Today I noticed Jeff Anderson doing a Saturday afternoon shift on KKLZ. Jeff did middays at KKLZ from 1987-1992. He was part of what I call the "Peoria movement" at KKLZ. In 1987, KKLZ hired PD Jeff Murphy from WWCT/Peoria. Murphy (a consultant with Demers Programming since 1992), brought with him two jocks from Peoria, Jeff Anderson and Kevin Vargas. Vargas went on to have many years of success as PD of KISS/San Antonio. He is now PD of WHDR/Miami (Low ratings, Miami is not a rock market at all).
These boys from Peoria transformed KKLZ from a rather wimpy classic hits station named Z96 (that also played recurrents and album cuts from artists such as Bruce Hornsby and the Range) to a "real" classic rock station. The Bruce Hornsby was gone and the hard classic rock was in (which the station has pretty much stuck with ever since).
In 1992,Jeff Anderson crossed the street
to classic rock 107.5 KFBI. The station switched from oldies KUDA (Big Oldies 108) to classic rock when they added Howard Stern. Anderson stayed with 107.5 when they switched to Extreme Radio a decade ago.
As the years went by I thought it was cool that someone so much older than the typical KXTE listener was still part of the airstaff. This paid off for awhile. I recall a few years ago when Jeff was doing nights at EXTREME that he had excellent 25-54 numbers. This was amazing considering that he was playing hard alternative that would seem to only appeal to "angry" white males ages 12-24, yet Jeff found a way to thrive 25-54 playing that music. He eventually moved back to days and then last year his long 13 year run at 107.5 came to an end. Now he's back where he started in Vegas...KKLZ.
Here's another retro example. A few months ago KWNR hired Mark Stevens for parttime. Mark was a major part of early KWNR history. In fact, He was the first jock on the air when the station switched from AC to Country in 9/90. He kicked off the country format by playing "Sweet Country Music" by Atlanta. He did middays for a long time, all the way through 1997 when he crossed the hall to (newly co-owned at the time) KFM-102. Mark eventually became PD and brought KFM up to their highest numbers in years until he was fired by Jaye Albright in 1998. Mark went on to do mornings in Baltimore for the past few years until moving back to Vegas last year. I heard him do some parttime for Beasley on both KKLZ and STAR last September. I had a feeling he would be on 104.3 since they flipped to COYOTE when he was in the building. But I guess things didn't work out. KCYEs loss was KWNRs gain as Mark Stevens is a solid jock.
Hearing Mark on KWNR and Jeff on KKLZ makes me believe there is a lot of truth in that old saying "The more things change the more they stay the same".
These boys from Peoria transformed KKLZ from a rather wimpy classic hits station named Z96 (that also played recurrents and album cuts from artists such as Bruce Hornsby and the Range) to a "real" classic rock station. The Bruce Hornsby was gone and the hard classic rock was in (which the station has pretty much stuck with ever since).
In 1992,Jeff Anderson crossed the street
to classic rock 107.5 KFBI. The station switched from oldies KUDA (Big Oldies 108) to classic rock when they added Howard Stern. Anderson stayed with 107.5 when they switched to Extreme Radio a decade ago.
As the years went by I thought it was cool that someone so much older than the typical KXTE listener was still part of the airstaff. This paid off for awhile. I recall a few years ago when Jeff was doing nights at EXTREME that he had excellent 25-54 numbers. This was amazing considering that he was playing hard alternative that would seem to only appeal to "angry" white males ages 12-24, yet Jeff found a way to thrive 25-54 playing that music. He eventually moved back to days and then last year his long 13 year run at 107.5 came to an end. Now he's back where he started in Vegas...KKLZ.
Here's another retro example. A few months ago KWNR hired Mark Stevens for parttime. Mark was a major part of early KWNR history. In fact, He was the first jock on the air when the station switched from AC to Country in 9/90. He kicked off the country format by playing "Sweet Country Music" by Atlanta. He did middays for a long time, all the way through 1997 when he crossed the hall to (newly co-owned at the time) KFM-102. Mark eventually became PD and brought KFM up to their highest numbers in years until he was fired by Jaye Albright in 1998. Mark went on to do mornings in Baltimore for the past few years until moving back to Vegas last year. I heard him do some parttime for Beasley on both KKLZ and STAR last September. I had a feeling he would be on 104.3 since they flipped to COYOTE when he was in the building. But I guess things didn't work out. KCYEs loss was KWNRs gain as Mark Stevens is a solid jock.
Hearing Mark on KWNR and Jeff on KKLZ makes me believe there is a lot of truth in that old saying "The more things change the more they stay the same".