MCRFB (Billboard) News – Page 6 – Motor City Radio Flashbacks

WLBS KISSED BY GOLD: WKSG FOCUSES ON LOCAL COLOR . . . . NOVEMBER 17, 1988

Detroit’s WKSG to Recall Motor City’s Brand of ‘Golden Oldies’

DETROIT — WLBS ended a brief experimentation with top 40 here Friday (November 9) when the station switched its call letters to WKSG and its format to oldies.

Now known as Kiss 102.7, WKSG has adopted the “Kiss Of Gold” format developed by veteran programmer and Detroit native Paul Christy. According to general manager Joe Buys, the new format focuses on music of the ’60s and ’70s, emphasizing Detroit artists and songs that were popular in Detroit in particular.

Program director Sergio Dean continues in that capacity. The rest of the staff will remain intact. However, Buys doesn’t rule out the possibility of signing longtime Detroit personalities: “We could use at least one person who understands Detroit’s lifestyle and characteristics.”

According to Buys, who joined the Inner City Broadcasting-owned station last month after a year in Chicago with Arbitron as central division manager, WLBS had undergone several format changes since its 1979 inception as a disco station.

After a lengthy stint with an urban format, the station switched to a “new music” orientation, which remained in place until last August. At that time, a Burkhart /Abrams-consulted “hybrid” hits format known as “the best of everything” went into effect.

“It didn’t work,” says Buys, noting that WLBS faced stiff competition for the top 40 market from Gannett’s WCZY and Capitol Cities’ WHYT. After researching and “evaluating the market’s holes,” Buys says, “we found ‘gold’ to be the biggest hole.” The Detroit area’s only other oldies station, he notes, is WHND Monroe, a daytime AM outlet which consultant Christy “got off the ground” in 1978.

“The baby boom generation is growing older, and they’re bringing their musical heritage with them,” says Buys. “We found an audience that wants updated gold, and they want stereo FM to hear it on.”

According to Christy, a 25-year radio veteran most recently with WCLS (formerly WABX) Detroit and currently consulting four other stations, WKSG’s ‘Kiss Of Gold’ format was “modeled for Detroit.”

“There is an emphasis on Motown music, of course,” says Christy, “as well as other artists popular in Detroit in the ’60s and ’70s.” In addition to better known artists such as Bob Seger, the MC5 and Ted Nugent, Christy says local favorites the Dynamics, the Wanted, the Velvelettes, The Gallery, Scott Richard Case and Tim Tam & the Turnons will be heard.

“I feel a cyclical backlash to top 40 coming on,” says Christy. “Artists like Prince and Cyndi Lauper are wonderful, but they’re played into the ground. WKSG’s new format, on the contrary, involves at least 3,000 titles, which is enough material so that there’s no repetition problem – with the advantage of built-in familiarity.”

Adds GM Buys: “Gold is a format that traditionally attracted loyal listeners, as well as cume sharing tendencies.” END

_______________

Information credit and news source: Billboard; November 17, 1988

COUNTRY WCXI AND AOR WRIF ARE BIG WINNERS IN MOTOR CITY . . . . FEBRUARY 2, 1980

Both AOR and Country Stations Draws Extreme Ratings Share in Motor City

DETROIT — The two big winners in this market in the October /November Arbitron ratings are country-formatted WCXI-AM and AOR outlet WRIF-FM.

The country Golden West station is benefiting from the fact that WDEE-AM abandoned the format early this year, leaving a clear field for WCXI. WDEE is now known as WCZY and plays beautiful music.

Although the Golden West chain is owned by Gene Autry, this is the first station of the chain that has moved into the country format. Program director Bill Ford is making the most of the situation and includes a number of old Autry records in the format. The DJs make frequent remarks about playing records made by the “boss.”

WCXI switched from a contemporary format in February, but it was not until this latest Arbitron book that the ratings substantially improved. The station climbed from a 2.0 share in the July /August book to a current 5.6.

Morning man Deano Day, who was hired from WDEE climbed in ratings from a 1.8 to a 6.3. R.T. Griffin, who has been in country radio for 20 years climbed from 2.6 to 7.1.

Ford says the station’s success is due to attention to country music’s roots. “Too many programmers cut off their library at 1965.” Ford says. He also has increased visibility of the station by having the DJs make 400 local public appearances in the past 10 months.

The ‘Riff

Over at ABC’s WRIF-FM program director Tom Bender has achieved an overall growth in share from 4.8 to 6.3 by playing “a purer form of AOR (album-oriented rock). We play many more new wave acts and have purged the Top 40 crossover acts such as Cat Stevens, Paul Simon and Al Stewart,” he says.

Bender explains, “Detroit is more hard rock-oriented than either coast. For example Jimi Hendrix is more important here.

Bender has also assembled a lineup of the market’s top rock DJs. He hired WWWW-FM’s morning team Jim Johnson and George Beier just before the rating period. As a result Johnson and Buyer delivered a 6.0 share in morning drive up from 3.9 in July /August while the Burkhart /Abrams Super Star W-4 fell from 4.0 to 3.2.

Bender also hired Karen Savelly away from WABX-FM and installed her in the 6 to 10 p.m. slot. The station’s share in that time period climbed from 6.0 to 10.0. Bender wooed CBS promotion man Ken Calvert back into radio and placed him in the midday period. Calvert registered a 6.8, up from 5.0.

Some of Bender’s success, as seen by the competition, is the result of an Arbitron book that does not favor adult radio. “It’s just not a good book for adult radio,” says CKLW-AM program director Bill Gable.

Gable’s formerly rocking outlet that now is adult contemporary beams a signal into Detroit from nearby Windsor, Ont. Gable points out that the latest Arbitron is the first to use Extended Sample Frame in this market. The audience measurement system has been in use in larger markets for more than a year.

It is a method to include listeners without listed phones in the survey. Some critics claim this. technology skews Arbitron’s figures to a younger and often non-white listenership. Most unlisted numbers are not held by up-scale people who pay to be unlisted, but by lower income people who move so much they just get left out of the phone book.

CKLW fell from a 5.5 share in the summer and a year ago to 4.4. The old-line MOR (middle of road) giant in the market, WJR-AM also had a bad book. The station fell from 14.1 to 10.0 overall and in the 7 p.m. to midnight slot from 22.6 to 5.0, a reflection that Detroit Tigers play-by-play added a substantial summer audience.

WJR program director Jim Long says the new numbers have forced him to take a hard look at what the station is doing. One thing he did was to hire Jim Davis away from WOMC-FM to be afternoon drive man. Davis registered a 6.6, down from a summer rating of 10.2 when Marc Avery was in that slot.

Avery was deemed to have “too old an image” to continue on WJR, so he was snapped up by WOMC program director Dave Shafer, who installed him in morning drive on the Metromedia MOR outlet.

Avery delivered a 4.3 share, up from the 3.1 the station had in the summer. Shafer also hired Tom Dean, who has been at ABC’s WXYZ-AM and WDEE, at the start of the rating period to handle afternoon drive. Dean came through with a 5.0 share, up from a summer’s share of 3.1.

Shafer also hired Steve Peck from WABX to be music director so that Jim Scollin can put down that second hat and concentrate on his mid-day jock duties.

WNIC-FM’s adult contemporary format held its own overall with a 3.5 share in both the summer and fall books, but morning drive climbed from 2.3 and 3.3 reflecting a new morning drive team of program director Jim Harper and Jerry St. James. END

_______________

Information credit and news source: Billboard; February 2, 1980

CLAY MASTER GOES TO MOTOWN . . . . JUNE 12,1971

Former Detroit Radio DJ Tom Clay Finds Home For Disk on West Coast Motown Label

**TOM CLAY** 1971 *(Photo credit: Bonnie Dater Jay)*

LOS ANGELES — Tom Clay, veteran radio personality now freelancing in this area, this week turned over his produced master, “Tom Clay’s ‘What the World Needs Now‘,” to Motown Records (MoWest), with Dick Sherman, West Coast sales director for the firm, promising Clay free records so Clay could satisfy a previously-made deal with listeners, who wrote in for free copies. Clay said that he had 17 thousand written requests for freebies disks, when he withdrew the offer June 1.

Clay prepared for his two-week vacation-fill slot over KGBS, local radio station here, by doing an eight -minute production, which he felt expressed his philosophy on the contemporary world situation. The recorded production in- interwove music and news events in Clay’s narration with special emphasis on Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy, and John F. Kennedy.

Clay played the record production once on his first day at KGBS on May 22. He was off Sunday but when he returned on May 24, disk jockeys who had been on KGBS over the weekend told him of repeated requests. The deal is one of the label’s rare master purchases.

Dave Bell, Motown West Coast A&R chief, went into the studio June 1 and re-cut the entire production, cutting the time from over 8 minutes to 6 minutes and 20 seconds. Motown is rushing the record for national release.

_______________

Information credit and news source: Billboard; June 12, 1971

WDEE FOLLOWS THE SWING . . . . OCTOBER 31, 1970

Detroit Modern Country WDEE Highlighted at CMA Meet in Nashville

NASHVILLE — The format of WDEE in Detroit is not focused just on acquiring the local country music audience of the city, but “the continuing swing of people to country music,” Chuck Renwick, national program director for Storer Broadcasting, told an audience here of radio executives during an annual broad- caster’s meeting of the Country Music Association. The CMA meeting was held here Saturday (October 17) in conjunction with the yearly birthday celebration of radio station WSM.

“We’d heard of so many radio stations doing variations of country music that we felt there was no right way or no wrong way,” Renwick said. He pointed out that Storer was a little reluctant to take the station country because of its failure with KGBS in Los Angeles with country music programming, but that “we’d got some experience programming country music on WCJW-FM in Cleveland.”

At the outset, WDEE was programed record-for-record until the air personalities got better acquainted with the format; now they build on their own shows. Another most important factor in building not only a stronger rapport with country music, but with their audience, is that deejays get on the phones with their listeners for 20-25 minutes after they get off the air. This also builds up a person-to-person relationship with the listeners, Renwick said. He spoke of a consistent flow of information, kept brief, aired on the station and played tapes illustrating not only the sound of WDEE, but its jingles, personalities, and music.

In Back Door

Also speaking on programming during the session was Bill Ward, general general manager KBBQ in Burbank (Los Angeles). Ward said that 95 percent of radio stations now playing country music “came in the back door . . . they’d tried everything else.” He said that all three of the last stations were this type . . . and that all became successes with country music. The best type of air personality for today’s country station, he felt, was a Top 40 jock out of the midwest because “they grew up in a country environment and know how to pronounce Red Sovine’s name, know who Bob Wills is.”

He felt that the typical rock format is about as refined as you can get it and that the same thing is happening in country music today. But perhaps country radio stations “ought to take stock – pay some dues – make an investment back into country music in general.”

Irving Hill, general manager of WCMS in Tidewater, Va., spoke of consulting with two radio stations, both in the major 50 markets of the nation, and found that the manager not only didn’t like country music, but didn’t listen to his own station.

Dan McKinnon, owner of KSON in San Diego, talked of various management problems at the government level then later delved into editorials, pointing out that the on-the-air broadcast of an editorial is only 20 percent of the work; KSON also mails out copies of its editorials to some 500 congressmen, business leaders, and members of the press. He also spoke on a KSON drug-abuse project.

Ads Raise Sales

Bill Hudson of Bill Hudson and Associates, spoke on how effective use of billboard advertising boosts spot sales on WKDA in Nashville. The station features client’s ad along with a station promo on various billboard signs in town. This same method can be used effectively with bus posters, he said.

Dorothy Kuhlman, promotion and publicity expert from station WHOO, detailed all of the various promotional methods used by the Orlando station, both on-the-air and off-the-air. Moderator George Crump, president of WCMS in Tidewater, Va., said there was a possibility of a second yearly Country Music Association radio meeting, if members wanted it. END

_______________

Information credit and news source: Billboard; October 31, 1970

DOUGLAS EXITS KXOK FOR POST AT WCZY . . . . AUGUST 20, 1983

New Gannett WCZY Station Manager Hails from Storz’s St. Louis KXOK

DETROIT — After five years in every capacity short of engineer at KXOK St. Louis, Lee Douglas, who assumed the GM position at the Storz outlet 16 months ago, has resigned to become station manager of Gannett’s WCZY here.

“It’s the number two position at the station,” says Douglas, a former air personality and programmer of several well-known top 40 outlets, including New York’s 99X and Miami’s WMYQ. “I’ll be primarily functioning to head up the programming effort, but I’ll be involved with every aspect of the station.”

With the announcement of Douglas’ arrival, GM Jim Mulla also promoted WCZY operations manager Dave Shafer to the post of operations director for WCZY and its AM counterpart WLQV.

Describing the AC-formatted ‘CZY, home of several longtime Detroit personalities, including highly paid morning. man Dick Purtan, Douglas says, “We’ll continue in an adult contemporary direction. Gannett is prepared to do whatever is necessary to really win, and I’ve never had that opportunity before.”

Since Douglas’ arrival at KXOK nearly six years ago, the station has shifted from top 40 to AC to, as of this spring, an all-talk direction. “We doubled our audience after eight weeks with the format and re- established the station. Talk was the one void in the market. Everybody thinks of KMOX, but they’re talking only four hours a day. The rest of the time they’re news or sports,” Douglas says.

“I think KXOK will be successful It’s a slow growth format, but they should have a good fall book. I’ve done as much as I could to position the station, so the offer from Gannett really came at the right time,” he continues.

At this point KXOK has neither an official GM nor a PD. Morning personality Gary King has been programming the station on an interim basis, but no decision from Storz’ Omaha headquarters has been announced. END

_______________

Information credit and news source: Billboard; August 20, 1983

GARY KING LEAVES KXOK FOR WCZY DETROIT POST . . . . OCTOBER 8, 1983

Former KXOK PD Transitions Here As New WCZY Mid-Afternoon Personality, Music Director

DETROIT — “There wasn’t a whole lot of decision making to be done,” admits KXOK St. Louis PD Gary King about the announcement of his move to Gannett’s WCZY here, where he’ll do mid-days and serve as the AC station’s music director. “It was an opportunity to work with Lee (Douglas, station manager of WCZY and former KXOK GM) again and the most exciting company in broadcasting today.”

King, who sees his future in the eventual ownership of a chain of properties, started out at Louisville’s WAKY and then moved to Baton Rouge’s WJBO /WFMF, where he was operations director prior to his move to St. Louis a year ago. Coming on board as acting PD and afternoon drive talent at KXOK, his title was not made official until this August. At that time, the Storz station had already transitioned primarily to talk, and King was doing mornings.

That shift will now be held by former midday man Charlie Brown, who, without the title, will be handling King’s PD chores. Afternoons, which were vacated last month by Pat Riley (Billboard, Oct. 1), are now being done by longtime KXOK per- sonality Johnny Rabbit, using his own name, Ron Elz, as the station continues to move in an all-talk direction with 20-year veteran Nick Charles handling mid-days.

With the addition of King in mid-days at WCZY, the Detroit lineup now features Dick Purtan in mornings and former WCAO Baltimore personality Lou Roberts in afternoons. Former WCZY afternoon talent Marc Avery now does that shift on CKLW here, while Dave Prince moves into the ‘CZY evening shift. END

_______________

Information credit and news source: Billboard; October 8, 1983

BEATLES WILL MAKE MILLIONS ON U.S. TOUR, EPSTEIN PREDICTS . . . MAY 8, 1965

Beatles Schedule for Second North American Tour Here, Late-Summer

**San Diego KFWB** August 28, 1965 *(click on poster 2x for detailed view)*

LONDON — Brian Epstein has estimated that the Beatles will earn almost $1 million on their second American tour in August. So far there are only 13 concerts on the schedule but another two may be added (see note below).

Epstein was told by New York promoter Sidney Bernstein that even before posters or tickets were printed, more than half of the 56,000 seats at Shea stadium, where the group opens on Aug. 15, have been sold. Bernstein wants them to perform the following night and the date is being held open.

Similarly, their concert at an open-air stadium in Chicago (August 20; two shows) has already been sold out, and unless Epstein agrees to a second show the promoter will have to return a great deal of money sent. After New York the Beatles return to the Mapleleaf Gardens in Toronto for two performances (August 17); a debut in Atlanta, one performance (August 18); Houston, Tex., two (August 19); Minneapolis, one (August 21); Portland, Ore., two (August 22).

Epstein said that he resisted presenting the Beatles at the 100,000-seat Rose Bowl in Hollywood in favor of concerts at the Hollywood Bowl (August 29 and 30). The tour concludes at the San Francisco Cow Palace (August 31).

As previously reported, the Beatles tape an Ed Sullivan show the day after their arrival in U. S. which will open Sullivan’s fall series Sept. 19. The group will have six free days in Los Angeles beginning Aug. 23.

The Beatles’ European tour, which commences with a French televised concert at the Palais de Sport in Paris June 19, will be followed three days later by a performance in Lyons.

The Beatles make their Italian debut in Milan (June 24), continuing to Genoa (June 25) and Rome (June 27), before returning to France for a show in Nice (June 30).

They perform at two large Spanish bullrings, the Monumental in Madrid (July 2) and another in Barcelona (July 3), before returning to London July 4. END

_______________

NOTE: San Diego was ultimately billed into the Beatles 1965 North American Tour (sometime after this Billboard article went to print) prior the group’s arrival in New York City for their first concert stop at Shea Stadium, August 15. Also, as to another possible add, the article made reference about the question whether the Beatles would commit possibly to a second performance to their NYC concert venue at Shea. Beatles’ history would concede they did not. — MCRFB

_______________

Information and credit source: Billboard; May 5, 1965

CKLW GETS LICENSE RENEWAL ON CONDITION . . . APRIL 19, 1969

Canadian Government Drops Gavel; RKO Owned CKLW Must Change Hands to Canadian Ownership Or Must Dispose Station’s Assets

TORONTO — The Canadian Radio Television Commission has ruled that radio station CKLW in Windsor, Ont., will receive its license renewal until Sept. 1, 1970. But within that period of time, the station must divest itself of its U. S. ownership or lose its broadcasting license altogether.

The CRTC said that, according to its records, the issued shares in Western Ontario Broadcasting are now owned by RKO Distributing Co. of Canada, which is owned by RKO General Inc. in the U. S.

These shares must change hands to a Canadian-owned company within a year and a half or the station will lose its license. This decision was based on a Canadian government order of Sept. 20, 1968, which ruled that any Canadian broadcasting outlet must be “effectively owned and controlled by Canadians.”

CKLW applied for an exemption from this order based on its geographic and economic situation – the Detroit area which adjoins Windsor directly across the river. The CRTC could have recommended such an exemption if it had so chosen but in so doing it would have had to satisfy both itself and the federal cabinet that this action would not be contrary to public interests.

The commission said that after careful consideration of the petition of CKLW, it could not make such a recommendation.

The commission noted that it was granting the temporary license renewal to “give the licensee an opportunity to comply with its provisions or to dispose of the assets of the station.” END

_______________

Information and news source: Billboard; April 19, 1969

19 BRITISH DISKS ON CHARTS . . . APRIL 4, 1964

Redcoats Revisiting States Coast-to-Coast

NEW YORK — The influx of British disk product continues to climb with more new product released this week and strong representation, led by the Beatles, on the charts. Counting 12 Beatle disks on the Hot 100, and seven other disks on the chart. British acts now hold 19 per cent of the big board listing.

The Dave Clark Five has two strong items on the chart in “Glad All Over” and “Bits And Pieces”. The group will be looking to strengthen its position with another trip to the States May 29. This two-week visit will include concerts at New York’s Carnegie Hall (29) and another appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show (31). Concerts in major cities are also being set up and the group will record its second LP prior to leaving for the U. S. The group has also signed a film contract with Anglo-Amalgamated and will begin a 10-week shooting schedule in October.

In addition to Clark, Dusty Springfield, the Swinging Blue Jeans, the Carefrees and the Searchers hold spots.

And the flood of Anglo product continues. The Searchers are presented on two other labels beside their hit “Needles and Pins”. Their next British record, possible U. S. follow-up to “Needles,” is “Don’t Throw Your Love Away” previously recorded by the Orlons here.

Other hard-hitting British products released this week that is getting extensive air play are “Not Fade Away”, by the Rolling Stones on London, and the Hollie’s version of Doris Troy’s hit of last year “Just One Look”, on Imperial. There’s a new Cliff Richard disk available on Epic as well, “I’m The Lonely One” coupled with “I Only Have Eyes for You”. Capitol of Canada is unintentionally creeping into the Richard market as well, with French titles “J’Attendre” getting extensive play and sales in New England. END

_______________

Information and news source: Billboard; April 4, 1964

CHART CRAWLS WITH BEATLES . . . APRIL 4, 1964

Beatles Wax Hot 100 With 12 Singles; Owns Top 5 on Chart, Week-Ending, April 4 1964

NEW YORK — Just about everyone is tired of the Beatles. Disk jockeys are tired of playing the hit group; the writers of trade and consumer publication articles are tired of writing about them and the manufacturers of product other than the Beatles are tired of hearing about them. Everyone’s tired of the Beatles — except the listening and buying public.

Two more Beatles singles popped onto the Hot 100 this week, “You Can’t Do That” on Capitol and “Thank You Girl,” on Vee-Jay. This ups last week’s total of Beatles records on the chart to 12. “You Can’t Do That” is the flip side of “Can’t Buy Me Love” which broke in at No. 27 last week and went to No. 1 this week.

Canada Source

The mass of Beatles material being supplied to American radio stations and stores is being increased again by product from Canada. Latest is “Love Me Do”, which is getting hot air play across the country. Now that U. S. retailers and subdistributors have set up air corridor channels of supply with Canadian subdistributors, “Love Me Do,” like the previous “All My Loving”, can be expected to funnel into the country at a much quicker and regular rate.

One thing that seems to have handicapped output of the “Love Me Do” single is the accidental breaking of one of the pressing masters in Capitol of Canada’s plant.

The Prices

Prices paid for those three Capitol of Canada disks from Canadian one-stops is approximately 61 cents and they are being sold to other retailers in this country for 75 to 89 cents. The retailer who gets on the street first with the disks can sell them for anything from $1.25 to $1.75. But as the amount of Capitol of Canada singles appear the price declines. It seldom goes below 99 cents, however.

There was also some demand for the Capitol of Canada LP, “Beatlemania”, but requests for this have diminished somewhat. It is understood that “Beatlemania” will be repackaged to conform with the new U. S. Capitol LP called “The Second Beatles Album”. There are two Capitol of Canada LP’s which have found their way into the U. S. market. “Twist and Shout” is the other. These package are being purchased for approximately $2.60 and it was reported that in Boston they were sold by some retailers for as high as S6. The Canadian LP price is S4.20.

Nine Positions

In Canada, the Beatles hold the first nine chart positions (italics added here for emphasis). With the addition of “Can’t Buy Me Love” at the No. 1 post, they now hold the first five slots on the Hot 100. Geoffrey F. Racine, executive vice- president of Capitol of Canada, has denied reports that any firm in the U. S. has distribution rights to “Roll Over Beethoven”. Racine also said that the company is not exporting Beatle Records to the United States and has no intention of doing so. He does admit. however, that records are being shipped here through one-stops and other large buyers of records who happen to have branches in Canada. It is also known that many American record merchandisers have set up specific deals with Canadian subdistributors of Capitol product. END

_______________

Information and news source: Billboard; April 4, 1964