Yes, I remember visiting Toowoomba many times in the 90’s with a quality AM ST car radio, often zips and zing from electrical noise and yes, great when it wasn’t.
I think 4AK and 4GR were in stereo, they were the only music stations to listen to.
What was 4WK like back in the 80s?
It never seemed to have much cut through in that part of the world, I never hear about it being fondly remembered like 4AK or 4GR is.
These days being a Caralis station, we all know it’s not much to write home about now!
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A little bit of history from 1994, adding some missing stuff between the “Kix 106” era and the ARN/Austereo joint venture era.
Screencap via Network Ten (well, Capital really but same diff at the time) from an NBL game on 28th May 1994 between the Canberra Cannons and the Geelong Supercats; a random game I’ve been watching in the NBL.tv archive: a courtside sponsor board for “Canberra FM 106.3”:
[Pardon the jaggies; obviously analog era TV scaled up doesn’t look that great 
]
Does anyone who grew up in Canberra remember this “Canberra FM 106.3” branding and how long it lasted?
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I don’t recall anything of the format itself but here is another copy of the logo, this was from late 1994.
This logo also marked the change in official call-sign from 2KIX to 1CBR
Thanks for that! I guess there is a lot of mention about the original Kix 106 and of course the change to Mix 106.3, but I guess that was the first time I’d actually heard of a brand in-between.
I should’ve done my own research, as I remember the National Library having Canberra Times up to 1995 online - apparently it lasted two years.
Kix (which had a pretty dire time of it against FM104.7 and even Kix’s co-owned 2CC) was killed off and Canberra FM reportedly started on 12 Feb 1994, in time for the first survey of the year:
Apart from a new station identity, the music format has also changed, with Capital City [Broadcasters, ARN’s licensee name in Canberra at the time] making a concerted effort to attract a more adult audience. According to the new station manager, Stephen Pead, Canberra FM will enable its listeners to, “Take it easy with the best mix of music from the '70s, '80s and today”. (Canberra Times TV Guide, 07 Feb 1994).
A report from a couple of days prior had mentioned that ARN’s TT-FM was to be the source of the new format - so it actually beat out the launch of Mix 106.5 in Sydney by about three months. (Coincidentally, by New Year’s Eve 1994, 2CC - which was still based off the old 2UW format - had been sold off to 2XL/2GN, letting ARN focus on 106.3.)
These were their promos in 1995:
At this point they were still 106.3 Canberra FM… but they were already starting by then to emphasise the Mix name from their parent’s newborn 106.5 in Sydney (hatched the previous year).
By October it sounds like they were in transition mode as I see references in the Canberra Times to Mix 106.3 Canberra FM, though by the end of 1995 it appeared still fairly interchangeable in common usage - the CT was referring to them just as “106.3 Canberra FM” but a Woden Plaza ad had “Mix 106.3”, so it’s probably safe to assume that they changed it in time for the 1996 ratings season.
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Thanks TV-E, and thanks too Spi.
I knew of Canberra FM but never got to hear it, so I had always wondered what kind of music they played, but that ad gives me a pretty good idea ie. a lot like the original version of MIX106.5, and somewhat similar to what Smooth FM is like.
As a final note: Wikipedia happily notes the joint venture happened “in the mid-1990s” (grain of salt of course). Took place during 1997; then-Austereo GM Peter Harvie “who will be appointed chairman of the joint-venture company for the first 12 months, said the group would dispose of 2CA immediately.” [The Age, 20 Mar 1997].
Given RG Capital (as a business name) looks like it was started up early 1998 [considering their business name’s still registered in QLD], presumably the sale of 2CA in 1997 (possibly early 1998) was what started that whole name up. (I wonder whether Reg Grundy bought 2XL/2GN/2CC separately from 2CA or whether 2XL bought 2CA first… hmm.)
@Radiohead You’re welcome 
The old style of Mix/TT-FM was actually quite a pleasure to listen to. I had positive memories from an early trip to Melbourne in 2000 when TT-FM was played a lot in the parents’ car… they were normally a 2WS listener but didn’t get as far as Gold 104! Certainly a far cry from what Mix became by the late 2000s/early 2010s, let alone the Kiis of today.
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Thanks again.
I always thought TT-FM was a more up tempo, pop focussed music format than MIX or Canberra FM.
But then that is based on a rather limited listen I had in the very early TT-FM days, when they were still simulcasted on 1026 AM in the weeks after converting to FM (which I picked up via night skip here in Newcastle), as they had a “Top 20” countdown on.
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Speaking of which, here’s the first 101 minutes (1:41 hours) of TTFM after it converted to FM on 24th June 1990: http://frankster.zanyspace.com/?p=4684
They were branded as a “Classic Hits” station back then, whilst KZFM (later Gold 104) was more of a “Hits & Memories” station.
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They were at the time they converted to FM but then became more of a pop music format (sort of a lighter version of Fox FM) as Radiohead mentioned. It was actually a good workplace format because it wasn’t quite as young and poppy as Fox but also not as old and daggy as Gold 104. Was sort of happily somewhere in between.
TTFM was a strong brand in Melbourne, even managing to hit #1 a couple of times in the mid-1990s, but never really recovered after becoming Mix 101.1, possibly also not helped by the arrival of Nova at around that time.
Probably explains why they never became Triple T, and that it may then have been too similar in name to Triple M.
Possibly. By the time 1990 came around we had Triple M, Triple J, Triple R (community station) and even Triple Z (a multicultural station). Probably the last thing Melbourne needed was another “triple” 
And TT was still a fairly fresh brand in Melbourne, having only been initiated in 1988 from what was left of the old 3DB.
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Identity-wise they were just carrying over the relatively new “3TT” name as TVAU alluded to (legally they are 3TTT), but also consider that there was a Triple T in Hobart - later Sea and now Hit 100.9 - which started in 1990 and that had an Austereo minority interest.
If 3TT had wishes to go “Triple T”, the Hobart Triple T beat them out by three months (March vs June 1990). I do definitely remember it being a little more “poppy” than Mix Sydney (their sounder from when I was there in 2000 still sticks to mind, almost semi-urban sounding, “TT-FM is where I wanna be”); which kinda makes sense given how long it took for Fox FM to take in the 2Day FM format (not until mid-decade).
TTFM was a great brand, music was good and it had strong community links through the good friday appeal.
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There was probably no reason they couldn’t have both had TTT branding – given there was no overlap between them and were very different markets and operations. But retaining the Double T name on-air probably made better commercial sense.
And once it became Mix its involvement in the Good Friday Appeal was essentially downgraded. No wonder 3AW was ready to pounce on that when the opportunity arose.
I agree it made good business sense seeing TT was only a couple years old (and likewise with KZ-FM before it turned Gold), but who knows - just made me ponder about the argument over the name “Heart” (which also involved Tasmanian stations, coincidentally) last decade, for instance.
modern-day networking and the opportunity to have national brands I suppose are a lot more prevalent now with networks being as widespread as they are. In 1990 it just wasn’t really a consideration.
A network name is good when it can work - but not when it means hurting local stations, Mix was a disaster in Melbourne.
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