Morning show sounds good and has been getting better since Stryker left. Numbers will catch up with it eventually. I know many people who listen and talk about KROQ mornings again. Kline & Ally is a winner… but will Audacy/Entercom spend any $$$ to promote? Alt987 perhaps had the most aggressive morning show promotion ever and it helped, however, that show is stale now and kroq has something new. Wishing them the best.
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Is it a fair fight for KROQ if…
- Thread starter Loverofradio
- Start date
Of course they do. Woody is a national show. Kline is live & local.
I disagree. I don't care for Klein and ally. I like him but don't care for her. I think the woody show is awesome. I miss how they gave Mike Kaplan aka show killer crap all the time. And I like rock traffic when they do it.
I really enjoy when woody talks about his early days in radio. I thinks it's a good morning show so much better then Klein ally show. I would rather hear Heidi and frank or Ryan seacrest in the morning. But I prefer the woody show.
With that said I really hope Kroq can get there numbers up to what alt 98.7 is. I wish them well. Looks like brining weatherly back was a good idea
The uphill climb for KROQ is that there's just not that much new audience to go around.
The other challenge is this: The station grew its brand on the image of being unpredictable, edgy, yet reliably cool. If KROQ played your music, you made it. The station didn't have to follow trends or listen to labels, because it played by its own rules. But quite frankly, that hasn't been the case since the mid-2000s. Like many other programmers, Weatherly played it safe post-PPM and lost the key piece that gave KROQ its success: spontaneity. Younger listeners do not care about KROQ's legacy as a rock station, so the brand really does mean nothing.
I recently had a conversation with a friend who does marketing at a major record label and agreed with me that this formula is almost impossible to replicate in the streaming era, post-PPM, in part because the music is too polarizing or is seen as too "mainstream" by its core audience that is looking for something truly different from what is being played on Top 40.
Here's an example of what I mean: A member of Black Midi, an alternative act on the rise in the UK, explained it well in a recent Pitchfork article when asked about two alt-rock heavyweights, Green Day and Muse:
“If you didn’t get into them [Green Day and Muse] at the time, they seem completely ridiculous. I can’t gauge what the good Muse is, the good Green Day. There’s something repellent about it.”
Infinity/CBS Radio's big marketing spend for KROQ was station events. But the last one that happened in 2019 barely sold out. They have not really done much in terms of in-person activations since COVID.
Meanwhile, iHeart has thrown two big alternative rock shindigs at the Forum (AlterEGO) that aired on a national TV partner, hosted by the morning show of the largest alt station in the country. If that isn't a great promo, I don't know what is.
I can't judge and say that the KROQ morning show is a "winner" quite yet. They'll be a winner when they start hurting The Woody Show's ratings, but it seems like that show is still very strong for KYSR. Woody Show does very well at engaging its fans on social media and I wish other radio programs followed their lead in making the content accessible on YouTube and other social platforms.
They're running a ROQ of the 90s weekend. The core of their format to this day. The new classic rock in a way. Pennywise, Siouxie and the Banshees, Sublime, Korn, etc.
In my view to make a continuous splash they could be dipping into adventurous new music that no other US commercial station is playing and hyping that up to the max on social, because this exact philosophy is what put them on the map in the first place!
In my opinion the daily playlist leaves tons to be desired, but if they're billing top 5 as noted on this board it's curious why they even departed from the earlier pop lean. Seems they could air anything and rake in the revenue, leaning on their heritage?
It makes sense when you look at the bell curve of alternative's popularity which peaked around 1995 that the SoCal stations like 91X and KROQ that started it all in the 80s would today be playing deep cuts by Smashing Pumpkins while the rest of the country's radio stations have moved on for better or worse.
In my view to make a continuous splash they could be dipping into adventurous new music that no other US commercial station is playing and hyping that up to the max on social, because this exact philosophy is what put them on the map in the first place!
In my opinion the daily playlist leaves tons to be desired, but if they're billing top 5 as noted on this board it's curious why they even departed from the earlier pop lean. Seems they could air anything and rake in the revenue, leaning on their heritage?
It makes sense when you look at the bell curve of alternative's popularity which peaked around 1995 that the SoCal stations like 91X and KROQ that started it all in the 80s would today be playing deep cuts by Smashing Pumpkins while the rest of the country's radio stations have moved on for better or worse.
Those events, like KISS' Wango Tango, are profit centers. They may also serve as promotions, but the principal objective is to make money from sponsors.
Those events alone don't help or hurt audience size. They are revenue driven and do help enhance the image of a station... but when you have a station with a cume of two million like KIIS, how much does an event that fills the former Staples Center with 20,000 people... many of whom are not KIIS listeners... mean?
You are assuming that both can not be successful simultaneously. While we know that rock in general has a shrinking core in LA due to population and ethnic changes, have we reached the point where we think that both stations could not have around a 3 to 3.5 share in 25-54 and be well within the top 10 billers in the market?
In 12+ in the first two weeks of July, KROQ has been gaining on KYSR, which is basically flat. KROQ is tied or beats KYSR after 10 AM, and is growing nicely in AM Drive, with the two-week average more than double the average of the 6 months up to June.
Were I to guess, the two will be in a +/- 0.1 to 0.2 tie in week 3 and come out tied for the book on 6 AM to Midnight. You can bet for me or against me at Windows 1 and 2 of the Nielsen Solid Gold Casino.
I very much like the ROQ of the 90s weekend KRQO is doing right now. Plenty of great songs, which frankly should receive airplay on a more frequent basis. (God forbid spins get taken away from Glass Animals, Maneskin or Sam Fender.)
While it's awesome to hear old school Korn, RATM, Nine Inch Nails and White Zombie on KROQ this weekend, the absence or near absence of Tool from the playlist is disappointing. Conversely, I was delighted to see "Guilty" by Gravity Kills receive a spin yesterday! (I'm a sucker for 90's industrial rock.)
Also, is it just me, or has KYSR cut way back on currents & recurrents recently? "L.A.'s New Alternative" is playing a lot of old music suddenly. Fine by me! I like the proven older stuff much better than the current material the format has to offer. It will be interesting to see if that trend continues into next week.
While it's awesome to hear old school Korn, RATM, Nine Inch Nails and White Zombie on KROQ this weekend, the absence or near absence of Tool from the playlist is disappointing. Conversely, I was delighted to see "Guilty" by Gravity Kills receive a spin yesterday! (I'm a sucker for 90's industrial rock.)
Also, is it just me, or has KYSR cut way back on currents & recurrents recently? "L.A.'s New Alternative" is playing a lot of old music suddenly. Fine by me! I like the proven older stuff much better than the current material the format has to offer. It will be interesting to see if that trend continues into next week.
Just my opinion. I‘ve listened to KROQ for years. I saw nothing wrong with their pop lean, and I felt KROQ overreacted and abandoned that formula too soon. In time, passing the baton new artists, with new post COVID marketing would’ve seen the station rise in time. During that brief stretch, it was almost like KROQ was finally doing their jobs as being a current alternative station and following music charts for once. But, at the same time, I also like what theyre doing now. The biggest thing that offended the major core of KROQ listeners was the ripping of the band-aid of the names that made 106.7 great for so many years, so quickly. I remember David at the time called it a “format change”. It felt like it for sure
Tell any 16-21 years old kid in Los Angeles right now, in a band, that their music will be on KROQ and see the response you’ll get. KROQ‘s brand is just as strong as Power, or 102.7
As long as kroq remains a Top 5 biller in the market
So, wait for the collapsing ratings to wreck billing and then try to dig out of that hole? (I doubt KROQ was a top five biller last year, but they might've been just inside the top 10.)
KROQ was never going to defeat KYSR by playing texturally similar music. KYSR's strong morning show is the deciding factor.
I think Audacy was smart to abandon the Kaplan approach before more collateral damage was incurred. Jury is still out if K.W. is the right guy for the job; I have my doubts. Really like what I'm hearing this weekend, though.
KROQ was never going to defeat KYSR by playing texturally similar music. KYSR's strong morning show is the deciding factor.
I think Audacy was smart to abandon the Kaplan approach before more collateral damage was incurred. Jury is still out if K.W. is the right guy for the job; I have my doubts. Really like what I'm hearing this weekend, though.
Does KROQ play *any* music by unsigned local bands? For that matter does KIIS or KPWR?
So set the station for failure in the future? In 2030, KROQ will be a classic rock station, competing against Jack FM in their own building. I hope everything works out. By some of the numbers David brought up, they did ok during the 2020-21 pop experiment. I remember 10-12 years ago we were also predicting the death of kroq back then. Kroq has had less than strong ratings for years. Remember all of us got tired of KROQ‘s playlist going stale? Then when 106.7 did play new music the upper part of the demo revolted because they werent hearing System of a Down, Rise Against, or Linkin Park
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Cannons, The Interrupters just to name a couple on KROQ. Locals have been heard on power for years. Not sure about kiis
Cannons are signed to Columbia.
Did KROQ play any of their early pre-label material?
KROQ's playlist grew stale because Kevin didn't do a good enough job moving library songs in and out of rotation. He also boosted spins for Modern AC type material to the detriment of harder edged artists, which in my view was a mistake.
KROQ at its peak was a fast tempo, irreverent, fun station. Resurrecting that type of stationality should be the goal.
Did KROQ play any of their early pre-label material?
KROQ's playlist grew stale because Kevin didn't do a good enough job moving library songs in and out of rotation. He also boosted spins for Modern AC type material to the detriment of harder edged artists, which in my view was a mistake.
KROQ at its peak was a fast tempo, irreverent, fun station. Resurrecting that type of stationality should be the goal.
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As a result of getting air play on kroq. Just like it was when No Doubt, Sublime, Incubus first needed an outlet and were new 20-30 years ago. Yes they were staples on Locals Only. And “Fire For You” was on heavy during pop experiment, they were signed to indie label
Playing unsigned acts opens the door for the station to get sued for playing unlicensed music. Typically a radio station requires the unsigned act to sign a release form that absolves it from payment or lawsuit.
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