Composite: WXKS-FM Kiss 108 Medford/Boston | July 17, 1984
Courtesy of Matt Seinberg, here’s a wonderful look back at Boston’s KISS 108 in it’s prime! Its a mid-summer’s day and you’ll hear Matty In The Morning, J.J. Wright, Dale Dorman and JoJo Kincaid!
Audio quality is somewhat marginal, but you’ll enjoy this otherwise excellent representation of Kiss 108 at the start of Boston’s CHR war with rivals WHTT HitRadio 103 (Now WODS) and 94.5 WZOU (Now WJMN) which got it’s start later that year from the ashes of then AC WCOZ.
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(4 votes, average: 5 out of 5)
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I never thought I’d say this in a million years, but after listening to this aircheck and the one from 2007, i actually like the 2007 one better. I was really surprised by how uninspiring I found the 1984 aircheck. there is almost no production whatsoever to help generate the excitement. matty in the morning’s delivery almost put me to sleep. Dale Dorman, while a huge talent, sounds out of place introducing 80s music. the jocks seem to be trying as hard as they can to get the fun going, but the overall sound of the station doesn’t support their effort. Listen to any Z100 aircheck from NYC from this same time period and you’ll know what I mean.
Now that’s an interesting take. I’ll agree with the lack of production elements, but there was always more to Kiss-108, and top 40 in general, than just the produced bits between the music. Some would argue it was the talent in between the songs that mattered and that modern production has simply replaced the jock patter.
Have to agree about Matt Seigal, he was very bland, but as I remember, this particular show is very representative of Matty in the Morning at least in that era. As for Dale, he always had excellent ratings and stayed at Kiss until 2002! The comment about his sounding out of place… imagine doing CHR at 60! That was Dale Dorman toward the end of his days at Kiss 108!
Overall, I thought that Kiss 108 clip was wonderful, but that’s looking through jaded eyes, as it served to bring me back to a station I loved. To an outside ear, I suppose it is somewhat unremarkable given some of the heritage CHR stations in other markets in the mid-80s. We New Englanders sure loved it though. You have to remember that WHTT, Kiss’ main competitor in 1984, was VERY methodical and (I believe), much more rigid in it’s presentation than Kiss 108’s personality driven approach. WROR (98.5) tried CHR in 1983 with a personality approach and it failed, although IMHO it sounded better than any Boston station in the 80s. Kiss was forced to tighten things up a bit in late ‘84 when WZOU launched, and perhaps that was really the start of what I’d call a 5 year second golden age for Boston Top 40 radio. Somewhere on this site I’ve posted a few late 80s incarnations of Kiss and Z94 that you should listen to for comparison.