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'OR-FM"!

W

Wimmmex

Just got done listening to this great aircheck of WOR-FM and the late Mark Driscoll.

https://www.mixcloud.com/rob-frankel/wor-fm-1972-04-06-mark-driscoll-rip/?fbclid=IwAR1go4eWYrxqpwaRXlwe4DOjHlVGaLGArj90hsxvRFaheDFn0oZgEZQU-To

Not being from NYC, it appeared to me that 'OR-FM always lived in the shadow of monster WABC.

During all their years as a Top 40 station, did WOR-FM have a day in the sun? What was the highest ratings they ever achieved?


On another note, Why did the flip the calls to WXLO (99x) in 1972? What were the best years for 99X? Did they ever make a dent? Was the format the same as WOR-FM?
 
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I don't know all the history, but it's my favorite station I never heard in person. It had all the Drake formatics but a softer sound including album cuts in the late 60s. It was essentially a live version of Drake-Chenault's "Hit Parade", syndicated across the country. It eventually went full top 40, but WABC was king. They originally flipped to WXLO, keeping all the formatics, jocks and music, but having the jingles re-sung. Pat Holiday (who worked at OR-FM as China Blue) has mentioned his time at OR-FM in his PD course (Musicom Academy on YouTube), He talked about board ops coming from the TV side and being loose on execution. Except for one or two who were enthusiastic about radio and wanted to learn how to layovers like CKLW.

We don't have the luxury of knowing what would have been the result of RKO handing the keys of WOR (AM) to Drake. The head-to-head Drake/Sklar battle would have been epic.
 
gr8oldies said:
Though Hoffman and Co. were spoofing WWDJ, when they briefly called it "9J".
Click to expand...

Ha! You are correct. All these years I thought it was 99X, since it happened at the same time. I did some research and found this from Howard Hoffman:

"I returned to WALL/Middletown NY in August 1974 after a lengthy 3-month gig as production director at WDRQ/Detroit, so I was primed to do anything that could shoot down formatted index-card radio. Radio itself presented the ammo. Randy West (also at WALL at the time) and I were driving around greater Middletown listening to WWDJ through the static shortly after Mark Driscoll took over the reigns. They had already shortened their moniker from 97/WWDJ to 97/DJ - but for reasons known only to Driscoll, they started calling it "9/J" (using the slogan Pass the J - the formatic lasted about 9 hours before they went back to "97/DJ"). Randy and I stopped the car, looked at each other and simultaneously yelled, "What's NEXT?! They're just gonna open the mikes and yell 'NINE'!?! Epiphany.
A few weeks later, we were joined by Pete Salant and Amos B Moses in the production studio at WALL, and created the Nine tape under the influence of some refreshments which sure made the whole thing seem a lot funnier. (We were later pleased to find we still laughed after the "refreshments" wore off.) We were supposed to write an ending to it, but Jim Brownold (then-production director at WPLJ/New York) got a copy of the work in progress from me. The ABC engineers heard it, dubbed off a trillion copies and Nine was out there. The version they spawned was before all the processing and post-production which I quickly performed due to demand. We never did make an ending for NINE, and as it turned out, we never really needed it... the whole thing is one big payoff.
Click to expand...

Interesting that Mark Driscoll, who recently passed away, was PD of WWDJ at the time.

Sorry for the distraction. We now return you to the previous thread.
 
Wimmmex said:
Just got done listening to this great aircheck of WOR-FM and the late Mark Driscoll.

Mixcloud

Not being from NYC, it appeared to me that 'OR-FM always lived in the shadow of monster WABC.

During all their years as a Top 40 station, did WOR-FM have a day in the sun? What was the highest ratings they ever achieved?


On another note, Why did the flip the calls to WXLO (99x) in 1972? What were the best years for 99X? Did they ever make a dent? Was the format the same as WOR-FM?
Click to expand...
The change form OR-FM to 99X (WXLO) supposedly was made because management thought Arbitron was having problems attributing the credit properly when people wrote WOR in diaries.

I thought in its early Drake days, WOR-FM sounded great. It was different from other RKO stations in terms of the amount of older product played. The jocks in my opinion for the most part were really good and also appropriate for the station's format. Keep in mind this was before FM took over, and I think WOR-FM's ratings were quite respectable. They seemed to have taken more away from WMCA than WABC. This might have been because WMCA dominated the boroughs, where AM reception was becoming increasingly difficult.

In its early 99X years, consultant Jerry Clifton turned the station into a super high-energy Q-type format with the shotgun jingle. I don't know his rationale for this strategy, but with some exceptions (e.g. Walt Baby Love), I never felt the station sounded especially good.
 
TheBigA said:
Ha! You are correct. All these years I thought it was 99X, since it happened at the same time. I did some research and found this from Howard Hoffman:

Interesting that Mark Driscoll, who recently passed away, was PD of WWDJ at the time.
Click to expand...
Following WWDJ, Mark Driscoll was hired for late nights at WRC in Washington. WRC, an NBC O&O, had recently gone Top 40, a format that NBC was not very fond of, under PD Lee Sherwood. Driscoll stayed at WRC for a very short time (like a few months) and moved to Pittsburgh when 13Q went on the air.
 
RoddyFreeman said:
Following WWDJ, Mark Driscoll was hired for late nights at WRC in Washington. WRC, an NBC O&O, had recently gone Top 40, a format that NBC was not very fond of, under PD Lee Sherwood. Driscoll stayed at WRC for a very short time (like a few months) and moved to Pittsburgh when 13Q went on the air.
Click to expand...
And Cecil Heftel's lousy signal AM 13-Q, under Bill Tanner was able to beat an FM Top 40 station, programmed by someone who seems to have managed, nonetheless, to slither his way to the top.
 
DavidEduardo said:
And Cecil Heftel's lousy signal AM 13-Q, under Bill Tanner was able to beat an FM Top 40 station, programmed by someone who seems to have managed, nonetheless, to slither his way to the top.
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David, I believe Buzz Bennett created 13Q and was the first PD. Heftel did later send Tanner up from Miami so maybe he was PD at one point.
 
DavidEduardo said:
And Cecil Heftel's lousy signal AM 13-Q, under Bill Tanner was able to beat an FM Top 40 station, programmed by someone who seems to have managed, nonetheless, to slither his way to the top.
Click to expand...

If it's the guy I'm thinking about, that may have been his first job as a programmer. From there, he went to Chicago, New York, and the world.
 
RoddyFreeman said:
The change form OR-FM to 99X (WXLO) supposedly was made because management thought Arbitron was having problems attributing the credit properly when people wrote WOR in diaries.

I thought in its early Drake days, WOR-FM sounded great. It was different from other RKO stations in terms of the amount of older product played. The jocks in my opinion for the most part were really good and also appropriate for the station's format. Keep in mind this was before FM took over, and I think WOR-FM's ratings were quite respectable. They seemed to have taken more away from WMCA than WABC. This might have been because WMCA dominated the boroughs, where AM reception was becoming increasingly difficult.

In its early 99X years, consultant Jerry Clifton turned the station into a super high-energy Q-type format with the shotgun jingle. I don't know his rationale for this strategy, but with some exceptions (e.g. Walt Baby Love), I never felt the station sounded especially good.
Click to expand...
I thought Dave Thomson and Big Ron O'Brien were amazing on 99X. And yes Walt Baby Love was amazing too. The energy coming from 99X in 1974 was second to none. Only KCBQ came close. After 1974 99X couldn't match the energy or excitement that Jerry Clifton brought to 98.7. Just my opinion.
 
blindowl said:
I thought Dave Thomson and Big Ron O'Brien were amazing on 99X. And yes Walt Baby Love was amazing too. The energy coming from 99X in 1974 was second to none. Only KCBQ came close. After 1974 99X couldn't match the energy or excitement that Jerry Clifton brought to 98.7. Just my opinion.
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98.7 didn't go directly from WOR-FM (or 'OR-FM) to 99x, per airchecks. There was a period with the exact same format as OR-FM was running with the jingles re-sung as WXLO.
 
blindowl said:
I thought Dave Thomson and Big Ron O'Brien were amazing on 99X. And yes Walt Baby Love was amazing too. The energy coming from 99X in 1974 was second to none. Only KCBQ came close. After 1974 99X couldn't match the energy or excitement that Jerry Clifton brought to 98.7. Just my opinion.
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I agree with you. After Clifton left, the station was less Q format and more personality focused with guys like Al Bandiero at night. Thomson was my favorite. I was surprised at the lack of response to his passing. He was the afternoon jock on a major station for several years. I think he deserved more than two posts on the other board and one of those two posts was mine.
 
blindowl said:
I thought Dave Thomson and Big Ron O'Brien were amazing on 99X. And yes Walt Baby Love was amazing too. The energy coming from 99X in 1974 was second to none. Only KCBQ came close. After 1974 99X couldn't match the energy or excitement that Jerry Clifton brought to 98.7. Just my opinion.
Click to expand...
Big Ron was a legendary jock. I felt his show on 99X was very teen oriented. His show on CFL seemed to be focused on a slightly older audience.
 
radio128 said:
I agree with you. After Clifton left, the station was less Q format and more personality focused with guys like Al Bandiero at night. Thomson was my favorite. I was surprised at the lack of response to his passing. He was the afternoon jock on a major station for several years. I think he deserved more than two posts on the other board and one of those two posts was mine.
Click to expand...
Dave was an incredible talent and great guy. I was shocked and very sad when he passed. I enjoyed very much working with him at
99X.
 
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