What an abrupt change. I still don't get why beautiful music was removed from the FM Dial. It's stress relieving. Boy we need it back now with all that's going on in this world.
In 2019 the rockers were dismissed in turn just like the blue haired retiree format was in '82 I was KJAZ 92.7 listener from 1979 to 1994 then it TOO went to the highest bidder... Nothing good lasts forever, and neither does anything bad, Thanks God.
You know there must have been a few people caught completely unawares by that format flip on that fateful day, perhaps driving their Buicks into a telephone pole as a result.
I was there at the brand new studio in Ghirardelli Square about an hour before the cutover. I was kicked out to make room for the news cameras that would record the actual cutover, so I listened to the cutover in my car right outside the square looking at the studio window.
During the last week of The Quake, non-profit KFJC bought ad time promoting their station and the similar music they played. Sadly I couldn't get that station where I was and was just left out in the cold when The Quake went under.
Dave Logan came from WLAV-FM in Grand Rapids (MI) to program KFOG. Brought M. Dung out west with him. Love the spots they air for other Beautiful Music stations prior to the switch. WCFL in Chicago did the same when they flipped from Top 40 to Beautiful Music in 1977. One was a spot for WLS. Started with Fred Winston saying "ladies and gentlemen....now for a sound you thought you would never hear on this radio station", followed by the "89-WLS" jingle. Classic stuff!
I believe they are going to re-broadcast this tonight at 11:00 PM Pacific time, along with their last 10 at 10, which will be a tribute to the grateful dead.
I listened to the last hour of the station. They heavily edited the broadcast of the format change, but left in the commercial for the Oakland Athletics, and the news report from that afternoon.
Bob Woodruff It ran at 2 AM this morning if you are in the eastern time zone, and it signed off at 3 AM eastern if you are in the middle of the night during after hours.
KFOG's AOR flip is similar to how WRFM New York (then a sister station to KOIT) ditched beautiful music; no goodbye mentions of any sort from the announcer but the format was in place right up to the top-of-the-hour newscast.
The NY Daily News published notice of WRFM's impending flip on the morning before it happened. The article read, "RADIO SHOCKER". I listened to the change as it occurred. The newscaster gave the weather and I could tell he was saddened by the flip. With that, there was fanfare and we had the new WNSR Soft Rock 105. First song was "Celebrate" by Kool & The Gang.
frdjr252 That was when WRFM pulled the plug on easy listening format and went to AC as WNSR in 1987. WPAT-FM’s “Easy 93” was the only station left in the easy listening format until it died out by the early 1990’s.
One thing I noticed about the flip is how professional Greg Roberts (the outgoing KFOG DJ) was. Even at the very end, with his job literally seconds from ending, he still maintained total professionalism. As an ex-DJ, I can tell you pulling that off is much more difficult than it sounds.
This approach was done in a few places. When WIBQ Utica-Rome NY flipped to CHR WNYZ, they did the same thing. That aircheck is posted on RU-vid, and I love how jarring their change was. They went from their last Easy Listening record and legal ID straight into 'I Wanna Rock' by Twisted Sister. No announcements whatsoever...I can only imagine the shock of everyone listening at the time hearing that!
@@EllisFeaster We prefer to call it "easy listening" or the broadcast term for the format... "Beautiful Music". We don't call it "elevator music" as our kind of music was on AM/FM broadcast radio for over three decades, and wasn't just heard in elevators. ;)
I know. I worked at a Beautiful Music station about 40 years ago. (I still have nightmares of changing the reels!) I just refer to it as elevator music so people outside of radio will know exactly what I am talking about, since many of them have never heard that format.. When people under 40 hear the term "Easy Listening" they have a different sound in mind than what we are thinking of.
@@EllisFeaster We use "instrumental easy listening" or "instrumentals of mostly pop hits" to describe the music that easy listening/beautiful music stations offered 30+ years ago. But yes...people today use the term "easy listening" to categorize a wide array of musical genres, including soft rock and mainstream adult contemporary.
KCTC in Sacramento was one of that format's premier stations, but changed to adult contemporary around 1990. I heard they still had respectable ratings then, but it was getting harder to sell ad time because so much of their target audience was dying of old age!
I had this recording on a 30 year old reel to reel tape. But KFOG did replay the first hour last night at 11pm, about 8 hours after I posted this. I'll post a few more KFOG recordings over the next few days.
How old are you? How do you adapt Triple A for younger audiences? Make no mistake Cumulus screwed up KFOG big time. They did not take hints from iHeart Media's KBCO, Alpha Media's KINK, Entercom's WXRT and WMMM or their own WQKL and KBXR. Still KFOG audience was getting older, and they were not bringing in new listeners. I get that each Triple A station in unique but still they can and should lean each other.
Kind of funny how they kept the old format as usual up to the last minute (only really odd thing being the ad for KOIT, presumably telling people where to go after the change). Like how Dave Morey says "I apologize to all the dentists!" I hated the "beautiful music" format with a passion back then, but now that it's completely dead I miss it, and can listen to the music left behind with a sense of humor.
You'll occasionally hear competing stations buy time on stations that are flipping format, usually when it's common knowledge the format is changing. Even with a format change coming, stations will still do things to make a few extra dollars.
I hated the "dentist office", "doctor's office" comments as much as the "elevator music" nonsense (amd still do)...as though those were the only places easy listening/beautiful music stations could be heard. Those stations weren't rated #1 in their markets merely bc doctors, dentists, and office buildings were the only ones out there playing it, lol.
@@EllisFeaster My favorite station in 84-85 was The Quake in San Francisco- it was unfortunately sold in 85 with a format change but they were allowed to let people know the station was ending and a college station KFJC advertised saying you could find the same music there, though that didn't come in where I was.
My folks had a nice Fisher system in the living room. Late 70s/early 80s I'd typically set the dial to KOME, and my stepdad would move it to KBAY. He'd razz me about the screaming vocalists, and I'd razz him about his elevator music. Still, he ended up dubbing my prog rock albums to cassette for listening during his commute, and now 40 some-odd years later I find myself looking for Johnny Pearson, Mantovanni, etc on youtube for listening while I work, a tear in my eye. The worm definitely turns.
I'd like to recreate this with the music, but some are snipped right out. For instance, Dave Morey says "Most recently the Beatles, we heard from The Cars, The Who... No Idea what Cars tune to put in there. Can I borrow your reel tape? A cassette would do... In SJ.
5:44 is the last song on KFOG when it was an easy listening station called “The Last Farewell” by Roger Whittaker, and it was used for WGN-TV (channel 9) in Chicago for its station’s ident back in the 1970’s.
I like how the ID right after that is business as usual, "When your friends ask what station you listen to..." They should have changed it to "listened". No internet back then so format changes were often a big surprise- was there any press coverage of it beforehand?
The Media Hoarder And the first song that was played on KFOG was “Rock This Town” by The Stray Cats which was a hit back in 1982, and it was not an easy listening song. Looks like they dumped the easy listening format in the trash and put something new. WRFM in NYC basically dumped the easy listening format in the trash a few years later in 1987 when it became an AC format known as WSNR “Soft Rock 105”, and “Celebration” was the first song by Kool & the Gang. KFOG was originally a station that had the same format that WRFM in NYC did back in the 1970’s and 1980’s, as well as its competitor, WPAT-FM’s “Easy 93” back in the 1980’s and early 1990’s until they dumped the format and went AC for a short time until it became a Spanish AC station where it still remains today.
It's music that come from a syndicator, and delivered to your radio station by satellite, rather than having the programming come from your station locally.
@@EllisFeaster Interesting they would mention that in the spot. I would suspect most listeners didn't care where the music originated as long as it was there (especially with an Easy Listening format).
@@DanDrolett WEZO-FM in Rochester advertised themselves as "Satellite Stereo" in this same time period, running Bonneville's "beautiful music" format. When everything worked well, it did sound better than the tape-based automation. Unfortunately, there were a lot of technical issues with satellite delivery of audio in 1982 (it was actually analog audio at that time), and the station soon reverted to the tape-based automation system until changing format to AC in the summer of 1988.
