Station: 101.1 WCBS-FM New York, New York, USA
Format: Oldies
Owner: CBS, Inc.
Featured Air Personality: Bill Brown
Contributor: Steven Green
Comments:
There are few recordings out there from before the Oldies format took hold at WCBS-FM. Still, many do remember the somewhat-progressive Rock format which was heard at 101.1 FM prior to 1972. Its an odd format that took many elements of AM top 40 radio – the jock talking over the music, Jingles, and one or two spots every other record or so. Hardly what one remembers as progressive rock. But what makes this stand out is the playlist. No doubt, Bill Brown is picking much of the music himself. Some album songs, a few hits (Its nice to hear “Mercy, Mercy Me from Marvin Gaye), and some low charting music, like the Steppenwolf cut early on in this scoped presentation.
Our Contributor, Steve Green, says this is one of his recordings. Taken from the source tape, it held up pretty well over the years, aside from some tape rumble and lack of low end frequency response. We’ve tried to clean it up a bit with some light processing, but essintially left most of this intact, as recorded from 1971.
Bill Brown passed away on October 11, 2011. Click HERE to read the memorial posted at wcbsfm.com
Listen to the wide variety of cuts in this pre-Oldies WCBS-FM jingle library. They are used often, out of stopsets and in segues. Runs 14 minutes, total.
Why are you so sure that Bill was picking his own music? This was the music that the station was playing at the time.
RIP BILL ! you will be forever in our hearts !
I never considered the pre-oldies WCBS-FM a full-fledged progressive rock station like WNEW-FM/WPLJ. They played more album rock than WOR-FM, but were more hit oriented than WNEW-FM/WPLJ. “Draggin the Line” by Tommy James, which CBS-FM played
constantly in the summer of 1971, was a song you would never hear on WNEW-FM/WPLJ.
Steve,
I just saw this article, but I really love WCBS-FM before they went to Oldies in 1972. I am looking for pre-Oldies days air checks I am particularly in search of the many station & DJ jingles. Cn you point me in the right direction to possibly acquire some of them.
Thanks for any help,
Jerry