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Changes afoot at WENN

passtheword

passtheword

Something's afoot at WENN. The simulcast with "Kiss" is gone this afternoon, with some type of talk programming aimed at the black community going on. The station is now presenting itself as a separate entity as "WENN 1320".

btw, regarding the WENN calls, I've been trying to determine when they first wound up on AM 1320 after I read about the return of the WENN calls last month. The calls for the station were originally WEZB, and sometime later (presumably the 50's) WEZB moved to 1220, which at the time was WEDR. At some point following WEZB's move to 1220, the WENN calls were installed on 1320.

Today, I found this rather useful website by one of the radio-info posters on the Houston board. It's a website about American Radio History, where most of the Broadcasting Yearbook's have been converted to pdf files (from 1944 to 1979 so far). I did know that WENN was on 1320 for most of the 60's (if not all of it), so I started going back through each year's listings. The 1958 Yearbook lists WEZB at 1320 and WEDR still at 1220. The '59 Yearbook lists 1320 as WENN, so the WENN calls must have first been used on 1320 somewhere between '58 and early '59. Now, here's the interesting thing I found. In the 1958 yearbook, Bessemer's AM 1450 is listed as WENN. I'm not really sure if that's an error or not (I remember having several of those yearbooks in the 70's which listed WRKN-AM, Brandon, MS as a Birmingham station, lol. I think Brandon, MS is a suburb of Jackson). I always thought AM 1450's original calls were WBCO. In the 1959 book, AM 1450 is listed as WEZB, so there might have been some temporary call swapping with the WEZB call letters between the three stations (1220, 1320, and 1450).

Confusing Enough? :D

Here's the link to the information for both Yearbooks (1958 and 1959):

1958 Broadcasting Yearbook page where it lists WENN at 1450 (Scroll down to page 35)

1959 Broadcasting Yearbook where it lists WENN at 1320 - (listed under "Homewood"- scroll down to page 208)


[EDIT-unauthorized promotion]
 
Hope they get something new in place, on 1320 AM. When they do, I hope it works out for them.

Now for a History Lesson:

I do remember listening to the original WENN 107.7 FM, back in the 80s and 90s. They had a monster signal and played just about any Urban song you could ever want. Even did a block of Rap and Hip-Hop on Friday and Saturday nights. This station did have some major competition from the old "Power Hits Kicks 106.9". That station had and still has a monster signal to this day. I remember listening to that station too and heard a unique mix of Top 40 Remixes, Urban and Hip-Hop. During their stint as Power Hits, I do remember them stealing some of the WENN listeners from B-Ham. This unique format didn't catch on here too well. Many of the people I knew, didn't like that station. They were more of a WENN listener anyway.

I also remember an old catch phrase from WENN FM. See you remember this one. "On the Attack and Jammin' Back", This is WENN 107.7 FM Birmingham. I remember some people using that phrase, when they ran for certain student government positions, at Selma High in the late 80s. This station had a loyal following, during that time, since the now silent WTQX was mostly for the grown folks, had an awful hum in their background and didn't have a huge coverage area. They also had issues keeping the station on 24 hours a day, due to consistent tech issues at their old transmitter site. Amazingly their old Tower is still standing, although the lights no longer flash on it.

The old WENN radio station was a major player, during its hey day. They had the Urban and Rap crowd all to themselves, for many years. When Cox brought in WBHJ and WBHK that all changed.

Man those were the days.

R.D.P. <><
 
Well...the talk programming was short-lived. I made a return visit to WENN a little after 6 pm tonight, and they were back to simulcasting "Kiss". The program on this afternoon made mention of a 2-6 pm (?) time slot, so maybe Cox is going to implement the talk programming "a la WYDE" (phase it in a little bit at a time). ;)


[EDIT-unauthorized promotion]
 
The street committee says Al Sharpton, Warren Valentine and local talk is coming back to B'ham. Things will heat up for the summer if this turns out to be true.

BSOD (The Brighter Side Of Darkness)
 
This'll be the second time the station has featured “urban talk” if I'm not mistaken.

And WENN-FM did have a monster signal, it's a shame that the old tx site in NE Jefferson County is no longer used, it was a great location.
 
Zach said:
This'll be the second time the station has featured “urban talk” if I'm not mistaken.

And WENN-FM did have a monster signal, it's a shame that the old tx site in NE Jefferson County is no longer used, it was a great location.
Click to expand...

Yes, this is round #2 for talk on 1320. I guess this will be repeat of WPSB's black talk format with a (fresh?) new coat of paint on it. I don't think it's gonna work myself. We already have 3 talk stations (4 if you include the simulcast on WYDE-AM). There are too many talk stations in Bham as it is. Even WYDE-FM isn't fairing all that well after its rebirth as "The Source", with just a fraction of its original audience. Most of the talk listeners are split between WERC and WAPI. I don't believe WPSB's talk format lasted but a year before Cox pulled the plug on it. I guess for AM stations there are few, if any, options these days, as far as prospective formats go. But talk isn't going to help because we're already inundated with talk programming now. At least Cox picked up some recognizable and historic calls for the new format, anyhow.

[EDIT-unauthorized promotion]
 
Did anyone happen to catch the blurb about WENN in the Taylor on Radio-Info letter? It mentioned that the AM's picking up the Altanta Braves. Now why on earth would the franchise want to go this relatively small and new-formatted station when they had been on a 100kw FM or a 50kW AM powerhouse? ???
 
Zach said:
Did anyone happen to catch the blurb about WENN in the Taylor on Radio-Info letter? It mentioned that the AM's picking up the Altanta Braves. Now why on earth would the franchise want to go this relatively small and new-formatted station when they had been on a 100kw FM or a 50kW AM powerhouse? ???
Click to expand...

Maybe the Braves just aren't as popular regionally as they once were. IIRC, WJOX & WAPI had been reluctant to clear many (if any) of the day games, as they'd preempt local programming (and advertising)--I think there was a B'ham News or a Business Journal article where fans were complaining.
 
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