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WLIB goin' full-time gospel

F

FightingIrish

After 29 months as the flagship station for the progressive talk network Air America, WLIB will become a full-time black gospel music station on Sept. 1.

It will be "music-intensive," says Vinny Brown, operations manager of sister station WBLS (107.5 FM), "but will not exist in a vacuum, just playing songs. It will be heavily involved with the community, because in many ways the church is the community."

Vice president/general manager Deon Levingston says while the "Praise and Inspiration" format will not have talk shows "per se," some shows "will focus on issues in a way that's compatible with the music."

(snip)

"This will be a 24-hour gospel format," says Brown.

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/ent_radio/story/445270p-374953c.html

I have to say, it's not a bad idea for WLIB. Black gospel has done well in quite a few markets. Less of a crapshoot than R1's talk format.

Article also says that country and oldies were considered. Quite frankly, I can't imagine either of those formats on WLIB.
 
FightingIrish said:
After 29 months as the flagship station for the progressive talk network Air America, WLIB will become a full-time black gospel music station on Sept. 1.

It will be "music-intensive," says Vinny Brown, operations manager of sister station WBLS (107.5 FM), "but will not exist in a vacuum, just playing songs. It will be heavily involved with the community, because in many ways the church is the community."

Vice president/general manager Deon Levingston says while the "Praise and Inspiration" format will not have talk shows "per se," some shows "will focus on issues in a way that's compatible with the music."



(snip)

"This will be a 24-hour gospel format," says Brown.

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/ent_radio/story/445270p-374953c.html

I have to say, it's not a bad idea for WLIB. Black gospel has done well in quite a few markets. Less of a crapshoot than R1's talk format.

Article also says that country and oldies were considered. Quite frankly, I can't imagine either of those formats on WLIB.
Click to expand...


Gospel is definitely the best choice out of the 3 format choices but music on AM, as mentioned, is a hard sell as is their format for the most part especially in New York.
They'll pull in some numbers and revenue albeit not much but then again I don't think that's their main ploy. More power to them. I wish them luck!
 
Jeffrey said:
FightingIrish said:
After 29 months as the flagship station for the progressive talk network Air America, WLIB will become a full-time black gospel music station on Sept. 1.

It will be "music-intensive," says Vinny Brown, operations manager of sister station WBLS (107.5 FM), "but will not exist in a vacuum, just playing songs. It will be heavily involved with the community, because in many ways the church is the community."

Vice president/general manager Deon Levingston says while the "Praise and Inspiration" format will not have talk shows "per se," some shows "will focus on issues in a way that's compatible with the music."



(snip)

"This will be a 24-hour gospel format," says Brown.

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/ent_radio/story/445270p-374953c.html

I have to say, it's not a bad idea for WLIB. Black gospel has done well in quite a few markets. Less of a crapshoot than R1's talk format.

Article also says that country and oldies were considered. Quite frankly, I can't imagine either of those formats on WLIB.
Click to expand...


Gospel is definitely the best choice out of the 3 format choices but music on AM, as mentioned, is a hard sell as is their format for the most part especially in New York.
They'll pull in some numbers and revenue albeit not much but then again I don't think that's their main ploy. More power to them. I wish them luck!
Click to expand...

I wonder if paid religious programming will be part of the mix. I can see the station starting out "music intensive," then selling more and more airtime to local, regional and national preachers. Could that work in New York?
 
WLIB is not going to be an oldies station, but it's going to be a gospel station. That's why New York is not going to get a full-time oldies station in New York City. No way! :mad:

Look what happened to other full-time oldies station in other places beside NYC. WBPM is still doing oldies on 92.9 in Saugerties, NY, it's about more than 90 miles north of NYC. that's what it remains as an oldies station playing nothing but 50's and 60's music. That's why New York City has no oldies station there. Up in Connecticut, WKHL went from "Kool 96.7" to "The Coast" with a different calls WCTZ and it's an adult hits station than "Jack" does. I listened to oldies on WMTR in Morristown, NJ and it sounds great in NYC.

Maybe New York City should live without oldies for good. WCBS-FM is not going back to oldies, forget it. It's over. WLIB is not going to be an oldies station, it's a gospel station.

Look at all the gospel stations there. WMCA and WWDJ had religious talk running and plays a few gospel stuff. I hope there is room for gospel there to fit on WLIB. Will see what happens.

By the way, no oldies station in New York City, oldies is not coming back, leave "Jack" alone and stick with the format until you'll see it fail. I'll rather listen to my iPod to hear the "WCBS-FM Top 500 Songs" or the "WCBS-FM Top 1001 Songs" playlists. Perhaps I will shuffle it to hear some great oldies that I missed since I was listening to CBS-FM when it was an oldies station. I'll listen to it on my iPod.
 
FightingIrish said:
I have to say, it's not a bad idea for WLIB. Black gospel has done well in quite a few markets. Less of a crapshoot than R1's talk format.
Click to expand...

If you're in an area with a sizable black population, gospel is now a viable format. Kirk Franklin has album sales equal to or better than most rap stars. The God-friendly image makes the format easy to sell to advertisers.

WLIB and co-owned WBLS have a long heritage in the black community, so this format decision looks like a winner. The WLIB signal easily covers NYC and some suburbs with a large black population -- Yonkers, Mount Vernon, White Plains, Newark, Jersey City, Teaneck, Englewood, even Plainfield and New Brunswick.

FightingIrish said:
Article also says that country and oldies were considered. Quite frankly, I can't imagine either of those formats on WLIB.
Click to expand...

Country is too white a format for NYC. Oldies is seen as a dying format -- it's losing stations left and right.
 
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