FM

by Richard Neer

  Zach’s coworkers at WNEW-FM were more polished in their manner on the air as well. He was more simpatico with the unvarnished presentation at WPLJ, the lack of showmanship and structure. Indeed, he’d agreed with Rosko on the use of the rack. It was Rosko’s viewpoint that the music director not even touch the rack, but that records would find their own way into airplay or oblivion. It was a nice but hopelessly naÏve thought, just in terms of maintaining order. When a song is reaching its conclusion and one is casting about for a perfect segue, you’re never afforded the time to rummage around through unsorted piles of albums to locate the one you need. But Zach didn’t worry about that, he just knew that he had found kindred spirits at WPLJ and that when his contract expired, he’d try to join them.

  Muni was aware of Zach’s dilemma, but was also pragmatic enough to know that ABC, for whom he’d worked years earlier, would not tolerate what was going on at WPLJ much longer. His entreaties fell on deaf ears. Zach had told him that he’d never held any job much more than a year, so it was time for him to move on. Unlike many jocks, John Zacherle wasn’t making the standard power play to better himself. He was a true believer who loved his audience and wanted to remain true both to it and himself by working in an environment more suited to his nature. There were jealousies and rivalries galore at WNEW-FM that he sensed weren’t present in the more communal atmosphere at WPLJ.

  A little insight into the man: When he did the morning show, he sometimes felt isolated from his audience. So one day he told the listeners to gather outside his window at 230 Park Avenue and that there would be a nice surprise awaiting them. As a small crowd bunched up minutes later, eyes to the sky and his thirteenth-floor window, they gasped in amazement as dollar bills began floating down toward them, from Zach’s own wallet. Upon being introduced at rock shows, as he took the stage, he pulled off his wristwatch and flung it into the crowd for some lucky concertgoer to keep. He later admitted that it was becoming too costly a habit, and that he switched to an inexpensive Timex when a public appearance loomed. One of his quirks while on the air was to activate the turntables with his toes instead of fingers. The studio ceiling was pocked with tiny black holes where he’d engaged Schwartz in a competition to hurl sharpened pencils upward like darts, trying to stick their points into the soft acoustic tile.

  Zach dressed in jeans and work shirts but wasn’t a “limousine liberal,” as were many of his peers. In fact, one jock who professed to be a man of the people took limos to concerts whenever possible, but asked to be dropped a block away so that he wouldn’t be seen by his fans. Not Zacherle—what you saw was what you got. He either walked, took the subway, or came puttering up in his Volkswagen.

  So in June of 1971, he bade WNEW-FM good-bye and went to work for the competition. WPLJ was thrilled to have him, and gloated not unlike Americans welcoming a prominent communist from behind the Iron Curtain. Perhaps the tide was changing—the more commercially successful WNEW-FM was losing defectors to the revolutionary cause.

  For Alison Steele, Zacherle’s move meant a sea change in the course of her career. Although she’d gained a small cachet from her overnight exploits, other than night workers and cramming college students, few had actually heard her, save for the occasions when she filled in during the day, when her Nightbird routine seemed out of place. But now that the coveted 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. shift was hers, she could play to a far wider audience while still working after sunset. It was in this time slot that her legend was born.

  This also meant a change for me. As music director, I’d asked Paulsen and Muni if I could come in with Harrison at 6 a.m. This would serve several purposes. Since both of us were frugal with our newfound wealth, we could save money commuting. We could also enjoy each other’s company and bounce ideas around on the ride in. And I had the advantage of being able to audition records in peace and quiet for three hours before the phones began to ring, thus freeing me to make more decisions independent of the pressures of record promoters. I’d leave by three, sometimes with, sometimes without, Harrison. I could also assist Michael in putting his show together: fetching albums from the library, offering opinions on new material I’d heard, or helping to sort out commercials. Muni had no problem with the hours, as long as the work got done.

  But now I faced a fork in the road. I was offered Alison’s old overnight shift. I’d make a few more dollars and work five days live and one on tape instead of seven days a week. But I’d be giving up the chance to stay in management and the opportunity to shape the direction the station went musically. Plus, my life would be turned around and I’d lead a vampiric existence—sleeping by day and working all night.

  The choice wasn’t difficult. I enjoyed performing more than directing and here was a chance to perform twenty hours a week. I could hone my talents in the relative obscurity of the overnights and, when someone else left, spring into a more prominent spot. Besides, it was becoming increasingly obvious to me that WNEW-FM was not about to offer the jocks any structured musical direction, so my job in the library would essentially be that of a lackey whom the staff would distrust if I aspired to more control. So I agreed to do the overnight show. I would be surrounded by the two people I liked most at the station, Alison Steele at night and Harrison in the morning.

  A young contemporary of ours named Dennis Elsas was hired to do the weekend shows I’d abandoned. Dennis was a friend of Pete Fornatale’s, and like-minded in his taste for accessible music. So when John Zacherle took the shopping bag that he carried in lieu of a briefcase to WPLJ, we lamented the loss of a well-liked and good comrade, but found ourselves a strong new player.

  Things were rapidly falling apart at WPLJ. The uneasy alliance between a large corporation and leftist radicals was crumbling and both sides were growing increasingly militant. Compromise seemed out of the question and decisions were coming from ABC that risked throwing the baby out with the bath water. As Muni had forewarned, shortly after Zach signed his deal at WPLJ, the ax fell. He’d done only a few shows when ABC, tired of the lawsuits and political culture that had developed, brought law and order to Sixth Avenue. The entire staff was called into a meeting on August 26, 1971, and sat silently as general manager Lou Severin outlined the new rules. The music would be formatted (it would later be called “rock in stereo”). There would initially be two or three songs an hour that must be played. A card system would be instituted that would restrict choice somewhat but still offer a wide range. All guests had to be cleared with management prior to airing and no politics would be discussed.

  The mood was somber. This was the beginning of the end—no one could deal with any of these restrictions and retain their credibility with the political community. The audience at the time may not have been large, but they were fiercely loyal. The jocks felt powerless to object—after all, it was ABC’s candy store. WPLJ was destined to become just another radio station, albeit a far more profitable one.

  At a lull in the presentation, Zacherle slowly reached down under the table into his shopping bag and pulled out a vintage machine gun. With a crazed look in his eyes, he aimed it in the direction of Severin and Shaw and screamed, “You’ve betrayed me, you son of a bitches! I’ll get you bastards! You’ll pay for this!”

  The two men cowered in fear. This was an era when the staff had openly urged violence against the establishment. Times were not far removed from the political assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy. A bomb factory run by student radicals had recently been discovered in the Village. Severin and Shaw had always felt that Zacherle was a harmless eccentric, and never thought he was given to violence.

  Herman and Scelsa watched in horror as Zach’s diatribe continued, cursing the two men and the whole establishment for killing his dreams of WPLJ. He then hoisted the weapon into firing position, locked the clip, and pulled the trigger, as members of the staff dove under the table for shelter.

  But instead of a hail of murderous bullets emerging from the barrel, out popped a harmless little
flag that simply said, “BANG!!”

  The room erupted into relieved laughter as the tension was broken. The meeting ended shortly thereafter, and the staff retreated into little groups to discuss their next move.

  For Scelsa, it was simple. He told Severin plainly, “I’m outta here,” and never did another show. Herman said that he was leaving also, but Shaw insisted that Dave had a contract and would not be allowed to quit. He said that if Herman refused to work, he’d sue him and keep him from making a living in radio for as long as he could. Since Herman had a family, he couldn’t risk the banishment, so he reacted like Harrison and I had when Reiger had censured us for using our names too often. He did his show, but he spoke as seldom as he could. When he did open the microphone, his voice was a slow monotone, merely identifying the call letters and never using his name. After several weeks of this, management agreed to release him from the remainder of his contract. One by one, the rest of the staff quit or were fired, with one prominent exception: John Zacherle.

  After a series of programmers tried to restore order, Larry Berger, a Rick Sklar protégé, was brought in to settle the station. Berger had survived the payola era, but only barely. A story circulated that while at another station, he had agreed to play a certain record and had accepted a large sum of money to do so. But when it came time to deliver on his promise, he reneged. Apparently, the promoter he had cheated was connected to the underworld and sent a messenger to Berger’s high-rise office. The burly enforcer then dangled the diminutive Berger out the window by his heels until he relented and agreed to play the record. No one knew if the tale was apocryphal, but legend has it that the experience left Berger scarred for life and that, much like Sklar, he refused to entertain promotion men after that and became absolutely incorruptible.

  The noose restricting choice got tighter over time until the jocks had no say in what they played. Berger brought in his own staff, who understood from the beginning that he was the boss and that their opinions on music and politics held little sway with him.

  Zacherle remained at WPLJ for another twelve years, obediently toeing the line and playing the hits. He had nowhere else to go, having walked out on WNEW.

  Prove It All Night

  “Wake up, the record’s over.”

  Engineer Pete Johnson was shaking me by the shoulder. Where was I? Who was I? I groggily arose from the uncomfortable sofa and stumbled through the darkness toward the light switch.

  Oh, God! I’m working. I’m on the air. Before I could organize my thoughts, I rushed to the studio and pushed the remote button for turntable one, and I watched in horror as the other tonearm spun relentlessly into the center groove with a sickening click . . . click . . . click.

  It was coming back to me now. This was my first Saturday doing the all-night shift from 2 a.m. until six. After struggling through the first hour, I told Johnson that I needed a quick nap, just twenty minutes or so to refresh me so that I could make it through the rest of the night. Luckily, the cool new group Emerson, Lake and Palmer had just released Tarkus, and all of New York was clamoring to hear it. With Keith Emerson of the Nice, Greg Lake of King Crimson, and Carl Palmer from Atomic Rooster, they comprised a typical British supergroup. Like Blind Faith and Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young before them and Asia, Foreigner, et cetera, later, they were presold as an all-star lineup before recording a note. With Emerson’s keyboard pyrotechnics, Lake’s sensual vocals, and Palmer’s frenetic drumming, they’d scored big with their first album, which featured the single “Lucky Man.” The hit was a ballad of manageable length with a conventional acoustic guitar. The only progressive element was the ending, with Emerson’s synth swirling from channel to channel like a Hendrix guitar solo. The rest of the album had long, largely instrumental set pieces, which showed the performers’ virtuosity to great advantage. On Tarkus, they’d decided to go all out with a concept album about some mutant tank that resembled an armadillo with gun barrels. The first side ran almost twenty minutes and would afford me the nap I needed.

  I told Johnson to wake me up with about two minutes left on the side, but when I looked at the studio clock, I calculated that the side had been over for nearly five minutes. I pressed the intercom button to yell at Johnson across the glass.

  “Pete, what the hell happened? I thought I told you to wake me up before the record ended.”

  “Sorry, man. I fell asleep, too.”

  I couldn’t stay mad at him. He was working a split shift and was doubtless having the same problem adjusting to the hours. For months, I’d been arriving at the station at 6 a.m. with Harrison, so I was used to going to bed early and getting up at 4:30 a.m.. Michael would pick me up at 5:15, or we’d take my car to the Vernon-Jackson subway stop in Long Island City where we could park all day for seventy-five cents. We would then grab a train to Grand Central, and ride the long escalator up to street level. There was an all-night deli where we’d pick up orange juice and a doughnut, and then walk across Forty-fifth Street to the studio. We felt like coal miners as we commuted with the early morning shift.

  Luckily, my adjustment to the overnights came quickly and soon I’d worked out a routine. I’d usually hang with Harrison until six-thirty, then go home and try to get to sleep by seven-thirty. If I got up by one or two in the afternoon, I still had a good stretch of daylight in the summertime to enjoy the weather. The problems came later, in the winter, when if you didn’t get to sleep right after getting home, you might think you lived in Norway, seeing little or no sunlight from November until March. You acquired what Frank Zappa referred to as a “studio tan,” a ghostly pallor that made Zacherle look healthy by comparison.

  It was during one of these nights that I got my real name back. I’d always hated the nickname “Dick” but since it was the only one I used in radio, I figured I was stuck with it. Then while doing my overnight show, I noticed a new album by “Richard” Betts of the Allman Brothers. I said spontaneously, “Well, if old Dickey Betts of the Allman Brothers can change his name to Richard, dammit, so can I. From now on, I’m Richard Neer.”

  I never used “Dick” Neer on the air again. It took a little longer to convince my colleagues to make the switch, but within a few months the conversion was complete. I can always judge the age and station loyalties of a listener these days when they approach me by saying, “I knew you when you were Dick Neer.”

  But it was while doing overnights that I learned, almost by osmosis, how the business was structured and how lucky we all were to be in the right place at the right time. And how the days of free form were numbered.

  The economics of AM radio were changing. The mid-twenty shares that WABC once enjoyed were now sinking rapidly into single digits as FM began to flex its muscles. WNBC, with the spoken emphasis on the N, took up the competitive mantle for years, even managing to steal away Bruce Morrow after Sklar decided to attempt to impose what he saw as the new realities. Bruce had been used to the big money of the golden years, averaging close to two hundred thousand a year in salary and perhaps double that in outside activities. As FM stations began making inroads, ratings were slipping from their peak in the late sixties. To protect themselves against falling revenues, management proposed a lower base salary for Morrow, with incentives for ratings increases, coupled with deductions if the station’s popularity fell. Bruce was incensed, feeling betrayed by the very people he felt he had helped make into legends. Everyone could read the writing on the wall: No matter what they did, things would never be as good as they once were.

  Always a canny businessman, Bruce knew that rival WNBC had tried an array of talent to combat WABC’s superiority. The one thing they hadn’t tried was pirating their disc jockeys. So while Morrow told Sklar he agreed in principle with the new concept, he was secretly being wooed by WNBC’s Perry Bascom, who had no qualms about guaranteeing Morrow’s contract at a much higher salary. Bruce allowed that he would consider WABC’s new arrangement if they would tear up his existing contract immediately.

  W
hat happened next is unclear. Executives at ABC said that they realized that releasing Morrow in this fashion would make him a free agent, but that they were unconcerned. By this time, Sklar considered his jocks to be like “spark plugs.” They give you service for a while, then wear out and are replaced by new ones. Whatever WABC’s attitude was, Morrow didn’t wait to find out, inking a new deal with WNBC the next day. Bruce presented Sklar with a gift-wrapped spark plug as a going-away present. But both stations continued to lose numbers as more listeners flocked to FM.

  Even though it was winning over hearts and minds, the progressive era was an anomaly for several reasons. Chief among them was the FCC, who took almost worthless FM stations and by decree gave them profit potential. The duopoly and the AM-FM receiver rulings opened up a wealth of possibilities, through no fault of the broadcasters themselves. It would be as if the FTC had declared tax rebates were available to anyone who bought the Edsel. It was a gift from the gods to radio-station owners, whose main purpose was to make money.

  And since owners suddenly had all these frequencies to fill and with all the good formats taken, they had to be creative. The music industry realized they could make more money selling long-playing albums than singles. They in turn pressured artists for more than just a few three-minute songs a year—now they needed forty-minute albums. So recording artists began to experiment. Some got the idea that rather than come up with twelve short tunes, they could write five short ones that might work as singles and four long ones that allowed them space to jam. So now you had a new kind of music on record that wasn’t being played on the radio, and progressive programmers swooped in to give it exposure.

  Also, to staff the new stations, there were a bunch of young broadcasters who hadn’t ever held a job and were willing to work for a tenth of what stars like Cousin Brucie were drawing. In addition, there were legions of burnt-out Top Forty jocks who were willing to work for less money to revitalize their sagging careers. So a whole staff of FM disc jockeys might cost less than one Top Forty personality. Plus the AM sales staff could sell FM time on the side, and the AM general manager could mind the cash register. Since production was an artifice scorned by the new medium, money could be saved on jingles, promotions, and contests. A program director merely had to ride herd, since no real direction was given. So no FM station had to pay Rick Sklar–type money for a programming genius. Any profit would be pure gravy.