by jon » Fri Oct 15, 2010 9:31 pm
Wow! Quite the spread on CKLG-FM. Lots of great pictures there, too.
My father actually preferred CKLG-FM over CHQM much of the time, so I have a lot of first hand memories of the station. As well as historical material I've read in the last decade.
The main point not covered in this spread is my understanding that CKLG-FM was attempting to pick up where CKLG-AM had left off two months earlier, before they switched to Top 40 to coincide with the Beatles first concert in Vancouver. And perhaps evolve a fair bit in the process.
Until they switched to a San Francisco-inspired "Underground" format in early 1968, CKLG-FM continued to evolve, soon dropping the classical pieces mentioned as being sprinkled into each hour, into a more consistent format of mostly instrumentals with some vocals, with many of them cover versions of recent Top 40 hits and movie themes. As was CHQM during this same period.
But, to (they hoped) differentiate themselves from CHQM, CKLG-FM eventually began calling themselves The Foreground Sound, as a jab at CHQM's image in most listeners' minds as "Background music".
I've heard two claims about CKLG-FM over the years. Both focusing on their move to a full-time Underground format in early 1968. One, which I believe to be true, is that they were the first station to do so in Canada. Full-time, that is, since CJOR had been running a very similar format in Evenings, with Tim Burge, as early as August 1967.
The second claim was more "common knowledge" at the time that wondered out loud if CKLG-FM wasn't the first station in Canada to break the supposed rule that FM stations in this country could only be classical or "background music". I've never really investigated that one now that we have access to so much more Canadian radio history.
Despite its many ups and downs, including at least two periods of no live announcers, LG-FM has a special place in my heart, and, during my youth, was tied with KOL-AM Seattle for most years as Favourite Station.