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1490--wlpa

U

Unregistered

Guest
I've heard 1490--WLPA will soon flip to standards.
wonder if it might be oldies /standards . Probably automated / syndicated .
(1600---WPDC recently flipped to oldies. )
 
apparently 1490 willl flip on April 1 to standards----from
cumulus--westwood one.
 
1490, 1600, 960 must be airing music for folks over 75.

an alternative to talk radio or sports talk .
 
Unregistered said:
1490, 1600, 960 must be airing music for folks over 75.

an alternative to talk radio or sports talk .
Click to expand...

Whatever 1490 is going to do is still an open question.

Anyone "over 75" grew up on Doris Day and Frankie Laine, the music of the late 1940s and early 1950s, not the kind of music being played on either 1600 or 960. People in their 50s and 60s grew up squarely in the rock 'n' roll era, which is what both stations are featuring, WHYL especially, which is focused on the 1960s and 1970s..

As for me, I'm pushing 63 and still listen to contemporary rock and pop music, and if I want to heard Oldies or Classic Rock, I have a bigger and better selection on a thumb drive in my car than any commercial radio station would ever play, and it's all music I like. I can also listen to thousands of stations on my iPhone.

Even if they were on FM, that is the uphill battle that any retro-formatted station will face. Add to it the perceived poor sound quality of AM radio. I have a new car, and the AM band sounds terrible. At home I have a GE SuperRadio, which allows the entire AM bandwidth, and on that radio, both 1600 and 960 sound great.

I wish them both well in trying something on the AM band besides the various boring political and sports talk formats that appear from one end of the dial to the other. How much of that do we need!
 
I hope the revitalized WHYL succeeds. They have a nice signal and is a welcome breath of fresh air from what is generally found on AM. I also applaud 1490 flipping from Sports. That's a most welcome switch and it is good to see 1600 switch to oldies,as well. Just about every oldies/classic hits station on FM is now centered on the 80's leaving a huge group who grew up in the 60's and 70's. I applaud these changes and it's nice to scan the AM band, at least in Central Pa and hear something other than political talk, sports and religion.
 
Does 96.1 still air any music of the 60's?
And much from the 70's?

who airs classic rock? WYCR ? WTPA ? WRVV ?
 
470

the Lancaster newspaper confirmed 1490 is airing standards as of April 1.
 
Mostly likely the audience of these stations will be 70+. If you figure
the average person listening to this music when it came out in 1965 or 70
was 20 or 25 years old, that squarely puts them at 70+ at this time.
So as much as you would think it might appeal to 50 & 60 year old folks...the
reality is it won't and the advertisers won't buy either that is unless you are
a funeral home or assisted living facility. If you are programming for an audience
over 55 theres really no money out there for you , This is just the reality of it all.
 
Great response to WHYL

Thanks, John for the great comments on the new 960. We've had tremendous response so far, and except for a few old coots who think we should still be playing all 50s do-wop, overwhelmingly positive. Saw your friend and co-worker Lou Castriota today at the Zembo Pancake Jamboree press dinner. He seems to have found a great niche with the seasoned pros at Channel 8.
 
Say, here's a thought. How about we wish these people well in their endeavors and respect their entrepreneurial spirit. Their level of success will depend on their ability to become involved in their respective communities and turn their goodwill into enough revenue to keep the lights on. AM radio isn't quite dead yet, and neither are the people who grew up with it. (I plan on living forever. So far, so good.) Neither WHYL nor WPDC will ever see an agency buy, but there are still thousands of mom-and-pop businesses out there for someone willing to make the effort to call on them. I agree that it's a tough sell, but there are people succeeding at it.

WPDC seems to have officially launched today, and has taken a somewhat different approach than WHYL. I wouldn't call WPDC "Oldies" in any traditional sense. I might describe it as WARM 103 circa 1988. The majority of the music heard in my 45-minute drive was 70s and 80s pop hits of a softer variety (John Denver; Barry Manilow; Air Supply), with some equally middle-of-the-road 60s tunes thrown in ("This Guy" by Herb Alpert; "And I Love Her" by the Beatles and "My Girl" by the Temptations). Didn't hear any 50s or early 60s, and nothing that could be remotely called "Rock." I wouldn't expect to hear "Born to be Wild," as I did on WHYL yesterday. (Cranked it up, Ray! Sounded great!)

Beats turning the AM dial completely over to more conservative talk, another sports network or old time religion.
 
re: WPDC

John-Summers said:
Say, here's a thought. How about we wish these people well in their endeavors and respect their entrepreneurial spirit. Their level of success will depend on their ability to become involved in their respective communities and turn their goodwill into enough revenue to keep the lights on. AM radio isn't quite dead yet, and neither are the people who grew up with it. (I plan on living forever. So far, so good.) Neither WHYL nor WPDC will ever see an agency buy, but there are still thousands of mom-and-pop businesses out there for someone willing to make the effort to call on them. I agree that it's a tough sell, but there are people succeeding at it.

WPDC seems to have officially launched today, and has taken a somewhat different approach than WHYL. I wouldn't call WPDC "Oldies" in any traditional sense. I might describe it as WARM 103 circa 1988. The majority of the music heard in my 45-minute drive was 70s and 80s pop hits of a softer variety (John Denver; Barry Manilow; Air Supply), with some equally middle-of-the-road 60s tunes thrown in ("This Guy" by Herb Alpert; "And I Love Her" by the Beatles and "My Girl" by the Temptations). Didn't hear any 50s or early 60s, and nothing that could be remotely called "Rock." I wouldn't expect to hear "Born to be Wild," as I did on WHYL yesterday. (Cranked it up, Ray! Sounded great!)

Beats turning the AM dial completely over to more conservative talk, another sports network or old time religion.
Click to expand...

If WPDC continues with that course, they might want to consider another logo and/or slogan. From what I gather from here, it seems like they aren't too dissimilar from Sunny 1450/1320 on the gulf coast of Florida.

http://www.sunnyradioam.com/main.html

Now a crazy idea I thought of would be to come up with a 'mellow album' format consisting of artists such as Carole King, Carly Simon, James Taylor, Paul Simon, Bread, Donovan, Elton John, Carpenters, Fleetwood Mac and the like; with some emphasis on viable album cuts.
 
Unregistered said:
If WPDC continues with that course, they might want to consider another logo and/or slogan. From what I gather from here, it seems like they aren't too dissimilar from Sunny 1450/1320 on the gulf coast of Florida. WPDC: Music not done yet, format will duplicate the old Nice 960 when done. It's not really oldies, it's MOR, but people won't say that---it's radio speak. So, with the handy frequency tie-in and alliteration, SWEET 16 it will be.

http://www.sunnyradioam.com/main.html

Now a crazy idea I thought of would be to come up with a 'mellow album' format consisting of artists such as Carole King, Carly Simon, James Taylor, Paul Simon, Bread, Donovan, Elton John, Carpenters, Fleetwood Mac and the like; with some emphasis on viable album cuts.
Click to expand...
WPDC: If you listen, we play every one of those artists, we just play the hits, not album cuts. This format is no big secret--back in the day we had "chicken rockers" like WSBA, WCMB that played all but the "loud rock" of top 40. We are chicken oldies. I grew up here, I play the music I grew up with on WSBA but I play hits and I keep it non-offensive in content, "texture",etc.
 
Chicken oldies? I listened to WPDC this morning and music mix sounded good. I would call it pure pop...not too hard and not too soft. The WSBA you grew up with....was it after the switch to AC in 1977...or prior to that when they were "top 40"...yet heavily day parted? I have always felt that they were on a "chicken rock" direction since about 1967. I heard they didn't play The Stones "Honky Tonk Women" in 1969, but can't verify it. They played all their other hits. I always felt they were kind of a pop station like WOWO in Fort Wayne.....which is NOT a bad thing at all.
 
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Unregistered said:
If WPDC continues with that course, they might want to consider another logo and/or slogan. From what I gather from here, it seems like they aren't too dissimilar from Sunny 1450/1320 on the gulf coast of Florida.

http://www.sunnyradioam.com/main.html

Now a crazy idea I thought of would be to come up with a 'mellow album' format consisting of artists such as Carole King, Carly Simon, James Taylor, Paul Simon, Bread, Donovan, Elton John, Carpenters, Fleetwood Mac and the like; with some emphasis on viable album cuts.
Click to expand...


What you describes sounds like the original Magic 103 circa 1975 when it came on the air. Music would be too unfamiliar to succeed. Might make for an interesting internet station however.
 
Even with the poor audio quality in today's cars, it is refreshing to hear music again on AM radio. An alternative to political or sports talk which has dominated the band for years. WLAN did a standards format a few years ago before switching to the WHP simulcast.
 
I think we should avoid the adjective "chicken" when describing WPDC. It's a negative term, associated with someone who is frightened or cowardly.

WPDC's format might best be called "Soft AC" or "Classic AC." Check out the ratings for WDUV 105.5 in Tampa. It's #1 in the ratings by a wide margin, #1 in cume and #1 25-54. The format is the soft hits of the 70s and 80s with an occasional song from the late 60s or early 90s. And there are similar stations in San Diego (KIFM also #1) and Miami (WFEZ, #6). KIFM and WFEZ do play a few current and recent soft hits, but mostly concentrate on softer songs from the past.

As for 1490 WLPA Lancaster, they are carrying the syndicated format "America's Best Music." That also plays soft hits but goes back to the 60s and sometimes 50s. And it also features some Adult Standards from Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Barbra Streisand, etc.
 
small AM stations are meaningless & worthless. MANY willl leave the air in the coming years. They
Won't be worth owning & paying the electric bills .
 
Chicken rock was an early term in the 60's to describe upbeat middle of the road or adult pop stations. These were stations trying to position themselves between MOR and Top 40, targeting the young adult listener. As we got into the 70's these stations got their act together by playing only hit currents and becoming gold based. Adult Contemporary was born and the format evolved over the years to Hot Adult Contemporary. Many of these hits are no longer played on your Classic Hit stations, who want a more upbeat mix. Yes there is a niche for softer songs. There are those listeners who don't want to hear "Uptown Funk" and do want to hear James Taylor. It's true these listeners may be older, but hey...it's a niche nobody else is trying. Best of luck to you!
 
A few posts back, soft rock album tracks were mentioned as a format option. I recall a few years when the format was tried and had some success. Most of these stations positioned themselves as the alternative to album rock radio of the day. The idea was to sound cool, current and such, just like the AOR format. There usually was about a 25% mix of 'hits' or singles, past and present sprinkled in the mix. Emphasis was saying a song was from a certain album, etc. Like AOR, the format tended to have a heavy rotation of currents, many of which would be the hit from the album the top 40 would play in a couple of months. Some stations used the moniker of 'mellow rock'. Many added a late night jazz show, say 10 to midnight, that worked nicely in many markets. Some of the stations had somewhat of a Mother Earth News slant with tidbits of information on things like gardening, alternative power sources and the environment. I suppose the more grassroots, more acoustic-based format better matched the earlier proponents of DIY and Green lifestyle.

In today's world I can't see it working but I'd certainly listen to such a station. The format may have been credited to KNX FM in Los Angeles. I do know the format was syndicated as KORJ in Orange, California utilized the format into the late 1970s. 102.9, billing itself as Magic, opted for the format around the mid 1970s in Dallas/Fort Worth. KAFM in Dallas even had a somewhat similar format at one point in the mid 1970s. It was one of the more long lasting formats on the frequency. Then KRLD's FM, you could count on an annual format change during most of the 1970s when frequently the format was automated.
 
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