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WLS-FM moves to Classic Hits, Announces New Hires

C

casual observer

Guest
From AllAccess.com. The Fred Winston move is brilliant. Smart upgrades across the board.

WLS-FM/Chicago Shifts To Classic Hits, Brant Miller To Mornings, Fred Winston To Afternoons
September 28, 2012 at 3:32 PM (PT)

CUMULUS Oldies WLS-F/CHICAGO is repositioning as "CHICAGO's Classic Hits... 94.7 WLS" and shuffling its lineup in the wake of the exit of morning man DAVE FOGEL, bringing BRANT MILLER back for mornings alongside MARTI JONES in his third term at the station and promoting market veteran and weekend host FRED WINSTON to 2:30-6p (CT) weekdays.

http://www.allaccess.com/net-news/a...-chicago-shifts-to-classic-hits-brant-miller-

URL provided as a courtesy by Radiodiscussions.com

[Truncated because excerpt exceeds amount permitted under Fair Use standards]
 
I'm happy for Fred Winston, and I'm glad Shannon is gone, but leaving Dick Biondi on that terrible time slot is an insult to his listeners. Biondi sounds 10 times better than Landecker, but Jan Jeffries plays favorites.
Then again Jeffries has never cared about Biondi's listeners.
 
casual observer said:
From AllAccess.com. The Fred Winston move is brilliant. Smart upgrades across the board.

WLS-FM/Chicago Shifts To Classic Hits, Brant Miller To Mornings, Fred Winston To Afternoons
September 28, 2012 at 3:32 PM (PT)

CUMULUS Oldies WLS-F/CHICAGO is repositioning as "CHICAGO's Classic Hits... 94.7 WLS" and shuffling its lineup in the wake of the exit of morning man DAVE FOGEL, bringing BRANT MILLER back for mornings alongside MARTI JONES in his third term at the station and promoting market veteran and weekend host FRED WINSTON to 2:30-6p (CT) weekdays.

http://www.allaccess.com/net-news/a...-chicago-shifts-to-classic-hits-brant-miller-

URL provided as a courtesy by Radiodiscussions.com

[Truncated because excerpt exceeds amount permitted under Fair Use standards]
Click to expand...

What I want to know is how Scott Shannon holds his huge ego in. Jan has got him off WLS-FM and he demoted him at WPLJ
 
Earlyriser said:
It's all because WJMK will soon dump the format.
Click to expand...

Source of this information please. I don't believe it will happen anytime soon. I think WLS-FM is feeling the pinch of appealing to too old of a demographic and wants to draw in younger listeners (and compete more evenly with WJMK-FM).
 
casual observer said:
From AllAccess.com. The Fred Winston move is brilliant. Smart upgrades across the board.

WLS-FM/Chicago Shifts To Classic Hits, Brant Miller To Mornings, Fred Winston To Afternoons
September 28, 2012 at 3:32 PM (PT)

CUMULUS Oldies WLS-F/CHICAGO is repositioning as "CHICAGO's Classic Hits... 94.7 WLS" and shuffling its lineup in the wake of the exit of morning man DAVE FOGEL, bringing BRANT MILLER back for mornings alongside MARTI JONES in his third term at the station and promoting market veteran and weekend host FRED WINSTON to 2:30-6p (CT) weekdays.

http://www.allaccess.com/net-news/a...-chicago-shifts-to-classic-hits-brant-miller-

URL provided as a courtesy by Radiodiscussions.com

[Truncated because excerpt exceeds amount permitted under Fair Use standards]

No more oldies in Chicago. This is a shame. Why mess with something that seems to be working so well. I hope they fail, and fail big time.

Old Chicago
Click to expand...
 
OldChicago said:
No more oldies in Chicago. This is a shame. Why mess with something that seems to be working so well. I hope they fail, and fail big time.
Click to expand...

How is being below 15th in "The" sales demo "working"?

I'd guess that moving into WJMK's format area would put enough pressure on 'JMK for it to move elsewhere. The result would be an unobstructed ownership of a more 25-54 friendly format.
 
Classic Hits is an industry term. Oldies is a consumer term. WLS-FM will still have jingles and legendary jocks who talk over the intros. You'll just hear more 80s songs which, by the way, are already heard on several other stations in the market. Saying you'll now be playing Bryan Adams isn't really a bold step forward. But Jan Jeffries has to do something because as David Eduardo noted, the station currently ranks below 15th with Adults 25-54. That demo is dominated by others in the market so the rumored departure of the under-achieving WJMK likely won't help them much either.
 
Kinda late to the party, but guess better late then never!

KOOL, KRTH and countless other major/smaller market stations all over the country did this a long time ago!
 
Earlyriser said:
It's all because WJMK will soon dump the format.
Click to expand...

104.3 The Score? We've been hearing that for months (over a year?) and it hasn't happened yet. Unless they plan to move the local programming to FM and put CBS Sports Radio on 670.
 
casual observer said:
Classic Hits is an industry term. Oldies is a consumer term. WLS-FM will still have jingles and legendary jocks who talk over the intros. You'll just hear more 80s songs which, by the way, are already heard on several other stations in the market. Saying you'll now be playing Bryan Adams isn't really a bold step forward. But Jan Jeffries has to do something because as David Eduardo noted, the station currently ranks below 15th with Adults 25-54. That demo is dominated by others in the market so the rumored departure of the under-achieving WJMK likely won't help them much either.
Click to expand...

I agree with this. Really, the station has been gradually heading in this direction in a while, outside of Shannon's show which really was bound to be removed eventually. Before this week, his show was pretty much the only time the station used the "O-Word" or played a lot of music that you wouldn't expect to hear on a typical Classic Hits station. So what we have now, aside from the removal of Shannon, is a slight re-imaging and the addition of some 80's. If anything, I think the mistake they've made is making a big announcement out of this - there would probably be considerably fewer complaints if they tweaked quietly.
 
airpab said:
Kinda late to the party, but guess better late then never!

KOOL, KRTH and countless other major/smaller market stations all over the country did this a long time ago!
Click to expand...

I was thinking yesterday that the station is now sounding more than a little like KRTH. I'm guessing KRTH has been doing at least somewhat better in the sales demo than WLS-FM has been. Perhaps David or someone else with knowledge of the situation can jump in and confirm or refute.
 
Pretty Woman by Roy Orbison played twice within 4-5 hours last night.

I want to say the first time was around 11:30 PM and the later instance about 5 AM.

Is there some compelling reason for not playing some OTHER Roy Orbison song?

It's just seems so unlikely numerically for that to occur unless the total number of songs is quite limited.

Someone else please help imagine some way that this was either "intentional" or "allowed to happen".

If Pretty Woman were a recent hit or repopularized as happened in the 80s, it might might make sense.
But if we have to hear this song too often because it was "movie-related in the eighties,
that's really sad.



Some "eighties" have been added, but only the very toastiest tunes and titles from the eighties.

It's now a mish-mosh that certainly doesn't seem like WLS.

When I hear something that suprises me in a pleasant way, I will certainly note that here.
 
I heard "Hold On" by Eddie Money three times yesterday and I didn't listen all that much. This must be one of those records that "tests" really, really well. ;)
 
You will also be hearing a lot of "Running on Empty" by Jackson Browne.

I agree with an earlier post that it would probably have been better if they had just gone about this quietly and maybe in increments over a month or two...
 
It's common practice on Classic Hits stations to recycle music from the previous day (9a-5p) into the overnight show. This helps with rotations in prime dayparts.
 
How many people listening at 11:30pm would be listening at 5am? Not many.It makes total sense
to recycle the high testing songs like "Oh,Pretty Woman" . As great a some of Roy Orbisons other songs(Crying, Only The Lonely,In Dreams) are , they just don't test well under the age of 54 anymore.
 
1954 said:
How many people listening at 11:30pm would be listening at 5am? Not many.It makes total sense
to recycle the high testing songs like "Oh,Pretty Woman" . As great a some of Roy Orbisons other songs(Crying, Only The Lonely,In Dreams) are , they just don't test well under the age of 54 anymore.
Click to expand...

How many people? A great many, I assure you.

Anyone on the midnight shift working 11 PM to 7 AM who happens to have the radio on.
This is not East Overshoe, it is Chicago, and lots of workplaces never shut down production.

I was out working on machines most of the night, but I return to a maintainance shop, where the radio is kept loud enought to be heard
throughout the shop and lunch area.

And I KNOW Pretty Woman tests real well.
So does pure sugar, but I still prefer a more complex flavor than just sweet.

"Testing" is its own particular set of blinders.
 
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