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1500 KROQ 1976-1984

T

thebeach33445

Hey Guys:

I was going through my notes on 1500 KROQ and I want to see if my notes are correct.

1. When KROQ 1500 went back on air in 1976 did it simulcast KROQ 106.7 or was did it have it's own AOR format?

2. Was 1500 sold to a spanish braodcasting company in 1980 and go Spanish till Oct 1984 when it went dark?

Thanks again for your help.

T.J.
 
t.j. said:
Hey Guys:

I was going through my notes on 1500 KROQ and I want to see if my notes are correct.

1. When KROQ 1500 went back on air in 1976 did it simulcast KROQ 106.7 or was did it have it's own AOR format?

2. Was 1500 sold to a spanish braodcasting company in 1980 and go Spanish till Oct 1984 when it went dark?

Thanks again for your help.
Click to expand...

KROQ was not sold to an Hispanic company (by law it could not be owned by a Spanish company), it was LMAed to Teddy Fregoso who also operated XEPRS under an LMA. XEPRS was regional Mexican and 1500 was Radio América with an oldies or nostalgia format. The horrible coverage pretty much did that effort in and it was given back to the owner...
 
105.9 The Lazer Fan said:
The airchecks I have from the mid-late 70's of KROQ are all from FM, and they don't mention the AM station.
Click to expand...

I don't think there would be any reason for them to mention the AM, as it had separate programming which was at that time a requirement for AM and FM stations with the same owners.
 
DavidEduardo said:
105.9 The Lazer Fan said:
The airchecks I have from the mid-late 70's of KROQ are all from FM, and they don't mention the AM station.
Click to expand...

I don't think there would be any reason for them to mention the AM, as it had separate programming which was at that time a requirement for AM and FM stations with the same owners.
Click to expand...

The Insane Darrell Wayne posted the following to a KROQ reunion site about the revival of the stations in 1976:

We didn't have broadcast lines or an STL to the AM site, so we hooked an FM tuner set at 106.7 up to the AM Transmitter. The next year (1977), we were getting around the simulcast law by tape delaying FM live to AM air by 24 hours.

I've heard tape from that era...and not only don't they mention the AM in conversation, it's also not included in the legal IDs. Could be that they dropped them in as part of the tape replay next-day on the AM.

Darrell says the programming rights for the AM were leased to the Spanish-language broadcaster in 1979. It went dark after that failed.
 
michael hagerty said:
The Insane Darrell Wayne posted the following to a KROQ reunion site about the revival of the stations in 1976:

We didn't have broadcast lines or an STL to the AM site, so we hooked an FM tuner set at 106.7 up to the AM Transmitter. The next year (1977), we were getting around the simulcast law by tape delaying FM live to AM air by 24 hours.

I've heard tape from that era...and not only don't they mention the AM in conversation, it's also not included in the legal IDs. Could be that they dropped them in as part of the tape replay next-day on the AM.

Darrell says the programming rights for the AM were leased to the Spanish-language broadcaster in 1979. It went dark after that failed.
Click to expand...

That would explain why the AM sounded just like the FM, but was different. It's funny how the mind does not consider the option of some kind of simulcast or delayed simulcast because we knew that was illegal.
 
DavidEduardo said:
michael hagerty said:
The Insane Darrell Wayne posted the following to a KROQ reunion site about the revival of the stations in 1976:

We didn't have broadcast lines or an STL to the AM site, so we hooked an FM tuner set at 106.7 up to the AM Transmitter. The next year (1977), we were getting around the simulcast law by tape delaying FM live to AM air by 24 hours.

I've heard tape from that era...and not only don't they mention the AM in conversation, it's also not included in the legal IDs. Could be that they dropped them in as part of the tape replay next-day on the AM.



Darrell says the programming rights for the AM were leased to the Spanish-language broadcaster in 1979. It went dark after that failed.
Click to expand...

That would explain why the AM sounded just like the FM, but was different. It's funny how the mind does not consider the option of some kind of simulcast or delayed simulcast because we knew that was illegal.
Click to expand...


That was a novel approach probably not used often. Most stations did like in my hometown back in Ohio, they got one of those Gates automation systems that looked like the computer in the old TV show "Voyage To The Bottom of The Sea". You could get them with prepackaged music on reels and all you had to do was insert local spots, news and whatever. In their case the AM was a daytimer so the machine only ran from after 10am until local sunset then the FM was live again.

The FCC mandate for separate programming on AM/FM combos probably made the Schaefer company back then. Who would have envisioned a day when you could run an entire station from a PC?
 
nmoore6676 said:
DavidEduardo said:
michael hagerty said:
The Insane Darrell Wayne posted the following to a KROQ reunion site about the revival of the stations in 1976:

We didn't have broadcast lines or an STL to the AM site, so we hooked an FM tuner set at 106.7 up to the AM Transmitter. The next year (1977), we were getting around the simulcast law by tape delaying FM live to AM air by 24 hours.

I've heard tape from that era...and not only don't they mention the AM in conversation, it's also not included in the legal IDs. Could be that they dropped them in as part of the tape replay next-day on the AM.



Darrell says the programming rights for the AM were leased to the Spanish-language broadcaster in 1979. It went dark after that failed.
Click to expand...

That would explain why the AM sounded just like the FM, but was different. It's funny how the mind does not consider the option of some kind of simulcast or delayed simulcast because we knew that was illegal.
Click to expand...


That was a novel approach probably not used often. Most stations did like in my hometown back in Ohio, they got one of those Gates automation systems that looked like the computer in the old TV show "Voyage To The Bottom of The Sea". You could get them with prepackaged music on reels and all you had to do was insert local spots, news and whatever. In their case the AM was a daytimer so the machine only ran from after 10am until local sunset then the FM was live again.

The FCC mandate for separate programming on AM/FM combos probably made the Schaefer company back then. Who would have envisioned a day when you could run an entire station from a PC?
Click to expand...


Reading the reminiscences of KROQ jocks at the time, the station had no money and worse credit. They probably couldn't have gotten an automation system...which is why they did what they did.

And a little more than a decade later, this barely-on-the-air, barely legal toilet (the FM) set a record for a single-station sale price.

You just never know.
 
As for an AM simulcast of "The Roqs" (as it was often reffered to on the air), I've heard airchecks with a dual AM and FM ID as early as 1974 and as late as 1978.

On an aircheck, circa 1980, I recall hearing a KROQ DJ (possibly Frazer Smith) make a reference to the Spanish announcer on the AM station across the hall. So, at some point, both the AM and FM were under the same roof in Pasadena.
 
This frequency is my namesake. I remember the Spanish format, although briefly in the early 80s. I grew up on the other side of the hill, so this AM was a real "blaster" into my neighborhood.

What's funny, is that I never even knew about KROQ 1500 until much later (90s).
 
EasyBakeOven said:
On an aircheck, circa 1980, I recall hearing a KROQ DJ (possibly Frazer Smith) make a reference to the Spanish announcer on the AM station across the hall. So, at some point, both the AM and FM were under the same roof in Pasadena.
Click to expand...

I wonder how long the AM was colocated after it went to a Spanish language format? My associate who worked there (did mornings there and afternoons on XEPRS) worked out of studios next to Paty's restaurant on Riverside in Toluca Lake. Sales was done out of the XEPRS office in Hollywood.
 
DavidEduardo said:
EasyBakeOven said:
On an aircheck, circa 1980, I recall hearing a KROQ DJ (possibly Frazer Smith) make a reference to the Spanish announcer on the AM station across the hall. So, at some point, both the AM and FM were under the same roof in Pasadena.
Click to expand...

I wonder how long the AM was colocated after it went to a Spanish language format? My associate who worked there (did mornings there and afternoons on XEPRS) worked out of studios next to Paty's restaurant on Riverside in Toluca Lake. Sales was done out of the XEPRS office in Hollywood.
Click to expand...

The Insane Darrell Wayne says the AM shared the Los Robles building for the first six months of the Spanish format and then moved out on its own.
 
In a recent article on LARadio.com about Teddy Fregoso, he stated that KROQ-AM (1500 kHz) started broadcasting full-time in Spanish on October 1, 1977, via a very early LMA.
 
OK, kids, here it is, from someone who was there (I need to write the whole story one of these days):

KROQ 1500 returned to the air in June or July of 1976 - AM only, from a makeshift air studio in the underground bunker at the AM transmitter (34-11-48N 118-15.33.33 W - also known as Mt. Tongva, also known as 1200 N. Beaudry Fire Road, Glendale!).

We had to beat an FCC deadline to either turn it on (the AM) or turn it in (the license). When the FM studio at the Pasadena Hilton was ready a few weeks later, it was an AM/FM simulcast. When the station got thrown out of the Hilton, we moved across the street, went on the air and started setting up a cubicle with a pair of Ampex 350 decks; One to record the FM (an hour at a time) on ten inch reels of tape, the other to play the tapes back on the AM 24 hours later. There was no automation - the tapes were run by unpaid interns (read: groupies).

Next question?
 
Dusty Dale Brooks said:
I once heard it said that back in the 70s KROQ was the last stop for an LA jock--after KBLA blew you out!
Click to expand...

Cute...except that KBLA became KROQ (with five years as KBBQ in between).

The only former KBLA jock I recall working at KROQ was Jim Wood.

As for last stop...not for Charlie Tuna, Jay Stevens, Steve Lundy, Jimmy Rabbitt or...Jim Wood.

I think Sam Riddle went to TV producing fulltime after KROQ...and I don't remember hearing Steve Sands after that.
 
I am curious as to whatever happened to the AM 1500khz frequency? Is it still on the air? The last information I have on that frequency is it had the call letters KRCK and was authorized for 50kw-DA-D and, I believe, 14kw-DA-N using a DA-2 antenna pattern. The station was actually licensed to Burbank at that time.
 
I believe they are silent now, and have been almost as long as I can remember (I first started getting interested in radio DX'ing in the early 1990s when the expanded band was JUST getting started).
 
As mentioned in other posts app's for 1500 are on file for Saul Levine and Royce mx'd with a 50kw upgrade for Art Astor's 1510 Ontario. Royce held an unbuilt CP for 1500 under KRCK then KIEV calls for about 25 years before being dismissed.
 
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