Radio Wars
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Chicago’s morning rock-radio wars are something of a yawn. The new guy in town is Mancow Muller, who rules the roost from an AOR outlet that’s as undistinguished as its marketing name: Rock 103.5, WRCX. Muller has a flair for getting 13-year-old boys all excited, and by consequence is number one in the key ratings category. Howard–What was his name? Oh yes–Stern is back in Chicago. His syndicated show, so popular across the country, is now on classic-rock station WCKG, but few seem to have noticed. Alternative rock Q-101 boasts Lance and Stoley, a pair of farting youths with split-second attention spans. And over at the Loop, Kevin Matthews’s trusteeship of the morning slot the station has traditionally dominated has been deemed a failure: he’s moving back to the midday slot where just a few years ago he blew away all comers. His replacement: yawn, Johnny B, back to claim his crown. Is he serious? You bet: Loop head honcho Larry Wert says Brandmeier, who’s been doing his midday shows from LA without telling listeners, has even deigned to move back to Chicago.
In Stern’s worldview, his failure on the Loop was the result of a conspiracy on the part of the station to vaccinate itself, so to speak, from the potent Stern strain. With Stern discredited in the market, the Loop could bring its own tired shock jock to its sister station in the form of Muller. If this indeed was Wert’s plan, it has succeeded nicely.
