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KROQ, again

MarkW said:
The DJ on the air right now is literally celebrating the resignation of Mike Kaplan as KROQ OM/PD on the air as we speak.

She just announced the station will be playing Tool, System of a Down, and Rage Against the Machine again, all artists "we were banned from playing when our old boss was still here."

This proclamation was made following the playing of "Freedom" by RATM at exactly 5PM. Two more Rage Against the Machine songs then followed.

Looks like the transition to an Active / Alt hybrid is now officially in full swing. :)
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I wouldn't say KROQ is an Active/Alt hybrid...yet.

An Alt/Active hybrid station, for example KTBZ in Houston, doesn't play Cannons, Glass Animals, ODESZA, Bob Moses etc. KROQ doesn't yet play artists like Godsmack, Shinedown, Breaking Benjamin, Staind and Seether, which are staples on Active Rock stations.

They are still very much an Alternative station, in my opinion, but I don't think they're necessarily concerned with following a "format," just playing songs that think will resonate with the audience that made the station popular in the '90s and early '00s. SOAD, Tool and RATM are examples of those artists, but I wouldn't expect some of the indie rock to entirely leave the station.
 
You raise good points. It'll be interesting to see what the next several weeks bring. I suspect the station is in a transitional phase right now.
 
macattack said:
Wow. There is no love lost whatsoever.
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New morning show promo: "Now that the whole gang is back together...minus our boss...let's celebrate..." :LOL: A+

macattack said:
They’re running a block party weekend right now.
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It sounds fantastic. So good to hear the station playing these bands again.

macattack said:
Ostensibly it’s because of the NCAA basketball tournament but I am almost 100% certain that it’s the transition point to the Active/Alt hybrid that KROQ is all but confirmed to be transforming into.
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Hopefully you're right. They seem to be re-establishing their position with a weekend of gold tracks from alternative rock artists -- a nice mix of top tracks and little spice from each one. I thought B.Y.O.B. from System of a Down put a nice exclamation point on the shift.

macattack said:
Monday is going to be an interesting day for the station.
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Will be listening for how many currents in the mix following the weekend of classic alternative rock.
 
Not sure what's more sad, the posturing, or the fact they think there's an audience left that buys into it and needs them to fill that void.

Active is not a healthy pool of music. So again, we're back to a gold basis. And at some point it's going to create the exact same issues Kaplan was trying to solve.
 
The whole package is what makes the station tick. Boring and unenergetic air talent (*cough* Kevan Kenney *cough*) needs to be broomed.

A heavily gold reliant station can work if programmed properly. Kevin Weatherly failed to give playlist curation the attention it deserved for a number of years. His morning show and playlist also increasingly became demographic mismatches. KROQ was the station programmed by an old guy, with a morning show hosted by two old guys, with music geared primarily toward millennials. The result? Weak ratings across the board, mostly.
 
Andy Travis said:
Not sure what's more sad, the posturing, or the fact they think there's an audience left that buys into it and needs them to fill that void.

Active is not a healthy pool of music. So again, we're back to a gold basis. And at some point it's going to create the exact same issues Kaplan was trying to solve.
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Active actually has a healthy pool of music, it’s just not well known due to Active largely being trapped in the Midwest and South, far away from the coastal hotbeds. The kids do blow up loud stuff on TikTok from time to time (this is why The Hu and Falling In Reverse have become things). If you play your cards right artists like Mastodon, Ayron Jones, LA’s own Dorothy, Volbeat, and others could all become big. Alt’s experiment with Bring Me The Horizon seems to be working so why not try more?

The only holdovers from the 2000’s that need to come along are Shinedown, Tool, Papa Roach, and Disturbed, who all have Zoomer fanbases (PR and Disturbed got theirs from being memed and wisely owning said memes). Mmmmmaybe Korn, Three Days Grace (if the rumors of Adam Gontier rejoining are true), and Breaking Benjamin. That’s about it. Crossing Active artists over doesn’t mean regurgitating the 2000’s outside of a select few.
 
This honestly sounds more like a return to pre 2020, pre Kaplan KROQ — which is fine, but doesn’t address the problems the station was having before Kaplan made it even worse.
 
Doctah said:
This honestly sounds more like a return to pre 2020, pre Kaplan KROQ — which is fine, but doesn’t address the problems the station was having before Kaplan made it even worse.
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Let's see what happens on Monday. It could easily go either way (just back to traditional KROQ or going Active-leaning).
 
This honestly sounds more like a return to pre 2020, pre Kaplan KROQ — which is fine, but doesn’t address the problems the station was having before Kaplan made it even worse.
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Not sure how you can say that when darn near the entire air staff is different from when Weatherly was running the show.

I've also noticed quite a high number of fairly deep album cuts from core artists today; Weatherly's playlists were always an inch deep (spontaneity was usually nowhere to be found). Too soon to say if that trend will continue once the current theme weekend concludes.
 
ChannelFlipper said:
Having name talent leave because of the PD is a huge problem, if that is indeed the case.
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We don't know why they left, just that they did. Here's what I said in Post #67:

TheBigA said:
But the bigger problem was he wasn't able to keep the talent he had, and then wasn't able to replace them once they left. That's the part of the job that he can control (as opposed to the music part). That's why they need someone full time to focus on fixing the talent situation and giving people a reason to listen. The only thing they seemed to have was the 2 minute promise, and that's not enough.
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MarkW said:
Not sure how you can say that when darn near the entire air staff is different from when Weatherly was running the show.

I've also noticed quite a high number of fairly deep album cuts from core artists today; Weatherly's playlists were always an inch deep (spontaneity was usually nowhere to be found). Too soon to say if that trend will continue once the current theme weekend concludes.
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Indeed correction, it will still be worse off than pre-2020 Kaplan KROQ. No Stryker, no Kevin Ryder etc. But the music mix will be similar it seems
 
ChannelFlipper said:
Of course it does. It helps to answer the question "Should he stay or should he go?". Having name talent leave because of the PD is a huge problem, if that is indeed the case.
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Kaplan is no longer a factor, rendering the question of that being a "huge problem" moot. And with Stryker, Kevin, etc. already gone, it no longer matters whether or not Kaplan was the reason.
 
K.M. Richards said:
Kaplan is no longer a factor, rendering the question of that being a "huge problem" moot. And with Stryker, Kevin, etc. already gone, it no longer matters whether or not Kaplan was the reason.
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But he is still heavily involved in Audacy's alt format in NY and at the national level. I guarantee you he is still being heavily evaluated in those roles by Audacy. It may very well be that by signficantly curtailing his responsibilities, Audacy is kindly and slowly showing him the door, allowing him to interview and attain employment elsewhere without actually having to fire him entirely.
 
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