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Question about WROQ-AM during the Q-61 era.

R

RobynWattsV2.0

Have a question about WROQ-AM from 1984 to around 1987 (when it became satellite fed oldies).

Was the AM supposed to be a "shadowcast" of WROQ-FM with mornings and afternoon drive shifts simulcasted (similer to what KIIS FM-AM in LA was doing at that time)? When the station(s) split off from each other, the AM would become Q-61, while the FM was Q-95. I understand that this was one way that an AM-FM combo could get around the FCC rules about simulcasting 100% of the time.

Did WROQ do this?

Thanks for any info,
Robyn
 
As I remember it from newspaper accounts, that was the plan. Simulcast of Sprinkle in the morning, and simulcast of whoever was doing afternoons at the time.

BTW...as I heard it at the time, Stan Kaplan's original plan was to use the WAYS call letters for both stations, but his PD, Randy Kabrich, convinced him to use the WROQ calls, and further, to change the longtime imaging of 95-Q to Q-95 and Q-61.

I remember more than one occasion where they took a contest winner from the phone and asked who their favorite station was, and received the reply "95-Q" and was corrected by the jock, "...er, you mean Q-95."

Mercifully, Kabrich did not survive the change very long.

Later....
Matt Smith
WGSR-TV
 
The Monicker change from 95Q to Q95 took place in 1984 when WROQ switched from New/Album rock to 100% CHR. The airstaff lineup was something like this:
Larry Sprinkle - Mornings...Later changed to Steve Norris and the Q Morning Zoo
John McFadden - Middays
JJ McKay - Afternoons
Bill Catcher - Evenings

There seemed to be a revolving door on late evenings and overnights and I fail to recall many names, but I do recall Chris William and Pete Richards on evenings.
 
Q95 was a rock 40 patterned after Pirate Radio 100.3, not a CHR. It became a true CHR when it changed to Z95.1.

In addition to sharing morning and afternoon drive, Q61 and Q95 also shared identical playlists during non-simulcast hours.
 
NewsNow said:
Q95 was a rock 40 patterned after Pirate Radio 100.3, not a CHR. It became a true CHR when it changed to Z95.1.

In addition to sharing morning and afternoon drive, Q61 and Q95 also shared identical playlists during non-simulcast hours.
Click to expand...
Q95 was a CHR. By the time Tone Loc's "Wild Thing" was popular late in the 1980s, whoever was covering TV and radio for the Observer said it was Rock 40, a new version of the format.

Z95.1 "Gorilla Radio" started early in 1990 with Peter Gabriel's "Shock The Monkey" played over and over so many times that the Observer reported the cops were called to see if someone had taken over and needed to be removed. At that time, 61 WAES, which had been oldies, then AM Only standards (talk at night) and then oldies again, took the WROQ letters and started using the satellite metal format Z-Rock ("We don't brake for wimps").
 
Actually the Rock 40 experiment was part of this station's identity crisis in the late 80s.

Here's the timeline as I remember it...

1973 to early 1982: WROQ was 95Q "The Album Station"

1982: WROQ started calling themselves "The New 95Q". They began adding a lot of new wave into the format. It was during this era that they featured Dave Wood's "Best Of British" on Sunday evenings.

1983: They started saying "The NEW ROCK is on 95Q". They also began phasing in some top 40 artists including Michael Jackson and Culture Club

1984-86: WROQ switched from using records to an all-cart CHR format. They used the "HOT HITS!" monicker extensively. During this time they were playing straight top 40 and went head-to-head against Z100.

Early 1987: they changed their name back to 95Q and used the monicker "Lazer Rock". Remember those "La-La-La-La-Laaazer" liners? They touted themselves as the first all-CD station in the south. They used the same jingle package (Jam's Hot Kiss package) but changed the calls from "Hot Hits WROQ" to "Lazer Rock WROQ-FM". (I always thought the "FM" on the end of the jingle sounded a bit cheesy. But, oh well...) During talks, the jocks would call the station "95Q." It was during this time that their format began to lean a little towards rock 40, but they still played some dance/top 40 hit artists like Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Tiffany and Cyndi Lauper.

Late 1987: they dropped the "Lazer Rock" monicker but kept the WROQ-FM and 95Q labels. They continued to use the revamped Hot Kiss jingle package from Jam as well as the liner imaging. I know not who made their liners during this time but remember the voice vividly.

Early 1988: they got a new jingle package but I don't know which one. It said "More favorites! 95Q". This was when they moved to straight Rock 40. I also heard the jocks say "Charlotte's Hot Rockin' 95Q" a lot.

1989: The station finally changed call letters to WZZG and became Gorilla Radio Z-95.1. This was a return to true CHR. Eventually, the dropped the "Gorilla Radio" monicker and just stuck with Z-95.1.

Late 1990: WZZG changed call letters again...this time to WGKL. This also came with a complete format flip to satellite-fed oldies as "Kool 95.1" This lasted less than a year.

Late 1991 or Early 1992: The station experimented for a week with different satellite-fed formats, including Z-Rock. The following Monday they debuted their new call letters WAQQ as "95QQ". They ran the station without live jocks for several weeks as part of a "25,000 songs in a row" promo stunt. Ero Collins was one of the first live jocks in the new format.

1994: The station switched call letters again to WEDJ and 95.1 The Edge was born. The music format was top 40 with a lean toward alternative rock.

1996: The current CHR format was born as Kiss 95.1. I think we can safely say the station has recovered from its identity crisis as this format is now 10 years old and apparently going strong.
 
Hey!
My name is blaine. Worked at WRQO from 85 to early 89. I was sent out the door just before "Shock the Monkey"!

When I started in 85, I was on the AM playing the same music from the same music log as the FM. It wasn't a simulcast though, I was able to talk. It was, as I was told "the playground for the FM". That was pretty much true! Chris William was doing 6p-10p and i would screen his calls and take votes for the "Hot 8 @ 8". Every now and then, he would buy me a pizza.

I was doing over nights on WROQ when Reggie Blackwell was hired as PD. He loved Boo Baron and put him on nights on the AM letting him play soul and R&B. I am pretty sure he was the only live jock on the AM at that time. He would hit a 10 minute song for his last song and told me to check if the board op didn't get there that there was no dead air! Later Reggie would move Boo to mornings on the FM. It was a fun time. Complaint calls and all! It didn't set the world on fire, but we weren't last either as I recall. Part of the 85 line-up was Boo AM/FM (with Lynn White traffic, Steve Norris, Brad Schutlz, and Frank Lassiter in the newsroom., John McFadden mid-days, JJ McKay afternoons (AM/FM), Chris Willaim 6p-10p and Bill Catcher late nights 10p2a. Dena Chase (silent sam) ran the board over nights. Later I was overnights. I was also called morning show producer, which while Boo was there meant to call him and tell him to come to work!

I was only there for a short while before the Kaplans sold. CRB Broadcasting came in and I hung on to do mid-days for a few years. It was Chris WIlliam mornings with Chrissy Hart, Lassiter and DeWayne Ward news, Sherry Mims on traffic as Lynn had gone to Nashville. CRB sold to Frank Tenore, and i was fired.

I won't bore you with all the line-ups in between. I do remember having to say "FM" at the end of WROQ. I agree with the poster above. As I remember it, none us was in love with that. We also had to say "The forecast from the national weather center". That was painful. Mitch Craig was the voice of all the Lazer rock liners. I found the CD aircheck the other day when the changed over to "Lazer Rock". Chrissy Hart was on the air and played all the liners back to back and then that was it.

Some folks who floated through the building: Mary London, Jefferson Stone, Ray Mariner who came in for Mornings, Jay Kilgo (John) Jimmy's son on nights, Kent Layton late nights, Rusty Johnson, Tim Kelly, Animal, and tons more.

Sorry to run long. I grew up in Charlotte listening to Big Ways, so when I got a job out there, it was really cool, to me at least.
 
...and BTW, thanks for jogging my memory. I was trying to recall the name of the prominent female jock during the Lazer Rock days. Chrissy Hart!!! That's right! And I also remember William and Hart in the mornings.

I remember the first time I noticed the format change to Lazer Rock...I heard the sweeper at the top of the hour. Where up to that point it had been played under a live jock giving the legal ID talk, they then put Mitch Craig's prerecorded voice over it saying..."The World's First Lazer Rock Station...95Q! We taught the South how to rock and roll!"...and then the jingle tag was a "Lazer Rock!" shout and then a sing "WROQ-FM, Charlotte"
 
You are absolutely right! Few more notes from that time, then I will shut up....promise.
One liner we had was "Biggest CD collection on the planet". I don't know the full story, but someone with some pull complained and Randall C Bliss (PD) had the liner pulled. And, for a short time, it was "Saturday Morning Live with Sunny Hollywood Chase". Ed was already doing tons of voice stuff for Kilgo's show and the William & Hart morning show, so they gave it a shot.
Thanks for letting me post!
 
This is very cool and I've enjoyed the chance to reminisce. When all you guys (and gals) were on the air, I was just a radio-wannabe. I tried to break into the business and actually did weekend overnights for a while at WXRC 95.7 in Hickory back when it was just called "The Rock". But I never went any further than that because I never got good enough at it to go full time :D
 
squarehead said:
I don't know the full story, but someone with some pull complained and Randall C Bliss (PD) had the liner pulled.
Click to expand...
I heard that name on Oldies 93. I understand almost no one from there made it to Majic 94.1.
 
nerleman said:
Early 1987: they changed their name back to 95Q and used the monicker "Lazer Rock". Remember those "La-La-La-La-Laaazer" liners? They touted themselves as the first all-CD station in the south. They used the same jingle package (Jam's Hot Kiss package) but changed the calls from "Hot Hits WROQ" to "Lazer Rock WROQ-FM". (I always thought the "FM" on the end of the jingle sounded a bit cheesy. But, oh well...) During talks, the jocks would call the station "95Q." It was during this time that their format began to lean a little towards rock 40, but they still played some dance/top 40 hit artists like Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Tiffany and Cyndi Lauper.

Late 1987: they dropped the "Lazer Rock" monicker but kept the WROQ-FM and 95Q labels. They continued to use the revamped Hot Kiss jingle package from Jam as well as the liner imaging. I know not who made their liners during this time but remember the voice vividly.

Early 1988: they got a new jingle package but I don't know which one. It said "More favorites! 95Q". This was when they moved to straight Rock 40. I also heard the jocks say "Charlotte's Hot Rockin' 95Q" a lot.
Click to expand...
Thanks for all of this. The part I left in I didn't know about. I was in High Point at the time.

I'm almost certain "Shock the Monkey" was 1990.

I seem to recall the FM was to be a satellite Kool Gold format but only the AM did that. The AM became WAQS when the FM became Double-Q, and at some point it dropped Kool Gold for all sports.

By the way, I think I can name all the satellite formats from that stunt in late 1991. Well, not their exact names, but close. This is not in the order they were done.

Real Country (I remember the day I was just going up and down the dial and found this good country music--better than what anyone else was doing)
Stardust (Back when it was good; WIST-AM 1480 was smart enough to pick up this one a few years later, and then they added an FM signal which became Mix 106)
Kool Gold
Pure Gold
Hot Adult Contemporary (I don't remember what they called it)
Z-Rock (brought back a second time "by popular demand")
talk (actually, they simulcast WCNT which was on 1480 at the time and was the first news-talk station in the 1990s in Charlotte; they were all-sports soon after that with Gerry Vaillancourt and then they just disappeared)

Did I leave any out?
 
I had forgotten the 84-86 top 40 period. I was in high school and listened exclusively to classic rock and oldies, because the current music sucked, man.

After one of the house cleanings, their engineer gave my college station their old CD players and the very same Sis board that powered years of 61 Big WAYS shows. It's probably still sitting in a room somewhere at Pfeiffer.

I'll have to go check that out. I smell an e-bay auction.
 
RobynWattsV2.0 said:
Want to add two more SMN formats that were used:

"The Heat" (CHR)
"Starstation" (AC).

BTW: Thanks again, everyone for the info.

Robyn
Click to expand...
Yeah, I forgot to mention they were all SMN. I couldn't remember SMN having a CHR format, but I do remember that they eventually decided on CHR (which means they must have had that as one of the options), and when they selected something that was CHR, only it wasn't the traditional kind, then that was a surprise considering the final choice was "None of the Above".

And Starstation was the Hot AC.

I should also mention they did comedy over the weekend before unveiling their real format. Such as Abbott and Costello's "Who's On First". I guess I had heard that before then, but it was so funny hearing it that weekend.

I also remember when they unveiled the Double Q format. Someone who sounded like Ted Koppel imitating Walter Cronkite announced they had chosen "None of the Above", asking "What IS none of the Above"?
 
It was a good stunt with a lame ending. Of course the whole Double Q thing was already mapped out and planned. that much was obvious the day they were simulcasting WCNT and the hosts were speculating on which format they hoped the station chose.

None of them said news/talk.

And the liner afterwards kept saying that none of the above meant that 95.1 would offer something entirely different, unheard of in the QC. And so the station that was etched in granite in the minds of Charlotte as 95Q became.... 95 DOUBLE Q. I did like the groovy train song though.
 
I believe that the original plan WAS to bring back 95-Q, complete with the WROQ call letters and all. At the time of the planning for the new format, the WROQ call letters were available. Unfortunately, WCKN in Greenville/Spartanburg, SC had gotten word of Adam Communications plans and decided to acquire the WROQ call letters for themselves, while at the same time, revamping their station toward mainstream Album Rock (before then, they were Classic Rock).

In hindsight, if they were serious about the 95-Q relaunch, why didn't they just park the WROQ call letters on 610 and work from there?

Robyn
 
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