 |
||||||||||||||
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
It is impossible to understand radio programming without understanding popular culture. Radio programming helps transmit popular culture to people. The U.S. music industry -- what Joni Mitchell named "the star-maker machinery" -- has for decades relied upon radio programming to present musical entertainment to Americans. Knowing what went on in the U.S. over the decades following the introduction of rock and roll music programming will help clarify the powerful interaction between current events, popular culture, and radio programming. What happened to the programmers of Boss Radio in Los Angeles is also tracked here: 1940s American radio programming up through the late 1940's and into the early 1950's was built out of blocks. Radio stations would broadcast block segments of drama, mystery, soap opera, news, and music, both live and recorded. That so-called "block programming" stands in stark contrast to what emerged around 1950 and become known as "formula radio programming." The actual birth date of rock and roll radio is disputed. We can be fairly certain, however, that in the United States popular music took a giant evolutionary step as rhythm and blues mixed with country music and recording artists like Elvis Presley become the first rock and roll stars. In 1949 in Omaha, Nebraska, a crossroads event occured in the pop culture phenomenon known as rock and roll radio. What we know is that 1949 was the year Todd Storz founded his company in Omaha. However, whether the first radio programming to be known as "Top 40" happened in Omaha is debated even today. It is true that Todd Storz, while visiting an Omaha bar, noticed that jukebox selections would repeatedly be selected again and again. Deciding that since most jukeboxes of that time accommodated 40 single-play records, Storz instituted "Top 40 radio." 1950s History also records that the format appeared in New Orleans in 1953 on WTIX. And while Storz may be widely credited with being "the father of Top 40 radio," Gordon McLendon's chain of radio stations in the early 1950s became nationally prominent because of using a formulated mixture of music, news, and spirited station promotion. In 1953 McLendon's Dallas, Texas flagship station, KLIF-AM, became the highest rated metropolitan radio station in the United States through the use of McLendon's radio format. All programming formats since the 1950's owe a great deal to McLendon. He not only pushed the envelope of formula radio, he went on to pioneer all-news radio, which was the essential first step toward Ted Turner's all-news television, CNN. Ironically, why McLendon and others of the 1950's had to pioneer at all is because of television. When radio broadcasters noticed their listeners forsaking radio dramas, big band shows, and so forth, for television programming, there came about an almost immediate sense of urgency to do something to save radio. The radio broadcasters of that time could not sit idly by and watch their vast financial investments be challenged by the emerging medium of television. Thus the 1950s and 1960s saw the growth of rock and roll radio. At this same time, gigantic cultural influences followed the opening of Disneyland in Anaheim, California, and the founding of the McDonald's Corporation. The space age changed how people in the United States saw themselves and this planet. In 1957 when the Russians launched the first unmanned satellite, the cultural shockwave was felt around the world. So in 1958, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was founded to guide the United States in the race against the Russians to explore the moon and space. 1960s The youthful John Fitzgerald Kennedy was elected 35th president of the United States in 1960 demonstrating a new way of thinking: It was possible for young people to have dreams to grow up and lead the world. The rock and roll radio efforts that Drake-Chenault led in California in the early 1960s happened in this exact social context--a time during which people believed that almost anything could be accomplished if you only set your sights high enough. If nothing else is true, the people responsible for the rock and roll sound on Boss Radio in Los Angeles were young and visionary. Meanwhile, the presidency of JFK--described as "Camelot" with an exaggerated legendary, fabled air--got into trouble. A botched invasion of Cuba in 1961 at the Bay of Pigs showed a surprising vulnerability of the U.S. military. But in 1962, however, JFK demonstrated extreme presidential machismo by ordering a military blockade of Cuba even while the action skirted the very edge of world war. In August 1963 the civil rights movement in the U.S. achieved a new momentum when the reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his "I Have A Dream" speech in Washington, DC. Four months later, JFK was shot dead while riding in an open car motorcade on the streets of Dallas, Texas. Rock and roll radio in those days had a difficult time trying to put this shocking event into perspective amid the emphasis on musical entertainment. Beginning in late 1963, the nation's sensibilities were suddenly shifted. JFK was buried at Arlington National Cemetery beneath an eternal flame. Lyndon Baines Johnson became president and ultimately signed into law the Civil Rights Act that JFK had championed. In a major cultural shift, the American rock and roll music scene was jolted in 1964 as The Beatles arrived, forever altering how both radio/television broadcasting and the recorded music industry handles rock and roll. That same year, an African-American man from Kentucky who took the Islamic name of Muhammad Ali became the World Heavyweight Champion. The usually controversial Ali proved to be one of the greatest American athletes of the 20th century. In so doing, he drew attention to the Black Muslims in the United States. In early 1965, Malcom X, an African-American Islamic leader who announced his belief that there could be brotherhood between black and white, was assassinated in New York City. And there was warfare. Washington, DC in early 1965 saw the first major rally to protest the U.S. military efforts in Southeast Asia, which was becoming the most significant aspect of the Lyndon Johnson presidency. "Boss Radio," a slang term that some felt had already fallen out of vogue in 1965, was chosen for the Los Angeles radio format that premiered on KHJ in May of that year. Simultaneously that spring, intense pressures created by racial prejudice continued to build in Los Angeles. The concept of a black radio personality entertaining listeners of all races had not yet arrived back then. Boss Radio regularly played hit music of black entertainers. The very first song played on KHJ when Boss Radio launched was "Dancing in the Streets" by Martha Reeves and the Vandellas. This, and other, popular Motown hits were often played on 93/KHJ. But otherwise, Boss Radio essentially was all-white, and except for behind-the-scenes music and administrative people, was all-male. As KHJ grew in popularity in Southern California during the summer of 1965, racial tensions heated up until early August of that year when an white police officer arrested a black man for drunk driving, sparking six days of rioting in the Watts section of Los Angeles. A conservative shift in California politics immediately followed the LA riots. A most notable impact was conservative Republican Ronald Reagan's rise in popularity at this time. Reagan blamed the riots on the incumbent governor, liberal Democrat Edmond G. "Pat" Brown (the father of Jerry Brown). Ronald Reagan unseated Pat Brown to became the governor of California--an essential stepping stone to his two terms as President of the United States, 1981-1989. The year 1966 saw the establishment of the Black Panther Party. Ever larger protests were mounted against the federal policy of drafting young men into U.S. military service in Southeast Asia. And just when it seemed that the nation would implode from prejudice and protests, in 1966 the original Star Trek seried premiered with its sci-fi stories about the value of diversity. The series was filmed in Hollywood at Desilu studios (now Paramount Pictures) on Melrose Avenue next door to KHJ. In June 1967, The Beatles released 40 minutes of music that changed radio and records forever. Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band set very high standards against which all rock and roll performers will be measured. It was the first time anyone had deliberately put songs together in a particular order on one album with little or no spaces between tracks to create a unified listener experience. Rock and roll AM radio stations at the time mainly played many different songs each hour-none of which lasted more than about three and one-half minutes. The then-new FM radio with stereo sound and no static embraced a less structured format that allowed longer songs, so the Sgt. Pepper album was aired mainly on FM stations. This was the beginning of the end of AM radio's dominance in rock and roll radio. Also significant was the psychedelic nature of Sgt. Pepper precisely at at time when the recreational use of drugs was rippling through U.S. culture. Timothy Leary, a psychology professor at Harvard, became the outspoken advocate of mind-altering drugs like LSD and others. The popular music of the time reflected the undercurrent of recreational drug use. Boss Radio KHJ and other RKO radio stations in those days regularly played songs by artists like The Beatles, The Doors, The Rolling Stones and others who did not complete conceal the influences of recreational drug use upon their art. During this era, it may have seemed as though U.S. culture was trending toward more tolerance of violence. The manner in which violence appeared in society and culture changed rapidly as major motion pictures from this time period such as Bonnie and Clyde and The Wild Bunch radically shifted the public's sensibilities regarding blood and death as portrayed on the silver screen. But, blood wasn't just in the movies. During the late 1960s violence was, indeed, increasing in real life. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was gunned down in Memphis in April 1968. Riots erupted immediately in Washington, DC and other major U.S. cities. Because of social unrest in the United States created on two fronts-by racial tensions and also by protests against the war in Southeast Asia-in early 1968, President Lyndon Johnson shocked the nation by announcing he would not run again. New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy--brother of the late president John F. Kennedy--emerged as the apparent frontrunner for the presidency in 1968. But, just minutes after RFK made his victory speech in the California presidential primary, he was shot and died the next day. KHJ staff members were deeply affected by the assassination for several reasons, but among them, the Los Angeles campaign headquarters for RFK was across the street from the KHJ studios. A few weeks later, riots disrupted the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in full view of continuous, live network television coverage. In November of that year, Richard M. Nixon, pledging to bring order to a troubled nation, was elected the 37th president. He took office in 1969. It proved to be a complex year during which gay rights made it onto the national radar screen following the Stonewall Bar riot in New York City; the United States finally beat the Russians by being first to succeed at a manned landing on the moon; and a frustrated would-be rock star named Charles Manson perpetrated a grizzly mass murder in Los Angeles. As Star Trek said would happen, human exploration of space exploration becomes a reality. In July 1969, the United States of America wins the space race with the Russians by successfully completing the first human mission to the moon and back to our planet. 1970s When the new decade began, protests against the U.S. military efforts in Southeast Asia intensified. A riot near the University of California at Santa Barbara destroyed a branch of Bank of America, and in Ohio, four students attending Kent State University were shot dead by national guard troops during an anti-war protest. It began to seem that the war in Southeast Asia would bring down Richard Nixon as it had Lyndon Johnson. Instead, a break-in at the Watergate complex along the Potomac River in Washington, DC led to the decline of the Nixon presidency. He ran for re-election in 1972 and won, but resigned the presidency to avoid being impeached in 1973. Throughout these eventful years, the Drake-Chenault programming evolved from KHJ in Los Angeles and Boss Radio (a name that ultimately appeared on other radio stations) to a national syndicated radio programming effort using reels of recorded tape. The invention of the digital compact disc--the CD--like Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band before, would revolutionize the radio and record business once again. Eventually, radio stations would switch entirely to playing music on CD and the era of vinyl disks on the radio was almost entirely over. As a reward for how well KHJ performed in the Los Angeles ratings, RKO General signed the Drake-Chenault team to program AM stations in San Francisco, Detroit, Boston, Memphis, and WOR-FM in New York City with derivations of the Boss Radio format. Drake and Chenault expanded their reach outside of the RKO chain of stations. A national radio programming syndication company was formed (eventually named Drake-Chenault Enterprises) to provide FM stations with high-quality programming using prerecorded audio tape programs. In so doing, Drake-Chenault Enterprises played a central role in permanently establishing FM as the dominant radio medium for rock and roll music in the U.S., edging out AM. But, RKO General was not happy to watch Drake-Chenault Enterprises grow while the ratings of RKO stations begins to drop. So, in 1973 RKO ended its contract with the Drake-Chenault team. After six months waiting out the noncompete clause in their RKO contract, Drake and Chenault begin a five-year contract progamming FM station K100 in Hollywood with yet another derivation of their famous format. The Drake-Chenault programming failed to turn K100 into a ratings success. Various other formats were attempted, including semi- and fully-automated varieties from companies such as Transtar. 1980s Ronald Reagan was president of the U.S. for most of the decade. Ownership restrictions of radio and television stations continued to weaken at the Federal Communications Commission. K100 is ultimately purchased by Westwood One and the station became KQLZ, "Pirate Radio." In 1989 Jones Intercable entered into a partnership with what was called Drake-Chenault Radio Consultants to create Jones Radio Networks. One of the biggest changes in popular culture came in the 1980s when video killed the radio star: Music programming on the radio received a formidable challenge with the advent of music videos shown nationally on MTV. 1990s The 25th anniversary of Boss Radio KHJ in 1990 was the very last time that the radio pioneers and their entire team celebrated a reunion together. The Drake-Chenault taped syndicated radio programming business was sold by Jones in 1991 to Broadcast Programming in Seattle. At that same time, Jones boughts out the remaining interest Drake-Chenault had in Jones Radio Networks and the famous hyphenated brand name Drake-Chenault was no more. The FCC rules on station ownership are changed in the late 1990s during the presidency of William Jefferson Clinton. Some credit or blame the Republican-controlled Congress of the United States for sweeping changes in ownership that result in concentrating most U.S. radio stations under the control of a few huge corporations like ClearChannel. The late 1990s also were a time when hip hop grew from a strictly New York City neighborhoods cultural phenomenon of the 1970s to a cultural force that swept across the entire U.S. Just like rock and roll music in the 1950s and 1960s had done, hip hop in 1990s forcefully and similarly changed the U.S. music entertainment industry and radio programming as well. At roughly the same time, the Internet emerged as a potentially revolutionary new communications technology. 2000s The first decade of the 21st century has proven to be a time of tumultuous change in the U.S. that is similar in its cultural impact to the time period of the late 1960s. War in Southeast Asia was the political focal point of the late 1960s. War in Iraq in the 2000s holds a similarly powerful significance upon life and culture in the U.S. The cultural ripple effect of the terrorist attacks upon U.S. soil in 2001 has included outspoken protests by entertainment and music industry celebrities to the subsequent warfare in, and military occupation of, Iraq by the U.S. As in the late 1960s and early 1970s, when the U.S. military endeavors in Southeast Asia prompted movies and music that presented opinions about political and military events, the early 21st century war in Iraq has led to equivalent popular culture expressions. There were antiwar protest songs showing up on the Billboard music charts during the U.S. military involvement in Southeast Asia, mainly in the form of rock and roll as well as folk music. In the 2000s, however, Billboard charted music that offers commentary about the U.S. military involvement in Iraq has expanded to include country and hip hop. At this same time, the Internet has grown in popularity in the U.S. and around the world. This enabled rapid and hugely influential changes in technology such as downloadable music that is playable on cellular telephones. The methods of transmitting popular culture in the U.S. and around the world keeps changing. Once viable retail sales of popular music on CD now faces serious financial challenges in the U.S. Hip hop on the radio and in downloadable forms is enjoying a tremendous financial growth that is eclipsing the pop culture power of rock and roll on the radio. The British invasion of U.S. popular culture in the 1960s was accomplished by rock and roll artists like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, who relied upon radio programming in the U.S. to drive the sales of their music. In the 2000s, a second British invasion of U.S. popular culture is underway. Simon Cowell and other producers from the U.K. have overwhelmingly addicted U.S. audiences to American Idol, a star-maker vehicle using prime-time television programming to generate significant revenue from the sales of recorded music. |
|
|
|
Home | Audio | Author | Business | Culture | Music | Legal | Links | People | Sources | Technology |
|
|
|
You can contact the author if you modify this text to make it a working email address: |
|
|
|
...... |