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Friday, May 3, 2013

NYC Radio: WBLS' 'Open Line' Cut Back For More Music

Picket, Slade, Mtume
Sundays are sounding more like weekdays on WBLS 107.5 FM as the station cuts back on “specialty” programming to play more music in the mid-day, writes David Hinckley at  nydailynews.com.

For some listeners, though, this comes at a price: a cutback in “Open Line,” one of the few black talk shows on a major commercial city radio station.

“Open Line,” which launched on the late WRKS in 1989 and several times made the Talkers Magazine “Heavy Hundred” list, is now heard 8-9 a.m., rather than 10 a.m.-noon.

James Mtume, who had cohosted the show with Bob Slade and Bob Pickett since 1995, announced he was leaving the show on April 21, the same day listeners learned about the scheduling change.

None of the hosts commented on that change. Mtume said he was moving on to other projects.

But the change concerned some community groups, who have criticized commercial radio in general for giving little time to black talk shows.

Another WRKS Sunday talk show, “The Week In Review,” did not survive the merger of WBLS and WRKS in April 2012. Activists worried at the time that with only one adult-targeted major black commercial station left in town, community voices would go unheard.

WBLS still carries two other talk shows on Sunday: “Imhotep Gary Byrd,” 7-9 p.m., and “The Rev. Al Sharpton,” 9-10 a.m.

2 comments:

  1. Should've seen it coming after the so called "merger". The African American community better wake up and see that there are emenies among them. Look how much theyve lost since 2008.

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  2. I now listen to Wbls on Sundays from 8:00am to 10:00am.After those time frames nothing else on To listen to that Baffunery weekdays with Steve Harvey in the mornings is an Insult.Wbls has lost me as a listening audience,except 4 the time frame above.

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