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WILD FM 97.7 Gospel 1090

E

edbealtherapking

Guest
WILD FM TOm Joyner morning show is on , Russ Parr is Out . Gospel music on AM 1090 . WILD is now on FM . BY HOT 97.7 WBOT RIP <P ID="signature">______________
Jack Format is bad for radio .</P>
 
> WILD FM TOm Joyner morning show is on , Russ Parr is Out .
> Gospel music on AM 1090 . WILD is now on FM . BY HOT 97.7
> WBOT RIP
>
Is this for real? If so, then YES!!!!!!!!!! It's about time we had WILD on FM. Finally Boston will have an FM classic soul station. This was LONG OVERDUE. <P ID="signature">______________
Moe: (Sees a microphone in a radio studio) Ooh, a microphonie!

Curly: Or a phoney at the mike!

Moe: Quiet numbskulls I'm broadcastin'!

From The Three Stooges episode "Micro-Phoneys"</P>
 
It's about time!

Can you believe it! The full story is on bostonradiowatch.com <P ID="signature">______________
Moe: (Sees a microphone in a radio studio) Ooh, a microphonie!

Curly: Or a phoney at the mike!

Moe: Quiet numbskulls I'm broadcastin'!

From The Three Stooges episode "Micro-Phoneys"</P>
 
> WILD FM TOm Joyner morning show is on , Russ Parr is Out .
> Gospel music on AM 1090 . WILD is now on FM . BY HOT 97.7
> WBOT RIP
>
Yep I heard it (or tried to hear it) too. They are going the positioner "WILD-FM, The People's Station", which sounds a bit more contemporary than the *old* WILD 1090. We'll have to see how they have tweaked the programming. Somehow I doubt that they will be quite as gold intensive as they were on AM.

For the Boston market area, an urban/AC on FM is long overdue. For those of you who live in or south of Boston, this is a great new option for you.

Speaking personally, it's a disappointment because the 97.7 signal gets ripped apart by Cool 97.7 from the Keene market. That seems to be true along the whole 495 corridor north of the Mass Pike, until you get into Lawrence...where it's WOKQ that can give you trouble. I did a "road test" this morning from Merrimack, NH to the Chelmsford area and found only a few places along the route where WILD-FM was listenable. Same was true of Cool 97.7 - but it tended to dominate.

Their signal seems awfully strong for a Class A, as Nashua/Chelmsford are quite a bit further from the Winchendon/Keene area than they are from Blue Hill Boston.

I hope that plan that was spoken of earlier about Radio One offering $ for Cool to go directional will pan out. It would sure be nice to be able to listen to our "new" station.
 
Hip hop/younger at 6 pm

> Can you believe it! The full story is on
> bostonradiowatch.com
>
And it says there that younger demo stuff (hip hop, etc.) will still be on,
but only after 6 pm. Interesting. Classic soul...hopefully Sunny Joe White
can get a streamcast of this up in heaven :)

By the way having 1090 as a daytimer signal actually benefitted me in one way:
I work a night job at the post office and radio recep. isn't the best. Picture
working in a power plant, there's so much sorting equipment. So the fact that
ESPN put the baseball playoffs on 890 and 1400 meant I now had trouble hearing them (signals didn't quite make it to the workroom floor). I took a portable
CD player with AM-FM, digital readout, and put it near the "wall" and bought one of those FM mini-broadcasters (people buy them to relay their Ipods through
car stereo, etc.) and set the dial to 1090, WBAL, which has come in fairly
well. Then I re-broadcast it on an FM freq so that I could hear it in my work area on a Walkman.But only because WILD is off air...though if they were on past
sunset I'm sure they'd broadcast at such a lower power that I could prob.
still pick up WBAL.

Some baseball fans don't pay as much attention to the playoffs once the Sox
are out of it, but I do. And have been able to hear games this way. As it
turns out I'll definitely be able to see games 1,2, 6, and 7 on TV because they're on weekends, and also game 5 (taking a personal day). Anyway...
 
> > WILD FM TOm Joyner morning show is on , Russ Parr is Out .
> > Gospel music on AM 1090 . WILD is now on FM . BY HOT 97.7
> > WBOT RIP
> >
> Is this for real? If so, then YES!!!!!!!!!! It's about
> time we had WILD on FM. Finally Boston will have an FM
> classic soul station. This was LONG OVERDUE.

Well, in the daytime anyway. The article says that after 6 PM 97.7 will still be contemporary hip-hop.

By the way, last week the AM Stereo light was finally shut off on 1090. I wonder if that means they made the transmitter switch to the WXKS-AM site?
 
Re: Radio One Moves

I'm not surprised that such a move would eventually occur.

But I am surprised that it happened now, before Radio One had a chance to purchase a class "B" FM signal in the Boston area to which WBOT's format and call letters would be moved to.

I think the only way Radio One would be able to get a "big" FM signal is in the event Greater Media sells-off their Boston-area radio stations. Whoever buys them (especially if Clear Channel were the buyer) would likely have to spin-off at least a couple of the Greater Media stations.

Were Radio One able to get a class "B" FM signal, it's higher power and larger coverage area would be ideal for WBOT, with WILD moving to 97.7 (as has happened) and a Black Gospel station at 1090 (which has also happened).

It was only a few months ago that the 97.7 signal was moved to the top of Blue Hill, and as WBOT, the station's ratings climbed nicely (at least in 12-plus) over the Summer.

Is there any chance that Radio One might be able to purchase a "big signal" FM station in the Boston area and revive WBOT's hip-hop/urban format there, allowing 97.7 to go 24/7 Urban AC??

Postscript: Boston Radio Watch was actually wrong about 1090 being Boston's first Black Gospel station. For much of the late 1980's and early 1990's, there was a Black Gospel format on what was then WLVG-740 (now WJIB), at the time a daytime-only station.
 
> > WILD FM TOm Joyner morning show is on , Russ Parr is Out .
> > Gospel music on AM 1090 . WILD is now on FM . BY HOT 97.7
> > WBOT RIP
> >
> Yep I heard it (or tried to hear it) too. They are going
> the positioner "WILD-FM, The People's Station", which sounds
> a bit more contemporary than the *old* WILD 1090. We'll
> have to see how they have tweaked the programming. Somehow
> I doubt that they will be quite as gold intensive as they
> were on AM.

Only heard four songs so far, all adult urban contemporary ballads. Nothing going back to the 60's, 70's or 80's yet. It's great to have the urban AC audience finally served on FM in Boston, but I'll miss the classic soul.
 
Re: Radio One Moves

> I'm not surprised that such a move would eventually occur.
>
> But I am surprised that it happened now, before Radio One
> had a chance to purchase a class "B" FM signal in the Boston
> area to which WBOT's format and call letters would be moved
> to.
>
> I think the only way Radio One would be able to get a "big"
> FM signal is in the event Greater Media sells-off their
> Boston-area radio stations. Whoever buys them (especially if
> Clear Channel were the buyer) would likely have to spin-off
> at least a couple of the Greater Media stations.

Radio One would've been foolish to wait for such unlikely speculation.

> Is there any chance that Radio One might be able to purchase
> a "big signal" FM station in the Boston area and revive
> WBOT's hip-hop/urban format there, allowing 97.7 to go 24/7
> Urban AC??

I doubt it. I think the companies that own them want to keep them.
 
Re: Radio One Moves

I was thinking that, too, though I wondered if WLVG was totally gospel _music_
or did it have religious talk shows/preaching part of the time as well.
> Postscript: Boston Radio Watch was actually wrong about 1090
> being Boston's first Black Gospel station. For much of the
> late 1980's and early 1990's, there was a Black Gospel
> format on what was then WLVG-740 (now WJIB), at the time a
> daytime-only station.
>
<P ID="signature">______________
I am the REAL raccoonradio (2 c's). Accept
no substitutes!</P>
 
This aint Classic Soul

This new station isn't classic soul. So far they haven't played a track from earlier than 1990. Most of the tracks are current and recurrent R&B. This is a current-based urban AC, which will skew younger at night. Let's see what the mix sounds like this weekend. Any way you look at it, the 70's and 80's classic soul is gone.

It seems to me that Radio One wanted to get Tom Joyner on FM and introduce their successful gospel format to the market. This achieves both goals but the FM will probably sound disjointed for awhile until they find their sound.

Speaking of disjointed, I just heard a Hot 97.7 sweeper!

Mike Thomas

> Is this for real? If so, then YES!!!!!!!!!! It's about
> time we had WILD on FM. Finally Boston will have an FM
> classic soul station. This was LONG OVERDUE.
>
 
Re: Radio One Moves

Raccoon Radio (with two "c"'s) asked:

> I was thinking that, too, though I wondered if WLVG was
> totally gospel _music_
> or did it have religious talk shows/preaching part of the
> time as well?

Although I only listened to it a few minutes at a time while "scanning the dial", it appeared to me that WLVG was all Black Gospel music and did not have any religious talk shows or preaching (with the possible exception of Sunday mornings).
 
Re: Radio One Moves

> I was thinking that, too, though I wondered if WLVG was
> totally gospel _music_
> or did it have religious talk shows/preaching part of the
> time as well.

There were paid gospel church and preacher programs on WLVG. The station ran in dire financial straits, so I'm sure they took in any brokered programming they could that fit their format. There is still some paid gospel church programming on 740 on WJIB Sunday mornings.
 
Re: This aint Classic Soul

> This new station isn't classic soul. So far they haven't
> played a track from earlier than 1990. Most of the tracks
> are current and recurrent R&B. This is a current-based urban
> AC, which will skew younger at night. Let's see what the
> mix sounds like this weekend. Any way you look at it, the
> 70's and 80's classic soul is gone.
>

You're obviously not part of WILD audience so you'd wouldn't be expected
to know this. Joyner plays all 70s and 80s classic soul on his show.
Also, they just played Barry White.
 
Re: This aint Classic Soul

Really? I just punched up WBOT on Mediabase. Yup, nothing older than 1990. While Joyner does play some older tracks on his show, I'm not seeing any on WILD-FM's playlist after 10am. And BTW, Joyner doesn't play ALL 70's and 80's songs. Today he played the new Alisha Keys, Dwele and Mariah Carey tracks, and he also played "Ascention" from Maxwell, a 90's song. Maybe you, as part of the WILD audience, should listen a little more closely.

Oh, and that Barry White song? "Practice What You Preach?" That one's from 1994. Don't hold your breath for "Cant Get Enough Of Your Love" or "It's Ecstacy When You Lay Down Next To Me" outside of the TJMS.....

--Mike Thomas


> You're obviously not part of WILD audience so you'd wouldn't
> be expected
> to know this. Joyner plays all 70s and 80s classic soul on
> his show.
> Also, they just played Barry White.
>
 
Re: Radio One Moves

>
> Radio One would've been foolish to wait for such unlikely
> speculation.

Very true. GM's best assets are likely their radio station, and aren't they headquartered in Braintree? The only real division that the company has sold off were the Worcester County cable systems (Greater Media Cable) around 1997? The Greater Media name lives on, though, in Worcester's public access station, WGMC-13.

I was thinking, regarding potential mergers, would a merger between Bonneville and Greater Media be possible? They each own radio stations in only a few large markets, none of the markets have stations that overlap, they've both made some lousy decisions (GM's Mix 95.7/Philly, Bonneville's 95.7 MAX FM/San Francisco), and they both seem to be about the same size.

> (after a discussion whether WBOT would be revived on better FM station)
>
> I doubt it. I think the companies that own them want to keep
> them.

Plus, if WBOT failed on 97.7, then why would it work on a Pru FM signal?
 
Re: This aint Classic Soul

It seems as though they've dayparted the urban AC playlist (from 1990 onward only) to only before 4 PM. Since 4 PM, they've been playing mainstream urban hits including hip hop.

My opinion: Radio One really missed the boat on this one. Essentially, all they seem to have done is switched Russ Parr with Tom Joyner and taken the 97.7 music format in a more adult direction during the day keeping it fairly current, but changing practically nothing after 4 PM. Meanwhile, they've trashed a format (classic soul) that was quite often beating the mainstream urban format already on 97.7 despite having an inferior daytime only signal for gospel which I doubt will do better than urban gold/classic soul in this market.

They should take the music format on the new WILD-FM in a 24 hour urban AC direction, playing music from the 60's through today as most urban AC stations around the country do...merely adding in more 90's hits and current R&B songs while perhaps weeding out some of the lesser known/more obscure gold titles in the old WILD-AM rotation.

I'm very disappointed. I'll miss my classic soul fix even if it was only during daylight hours.

Any word on what happens to any of the personalities from the old WBOT-FM and WILD-AM???? Will any of them be sticking around for the new WILD-FM??

> Really? I just punched up WBOT on Mediabase. Yup, nothing
> older than 1990. While Joyner does play some older tracks
> on his show, I'm not seeing any on WILD-FM's playlist after
> 10am. And BTW, Joyner doesn't play ALL 70's and 80's songs.
> Today he played the new Alisha Keys, Dwele and Mariah Carey
> tracks, and he also played "Ascention" from Maxwell, a 90's
> song. Maybe you, as part of the WILD audience, should
> listen a little more closely.
>
> Oh, and that Barry White song? "Practice What You Preach?"
> That one's from 1994. Don't hold your breath for "Cant Get
> Enough Of Your Love" or "It's Ecstacy When You Lay Down Next
> To Me" outside of the TJMS.....
>
> --Mike Thomas
>
>
> > You're obviously not part of WILD audience so you'd
> wouldn't
> > be expected
> > to know this. Joyner plays all 70s and 80s classic soul on
>
> > his show.
> > Also, they just played Barry White.
> >
>
 
Re: Radio One Moves

Justin T asked:

> Plus, if WBOT failed on 97.7, then why would it work on a
> Pru FM signal?

WBOT had only about three months with a signal transmitted from atop Blue Hill. Prior to that, they transmitted from the Brockton/Abington line, with a iffy signal at best in much of Boston. I think that if they had kept the WBOT format on 97.7, it would have drawn more listeners (as it is, WBOT went up in the Summer book; I suspect it was due to the transmitter move and new signal).

WBOT's ratings problems didn't stem from it's programming; but from a signal that until recently wasn't strong in those areas of Boston that had a large African-American population and still wasn't too strong in the northern suburbs, where believe it or not a lot of suburban white kids would enjoy WBOT's brand of hip-hop radio if the signal were as strong as the other "major" Boston-area FM stations.

If WBOT had a "Pru FM signal" (as Justin T put it), I think it would have eventually become one of Boston's five most popular radio stations in overall listeners and be at or near number-one among teens and adults under 35 years of age.
 
Re: Radio One Moves

> Plus, if WBOT failed on 97.7, then why would it work on a
> Pru FM signal?

I don't think WBOT necessarily "failed". It's ratings almost doubled after the recent transmitter move to Blue Hill.

I'm guessing it was more a matter of Radio One deciding to serve a format that was completely absent from the (legitimate) commercial FM band in the market, urban AC, rather than continuing to compete with WJMN for hip-hop full-time.

Besides, it seems like 97.7 is still pretty much the WBOT hip-hop format after 4 PM.
 
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