Remember the good ol' days?

[Bobby BodySlam]

When the PRO-FM dee-jays had personality and the station didn't suck? I think it's really sad how a station that Gio, Hollande Cooke, Berkowitz and other guys helped build has become what it is. At least Gio's still there.

 

[xtreme11678]

actually speaking of Geo... how long has he been at the station? i think i heard him say recently hes got like 30 yrs there.... witch would prolly make him the longest dj at any station in providence at this point

 

[Runrigger]

I don't think they suck at all. Like all CHRs they're evolving with the format's audience. If you're talking Gio's early days, Gary Berkowitz, & Holland you're going as far back as the 70s. People change. Radio changes. The good old days are different for different age groups.

 

[ScottBurns]

But change can certainly be for the worse. I have to agree with the original poster; PRO-FM has all but lost any trace of personality. The nightshow, once the second-most personality-driven slot - and I remember not the 1970s, but the days of Magic Mark Anthony and Brian B. Wilde - has been un-filled for months and months and months. Davey Morris, who has been at the station for about 15 years, had far more personality when he was just a weekender. While Jessica has been a breath of fresh air, it is hard to argue that the current product can compare to any of the names mentioned earlier in this thread.

The one point about which I agree with Runrigger is that this lack of personality is common nationwide. If any of you ever spent any time in Tampa in the 1990s, then you surely knew the most personality-driven CHR station in the history of radio, WFLZ ("The Power Pig"), the station that made Bubba the Love Sponge famous. Today, the station is voicetracked almost every shift outside of mornings. Another sad example of what radio has become.

 

[Runrigger]

I know this topic would draw you in Scott, & I really don't dispute a lot of what you say. I'm just giving you a rationale. Things have changed. Morning shows used to be solo aside from a news person who more often than not conversed with the jock after the newscast. Middays were always handled by guys who appealed to women. Everybody sounded like Robby Bridges in PM drive. Nights were handled by high-energy jocks. I don't know if radio reacted to changes in audiences' tastes or created a product that audiences have come to accept as the norm. I just started buying Saturday Night Live season DVD sets & will probably stop when I get to the point where I think the show started sucking. Still I wonder how many people who weren't alive in 1976 can watch the show & think someone showing up at your door in a shark costume is funny.

 

[Bobby BodySlam]

I don't think they suck at all. Like all CHRs they're evolving with the format's audience. If you're talking Gio's early days, Gary Berkowitz, & Holland you're going as far back as the 70s. People change. Radio changes. The good old days are different for different age groups.

I think the Big 92 was much better in the 70's, 80's and early 90's than it is now.
It's sad to think of what it's become and I'd be interested to know what the guys who helped build it think of it.

 

[Bobby BodySlam]

The nightshow, once the second-most personality-driven slot - and I remember not the 1970s, but the days of Magic Mark Anthony and Brian B. Wilde - has been un-filled for months and months and months.

Can someone explain that to me?

 

[McRadio]

The night show on PRO-FM is probably less important to Citadel than the night show on Hot 106. That may not be an excuse but it's one explanation. It isn't just PRO. As far as the guys who helped build stations you could say the same about the history of B101 and to a lesser extent HJY. The guy in the shark costume showed up at the door of Providence radio and he keeps getting in and chomping away. But Runrigger is right. Tastes do change as society does. The role of the jock outside of morning drive is less important. Consider that morning jocks used to be actual jocks who had the capability to do more than just babble over intros. Now I would go so far as to say most morning people are not even jocks in the traditional sense and probably would get out of radio rather than move to a different time slot.

 

[ScottBurns]

I don't know if radio reacted to changes in audiences' tastes or created a product that audiences have come to accept as the norm.

I think you hit the nail on the head with the latter part of that assessment, Runrigger. I do not think that audiences have asked for a product that is far more bland than it was in the past. Instead, a bland product, made possible by efficiency consultants who have helped giant corporate owners "trim the fat" at each of their thousands of stations, is the standard that audiences have come to accept. For example, while WCTK has been up and down, I think that there is a direct correlation between their more recent success and the fact that the station is still mostly live and still has some high-energy jocks. Moreover, I would still posit that Providence is not that great a market for the Country format.

Another example helps. I think that part of 'HJY's sustainted success is the fact that the station has been so personality-driven for so many years. The average 'HJY listener knows the names Paul, Al, and Charles. Outside of Gio, who has worked at PRO-FM for decades, can the average PRO-FM listener so much as name another jock?

 

[Holland Cooke]

Ya wanna talk "good old days???"

RIP longtime WHDH/Boston morning mainstay Jess Cain:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2008/02/radio_legend_je.html

You might not think I heard much morning drive radio back then -- working 7-midnight at the time -- then, often, off to a saloon, where Pro Personalities were "frequently compensated for their appearances." But when I was vertical pre-9AM, I had two buttons, Salty and Jess (on the Boston AM now-known-as WEEI).

Jess Cain was my favorite jock then...maybe ever.

Good afternoon from Washington,
HC
www.HollandCooke.com

 

[Holland Cooke]

One SLIGHT correction...though only-a-technicality....

When the PRO-FM dee-jays had personality and the station didn't suck? I think it's really sad how a station that Gio, Hollande Cooke, Berkowitz and other guys helped build has become what it is.

Gary Berkowitz deserves 100% of the applause for Pro-FM's energy.
He had a sound in his head, and conveyed it to the air staff, and psyched-'em-up.

At the time, radio tuners were analog, not the digital dial position readout today's radios display.
And in Providence, WPRO AM and FM were at-the-same-position on slide-rule-looking tuners then.
Simply toggling the AM/FM switch back-and-forth got you Pro or Pro-FM.
So Berko taught the FM DJs to say "FM" in italics, to differentiate it from the AM station, which was the gorilla then.
Later, he took-it-up-a-notch, and they began-and-ended each break "FM! WPRO-FM!"

One SLIGHT correction...though only-a-technicality: I was on the-station-then-called "Pro," AM630...although, technically, I WAS on Pro-FM in its early-early days. Before I landed a full-time gig @ WPRO (September '74), I worked weekends June-September, while doing afternoon drive on WSPR/Springfield. On Saturdays, I did two shows on two stations in two states using two names. Once, I said "WSPRO."

Pro-FM didn't have a 24/7 air staff yet (overnights were automated); so my Saturday 7-midnight shift was simulcast. And when I legal-ID'd on-hour, I said "WPRO FM AND AM, PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND USA."

Nights were handled by high-energy jocks.

http://members.aol.com/cookeh/WPRO77.wax