If you live in the New York City area, you’re probably aware that oldies station WCBS-FM changed format several weeks ago and is now Jack-FM. The local media have picked up on the station’s new so-called random format, which means that you can hear Erasure, Twisted Sister, and Elvis Presley within any given half-hour. And they’ve given lots of play to the protests of the old ‘CBS listeners.
But I haven’t read anything about the switch in marketing tenor. ‘CBS positioned itself as eager to please–like most radio stations and most major brands. But Jack doesn’t seem to care if its audience likes it or not–witness the tagline, “Playing what we want.”
The on-air interstitials, voiced not by DJs but by an unknown and insufferably snarky voice, have the same underlying message: I don’t care whether you like this station or not, so long as I like it. One spot went so far as to say “You can’t choose the songs, but we will give you some say over the commercials.”
It’s certainly a distinctive approach. But given that radio is often considered the most personal of the mass media, will it be an effective one? Perhaps Jack is going after the Groucho Marx contingent, those who wouldn’t belong to any club that would have them, or after those lovelorn singles who are attracted only to men and women who reject them.
Personally, the last thing I want to hear as I drive from work, where I’ve spent much of the day answering the demands of bosses and customers, to my home, where I’ll spend much of the evening answering the demands of my family, is a disembodied voice from the radio telling me that it doesn’t care what I want. Whatever happened to slogans like “Have it your way”?
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