
All of those stations compete with the 45-year-plus heritage of Top 40 WKRZ, both the market leader and one of the few CHRs in any size market that is. It’s been a long time since you could hear Boston or Eddie Money on WKRZ, but they stayed there a decade longer than any other Mainstream Top 40. In Northeast Pa., the “because new music sucks” factor might not be quite as great as one might expect these days.
By the time I became really familiar with WKRZ, it had moved beyond the “hot-rockin’, flamethrowin’” feel of ’80s CHR and become something more full-service, which it remains. To some extent, that station in the early ’80s was WTLQ (Q102), programmed by the aforementioned “Banana Joe” Montione and similar to KKBQ (93Q) Houston’s distinctive music mix, heavy on reaction records and oddball oldies.
The new Mix very much has the feel of hot-rockin’, flamethrowing ’80s Top 40 — not just ’80s jingles but jocks interacting with jingles at the top of the hour. I heard Logan, based at WINK Fort Myers, on day 1, and it was very much a reminder that today’s heavily voice-tracked radio can still flow the way it used to, as opposed to the “random content from nowhere” that I often encounter. The jingles are to the tune of “92-PRO-FM,” the station where Berkowitz came to prominence, as well as Giovanni.
Like most Classic Hits outlets, the new Mix has a significant ‘90s component, but it also goes back to “Stand by Me” and “Respect.” There’s also a ‘60s at 6 hour (which I haven’t heard yet, but which according to Mediabase, included “She’s Not There” and “Help Me Rhonda”), a ‘70s at 7 (“Joy to the World,” “Ramblin’ Man,” “Message in a Bottle”), and ‘80s at 8 (“Caught Up in You,” “The Safety Dance,” “Nothin’ But a Good Time”).
NEPA’s existing Classic Hits outlets have different presentations. The River was jockless in the midday/early afternoon stretch I heard, and uses song tags. Gem had a more heritage/full-service feel. Both, however, had jingles. Both are covering different ground musically — Gem plays a lot of the ’70s that were once on Oldies’ “safe list,” but haven’t been for a while. But to listen to the three stations in succession was still to keep hearing songs I’d just heard.
Most of Logan’s Day 1 breaks were, as you’d expect, “here we are,” but energetically delivered in a way that ROR readers will appreciate. Stations are better about local geography these days. Mix, by necessity, had a lot of promos directing various towns to the correct one of its three frequencies. Gem had those, too. I counted four stations in River’s legal ID. None of the Classic Hits stations is a true full-market signal, although that’s subjective when even the bigger stations need simulcasts to reach the market edges.
Here’s 92 Mix FM just before noon on its first day:
- Green Day, “When I Come Around”
- Paula Abdul, “Straight Up”
- Twisted Sister, “We’re Not Gonna Take It” (noon :00 ID)
- Daryl Hall & John Oates, “Out of Touch”
- Billy Joel, “You May Be Right”
- Aerosmith, “Love in an Elevator”
- Fleetwood Mac, “Gypsy”
- Blondie, “One Way or Another”
- Matchbox Twenty, “Unwell”
- Billy Idol, “Mony Mony”
- Journey, “Any Way You Want It”
- Rolling Stones, “Start Me Up”
- Goo Goo Dolls, “Name”
- Madonna, “Papa Don’t Preach”
- Matthew Wilder, “Break My Stride”
- Prince, “Let’s Go Crazy” (1:00 p.m. song)
Gem middayer Fran Pantuso was more conversational with a lot of the sense of place that I look for in my out-of-market radio listening. There’s a station event coming up at the Stony Mountain Family Campground and another at the Hazleton Area Children’s Festival. There’s also the Sunday morning “Polka Connection” from 9-11 a.m., which may occasion a Fresh Listen of its own at some point. Here’s Gem 99 & 100 at 2 p.m:
- Lipps Inc., “Funkytown”
- Aerosmith, “Dream On”
- John Cafferty & Beaver Brown Band, “On the Dark Side”
- America, “Sister Golden Hair”
- Gap Band, “You Dropped a Bomb on Me”
- Police, “Every Breath You Take”
- Loggins & Messina, “Your Mama Don’t Dance”
- Prince, “Little Red Corvette”
- Don McLean, “American Pie”
- Genesis, “Misunderstanding”
- Doobie Brothers, “Black Water”
- Mr. Mister, “Kyrie” — the same song played on WQFM a few minutes later
- Foreigner, “Hot Blooded”
- Van Halen, “Jump”
The River is a flagship station of Bold Gold Radio, one of several admired small-market chains in the region. One of the things that stood out, besides the “Classic Hits in the ’90s/early-’00s sense of the term” mix was a strong local advertising presence. The studio sponsorship was the Mohegan Pennsylvania Casino Resort (where the studio is actually located), not 1-800-INJURY. There were numerous ads for local home repair of the sort lost to ValPak in most markets. There was also the ad for Roberts Automotive Towing that ended with “they don’t want your fingers; they just want your tows.” Here’s the River just before 3:30 p.m.:
- Big Country, “In a Big Country”
- Romantics, “What I Like About You”
- Bad Company, “Feel Like Makin’ Love”
- Uncle Kracker f/Dobie Gray, “Drift Away”
- U2, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” — heard a few songs later on Mix
- Elton John, “Philadelphia Freedom”
- Steve Winwood, “Back in the High Life Again”
- Doobie Brothers, “Long Train Runnin’”
- Billy Idol, “Mony Mony”
- Led Zeppelin, “D’yer Maker”
- Bon Jovi, “You Give Love a Bad Name”
- Guess Who, “No Time”
- Eurythmics, “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)”
- Bruce Springsteen, “Dancing in the Dark”
- Lynyrd Skynyrd, “Gimme Three Steps”
- Jeff Healey Band, “Angel Eyes”
