The first day of Fall. After the warm temperatures we've had lately, it's officially sweater weather! I'll admit this is not my favorite time of year. Now I do enjoy hoodies, hot chocolate, hayrides and Halloween; but not what we are headed toward. With my schedule, it's sad when it starts getting dark about 3 hours after I get up for the day! My favorite time year is Spring and Summer because it's getting warmer, staying light later, and you can be outside without freezing to death! 

I know I have to accept it. When we get to the first of winter, I will tell you a story (and show you a picture) from this past winter and the nightmare I had. Until then, thoroughly enjoy the colorful leaves and the football games.

Don't get the runaround. 

There is a lot going on with Jon Langston Tonight (9/22) at The Dusty Armadillo, Browns/Steelers, Guardians/Sox, and tomorrow is Friday! Wheww!

There is a very important date that you DO NOT WANT TO PASS YOU BY (or lap you! :)   FRIDAY 9/23/22!!!   

That is the last date you can register for The WQMX 5Kay on October 8th and still get a Race Shirt.   

Yes, you can still register to run or walk at Maize Valley Winery and Craft Brewery on 619 in Hartville, October 8th presented by Great Lakes Honda and WBNX-TV 55. 

Make note: If you register after Friday 9/23 you will not receive a Race Shirt.   Go Register NOW and insure your WQMX 5Kay Shirt by Clicking Here.

Net proceeds will benefit WQMX Bosom Buddies, which helps provide free mammograms for those who can't afford them.

The 4th annual WQMX 5Kay, happening Saturday, October 8th, brought to you by Great Lakes Honda, WBNX-TV, Maize Valley Winery & Craft Brewery, Get Fit 24/7 and The Dusty Armadillo!

Let me introduce you to my fur child, my furever toddler. His name is Buttercup and I love him dearly! Here is the backstory of how he came to live with me.

I was coming home from work one night and found him sitting on my front stoop. I went inside and told my ex boyfriend to grab some cat food and water and come outside with me. We fed him and sat with him for about 45 minutes. He was so friendly and we felt awful for him. The next afternoon, we were sitting on our Florida room and my ex spotted him in our backyard. We decided that we were bringing him inside and would try to find his home. We took him to the vet and got him his shots. We were not able to find his home, so we adopted him permanently. 

Ever since, I have been his human. He loves to sit in my lap and cuddle with me. He is a HUGE talker and the two of us have very deep conversations, often about world affairs ;) lol. Buttercup is a wonderful companion. I am a huge supporter of animal rights and the "adopt, don't shop" mantra. I cannot imagine life without animals in my home. <3

I have to admit with Fall Official tomorrow (9-22-22), I do not feel like it is football season.  It's not because of the implosion that happened last Sunday either.   To me it is still baseball season especially when the Guardian's Magic Number is 9... 

The Browns are in a short week, and a Rivalry Week!  So the news of Clowney out already and Bitonio, Conklin and Garrett up in the air (but expected to play) the squad maybe missing some key players.  The Steelers Offensive woes have continued from last year and with their loss of Watt.  I think they will struggle to get in the endzone and maybe defend it.  It seemed like Nick Chubb had more touchdowns last week than the Steelers do on offense this year...

If the Browns need some spiritual help they might have made a call to the Ghostbusters...   It looks like their new dogs that they will apparently have the players run onto the field really look like The Gatekeeper and The Keymaster...  I think this game will "GOZAR" the Browns way but after last Sunday, I am not putting a prediction down...   Who you gonna call??   In the game of course...

New addition to #Browns GameDay… the players will be running out next to these pups. (I’m not sure they have names yet…) pic.twitter.com/WxlLKFfUiv

— Aditi Kinkhabwala (@AKinkhabwala) September 18, 2022

I'll try to keep this as short as possible. This week marks my 9th anniversary here at WQMX's parent company Rubber City Radio Group! I've known this is what I wanted to do since I was 10 years old - 25 years ago!! (YIKES). I was lucky enough to have an internship class at Stow High School that got me an internship with the Akron Public Schools' station, as well as with a radio reading station for the blind community owned by Goodwill Industries.

In college I had people at my internship try to talk me out of a career in broadcasting. I knew that if I didn't at least try it, I would kick myself for the rest of my life! About 18 months after graduating from The Ohio Center for Broadcasting (now Ohio Media School), I was hired at our sister station WAKR to work sports and talk shows. Next, out of the blue, I got an opportunity to work a weekend here at WQMX and haven't looked back! That was four years ago. About three years ago, I achieved my dream job and get to play the best country music for you five days a week. I love my job and can't imagine doing anything else!!

The Akron Marathon is this weekend!  Along with the Half Marathon and the Team Relay on Saturday.  If you are participating we wish you the best of luck.  You can find out all you need to know for the marathon by Clicking Here.

For those not running the race(s) you maybe impacted by the road closures...

For Road Closures: 

Friday:

South High - From East Mill to East Market at 6:30pm

South Main - Bowery to Buetchel at 9am

Saturday has an array of closings some at certain times which you can find by Clicking Here.

Again good luck, enjoy our great city and everyone be safe.

Blake Shelton was a guest today on The Kelly Clarkson Show and Kelly harmonized with him on his first big hit "Austin". Check it out below! 

Box Office Results - The Woman King  -   (19 Million)

New This Week - Avatar -  (Back in theaters)  -  Don't Worry Darling

New NEXT Week - Smile / Bros / Hocus Pocus 2 (Disney Plus)

Reminder - October 14 — Halloween Ends with Jamie Lee Curtis

This Weekend – Check out my Country Music Memory Lane  (link)   Dwight Yoakam

When it was brought up that the WQMX Crew would be rolling into Progressive Field for a Team Building Night.  
I imagined "Trust Falls", "Puns" and "Dad Jokes"... lotsa Dad Jokes!   There was a lot of that, minus the "trust falls".   The Guardian's Games are so much fun.  They are playing each game at such a high level and hopefully continue the winning into and thru the playoffs. 

Here at 94.9 WQMX we have such a great team.  It was a fun night at cheering on another great team at the ballpark.  We have the best fans in the world, YOU!   It was great to see another group of fans cheering on their team as well!   Almost got 2 whole games in one on Saturday Night...

GO GUARDS!!!!

  Last week I featured Randy Travis and how his impact was immense on the future of Country Music in 1986, essentially saving the genre. Dwight Yoakam was right there with him.  And from my seat when these two showed up, everything changed for country.  Dwight Yoakam had a bevy of really great songs, but who he was, was just as important.  Dwight Yoakam was good for us in so many ways, the music was just one of them.

His Break Through Song!

As Urban Cowboy was running out of gas, we were at a pivotal point in our genre. Do we continue to record, release, market, and play the same stuff that was stagnant, vanilla and not really loved by fans, or do we go in a very different direction?  Travis' Storms of Life  album shifted the direction of the format for years to come, as did Yoakam's Guitars And Cadillacs.  Musically the two were entirely different, and in style and image as well.  But the one thing they totally had in common was they were new, young, and here to make an incredible difference.  They arrived at about the same time, the right time, they just took very different paths. 

This Was A Very Popular Song!

Yoakam for the most part grew up in Columbus, Ohio where he went to school and eventually enrolled in Ohio State, but that didn't last long.  He was heavily influenced by the music he grew up listening to on Columbus country radio, and what he saw on TV.  Elvis, and others to be exact.  He moved to Nashville in the early 80's and was told he was too honky-tonk, too bluegrass, too rockabilly, in short, he was just too much - period.  You see, country was very safe in those days. My first number of years in country radio there were safe pop sounding songs from mostly established older artists and no one new was finding us, listening to us, and most of all enjoying us.  We were officially "non-fun"  and "non risk taking" overall and we all were concerned. We were treading water.

A Former Elvis Hit One Of His Heroes - Big For DW

Yoakam moved to California where he embraced the Bakersfield sound, and eventually found the ear of Reprise Records and recorded an "EP" at that time with some songs Yoakam had written and a couple of covers. It would become the iconic, Guitars and Cadillacs, and it was a huge success.  I emceed a live show with Yoakam right at his beginning, as Honky Tonk Man was just finding its way to the charts.  It was at some big club in Columbus, and I was doing mornings at WRMZ FM-100 Country there, we were the sister station to WMNI, the station Yoakam had grown up with as a kid.  We had done shows there a few times with a local legendary group called, McGuffey Lane, all great guys.  (They were sort of the Michael Stanley of Columbus, in how much they were loved)  The place was mobbed, I mean jammed, with people seemingly hanging from the rafters to see Yoakam play.   He was different, and you could feel and see it.

With One Of His Idols - Legendary Buck Owens  #1   (This Song Was A Big Moment In His Run) 

Yoakam was this new avant garde hybrid with his look and way.  He was a new deal with a low riding hat, tighter than tight jeans that had holes in them, pointed boots, un-tucked shirt, jean waist jacket with some kind of rhinestones, and other stones lining the seams of his clothes with leather straps hanging off his sleeves, and some strange handmade belt worn low.  All of that unheard of at the time, common place later.  He had some Elvis type moves, a rockabilly singing delivery, and was just - cool.  That's the best way I can describe it.  The music was a bit loud, with a band that looked nothing like any country backup band I had ever seen.  The music was also respectful of his heroes well before him, and we knew that was his passion, and loved him for it.  We believed him, and that's a BIG DEAL for any country singer. He was on to something, it was new and really fun. It was a new day.

Huge Hit  - Grammy Award Winner

Gone were the freshly pressed leisure suits of the day with badly died hair, capped teeth, long necklaces with wide open collars, and boots with no hat or anything else that was up to date. And also gone were the perceived "fake cowboys" of country where the big belt buckle and occasional hat wasn't fooling anyone anymore.  This was a new kind of country star.  And to me, along with the incredible music, that is the real gift Yoakam brought us. 

A Real Yoakam Favorite

As where musically Randy Travis was politely asking Urban Cowboy to kindly step aside so others could play too, Yoakam seemed to give them the old heave-ho by the seat of their polyester pants, and Jordache jeans.  Yoakam's music in many ways was a throwback to an era gone by, but it had a thump, it was traditional, loud, brash and more in your face, all being delivered by a guy in a very cool and new kind of get up and approach. He really helped begin the change of the stage show for country, another great gift.  We were not just standing at the mic anymore.

Great Song  - Cool Video

DW would enjoy a number of years of really good success in country.  There are those who had more number one songs, and so on, but he was loved. His music was as distinct as he was.  You knew it was him on the radio and I always feel that is the mark of a really great artist, the one that can cut through.  His look which was  -  and is -  distinctly his.  It directly led to others in the years straight ahead to be more as daring, different and new.  Yoakam made us far more adventurous.  And at the beginning, we could have played him and Travis about 10 times an hour and no one would have minded. 

Big Concert Song For Him

Yoakam opened up the minds of those reluctant to do so, while easing the minds of those longing for a new traditional country sound, and he brought us new listeners who decided to give us a try after seeing and hearing him.  He was right there with Randy Travis closing out the Urban Cowboy pop country era for the newer traditionalists that were on the way.  He is a Grammy winner, a CMA and ACM winner going on to sell close to 30 million albums which was unheard of then.  He also was the very first country artist to EVER to have videos played on MTV.  He was that cool and different.  Acting was ahead as you know and he became re-famous in Hollywood doing great work there.

Later Yoakam - Different But Still Really Cool -

Dwight Yoakam to me is a very important player in the evolution of a far more modern country music landscape.  He broke down a bunch of barriers and was daring enough musically and style wise to help change the direction of country music and its future entertainers.  In the last few decades, he is one of the most respected artists we have had.  He was accepted by artists from many genres as a real innovative artist.  In a different way, he was as pivotal as Travis  - and for us he was right on time.

Dwight Yoakam - A true trailblazer.