CKLW - Detroit's Worst Top 40 Station

[FredRichards]

if you think CKLW's news was "fake", go check out www.thebig8.net & listen to some of those outstanding airchecks, especially from Byron McGregor & Grant Hudson. The teletype fx just spiced it up.

One of the mis perceptions of Big 8 news was that it was all for the blood & guts presentation.

In reality, McGregor was a stickler for good journalism, and pretty insistent on good writing, and accuracy of stories.

Another friend of mine in the news business in Motown compared it this way. If normal radio news was the Ford Fairmont, and WJR had the Cadillac ... CKLW had the Chevrolet Camero. It was news, but the presentation and creative writing made the difference.

 

[OldiesCat]

if you think CKLW's news was "fake", go check out www.thebig8.net & listen to some of those outstanding airchecks, especially from Byron McGregor & Grant Hudson. The teletype fx just spiced it up.

One of the mis perceptions of Big 8 news was that it was all for the blood & guts presentation.

In reality, McGregor was a stickler for good journalism, and pretty insistent on good writing, and accuracy of stories.

Another friend of mine in the news business in Motown compared it this way. If normal radio news was the Ford Fairmont, and WJR had the Cadillac ... CKLW had the Chevrolet Camero. It was news, but the presentation and creative writing made the difference.

AND, it fit their overall approach. You are quite right about Byron, too. Very underrated as a journalist.

 

[cARLOS Blake]

Where's Teddy Bear working these days?

 

[FredRichards]

Where's Teddy Bear working these days?

Last I heard he was with Jones Radio Network. If I'm wrong, someone correct me.

 

[Griff]

Where's Teddy Bear working these days?

Last I heard he was with Jones Radio Network. If I'm wrong, someone correct me.

That's correct. I sometimes listen to him on an internet feed out of a station in Wisconson. WBOG, Oldies 1460. He's doing the (syndicated, obviously) morning show.

 

[RADIO TRUTH]

CLKW 20-20 news circa 1966 was great because it was theatrical and dramatic but, the rest of the station, no matter what year it was, was bland and boring because it was Drake radio.

 

[RADIO TRUTH]

CKLW 20-20 news circa 1966 was great because it was theatrical and dramatic but, the rest of the station, no matter what year it was, was bland and boring because it was Drake radio.

 

[OldiesCat]

Not to hundreds of thousands of Detroit-area listeners who, year after year, said CKLW was the Motor City's #1 top 40 station and one of the top stations in the market in general.

You, obviously, are in the minority.

 

[Griff]

You, obviously, are in the minority.

Now there, is some "truth". ;D

 

[FredRichards]

Where's Teddy Bear working these days?

Last I heard he was with Jones Radio Network. If I'm wrong, someone correct me.

That's correct. I sometimes listen to him on an internet feed out of a station in Wisconson. WBOG, Oldies 1460. He's doing the (syndicated, obviously) morning show.

Ironically I was listening to WBUK-106.3 Ottawa OH just a moment ago, and the back sell to CCR was Ted Richards saying "Oldies 104-point-3, the Big Buck", and then Brother Bill Lyle picking up the rest of the of the liner.

Looks like Ted is still at JRN, and looks like 106.3 is not watching their automation system.

 

[cARLOS Blake]

Bland? Are we delusional ,Truth? It couldn't have been any more lively if they threw a 3 ring circus on the air. I used 2 have 2 SuperMax black & white Detroit license plates with Kinkle's head on them. Wish I still had 'em.

 

[lugnuts6]

THE BIG 8 was special on both sides of the border, as were the voices behind the mics!
but the most unique had to be CKLW 20/20 NEWS


the memories live on ...



And Now..............

 

[cARLOS Blake]

...and "Farmer Jack Savings Time"...

 

[Wthom100]

Bring back the Big 8 CKLW with 20-20 news!! I want more references of some "lead to the head" and "another floater found in the Detroit River". This was so much better than WJR today - at least it was exciting. Bring back Keener 13 while your at it. Alas - we can't turn back time - darn!!

 

[kasperson]

CKLW was a powerhouse and should be recognized for that. Who ever heard of a top 40 radio station with a news staff as large as CK. Not even WABC in NY had a news operation that large. CKLW on air personalities were highly identifiable, but the music was the message. What ruined radio as you called it is untalented on-air people that cannot be given much leeway. Listen to WOMC for what top 40 radio is today.

 

[cklw800]

kasperson, WThom100, cARLOS, lugnuts6...I couldn't agree with you more. CKLW was the BOMB! 20/20 News, the air staff, the music. It all fit like a glove. Even the tight rotation was cool because they played many interesting songs I heard nowhere else, but it was right on the money for CKLW. There were many great stations like WABC, WLS, WCFL, WKNR---all great, but I don't think I know of any other station with so many good components that flowed like CKLW. If there was one thing you didn't like, such as a song, there were ten things you liked about the station right around the corner. They were irresistible. I'm so glad to be old enough to have remembered great radio like that. I'm so thankful that I and others have those memories. I'm very, VERY glad that people saved their airchecks, and that there were radio and TV specials about the station revealing so much I didn't know about how the magic was done.

CKLW - Detroit's BEST Top 40 Station. The originator of the title of this thread as it reads now should be hit up side the head with a ten-day-old biscuit.

 

[OldSchoolWoman]

I grew up in Pittsburgh that had only one real top 40 station all through the Sixties-----KQV. I used to listen to CKLW a lot . Sometimes I could get WXYZ on a good night. I never heard WKNR, but they have loads of tribute stuff. The big mystery is WJBK. What were they like? Who were their jocks? Were they competitive ? Is there a tribute site? Four full time Top 40's was highly unusual in the Sixties. You never hear "THE Legendary WJBK!"

 

[JayPHunt]

For Rock and Rollers in the fifties, CKLW was one of the best stations, right up there with WJW Cleveland, WLS Chicago, and WKBW, Buffalo. Ron Knowles' evening show "Platter Express" was a huge hit with the teens until around 1960. That's when the Drake formula's top 40 format ruined AM radio.

 

[Huff]

The reason for this was because the average WABC listener listened for 5 minutes but, they had a 6,000,000 cume and it made them alot of money and gave them consistent number one ratings.

Going back to Arbitron and Pulse ratings for NY (Arbitron started in 1965 and Pulse in the 50's) the WABC metro cume was considerably less than 6 million since the entire radio universe of NY then was just under 9 million.

The 12+ cume for WABC in the January-February 1966 Arbitron book was 2,194,800 in the metro and 2,766,500 in the total survey area.

 

[ChrisInMI]

I grew up in Pittsburgh that had only one real top 40 station all through the Sixties-----KQV. I used to listen to CKLW a lot . Sometimes I could get WXYZ on a good night. I never heard WKNR, but they have loads of tribute stuff. The big mystery is WJBK. What were they like? Who were their jocks? Were they competitive ? Is there a tribute site? Four full time Top 40's was highly unusual in the Sixties. You never hear "THE Legendary WJBK!"

WJBK was the first Top 40 in Detroit. They got into the format in late 1956 (WXYZ had a number of pop music DJ shows at the time but weren't "officially" Top 40 for another two years or so). From the airchecks I've heard, their presentation was fairly laid-back, not a lot of bells and whistles and not a lot of energy, but their strong suit was personality. Casey Kasem was a Top 40 jock at WJBK in the early years; Dave Shafer, Terry Knight and Tom Clay also had tours of duty there. In the years before Keener 13 launched in late 1963, the big Top 40 battle was between Radio 15 (WJBK) and Wixie. Both were excellent stations, had excellent personalities, but both had extremely long playlists, quite a bit of on-air clutter (moreso in WXYZ's case because of the ABC network clutter they were still required to carry), and weren't particularly energetic in their on-air presentation, and no one station really "dominated" the market the way Keener and CK would in later years, which may be perhaps the reason why you don't hear much talk about WJBK today. CKLW was sort of just "there" at that time and WKMH (predecessor to WKNR) was of course a trainwreck of epic proportions. But if you pick up a copy of David Carson's excellent book "Rockin' Down the Dial," WJBK is discussed at length.

WJBK is nevertheless extremely important in the history of rock and roll radio in the Motor City, because Ed "Jack the Bellboy" McKenzie had been one of the first DJs to take the R&B and proto-rock sounds of the day and bring them to white listeners in the 1940s. Maybe he never got the nationwide attention of an Alan Freed or a Dewey Phillips, but he deserves mention.

WJBK was already out of the Top 40 game at the time the "Big 8" began, and had been for a while; they'd flipped to Beautiful Music in the summer of '64 (hurt not only by Keener, but from having been off the air at the time of Keener's launch due to a bulldozer accidentally knocking down a couple of their towers) and then adjusted to somewhat of an Adult Contemporary-type presentation two years later. They tried a return to all-out Top 40 again in 1969 which lasted only a few months before they went country as WDEE.