Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

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Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby radiofan » Wed Nov 01, 2017 8:19 pm

At 11:00 this morning (November 1) Castanet's Okanagan Oldies 103.9 officially launched.

https://okoldies.net/

For the live stream click on the Okanagan Oldies 103.9 logo at the top of the page.
Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who couldn't hear the music.
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Aaron » Thu Nov 02, 2017 7:37 am

I'm curious what their business plan for selling advertising is going to be....because the median age of the audience of this is going to be about 70.
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby sparky » Thu Nov 02, 2017 8:44 am

Yawn. Sounds like an A/C station from the late 80s or early 90s musically. No tempo, just safe soft hits from days gone by.

I thought there was supposed to be a live morning show? All I've heard in the past half hour is music and a few commercials along with a couple of cold voice promos from the Afternoon guy played over the intros of songs. No time checks, weather or any kind of info.

Very boring. I've checked it out and won't be back in a hurry.

The 70 y/o potential demo might be totally correct.

So clever to play In The Summertime on a day when there's snow in the forecast.
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Howaboutthat » Thu Nov 02, 2017 10:56 am

I heard them running Canadian Press news at 8am!
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Doug » Thu Nov 02, 2017 12:24 pm

sparky wrote:Yawn. Sounds like an A/C station from the late 80s or early 90s musically. No tempo, just safe soft hits from days gone by.

I thought there was supposed to be a live morning show? All I've heard in the past half hour is music and a few commercials along with a couple of cold voice promos from the Afternoon guy played over the intros of songs. No time checks, weather or any kind of info.

Very boring. I've checked it out and won't be back in a hurry.

The 70 y/o potential demo might be totally correct.

So clever to play In The Summertime on a day when there's snow in the forecast.


Loved this post - and Aaron's post above! I completely agree on the potential demographic for this station and, I agree, just sampling the music right now for the first time (their website "okoldies.net" produced 403 Forbidden errors yesterday), this is not oldies if they're playing mostly 80s music. This is almost a copycat of 103.1 Beach Radio, in my view. "Earth Wind and Fire" is playing now and that's what...70s? I guess the 70s is considered "oldies" now by virtue of the fact that the 50s, and maybe even 60s, are even further distant memories! Great song but, overall, I'm unimpressed. I'll stick with primarily 103.1 Beach Radio, K96.3 and, where necessary, 101.5 EZ Rock (when out of home only, of course). :)

Noticed they have John Tesh in the crucial 9 am to 2 am timeslot. Outside of the morning show, isn't that a radio station's best performing timeslot? I can't imagine Bell Media gave up John Tesh easily so I tend to think maybe they dropped him, allowing Castanet Media, through its Avenue Radio "sidecar" entity with the same beneficial ownership, to sort of "pick up the dregs", "sloppy seconds," pick your metaphor, etc. ;)

Cheers,
Doug
Last edited by Doug on Thu Nov 02, 2017 12:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Doug » Thu Nov 02, 2017 12:25 pm

Howaboutthat wrote:I heard them running Canadian Press news at 8am!


Is that a "rare breed" in radio these days, i.e., the old Broadcast News service that CP provided?
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Doug » Thu Nov 02, 2017 12:26 pm

dmehus wrote:
Howaboutthat wrote:I heard them running Canadian Press news at 8am!


Is that a "rare breed" in radio these days, i.e., the old Broadcast News service that CP provided?


Interesting how Castanet has become a major distributor of CP news stories after their public tussle a number of years ago where they were illegally copying (parts of) CP news stories and given a "cease and desist letter" by CP, I believe, to which they quickly became a licensed distributor. :)

Cheers,
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby the-real-deal » Thu Nov 02, 2017 2:38 pm

I just heard Okanagan Oldies' Madison Erhardt announce the 2 pm Nov 2nd news.

What a BUTCHERING of the news. The worst newscast that I have heard in Kelowna in years.

1. I heard her say "Christy Freeland" LOL It should be Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland

2. I heard a story in which she said: "constitional" You mean, constitutional !

Then, in sports, NO MENTION, whatsover, of the newest 2017 World Series champions, the Houston Astros, who went some 50 plus years without winning baseball's top prize. The first ever World Series win since they started in 1962 as the Houston Colt 45's

That's pretty f*cking lame !

Finally, there was some three or four minutes of DEAD AIR, after the news and sports was over !

Very bush league, small market radio.

The musical format is a ripoff of our Westbank Community Radio station. Nick Frost essentially stole our successful oldies format, plain and simple !
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Rocky » Thu Nov 02, 2017 7:08 pm

Nick should've hired former KFR (1150 AM) Kelowna morning man, John Jackson. He could've handled music and programming as well pulling an on air shift.

I'm waiting for 45RPM to offer the soon to retire wheezer, Don Stevens. He's done at XL-103 early next month.
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby the-real-deal » Fri Nov 03, 2017 2:08 am

If Frost really wants to promote the radio news business, he needs to step up his game and bring to Kelowna a "superstar" type female news talent with major market experience.

Somebody along the lines of a Gloria Mackerenko, a Linda Steele, or a Wendy Mesley. Or, go poach someone from News 1130 or 66 News.

History has shown that, when the local media brings a big name act to town, they prosper. Tarzan Dan Freeman, formerly from SUN-FM and Casey Clarke from Newcap are good examples of this.

The main problem with this market is the banality of the talent. Just because you are hard-working and diligent doesn't mean that you are good. Most Kelowna personalities are downright boring. And nobody gives a shit, either ?

He's got the men down, as Vizutti and Rothwell are excellent news deskers who bring instant credibility.

However, people who cannot pronounce names of important politicians, or who cannot line-up the sports show, properly, should be relegated to weekends or nights and not the critical afternoon shift.

The female desker, in addition to being well known, should be someone who can hit you a homerun, at will, cold, right off of the bench, every day, and not just once or twice a week. The news desker should not only be reading the news, properly, but generating and breaking the news, everyday !

For that type of female journalistic talent, it's gonna cost Nick Frost, more than a few shillings....
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Doug » Mon Nov 13, 2017 7:42 pm

Well said to all of you! :)

Yes, Madison Erhardt is terrible, both in pronunciation and on-air delivery...I cringe when I have to watch to a Castanet news story because there isn't a print version and she's the reporter who got the assignment. Similarly, her "on the street" reporters interviewing local citizens on topical local issues are similarly bad. Other bad reporters in terms of on-air delivery include Wayne Moore and Alanna Kelly. Too bad she's already made it onto their radio station! :(

Agree with you on the point about Oldies 103.9, which doesn't really sound like an "oldies" station to me, basically being a ripoff of the Westbank/West Kelowna radio station. I hadn't thought about that! The whole thing is pretty "low rent," from the inexperienced newscasters with terrible pronunciation to their elementary grade school-level logo (and radio station website! :)) to hackneyed language and news story writing.

I love the idea of bringing in a "star" personality, either for the morning show or for afternoon drive, but isn't that sort of Gord Vizzutti's role? He is, afterall, the better CHBC primetime news anchor of the current "lot" of Rick Webber, Doris Furlot/Janzen/Bregolisse/<insert marital surname of the year here>. Do you think we could even afford the $300-500,000 (or more!) salary it'd likely cost to get them to come here? I think Lynda Steele or Gloria Macarenko might be "reaching for the top" a bit too much, but perhaps we might be able to wrangle Deb Hope, Steve Darling or heck, even Christy Clark, all of whom are still out of work? ;)

In any event...would they really want to "slum it" here in Kelowna? You know who I'd love to see...Claire Matheson!!! Love her smile, her delivery, tone of voice and friendliness. She'd be a real gem!

Cheers,
Doug
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Re: Okanagan Oldies 103.9 is on the air

Postby Howaboutthat » Tue Nov 14, 2017 10:03 am

I see they have a twitter page, but nothing has been posted since they went on air. Perhaps the 'oldies' don't know how twitter works?
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