NICK SPITZER RETURNS TO WMMR FOR 50th ANNIVERSARY • COOL JOB OPEN AT WERS, BOSTON

Nick Spitzer at WMMR in 1972

Nick Spitzer, host of American Routes [link], worked at WMMR, Philadelphia when “free form progressive rock” was in its heyday. It is hard to imagine now that commercial radio was once a place where new music and ideas flowed. 

WMMR was one of earliest and best stations when “underground” radio was in its prime. WMMR is still a rock station, but now it has a corporate sheen.

Spitzer joined a few dozen of WMMR alumni at the station’s 50^th anniversary celebration in late September [link].  He wrote an essay for the occasion. You can read it here.

Today’s post combines portions of the essay with our own contextual notes.

[Disclosure: Our company, Ken Mills Agency, LLC, represents American Routes for new station affiliations and current station services. We have been associated with the program since 2011. For more information about American Routes, contact us at 612-819-8456 or publicradio@hotmail.com.]

Spitzer: The roots of American Routes were partly in “underground radio” – What we were playing at WMMR

Illustration by Alex Fine

Spitzer: This weekend I’m in Philadelphia for the 50th anniversary WMMR. 

The notes below were written for the event website, addressing my old comrades and a later generation of rock radio hosts.

Spitzer: In the late 1960s, “underground radio” grew nationwide to bring the new rock and pop of the era in FM stereo to a generation of listeners. Also called “free form” and “progressive rock,” the stations were viewed as an alternative to Top 40 AM radio in both content and audio quality. 

Spitzer: Many of them started on FM stations, some at colleges like the University of Pennsylvania’s WXPN in Philadelphia. Others were commercial stations—before the advent of NPR—that had been classical, jazz or easy listening formats.

Context: WMMR was owned by Metromedia, a private, for-profit company operated by John Kluge.   

Kluge parlayed his real estate holdings into a network of radio and TV stations. Metromedia's radio stations included WNEW in New York, KMET in Los Angeles, KSAN in San Francisco, WMET in Chicago and WMMR in Philadelphia. All had progressive rock formats.

Spitzer: After serving as program director at WXPN FM, I got a job at WMMR, which had gone on the air as a rock station. WMMR PD Jerry Stevens used to remind us that ‘We are a f**kin’ fine arts radio station.’ That still makes me laugh.

Context: Nick Spitzer started at WMMR in 1972. His air shift was 2pm-6pm, and his air name was “Nick Spencer.” The music choices were his and they tended to be as eclectic are possible.

Spitzer: I learned a lot at MMR about sonic and semantic segues as “journeys,” being “uptempo and familiar out of commercial ‘stop-sets,; segueing to the Moody Blues from classical music, putting the Beatles with the Everly Brothers or Carl Perkins, going from the Byrds to Coltrane to Ray Charles to Randy Newman.

Nick Spitzer in the early 1970s

Spitzer: All these decades later and after 20 years of American Routes on public radio from New Orleans, I can easily wax nostalgic about the funny times and learning experiences at MMR with friends like newsman Bill Vitka, Jonathan Takiff, David Dye, Michel Tearson, Johnny Kraft, Gene Shay and Carol Miller. I also loved the sales guys Rick “Bolt” Feinblatt, Chuck Fee, and receptionists, exec secs and traffic folks like Ruby, Jackie and many other great MMR peeps my memory has come up short on.

Spitzer: High points were interviews with Ray Davies, Bob Marley, Bob Weir, Bette Midler, Gram Parsons, Linda Ronstadt, Leon Redbone, Wayne Shorter, Commander Cody, and Sid Caesar (aka Progresso Hornsby in Mad Magazine), and shaking hands with a departing Linda Lovelace, who the late Ed Sciacky had interviewed on his show in 10-2 shift.

Context: Spitzer worked at WMMR until 1974. Freeform stations like WMMR were becoming highly rated, and the pressure for profit changed the radio landscape.  Consultants Kent Burkhart and Lee Abrams debuted their Superstars format – A limited number of the most popular album tracks played in rotations like Top 40 hits. Stations airing the Superstars format played what was then known as Album Oriented Rock (AOR).  It was hugely successful and WMMR dropped freeform. By 1974 Spitzer knew the biz was changing.

Spitzer: The commercials morphed from lovable local head shops, waterbed sales, book and camera stores, to canned network spots for beer, nylons and acne cream, I knew my time at Metromedia’s WMMR was not long.

David Dye at WMMR

Spitzer: I was reassigned to the all-night shift in favor of a more mainstream approach to the music mix. I decided to bag my life in progressive rock radio to travel across America, thinking romantically that I was on a Jack Kerouac meets Woody Guthrie quest, with friends David Dye (WMMR 6-10 PM) and David Watts (classical and jazz host from WXPN.

Spitzer enrolled in grad school, studying anthropology at the University of Texas in Austin. He worked part-time as an on-air host at the legendary alternative country station KOKE-FM where he played “Willie, Waylon and the boys.” He avoided pop music of the 80s and gained a passion making field recordings of cowboy, blues and Cajun/zydeco musicians.

Spitzer moved to Washington, DC in 1985 where he became a documentary producer for Radio Smithsonian. Then produced cultural features for NPR’s All Things Considered, followed by producing Carnegie Hall Folk Masters shows.

He began teaching at Tulane University in New Orleans and in 1998 created American Routes.

WERS IS HIRING A PROMOTIONS DIRECTOR

Speaking of great radio stations, WERS, the student-based alternative rock station at Emerson College in Boston is looking for a Promotions Director.

The person chosen for this job will manage all aspects of WERS promotions, events, and contests including on-air and online giveaways, remote broadcasts, festivals and concerts, plus events at the station.

More information is available here.