WBCN, 104.1 R.I.P.

[W1JS]

The corporate parent has slain Boston's original progressive rock station, WBCN.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2009/07/14/wbcn_signs_off_air_in_cbs_boston_radio_shakeup_1247605524/

I remember back in '68 coming home from college and turning on the parent's "new" Magnavox console stereo, tuning in WBCN, and instead of classical music coming out the speakers, heard the Beatles in hi-fi stereo - cool. 

They are swapping WBCN for wall to wall sports talk.  What a waste of hi fi FM spectrum. 

[W1RKW]

I was 13 when my Jr. HS went on a field trip to Boston back in '74. One of the stops was a trip to the top of the Prudential building where WBCN had their studio.  That was my first exposure to a radio station. I was fascinated watching the DJ's and hearing the "cool" music they were playing.

Over the years, every once in a while radio conditions were such that I could receive 'BCN in SE CT. In CT we had an equivalent station to BCN, WPLR before they sold out or were bought out.  But every time I could listen to BCN it brought back those memories.  I'm sure BCN was bought out by a big conglomerate way back when. It probably went the way WPLR did and never was the same.

What a bummer, another good thing gone.

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

Ugh! A sad day indeed for rock fans. Sorry to hear it, Jack. For me it was the 80s, a former girlfriend from the Cape who I met while she was at UVM turned me on to 'BCN during our weekends spent in Boston or driving through enroute to the Cape. Still remember WBCN blaring through the speakers while stopped on 93 north to recycle some Heineken (she was driving). It was dark, and the shoulder dropped off abruptly.  *Always* enjoyed listening, the last time being a year or so back while passing through MA from CT.

Since your post prompted the memories and nostalgia to bubble up, I dug out my old bumper sticker collection (they were easier to store than boatanchors!) to search. Sure enough, still have a couple from WBCN. The black one is from the 80s, the multi-colored example is from the early/mid 90s. Someday I need to get these things mounted, it'd be a good way to cover a wall.

Here's to the memory of another great station, a big part of many peoples' history, as it passes on. Where's my beer....

[W2XR]

And for those classical music fans out there, the New York Times has recently announced the sale of WQXR-FM, the Radio Station of the New York Times.

WQXR will move up the band to 105.1 Mhz, from 96.3 Mhz, and the transmitter power will be reduced to 600 watts (!!!). Supposedly, the classical music format will remain as before, but due to the 10 dB reduction in transmitter power (not sure about their ERP or new antenna height), you can safely assume the coverage area will decrease significantly.

In the words of the immortal Bob Dylan, "Ah, the times they are a changin'............."

W2XR was the experimental station precedessor to WQXR. Two very interesting articles about their original chief engineer, Russell Valentine/W2GX, appeared in the last two issues of Electric Radio magazine.

73,

Bruce

[WB2CAU]

WQXR will move up the band to 105.1 Mhz, from 96.3 Mhz, and the transmitter power will be reduced to 600 watts (!!!). Supposedly, the classical music format will remain as before, but due to the 10 dB reduction in transmitter power (not sure about their ERP or new antenna height), you can safely assume the coverage area will decrease significantly.

When I worked for Harman-Kardon in the 70s, we used to get frequent complaints of excessive background noise on 96.3 MHz which was traced to the ninth harmonic of the 10.7 MHz IF managing to creep back into the front-end of the tuner.  At that time 96.3 MHz was the only frequency where classical music was played and seemed to be the only program source where quiet passages in the music would make the noise even noticeable.  It was the worst choice of frequency for a classical format.  The change to 105.1 MHz should correct that problem, many years too late. 

[W4EWH]

When I worked for Harman-Kardon in the 70s, we used to get frequent complaints of excessive background noise on 96.3 MHz which was traced to the ninth harmonic of the 10.7 MHz IF ...

Well, 96.3/9 = 10.7, so it makes sense that way, but I don't understand how it got there: if you mean the 9th harmonic of the LO that converted 10.7 to 455 KHz, then the math doesn't work anymore, because of the 455 KHz offset.

If the harmonics were caused by non-linear stages in the IF, then I'll ask "How could an IF chain generate harmonics, especially ones that high"?

TIA

W1AC

[k4kyv]

I used to listen to 'BCN a lot back in the mid 70's, but I remember by then it was getting more and more commercial sounding.  They still played some good music, though. 

Does anyone remember WCAS, the little AM daytimer on 740 kHz, in Cambridge?  They had sort of a folk-rock progressive format.  I remember when some bible beater was trying to buy them and turn it into a religious station there was a lot of public opposition, and a movement sprang up.  You would see bumper stickers pasted on cars and on the walls of buildings all over "SAVE WCAS".  Someone did buy the station and they remained on the air with the same format; the publicity gained them a lot of new listeners and it became a top  rated station for a while.  I  remember they had a large self-supported tower somewhere at the edge of town, along the river.  Later, that facility was sold and they diplexed with another AM station somewhere near Everett, as I recall.  Their signal never was as  good, and a few years later I was back up visiting and they had completely changed format, and even call letters, I believe.

W2XR was the experimental station precedessor to WQXR.

Interesting.  If you write "WQXR" with that old style cursive Q that looks like a "2", which is seldom used any more, it comes out W2XR.  I wonder if there is a connection or if that is just coincidence.

[W4EWH]

I was 13 when my Jr. HS went on a field trip to Boston back in '74. One of the stops was a trip to the top of the Prudential building where WBCN had their studio.  That was my first exposure to a radio station. I was fascinated watching the DJ's and hearing the "cool" music they were playing.

WBCN had a colorful history, and the Pru played an important role.

When the original Boston Concert Network station went bankrupt, it was bought for a song (pun intended) by a couple of entrepreneurs. They got an old, but reliable, transmitter, located on the top of the Hancock building in Boston's Back Bay, and very little else. The new owners put a bare-bones station on the air, using incredibly cheap (Sparta, etc.) broadcast equipment, the old Rec-O-Kut turntables, and almost nothing else: the DJ's had a red bulb in front of the console that would light when the overmod indicator tripped, and they would back off the pots - there was no audio processing or compression.

WBCN caught the wave of "bad boy" radio just as it approached the shore of Vietnam-war unrest and Rock-and-Roll-as-protest-medium, and they rode that wave right into the beach. Not only did the station enjoy some phenomenal talent - Charles Laquidara comes to mind - but there expenses were miniscule, since they had inherited the original stations contract for transmitter space, and most of the DJ's were young kids willing to work for rent and food money.

The station was, in the late Sixties and early Seventies, the number one rocker in Boston. It had complete rewrite authority on all ads, which meant that the DJ's could work them into the shows by reading them aloud instead of playing canned spots, that the news staff could cover stories, such as protests by luminaries like Abbie Hoffman, which other outlets didn't dare to touch.

It was too good to last. When The Hancock Insurance company announced plans for its new, 790 foot-high tower next door to the old headquarters, WBCN's owners realized that the new building would be built just to the west of their antenna, thus eviscerating the station's signal in the all-important wealthy suburbs west of Boston, where high family incomes supported hoards of teenage consumers who bought over 80% of records.

The Hancock brass, mindful of how they had been locked into the old deal, demanded an extremely high rent for the new building - much more than 'BCN could afford, given its counter-culture audience and its refusal to accept advertisements for packaged goods. As construction started on the new building, WBCN desperately cast about for a solution.

They thought they had one - the Prudential tower was even further West than the new Hancock, and much higher than the old location to boot, so BCN execs asked for a little floor space in the Fifty-First floor service area, and an antenna mount on the roof. There was, however, a fly in the ointment.

WLVI-TV, which had just moved its transmitter off the Pru's roof, had also left the entire Fiftieth floor (the office space inside the perimeter of the Skywalk) vacant. The Pru gave BCN a "take it or leave it" offer: the whole Fiftieth floor, or nothing. There was no other suitable location high enough to get over the Arlington heights on its way to the proto-yuppies in Newton and Wayland and Weston, while simultaneously maintaining enough of a signal to meet FCC rules for the city-of-license, which was, of course, Boston.

WBCN took the deal, but to meet the new rent payments, they compromised their standards quickly and drastically. Not only did the station accept ads for packaged goods, they also took recruiting ads for the Armed Forces - which the DJ's routinely mocked on the air - and backed away from controversial news stories and commentators. In short order, they had lost their edge, just as a listening audience tired of "Up against the wall" lyrics turned to softer and gentler formats.

Although WBCN survived, it never regained its preeminent status. It wasn't until MCI bought out it's lease for the Prudential building's Fiftieth floor (microwave carrier systems have to be close to the antennas, after all), that WBCN was able to get what it wanted all along, which was to put its transmitter in the Fifty-First floor service area and move the studios to a former motel on Beacon street.

Too little, though, and too late: BCN tried to keep to its tried-and-true AOR (Album-Oriented-Radio, aka "All Over the Road") format, but both the Vietnam veterans, and the nation which had scorned them, turned away from the protest songs and drifted toward disco by way of John Denver and The Captain and Tennille, leaving rock-n-roll stations fighting for a smaller and smaller audience. The owners sold out in time to save their fortunes, and the only "talent" which stayed on were those who could adapt to the cold, heartless, network bureaucracy in charge of "O and O" (Owned and Operated) stations.

Sic transit gloria.

W1AC

[WB2YGF]

At that time 96.3 MHz was the only frequency where classical music was played

Actually, there was also WNCN classical on 104.3 (1953-1993)   I preferred it over QXR.

The Day the Music Died: Mourning Classical WNCN
http://www.nytimes.com/1993/12/19/nyregion/the-day-the-music-died-mourning-classical-wncn.html

Fortunately, we have a local non-commercial 24/7 classical network in NJ out of Trenton (89.1 Mercer County College) with several linked transmitters & translators.

[WB2CAU]

At that time 96.3 MHz was the only frequency where classical music was played

Actually, there was also WNCN classical on 104.3 (1953-1993)   I preferred it over QXR.

John, WNCN did not exist and was not a classical format during 1974 & 1975.  It was WQIV at the time, a progressive rock station.  It returned to a classical format later and continued until the early 1990s when it became a rock station again, as WAXQ.

W1AC (sorry, I don't know your name), I worked as a tech in customer service and the noise complaints on 96.3 were common across the entire product line.  I don't know exactly how this occurred but I know it was unique to 96.3 in the MPX stereo mode.  Our engineering department investigated the cause and drew the conclusion stated in my previous posting.  When WNCN (104.3) returned to a classical format, the noise was not apparent there.  Since you seem to be technically knowledgeable and question the reason, perhaps you should do a study with sample tuners and a laboratory-grade signal generator.  Maybe you will come to a different conclusion.  I would be interested in the outcome of your study.

Oh, and by the way, there is no conversion from 10.7 MHz to 455 KHz in broadcast FM receivers.  The IF stages at 10.7 MHz feed the detector.  The LO operates at 10.7 MHz higher than the received frequency.  There is no 455 KHz involved at all for FM broadcast.   

[wa2dtw]

WQXR will move up the band to 105.1 Mhz, from 96.3 Mhz, and the transmitter power will be reduced to 600 watts (!!!). Supposedly, the classical music format will remain as before, but due to the 10 dB reduction in transmitter power (not sure about their ERP or new antenna height), you can safely assume the coverage area will decrease significantly.

  
Horrible news! WQXR was the sound track of my childhood.  I still listen to it every morning and can hear it well from Erwinna PA.  600 watts, though?

[W4EWH]

W1AC (sorry, I don't know your name), I worked as a tech in customer service and the noise complaints on 96.3 were common across the entire product line.  I don't know exactly how this occurred but I know it was unique to 96.3 in the MPX stereo mode.  Our engineering department investigated the cause and drew the conclusion stated in my previous posting.  When WNCN (104.3) returned to a classical format, the noise was not apparent there.  Since you seem to be technically knowledgeable and question the reason, perhaps you should do a study with sample tuners and a laboratory-grade signal generator.  Maybe you will come to a different conclusion.  I would be interested in the outcome of your study.

Oh, and by the way, there is no conversion from 10.7 MHz to 455 KHz in broadcast FM receivers.  The IF stages at 10.7 MHz feed the detector.  The LO operates at 10.7 MHz higher than the received frequency.  There is no 455 KHz involved at all for FM broadcast.   

OK, sorry, I'm thick sometimes. If the IF was only 10.7, then I'd say that there might have been image interference from aircraft marker beacons on 75 MHz or a navigation aid at 117.7.  Was there an airport nearby?

The only other possibility I can think of is LO interaction with other FM stations near 85.6 or 107.0, but I don't think the FCC would allow a station to have a frequency near to a 10.7 MHz separation from another FM broadcaster.

Bill Horne, W1AC

[Rob K2CU]

FM I.F. strips are designed to run saturated and limit the amplitude as there is no AGC. The IF will be rich with odd harminics as a result. IT does not take much to get into the front end of a radio. IF you terminate the RF input, then tune across 96.3 and listen for an increase in background noise. The noise could be getting in to the antenna by leaking out the speaker or power leads, but is probably internal to the radio.

Years ago I added a small microprocessor board to a Motorola UHF radio. By pure chance, the 95th harmonic of the processor crystal oscillator was within the passband of the RX. A gimmick pulled the crystal enough to get it out of the way. but it sure took a while to find the bugger.

[flintstone mop]

I never cared much for Komon Hardon equipment.........hi
But WTOP in Washington DC needed better coverage for their news-talk and being O-O of the group of AM-FM's in DC took the "good music station" WGMS 103.4 FM off and it became the news-talk.

Fred