REFORMATTING THEIR (COMPACT) DISCS
Like Don McLean, da Flatline had his own "Day The Music Died." It was the morning last summer that I was driving to work and punched up WAXQ-FM (Q104.3), at that time the pioneering "alternative" rock station in the Metro NY area -- only to discover that they'd converted, with no advance notice, to a "classic rock" format. I recall screams of outrage coming out of my mouth, feelings of betrayal -- hell, it hadn't been that long ago that I'd attended their second anniverary party at Noo Yawk's Roseland Ballroom, and had gotten happily pummeled by the likes of White Zombie, Everclear, and Spacehog. How could they do this to me? What in God's name were they thinking?!?
Don't get me wrong, now. I have no animosity towards "classic rock" per se. It's just that, when WAXQ first hit the airwaves, "classic rock" was just about the only rock on the local airwaves, thanks to dinosaur stations like K-Rock (a/k/a Howard Stern's home base) and WNEW. The only new music I was getting was outta my crappy TV speaker, thanks to MTV. (College radio. you ask? Maybe -- but who has time to hunt down the one show in a hundred that played what I like?) Then the Q fired up their transmitter; all of a sudden, it was "Yow! They're playing Alice In Chains! They're playing Nine Inch Nails! They're playing the Smithereens! They're playing Black Sabbath tunes I haven't heard since college! Cool."
WAXQ threw the first stone in the NY radio pond, and everyone else felt the splash. K-Rock and Z-100 (home of the "Morning Zoo") changed wholeheartedly to new music -- in the former's case, jettisoning almost the entire air crew save Stern. WNEW (and, to a certain degree, its northern New Jersey soundalike WDHA) tried to keep feet in both the old and new camps. The alternative revolution sewn by Nirvana and ilk back in the early 90's had come to fruition on the New York airwaves, and yers truly couldn't have been happier. Q104.3 became, literally a member of the family -- in one case, I took the S.O. and Only Child to a local amusement park, after winning tickets on the radio, and several of the Q airstaff were on hand to give out T-shirts and stuff. I still recall the "bouncer" picking people out of the crowd to play a trivia game, and my daughter enthusiastically yelling "Pick my dad! Pick my dad! He knows!"
Then the Q performed their about-face; the only reason I can think of is that they perceived some kind of "classic rock" void that hadda be filled. And once again, it seems like everyone in New York radio is playing musical chairs. WNEW has firmly retrenched behind the classic rock lines, even bringing back most of its veteran DJs. Z-100, after losing audience share over the last decade, has resumed playing the Top 40 (mostly dance/rap/soul). And after switching from easy listening to country a while back, WYNY bought K-Rock's old call letters (WKTU) and format (disco, fer God's sake!) -- and is now the Number 1 station in the friggin' country.
Mind you, surprise format changes are nothing new in NYC (or anywhere else, I bet): back in '79-'80, WPIX-FM had a brief flirtation with punk/new wave -- only to be abruptly changed to "nothing but love songs." (They're no longer on the air, so there is SOME justice in the world...) And within the last few months, I found a station up Rockland County way with an grunge format (and PIX vet Meg Griffin behind the mike) -- only to turn it on one Saturday and discover they'd gone country. Gaaah.
Think I'm gonna wire the boob tube for stereo, set the cable box for MTV -- and then blow-torch the tuner. Thank God for Kennedy and Matt Pinfield...
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