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On one historical day in May 1965, Boss Radio was launched in Los Angeles on radio station KHJ. Bill Drake shares his memories. To make the format transition at KHJ to Boss Radio for the “old” format, there was much advance planning. But, because of the advance planning, security regarding the forthcoming format at KHJ was not very tight. Drake gave me an inside perspective on how their forthcoming format and imagery was leaked to two other Los Angeles radio stations before KHJ had the chance to debut the Boss Radio format. At that time the existing KHJ programming, including a live show starring Steve Allen and Jane Meadows, was pulled. In its place, the Drake-Chenault team put on a temporary “easy listening hits” format with a lot of oldies. Drake went on to explain: “No rock at all at that point. What we were really doing was doing that [easy listening format] on the air, and the guy would get off the air and go into a production room. He would do complete shows that were complete with the exception that it wasn’t on the air—you know, it was just ‘practice’ with the [Boss Radio] format, the logging and all of that stuff. “Then what happened was...some of the people were being let go at the time at KHJ. Somebody picked up [information] about the [new] format. Everybody was wondering what to call it. We decided it didn’t make any difference what to call it. And ‘boss,’ per se, was at that time an outdated Black term, and also and outdated surfing term. One day, somebody comes in and says, ‘Hey, man, KFWB is doing everything we’ve been practicing—Boss Radio and the whole format. They cut their playlist down to about the amount of records we’d be playing and they were doing the whole thing on the air. “Well we had to think about that for awhile! What we did at the time was, we went ahead and went with the format. We ran promos saying, ‘You’re listening to a sneak preview of a totally new broadcasting concept known as Boss Radio.’ And that we invited other Los Angeles radio stations to try it. We said KFWB at 98 on the dial, and, KRLA, which was doing some aspects of it, at 1110 on the dial—we invite them to try to this ‘boss’ concept. So, in effect, what happened was, it sounded like they were doing what we told them to do. “Obviously, they [the other stations] had some of the [format] sheets. I’m sure it was somebody who had been let go. We didn’t really care one way or another. So, as it went on, everything [the other stations] would do, we’d go right on the air and make it sound like we told them to do it. We were a nonentity at KHJ. That was a mistake on their part because it called a lot of attention to us. “They were doing ‘20/20 news,’ ‘Boss Radio,’ which, of course, was exactly what we were doing. What they had, in effect, done was flip their whole format. They were doing it identically—the news placement, the way they were using the jingles, to the slogans and everything else they were saying. Of course, they had changed their total sound, and the effect of it was, it sounded like they had done that because we had told them to."* Ron Jacobs told me that the final hours leading up to the format switch at the start of The Real Don Steele sent excited ripples of energy throughout the building. At one point an ambulence arrived at KHJ to provide care for a woman who had fainted in the crush of activity. And within six months, KHJ was pushed by Boss Radio to the top of the Los Angeles ratings. One important indication of the success of the format was the number of imitations it spirited. Metropolitan area stations such as WYSL-AM, Buffalo, New York; WSAI-AM, Cincinnati, Ohio; WIXY-AM, Cleveland, Ohio; and, KROY-AM, Sacramento, California (to name but a few) during the 1960’s became known within the radio industry as so-called “fake Drake” stations, ones that were not consulted by Bill Drake but were stations that intentionally emulated the Boss Radio imagery and format. The Boss Radio Name “They didn’t want to use the word ‘boss’ because It was not Bill Drake who chose the name “Boss Radio” for KHJ. Ron Jacobs, the program director at KHJ when the format was launched, provided me with the fascinating behind-the-scenes story when I interviewed him. WG: Most people probably have never heard of Clancy Imislund, yet he’s very important to Boss Radio. Ron Jacobs: When we got to KHJ, we, meaning the group that would later be known as the “Boss Radio” crew, we were not treated warmly in the building. Number one, there were so many different formats in and out of there. It was like everybody was saying how long are these guys going to last. I mean, the big power in the building was Channel 9, KHJ TV. They were the strongest independent station in LA, they had The Million Dollar Movie. Staff members were taking bets on how long we’d last. Plus the fact we were young and we had beards and so on. So the promotions director there who realized that something was going to happen, because Steve Allen and Michael Jackson—the talk show Michael Jackson—were being dumped But Clancy, the radio Promotion Director, started to put together things that could be ready for whoever was going to be arriving to do rock and roll. And when I went up to meet him he had these layouts of newspaper ads, very tasty ones, and the big phrase he emphasized was Boss Radio 93/KHJ. One of the advertisements showed the empty Hollywood Bowl with just a pair of kids sitting up near the back row. And I was real desperate for a slogan because the only condition that I was told was, “You can do whatever you want, but you can’t change the call letters.” I had already proved the value of a supporting slogan anyway. I mean in San Bernardino we had a lame one called “Real Radio” in the beginning. But what the hell, it’s not that lame. There’s a station in LA today that’s calling itself “Really Radio,” you know. I always played around with call letters, like in Honolulu, the disc jockey’s were called The Poi Boys. In San Berdoo, The K/Men and in Fresno, The K-makers. In San Bernardino, records would get “K-mentioned” and so on. Well, we couldn’t play with the call letters in LA. On the one hand they had huge recognition because very few three caller stations were around from almost the beginning of American commercial radio. But KHJ had all this, not so much negativity, but ambivalence. They just changed formats so many times. Meanwhile, I just couldn’t come up with something I thought would fly. And there was a lot of heat on to get copy locked in for ads in the LA Times. I recently saw the proof sheet of our first ad, which was all the original “Boss Jocks” standing behind an elephant. Anyway, and I was getting desperate and I don’t even know if the use of “Boss Jocks” came up at that moment. I know that the phrase, “Boss Angeles,” was not in effect until at least several weeks after we were on the air. I was standing in the booth and Dave Diamond was on, and he had just said, “The time is-such-and-such in Los Angeles,” and the old light bulb went off and I thought to myself, schmuck, you know this isn’t Los Angeles, this is Boss Angeles,” and that’s how that happened. But, Clancy was the one who originated the phrase “Boss Radio.” Another thing we had to do was to get with Johnny Mann and make jingles. I couldn’t top “Boss Radio,” even though I thought it was passe. And I really didn’t want it. The worst thing you want to have with kids, and that’s certainly how we defined the audience in those days, is something that’s already burned out, you know. But as it turned out it worked out pretty good. The Legacy In the final analysis, the name chosen for the format at KHJ in 1965 is not really as important as the cultural and financial impact the station had on the radio broadcasting industry. That is the true legacy. The name “Boss Radio” was neither trademarked nor copyrighted, so it is not surprising to find that name used by other radio stations to promote themselves in their local market. In Denver, for instance, KIMN was an AM radio station (no longer on the air) that used the name “Boss Radio” during the early 1960s. The station reportedly used the name “Boss Radio” in Denver to promote KIMN before KHJ started using the name in Los Angeles in May 1965. But, KIMN also used the imagery of “Denver’s tiger” and the name “Boss Radio” was not used in the same wall-to-wall imagery way that it was in Los Angeles at KHJ, however. Plus, when something of cultural significance happens in Los Angeles, people readily notice. Since nobody legally claimed ownership of the name “Boss Radio,” that name could be used freely by any station that wanted. This continues to be the case. The name “Boss Radio” has been used to promote a radio station in the Phillippines. And, “93/KHJ” has been used to promote a radio station on American Samoa. |
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