Cleveland alternative radio station 107.9 The End finds online revival

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- It’s not the end for 107.9 The End. Popular alternative radio station WENZ-FM 107.9 The End, which operated from 1992 until 1999, has returned with an online format run by a past program director.

You can listen to the new version of The End through the Live365 app or through an online stream.

Dan Binder served as the program director of WENZ 107.9 The End from January of 1998 until May of 1999, taking over the role from previous program director Sean Robertson. In 1999, WENZ was purchased by Radio One, which relaunched the station with a new format under the name Kiss 107.9, and later Z 107.9. The station remains popular today as a hip-hop and R&B-focused channel.

But fans of the old alternative station remain, many having grown up on The End’s mix of alternative, grunge and rock music.

“The station has had a huge history,” Binder said. “It has a humongous cult following even though it’s been off the air for 20 years.”

Though Binder was the program director for only about a year and a half, his time at the station stuck with him.

“We did some really great radio, and we put on a great festival,” he said. “It was a really special time in my career. We did a lot of good things for the city.”

Binder continued to work in radio, and he currently serves as the director of digital and online research for P1 Media, a radio research consulting company. He currently lives in North Carolina.

Binder looked back on his radio days in Cleveland and wanted to revive the old station. He decided to launch an online version of WENZ 107.9 The End as a hobby.

“While this might not be on any real frequency in the city, we have a lot of technology that we can do lots of different things that we didn’t have in 1998. Technology has changed a lot in 22 years,” he said. “I think when we went off the air in May of 1999, we never had a proper goodbye.”

Binder hasn’t hired any on-air personalities and has been running The End’s operations himself. The mix of music is similar to what it was in the ‘90s -- alternative music from the late ‘70s until today, with a variety of indie-rock, pop-rock and alternative rock. Artists featured include Imagine Dragons, R.E.M., Matt Maeson, Coldplay, Meg Myers, Linkin Park and more.

“The End prided itself on new artists, and all of the older artists, too. They had such a long history of playing that stuff. I thought it’d be really important to continue with that tradition,” Binder said. “Not that we’re going to break artists, but to expose them as much as I can, and also playing stuff that people haven’t heard in a long time.”

Binder also plans to include local music by Cleveland bands and artists in the near future.

Though Binder is the only person running The End’s online presence right now, he may look at hiring additional help down the road. He remains optimistic about the format, even though WENZ 107.9 couldn’t make it past the ‘90s, with other alternative radio stations meeting the same unfortunate fate.

“Broadcasters in general, I think they think running alternative formats can be risky because they don’t know how to monetize it,” he said. “That’s not really true. It is easy to monetize it. It’s just a matter of getting the right staff there.”

You can find more information about WENZ 107.9 The End at its newly launched Facebook page.

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