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DJs sharing negative opinions of songs/artists on air or online.

DavidEduardo said:
During the decade I actually programmed and syndicated Beautiful Music, I found that there were more Beatles songs that were "a good fit" (my opinion as the programmer) than from any other mid-60's to late 70's artist. Part was due to the huge number of songs that got redone in such versions, and part was that they were actually good songs.

Even covers of very good ballads done first by Manilow and The Carpenters and even the ballad Motown ones did not fit as well into Beautiful Music. Those of us who have heard the Beatles songs done by a real symphony orchestra can see how that might be true.
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I heard an instrumental version of " Fool On The Hill" which could have been on 530 KC. I believe Brazil 66 also did that. Both good versions.
 
CTListener said:
The jock (and I can't recall his name) actually explained that he was filling in and it was his first time on WXXK, and that he'd done a shift at sister station WHDQ (classic rock) earlier in the day. More information than a fill-in would usually give, so I was intrigued and curious if he'd continue to refer to "inside radio" stuff. Well, I was doing a bit of driving that day so I spent an enjoyable hour listening to the music, all the while hoping the fill-in would crack the mic after the current song! He didn't disappoint. During one break, he told about another jock at WHDQ ribbing him earlier about becoming a country DJ. And in the next, he added a "Hey, I like that" after a song with a rock edge.
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This happened the first time I ever cracked a mic on our country station when I was on-air back in 2006. I was part time/nights on Hot AC and we were still live in nearly all dayparts when I was asked to cover our Saturday night request show on the country station with maybe two hours notice. I went through the log with the jock covering 2p-7p to make sure I had all my pronunciations right and took a few jabs at myself during the shift for being a fish out of water filling in from 'down the hall'.
 
DavidEduardo said:
Even covers of very good ballads done first by Manilow and The Carpenters and even the ballad Motown ones did not fit as well into Beautiful Music. Those of us who have heard the Beatles songs done by a real symphony orchestra can see how that might be true.
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The format of Serenade Radio is what might be called adult standards, and one of their DJs on a special program said that for the most part, the station does not do "covers". That term implies there is an "official" version of every song. But the Serenade Radio collection seems to have every artist or group of the era doing every popular song, and beautiful music orchestras doing them as well. I had no idea Nat or Sinatra did so many different songs that I had only heard done by others. In the md-60s, the DJ said, that changed. The example the DJ used was "Sounds of Silence" by Simon & Garfunkel. Theirs was the "official" version and apparently all others were covers.
 
DavidEduardo said:
During the decade I actually programmed and syndicated Beautiful Music, I found that there were more Beatles songs that were "a good fit" (my opinion as the programmer) than from any other mid-60's to late 70's artist. Part was due to the huge number of songs that got redone in such versions, and part was that they were actually good songs.
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If I remember correctly, George Martin produced classical music before working with the Beatles and remained a fan of that genre until his death. It therefore wouldn't surprise me to know that many of the Beatles' works, particularly from the "Rubber Soul," album on, could more easily fit into classical and easy listening instrumentals--I'm Guessing that Martin encouraged Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison to write like that.
DavidEduardo said:
Even covers of very good ballads done first by Manilow and The Carpenters and even the ballad Motown ones did not fit as well into Beautiful Music. Those of us who have heard the Beatles songs done by a real symphony orchestra can see how that might be true.
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There is an aircheck of Larry Lujack at WCFL after the station switched to easy listening in March of 1976. Initially, it contained only his breaks but was expanded to include scoped versions of the songs played. What struck me most, mainly because I didn't remember it, was that Easy listening stations like WCFL during this timeperiod weren't all instrumentals. They did include some vocal numbers, though mostly not by the original artists that made them hits. That aircheck showcased Ray Coniff as being one of the prolific (and probably popular) vocal coverers of works made famous by other artists.
 
I have worked my share of sub 100 market stations. I believe it was Smokey at WISE told me that they didn't have a large research budget and the best way he could tell if a song was good or bad was by sales and requests. Calling local record shops ( a tremendous asset back in the day) , national charts plus they logged requests requests was 90% of the current playlist. He said:

If folks "wasted" their money or took the time to call the station for "crap" that "crap" had to be good to somebody. Your personal tastes didn't count.

Of course now sales can be deceiving because downloads are cheap. Back then you had to actually had to commit. Take some time to go to a store, walk in and physically pick out your music. Some folks were in a "record club" but that's another subject.
 
The man who runs serenade Radio just said he doesn't like how other artists sound on uptempo songs by The Beatles. And yet he played one. He also said Ella Fitzgerald didn't sound good on "She Loves You" and then said other artists do sound good on slow Beatles songs, better of course than The Beatles. Then he asked if he was in trouble. Well, he does RUN the station in addition to having a show.
 
vchimpanzee said:
The man who runs serenade Radio just said he doesn't like how other artists sound on uptempo songs by The Beatles. And yet he played one.
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I have an aircheck of WJIB back when they were an Easy Listening/Beautiful Music station run by Bob Bittner, and among Percy Faith, 101 Strings, Hugo Winterhalter, etc., he played "Nowhere Man" -- yes, the original Beatles version, not an instrumental cover of it.
 
kevtronics said:
I have an aircheck of WJIB back when they were an Easy Listening/Beautiful Music station run by Bob Bittner, and among Percy Faith, 101 Strings, Hugo Winterhalter, etc., he played "Nowhere Man" -- yes, the original Beatles version, not an instrumental cover of it.
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As you've indicated, Bittner's WJIB was a hybrid Beautiful Music/Soft AC. The original WJIB would only play the instrumental covers of any Beatles songs.
 
radiofan2023 said:
Have you ever heard Ethel Merman's disco songs on that station?
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I've heard Ethel Merman, but I don't know about disco.

Disco does get played every now and then, but it's mostly jazz standards and beautiful music, and whatever the parents listened to as the kids were enjoying that evil rock and roll. And some of that evil rock and roll too.
 
Never knew Ethel Merman had a disco album but Charo had a disco album and she showed up in Dallas when the label invited a bunch of record store management to a listening party. She 'cuchi cuchi-ed' around the room sitting on guys laps and such, including mine. I was quite unimpressed with her and the album.
 
I was PD for a far flung from Memphis owned by the good doc, Flinn Broadcasting. Adult leaning Hot AC.. we had a mainstream AC power house as a competitor on one side and a rhytmic chr/top 40 station on the other side.

I had a mid dal gal who didnt like Nickelback and we played them. They'd come up in her shift at her VT points sometime and id let her do her thing with her... id not even call them digs at Nickelback.... just her remarks.... it was said in a slight modicum of good fun, but honesty. She was never mean, didnt name call, nothing like that. It was her "schtick" I guess... honest and real.

I never said anything to her about cuse... well, i just didnt find much a problem with it. We werent in a small town or in a town that was conservative.

One day we got a complaint, I guess they called and my GM answered.. shed then come to me and ask why i didnt say anything.. I told her "I didnt find a problem with it" so i had to call the mid day girl and say "hey listen, im being forced to call you by JB, but... you gotta stop........."

Was it the right thing to let her continue with it when i first caught it? Maybe, maybe not. It seems like an ok thing at the time, 10 years ago. And it wasnt something she did every time a nickelback song came on.
 
vchimpanzee said:
The man who runs Serenade Radio just said he doesn't like how other artists sound on uptempo songs by The Beatles. And yet he played one. He also said Ella Fitzgerald didn't sound good on "She Loves You" and then said other artists do sound good on slow Beatles songs, better of course than The Beatles. Then he asked if he was in trouble. Well, he does RUN the station in addition to having a show.
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Although the song was by Andy Williams, he said, "I'm terribly sorry. That was almost a pop song. We can't have any of that nonsense, can we?"
 


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