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KGO-FM Stereo 104

BossRadioDJ

BossRadioDJ

So... what were you doing forty years ago?

Forty years ago -- almost exactly, on October 16, 1967 -- ABC-owned KGO-FM Stereo 104 was playing an odd little mix of current hits and oldies, using what sounds like an incredibly clunky automated system to mix the music and some really groovy jingles.

Go on, you know you want to listen...

http://www.sfradiomuseum.com/audio/kgo/1967/kgo-fm_oct-16-1967.shtml

DJ
 
BossRadioDJ said:
Forty years ago -- almost exactly, on October 16, 1967 -- ABC-owned KGO-FM Stereo 104 was playing an odd little mix of current hits and oldies, using what sounds like an incredibly clunky automated system to mix the music and some really groovy jingles.
Click to expand...

Actually, it was called 103.7, not 104. The automation system was a Schafer 800, considered the top of the line at the time. The system was later sold to KNGT in Jackson, CA, and I saw it in person. It had Nixie read-out lamps to indicate the time and lots of open reel decks.
 
My computer at work won't let me open it, so I'll have to wait until I get home to listen, gosh darn it. A couple of historical notes worth mentioning - David may need to correct me on details. The KSFX "progressive rock" format that David mentions (http://www.sfradiomuseum.com/audio/kgo/1967/kgo-fm_oct-16-1967.shtml) was a big success in Los Angeles (on 95.5, first KABC-FM, then KLOS ), but never got traction in the Bay Area. In the early 70s, KLOS often beat Metromedia competitor KMET in the ratings, but KSFX did poorly here against Metromedia's KSAN, and others. Until recently, KLOS (now classic rock, of course) used the same rainbow logo that KSFX used only briefly in the early 70s.

KSFX then briefly tried "Musicradio" a hit format similar to 77/WABC in New York - that didn't garner ratings, either. But when KSFX went with a soul-funk-dance format, it became very popular. I remember it was huge in San Francisco's gay community - you'd hear the station blasting out of every bar and store in the Castro district. It was bigger than "Energy. 92.7" is today, though ABC obviously avoided any direct identification with the gay community, it being the 1970s, and all.

When disco became huge, KSFX morphed away from regular soul music, and used the handle "Disco 104." Unfortunately, it was TOO identified with disco, and the station's ratings died with the death of the disco craze in the late 70s.
 
Great link!!!
It went right into 'My Favorites'
Where was I ???
That year when I was very young, I had just moved to San Francisco from Boston. The street sign on the corner was spelled "Haight", and all this time I had thought all these folks with flowers in their hair hated some guy named Ashbury. :-\
 
Amazing listen! I really enjoyed that. What strikes me is how FM music radio stations are currently evolving to become just that type of Radio again - fully automated, with no live talent and wall to wall music and spots run by one or two people.
 
DavidKaye said:
BossRadioDJ said:
Forty years ago -- almost exactly, on October 16, 1967 -- ABC-owned KGO-FM Stereo 104 was playing an odd little mix of current hits and oldies, using what sounds like an incredibly clunky automated system to mix the music and some really groovy jingles.
Click to expand...

I remember KGO-FM reemerged in 1982 with an FM Talk format until the station was sold to the late Bill Weaver in late 1983 and then became KLOK-FM with an all-request music format known as "Yes/No" Radio. I do remember one of their most requested songs was "The Pachelbel Canon In D" by The Paillard Chamber Orchestra. Every time that song came on, I voted "NO!" I was only 18 at that time and I believe that only people in their late 40's and older must of voted to keep that song on!
Click to expand...
 
"What strikes me is how FM music radio stations are currently evolving to become just that type of Radio again - fully automated, with no live talent and wall to wall music and spots run by one or two people."

Uh...maybe...except for the spot load. I've been listening, and I'm at least 16 songs in, and it's nothing but back to back music, except for a 30 second promo for a contest over on KGO-AM. I assume KMPX hit the air with alternative rock programming a few months ahead of this air check, but FM was still into it's experimental and simulcast phase. Big corporations owned most of the FM stations even then (though more of them than today, of course), and nobody expected them to make any money. They finally woke up a couple of years after this when the "underground" stations they'd turned over to the hippies (Tom Donahue, etc.) started to get substantial ratings and made some real revenue.

The songs on KGO-FM are practically all current soft hits of the day (66-67) with an occasional oldie thrown in...kind of a KOIT of it's day. Love the corny jingles - "K-G-Oh - Ster -e-Oh", and especially "K-G-Oh-de-oh-do"

Bill Drake ran an automated FM service around this time that was similar musically - called "Hit Parade 67" (68, 69, etc) that was much slicker. The KHJ Boss Jocks provided pre-recorded song title/artist IDs by personality...The Real Don Steele back announced the louder songs, while "mellow" Humble Harve Miller did the slow songs, etc. Drake's automated system even announced the current time during stop sets.

It ran on KHJ-FM 101.1 (later K-Earth) in LA. Does anybody know if it ran in the Bay Area? KFRC-FM, possibly?

A fun air-check. Thanks, DJ
 
Hey BossRadioDJ, would you mind adding some KSFX airchecks from the 70's, especially from the disco era in 1979 in the near future. I know everyone also knows KSFX's last 11 days in April/May 1982 which led to the changeover of KGO-FM, which simulcasted the AM until ABC sold it in early 1984. I know there's also an aircheck of Richard Gossett on the last hour on your website as well. Let me know if you're ready, O.K. Thanks.
 
"I know everyone also knows KSFX's last 11 days in April/May 1982 which led to the changeover of KGO-FM, which simulcasted the AM until ABC sold it in early 1984."

Unless I'm forgetting something, KGO-FM in the 80s never simulcast KGO-AM. It was the Bay Area's first FM talk station...I think, and ran programming from the ABC Talk Radio network. Their flagship station was WABC (AM) in New York, which had finally dropped their famous top 40 format. ABC moved Owen Spann from KGO to NY for his morning show. That network also ran Dr. Toni Grant (KABC) middays, and Ira Fistell nights (KABC?).

Ratings were not good. Later KGO-FM tried a local show - a resurrection of Don Chamberlin's 70s "California Girls" talk show (KNEW) - but this time, they pulled no punches - calling it "Sex Talk" or something similar, and pushed the censorship limits with much more explicit content. After awhile, I think the station became a bit of an embarrassment to the AM side, and they dropped the KGO branding, re-naming it(clumsily) "Talk Radio FM 104." in the months before they gave up and sold the station

Despite #1 ratings for KGO-AM, KGO-FM was never popular, much like the other later FM talk formats - KPIX in the 90s, and , of course Free-FM.
 
BossRadioDJ said:
So... what were you doing forty years ago?

Forty years ago -- almost exactly, on October 16, 1967 -- ABC-owned KGO-FM Stereo 104 was playing an odd little mix of current hits and oldies, using what sounds like an incredibly clunky automated system to mix the music and some really groovy jingles.

Go on, you know you want to listen...

http://www.sfradiomuseum.com/audio/kgo/1967/kgo-fm_oct-16-1967.shtml

DJ
Click to expand...
I remember listening to KSFX in high school in 1967. Same station right?
 
KGO-FM during the 1967 era was programmed by the folks at WABC. The songs were shipped every few weeks on open reels. The jingles were included with the songs, by the way, since the system at the time used only 4 open reel decks (2 current, 1 oldies, 1 pre-news backroll with news jingle). I think they had just one Carousel for spots, which were all PSAs and promos.

They had no commercials because apparently, KGO-FM wasn't ready to sell spots on the station or didn't have enough audience to do so. The FCC had mandated that FMs be separated from the AMs effective January 1, 1967, and I get the impression it was a scramble to put something on the air. KGO-FM was unattended, and at one point wasn't even properly monitored. I believe at that particular time it was monitored by the people at KGO-TV, who had a little cue speaker they cranked way down.

KMPX didn't really make much of a dent in the ratings. The big guys in town were still KFRC and KYA and remained so for some time.
 
DavidKaye said:
Actually, it was called 103.7, not 104. The automation system was a Schafer 800, considered the top of the line at the time. The system was later sold to KNGT in Jackson, CA, and I saw it in person. It had Nixie read-out lamps to indicate the time and lots of open reel decks.
Click to expand...

You're absolutely right. There are several singing jingles in there that include "FM 103 point 7."

Strange, because when KSFX flipped back to KGO-FM in May 1982, the station IDed as "KGO-FM 104." Logo at http://www.bayarearadio.org/audio/kgo

...And KGO-FM did simulcast with 104 (103.7) in May 1982, at least during the Morning News with Dunbar & Wygant, as evidenced by the recording of the first day (also available at http://www.bayarearadio.org/audio/kgo).

(And, to answer another post, the KSFX call letters were used on 103.7 from January 1, 1971, until May 3, 1982.)

DJ
 
I remember when a DJ named Marcos Guiterrez was on KSFX and doing a local countdown at night. I remember the song "Call Me" by Blondie was #1 on March 8, 1980" on the most requested songs on KSFX that week. I have the tape someplace but I remember Marcos's voice like it was yesterday announcing that.
 
"Strange, because when KSFX flipped back to KGO-FM in May 1982, the station IDed as "KGO-FM 104."

Not strange, really - KSFX was always "104." It makes sense that when FM was just for hobbyists and stereophiles in the 60s that they would use exact frequencies. But when FM became popular in the early 70s, and even into the 80s, most people didn't have digital radios yet, so it probably sounded better from a marketing standpoint to round off... you know, K-San Jive 95 (94.9), Quake 99FM (98.9), KABL 98FM (98.1), KCBS-FM 97 (97.3), etc. It was K-101, not K-101.3, and so on.

It seems to me that stations started to switch to exact frequencies more in the late 70s, like 99.7/KYUU. And I remember they started IDing K-101 as "101.3/K101."
 
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