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Back To The 70's


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Were these stations already in existence in the 70s? Didn't 102.7 and 99.5 start in the early 80s?

DWXB 102.7 (tagline MAGIC DISCO 102) started even way back in the 70's. Its format, believe it or not, was disco music, particularly during the time when Saturday Night Fever, Thank God It's Friday, and other movies of that genre were showing. Their first batch of DJ's include The Friendly DJ (Jesse Ferrer in real life and later with 93.1 DWEI), Lady Love (later with 93.1 DWEI), King George (later known as George Boone), Joey Don (later moved to RT), Lord Shiloh, among others. The Triggerman also joined the XB crew in the late 70's. Jessie Gonzales later joined XB sometime in 1979, if I'm not mistaken.

 

The company was owned by the National Council of Churches in the Philippines, a group of Protestants. The company name was Masscom Network.

 

At that time, XB was one of the top radio stations of the 70's. They competed directly with 99.5RT in the upper economic class and played top disco tracks from the Bee Gees to the two Pauls (Nicholas and Jabara) to The Raes, to Sister Sledge, to Gonzales, among others.

 

Believe it or not, while the XB of the 80's had a cult following, it's 5KW transmitter power wasn't enough to gain significant market share as evidenced in the ratings. The XB of the 80's normally found itself in the cellar of the rankings. The XB of the 70's was part of the Top 10 at that time and had considerable advertisement because of its niche market. If one would actually look at it, XB was more successful back in the 70's compared to their 80's counterpart.

 

Here's another trivia about XB: it used to have an AM station as well. It's call letters were DWEE-AM and they had in their DJ stable, believe it or not, the likes of Joey De Leon, Vic Sotto, Ed PIcson, Jing Magsaysay and Jun Sta. Ana. Picson and Magsaysay would later join Brother Wayne and Bambi Fonacier at DWWK 101.9 (Your Jazz Authority) in the early 80's.

Edited by the_sentinel
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Nice piece of trivia, the_sentinel. I remember in the mid to late 80s, 102.7 was the "in" radio station. The Smiths, OMD, Depeche Mode, Tears for Fears, Colourfield, Ice House, etc. dominated 102.7 in that period then the station slowly shifted to glamour rock with the likes of Skid Row, Nelson, Warrant, Aerosmith, etc

Yes, I was also a big time follower of XB in the 80's. We even guested in one episode of the mobile circuit feature. Our mobile disco system played in a huge party and one of the guests was an XB DJ (whose name I forget at this time). He liked our playlist which gave heavy airplay on new wave and got invited to his program on XB one Saturday night at 9PM. Went there and played a pre-taped mixed music that included tracks from Depeche Mode, Xmal Deutschmal, The Care, The Smiths and of course, New Order.

 

Nonetheless, despite XB's legendary existence in the 80's, it was actually more popular in the mainstream back in the 70's when their format was Magic Disco. There were only less than 15 FM radio stations back then, and most were catering to certain niches. At a time when disco hits were lording it over the airwaves and people would flock to discotheques like Stargazer, Where Else?, etc. during the Martial Law era, XB's disco format, not surprisingly, did well in the ratings.

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Xmal Deutschland? Yup, I know that group. They had one famous song, "Matador". Stargazer ka pa pala. Hyatt yan diba? During my time, it was Faces, Euphoria, and Metro. Huli na ang Mars which took over the place left by Faces. Those were the days. Nothing beats these places. One song I remember that dominated the disco scene in the early 90s was Simply Red's "Stars". People would flock to the dance floor and sing to the beat when this song played. Later it was "The Sign" by Ace of Base.

Stargazer = Silahis International Hotel

Louie Y. (later, Isis) = Hyatt Regency Hotel

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Xmal Deutschland? Yup, I know that group. They had one famous song, "Matador". Stargazer ka pa pala. Hyatt yan diba? During my time, it was Faces, Euphoria, and Metro. Huli na ang Mars which took over the place left by Faces. Those were the days. Nothing beats these places. One song I remember that dominated the disco scene in the early 90s was Simply Red's "Stars". People would flock to the dance floor and sing to the beat when this song played. Later it was "The Sign" by Ace of Base.

Yup, Matador as well as Incubus Succubus that we normally played back-to-back.

 

'Gazer and Where Else? were the two most popular discotheques in the 70's. 'Gazer was famous for its host of VIP guests, normally children of Martial Law officials. Bongbong Marcos and Jacky Enrile were regular fixtures there. It was located at the old Silahis Hotel, same place where the old Playboy Club was located. Where Else? on the other hand, was based at the Intercon. It was replaced thereafter by Euphoria sometime in the mid-80's. Isis and later, Louie Y, was located at the old Hyatt owned by Jose Mari Chan. Louie Ysmael, the king of discos back then, was responsible for putting up the audio / lighting system of 'Gazer and later, Isis and Louie Y, hence the name.

 

But yes, much of my experiences were really in the 80's - the likes of Faces, Zigzag, Vaultz, Culture Club, Kudos, Mars (which took over from Faces), among others. But this discussion is good in the 80's thread so I'll stop here. :)

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Some of the best albums back in the 70's:

 

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fb/FMacRumours.PNGhttp://rymimg.com/lk/f/l/2ce673bb7967d8ac9f248da76ff1e3cf/2540424.jpghttp://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51CrP3qyEGL.jpghttp://eil.com/images/main/Grease-Grease-233449.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/_jV-HpsZVI9o/S8SuWftZeyI/AAAAAAAAAEE/x96B9ZOBjiE/s1600/caratula+thank+god+it+s+friday+frente+copy.jpg

Edited by the_sentinel
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Some of the best albums back in the 70's:

 

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fb/FMacRumours.PNGhttp://rymimg.com/lk/f/l/2ce673bb7967d8ac9f248da76ff1e3cf/2540424.jpghttp://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51CrP3qyEGL.jpghttp://eil.com/images/main/Grease-Grease-233449.jpghttp://1.bp.blogspot.com/_jV-HpsZVI9o/S8SuWftZeyI/AAAAAAAAAEE/x96B9ZOBjiE/s1600/caratula+thank+god+it+s+friday+frente+copy.jpg

"Don't stop thinking about tomorrow, don't stop...." This song came to mind when I saw the Fleetwood Mac album you posted above.

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One of my favorite shows back in the 70's - albeit, only shown once a year. I can never forget the first year when Gabe Kaplan (Welcome Back, Kotter) captained ABC, Telly Savalas (Kojak) was head of CBS and Robert Conrad (Baa Baa Black Sheep) skippered NBC. There was a protest filed by Conrad against ABC and to settle the dispute, Conrad and Kaplan duked it out on the obstacle course. Kaplan, with his long limbs, easily won, making Conrad eat crow.

 

And yes, the photo says it all - it's called the "baseball dunk" that spun off several imitations in local variety shows, in particular, Suerte Sa Siete, the pre-programmer of Student Canteen back then.

 

http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/dc/1e/42/dc1e426f38e0245b294132af2e042006.jpghttp://www.longisland70skid.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Battle-of-the-network-stars.jpg

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