February 2017 Boston Radio Ratings.

http://ratings.radio-online.com/cgi-bin/rol.exe/arb013
WROR #1 and no one else is even close.

WKAF gets a nice boost.
WGBH and WZLX make nice gains also.

Will the Celtics and Patriots talk be able to keep WBZ FM ahead of WEEI FM ?

I wonder how long cheap channel will keep wjmn going they fell back again.

Just a couple months after signing on and WKAF is gaining momentum. My prediction is this station just keeps rising to the top! They have been playing great music and really connecting with listeners with is what a lot of stations lack nowadays.

As for WBZ and WEEI it will be interesting to say the least. I think WBZ lost several listeners after Rich Keefe joined the Dale and Holley show. And even on the AM side of WBZ with the retirement of Diane Stern.

WROR lost Wally Brine but yet they are #1? Interesting but not surprising.

Jam'n has gone down the tubes because of a number of reasons. For one they have The Breakfast Club syndicated in mornings and this is a Top 10 market so not having a local morning show is part of it, then you have Dylan Sprague who recently said in an Globe article that he doesn't consider Hot 96.9 competition, Kiss 108 is! This guy obviously doesn't get it. Then you have all these really weak personalities on what used to be a heritage station, come on! iHeart needs to stop being so cheap and invest in their heritage stations, get rid of Ashlee, Pup Dawg, Maverik, and the rest of them and bring in some real talent that can target your demo and bring your ratings up otherwise you'll be seeing Jam'n flip to the Bull!

They hold to the belief that a Mainstream Urban wouldnt work in Boston. This station has been in this format since I was born in 1994. The region has changed soo much demographically. I think 977 will rove that you can operate a profitable Urban station in 2017 EMass, maybe it didnt work 15 years ago in the early 2000s...but the fact that Jamin has but 280 months of experience to WKAF's 2 and WKAF is within .5 Arbitrons of Jamn is INSANE.

They are Too removed from Boston to understand idiosyncracies of our demographics and regional music tastes. Most Hispanics in Eastern Mass identify with blacks to a great extent. ESPECIALLY IN THE YOUNGER GENERATION. A mainstream Urban like they have in NYC or Philly would go over very well here. You cant have an Urban show like Breakfast Club and then play golden hip hop hits from 2010. No one likes the music they l, no one.

Im a young and Urban, most people I know in my circle LOVE the Breakfast Club and think its the best part of Jamn. But the people who actually listen to JAMN are driving their kids to school dont like t because its too crass and not local and homer-ish enough for them. The Breakfast Club keeps you plugged into the hip hop culture nationwide and is an honor to have in Boston.

They need to clean house only keep most of the Jamn Mixers keep Money Mav and Pup Dawg, bring in the top local voices we hear on pirate B87.7 which has an ENORMOUS following in Boston proper. Switch to a New Fresh Hip HOp station an call it a day.

Personally I love WKAF but the morning show lacks. My mom is their target demographic. 50 year old Black woman living on the South Shore near Brockton..she likes the weekend personalities. She complained to me about how KJ and Kesha are "SOOO BORING" she said "they dont know black culture" she even said they "sound scared." Granted they may not be the most typically black sounding Urban AC hosts I think we must concede that this IS still Boston I think KJ and Keshas biggest problem is that they are not Boston locals and are till trying to acclimate themselves to our very unique black culture here. They should have tapped more local people or gone with a Steve Harvey Morning Show. Music and finish is immaculate though

Interesting that WGBH -FM's Talk Format is way ahead in ratings than WRKO.

What top local voices? That pirate B87 is nothing but a bunch of inexperienced nobodys on an illegal radio station. When it comes to Jam'n 94.5 Money Mav and Pup Dawg are a big part of the reason why ratings are so low, not to mention valley girl Ashlee! The Breakfast Club is not a good fit for the Jam'n target demo which is a mid 20's white girl. If you ever listen to them they frequently have on Minister Louis Farrakhan and target black people which is fine but don't go on shouting black power because that turns a lot of people off especially on a syndicated show heard in some predominantly white markets! Charlamagne is annoying as hell and then during Super Bowl season has the nerve to bash the Patriots saying Dallas Cowboys are gonna win! Boston is a big market with loyal sports fans, you don't do that.

As for WKAF 97.7 I think their morning show is good but it's a little too music intensive and should have more features to engage listeners. KJ used to be on WILD back in the day so he is familiar with Boston, Kesha not so much. I would have to agree with your mom that the weekend personalities are where it's at with this station! T. Clark from WILD back in the day, and Jay Brown aka Master Jay from Jam'n back in the day are definitely well know in Boston and were once competitors so it's great to see them tag team to takeover the weekend duties. It's hard to believe that station doesn't have a night show! I wouldn't be surprised if one of the weekend personalities gets on air nights. I personally think they should be playing some old school 80's and 90's Hip Hop in addition to the R&B but that's just my opinion. Keep in mind Boston has never had an Urban AC on the FM dial so there is a niche for this format. We are lacking a Spanish FM powerhouse as well which would bring in a boatload of money!

WROR's Wally Brine may have retired in mid December but, 3 months later, it's still the Loren and Wally Morning Show. They still run some voiceovers that include Wally's voice. They are (or were as recently as a couple of weeks ago) doing a Live Like Wally contest. And Wally has been in the studio live or on the phone live twice that I know of since retiring: first time was a couple of days after the SuperBowl; 2nd time was live on the phone from Vancouver British Columbia. And Hank and Loren and Lungboy and LBF still mention him quite a bit. So it's as if he never left and it's possible that even the casual WROR morning show listener might not even know he's gone. They are carrying on just fine without him. I keep expecting to hear someone new on this how as Loren's new partner but nothing so far.

This week, Loren is on vacation. Lungboy, Hank and LBF are there but, this time, as far as I know, they haven't played any old Wally bits. Not sure if they've played Men From Maine this week. Perhaps this is the start of something new.

WMC2006 said:

WROR's Wally Brine may have retired in mid December but, 3 months later, it's still the Loren and Wally Morning Show. They still run some voiceovers that include Wally's voice. They are (or were as recently as a couple of weeks ago) doing a Live Like Wally contest. And Wally has been in the studio live or on the phone live twice that I know of since retiring: first time was a couple of days after the SuperBowl; 2nd time was live on the phone from Vancouver British Columbia. And Hank and Loren and Lungboy and LBF still mention him quite a bit. So it's as if he never left and it's possible that even the casual WROR morning show listener might not even know he's gone. They are carrying on just fine without him. I keep expecting to hear someone new on this how as Loren's new partner but nothing so far.

This week, Loren is on vacation. Lungboy, Hank and LBF are there but, this time, as far as I know, they haven't played any old Wally bits. Not sure if they've played Men From Maine this week. Perhaps this is the start of something new.

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WROR currently has a morning co-host position posted on their website so it should be interesting to see what happens because I can't see Loren working with anyone else! He is probably not too far away from retirement himself so it should be interesting to see what happens with mornings.

Jamn 945 should not e targeting 25 year old white girls. That's their problem. They dont really ant to hear hip hop anymore- because feminism. They certainly dont wanna hear the same 9 top hip hop hits from 2010/2011 and a few from 2002. Its just gross music thats so bad not even a 25 year old middle to low income suburban white girl likes it, maybe her kids do. Boston could support a fresh/hot/new hip hop station. They should have artist and celebrity on air interviews ike they did 15+ years ago.

B87 has over 20k twitter followers and tons of Instagram followers, it rivals jamn 945 in popularity in Boston Proper. They have one or two competent jockeys but I get what your saying about the rest of them. KJ has WILD i get that but they still idk they lack the right connection I think they would have been a little better off just doing Steve Harvey and completing the rest of the schedule really fast. I feel bad for some of the people i know at WZBR.

As far as the breakfast club theyre targeting urban minorities ages 18-30, Im right in the middle of that demo and I love their show, its a bit profane yea but they actually have good insight to the social dynamics of the hip hop industry and black hollywood as a whole. As far as radio and pop culture go they are the biggest thing for young people in America. They all have show on MTV/BET and hosting gigs. They are well renowned if youre not in the demo youll hate it. Theyre also in Markets whiter than Boston and each interview they upload-even of some of the more obscure celebs has at least 250k views. Nosense in playing tired old trash hip hop music like Jamn and then having the BClub-that not the BClub brand

Is it weird that a pirate is programmed like a legitimate music-formatted station? Or that B87.7 is actually at 87.75?

Tomgsinger said:

Is it weird that a pirate is programmed like a legitimate music-formatted station? Or that B87.7 is actually at 87.75?

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...ADVERTISEMENTS included! That includes a Geico ad I heard recently. Besides that, the station sounds like a regular, non-pirate, urban station. It has one advertisement where a young woman (sounds quite professional to me) is talking about getting other local businesses on the station for spots.

For a time Franken-stations were allowed (maybe not now though?) Put out a TV signal on the old analog Ch 6 and the sound portion shows up on FM radio. There was even a commercial sports station on in Chicago on 87.7

And now the FCC may not step in unless, say, an 88.1 is being stepped on.

Jamn 945 - 57.9k twitter followers..2.1 rating

Hot 969- 12.9k twitter followers..3.7 rating

B87- 23.2k twitter followers...
?rating

My point is a full Urban/ with the market cleared of JAMN clearly could compete...if it's doing this much underground...

Tomgsinger said:

...ADVERTISEMENTS included! That includes a Geico ad I heard recently. Besides that, the station sounds like a regular, non-pirate, urban station. It has one advertisement where a young woman (sounds quite professional to me) is talking about getting other local businesses on the station for spots.

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How would a pirate get a national account like Geico for an advertiser? I remember The Touch airing local ads back in the day, but never anything like the Geico spots that are heard so often on licensed broadcasters and even on network feeds.

As for Franken FMs, I believe they're still out there, but no LPTV has ever been authorized for analog channel 6 in Boston.

CTListener said:

How would a pirate get a national account like Geico for an advertiser? I remember The Touch airing local ads back in the day, but never anything like the Geico spots that are heard so often on licensed broadcasters and even on network feeds.

As for Franken FMs, I believe they're still out there, but no LPTV has ever been authorized for analog channel 6 in Boston.

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GEICO's advertising is like the environment - unavoidable. Fercrissake, they even run spots on HD2s - or used to, anyway. They stopped just after Christmas.

The_Raven said:

GEICO's advertising is like the environment - unavoidable. Fercrissake, they even run spots on HD2s - or used to, anyway.

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I have also heard them on HD3's, but I don't remember whether Boston's only HD4, the ill-fated former 104.1 WBMX HD4, ever ran them.

All of these HD streams are run by licensed broadcasters. Still unanswered is my original question: How does a pirate get the account, unless maybe they're recording the ads from somewhere else and running them for nothing just to make the station sound legit?

I wonder if B87 has a way of estimating its listener ship and do they take those numbers to some sort of agency that connects them to advertisers. I have definitely heard an All State commercial (and of course PSAs). Are there legal implications for Gecio/AllState. I'm listening now out of enjoyment and curiosity. They certainly have fluid transitions and voice drops, furthermore, they have more local ads than the other three urban stations.

Many people on this board is upset that B87 is somehow damaging the integrity of the FM band but lets be honest, there is no integrity/sanctity left in modern, corporate, terrestrial radio. Most people who listen dont even know B87 is a pirate, its preset on many a car in Boston.