WECK: All has been revealed...

Mark1981 said:

You're going to have to pick up your game here, Buddy. I listened early in the week. Your PM news was a rehash of AM stories. I'll reserve total judgment until John Zak starts. But you're going to have to do a much better job if you think you're going to compete with WBEN and WBFO when it comes to local news. News is something you can't pretend at. Your newscasts need to be timely, accurate and credible if you want to be a player.

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Good point. Add WGRZ, WIVB, WKBW and The News to the cited sources. Consumers can get a "decent local newscast" anytime they want from their android or iPhone. Adding John Zak should help increase morning listening. When a morning newscast is replayed four, six, eight hours later, if the stories are are the same, but re-written or placed in a different order, it's not news. It's history.

Mark1981 said:

You're going to have to pick up your game here, Buddy. I listened early in the week. Your PM news was a rehash of AM stories. I'll reserve total judgment until John Zak starts. But you're going to have to do a much better job if you think you're going to compete with WBEN and WBFO when it comes to local news. News is something you can't pretend at. Your newscasts need to be timely, accurate and credible if you want to be a player.

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Exactly. And even with a soft rollout this is something that should have been put in place beforehand. There's companies you can pay or barter with to do local-sounding newscasts throughout the day.

I love the title of this thread....."all has been revealed"........just FYI.......not all has been revealed. The best is yet to come.........

Buddy Shula said:

I love the title of this thread....."all has been revealed"........just FYI.......not all has been revealed. The best is yet to come.........

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Buddy, you are a true showman! That statement proves it. Best of luck with WECK. I hope it's an idea that catches on all over the country. Buffalo has always been a great city for personality radio.

I have to say the music mix is very impressive. Not an oldies station, more of a soft A/C mix with titles that haven't been burned to death. Good work, whoever is doing the music knows what they are doing, for sure!

Buddy Shula said:

I love the title of this thread....."all has been revealed"........just FYI.......not all has been revealed. The best is yet to come.........

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Noted; however, in my defense it was based on what was already talked about on these boards.

Also, just an observation: I think it'd be more accurate to call WECK(if you had to classify it as a format)a full-service station. Consider: You have top of hour newscasts from CBS News(and eventually local casts), the music and sports(if memory serves, WECK still holds the right to Canisius basketball).

I did notice that the 'recently played' playlist plugin isn't working properly.

http://timelessweck.com/pages/recently-played-songs

ckg279 said:

Noted; however, in my defense it was based on what was already talked about on these boards.

Also, just an observation: I think it'd be more accurate to call WECK(if you had to classify it as a format)a full-service station. Consider: You have top of hour newscasts from CBS News(and eventually local casts), the music and sports(if memory serves, WECK still holds the right to Canisius basketball).

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Good point, I'm a fan of "Full Service" radio stations and really miss them. Just enough news each hour so I can turn it on and know if there is something important going on in the world or locally.

Also, in addition to doing nights, Buddy Shula will also be doing a weekly Elvis radio show Saturdays at 5pm starting tomorrow(7/8).

Harv Moore would have been a better fit to host a show such as that.

Offered as a public service for the purpose of discussion, for those who didn't hear the hard roll out.

Monday, between approximately 7:45-8:10 a.m. Tom Donahue and Gail Ann Huber working together for the first time, sounded cohesive at times and other times, disjointed. Overall, more in sync than not. Attempted to listen to WECK FM on a portable mid-value AM-FM radio, but interference by 102.5 (Rob Lucas) and 103.3 (Shredd & Ragan) made it difficult. Tuned to WECK-AM, which sounded reasonably good, considering what AM, music on AM, and the nature of AM receivers have become in the last ten years.

7:50 Too Much Heaven -Bee Gees, backsell "coming up on 8 o'clock" no exact time given, no weather/temp, D&H talked to and about Jon Summers, but it sounded like he was outside the studio, very off mic, his part of the brief conversation unintelligible

7:53 Track of My Tears -Johnny Rivers, followed by backsell, and a news tease from John Zach, who apologized for "technical difficulties" in an earlier newscast. A brief discussion ensues about how good he now sounds, how bad the quality of his previous cast sounded. Zach offers, "it sounded like I was in the men's room."

Commercial set, all local accounts: Payroll Processing, 60; Buffalo Dental Group, 60; Carpet Smart, **; Universal Windows, 60; Town and Country Furniture, 60; legal ID

7:58 It's Not Unusual -Tom Jones, early fade out to join...

8:00 CBS Radio network news

8:04 Local news, intro to which, includes source credit to the Buffalo News: Zach reads sponsor billboard, delivers three local stories: NYS trooper shooting; Taste of Buffalo recap; Cellino & Barnes break-up

8:07 Commercial for local doctor

8:08 Weather, traffic

8:09 Snowbird -Anne Murray, intro with time, temp

end of listening

I heard bits and pieces of it as well; Zach apologized at the end of the 9 o'clock newscast for the technical glitches that made their voices sound different than they usually do. He also said if anyone in the audience had news tips to call them in(likewise, to send photos-with the advisory of "if you can do so safely").

Further observations:

1. There seems to be a new voice-over doing the imaging.

2. Buddy did a liner fully introducing the new format(and he himself used a term that I did earlier on in the thread: "full service")and also took a subtle dig or two at WBEN in the process.

First of all, I love what Buddy is doing. He brought back some great personalities. I'm hearing songs I haven't heard in years. It's all good! That said, I do have some criticisms. I would scale back the digs at WBEN. Buddy, this was the station that employed you, allowing you to become one of the leading sales reps in the market. In essence, it was Entercom that gave you the opportunity to build your wealth so that you could achieve your dream of buying a radio station. Plus, you can't back up your claim that your station is now a player in local news. John Zach rewriting news articles from the Buffalo News is comparable to what other music stations do in the morning. It's not a news department. And what does full-service even mean? A music station that has news at the top of the hour is full service while a station that opts to run talk programming between newscasts is not? I don't get the distinction. Have live local news from 6am to 6pm each day with a reporter on the street gathering stories and then you can start boasting about being full-service. Again, I don't want to be like some others on this board who just criticize, criticize, criticize. I'm pulling for you Buddy. I want you to succeed. Ralph Irene is appointment listening for me. I'm sure I'm going to be spending an inordinate part of my time on Friday afternoons listening to Danny. And you're fortunate to have the incomparable Tom Donahue in the mornings. I'm just suggesting you tone down some of your imaging. You're a music station. When I'm looking for news, I know where to turn.

Mark: I know you're not looking to criticize; however, here's a definition of what a full-service format is:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_service_(radio_format)

Going off that list, WECK meets quite a few of that criteria: local/national news, automated programming overnights, music(which does cut across many formats), sports(as I noted before, I think they still hold the rights to Canisius College basketball), a large list of local advertisers, brokered programming only on the weekends(and very little of it right now)and a good chunk of specialty music(Ralph Irene on Saturdays along with the just-debuting show focusing on Elvis Presley and the Sunday morning polka show).

Mark1981 said:

First of all, I love what Buddy is doing. He brought back some great personalities. I'm hearing songs I haven't heard in years. It's all good! That said, I do have some criticisms. I would scale back the digs at WBEN. Buddy, this was the station that employed you, allowing you to become one of the leading sales reps in the market. In essence, it was Entercom that gave you the opportunity to build your wealth so that you could achieve your dream of buying a radio station. Plus, you can't back up your claim that your station is now a player in local news. John Zach rewriting news articles from the Buffalo News is comparable to what other music stations do in the morning. It's not a news department. And what does full-service even mean? A music station that has news at the top of the hour is full service while a station that opts to run talk programming between newscasts is not? I don't get the distinction. Have live local news from 6am to 6pm each day with a reporter on the street gathering stories and then you can start boasting about being full-service. Again, I don't want to be like some others on this board who just criticize, criticize, criticize. I'm pulling for you Buddy. I want you to succeed. Ralph Irene is appointment listening for me. I'm sure I'm going to be spending an inordinate part of my time on Friday afternoons listening to Danny. And you're fortunate to have the incomparable Tom Donahue in the mornings. I'm just suggesting you tone down some of your imaging. You're a music station. When I'm looking for news, I know where to turn.

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Mark, I hate to disagree, but you are wrong. WECK is not a music station. It is not a news station. It is not a sports station. It is not a talk station. It is Buffalo's only full service AM/FM radio station. We provide timeless music, and local and national news and information, distributed by friendly and familiar trusted voices. You are really assuming a lot. WECK is not in competition with other Buffalo radio stations. Our goal is to provide an enjoyable listening experience for our listeners. That really should be every stations goal. I could care less about any competition, as long as WECK sounds the best it can. I realize the opportunities I have been given. I also realize what I have contributed to all of my former employers. If other stations have weaknesses, the listeners will decide. All I know is WECK will be providing a great local listening experience.

Buddy Shula said:

I love the title of this thread....."all has been revealed"........just FYI.......not all has been revealed. The best is yet to come.........

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Buddy's right...http://www.buffalobroadcasters.com/weck-adds-sports-programming-announces-promotions/

Cliff notes version:
Glenn Topolski has been promoted to Program Director
Current Production Director Frank Miller has added the role of Assistant Program Director
PM Driver Mike Jacobs is now the Community Events Coordinator
Paul Peck and Kevin Sylvester are launching “Buffalo Sports Page Radio,” on Saturday, August 5 (will air Sundays too during Bills season)

Rob Piotrowski said:

Paul Peck and Kevin Sylvester are launching “Buffalo Sports Page Radio,” on Saturday, August 5 (will air Sundays too during Bills season)

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It'll be interesting to see what the NFL and the Bills allow them to say. I've known stations that have been unable to use the team name in game-day programming.

TheBigA said:

It'll be interesting to see what the NFL and the Bills allow them to say. I've known stations that have been unable to use the team name in game-day programming.

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Could you supply attribution?

That sounds very strange. Never heard of such a thing. The "Buffalo Bills" is the proper name of a sports entity. Covering the team in a news capacity requires using the proper name of the subject of the story. Now, if WECK called its sports show the "Buffalo Bils Sports Hour," or something to that connects the team with the radio station in a programming and revenue generating capacity, it's plausible that the team would object and the objection would be upheld in court. But to say, for example, "the Buffalo Bills play the Miami Dolphins this afternoon at New Era Field..." That's a reported statement of fact.