Duane Ingalls Glasscock for President!
July 14, 2009 2:11 PM   Subscribe

 
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man, I loved that station in the early '80's
posted by Confess, Fletch at 2:14 PM on July 14, 2009


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posted by anastasiav at 2:19 PM on July 14, 2009


And just a note from the article .. they're going digital only and ceasing to transmit on FM. So, not totally gone, but a landmark moment to be sure.
posted by anastasiav at 2:21 PM on July 14, 2009


well there goes my one radio station ... now I can look forward to "Hot Adult Contemporary" music..whatever that is.
posted by TonyDanza at 2:23 PM on July 14, 2009


wow....

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posted by blaneyphoto at 2:27 PM on July 14, 2009


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Bye, bye, my adolescence, it was a good ride. ~sniff~
posted by tristeza at 2:28 PM on July 14, 2009


"Hot Adult Contemporary" Biggest oxymoron ever
posted by wheelieman at 2:31 PM on July 14, 2009


on a related note, the Cosmic Muffin died almost exactly three years ago.
posted by Confess, Fletch at 2:31 PM on July 14, 2009


What's FM radio?
posted by HumanComplex at 2:49 PM on July 14, 2009


WBCN - who's this?
posted by acro at 2:49 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


well there goes my one radio station ... now I can look forward to "Hot Adult Contemporary" music..whatever that is.

Tony - I hope I don't step on any toes here, but 101.7 (WFNX) is basically the exact same station in terms of content, broadcast location and broadcast power. It's a pity there's only one rather than two, but it's not as if Boston's suddenly devoid of alt-rock public radio.
posted by Ryvar at 3:09 PM on July 14, 2009


DJ: WBCN who's this?
Brad: Hey this is Brad (this is Brad this is)
DJ: Now uh who's your favorite artist, who do you want to hear?
Brad: Well m my favorite artist right now is Fatboy Slim, that guy kicks ass.
DJ: How tremendous is Fatboy Slim?
Brad: The band of the 90's, if you want to call it a band because it's a one man name.
DJ: Wow...fatboy, and you want to hear that new fatboy song?
Brad: Absolutely.
DJ: Which one?
Brad: The um funk soul brother check it out.
DJ: Sing it, I don't know which one.
Brad: Right about now, the funk soul brother check it out now, the funk soul brother.
posted by smackfu at 3:11 PM on July 14, 2009 [7 favorites]


Oops, acro posted that while I was dawdling. But that was my first exposure to WBCN.
posted by smackfu at 3:11 PM on July 14, 2009


now I can look forward to "Hot Adult Contemporary" music..whatever that is.

Why, it's Mix 98.5... only now it'll be Mix 104.1! And Boston gets another sports talk radio station because apparently people were getting bored calling into the same shows hollering the same opinions.



. for BCN

. for the Cosmic Muffin

. for Charles Laquidara, who got, er, phoned in Upton, Mass. by BCN years before the rest of us did.
posted by Spatch at 3:12 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


My girlfriend used to work for WCBN, a freeform station in Ann Arbor. People always used to confuse the two, and I've fucked up emails once or twice with sloppy fingers.

Ah well.
posted by klangklangston at 3:25 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


Oh, that's depressing. Laquidara and BCN supplied the soundtrack for my late-80's paper route. Glad to see he's still reaching the masses, on his blog.
posted by borborygmi at 3:33 PM on July 14, 2009 [3 favorites]


WBCN always seemed like the least selly-outy station in Boston, when even "alternative" WFNX became a bit lame. I switched to satellite a couple of years ago, but I'm sorry that BCN won't be in Boston anymore.
posted by xingcat at 4:07 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


And Boston gets another sports talk radio station because apparently people were getting bored calling into the same shows hollering the same opinions.

What if by some stretch the new station destroys WEEI? Then WBCN will have died so that we may live. Like Jesus, but real!

May Gerry Callhan melt like his friends who opened the Ark of the Covenant.
posted by Mayor Curley at 4:08 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


Aw, what kind of mishegass is that?

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posted by freshwater_pr0n at 4:11 PM on July 14, 2009


Hate to say it, but it's been a terrible station for 10 years.

long live FNX
posted by Lacking Subtlety at 4:11 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


RIP soundtrack of my youth. I haven't lived in Boston or listened to BCN in 15 years, but I'll always remember it fondly.
posted by CunningLinguist at 4:23 PM on July 14, 2009


long live WMBR and WZBC. More power to them. I demand it.
posted by kuujjuarapik at 4:23 PM on July 14, 2009 [3 favorites]


Hate to say it, but it's been a terrible station for 10 years.

I gave up loafing, driving and radio simultaneously in 2000. Odd how that works. Radio: entertainment for the bored and the trapped.
posted by jsavimbi at 4:29 PM on July 14, 2009


Beantown, you may have lost a radio station, but give thanks for what you still have: law enforcement entities with a serious commitment to over-reacting to electronics.

And the Bruins! Ha! You can keep 'em! The Mets are more likely to win a Cup than the Bruins!

This has been a public service announcement by the Committee to Rag on Boston (CROB).
posted by Mister_A at 5:07 PM on July 14, 2009


Wow, there's going to be a whole lot less Pearl Jam in my life now.


(Not really, I bailed ship on BCN around freshman year of high school when I developed some real musical taste. Good riddance; radio's a dinosaur)
posted by oinopaponton at 5:08 PM on July 14, 2009


When I bought a cassette player for my car, I stopped listening to radio completely. Even though I don't have a radio-announcer voice, my taste in music is much better than any of those guys.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 5:10 PM on July 14, 2009


I always thought they were assholes. I don't mourn their passing.
posted by Scoo at 5:36 PM on July 14, 2009


Mister_A: Beantown, you may have lost a radio station, but give thanks for what you still have: law enforcement entities with a serious commitment to over-reacting to electronics.


Current.
posted by billypilgrim at 6:11 PM on July 14, 2009


.

First 104.1 "Radio 104" Hartford, now 104.1 Boston. Damn.

I used to always get a kick out of driving from one station's listening area into the other's (somewhere around Sturbridge MA on I-84, when headed north) without touching the dial and going from one station to the other.
posted by Kadin2048 at 6:28 PM on July 14, 2009


In small town New Hampshire, in the 1970's WBCN was about all there was to listen to.
I used to leave my radio tuned to 'BCN all night figuring the music would percolate into my
subconscious. And there was Roxanne, whose voice fueled many teen-aged fantasies.
Oh, and .
posted by archaic at 6:30 PM on July 14, 2009


"Hot Adult Contemporary" music..whatever that is.

Bedtime Magic (WMJX) nightly with David Allan Boucher.

Aaaargh....no!!!
posted by ericb at 6:49 PM on July 14, 2009 [2 favorites]


Whatever happened to Ken Shelton?
posted by adamg at 6:56 PM on July 14, 2009


Aroo, goodbye to late night high school Dr. Demento listening.

Also does anyone else think that this photo of Peter Wolf is totally that generic guy picture on facebook? See?
posted by jessamyn at 6:58 PM on July 14, 2009 [3 favorites]


They were great for a long long time, until just before Infinity snatched them up. In fact, I think you could chart their awesomeness as an inverse to the number of ballads on each Aerosmith album. Duane Glasscock aside, they always did stuff you could love. They ran a 'Smarten up!' mock PSA campaign they ran for each batch of new college students that was sidesplitting.
posted by drowsy at 6:58 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


I can't believe I ever found Dr. Demento funny. What the hell?
posted by Mister_A at 7:14 PM on July 14, 2009 [1 favorite]


I think you're on to something there jessamyn. Same exact dude!
posted by Mister_A at 7:15 PM on July 14, 2009


Worth noting: WBCN is owned by CBS and has been for a long time. Frequency is being changed to All-Sports-Radio. Sounds like something that would've happened to an AM station twenty-odd years ago.
posted by wendell at 7:20 PM on July 14, 2009


Torn, as I hate when something local (and it's still local despite the CBS ownership) passes, even if I haven't listened in forever and they've pretty much sucked for years. All-sports radio...gee, there's something we really, really need - what a novelty!!! (ugh)
posted by jalexei at 8:22 PM on July 14, 2009


The Duane and Oedipus Lockout was pretty cool radio at the time. I was like 19, what did I know. I'd have to hear some Duane Glasscock rants again to reframe my opinion. Laquidara and the Big Mattress was always a nice place to be. That station had loads of personality for a few years.

And then they started feeling the bucks and got sucky. As it has been forever now. See ya.
posted by Camofrog at 1:08 AM on July 15, 2009


Sorry to lose the call letters more than the current programming.

...but I so remember listening back around 1980 when they first played some great Irish band named after a spy plane...
posted by Pliskie at 3:28 AM on July 15, 2009


Musta got lost.

My youth is long gone anyway. Most of my youthful conquests involved BCN playing in the bacground.

Sigh.


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posted by fourcheesemac at 3:58 AM on July 15, 2009


yeah, wbcn in the late 70's and early 80's was the soundtrack of my adolescence. before it (wbcn, not my adolescence) got so cock-rock, at which point i punted them.
posted by rmd1023 at 4:03 AM on July 15, 2009


Eh, Radio died when Q104.3 in NYC stopped being awesome and became your standard "Classic Schlock" radio station (I think they were bought by Viacom, then sold to Clear Channel). Where else could you hear Southern Culture on the Skids, the Bottle Rockets, Sonic Youth, Hal Lovejoy Circus, and Prodigy all on the same airwaves?
posted by Eideteker at 4:51 AM on July 15, 2009


I only wish they had sacked their morning show guys when they cut the power. On the occasional days that the alarm clock is tuned to BCN, I end up leaving the house incredibly angry after hearing those two yokels.

Also, I think they're the only two people in the world who still call women "broads".
posted by backseatpilot at 5:13 AM on July 15, 2009


After the Rat shut down, rock was dead in Boston anyway. And Mr. Butch is now playing air guitar in that great Kenmore Square in the Sky.
posted by zaelic at 6:59 AM on July 15, 2009 [3 favorites]


Of course broadcast radio is going the way of the dinosaur, but that doesn't change the fact that, as others have written, BCN is an institution in this town.

XM/Sirius/Podcast/Itunes etc. will never replace the intimacy of knowing that only you and others within signal range can listen. I'm all for technology but a little piece of me will die on August 12th.
posted by eggman at 11:15 AM on July 15, 2009


I used to tune WBCN in from my bedroom in Providence and listen to Charles Laquidara every morning in the 70's instead of getting to school on time.
posted by jfrancis at 6:26 PM on July 15, 2009


Just as an FYI, in its final four days on the air, 'BCN was allowed "off the leash" by CBS, and broadcast the best FM rock radio that anybody around here has heard in years. It was the old stuff, what radio used to be and could beā€”deep cuts, unsigned bands, and all the rest. It didn't make you miss what 'BCN has been in recent years, but it sure as hell made you wish those four days could last forever.

They finished just after midnight, with "Shine on You Crazy Diamond," with the call letters recited over the song's ending, followed by a minute-or-so montage of classic voices and moments from the station's history...and then, static. I listened for a few minutes and then turned the radio off.
posted by cribcage at 12:29 PM on August 13, 2009 [4 favorites]


Here is the end.
posted by CunningLinguist at 3:36 PM on August 13, 2009 [2 favorites]


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