Please don't be confused. YES, I have changed the name of my blog. I decided to claim what is rightfully mine, and take back the name that I originally created to use on my blog and on my future endeavors. "Classic Country Front Porch" was a nice name, but I was settling for something and was not completely satisfied. You may remember from my original post on this blog, the story about the former friend of mine who hijacked my original "Front Porch" concept and created a page on Facebook with the name "CountryMusic Front Porch.
This is my porch and I am not going to let a fraud keep playing like he created it. If you are a "fan" of the other page on Facebook, please think about how little interaction that person has had with his page. My pages are pretty busy when I have the time to devote to them. Having a full time job outside of this hobby keeps me from adding content more frequently. But I hope to spend more time on my pages in the very near future. Until then, please rest-assured that "Country Music Front Porch" and "Classic Country Front Porch" are one and the same. I am just renaming everything "Country Music Front Porch". After all. It was my idea in the first place.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Sunday, April 17, 2011
No more crying over "The Wolf"!
Last December I posted a review of the San Francisco radio station at 95.7 FM, KBWF, also known as "The Wolf". I pointed-out many reasons why I thought the station was performing so poorly in the ratings and also predicted an eventual format change for the station, taking country music away from San Francisco listeners.
On April 15, "The Wolf's" parent company Entercom Communications did exactly what I had hoped for, and what many Bay Area country music fans dreaded. They changed the format of KBWF from "today's country" to sports talk. While many people don't understand how something like this could possibly happen, I completely do.
Endless bad decisions by station management, as well as their own deep-rooted arrogance led to Entercom making this decision. In the end, it was about money. But as it relates to the state of country music, I believe there is more to this story. But first the business part. KBWF was losing money, BIG TIME!! Advertising revenue at the station was down by more than fifty percent. Ratings were also dropping steadily and consistently for months. Some have blamed the addition of the "Fitz In The Morning" show for this. I think importing the Seattle-based Fitz show to San Francisco was more of an effort to save money, rather than spend it.
After the station's locally-based Ken and Kory morning show was dropped last fall, management chose NOT to replace it with a local program. Expanding the already-established Fitz show to San Francisco was a win win for the station because it saved the money of producing a local show with new talent. This was an indicator that Entercom was most-likely planning a format switch for a long time.
Another thing The Wolf did was drop the syndicated (and dreadful) Second Shift with Alan Kabel earlier this year. They replaced Kabel with their own part-time dj, Ali Wilder, which filled void for the rest of The Wolf's time on the air. Despite all the changes at the station (or perhaps because of them), KBWF's monthly ratings and position among Bay Area radio stations continued a steady plummet. And worst of all, the very important CUME (cumulative audience) ratings have seen a huge drop since last Fall.
Earlier this month, "The Wolf" began carrying the live broadcasts of Oakland A's baseball games, along with the A's radio network's pre and post game shows, giving roughly five hours of daily programming to the Oakland A's throughout the baseball season. For me, this was the final clue that something big was about to happen. No music stations give up four years of programming for sports. This just doesn't work. But some would say that having sports on FM radio is also a big mistake. Not Entercom...
Entercom has dabbled with FM sports programming in other markets and they have found success. So the flip of the KBWF from country music to sports talk is not that big of a stretch. And considering Entercom's recent activity in the Bay Area market, this move was a right on track. In February, the company sold-off its very popular classical music station KDFC, to a non-profit organization. The station moved down the dial, but Entercom kept the 102.7 frequency and moved it's south-bay based classic rock station to that spot. This may have put the company in a better financial position to go after the A's.
This format change leaves the nation's 4th largest radio market without a country music station. Of course I have pointed-out in the past the fact that KBWF's "The Wolf" was hardly a "country" station. The format featured what has been referred to as "country-pop" or "top-40 country". It's a far cry from traditional country. While this move is tough for Bay Area country music fans, it could signal the end of so-called "today's country". Which means this could be the start of a major downhill slide for country music that will hopefully lead to a revival of the genre on the scale of the 1980's rebirth after the disaster that was known as the "Urban Cowboy Craze".
If you saw the telecast of the Academy of Country Awards from earlier this month, you should know exactly what I am talking about. Country music is dead. It has been replaced with a replica that doesn't resemble this great American musical genre one bit. The ACM awards the Grammy's version 2.0. I mean really? Rihanna, Steven Tyler and James Taylor all performing on the same show as Taylor Swift, Sugarland and Carrie Underwood. It was a line-up that Ryan Seacrest would be proud of. In fact, he WAS proud of it. As Seacrest took the stage to present the final award of the night, he said "this night has not been about country music, it's been about American music." Boy was he right.
If Bay Area country music fans are unhappy with the demise and end of their country station, they should take heart in the fact that they have plenty of other places to get their country from. My hope is that after "today's country" fades into oblivion, some of today's real country performers like Chris Young, Sunny Sweeney, Easton Corbin and Zaz Brown Band will be left standing. I also hope that the next incarnation of country music will bring back some of country's missing talents like Trisha Yearwood, Marty Stuart, Patty Loveless, Alison Krauss, Alan Jackson and others. And of course I will work to make sure that when country comes back, it won't forget the legends who paved the way for everyone else to enjoy a career in this business.
On April 15, "The Wolf's" parent company Entercom Communications did exactly what I had hoped for, and what many Bay Area country music fans dreaded. They changed the format of KBWF from "today's country" to sports talk. While many people don't understand how something like this could possibly happen, I completely do.
Endless bad decisions by station management, as well as their own deep-rooted arrogance led to Entercom making this decision. In the end, it was about money. But as it relates to the state of country music, I believe there is more to this story. But first the business part. KBWF was losing money, BIG TIME!! Advertising revenue at the station was down by more than fifty percent. Ratings were also dropping steadily and consistently for months. Some have blamed the addition of the "Fitz In The Morning" show for this. I think importing the Seattle-based Fitz show to San Francisco was more of an effort to save money, rather than spend it.
After the station's locally-based Ken and Kory morning show was dropped last fall, management chose NOT to replace it with a local program. Expanding the already-established Fitz show to San Francisco was a win win for the station because it saved the money of producing a local show with new talent. This was an indicator that Entercom was most-likely planning a format switch for a long time.
Another thing The Wolf did was drop the syndicated (and dreadful) Second Shift with Alan Kabel earlier this year. They replaced Kabel with their own part-time dj, Ali Wilder, which filled void for the rest of The Wolf's time on the air. Despite all the changes at the station (or perhaps because of them), KBWF's monthly ratings and position among Bay Area radio stations continued a steady plummet. And worst of all, the very important CUME (cumulative audience) ratings have seen a huge drop since last Fall.
Earlier this month, "The Wolf" began carrying the live broadcasts of Oakland A's baseball games, along with the A's radio network's pre and post game shows, giving roughly five hours of daily programming to the Oakland A's throughout the baseball season. For me, this was the final clue that something big was about to happen. No music stations give up four years of programming for sports. This just doesn't work. But some would say that having sports on FM radio is also a big mistake. Not Entercom...
Entercom has dabbled with FM sports programming in other markets and they have found success. So the flip of the KBWF from country music to sports talk is not that big of a stretch. And considering Entercom's recent activity in the Bay Area market, this move was a right on track. In February, the company sold-off its very popular classical music station KDFC, to a non-profit organization. The station moved down the dial, but Entercom kept the 102.7 frequency and moved it's south-bay based classic rock station to that spot. This may have put the company in a better financial position to go after the A's.
This format change leaves the nation's 4th largest radio market without a country music station. Of course I have pointed-out in the past the fact that KBWF's "The Wolf" was hardly a "country" station. The format featured what has been referred to as "country-pop" or "top-40 country". It's a far cry from traditional country. While this move is tough for Bay Area country music fans, it could signal the end of so-called "today's country". Which means this could be the start of a major downhill slide for country music that will hopefully lead to a revival of the genre on the scale of the 1980's rebirth after the disaster that was known as the "Urban Cowboy Craze".
If you saw the telecast of the Academy of Country Awards from earlier this month, you should know exactly what I am talking about. Country music is dead. It has been replaced with a replica that doesn't resemble this great American musical genre one bit. The ACM awards the Grammy's version 2.0. I mean really? Rihanna, Steven Tyler and James Taylor all performing on the same show as Taylor Swift, Sugarland and Carrie Underwood. It was a line-up that Ryan Seacrest would be proud of. In fact, he WAS proud of it. As Seacrest took the stage to present the final award of the night, he said "this night has not been about country music, it's been about American music." Boy was he right.
If Bay Area country music fans are unhappy with the demise and end of their country station, they should take heart in the fact that they have plenty of other places to get their country from. My hope is that after "today's country" fades into oblivion, some of today's real country performers like Chris Young, Sunny Sweeney, Easton Corbin and Zaz Brown Band will be left standing. I also hope that the next incarnation of country music will bring back some of country's missing talents like Trisha Yearwood, Marty Stuart, Patty Loveless, Alison Krauss, Alan Jackson and others. And of course I will work to make sure that when country comes back, it won't forget the legends who paved the way for everyone else to enjoy a career in this business.
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