Missing the Old Campus Radio

03/13/2013 01:00 PM 

For people who’d been aging at somewhere between my generations, a student’s life will never be complete without being hooked up on the FM radio station which is known as Campus Radio. Yes, even for once on their respective lives.

Well, I’m actually a late-bloomer when it comes to things like this, and in fact, it was during the 2000s when I only managed to listen to cliché radio stations, and I mean by the radio stations that caters to the youth (and this was the real “young, wild and free” deal). Magic 89.9 was one, RX was also an epic one (thanks to the likes of The Morning Rush), KC FM was also an urban legend before it was reformatted into iFM, 99.5 RT was the real music authority to the mainstream pop fans. And so were 103.5 K-Lite for the alternative genre and NU 107 for rock. But among them all, there is one station that was already stamped on the listeners’ ears and minds: it was the Campus Radio.

Campus Radio was then the GMA’s flagship FM station in all over the archipelago, with 97.1 DWLS FM at their mother station at Manila.

Those were the days when Jimmy Hendrix was waking up every single listener from 5-9 AM, The Triggerman counting down the top 20 songs daily and weekly every 12 noon. And… yeah, they used to air 24 hours a day, too. Other jocks were Joe Spinner, Dan the Man (well, this guy still remained at LS via his new air name Papa Dan and on the station’s new format by the name of Barangay LS if I'm not mistaken.), Master T, Jimmy Jam, to name the few of them.

Some people have made their names on Campus Radio via Campus Aircheck, the station’s student DJ program, and more known as “the first school on air.” Not to mention, this was also the station that brought Info Pop, and that was way back the era where the mainstream pop was really the mainstream pop. It’s all “because you want (or need, whichever is right) to know.”

And who can deny this? Top 20 at 12 was the longest running countdown on-air even if by Monday to Saturday, the show plays about 60% of the music tabulated list or literally… the top 12 of it.

I used to remember Liz-Anne Bautista’s article on MTV Ink Magazine about her life being a jock at the station. Indeed cool and interesting because I used to dream of becoming a radio DJ then). And If I can remember it right, King DJ Logan of now-Wave 891 also started here.

Front.Center was the venue for the local artists, something that is quite familiar… like Tunog Kalye and Sunday Sessions.

Clubnights were similar to Magic's Party On Weekends.

And they’re hell similar because they are all good for the youth. They play modern pop, RnB, rock and OPM, something that the audience really needs and wants to dig. And of course, if there’s a modern, there’s a classic.

Retro Jam was their weekly throwback counterpart to Friday Madness, Monstrous Riot, or 24K weekend. And it also competes with the typical Sunday classical music programs like that from the masa stations.

And after 2 decades, 97.1 WLS FM made a 360 degree turn-around. From student’s fave to masa, and the name was Barangay LS.All that happened on that unfaithful day of February 14, 2007.

Perhaps I was one of the many, many youngsters way back then who did not hold on to maintain the frequency. Maybe it was, it was due to our disbelief.

But let’s accept the fact then, even if deep inside, it may suck in your own view actually. It’s all for business. The station failed to sell the format even if it really rocks at the top spot for the pop category. They can’t survive that way, they need to make money too. And what else can the station do if the audience has gone ruralized, or even dumb (depending on how you judge it) via street lingo per se?

The bottom line, radio nowadays may still on the roll, but the old ones are way better than the present. Well, just sayin’, folks.

Author: slickmaster | © 2013 september twenty-eight productions