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WKLB in Rhode Island

K

Kenny Atkinson

A few people I know in the Providence area are enjoying WKLB at thier new home of 102.5.
Thier coverage in Rhode Island great. Watch out Cat! This is worth watching.
 
I'm glad KLB's signal reaches RI now but a few people enjoying them means nothing. A few people with diaries enjoying them would mean something. If you listen to KLB in RI you also listen to WCTK. Will diary keepers remember Cat Country or Country 102.5? It will take a long time for new listeners to even remember their call letters. As Holland constantly points out, Arbitron is a memory game & people will remember Cat Country regardless of how long they listened to either station.

Boston stations always show up in the Providence book but KISS has no effect on PRO-FM. Magic has no effect on Lite. Mix has no effect on Coast. JAMN may have at times given Hot a run for its' money & WEEI is an obvious sports format contender, but that's about it in terms of actual competition or sales dollar competition.

I might want to know what KLB's signal is like the further into some Massachusetts area you go, like Cape Cod, Plymouth, Brockton, as there's probably little loyalty to the Providence market in those areas. That's about it though. CTK holds its' own against othe Providence formats & any effect KLB has will be minimal.
 
I have to disagree with Runrigger that if you listen to KLB you also listen to CTK. I RARELY listen to CTK. I rarely ever have. To a REAL country music fan that grew up listening to the music, their variety SUCKS. I listened to WHIM for years and continued to listen to WHIM loyally on thier 1110 AM signal after CTK came on. Then when WHIM went off, I checked out CTK more but was never liked them because they did not play any classic country. I then checked out the country FM in Boston which I believe was Country 96.9 WBCS and had much better variety, and then later 99.5 WKLB. The fair signal of 99.5 didn't even bother me because the music variety was so much better. Now that KLB is on 102.5 and still has the same great variety (which regularly includes gold songs from the 70's, 80's, and 90's), when I want to hear country music, I listen to them.
 
Radiojay,

There was a short period of time during the early 90's. WCTK had a 'Classic Country' show on the weekends.
It was done in house. And the jock hosting it was 'Barrett Lee'. It ran either Sat or Sunday night between
7pm And midnight. Everything from Ernest Tubb to The Oak Ridge Boys were played. I have an aircheck or
two in my collection. Once I dig it up. I'll post the air date.
 
I think that was the only time I did listen to WCTK, when they had that classic country show. That was too good to last. The only other time I listened was during request hours when people would sometimes call in to hear some gold songs. During regular programming you were lucky to hear anything before the 90's. From my point of view today, CTK is the PRO FM of country music. They play mainly new stuff with some slightly older songs from a few months to a few years ago, every now and then.
 
There is absolutely no comparison between WCTK and WKLB. The former's playlist has tightened considerably in recent years, offering little variety. In addition, many of its jocks, as well as its tired imaging, makes WCTK sound like a small-market station in Iowa (no offense to those in small markets). WKLB, on the other hand, has a big-market feel and sound. It has the best variety I have heard on a Country station this side of the legendary WSIX/Nashville. In the few times I have heard the station since they moved to 102.5, I find myself in awe of songs from the 1990s that I hardly even remembered. WKLB's re-entry into Rhode Island (they had been heard back when they were on 105.7 in the mid-1990s) is welcome!
 
Well of course it has a big market feel. It's a big market station. There's pretty much no comparison between any Providence station vs any Boston station with the same format. Even the ones in Providence who have been on for years are borderline hacks. Rho Disland listeners do not care. Did you see the blurb in the local rag last week about the declining population? Younger upwardly mobile people (that's potential listeners baby) are leaving the state. New people moving in don't speak the language. There's no need for any station to push any envelopes. Radio wars in Providence are like cola wars. In the long run nothing changes.
 
Re: WKLB in Rhode Island : 90's

Actually I am Barrett Lee, and the history is a bit different.
I was the first new and *"country" person to come on board in 1988 when Country 98.1 WCTK switched over from its easy listening format. They were actually using the same on air people from the old format, and they were completely clueless. Interesting note here, the midday guy Tom Devoe shortly moved into sales and later became GM. Anyway, I typed up lots of notes and put a notebook in the studio, along with a Country Almanac, clarified lots of proper pronunciations of names (it was quite funny) and began immediately doing weekend nights 7pm-12mid.
Then the hiring began, Jim O'Brien from WHIM fame came aboard to do mornings and the whole daypart rotation was changed with exception of the overnight position of Steve Miller. Steve was very adaptable and did a great job there for years. Anyway, I was asked to come aboard full-time weeknights 7pm-12mid and after a few ratings cycles bumping that slot to #1 with Adults 25-54 they asked me to take over afternoons. Lots of great strided were made during those days, we had the ** "SUPERSHOW" at the Providence Civic Center and made our mark in the ratings. In 1990 they blew out Jim O'Brien and asked me to do mornings. Dan Meaney was hired as program director (PD) and took over afternoons, Tiffany Hill was middays and Steve Miller was still doing the night shift. Things were lots of fun and smooth for a while then we needed to fill the night spot and I recommended Mark Burns from Country radio WCAV in Brockton, MA. He was the only guy I knew that knew as much about country and loved it as much as I did. Shortly after he was hired they blew out Dan Meaney, and Mark took over as afternnon drive guy and PD. In the summer of '92 The Providence Journal did it's contest for favorite morning radio personality, and I came in #2 behind Salty, and more importantly I was able to get 5,000.00 for the Children's Hospital that was being built at the time. We hosted tons of concerts at the Warwick Musical Theater, Cape Cod Melody Tent, Indian Ranch, Worcester Centrum and more. We did some great toy drives for Toys for Tots, and in general just had a great time with our listeners and with each other.
Unfortunately, in the fall of 1992 Mark Burns was killed by a drunk driver in Fall River, and everyone was really effected, and myself I was devastated. After that things were a lot different around the radio station. Later that year I was in Nashville to co-host my friend Charlie Daniel's volunteer jam, and while there and appearing on Video Morning (CMT) I met someone who later asked me if I would be interested in doing mornings at a planned new 50K FM Country station in Memphis, TN. I left WCTK just before Christmas and took the job at Froggy 94, which we launched in January 1993. So, obviously there's a lot more history about WCTK, but these are the highlights that mean a lot to me, and in response poster "truthandjustice" we didn't do a classic country weekend show, or at least I didn't and noone did between 1988 and 1993.
If posters have other questions, comments or memories about the early years of Country 98.1 WTCK I lok forward to your posts.

Barrett Lee

* I did weekend afternoons 1980-1982 at Country 1110AM WHIM, and Jim O'Brien was the morning guy and music director.
** SUPERSHOW, we gave away all 14,000+ plus tickets for a free concert with Ronnie Milsap, The Desert Rose band, The Forester Sisters and Mary Chapin Carpenter. NICE SHOW!

truthandjustice said:
Radiojay,

There was a short period of time during the early 90's. WCTK had a 'Classic Country' show on the weekends.
It was done in house. And the jock hosting it was 'Barrett Lee'. It ran either Sat or Sunday night between
7pm And midnight. Everything from Ernest Tubb to The Oak Ridge Boys were played. I have an aircheck or
two in my collection. Once I dig it up. I'll post the air date.
Click to expand...
 
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