While WJIB 96.9 (now 96.9 "Boston Talks") reigned as the king of "muzak," WSSH outlasted other beautiful music stations like WCOZ 94.5 (now Jamn' 94.5!), WBOS 92.9, and WWEL 107.9 (now Kiss 108 FM!). The automated beautiful music station probably benefited most from a better mix of elevator music, good sounding announcers and a strong signal. For some reason, everything has sounded good on the 99.5 signal.
Most of the instrumental music faded in the early 1980s, giving way to more of an adult contemporary format, featuring familiar artists like John Denver, Neil Diamond, Anne Murray and the Carpenters. Delilah Rene had a radio show on WSSH before going syndicated with her famous nightly song request and dedication show. The 50,000 watt blowtorch of soothing sounds really came into its own, however, in the late 80s when WSSH moved to Woburn and featured some fantastic live local talent, especially Jordan Rich. Today Rich is well known as a talk show host on WBZ AM Boston.
Ratings eventually tanked and smooth jazz, country music (WKLB) and eventually classic music WCRB took over the airwaves at 99.5. Those ensuing formats have all sounded good (actually I couldn't stand the cloying smooth jazz station), but I miss most...
WISSHHHHHH...99.5!
Ah....I worked in radios sales for many years and knew many people from WSSH. I'm enjoying your posts that take us down memory lane!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the nice comments, we like to live in the past here!
ReplyDeleteThe sound of the bell that WJIB used as their id is etched in my mind. There was a radio station in the greater Boston area that had a show on Saturdays afternoons that played Irish music, the D.J was John Latchford, who would bring his own collection to the studio. He would sometimes let out a whoop as he would start to play a record. Rumor was that he would have a few during the show.
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