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New KLOS PD

C

calguy

According to Don Barrett its Derek Madden who comes to LA from Cumulus sister station 107.7 THE BONE AKA KSAN-San Francisco. Say's he did afternoon's too. Watch out Gary Moore!
 
The question is, what is the real purpose for the hire? I don't get up to SF these days as much as I used to, but as far as I can recall, KSAN "the Bone" has generally been the hard rock version of classic rock - so ZZ Top, Led Zep, and AC/DC, yes; Jackson Browne, Steely Dan and Toto, uhh, no. If you want to hear Jack Johnson, better head down the dial to (also Cumulus-owned) KFOG.

The last KLOS PD successfully jettisoned most of the 60's and early 70's stuff to lower the average listener age, which seemed to be quite the successful strategy and implementation at the time, leaving that whole genre of classic rock to the Sound and adding more Green Day and Pearl Jam. But KLOS still positions itself as the heritage rock station in town, despite removing much of the "heritage" library. So if they want to tweak the format instead of blowing it up, then the only logical move is to make this station a Bone copycat. Hard rock all the time - Foreigner, Boston, or Soundgarden, doesn't matter, as long as it is hard rock, it is on. Anything more new and aggressive would simply represent a change in format to Active rock or whatever genere label they are using to describe the tattoo bands these days, which does not seem to be what they are up to. So if making it a Bone copycat is the plan, then then new PD is the man. Otherwise, what does he bring to the table?
 
ChannelFlipper said:
So if making it a Bone copycat is the plan, then then new PD is the man. Otherwise, what does he bring to the table?
Click to expand...

Who said KLOS would be a Bone copycat?

Most good programmers are able to take research and market information and craft a format specific to the available niche or position of a station.

So maybe The Cloud just brought him in because they consider him a good PD?
 
Exactly. Before KSAN, he programmed Modern Rock and Hot AC. Format is irrelevant to a good PD. Rick Carroll scored with both KKDJ and KROQ. John Rook did well with KFI as a Top 40 and KABC as a talker. Kevin Weatherley programs JACK and KROQ today. Rick Thomas is inheriting KRTH and KTWV from Jhani Kaye.
 
What Mister ChannelFlipper described---KLOS dropping a lot of the classic hits in favor of newer music---dates back a lot farther than "the last KLOS PD." In 1992 KLOS decided to add a lot of alternative rock to the playlist. Ratings dropped and the format "tweaking" lasted only about a year. Apparently KLOS's listeners didn't want to hear Elvis Costello, Happy Mondays, Psychedelic Furs, Jane's Addiction, and the Jesus & Mary Chain. Nosirree, they wanted to keep hearing Free Bird, Light My Fire, White Room, Back In Black and Stairway To Heaven. Yes, KLOS is the "heritage rock station."

And yet KOLA, the "heritage oldies station" for Riverside-San Bernardino, saw ratings rise after they dropped all the 1960s hits and added 1980s-90s music. Why would that work for KOLA but not for KLOS? Go figure!
 
LARadioRewind said:
What Mister ChannelFlipper described---KLOS dropping a lot of the classic hits in favor of newer music---dates back a lot farther than "the last KLOS PD." In 1992 KLOS decided to add a lot of alternative rock to the playlist. Ratings dropped and the format "tweaking" lasted only about a year. Apparently KLOS's listeners didn't want to hear Elvis Costello, Happy Mondays, Psychedelic Furs, Jane's Addiction, and the Jesus & Mary Chain. Nosirree, they wanted to keep hearing Free Bird, Light My Fire, White Room, Back In Black and Stairway To Heaven. Yes, KLOS is the "heritage rock station."

And yet KOLA, the "heritage oldies station" for Riverside-San Bernardino, saw ratings rise after they dropped all the 1960s hits and added 1980s-90s music. Why would that work for KOLA but not for KLOS? Go figure!
Click to expand...

Softball, right over the plate...

Because Los Angeles in 1992 is very different demographically from the Inland Empire in 2013.
 
So listeners in 1992 didn't want to hear new music on KLOS but listeners in 2013 want to hear newer music on KOLA. I suppose the ratings are proof that those two declarations are indeed true.

And please note that I resisted the urge to make some "softball" jokes. :D
 
LARadioRewind said:
So listeners in 1992 didn't want to hear new music on KLOS but listeners in 2013 want to hear newer music on KOLA. I suppose the ratings are proof that those two declarations are indeed true.

And please note that I resisted the urge to make some "softball" jokes. :D
Click to expand...

Clarification: Because 40 year old predominantly Anglo Baby Boomer males 21 years ago were calcified in their musical tastes while 35 year old predominantly Hispanic females today are far more open.
 
Breaking news! Breaking news! (I always wanted to say that. On radio and television, almost every story is "breaking news.") Don Barrett just sent this one-sentence bulletin to his subscribers:

"Cynthia Fox exits KLOS after a 10-year run to make room for new PD's midday shift."
 
As michaelhagerty predicted in the thread starter - except he thought it would be Gary Moore shown the door.

As mentioned in the San Francisco thread about Derek Madden's departure from The Bone, it appears to be Cumulus policy to (usually) have the PD take an air shift, thus bumping someone off the air whenever a new PD arrives (unless, of course, the new PD slides into the same time slot that the old PD had).
 
pjc1961 said:
As michaelhagerty predicted in the thread starter - except he thought it would be Gary Moore shown the door.

As mentioned in the San Francisco thread about Derek Madden's departure from The Bone, it appears to be Cumulus policy to (usually) have the PD take an air shift, thus bumping someone off the air whenever a new PD arrives (unless, of course, the new PD slides into the same time slot that the old PD had).
Click to expand...

That was calguy's prediction, not mine.
 
Oops - sorry 'bout that! My eyes have been playing tricks with me lately...reading one thing, but thinking another.
Time to rest and actually listen to the radio (or streams) for a bit and give the keyboard a break.
 
LARadioRewind said:
And yet KOLA, the "heritage oldies station" for Riverside-San Bernardino, saw ratings rise after they dropped all the 1960s hits and added 1980s-90s music. Why would that work for KOLA but not for KLOS? Go figure!
Click to expand...

It is really hard to compare the music that those who liked CHR in the 70s would like with the music that AOR listeners in the 70's would want to hear today.

KOLA was an oldies station that became a classic hits station... a straight line progression.
 
LARadioRewind said:
Breaking news! Breaking news! (I always wanted to say that. On radio and television, almost every story is "breaking news.") Don Barrett just sent this one-sentence bulletin to his subscribers:

"Cynthia Fox exits KLOS after a 10-year run to make room for new PD's midday shift."
Click to expand...

I don't really listen to KLOS much middays (got lots of alternative sources of music so I don't have to suffer through yet another spin of AC/DC's "You Shook Me") But Cynthia represents one of the last on air links to KMET, so I liked having her around. I have met her at a couple of times at KLOS blood drives and one year she signed my shirt and wrote a nice note on it (so of course now I can never actually wear it!).

Anyway, I know of a similar fate that befell a fellow ex-KMET traveler awhile back who ended up on the Satellite, maybe he can put in a good word for her?
 
Yes put on the HeadSets Channel Flipper :)
Jim Ladd, Uncle Joe, Mark & Brian, now Cynthia Fox. Who's/What's next? Not that I listen to KLOS (like you also don't ) but still .......
 
KLOS is abysmal when it comes to music (as was the late WCBS-FM during its Classic Rock days). Someone needs to bring this station into the 21st century. Leave the dinosaur music to The Sound and K-Earth please.

The void between KLOS and KROQ is a mile wide. So much good hard rock & rock alternative music from the 1990's & 2000's receives no airplay on L.A. radio.

Anything that sounds remotely close to Rock 105.3 from San Diego would be wonderful.
 
Gotta love how quickly the Sound swoops in to score some PR buzz at KLOS' expense. Cynthia has already accepted their offer to spin records on their It's Your Turn show this Sunday at 6:00 pm.
 
What I would like to see KLOS do is become more like KDKB here in Phoenix: Play a lot of '70s, '80s and '90s metal (but without the "nu metal" such as Korn or Linkin Park). Stuff like AC/DC, Van Halen, Metallica, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, hell, even Bon Jovi. And while they're at it, how about picking up Dee Snider's syndicated program called "House of Hair"?
 
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