I haven't listened to BCN in the new millennium but from the 70s into the 90s it was the best rock station in New England bar none. Like growing up with certain bands/music is so much a part of your youth, BCN was a big part of mine. Just like the movie American Graffiti, the music coming out of all our cars, at party's, and at home was on WBCN 104.1. You got to know all the DJs, and often would tell the time by who's voice was speaking at the time (knowing all their air shifts by heart). To recall just some of the cool things that happened over the years would take pages. Steven Tyler and Joe Perry would often stop in, and Peter Wolf (a former DJ there) would do a New Years show every year. And Billy West (Stern, Ren and Stimpy) did the morning shows with Charles Laquidara, and many small bits and commercials played throughout the day. In a radio world before Stern these DJs and the station were cutting edge. Many of us just figured BCN would get old with us and couldn't imagine them not being what they always were, but in the ninety's after being bought out (I want to say by clear channel) they got rid of all the old DJs and went through several format changes. Boston TV station channel 7 this morning reported that BCN will be all sports talk and move down the dial to 98.1 and a "Mix" station that occupies that frequency will be moved to 104.1 in August. I tried to find a link online to the story, but haven't yet. Even though I haven;t tuned into BCN for quite a while ( actually in the latter ninety's a station in Falmouth MA poped up right around the 104 frequency and screwed up the Cape's reception overriding BCN so you really couldn't listen in most weather) But this is indeed like losing an old close friend, abit one you had lost contact with.......
Here's a short history of the station
Station History
WBCN first took to the airwaves in May 1958, as a standalone classical FM known as the “Boston Concert Network”. WBCN was part of a group of “Concert Network” stations, including WXCN 101.5 Providence (now WWBB), WHCN 105.9 Hartford, WRCN 103.9 Riverhead, N.Y., and WNCN 104.3 New York (now WAXQ). WBCN's studios were then located at 171 Newbury St. in Boston's fashionable Back Bay neighborhood.
By the late 1960s, WBCN began to feel the competition from other classical outlets, including WGBH 89.7 and WCRB/WCRB-FM. WBCN began leasing out time at night for ‘underground rock’ broadcasts, under the name “The American Revolution”. The first rock song heard on WBCN, on March 15, 1968, was “I Feel Free” by Cream.
Within a year, WBCN had become a full-fledged rock station, and classical music was history on 104.1. Early WBCN personalities included Peter Wolf, later to become famous as a member of the J. Geils Band, and “News Dissector” Danny Schecter, who brought a uniquely left-wing viewpoint to his newscasts.
WBCN's first few years found the station at the forefront of the underground FM music, as adventurous programmers experimented with playing longer album cuts and diverse genres of rock music. But by the mid-70s, WBCN had settled down to a more commercial approach, playing album rock from its new studios in the penthouse of the Prudential Tower. Several of the 1970s DJs, including morning man Charles Laquidara, were to stay with WBCN for decades.
WBCN moved to 1265 Boylston Street, in the shadow of Fenway Park, in the late 1970s. The station came under the corporate ægis of Hemisphere Broadcasting in 1979, becoming the start of the Infinity Broadcasting empire.
The 1980s saw WBCN continue on an album-rock course, outlasting longtime competitor WCOZ 94.5. By the early 1990s, WBCN began to feel new pressure, from stations such as WFNX 101.7 Lynn, that were playing more adventurous modern rock and drawing a younger audience, as well as from Cook Inlet's WZLX 100.7, playing the classic rock tunes that had made WBCN famous.
The changes at WBCN in the 1990s began with the addition of Howard Stern in evenings in 1993. Infinity's purchase of Cook Inlet that year brought WZLX into duopoly with WBCN, allowing WBCN to add more modern rock to its playlist.
In 1995, WBCN made a full break from its album rock format, switching to modern rock in direct competition with WFNX. Stern moved to mornings on April 1, 1996, sending Laquidara to WZLX after more than 25 years at WBCN. The addition of New England Patriots football with the 1995-96 season also helped draw more listeners to WBCN.
WBCN acquired two more sister stations in early 1996, with Infinity's purchase of Granum's WBOS 92.9 and WOAZ 99.5. The biggest change of all came on June 20, 1996, when CBS/Westinghouse announced a $5 billion deal to purchase Infinity, putting WBCN and the other Infinity stations under the same corporate roof as WBZ, WODS, and WBZ-TV. CBS's merger with Viacom would later add to that WSBK-TV.
As the rock radio universe in Boston, and nationally, struggled with change in the nineties, WBCN struggled as well. While some veteran staffers, including PD Oedipus and jocks Bill Abbate, Albert O and Bradley Jay, remained with the station as it swerved first toward WFNX-style alternative rock and then toward WAAF-style active rock, others departed: middayer Ken Shelton in 1993, afternoon veteran Mark Parenteau in 1997 and music director Carter Alan in 1998.
In 2001, WBCN began tipping away from music entirely, following the lead of stations such as New York's WNEW, Philadelphia's WYSP and Washington's WJFK (all Infinity/CBS sister stations) in adding FM talk to its lineup. In addition to Stern's top-rated morning show, former WAAF afternoon hosts Opie & Anthony returned to Boston, at least until their WNEW show was cancelled in 2002 after the “Sex for Sam” on-air stunt that prompted numerous complaints.
WBCN's music programming began to include some classic hard rock in 2002, though the presence of Stern in morning drive continued to give the station a strong talk lean as well.
Early in 2005, WBCN left the Fenway area to share studios on Birmingham Parkway with WODS.
With Stern's exodus to Sirius Satellite Radio, most of his former CBS Radio affiliates went to a mostly-talk format under the “Free FM” nickname. While WBCN picked up the David Lee Roth morning show that succeeded Stern, it eschewed the “Free FM” branding and the rest of the syndicated lineup, retaining its music programming with jocks Adam-12, Hardy and Mark Hamilton.
The Roth show was short-lived, replaced in April 2006 by a simulcast of Opie & Anthony's XM Satellite Radio morning show. In June 2006, WBCN added talk in afternoon drive, hiring “Toucher and Rich” (Fred Toucher and Rich Shertenlieb) from Atlanta's WNNX.
WBCN also added an HD-2 subchannel in 2006, playing new and indie rock as “Indie 104-1”
Here's a link to Charles Laquidara's site that has many sound bites and Billy West bits that were played over the years. Do yourself a favor, check it out, while dated they were great and still are funny...
Charles Laquidara's site Sounds
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Originally Posted by FORD
