WINN Music

[John Quincy]

As I've been editing Moon Mullins' WINN airchecks for this site, I've taken note of the rather unusual mix of songs in the early '70s airchecks...at least, for a so-called country station. WAKY was known for mixing in a few country crossovers, but in 1971 they had nothing on WINN, who played more Top 40 music at a time than WAKY ever did country.

Check out the December 31, 1971 WINN survey. Along with country hits by Merle Haggard, Johnny Paycheck and Hank Williams, Jr. you'll find "American Pie" by Don McLean, "Brand New Key" by Melanie, "Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves" by Cher and "Stones" by Neil Diamond among other records that WAKY and WKLO were wearing the grooves down on.

(I wish the country station I worked at in the Summer of '72 had a playlist like that!)

As Artie Johnson's German character on Laugh-In used to say, "Verrrrrry interesting."

[john1970]

Maybe the folks over at WINN saw the success that WAKY & WKLO had with inserting crossover music, and decided that it mightwork the other way around!

[1240winn]

When I first saw this December 1971 survey, I had wondered if WINN had abandoned the country format for a while!

I always remember hearing a few songs on WINN that were borrowed from the pop side, but this survey semed to stretch the bounds a little bit.

I think some of this could have been dependent on the Program Director at the time. If I read some of the recently posted newsletters correctly, this was in the Danny King era. One of his memos talked about winning the 18-49 demographic. Perhaps this is why the playlist list had a little more rock than usual.

[chad]

I sure wish the RIAA wasn't so mean. I would love to hear a few of the songs from the July 1971 aircheck of Moon Mullins in their complete form. WINN had a nice mix of tunes including many that are never heard anymore on "traditional country" stations. I wonder if there is any way to sell these airchecks with the music intact or does that violate some crazy RIAA rule?

Chad

[John Quincy]

The only Moon Mullins airchecks I received that were unscoped were the ones from the Fall of 1970 and the day Elvis died (August 16, 1977). The rest of them were "skimmer" tapes, where the recording starts when the DJ turns his mic on, and the recording pauses when the DJ turns his mic off. I edited the skimmer tapes so that the transitions between segments where the original tape started and stopped would sound smoother.

But yes, it would be great to have unscoped versions of these broadcasts. I wished I had taped a lot more "back then."

If I had them, I could put unscoped airchecks online, but I'd have to pay for the privledge, like Uncle Ricky does at www.reelradio.com.