One thing I encounter on some music blogs I read is an interest in old regional chart action. Back when there was much less homogeneity, radio stations across the country published their own ranked lists of the hottest pop songs in their market. In late 70s and early 80s Cincinnati, the gatekeeper Top 40 station was WKRQ (Q102). I still have fifty-one of Q102’s lists, ranging between September 26, 1977 and October 12, 1981 (they generally have a Monday date); I picked them up from a record store in the Florence Mall. The year most represented is 1980 (might have something to do with increased mobility, having just gotten my driver’s license), but I do have a number from 78, including the one from forty years ago today.
Initially, the most interesting thing to me are the big differences between the Cincy national scenes. Q102 favored Meat Loaf, Celebration (wow!–that’s a true obscurity today–Mike Love was moonlighting), and Linda Ronstadt. The highest national songs not listed here, comparing to the 6/24/78 Hot 100, are “Use Ta Be My Girl,” by the O’Jays, “Too Much, Too Little, Too Late,” from Johnny Mathis/Deniece Williams, and Peter Brown’s “Dance with Me.”
They were pretty casual about matching the exact song title (see Gibb, Loaf, Walsh, and Ronstadt). Another thing: it looks like they’d expanded their list to 35 songs only the week before (previously, there were 30).
Quick tours through my memory and a portion of my 45s show that Amy and I had bought the songs at #6, 22, 23, and 25, but I’m also somewhat of the belief that maybe we had #1 and 9 as well…
Since the paper is so thin that you can see through pretty well, I may as well show you the back:
Would have been a fun (and cheap) show!
The inspiration for posting this came from HERC, who writes frequently about what was hot on WLS in Chicago, and jb, who cites charts from around the country in many posts. It was fun to go digging through one of the bins in my basement for these. Others of them will likely appear from time to time!
The Music of My Life 
I would move to NKY about seven weeks after this. I listened to Q102 for my first week or so, then mistuned to WEBN and found it closer to my tastes. I actually think it’s funny that Q102 would have been involved with a lineup including Rainbow and the Dregs!
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