Jeff Kinzbach on WNIR

[vjm]

At the end of the day, Howard Stern was (at the time) something fresh, new, and completely different than anything else on Cleveland radio.

Jeff and Flash--who are legends and God love 'em--were by 1994 tired, worn out, and completely mismatched with the alternative rock format that WMMS was running at the time.

Also don't forget, a lot of old school WMMS fans weren't thrilled with the Buzzard's flip to alt-rock (remember "The Buzzard: The Next Generation"?), and were flocking to NCX anyway to hear their old favorite "mullet-rock" tunes.

And here's this guy Stern going places no DJ ever went to before on the radio, and that's what brought down the Buzzard.

Of course WMMS then spent many years wandering aimlessly in the radio wilderness before finally finding renewed life with their hybrid talk/rock/sports mancave format thanks to the Browns, Rover, and Maxwell/Alan Cox

 

[Tim]

vjm: great post!

 

[Capulet]

Jeff and Flash----were by 1994 tired, worn out, and completely mismatched with the alternative rock format that WMMS was running at the time.

Also don't forget, a lot of old school WMMS fans weren't thrilled with the Buzzard's flip to alt-rock ....... and were flocking to NCX anyway.

And here's this guy Stern going places no DJ ever went to before on the radio, and that's what brought down the Buzzard.

Of course WMMS then spent many years wandering aimlessly in the radio wilderness........

+1 ............Really well said.


Jeff and Flas were tired in 1992 when Stern first signed on. This opened the door for Stern's success.
WMMS alternative format was jetisoned as soon as Nationwide bought the station.

I'm not so certain WMMS has " renewed life " with all the talk. I will say Alan Cox is a talent.

vjm really nails it here.

 

[vjm]

Jeff and Flash----were by 1994 tired, worn out, and completely mismatched with the alternative rock format that WMMS was running at the time.

Also don't forget, a lot of old school WMMS fans weren't thrilled with the Buzzard's flip to alt-rock ....... and were flocking to NCX anyway.

And here's this guy Stern going places no DJ ever went to before on the radio, and that's what brought down the Buzzard.

Of course WMMS then spent many years wandering aimlessly in the radio wilderness........

+1 ............Really well said.


Jeff and Flas were tired in 1992 when Stern first signed on. This opened the door for Stern's success.
WMMS alternative format was jetisoned as soon as Nationwide bought the station.

I'm not so certain WMMS has " renewed life " with all the talk. I will say Alan Cox is a talent.

vjm really nails it here.

Thanks for the kind words.

As far as MMS goes, when they saw how well Maxwell was doing in PMD with his talk show, a light bulb went off in their heads realizing that more of this could lead to bigger and better for the station as a whole.

That's when they signed Rover--who FINALLY brought stability to AMD after over a decade of musical chairs morning hosts--and went full bore with their mancave format.

Then when Maxwell left and Alan Cox took over, they didn't miss a beat (and may have even gotten better).

Point is with the Browns, Rover, and Cox, 100.7 has now found both an identity and more stable footing than in the recent past with all the comings and goings and tweaks and experiments that have plauged the station in the post Jeff and Flash era.

 

[VODood]

WMMS "The Next Generation", while short lived, was quite successful (I started with Legacy/Omni in '94 at WMJI/WMMS). It was one of the tops in the format nationwide at the time. Incredible staff all the way around. Lou Santini and Jennifer Wylde the on air stand outs.

WMMS NG destroyed The End. IMH (biased) opinion WMMS NG sounded better, had better talent, promotions and imaging. Nationwide screwed up in changing the format from alternative.

 

[Tim]

I heard the last 15 minutes of Jeff on WNIR today....and til a caller said "Jeff"....I didn'tknow who it was on the radio...I didn't even recognize his voice. Maybe it was my car radio that tricked me...LOL.

 

[CleveRadioInsider]

The problem with the End was constant changing of morning shows and air personalities. I don't think Rick Michaels as PD really fit the format as he was tied in with Power 108 for 5 years before. I believe Rick Michaels is doing morning drive on an oldies station now in PA.

 

[vjm]

Alt-rock in and of itself has shown to be a not long-sustaining format.

From WMMS to WENZ to the 746 different call letters of 92.3, all did the alt-rock thing for awhile, and all eventually abandoned it.

100.7 has finally found itself as a rock/talk/sports mancave station, 107.9 has been a ratings machine as the hip-hop/rap "Z 107-9", and 92.3 is making a long term commitment to sports as "The Fan".

At the end of the day, alt-rock is a niche format, and can't really be counted on as a "signature" format to build around.

 

[OhioMediaWatch]

At the end of the day, alt-rock is a niche format, and can't really be counted on as a "signature" format to build around.

And it currently sits on a 250 watt translator with a signal so spotty, it has to promote its iHeartRadio feed 20 times an hour. (BTW, Bo finally got them to move "99X" into the main local stations listing in Cleveland, on iHR's smartphone menus.)

That "87.7" TV audio signal is wiping the floor with 99X, reception wise, according to numerous OMW reader reception reports I've been receiving. Of course, WLFM-LP's bigger problem is that it's not actually in the main part of the FM band, and they'll have to promote the heck out of it to get folks to even realize it is there.

 

[vjm]

At the end of the day, alt-rock is a niche format, and can't really be counted on as a "signature" format to build around.

And it currently sits on a 250 watt translator with a signal so spotty, it has to promote its iHeartRadio feed 20 times an hour. (BTW, Bo finally got them to move "99X" into the main local stations listing in Cleveland, on iHR's smartphone menus.)

Exactly.

On the full powered stations, alt-rock is part of the music jumbalaya of "The Lake", and a component of the rock mishmash of WMMS during their music blocks.

But on it's own, a 250 watt translator with a so-so at best signal is the best it can hope for.

I know the alt-rock fans will throw bricks at me for saying this, but if it was such a hot format, why did 3 different stations in town dump it the first chance they had?

 

[fingers]

Off topic a little, but did Liz Wylde (or Wild)-replace Jeff and Flash, or was it Brian and Joe? I remember Liz was brought in, kind of trying to be a "female Howard Stern"-it was so bad-I can't remember, but she could not have lasted a year.

 

[CleveFan]

Off topic a little, but did Liz Wylde (or Wild)-replace Jeff and Flash, or was it Brian and Joe? I remember Liz was brought in, kind of trying to be a "female Howard Stern"-it was so bad-I can't remember, but she could not have lasted a year.

Brian and Joe replaced Jeff and Flash. I believe according to the Radio Daze book, Flash was involved in a temporary morning show that also included radio personality Ross Brittain. (If I am wrong, please say so.)

Liz Wilde replaced B and J, who moved to afternoons before the big Clear Channel-Jacor merger allowed them to move to WMVX. 'MMS wanted an edgier morning show to compete with Stern on WNCX, and B & J did not seem to want to go in that direction. As for Liz, she was canned after several months in 1997. I think she also sued the station.

 

[CleveFan]

At the end of the day, alt-rock is a niche format, and can't really be counted on as a "signature" format to build around.

And it currently sits on a 250 watt translator with a signal so spotty, it has to promote its iHeartRadio feed 20 times an hour. (BTW, Bo finally got them to move "99X" into the main local stations listing in Cleveland, on iHR's smartphone menus.)

Exactly.

On the full powered stations, alt-rock is part of the music jumbalaya of "The Lake", and a component of the rock mishmash of WMMS during their music blocks.

But on it's own, a 250 watt translator with a so-so at best signal is the best it can hope for.

I know the alt-rock fans will throw bricks at me for saying this, but if it was such a hot format, why did 3 different stations in town dump it the first chance they had?

I think it has to do with ownership changes (for WENZ in 1999 and WMMS in '96/97), revenue (possibly WKRK in 2011) and even music trends regarding the format changes. Not to mention WKRK was helped for a while by Rover and even Opie and Anthony for a while. The all-music/no-jock was even successful, but the Sports trend might have been seen as a better opportunity for revenue as opposed to a product that has been up-and-down in Cleveland and all over the nation.

The Alternative format was going through a rough patch in '98 while Hip-Hop was becoming even more popular in that same year. In 2011, there seemed to less and less newer product catching on, and formats like Sports, Hip-Hop and even the "mancave" talk/rock/sports are better money-makers than straight-up Alternative.

It's not just Cleveland, but other markets all over that have dropped the format, but not all changes have proven successful. Yet, there are still fans who are into Alternative. So much so, they expressed their anger when stations like The End, Buzzard: The Next Generation and Xtreme/X/K-Rock/Radio go off the air or moved to HD subchannel heaven.

 

[almaniac27]

At the end of the day, alt-rock is a niche format, and can't really be counted on as a "signature" format to build around.

And it currently sits on a 250 watt translator with a signal so spotty, it has to promote its iHeartRadio feed 20 times an hour. (BTW, Bo finally got them to move "99X" into the main local stations listing in Cleveland, on iHR's smartphone menus.)

Exactly.

On the full powered stations, alt-rock is part of the music jumbalaya of "The Lake", and a component of the rock mishmash of WMMS during their music blocks.

But on it's own, a 250 watt translator with a so-so at best signal is the best it can hope for.

I know the alt-rock fans will throw bricks at me for saying this, but if it was such a hot format, why did 3 different stations in town dump it the first chance they had?

I think it has to do with ownership changes (for WENZ in 1999 and WMMS in '96/97), revenue (possibly WKRK in 2011) and even music trends regarding the format changes. Not to mention WKRK was helped for a while by Rover and even Opie and Anthony for a while. The all-music/no-jock was even successful, but the Sports trend might have been seen as a better opportunity for revenue as opposed to a product that has been up-and-down in Cleveland and all over the nation.

The Alternative format was going through a rough patch in '98 while Hip-Hop was becoming even more popular in that same year. In 2011, there seemed to less and less newer product catching on, and formats like Sports, Hip-Hop and even the "mancave" talk/rock/sports are better money-makers than straight-up Alternative.

It's not just Cleveland, but other markets all over that have dropped the format, but not all changes have proven successful. Yet, there are still fans who are into Alternative. So much so, they expressed their anger when stations like The End, Buzzard: The Next Generation and Xtreme/X/K-Rock/Radio go off the air or moved to HD subchannel heaven.

I would add that alternative rock fans tend to be younger and thus more adept at getting their music online, and have all but abandoned regular radio because why bother when your iTunes library can be 3 times bigger than a radio station's and only plays stuff you like?

 

[CleveRadioInsider]

The weird thing about that temporary morning show on WMMS with Ross Brittain was that they basically recycled the Buzzard Morning Zoo minus Jeff Kinzbach. They had Flash, Spaceman Scott and Len Goldberg with Ross.

 

[almaniac27]

Did Kinzbach crash WNIR's website?

 

[OhioMediaWatch]

I would add that alternative rock fans tend to be younger and thus more adept at getting their music online, and have all but abandoned regular radio because why bother when your iTunes library can be 3 times bigger than a radio station's and only plays stuff you like?

I think we have a winner, here, regarding the slow death of alt-rock on terrestrial radio. (And for that matter, throw in every online source of music, from the legal Pandora and Spotify to music piracy/sharing.)

Clear Channel didn't have any big plans for alt-rock on 99.1. They grabbed the low-hanging fruit when 92.3 changed to sports, and have installed a little-changed "Alternative Project" feed with some local liners. The translator was presumably tabbed as a WTAM FM rebroadcaster until 92.3 abandoned the alt-rock format.

 

[HHH]

I would add that alternative rock fans tend to be younger and thus more adept at getting their music online, and have all but abandoned regular radio because why bother when your iTunes library can be 3 times bigger than a radio station's and only plays stuff you like?

I think we have a winner, here, regarding the slow death of alt-rock on terrestrial radio. (And for that matter, throw in every online source of music, from the legal Pandora and Spotify to music piracy/sharing.)

Clear Channel didn't have any big plans for alt-rock on 99.1. They grabbed the low-hanging fruit when 92.3 changed to sports, and have installed a little-changed "Alternative Project" feed with some local liners. The translator was presumably tabbed as a WTAM FM rebroadcaster until 92.3 abandoned the alt-rock format.

CC might have originally thought that the 99.1 signal might be good for downtown office listening of WTAM, but when they finally set up the signal, the downtown coverage was very spotty with little building penetration (the whole idea of putting an AM on FM) so I think they scrubbed it and went with the national HD alt feed with 99X IDs just thrown in. Signal is pretty good east-west, but sucks north.
I think they had to directionalize it away from Canada.

 

[CleveRadioInsider]

Back to the original topic. Jeff Kinzbach will be auditioning from 10am-3pm next week on WNIR. So far it is Couch Burner and Jeff Kinzbach getting the week long duties. It will be curious to see who else will get the week long audition as well.

 

[OhioMediaWatch]

Jeff is indeed doing all week next week, and yes, John "Couch Burner" Denning is the only auditioner who's done the same.

I'm moving a pile of fake money over to Jeff, with a strong prospect that Couch Burner gets something out of this...maybe regular fill-in to add him to the Earley/Isabella roster. Maybe he'll be Earley's own fill-in on weekend nights.