Realizing that my last post about WARM might've been somewhat edgy, I thought it a good idea to sit and watch WARMland Remembered again. So, I did.Saturday evening I sat through yet another broadcast of this memorable program produced by WVIA.
The show sure has its moments. Every so often you could darned near go a bit weepy for the good old days, scant few as they were.
Admittedly, my previous post may have been snarky. Some situations call for snark, so if you're an honest type, you go with it. I did.
With that admission, I'll be sticking with my previous post. After watching WARMland Remembered, my recollections and observations about WARM snapped into even sharper focus.
Once great, once the legit market leader, and a singularly strong one at that, WARM fell victim to its own smugness, its own vanity. Foolish in its belief that it could dictate tastes, wants, and needs, WARM moved further and further afield of serving its listeners.
WARM developed a position that seemed to be, "We'll tell you what you want and need, then give it to you...maybe." WARM began treating its listeners like errant children.
WARM management had adopted an attitude of "Our way or the highway." Given enough time, most people headed on down that highway, leaving WARM behind and befuddled as to what went wrong.
Lots went wrong.
One startling move was the introduction of play-by-play sports to WARM's schedule.
Among the most notable reasons so many people loved WARM was that it didn't clutter up its programming with baseball, football, basketball play-by-play.
Sports? Yep, plenty of sports, done about the best and always right up to the minute in the market, via 20/20 Sports with Ron Allen and the news department. Scores, stats, and pertinent information, all yours on WARM without the clutter. I will forever contend that WARM made its first disastrous turn when it began carrying PSU Football somewhere in the mid to late 70s.
Which brings me to what I feel is a valid point; WARM was headed in a wrong direction long, long before most would admit. It wasn't until seeing WARMland remembered again, and tempered by WARM going away for good, that I heard things I'd missed many times before.
If you watch and listen, you'll find within the words of Bill Kelly, Tommy Woods, Terry McNulty, George Gilbert, Harry West, Joey Shaver, and Lenny Woloson, an acknowledgment that things were bad, and sliding towards worse, a great many years ago. If these gentlemen knew it, it wasn't exactly a guarded secret.
Their sense of discretion may have prevented them from shouting it at passing cars, though it is inarguable that they all knew.
You also might come to understand that those Golden Years at WARM were few, that they likely ended before the '60s did. In an act of generosity, most concede that WARM was the monster through much of the '70s. The actual fact is that WARM was king of an increasingly steeper and more menacing hill until 1981.
I'll wrap up commenting on WARM with a couple things.
1) Over on the right is the cover of the last edition of The WARM Cookbook, an extremely popular promotion. I had the privilege of editing that last edition. It was tough, and that's no joke. We asked for recipes on the air, we got them by the sackful in the mail. Thousands, and it could have been literally tens of thousands of recipes from viewers. We rejected recipes by what was probably a twenty to one ratio, at least.
2) Take a good look at that logo. That is the logo of the radio station that was supposed to the voice of NE PA, fun listening, contemporary, on top of it all. The last thing that logo says to me is fun. It looks like it was designed by a committee of accountants.
The signs were long there. Many saw them, many did not, and even more saw them and pretended all was well.
