Traen Derailment at KQRS

KQRS-FM (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

KQRS (92.5 FM) is once again the center of controversy in the Twin Cities radio world, having said goodbye to popular personalities Terri Traen and Brian Zepp, both of whom had been hosting a late-afternoon show on the station for about a year.

Traen and Zepp had been regulars on "The KQ Morning Show", bantering with host Tom Barnard.  Traen's naive act did not sit well with Barnard, so she was the subject of many verbal put-downs that were less funny than mean spirited.  How she put up with it for three decades at KQ, we'll never know.

Judging by the comments on the local media's Facebook pages, most of those who posted blamed Barnard for Traen's ouster and vowed never to listen to KQ again.  Others bragged about not having listened for many years.

Isn't it also possible that Traen's and Zepp's show was canceled on its own merits?  From all reports (meaning we didn't listen to it either), the show was lacking artistically and in the ratings.

Barnard, meanwhile, has two more years to go on his contract at KQ.  He replaced Traen with Michelle Tafoya of NBC Sports, but otherwise things haven't changed much on the morning show.  Barnard still beats his chest over the issues of the day in a manner that would make Rush Limbaugh proud, talks about himself and his family, and plugs his separately-produced daily podcast.  The rest of his on-air crew react as if they were verbal bobbleheads.

Barnard's show used to be the most dominant on Twin Cities morning radio, to the point where every other station gave up trying to compete.  No longer.  The top-rated show is now "The Power Trip" on KFAN (100.3 FM).  Either this is an indication that the quality of morning radio has gone way down since Barnard started his show 30 years ago, or listeners have grown tired of him, or both.

Another familiar complaint is that KQ's classic rock format has devolved into playing the same number of songs from the same number of artists that were popular 40 or 50 years ago.  Classic rock has been a lucrative format for years, but is now becoming stale as more people find better music options and Baby Boomers are aging out of the 25-54 demographic.

Cumulus Media, KQ's parent company, has been accused of skimping on the hundreds of radio stations they own just so they could avoid bankruptcy.  So, for that matter, is iHeart Media.  CBS Radio is selling its stations to Entercom.  But as long as Cumulus still thinks KQ is making money in its current format, they don't see a reason to change.

Everyone who works in media gets fired at one time or another, and Terri Traen and Brian Zepp are no exception.  Maybe they'll find gainful employment somewhere else, maybe they won't.  But the years spent as well-known personalities at a top-rated rock station probably won't be duplicated.