Fresh Listen: A Surprisingly Active Rock Corridor

When you think of the epicenter of the Active Rock format, it’s natural for the Midwest to come to mind, but the mid-Atlantic is a surprising stronghold as well. Heritage rockers WMMR Philadelphia and WIYY (98 Rock) Baltimore are format anchors, but if you drive west from either station, you’ll have a local station to listen to for hours.

If you take I-70/I-68 from Baltimore, you’ll hear WBHB (101.5 Bob Rocks) Hagerstown, Md., followed by WDZN Cumberland, Md., and WCLG Morgantown, W.V. Take the Pennsylvania Turnpike and after Philly, there’s WQXA (105.7 the X) York/Harrisburg, and WQWK (Qwik Rock) State College, leading into rock-leaning Alternative WXDX (The X) Pittsburgh. In the just-released fall Nielsen ratings, WBHB is No. 2, up 7.1-7.2 12-plus.

“You’ve got a lot of relatively large populations in close proximity that lean pretty blue-collar,” says Shelter Music’s Tyson Haller. “I would also include Norfolk, Monmouth, Wilkes-Barre, and Salisbury, Md., in there, all with top five rock stations.” 

Haller notes that Philadelphia is Scott Stapp’s “biggest sales market as a solo artist. Funny enough, I just read an article that claimed that Creed is now the most-played band on jukeboxes in Philly, beating out Taylor Swift.”

Similarly, Kurt Steffek points to a Jacoby Shaddix interview on 98 Rock’s morning show that led to the decision to work Papa Roach’s “Leave A Light On,” eventually a No. 1 Active Rock, top 10 Alternative, and currently top 15 at Hot AC. 

Here’s a Fresh Listen to five Active Rock outlets in the mid-Atlantic, starting with WCLG p.m. driver Maynard and heading east. Of the smaller-market stations here, WCLG is the one that goes back the furthest on Classic Rock but also supports some brand-new titles. Here’s “The Legendary CLG” at 3 p.m., January 21:

• Green Day, “Basket Case”
• Pink Floyd, “Have a Cigar”
• Papa Roach, “Leave a Light On”
• Korn, “Got the Life”
• Velvet Chains, “Dead Inside”
• Rage Against the Machine, “Testify”
• Metallica, “Whiskey in the Jar”
• Weezer, “Say It Ain’t So”
• Linkin Park, “Heavy Is the Head”
• Kid Rock, “Cowboy”
• Jethro Tull, “Locomotive Breath”
• Blind Melon, “No Rain”
• Motley Crue, “Girls, Girls, Girls”
• Smashing Pumpkins, “Sighommi”
• Finger Eleven, “Paralyzer”
• Sara Robinson, “Queen”

Launched just over three years ago, WDZN is Active, but with a significant Alternative component. Here’s PD/middayer Ethan Dunkinson around 10:30 a.m., January 21, after the syndicated Free Beer & Hot Wings morning show:

• Linkin Park, “What I’ve Done”
• Audioslave, “I Am the Highway”
• Red Hot Chili Peppers, “Otherside”
• Billy Morrison f/Ozzy Osbourne & Steve Stevens, “Crack Cocaine”
• Offspring, “Pretty Fly (For a White Guy)”
• Foo Fighters, “The Glass”
• Stereo MCs, “Connected”
• Disturbed, “Land of Confusion”
• Seether, “Fake It”
• Cure, “A Fragile Thing”
• Everclear, “Santa Monica”
• Weezer, “Hash Pipe”
• Twenty One Pilots, “Heathens”

101.5 Bob Rocks is one of the format’s most distinctive radio stations. Its daytime lineup is Crazy Bob mornings, Nasty Bob middays, and Just Bob in afternoons, who was soliciting listeners stories about things they instantly regretted (childhood streaking was one). Here’s the 5 p.m. drive-home feature, The Rage:

• Stone Temple Pilots, “Dead and Bloated”
• Metallica, “Sad but True”
• Starset, “Toksik”
• Motley Crue, “Girls, Girls, Girls”
• Theory of a Deadman, “RX (Medicate)”
• Sleep Theory, “Stuck in My Head”
• Live, “I Alone”
• Living Colour, “Cult of Personality”
• 10 Years, “Wasteland”
• Stone Sour, “Through Glass”
• Point North, “World (vs.) Peace”
• Papa Roach, “Last Resort”
• Guns N’ Roses, “Don’t Cry”
• Shinedown, “Second Chance”

Like some of the other Cumulus Active outlets, WQXA can occasionally lean Alternative as well; (it’s playing Dexter & the Moonrocks’ “Sad in Carolina.” Here’s the station at 10 a.m., just after a promo for the departing People’s Morning Show featuring Gov. Josh Shapiro:

• Stone Temple Pilots, “Plush (Acoustic)”
• Guns N’ Roses, “Mr. Brownstone”
• Green Day, “Bobby Sox”
• Nirvana, “Smells Like Teen Spirit”
• Three Days Grace, “Pain”
• Staind, “So Far Away”
• Sum 41, “Landmine” 
• Danzig, “Mother”
• 311, “Down”
• Wage War, “Magnetic”
• Blur, “Song 2”
• 3 Doors Down, “Kryptonite”
• Everlast, “What It’s Like”

Baltimore Ravens flagship 98 Rock was just wrapping up its final “Purple Power Hour” for the season, with the team’s Femi Ayanbedejo and Dennis Pitta joining the p.m. drivers Kirk and Marianne. (“I wish it was a little later in the year,” she noted.) 98 Rock is known for a more-mainstream feel in both its gold and current choices, but in a format where many current titles disappear quickly, there were non-crossover library titles in this segment from 7 p.m., January 20:

• Muse, “Starlight”
• Weezer, “Undone (The Sweater Song)”
• Scott Stapp, “Black Butterfly”
• Halestorm, “The Steeple”
• ZZ Top, “Legs”
• Dirty Honey, “Don’t Put Out the Fire”
• Beck, “Loser”
• Pretty Reckless, “And So It Went”
• Green Day, “Bobby Sox”
• Drowning Pool, “Bodies”
• Bon Jovi, “You Give Love a Bad Name”
• Daughtry, “The Dam”
• Alice in Chains, “Man in the Box”