Wolfman Jack is rolling over in his grave!

[DJ1725]

Why are so many local radio stations dropping the personality part of the programming. The new Jake has no live DJ's. Brew has no live DJ's; most of Bob's jocks are lame except for mornings and Renda is now going straight to stop sets without any DJ out of the music sweep.

How can this healthy for radio?

 

[Watercooler]

Brew is a new station and is doing very well at beating KRXO and Bob in Music. I am sure brew will add some jocks "hopefully local" at some point this spring. I can't hear Bob very well in south okc it flutters worse then 105.3 when 104.9 HD is on. As for Jake Fm they will have Crash from the Crash and Burned morning show on there, other then that I doubt we will see much more do to the fact they are paying a consultant who every station he has touch it has became a flop. Listening to the KRXO jocks trying to sound hip in the 80's music would be like listening to Danny Williams come on KJ and say snoop doggie dogg on KJ-103.

 

[GeneSavage]

DJ1725, to answer your question:

If you are looking at the short-term (I.E., this quarter's profit / loss), no DJs = more money staying in the shareholders' pockets.

In the longer term, it is argued no DJs means nobody saying the wrong thing, talking too long, trampling intros, or taking his / her audience with them when they leave.

How can this be healthy for radio? I would argue it isn't. It leaves broadcast radio vulnerable to Sirius / XM, Pandora, podcasts, iPods, etc. etc. etc.

The bean-counters clearly disagree.

To their credit: it WILL allow them to run their stations as cheaply as possible until the bottom completely falls out of broadcast radio & they have to have a "fire sale" for their stable of sticks...

A good selection of music w/o jocks will always beat a bad selection of music &/or annoying jocks. However, good content will always beat any mix of music, even jockless.

That's why AM talk radio beats out so many FMs in so many markets. Ignore the politics; many of the shows are extremely entertaining. They are also highly focused on their target (remember narrow-casting?).

If you had a quality music mix + entertaining content, you would be unbeatable.

Corporations have paid too much for their stations to dare risk it... YET.

(It's also hard to do. If it was easy, everybody would have kept doing it.)

 

[lurker34]

I've heard Jake will have jocks soon. From what I can gather "The Brew" is just an inexpensive corporate flanker. It's not designed to win, but take a few shares from the Renda Stations. When you say the Brew is beating KRXO, are you talking ratings or personal opinion?

 

[Watercooler]

I ment it as in upside the head, listen to KRXO and see how mainstream 80's it has become.

 

[OKCRadioGuy]

Which is exactly what they shouldn't have done. KRXO is a day late and a dollar short to add 80s that strongly into their music rotation. It should have been a gradual adding a long time ago. Since they really DIDN'T add enough over the course of time, the old farts are going to not like the "change".

Isn't this a re-run of when Bob came on the air? Knee-jerk reactions are counterproductive. BAD IDEA.

With that being said, Renda should have entertained the idea of 80s-based rock-40 a long time ago. It's the next evolution of oldies, and they just missed the boat. Game over on trying to jump on that boat now folks....

 

[OKCRadioGuy]

So let's recap here....

We go for YEARS without 80s based rock having any respect as classic rock out of the 'establishment', then all of a sudden CC turns on a station that caters to it and now all the 'established' stations come running that direction. It would have been a viable format demographically for at least five years but NO ONE bothered. Now that CC has taken a chance, here's comes everyone else. How about sticking to your format for older folks KRXO and KQOB? My generation now appearently has a station to listen to. There's no need to come running after us now.

 

[radio3452]

From the last ratings book the Brew is doing quite well considering its what, 90 days old? Still no jocks, and sadly if it has good ratings, and no jocks, whats the motivation for managment to pay a jock? Its like all the stations that voice track..if they beat the stations that don't..once again, whats the motivation to NOT voice track if you are winning in the ratings while Voice tracking everything but your morning show? I've been told that Jake FM is going to have Crash do 7 minutes a morning..the WHOLE morning..I've listened and all I hear is a different jock come on and give the same song/title..but thats it. No personality, no traffic, no weather, no nothing. Still boring. So why would a listener listen to them over the Twister where they could have some persoanlity, news & weather?

I think radio is headed for a sad era right now..Not because there aren't people out there that have good personality and good music, but because most of the people who end up being PD's, consultants, or GM's are morons, and it eventually trickles down to everything else. Nowdays with a lot of the new cars listeners have the option of plugging in their Ipod with the auxillary cable and just listening to what they want without all the commericals..Or even using Pandora radio in their cars/trucks..or as previously mentioned, Satellite Radio. So until radio finds some GM's and PD's who aren't totally out for themselves & their pocketbooks, I fear radio will continue to suffer. :'(

 

[Silkie]

In his professional autobiography, Have Mercy!, the Wolfman said himself, toward the end of the book that it's all a big scam, but that he had a ball with it.