The Fall of WNEW-FM

[lesliepear]

I don't know if anyone else is following the sad saga of Opie and Anthony on WNEW here in NYC. Here's a good summary of the story:

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/13082p-12380c.html

WNEW was *THE* rock and roll station in NYC from the late 60's to the 80's. For a really good book about their glory days, read Fm: The Rise and Fall of Rock Radio by Richard Neer ( http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0679462953/qid=1030111990/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-7894089-9452920 )

Anyway about 3 years ago, they dumped rock and went to a talk format, leaving Q104 to be the classic rock station here. They hired these Shock jocks Opie and Anthony who are rude and crude. The stunt that has gotten them canned was having people have sex in public places and get points for it. Two people pushed it too far and did it in St. Patrick's Cathedral during a service on a holy day.

Some people say the Catholic Church is really SCREAMING about this to hide their own sex abuse problems. I think it is getting more attention because of the high profile of Catholism in NYC and of St. Patricks Catherdral. I think any religion (Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Pagan, whatever) would be upset about the violation of the sancitity of a place of worship.

I'm glad these guys got fired. They should fire all of WNEW and bring back the old jocks.

I like Pete Forntale's comments in the NY news article:

Pete Fornatale, a disk jockey from the days when WNEW was the leading local outlet for rock music, was delighted to hear Opie and Anthony got the ax.

"Good riddance to bad garbage," he said. "I only wish now they would retire the WNEW call letters with the glory of the first 30 years and not the embarrassment of the last three."

Comments

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this

[bklyngirl.livejournal.com]

Sorry – I disagree with you on this. First, I enjoyed O&A – they were rude and crude & sometimes they were even offensive to me – which was when I simply switched them off. But the reason I enjoyed them was because they weren’t "politically correct" namby-pamby mealy-mouthed drones – which is what you find practically everywhere else on New York radio, with a few notable exceptions. I respect the fact that they weren’t for everyone – but they weren’t nearly the boogeymen that everyone is making them out to be. And I think it’s sad that while I respect everyone else’s right NOT to listen to them or like them if that’s their opinion, apparently it became someone else’s job to decide for ME what is acceptable for me to listen to.

To me this is just another example of what I was ranting about in my own journal earlier – lazy reporters getting half a story & creating a false perception. I truly don’t mean to offend you – but I’m really curious – did you actually hear the broadcast or are you going by what the news has said?

I think Infinity (the company that owns WNEW-FM) made a big mistake handling this whole situation. They never bothered to correct the inaccuracies and misperception that was flung around all week. They allowed the Catholic League to control what was disseminated to the public – and the media was only to happy to oblige them by not bothering to dig any further than the info the Catholic League handed them. William Donohue (Catholic League) was all over the place this week--TV, newspapers. He got his "side" out and succeeded in tagging O&A with the "they sent people into St. Patricks Church and then broadcast them having sex" label. That wasn’t what happened by a long shot but no one from WNEW or Infinity was countering that. Those of us who actually heard the broadcast were in agreement that it was extremely bad judgement BUT we also knew that it did not rise to the level being implied. Yet NO ONE from WNEW/Infinity was getting the truth out.

In my opinion, O&A deserved to be suspended - along with the management team and the legal team that both knew about & approved of the contest long before it was run. However, when you hire deejays and tell them to "push the envelope" (and reward them quite well with a very lucrative contract for doing so) then it makes sense that they are going to do just that - push it as far as they can. And it's a little hypocritical to fire them for doing what you hired them to do in the first place. It's their job to dream up outrageous things to do and say - it's management's job to draw the line when something is going or will go to far. The people they knew they had to answer to - management, legal, and the sponsor (Samuel Adams Brewery) didn't think they had to pull the plug on the contest. In my opinion the punishment outweighed their particular crime.

Oh, and for what it’s worth - as far as the "old" WNEW-FM goes – I despised their format in the couple of years right before the format changed to Talk. In my mind, it had become hackneyed and old – playing the same songs over and over again, with the same droning deejays – I could practically predict what they were going to say before they said it. They ran that format, and the station with it, into the ground long before Opie and Anthony came along. Just my opinion – but apparently I wasn’t alone because they were in the ratings basement at that point in time.

Hope you don’t take my disagreeing so strongly personally – it’s just that this issue has come up at the same time as a couple of other similar things and it just pushes my buttons. Hope I didn’t offend you.

Re: I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this

[lesliepear.livejournal.com]

Not personal at all. I don't care for shock jocks and wouldn't listen to them, so I'm going on what I've heard in the media (although they did touch on this on WPLJ's morning show).

I'm not sure I know the whole story of what O&A were doing but just the idea doing something weird and possibly offensive while a religous service is going on not good. The Catholics may have gotten more publicity on this than another religious group, but I'm sure any religous group would be upset.

WNEW/Infinity are keeping their mouth shut for some reason...perhaps under legal advice. I agree O&A may have been hired to push the envelope, but sometimes people can go to far.

Classic rock stations do tend to repeat the same stuff over and over (Q104 does the same), but it was still very sad when things you've expected to be the same change - like WNEW. I wasn't a big WNEW fan growing up but my DH was - he's got tons of concerts he taped of the air from them. Now he likes WFUV.

Re: I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on this

[gany.livejournal.com]

Yap, the station was long dead before thay came along, I wrote about O&A in my journal. I am gonna miss them.