ROGER ASHBY: ONE FINE MORNING (MAN)
by: BY DOUG THOMPSON
'I didn't get into radio to be famous. I didn't get into radio to be a star. And I certainly didn't get into radio to have my face plastered all over the city. I got into radio because I wanted to talk on the microphone to people.'
Talking on the microphone has taken Roger Ashby to the very top. CHUM-FM's Roger, Rick and Marilyn is Toronto's highest-rated morning show. But Ashby didn't always command such a large listenership. In fact, his first radio audience consisted of only two people - his mom and dad.
'My father built a mock radio station in the basement,' he remembers, 'pretty much like a real radio studio with turntables on one side and a tape machine on the other and a microphone in front of me.
LINK: aircheck Roger Ashby & Mike Holland Morning Show on 1050 CHUM April 26,
Roger Ashby & Mike Holland Morning Show on 1050 CHUM April 26, 1985
From Adam Greenberg in Toronto comes this vintage 1985 CHR ‘check of “HitRadio” 1050 CHUM. The HitRadio monikker was used at a lot of U.S. stations in the 80s, and here’s Canada’s first Top 40 station also using it.
One of the great things about CHUM was the fact that they stayed with CHR for a long time after most American AM stations had moved on to other things. Part of it likely was the fact that Canada’s version of the FCC, the CTRC, really kept the AM band going… for one thing, the government licenses FORMATS to stations, something the free market-minded USA wouldn’t ever go for. Canadian listeners can elaborate further by commenting on this aircheck.
LINK TO SITE AND AIRCHECK AUDIO TRACKS
Roger Ashby & Mike Holland Morning Show on 1050 CHUM April 26 ...
Jackson Armstrong, 1050 CHUM Toronto June, 1968