Article in Commercial Appeal -- Kidd and Memphis

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Subject: Article in Commercial Appeal

Author:
Jessica

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Date Posted: 11:40:55 11/01/06 Wed

Here is an article in the Commercial Appeal concerning Entercom and how they are buying local stations and making "cut-backs".

'End of an era,' says FM fixture since 1979
By Michael Lollar
Contact
November 1, 2006
Steve Conley, one of the best-known names in local radio for more than a decade, is off the air as a disk jockey and on-air personality at WMC FM 100.
Conley, at FM 100 since 1979 and part of an on-air team with Ron Olson for almost 13 years, said he was told Monday he was being let go along with the station's market manager Terry Wood and night deejay Garner Miller.

"I was flabbergasted," said Conley, 53, who said the decision was made by Entercom Communications, which bought the station along with 15 other stations around the country.
Wood, 64, said Entercom characterized the cutbacks as "eliminated jobs" and included one other on-air personality, deejay Twitch at FM 93X. Three other former CBS employees also were let go, he said.

Wood said Entercom already had a market manager in Memphis, Steve Sandman at WRVR-FM 104, and chose to let him assume the management role for all locally owned Entercom stations. "That was basically an economic decision. They don't need two (managers)," he said.

Sandman said Tuesday that Entercom's operation of FM 100 begins effective today, but he said he cannot comment on personnel decisions.

Wood said Entercom offered no explanation why it chose to eliminate specific personalities. He said he did work Tuesday, his last day, and spent part of the day fielding calls from "irate callers" upset that Conley was let go.

Conley had been a station programmer when he joined Olson on the air. "We played off each other very well," he said, with Olson often coming off the jokester to Conley's straight man.

Conley said he isn't sure what he will do next, except that he wants to remain in Memphis. He moved to the city from his hometown of Milwaukee in 1979, and described that as a time when music and radio played a more vital role in the fabric of society.

"Music today is so diluted from the strength and impact and excitement you used to have," Conley said. "In a way it's kind of an end of an era. Radio is changing now with iPods, satellite and all of that. Now commercial radio is having to redefine itself because of these new technologies, and it's getting really tight."

Conley said the technological changes leave him "kind of sad. Mass media is becoming so fragmented now. Everybody walks around in their own little world. We used to be able to mobilize tons of people even if it was just to buy a gas grill."

Now, he said, FM 100, which used to have radio ratings with a 14 share, has to struggle to get a 6 or 7 rating because of this fragmenting audience.

Music has changed, too.

"Music labels don't develop acts anymore. It's all so disposable. What are they going to do for golden oldies in generations to come?"

-- Michael Lollar: 529-2793

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