This aircheck begins with true Top 40 promise, but quickly drifts into oblivion. Despite the genuine PAMS jingles, KYA, a pioneering San Francisco Top 40, had real trouble projecting a desirable brand name just ten years after their initial success as a Bay Area Top 40. This (scoped) half-hour creates the impression that all the genius of their initial direction had been lost.
Yes, we have hot PAMS jingles, but we don’t play them often. Yes, we play Top 40, but even though it is 1970, we never play two records back to back. Sometimes, we identify the station when we play a record, and we play everything from the Marvelettes to Leon Russell, (“Future Heavies”) and we play Preparation H spots directly into “Hitchin’ A Ride”. It’s not necessarily the music or content, or the talent that is disappointing – it’s the presentation. There is no sense of station.
The GOOD news (I think) is that Pete McNeal went on to KHJ, from 1970 to 1972, so he survived this uncomfortable experience in the “Mysterious World of KYA”.