All Disco WMGE

Disco at least in name, is a four-letter word.

It was heinous, unnecessary, implacable and vile. It was an outlier, a lone straggler two decades behind a trend. Of course today it is forgotten, 103.5 WMGE in Fort Lauderdale, Florida was playing an all-disco format in late 1999. It was only in January of 2003 they gave up the ghost and went urban changing calls to WMIB.

In 1995 they were a simple AOR station, with the calls WSHE. The ratings took a nosedive, times were a-changing. In 1996 they became "The Planet" changing calls to WPLL. The playlist mixed Hot AC and some alt rock. Clear Channel bought the station fro Paxon Communications and tried an evil experiment, ALL-DISCO. On Tuesday July 13th 1999 that they launched "Hits of the 70s" and went disco with the new calls WMGE. They changed brands to 'Mega 103.'

They did mix in some disposable mid 1980s pop like the Human League, but they still kept a large number of disco singles in rotation like the Brothers Johnson's "Strawberry Letter 23" and the Andrea True Connection's "More, More, More." The biz struggled with the obstinance unsure of what to call the format: Urban Oldies? Rhythmic Oldies? Thankfully it went away before we had to decide.