CKGM


CKGM is an English-language AM radio station in Montreal, Quebec, owned by Bell Media Radio. Formerly an affiliate of sports radio network "The Team," it was one of three stations to retain the sports format after the network folded in 2002 until it switched to the TSN Radio branding in October 2011. CKGM has been an all-sports station since May 2001. Its studios and offices are located on René Lévesque Boulevard East in Downtown Montreal.
On September 4, 2012, CKGM officially began broadcasting on 690 kHz, as a non-directional clear-channel Class A station. It runs the maximum power permitted for Canadian AM stations, 50,000 watts. By day, CKGM can be heard from Ottawa to Sherbrooke and across the border into New York State and Vermont. At night, its signal covers much of Eastern North America. Its transmitter is located near Mercier. CKGM is also heard on the HD3 subchannel of CITE-FM. CKGM is carried nationally on Bell Satellite TV satellite channel 985.
While it was still broadcasting at 980 kHz, CKGM was known for being a legendary and influential Top 40/CHR radio station from 1970 to 1986. From 1941 until 1999, AM 690 in Montreal was the home of CBF, the flagship station of the CBC's French-language radio network, now known as Ici Radio-Canada Première.

Current programming

CKGM airs local shows on weekdays, with TSN Radio programming heard evenings and weekends, and ESPN Radio programming late nights. Local shows include Melnick in the Afternoon with Mitch Melnick and Jon Still, Campbell vs Gallo with Sean Campbell and Mitch Gallo from 10am-2pm. The Morning Show with Conor McKenna and Shaun Starr, and The Starters with Simon Tsalikis & Joey Alfieri. These shows mainly focus on Montreal Canadiens analysis, especially during hockey season, but also address all the major sports in North America.
CKGM is the English-language flagship station for the Canadiens, with lengthy pre and post-game coverage for each game. TSN Radio 690 also carries network national feeds of the NFL and the World Junior Hockey Championships. CKGM, as part of the TSN Radio Network, also has rights for The British Open golf, U.S. Open Tennis, major world soccer championships, and NBC Sunday Night Football.
On June 22, 2011, Bell Media announced it had signed a deal with the Montreal Canadiens for CKGM to become the Canadiens' official English-language radio broadcaster for the next 7 seasons.

Live sports

TSN Radio 690 is the flagship station for the following teams' radio broadcasts:

Early days

CKGM was founded by Geoff Stirling and opened on December 7, 1959 with its downtown studio address at 1455 Drummond St. The station was then on 980 kHz with a power of 10,000 watts full-time as a class B station, using a directional antenna with different patterns day and night. The 980 frequency had been previously occupied by CKVL, before it moved to 850. While most of the station's programming was devoted to music, the station also had a number of open-line talk shows. CKGM 980 was very well listened to in its heyday of Top 40 hits in the Northern Vermont and Northern New York areas due to their proximity to Montreal.
On July 16, 1963, an FM sister station, CKGM-FM, later known as CHOM-FM starting in 1970. After a few weeks of simulcasting CKGM, the FM station adopted a beautiful music format on September 1.
In 1963, a Molotov cocktail was thrown through a window, but was faulty and did not ignite inside the studios. Only three people were in the studios at the late night hour, including Jim Turner, on the air in the control room just a few metres away.
In 1965, CKGM hired open-line host Pat Burns, famous for his controversial opinions, especially on language issues. Known in particular for featuring prominently on his show Francophones who were proud of being bilingual or of being assimilated to the Anglophone community, Burns would remain on the air until early 1969, resigning after a boycott campaign targeting the station's advertisers was launched. Burns was sufficiently controversial to be publicly denounced by Quebec Premier Daniel Johnson Sr., and the station received several bomb threats during the late 1960s.
In 1968, CKGM moved from 1455 Drummond in downtown Montreal to 1310 Greene in Westmount.
CKGM became the Montreal Expos' flagship for the baseball team's first season in Montreal in 1969.

Top 40 era

On January 1, 1970, CKGM changed its format to become a full-time Top 40 station. The ratings quickly climbed, with CKGM beating direct competitor CFOX, also a full-time Top 40 station, in the Fall 1970 BBM ratings. CKGM would quickly become one of North America's legendary AM Top 40 stations.
Legendary morning drive time host Ralph Lockwood, formerly of CFOX, made his debut on CKGM on October 2, 1972. He would remain with the station until late 1981.
In 1975, CKGM introduced "La Connection Française", referring to a trio of bilingual personalities which used both English and French on the air and played songs of both languages. As CKGM remained an English-language station, this resulted in French-language stations complaining to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission and even refusing to observe quotas of Francophone music. On-air bilingualism would remain a distinctive CKGM feature until stringent CRTC regulation forbidding it went into effect on January 1, 1980.
CKGM got a record-high number of listeners among English-language stations in Montreal according to the Fall 1976 BBM ratings that were released on December 13 of that year, thanks in part to the large numbers of Francophones who listened to the station.
During its Top 40 era, CKGM was one of a handful of Canadian radio stations to carry the syndicated countdown show American Top 40 with Casey Kasem.

Sale to CHUM Limited

On August 20, 1985, CKGM and sister station CHOM-FM were sold to CHUM Limited. CKGM switched its format to gold-based adult contemporary under the "Lite Rock, Less Talk", and "Favourites of Yesterday and Today" monikers a few months later, on January 15, 1986.
The station returned to a Top 40 format at 5 p.m. on February 10, 1989, changing its call sign to CHTX in an attempt to distance itself as far as possible from its earlier days as a Top 40 station that even included adopting a new phone number. CHTX identified itself on-air as 980 Hits, and also referred to itself as "the station that plays the most music allowed by law". Anecdotal evidence suggests that at least some listeners wondered if there was, in fact, a legal limitation on the number of songs radio stations can play.
On September 14, 1990, at 5 p.m., CHTX moved to 990 kHz, increasing its power to 50,000 watts full-time from a new transmitter site located in Ville Mercier, and converting itself to AM stereo. However, 990 was a class B frequency, requiring the station to use a directional antenna which is slightly directional during the day and extremely directional at night to protect clear channel stations CBW in Winnipeg, Manitoba and CBY in Corner Brook, Newfoundland and Labrador. The switch occurred one week later than initially scheduled, on orders from the federal Department of Communications, due to the "tense security situation" in the neighbouring Indian reserve of Kahnawake.
Another format change occurred at 6 a.m. on May 24, 1991, with the new format being oldies, although the station would also air Dr. Laura's syndicated advice show. The station changed its call sign to CKIS and identified itself as Oldies 990.
On January 15, 1996, the station returned to its original CKGM call sign, as the station moved to a talk radio format known as "Talk Radio With Attitude." The station aired mostly syndicated talk shows. For that reason, the station got low ratings, with fewer than 100,000 listeners. The CKIS call letters moved to a Calgary radio station formerly owned by Rawlco, and as of 2009, are now used on a Toronto radio station.
When the 1998 Ice Storm took place, CKGM continued to rely on automation, making few efforts to broadcast adapted emergency information. On January 9 of that year, competitor CJAD lost its broadcast towers due to the accumulation of ice. After that station moved temporarily to 1410 kHz using the former facilities of CFMB, CKGM leased its signal to CJAD on a temporary basis, starting on January 25, 1998. CJAD returned to 800 kHz on May 29, 1998, and after two weeks of simulcast, CKGM returned on June 12, 1998, at noon. The station took the opportunity to re-launch itself as a largely automated oldies station, again using the "Oldies 990" as its moniker.

The Team 990

In September 2000, shortly after the CRTC made changes to radio ownership regulations allowing a single company to own up to four stations in a market, CHUM announced it would trade CKGM and sister station CHOM-FM to Standard Broadcasting in exchange for CFWM-FM in Winnipeg. This move allowed Standard to acquire Winnipeg's CKMM-FM and CFQX-FM.
However, a few months later, the CKGM portion of the deal was cancelled. The company immediately announced that CKGM would be added to the list of CHUM-owned AM stations switching to an all-sports format on May 7, 2001, joining the new "The Team" network and identifying itself as "Team 990". CKGM became the radio flagship of the Montreal Expos a few days later, marking a return of baseball on English-language airwaves. The station would broadcast the last Expos' games as a Montreal franchise in 2004.
Even in the very last days before the switch to the new format, the largely automated CKGM continued to air a promo criticizing "those talk stations".
While most Team stations returned to music programming on August 27, 2002, CKGM was one of the few stations where the all-sports format survived, and locally produced programming was increased.
The Team 990 was anchored by the afternoon drive show hosted by Mitch Melnick. Its morning show featured veteran broadcaster Elliot Price and Shaun Starr. Former NHLer PJ Stock hosted his own program daily from 1-3pm. Stock, from 2010–2011, was part of the morning show at CHOM.
Other popular programs included the Delmar Cargo Habs Post Game show, which came on after each Montreal Canadiens game.
In the summer of 2007, Matthew Ross, host of Game Points, set a station record by hosting a 10.5-hour marathon program.