Illinois Entertainer June 2015 | Page 14

By Rick Kaempfer LOW POWER, DEEP CUTS ark Zander has been around the le. "At first they looked me like, OK here's Chicago radio block. Among his this rock guy. Is he going to be able to hanten stops along the dial, he has dle playing the Carpenters? Is he going to hosted nights at the Loop and the old snicker? I think I surprised them. There are WCKG, and programmed the River a lot of songs here I like that I've just never 95.9FM in Naperville. But none of those admitted I liked – but now I can admit it previous gigs are like his current one. He's openly and publicly. (laughs) Yeah, I like now the man behind the music at a radio "Snowbird" by Anne Murray. Got a probstation broadcasting on a low-power tele- lem with that? " Me-TV FM is a streamlined operation – vision/analog FM radio frequency, attempting to provide a musical compan- only two employees are currently ion to a television network. That's a new employed at the station: Zander and the imaging director Michael Horn. There are one. Zander explains the origin of this a couple of very good reasons for that. The first, is obviously unusual operation, financial. "WGN sank MeTV, 87.7FM. "Neil a lot of resources into Sabin is the architect The Game (the previof MeTV, the hugely ous resident of this fresuccessful retro telequency) before they vision network, and were profitable, and he comes from a that's one of the rearadio background. sons they only lasted a He was at WLS and year. Weigel WIND back in the Broadcasting (owner '70s and has radio of Me-TV) is doing it coursing through his right – they're starting veins. It's always slow. It's a lean and been an idea of his to mean machine and create this companthey're giving it time ion to ME-TV on the to grow. Nobody does radio, music from the that. Everyone wants era of the retro shows results and they want Me-TV airs. That's them now. Weigel been bubbling under knows it's not going to for a long time, and Mark Zander work that way, and when 87.7 became available (it had previously aired "The they are perfectly willing to be patient." There's also a potential sword hanging Game") through Venture Technologies, he over their heads; one that is completely struck a deal and put on this format." And while Zander has been program- out of their control. The F.C.C. has been ming the station since early March, Sabin asked to make a decision regarding the is still very much involved. "Neil and I future of low-powered television signals come up with the music together," Zander like this one, and recently put it off again. admits. "When I started he handed me