I got my first gig as program director and music director at a small town station. I analyzed the market. Clearly this young Hispanic border town was listening to 550 KTSA, a highly rated Top 40 in San Antonio, 150 miles away. Across the river in Mexico was an FM top 40. I knew a guy that worked there. There was no microphone in the studio. The jocks manually played a song then a carted liner, a few commercials, another liner and another song. They called themselves "The Machine". My station was an FM where the station had a reputation of being "mickey mouse".
Having worked in a record store, I had become fairly skilled at picking the hits. With all the music I heard, those hits just sounded different enough to be easily identified. My record store was months ahead on pushing Heart and Boston among others.
I wasn't exceptional at 'predicting' the hits but I think I was right about 2 out of 3 times. I considered this an important factor because back then being the first to introduce a group or song before the other stations was important to listeners. The station that was ahead of the curve was 'cool'.
Back in those days we got singles and sometimes albums from the record companies. And as a former assistant manager of a record store I had contacts that fed me info and records.
My goal was to be on hits about 4 weeks ahead of KTSA that would push the stuff I had been playing as 'new'. The station in Mexico, The Machine bought records at the record store downtown, so they could not beat me to the punch.
Sometimes it went wrong. A Poco album arrived. After a listen, I selected In The Heart of The Night and Crazy Love as the singles and felt Crazy Love would be the followup, not the first single. Got the songs right but the order wrong.
I was there 18 months. In hindsight I was a very small part in the success of the station. It's what my boss put in place that created success. He got advertisers. He got businesses playing the station. He worked on making the station a part of the community. He encouraged us and would buy a new piece of equipment here and there to replace the true junk we had been working with. And he got us Tanner jingles (man, that was so cool).
Even though this was the late 1970s, I refused to be heavily recurrent and gold. Many were 60% currents. I was about 75%. Being in a small market, I was forced to daypart making mornings more AC and the rockers after 6pm. As early as 1976 I felt it was time to return Top 40 to all hits and recurrents. I was tempted to do this in 1978 but figured I'd slice it down the middle with 75% currents.
Having worked in a record store, I had become fairly skilled at picking the hits. With all the music I heard, those hits just sounded different enough to be easily identified. My record store was months ahead on pushing Heart and Boston among others.
I wasn't exceptional at 'predicting' the hits but I think I was right about 2 out of 3 times. I considered this an important factor because back then being the first to introduce a group or song before the other stations was important to listeners. The station that was ahead of the curve was 'cool'.
Back in those days we got singles and sometimes albums from the record companies. And as a former assistant manager of a record store I had contacts that fed me info and records.
My goal was to be on hits about 4 weeks ahead of KTSA that would push the stuff I had been playing as 'new'. The station in Mexico, The Machine bought records at the record store downtown, so they could not beat me to the punch.
Sometimes it went wrong. A Poco album arrived. After a listen, I selected In The Heart of The Night and Crazy Love as the singles and felt Crazy Love would be the followup, not the first single. Got the songs right but the order wrong.
I was there 18 months. In hindsight I was a very small part in the success of the station. It's what my boss put in place that created success. He got advertisers. He got businesses playing the station. He worked on making the station a part of the community. He encouraged us and would buy a new piece of equipment here and there to replace the true junk we had been working with. And he got us Tanner jingles (man, that was so cool).
Even though this was the late 1970s, I refused to be heavily recurrent and gold. Many were 60% currents. I was about 75%. Being in a small market, I was forced to daypart making mornings more AC and the rockers after 6pm. As early as 1976 I felt it was time to return Top 40 to all hits and recurrents. I was tempted to do this in 1978 but figured I'd slice it down the middle with 75% currents.
