KOLA 20th Anniversary?

[michael hagerty]

Billo Earl says that in 1976 KRLA was losing money and came very close to putting on a Drake-Chenault syndicated oldies format but then decided to bring in Art Laboe, who became program director and put up his own money to save the station. In late 1993 KLAC dropped country music for Westwood One's satellite-fed adult standards format. Was KLAC the first Los Angeles station to use a satellite service full-time? Jim Hilliker will know. (And yes, I'm way off topic. Again.)

How do you lose money when you are a not for profit station? KRLA was a cash cow! Plus we have already done this. KIQQ used Transtar's Format 41 fulltime with local mornings done by Jim Carson back in 1985.

Non-profit doesn't mean you don't have fixed expenses you have to meet.

The KRLA cash cow started drying up with Shadoe Stevens' album rock approach in 1972. The AC format that followed from '73-'76 did so poorly the station, even automated, wasn't meeting expenses.

Art Laboe invested money, became GM and hired Bill Pearl and Tom Greenleigh to program. They beat KHJ in the Fall '76 book. Bill and Tom used that to junp to KIQQ, replacing Bill Drake in Spring 1977. At that point, Art Laboe took over programming at KRLA, and eventually handed the GM reins over.

 

[Hot Hits]

1977 was the year I worked there They seemed to have NO problem selling KRLA, and seemed quite popular once again. They had a ton of trade, a lot of discretionary cash, and I'm sure Art made his money back with interest. Also one person here remembered his Son, Art Jr! In all the reading I have done about KRLA, and it is quite limited, why didn't Art make a play for KRLA ownership?

 

[davideduardo]

1977 was the year I worked there They seemed to have NO problem selling KRLA, and seemed quite popular once again. They had a ton of trade, a lot of discretionary cash, and I'm sure Art made his money back with interest. Also one person here remembered his Son, Art Jr! In all the reading I have done about KRLA, and it is quite limited, why didn't Art make a play for KRLA ownership?

At that time, wasn't the station still owned by the interim operator, pending the DCC decision on the applicants for the revoked Cook license? If that was the case, then the station could not have sold as it had no "owner" as the license was in trusteeship until reassigned.

 

[michael hagerty]

1977 was the year I worked there They seemed to have NO problem selling KRLA, and seemed quite popular once again. They had a ton of trade, a lot of discretionary cash, and I'm sure Art made his money back with interest. Also one person here remembered his Son, Art Jr! In all the reading I have done about KRLA, and it is quite limited, why didn't Art make a play for KRLA ownership?

You were there immediately after KRLA beat KHJ. They absolutely made money then.

If KTNQ hadn't come along in December 1976, and if Bill and Tom hadn't decided they wanted an FM, I wonder if they could have beaten KHJ for a few books more.

 

[Hot Hits]

At that time, wasn't the station still owned by the interim operator, pending the DCC decision on the applicants for the revoked Cook license? If that was the case, then the station could not have sold as it had no "owner" as the license was in trusteeship until reassigned.

Yes of course and that was the reason which I understand. I wondered if he was associated with any of the perspective groups. Also why did the trust have to turn to an outside money man who also took over the programming?

You were there immediately after KRLA beat KHJ. They absolutely made money then.

If KTNQ hadn't come along in December 1976, and if Bill and Tom hadn't decided they wanted an FM, I wonder if they could have beaten KHJ for a few books more.

That is quite interesting when you think about it. They were flush with money! They had a huge overhead with their AFTRA & IBEW staff. To the best of my limited knowledge KRLA never had automation equipment as we knew it. It was strange working out of that Hotel!

 

[michael hagerty]

Roy Elwell took them automated in 1973. Most of it was at the transmitter, though.

Here's the Billboard article about KRLA beating KHJ:

http://books.google.com/books?id=xCMEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PT17&lpg=PT17&dq=billboard+krla+pearl+greenleigh&source=bl&ots=rFsK18U3HQ&sig=ZzgbXgwy4V2GEY59AJGw_Bm0WQ4&hl=en&sa=X&ei=BLURUcvnJoGQiQLnm4CQCQ&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA

 

[Hot Hits]

Great article! I still will always have these unanswered questions about Laboe's roll? I would see Phil Little doing production and Johnny Hayes doing his mid day show at the Huntington Sheraton. The Art Laboe morning show didn't feature Art. I knew they didn't use a traditional automation system or service. I couldn't see KRLA signing up with Unistar AND SMN to keep those fringe formats out of L.A. giving up additional Inventory. They were close to Sold Out when I was there Signed with Unistar to save money. Carried part of Beau's show in the morning. Our Oldies format was terrible, and KRLA's programmer Mike Wagner was way sharper than Bill Moyes and his Research Group, or Jeff Serr, Format P.D. who lasted about 2 months. I'm not sure when Steele returned offhand, but "The Heart & Soul of Rock & Roll" KRLA was better than anything up on the Satellite at that time!

 

[michael hagerty]

Great article! I still will always have these unanswered questions about Laboe's roll? I would see Phil Little doing production and Johnny Hayes doing his mid day show at the Huntington Sheraton. The Art Laboe morning show didn't feature Art. I knew they didn't use a traditional automation system or service. I couldn't see KRLA signing up with Unistar AND SMN to keep those fringe formats out of L.A. giving up additional Inventory. They were close to Sold Out when I was there Signed with Unistar to save money. Carried part of Beau's show in the morning. Our Oldies format was terrible, and KRLA's programmer Mike Wagner was way sharper than Bill Moyes and his Research Group, or Jeff Serr, Format P.D. who lasted about 2 months. I'm not sure when Steele returned offhand, but "The Heart & Soul of Rock & Roll" KRLA was better than anything up on the Satellite at that time!

Steele arrived at KRLA in March of 1985, after six and a half years off the air.

 

[radio124]

Well I moved to SoCal in late August 1978 and Steele had already left 10Q. I think Jackson Armstrong was doing PM drive then.

 

[michael hagerty]

Well I moved to SoCal in late August 1978 and Steele had already left 10Q. I think Jackson Armstrong was doing PM drive then.

In an earlier post, I have Steele leaving in September (after Storer's announcement that they planned to go country) and Armstrong arriving in October. That was based on back issues of Billboard in the Google Books archive.

Unfortunately, Google Books has made the archives no longer searchable by keyword within the individual issues, so I can't go back and post links. The KRLA link was copied and pasted from a previous post.

 

[Thomps2525]

KRLA's last day broadcasting from the Huntington Hotel was Friday, March 1, 1985. Just before midnight, they played Thanks For The Memory by Bob Hope and then a tape of Don Steele announcing that KRLA would be off the air until sunrise, at which time the station would begin broadcasting from new studios on Wilshire Boulevard. The new weekday lineup as of March 2 was Emperor Hudson from 5 to 9, Mike Wagner 9 to noon, Johnny Hayes noon to 4, Steele from 4 to 8, and Art Laboe from 8 to midnight. Old Wolfman Jack shows ran from midnight to 5 am. Oww-OOoooOOOooooooo,

 

[Neel]

Here's an old bumper sticker I found from the "Kool Gold" days..

 

[Hot Hits]

Here's an old bumper sticker I found from the "Kool Gold" days..

Well it says 'Cool Oldies' to be fair! Those other pictures, is that your Truck & House, and who are those people? I like the House!

 

[Neel]

Haha. Thanks. I couldn't figure out photobucket how to make what public and private, but there's no scandalous pics there so all good. I'm the guy in the beige jacket..and I live up in Azusa, basically all mountains past my house. It's boonies, but i like it.

 

[GeorgeJ.]

I would be interested to know when KOLA exactly went AOR? I would say the mid 70's. Fred Cote programmed his Station directly from the KMET reporting section @ R.& R.. By 1979 I got him to add New Wave Modern Music and the kids went crazy. I will never forget, we carried a live Jefferson Starship concert and ordered a 3 kz mono 'Broadcast' line. The audio was so bad we rebroadcast KMET without permission. A few times that night you could hear KMET LOS ANGELES, followed by a quick 'KOLA SAN BERNARDINO' voiced by Danny Dark. Fred even called in to tell me what a great job I was doing! I'm glad Fred is still a guest of the State!

KOLA was Top 40 for quite a number of years in the mid 70's...competing with KFXM on AM. I don't think they ever beat KFXM but as I recall, they came rather close in some dayparts. But keep in mind that this was Hooper ratings, for what it's worth. KMEN was out of the Top 40 race by this time.

 

[Unregistered]

Where was Ted Ziegenbusch?

Not to get off the subject here---("Oh sure!")---but didn't Ziegenbusch also program XETRA-690 in the mid-1980s? I remember two things about "The Mighty 690" from those years: The station ID came at about ten minutes before the top of the hour...and for several months the first song played after almost every ID was Every Breath You Take.

Ted Ziegenbusch was already on KOST by the time "Every Breath You Take" came out by the Police. However, you are correct. Ted was the one who changed KOLA from a little bit of everything - way too eclectic - to full Album Rock. At that point, Ted had KOLA beating KCAL-FM, KMET and KLOS. Ted was also the pd at The Mighty 690 in the early 1980s before he helped KOLA or KOST.