Spirit of the Radio ( Part 6 ) Top 40 Edition. WMYQ Miami
It was late winter 1970 and I was fresh out of high school where I spent my nights managing bands and days working on a new format for the yet-to-emerge FM band, barely graduating. Throughout the late 60’s I was also a gofer at the dominant WQAM in Miami. My all time favorite top 40 station. I am forever indebted to guys like Dan Chandler, Jim Dunlap and Rick Shaw for letting me into their world. It was like a degree in radio as I observed, well, everything about their operation and culture. I wrote about it here: http://560.com/abrams.htm. Ironically, my later consulting partner Kent Burkhart was the first PD at WQAM when top 40 pioneer Todd Storz acquired them in the mid 50’s. I earned their news tip money...$56 a week, so long as there was no fire that someone called in, I would get paid. It was there I performed guerrilla research with such projects as my hitchhiking survey, hitching rides throughout South Florida to study in car listening habits. Couldn’t do that today, but then it yielded amazing amounts programming information that few had uncovered. Like listeners screaming profanities at the car radio when jocks talked up records. “Shut the f up” being the most common response along with listening to station A while they thought it was station B. Some of the lessons from hitchhiking studies help fashion my general philosophy about lister behavior.
By this time, I completed my new format idea and put it into a crude proposal. I mailed it to every “heavy” programmer I knew of. The idea was to convince them to give me the keys to their dormant FM while they commanded their giant AM. I was 17 at the time, so the replies I received were more inspirational that material, except for one. From Buzz Bennett who had just taken over the Bartell stations. I met Buzz at various conventions. I once challenged him on a panel and I think he was taken aback, and immediately took me to lunch. He was amazing. Legendary. Bigger than life. Genius. His followers were cult like, even adapting his mannerisms. “Heeeey man, dig it....”. He was a rock star programmer. Truly. Looking like a cross between a south-of-the-border bandit and a member of The Mothers Of Invention.
Buzz later called me and said Bartell bought a 100kw FM in Miami. Ain’t gonna do the format you sent, but if I’m into it, Al Casey ( Steve Taylor at the time) would call me.
Duh!! Yes!!! A few days later Al called. He just arrived from WHBQ in Memphis and invited me down to the WGBS building on Brickell Road near downtown Miami where WMYQ was temporarily housed.
I pulled out the suit I wore at prom, got a haircut and drove down to meet him.
Oh uh. Upon arrival I felt like a narc. That’s what he thought too. This was more like an earthy California vibe than a corporate one. I quickly assured him that I was ok...I apologized for my super straight appearance and he grabbed his right hand man, Robert W Walker, and we walked to a seedy motel a block away to meet.
They asked if I wanted to get high and I said sure! First barrier broken. We proceeded to get very stoned, drove around Miami for hours talking radio and music. I was as enthusiastic and positive as they were. Second barrier broken. I was hired by the end of the ride. I didn’t even ask what the salary as, I was ecstatic to have finally made it to a major market FM with some very cool people, overseen by the cerebral Buzz Bennett. I could feel that magic was about to happen as one of the very first FM pop stations
Building the station was a blast. Even the little things like going to distributors to build our library...and mine, as this was a top 40 project and I took home all of the progressive stuff. A staff of like minded people were brought in. Some made the cut, others didn’t. We were a stoner bunch and there was one raving drunk we hired...not a good fit...another guy forgot to show up for overnights. While I was full time music director, I was doing 6-midnight Sunday nights and ended up on the air til 6 the next morning— never heard from the missing jock again, but the keepers were the best. Dave Thompson, Dave Van Dyke, John Emm with news and a host of others. In fact Dave Van Dyke, Robert Walker and I still zoom every Monday so suffice to say that many of the relationships made there are permanent
As most of the WMYQ staff were from out of town, it was decided that instead of each having crappy apartments, we’d pool our meager money and rent a mansion in coconut grove, an enclave for artists and rich hippies. We did just that and christened “The Q house.” It was ground zero for radio innovation and that pot fueled 1971 lifestyle. It was THE meeting place. Many in the record promotion trade preferred to meet us at the house rather than the station. The record business met us with a wide range of emotion ranging from a joy that there was another option other than WQAM and WFUN, some skeptical as one guy told us “ we were pissing in the wind, no FM will ever beat QAM,” to one who made us buy our records because we played an alternate version of one of his hits. But generally a fun bunch all kissed by the excitement of the new musical era.
WMYQ was new. Very new. We did things like played the long versions of album crossovers, introduced shotgun jingles, used the brilliantly eclectic Bobby Ocean production, from our sister station KCBQ, printed our survey on heavy stock paper with psychedelic designs. All different if not revolutionary in Top 40 at the time.
Musically, all of us were album guys. Yes, Cat Stevens, Pink Floyd and Mc Cartney wallowed through the halls of the Q house when the radio wasn’t on. But our radio playlist was straight pop. The radio was our stage and we were the actors and scriptwriters. We acted the play very well. No way we lived the 14 year old bopper or 30 year old little league Mom role, but we sure knew how to turn on the charm. How to reach them on an emotional level. Maybe because we weren’t true fans of David Cassidy, that we could present him in a more thought out and dramatic way. We never lost sight that the radio was our stage. We knew how to put on a show.
Some of the most creative and memorable times were when Buzz and Bobby Ocean visited. We were sponges for their knowledge, experience and well, vibe. To say those were magical evenings at the Q house is an understatement. Intense radio discussion, followed by music listening in our music room late at night, prank calling overnight guys at the competition and watching Bugs Bunny cartoons in the early morning. One day I’ll talk about those hotline prank calls to other stations which included impersonating a consultant and having them change the format on the fly. Whacked brilliance fueled by programming theory and brainstorming…and fun.
While we were musically tight, we discovered a lot of songs. We were first on Maggie May and even American Pie as most stations were initially freaked at the length. We played album cuts judiciously as in Mc Cartney and Chicago and of course those long versions of everything from Crimson and Clover to Time Has Come today. But at our core, we were pure pop.
Research was my guerrilla stuff, calling record stores ( sometimes bribing them to report false info to competitors —- hey, this was war) and a weekly conference with KCBQ. Among my duties was to hand write the playlist 24/7. Ultra labor intensive but this was before computerized music programs, and allowed great flexibility. If there was a new Three Dog Night, we could write that song in every hour. It gave A,B,C, POWER etc….a new range of orbits
The knowledge acquired at WMYQ ( and WQAM ) were critical to the architecture of our Album rock format ( Superstars ) and others developed over the years. It was a cross between discipline, production and presentation with the amazing new album artists that created the foundations for competitive muscle.
WMYQ became an entry point for many well know jocks and programmers, though much Later, WMYQ was bitten by FCC issues, lawsuits and call letter changes, though the essence of WMYQ was morphed into Y100, mainly led by Robert Walker who had the Original WMYQ approached etched into his DNA
Over time, the team dissipated. I went on to program WRIF in Detroit before ABC, Rob commanded the Miami airwaves for years at Y100, Al ( rip) went on to program other Bartell FM’s, Dave Van Dyke went on to be a PD in our consulting group, later a CBS GM now running a successful research company, and a few are MIA.
WMYQ was a legitimate FM pioneer. It was only a year...But that year in Miami is forever etched in rock.