Rock 104 Going Country

The University of Florida has announced that its powerful FM commercial station on 103.7, WRUF-FM, will change its format from hard rock to country, starting next week. And this week will mark the end of it carrying the grossly offensive morning talk show Lex and Terry.

Getting Lex and Terry out of there was no doubt the result of the intense public opposition to it, although probably a lot of the public were devoted listeners. Since I was one of those opposed to the negative demographic stereotypes promoted in it, I was glad to see this show at least leave Gainesville radio. Not that another station won't pick it up for their morning lineup. But at least UF won't be responsible for it anymore.

As for the switch to country music, the idea was to raise WRUF's sagging ratings. And Gainesville and its surrounding communities have a large audience for country music. So I'm cool with the format change, although I think changing to more college-oriented alternative/independent rock music would have been more appropriate.

This doesn't mean that now another commercial station won't fill in the rock & roll vacuum created by Rock 104's departure and change its own format. But that remains to be seen. In any event, none of this affects me very much as I get my music from the Internet anyway.

Oh, by the way, Rock-104 will still be broadcast on the Internet, if anyone is actually interested. I'm not.