The demise of Supertalk FM 96.5

I have so many thoughts on the format change of 96.5 FM that came about without warning this morning. Nothing’s more irritating than turning on the radio, expecting to hear your favorite morning show, and instead hearing the sounds of construction for minutes on end.

Personally, I’m disappointed in the sudden move, since the old station was my part-time employer (if you consider getting four minutes of air time every Friday night employment). I’m also disappointed that I’ll no longer be able to hear the Two Angry Guys every morning. For my money they were the best radio duo in Cincinnati, and I’m afraid that this might be the end of their radio careers in Cincinnati; there’s very few options for sports talk broadcasters in Cincinnati (especially ones not owned by Clear Channel, from where Tom Gamble quit earlier this year and Richard Skinner was let go in a controversial move), and Tom Gamble doesn’t want to do an evening show. There are also a lot of good people at that station who are likely going to be without jobs today, and it sure sucks that this move came the day before the company Christmas party.

At the same time, I am somewhat comforted by the fact that the desire for a conservative FM talk radio station in Cincinnati was so weak that the format could only sustain itself for barely more than a year. Granted, their evening and overnight programming was fairly weak, but when they have major players in the right-wing talk arena such as Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, and Dennis Miller, and they think that a “mountain music” format (my understanding is that this is what’s been registered as the new format, it won’t be official until noon) will pull better ratings, it makes you feel like there’s a little sanity in the world.

I’m confident that we'll find a new station in town, and I’m hopeful that the good people at the station who get laid off are able to find an equal or better job within the industry. I’m also happy that those who tune in the station at 10:00 this morning expecting to hear Beck are going to be greeted by the noise of hammers, saws, and forklifts. Sometimes you have to make the best of a bad situation.

UPDATE: Looks like they're going with the hard rock format instead. Given that their first song was Metallica's Enter Sandman, I'm guessing they're going to try to compete with WEBN. Good luck with that.

LATER UPDATE: Thanks to the commenter that found the link on Cincinnati.com. The Two Angry Guys will stay on the air, and my mornings will stay happier. Here's hoping that everything works out well for the show that I'm a little bitty part of as well.