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Highest-Rated AM Music Station Still Standing, pls ?

Steve Green NEPA

Steve Green NEPA

What would it be?
Perhaps such an inquiry should cover the top 50 markets, or the top 20.

See, the thread about WABC-going-to-oldies got me to thinking. Former clears and even former regional AM music stations were huge in their day. WABC, WLS, WDRC Hartford, WKBW, The Big Ape Jacksonville : their music pantheon days are long gone. Sheesh, I just looked at the Detroit book and didn't even see CKLW listed!
But some American AM music stations still exist. Our county's directional daytimer WLSH 1410 (oldies) would show up in the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton book with 0.4 at times. They are still very much oldies. And they are also still very much daytime-only and directional. WLSH shouldn't really count, because WB/Scr is not a top 50 market.

Are there any major market or medium market AM music stations that show up decently in the ratings anymore?

I don't mean 'the most total listeners' in the country ; I'm asking about the ratings in their home market.
 
WDIA Memphis had a 5.3 in the latest book. It doesn't seem to have an FM translator, either. It's an urban AC, as are the top two stations overall in the market WRBO and KJMS, both FMs. The market is about 50 percent African American and WDIA has near-legendary status, but still, that's an impressive number for an AM these days.
 
Top 10 market English language AM music stations which show up in the ratings:

NYC: WLIB (Gospel), WMTR (Oldies), WHTG (Oldies, with FM translator)

LA: KSUR (Oldies, with FM translator)

Chicago: WGRB (Gospel)

San Francisco: KLIV (Classic Country -- just recently went dark)

Atlanta: WJZA (Jazz, with FM translator)

Philadelphia: WDAS (Variety Hits, with 2 FM translators)

Boston has WJIB (Adult Standards, with FM translator) but it hasn't shown in up the ratings recently (probably it isn't a subscriber).
 
Last edited:
Steve Green NEPA said:
What would it be?
Perhaps such an inquiry should cover the top 50 markets, or the top 20.

See, the thread about WABC-going-to-oldies got me to thinking. Former clears and even former regional AM music stations were huge in their day. WABC, WLS, WDRC Hartford, WKBW, The Big Ape Jacksonville : their music pantheon days are long gone. Sheesh, I just looked at the Detroit book and didn't even see CKLW listed!
But some American AM music stations still exist. Our county's directional daytimer WLSH 1410 (oldies) would show up in the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton book with 0.4 at times. They are still very much oldies. And they are also still very much daytime-only and directional. WLSH shouldn't really count, because WB/Scr is not a top 50 market.

Are there any major market or medium market AM music stations that show up decently in the ratings anymore?

I don't mean 'the most total listeners' in the country ; I'm asking about the ratings in their home market.
Click to expand...


I had WLSH well after dark one night in October up in NW PA (715pm)
 
The January ratings for Nashville listed WSM-FM (5.1) without mentioning the AM station.
 
Kemosabe said:
The January ratings for Nashville listed WSM-FM (5.1) without mentioning the AM station.
Click to expand...

They are separate entities. The FM is hit country, the AM classic country. The AM's low ratings don't matter as it's more a 24/7 infomercial for Nashville as a tourist attraction for older country music fans, kind of like WWOZ in New Orleans, which plays the sort of Dixieland jazz the locals don't listen to in great numbers but the tourists think is all that New Orleans people like.

This thread seems to have drifted. The question was about highest-rated AM music stations. Since only the insiders know the AM/translator splits for the stations that have translators, there is no way for us mere mortals to know if anyone is listening to those stations' AM signal at all, so we probably ought to keep the discussion limited to standalone AMs that missed the boat on "revitalization." Any such AMs out there doing better than WDIA's 5.3?
 
Even though it's out of the country [and I don't even know if they subscribe to a Canadian rating service or if they even show up in USA books] AM740 [Zoomer Radio] out of Toronto still plays music and their signal booms in over most of the Eastern and Midwest of the USA during the nightime hours. I've listened to them while driving from TN to the northeast. They've changed their music focus at least three times that I know of, at one point from the 40s to the 90s, then they dropped the 90s stuff, now it's from 60s to 80s with an occasional late 50s song tossed in.
 
Yabadabado1 said:
Even though it's out of the country [and I don't even know if they subscribe to a Canadian rating service or if they even show up in USA books] AM740 [Zoomer Radio] out of Toronto still plays music and their signal booms in over most of the Eastern and Midwest of the USA during the nightime hours.
Click to expand...

CFZM AM/FM is a participant in the Numeris Toronto PPM ratings; Numeris is the broadcaster / advertiser owned non-profit ratings company in Canada formerly known as the BBM.

http://assets.numeris.ca/Downloads/2018-19_12_Radio_ME_TorontoToplineRadio.pdf shows the November public release data for Toronto.
 
Moses Znaimer's Zoomer Media has a whole portfolio of radio, TV and print properties aimed at an older audience. I don't know if there's anything like it in the United States, is there?

I've always thought it was a smart way to extend the life of some older technologies like AM radio and magazines. Those types of media are still important to a lot of seniors, but that's a demographic that's shunned by advertising agencies in this country. Does anyone know how well Zoomer Media is doing, financially, with its strategy?
 
Here in Pittsburgh it's a tricky question that could cut a couple of ways.

There is very little music on the AM dial here to begin with. None of the Class A or B stations program it.
So basically you are trying to evaluate the Class D's and a number of suburban and fringe stations.

I think there is a pretty good chance that it's WKFB. Even though they only broadcast at 750 watts
they play music every hour that they are on, and Pittsburgh has a very loyal cadre of oldies and doo-wop fans.

Also a good argument for WAMO. A daytimer at 660, it really is just a placeholder for the FM translator.
Since they fill that urban niche once served by the legendary WAMO you could argue that they have more
total listeners than WKFB (though nearly all of them are listening on FM)
 
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