Top-40 AMs transition in the 80s.

[Phil Harmonic]

13-Q/WKTQ 1320 AM in Pittsburgh left Top 40, when our owner Cecil Heftel sold the station in 1981. Then it returned to its former WJAS call letters, the new format was still music, adult standards. 13-Q was Y-100/Miami's sister station, back then.

 

[Gregg.]

What about the stations that used the single with the "girls I knew" patch over the offensive "crap I learned" phrase in Paul Simon's "Kodachrome," which is what WBZ was doing when WRKO was playing the "naughty" version? Or the stations that censored the "making love in the green grass" line in Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl"?

As a Connecticut listener, you may remember WABC's version of the song. It simply cut the line and to my ears, it wasn't a bad edit. The WABC version went "When I think back, it's a wonder I can think at all." The missing words are between Back and It's. The beat was a little off but it worked.

 

[davideduardo]

13-Q/WKTQ 1320 AM in Pittsburgh left Top 40, when our owner Cecil Heftel sold the station in 1981. Then it returned to its former WJAS call letters, the new format was still music, adult standards. 13-Q was Y-100/Miami's sister station, back then.

But remember, Norm Wain and Bob Weiss, Metroplex, bought Y-100 well before 1981 so it was no longer a sister to 13-Q by then.

 

[Ed Nielson]

As a Connecticut listener, you may remember WABC's version of the song. It simply cut the line and to my ears, it wasn't a bad edit. The WABC version went "When I think back, it's a wonder I can think at all." The missing words are between Back and It's. The beat was a little off but it worked.

There is a discussion of that edit on another thread. WBZ in Boston did a similar edit. Someone recreated the edit and put it on SoundCloud.

 

[CTListener]

As a Connecticut listener, you may remember WABC's version of the song. It simply cut the line and to my ears, it wasn't a bad edit. The WABC version went "When I think back, it's a wonder I can think at all." The missing words are between Back and It's. The beat was a little off but it worked.

I didn't become a Connecticut listener until 1981. When "Kodachrome" came out in 1973, I was still living in suburban Boston. I hardly ever listened to WABC at night because it was so slow to pick up on songs that were already hits elsewhere.

 

[Ed Nielson]

I didn't become a Connecticut listener until 1981. When "Kodachrome" came out in 1973, I was still living in suburban Boston. I hardly ever listened to WABC at night because it was so slow to pick up on songs that were already hits elsewhere.

As much as I love WABC, that was one of the reasons I also listened to other stations. In the early 70s, WOR-FM and WPIX were known for being ahead of the curve. "New music first, by the time they play it, it will be a golden oldie!"

 

[desertaire]

KRIZ/1230 Phoenix was sold to Family Life Radio in 1978. It ended Top 40 and got religion on 7/30/1978 as KFLR.

Also in Phoenix, KRUX/1360 switched from Top 40 to all-news via NBC's short-lived News and Information Service
in 1975.

KTAR/620 tried a Top 40 format in the early '70s, but dumped it for all-news in 1973.

KTAR was actually MOR (with pre-KOY Bill Heywood!)before the all-news switch. sister station KTAR-FM was Top-40. Phoenix had three MOR format stations during that time period...KTAR-AM, KOY, and KOOL-AM.

 

[NoWayNoCC]

Among the really big AM stations, WSAI Cincinnati switched from top 40 to country in 1978. I barely even remember when it happened, but people still talk about it.

 

[Murfradiojim]

In the Midwest KCMO In Kansas City went from Top 40 to News/Talk in 1980. They had the resources of their co-owned TV station to make that move. In 1984 in Wichita KLEO switched from what would be called a HOT AC today to Music Of Your Life. It worked out well for them ratings wise for a few years

 

[Mark Roberts]

In the Midwest KCMO In Kansas City went from Top 40 to News/Talk in 1980. They had the resources of their co-owned TV station to make that move. In 1984 in Wichita KLEO switched from what would be called a HOT AC today to Music Of Your Life. It worked out well for them ratings wise for a few years

KCMO was never, ever, a top-40 station. At most it was an adult contemporary station at times as it drifted from format to format in the 1970s. It continued with music after adding news blocks in morning and afternoon drive in March 1980 and later eliminated the music. KCMO also picked up the CBS radio affiliation at that time, which KMBZ had dropped a few months early, while retaining ABC affiliation, enabling it to continue to run Paul Harvey's programs.

KCMO already had a strong news department (the one thing it was really noted for) before the addition of longer news blocks in 1980 though certainly they did draw on the resources of KCMO-TV before the radio stations split from Channel 5 late in 1982.

 

[TexasTom]

Seattle market-
[...]

KING, OTOH, was pretty abrupt. The local family who owned them were never super comfortable with T40 as a format (the FM was and is classical, the TV was always community-programming driven.) But until the early 80s they put up with the AM being T40 becuase it billed well. They softened up imaging and dumped a couple of the louder jocks and louder rock in 1982. Then abruptly went all news-talk in 1984 with mostly local talent.

By some time in 1981, KING-AM had gone all the way over to AC. As I recall, a couple of their liners from the time: "You grew up with us, now we've grown up for you" and "More soft rock than Mount St Helens".

That said, KING's Top 40 format was getting pretty squishy by late 1979 or early 1980, when they were doing on-air testing of the Kahn independent sideband AM stereo system. You could listen to the station in stereo by using two radios, one tuned above their center frequency and the other below, so I gave it a try. At that point the music did seem a little softer and they were doing three-song music sweeps without any talk during the sweeps.

 

[CCBInMI]

IIRC, CFGO actually first flipped to Alternative as CJBZ "The Buzz" in 1997 before going all-sports the following year. They were still healthy in the ratings at the beginning of the decade, but likely never recovered from Kool-FM's launch in 1993 (hit music on FM, even if it couldn't be a "true" CHR under CRTC rules).
In Toronto, CFTR of course went All News in 1993 with CHOG going Talk two years later. Other than that, most of the Canadian AM CHR flips I can think of off the top of my head were into AC (CHUM, CFUN, CKGM, CFRA) or Oldies (CKOC) formats. Then there's CKCY in Sault Ste. Marie, ON, which in 1992 went from CHR to... nothing; they went silent and gave up the license.
CKGM, of course, would flip back to CHR in 1988, but with new call letters (CHTX), and ultimately went Oldies in the early '90s. I've heard CKLG experimented with Talk in the mid-'90s but did so poorly with it they switched back to music, and survived as a contemporary station (or at least Hot AC) into the current century.
WFBL in Syracuse, on the other hand, went directly from Mike Joseph's Hot Hits format into MOYL in the fall of 1980. No softening of the music there; they went out both guns blazing.

 

[Murfradiojim]

KCMO was never, ever, a top-40 station. At most it was an adult contemporary station at times as it drifted from format to format in the 1970s. It continued with music after adding news blocks in morning and afternoon drive in March 1980 and later eliminated the music. KCMO also picked up the CBS radio affiliation at that time, which KMBZ had dropped a few months early, while retaining ABC affiliation, enabling it to continue to run Paul Harvey's programs.

KCMO already had a strong news department (the one thing it was really noted for) before the addition of longer news blocks in 1980 though certainly they did draw on the resources of KCMO-TV before the radio stations split from Channel 5 late in 1982.

I had seen it listed in some places and others call it Top.40 or Contemporary. The Kansas City Star radio listing's from early 1980 lists it as Middle Of The Road. I will say you are right. We lived in Emporia from 1978-81. I remember my dad listening to Music 81 KCMO on his AM car radio. He had to drive a lot for work in east central Kansas in those days and probably listened because of their strong signal. He switched to KMBZ after KCMO dropped music. KMBZ in the 1980s is a whole other story.

 

[Oldbones]

What about the stations that used the single with the "girls I knew" patch over the offensive "crap I learned" phrase in Paul Simon's "Kodachrome," which is what WBZ was doing when WRKO was playing the "naughty" version? Or the stations that censored the "making love in the green grass" line in Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl"?

I didn't become a Connecticut listener until 1981. When "Kodachrome" came out in 1973, I was still living in suburban Boston.

Hate to break it to you, but WRKO was also playing an edit of "Kodachrome", as I just verified from listening to an aircheck of Dale Dorman on May 8th of that year. It went "when I look back on/all I learned in high school".
I don't EVER remember hearing the "laughing and running" edit of "Brown Eyed Girl" until the late 70s. Does anyone have proof that it was issued in 1967?

KHJ actually played the edit. I never did. So my AC block in Bishop, California was wilder than the number one Top 40 on the West Coast (if that counts as "wild").

Correction: AN edit. AFAIK, Columbia never issued an edit of this to radio, again, if someone can prove me wrong please do so. I'm guessing your small market station let a lot of that stuff slide for the same reason the (not quite as small market) one I was at in 1973, it was more trouble to edit and cart up a song than it was worth.

There may have been timid AC PDs, but I wan't one of them. I wasn't willing to let a guitar lick kill an otherwise great record for my stations. My rule was never "will this offend my most sensitive listener?" These were people who grew up on Top 40. We're playing the hits they remember and sparing them 5-7 current records this week that they don't want to hear.

If I'm not mistaken, you were a high school kid (or at least a teenager) at the time at your first gig. Teens look at the world quite differently than someone older/more experienced. Where you draw the line on songs like that is a VERY gray area, and varies a lot by individual and market.

Again, we were on different sides of the continent, so mileage may vary, but it was clear, from the time I entered the business in 1971, that the first generation of Top 40 listeners were not interested in "graduating" to MOR, but that several records Top 40 played, from Donny Osmond to Led Zeppelin, as well as a teen-centric approach to jock content and promotion, weren't working for them anymore.
.......
Black music and Latin-influenced music (Santana, Malo, El Chicano) was not only welcome, but essential. If there's one place where AC PDs tended to play it too safe, in my opinion, it was there. But I had the advantage of being a native Californian and the radio without that music was just out of the question.

This was a dilemma top 40 stations on AM faced in the early 70s. There was "FM music" and "AM music", T40 stations were kind of stuck in the middle, trying to play the biggest hits, regardless of genre but many of those who liked one style didn't often like the other very much. What few FM top 40s stations seemed to have a little more leeway, since just being on the FM band inferred some sort of hipness. As long as you kept away from the real teenybopper stuff you were generally OK.

As far as Latin-influenced music being essential, I'm gonna say that was a west coast/southwestern thing. Here in the northeast, Latin influence was nil. Yeah, Santana's hits got played, but Malo, El Chicano, etc. not so much.

 

[michael hagerty]

I don't EVER remember hearing the "laughing and running" edit of "Brown Eyed Girl" until the late 70s. Does anyone have proof that it was issued in 1967?

I'm looking for proof, but in the meantime I can tell you that in my hometown KIBS wouldn't play it until the radio edit arrived. They were weeks behind. When I got hired there four years later it was in the gold library and I swapped it out for the unedited version.

In junior high and high school, listening to distant stations at night, the question when "Brown Eyed Girl" came on was "which version are they playing?"

It also doesn't make any sense to do a content edit on a record that has hit in one version strictly for oldies play years later.

By 1974, I don't remember anyone that still played the edit.

Correction: AN edit. AFAIK, Columbia never issued an edit of this to radio, again, if someone can prove me wrong please do so.

No, they didn't. The edit that KHJ played was an in-house butcher job. Probably the same one that WRKO played. KFRC played it unedited.

I'm guessing your small market station let a lot of that stuff slide for the same reason the (not quite as small market) one I was at in 1973, it was more trouble to edit and cart up a song than it was worth.

Don't guess. I edited and carted at KIBS. I just didn't think "Kodachrome" warranted it.

If I'm not mistaken, you were a high school kid (or at least a teenager) at the time at your first gig. Teens look at the world quite differently than someone older/more experienced. Where you draw the line on songs like that is a VERY gray area, and varies a lot by individual and market.

I programmed Adult Contemporary radio stations until I left for TV news at age 25. I trusted the audience not to freak out because I understood where the audience had come from (early Top 40) and it worked.

This was a dilemma top 40 stations on AM faced in the early 70s. There was "FM music" and "AM music", T40 stations were kind of stuck in the middle, trying to play the biggest hits, regardless of genre but many of those who liked one style didn't often like the other very much. What few FM top 40s stations seemed to have a little more leeway, since just being on the FM band inferred some sort of hipness. As long as you kept away from the real teenybopper stuff you were generally OK.

Kinda what I said---"several records Top 40 played, from Donny Osmond to Led Zeppelin, as well as a teen-centric approach to jock content and promotion, weren't working for them anymore."

As far as Latin-influenced music being essential, I'm gonna say that was a west coast/southwestern thing. Here in the northeast, Latin influence was nil. Yeah, Santana's hits got played, but Malo, El Chicano, etc. not so much.

And I was in California and Northern Nevada.

 

[K.M. Richards]

I programmed Adult Contemporary radio stations until I left for TV news at age 25. I trusted the audience not to freak out because I understood where the audience had come from (early Top 40) and it worked.

Very same thing that I instinctively knew when I got my first PD gig in 1978, doing that same format.

My old friend Jhani Kaye once told me "programmers can hear the station in their heads before creating it on the air." He can do that, I can do that, and knowing Mike like I do, so can he.

Stop second-guessing him, @Oldbones. You're out of your league.

 

[michael hagerty]

As for "Brown Eyed Girl", it had been on the Hot 100 four weeks and was #66 when KHJ added it. It peaked at #10 in Billboard, but #2 at KHJ.

KHJ's chart ran fast in those days, though. It made #2 in just four weeks. That same week, it was still climbing in Billboard and was at #27.

At KHJ, after a week at #2, it went 3-4-14-gone. It was still climbing in Billboard, and didn't peak at #10 until a week after that.

 

[michael hagerty]

And I have been through all my California Top 40 airchecks and none of them are from the weeks when "Brown Eyed Girl" was having its chart run, so I can't give you audio as to who played which version when it was a current.

Worth noting that the record was released in mid-late May.

Taking eight weeks to get to #66 suggests radio resistance, which would have been a reason to send a radio edit out. In '67, the existing radio trades didn't cover that sort of thing the way they would later, so there's no record in Billboard, Cash Box or Record World.

 

[Murfradiojim]

I played "Brown Eyed Girl" as a teenage DJ at an AM Oldies station in 1992 lol. Even kids my age liked the song.

 

[CurtisNEPA]

WIBG in Philadelphia was a most listened to Top 40 station in the 60's and 70's, but around '77, the call letters were changed to WZZD and was called "Wizard 100". Upon the format change, I believed it started out as an AC but only lasted awhile until it was abruptly changed to all-disco. After the disco craze faded, it changed to religious/Christian music.