After 36 years, Galaxy Media founder Ed Levine is handing his Syracuse and Utica stations to Pamal Broadcasting. He looks back on 95X, a $500,000 lesson, and why the car dashboard is radio’s biggest fight.
Ed Levine was 12 years old when he picked his first fight with a radio legend.
Growing up outside New York City, he lived on WABC. Every Tuesday night at 8 o’clock, Cousin Brucie counted down the hits, and young Ed kept score.
“I would sit there religiously by the radio, and I would keep track of the songs,” Levine said. “And then what I would do at the end of the year, I would produce my top 50 or so songs of the year, and I would do a point total. If it came in number one for one week, that was 10 points. If it came in number two for two weeks, that was 18 points, and so on and so forth.”
His math crowned “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” by B.J. Thomas. WABC crowned “Hey Jude.” So the kid did what any future broadcaster would do. He told the boss he was wrong.
“This punk kid from Yonkers, New York, sends a very detailed letter to the great Rick Sklar, saying, ‘You got it wrong, man. Here’s my point total,'” Levine said. “Handwritten letter, in 12-year-old handwriting. And what I got was a nice little note from him and a copy of their countdown of the year. I’m sure he was very bemused by the letter. But that was my first point where I really paid attention to the radio.”
From there, he followed his generation to FM — first WPLJ, which he called “the starter drug,” and then the legendary WNEW-FM. “That’s really where my love for the business came in,” he said.
Decades later, Levine is still keeping score. On October 1, Pamal Broadcasting took over day-to-day operations of Galaxy Media’s Syracuse and Utica stations under an LMA, pending FCC approval. It closes a 36-year chapter for the company Levine founded — and opens a new one for him.
The Talent Pool at WAER
Levine picked Syracuse University for one reason: the radio station. In the 1970s, student-run WAER was turning out future broadcasters and record executives at a remarkable clip.
“When I was in college, on the radio side, it was myself, Ted Utz, who had a legendary career at WMMR and WNEW, Dan Neer, who was a fixture on New York radio for many years, and legendary music executives, the late Phil Quartararo, John Sykes,” Levine said. “That was our talent pool. We didn’t know it at the time, but it was some of the best people in broadcasting. And when the bar is that high, it makes you better faster. A lot of us were roommates, but we still were competitive with each other. And I think that led to a lot of the success that we had in forthcoming years.”
After graduation, the goal was simple. “Forget the owning radio stations part. That’s way later,” he said. “My goal was to get on the radio.”
Small Signal, Big Lesson
The break came when Craig Fox and his partners landed a rare open FM frequency. In 1978, they put WAQX — 95X — on the air.
“Syracuse at the time was probably the largest market in the country without a rock and roll station,” Levine said. “We filled that hole, and we did it with a 3,000-watt station. We shot to the top of the ratings.”
Across the street sat a 100,000-watt sleeping giant owned by the Newhouse family. It woke up fast.
“They basically said, ‘Okay, kiddies, thank you for showing us that the hole’s there and the hole’s real. Now step aside, because here comes the big boy,'” Levine recalled.
The giant debuted at No. 1 with an 8.7 share. But 95X didn’t collapse. It dipped to about a 5.5 share, then climbed back to a 6.4 within 18 months, even as the competitor rose to a 13.6.
“We just created new audiences because we were so competitive with each other,” Levine said.
Then Dick Ferguson, who ran the Newhouse radio side, asked a smart question. Why fight over black T-shirts and bar nights when there’s a gigantic AC hole sitting right there? He flipped the station to hot AC. It debuted at No. 1 again, and 95X eventually rose into double digits. This August marked 48 years since that station signed on.
“It was a lesson in economics for me,” Levine said. “He with the biggest ratings isn’t necessarily making the most money, and that proved to be true later on in my career.”
The $500,000 Afternoon
Like a lot of rock stations back in the day, Galaxy had a signature branded festival — the K-Rockathon. Levine called those events “the 13th month,” because all of a sudden, all this money came in. Until it didn’t.
“One year we got a little too cute for the room, and lost a little touch with the audience, and expenses went out of control,” he said. “We went from making, I believe, about a quarter of a million dollars one year in profit to losing a quarter of a million dollars the next year. That’s a $500,000 swing. And for those of you that are reading this in New York or Chicago, you might say, ‘Well, big deal.’ Well, in Utica, New York, that’s a big swing of money.”
His relationship with the bank kept Galaxy standing.
“We busted every covenant known to man,” Levine admitted. “But the one thing I did that turned out to pretty much save our butt was I kept them informed of where we were along the way. So when the thing did half the numbers of the year before, that was not a shock to them.”
The economics of concerts had shifted under radio’s feet, too.
“The band that was playing casinos and charging 50 to $60,000 — ‘Oh, you want them at your festival? That’ll be $120,000,'” he said. “We’d spend three or $400,000 on talent. Now that might get you one significant band. This is the band’s main gig now. It’s not their side piece. And I don’t know that the radio guys have figured that out, or did figure it out in time.”
So Galaxy pivoted to lifestyle events. Levine bought Taste of Syracuse outright — customer list, brand, logos, all of it. “As far as I know, we were the first… to purchase an event, an ongoing successful event,” he said. Galaxy also partnered with Onondaga County on Lights on the Lake and later bought the Syracuse Nationals, the largest car show in the Northeast.
The Dashboard Problem
Ask Levine for advice to people in the business, and he starts with honesty.
“The uncertainty can be paralyzing, but it also can be invigorating,” he said. “The old paradigms don’t exist anymore. There are no clear markers to how you get there.”
He’s genuinely impressed by AI tools, which he says can turn out market research in three minutes that once took weeks. He’s also clear-eyed that the same technology will replace jobs. But the issue that keeps him up at night is the car.
“For a long time, I was the guy saying radio has a terrible image, and we just have to clean up our image and everything’s going to be fine,” Levine said. “Well, guess what? That was wrong. We have a problem, and it’s a usage problem. You get into a car now, and good luck finding a local radio station.”
He sees AM radio’s protected spot in vehicles as a win that could come with a catch.
“My fear is that Congress is going to say to the NAB, ‘Hey, you got your AM clean. Don’t get greedy now,'” he said. “I’m skeptical. Was this a Trojan horse all along? I think the real Trojan horse is that they’re very quietly taking FM radio out of the cars.”
The core of radio’s appeal, he argues, was always simple.
“Even when we weren’t great, we were free, and we were easy to find,” Levine said. “The manufacturers have told us, ‘You’re in the car. What’s the problem?’ Yeah, you’re in the car, but it takes you a minute and a half to find the damn thing. The ease to find us in the car is disappearing, and nobody talks about that.”
Still, he’s not writing radio’s obituary. He’s putting it in context.
“There’s nothing strange going on here that hasn’t gone on for the last 100 or 150 years in business,” he said. “Things continue to evolve. There’s been a constant evolution of media. Now it’s happening faster than ever, and I think all of us in the radio business have to ask ourselves the honest question, which is, where do we fit in?”
A Glove-Like Fit
When it came time to sell, Levine knew exactly who he wanted. He’s known Pamal founder Jim Morrell since Morrell bought his first station in Albany.
“He was a well-known car dealer in the Albany market at the time, and all of us really smart guys in radio were like, who’s this car dealer thinking he’s going to become a radio guy?” Levine said. “Well, guess what? 40 years later, he’s proven he’s a pretty damn smart car dealer, and he’s not a car dealer. He’s a legitimate radio guy. He’s a broadcaster’s broadcaster.”
“Galaxy’s had one owner, the founder, me, for 36 years,” he added. “For the employees, for the advertisers, and for the listeners, there’s no buyer that would fit like a glove like Pamal does for Galaxy, and vice versa.”
Events First, Radio Second
Levine just turned 70. He’s in Charlotte now, talking from his man cave in shorts with his dog beside him. And he’s not done.
“My mind feels like it’s 30,” he said. “But when I look at the actuary table, I don’t have 20 years to build an event.”
So he’s flipping his own playbook.
“I built a radio group first, and then said, ‘Okay, what events can I actually own to blend with this?'” Levine explained. “Now I would say, ‘Let me buy a really good or start a really good event, and then is there any local media I can add to it to make it better?'”
He sees opportunity in a niche that reminds him of radio 30 years ago — successful local events run by a staff of three or four, often by owners ready to cash out.
“Mom and pop run it really well for 20 years, so they made a lot of money,” he said. “But now all of a sudden, they’re 60, and they’re looking at how do I monetize this?”
“We’re not trying to book Taylor Swift at Bank of America Stadium,” he added. “We’re not trying to be AEG. But we’re trying to have a little bit more sizzle than a local city fair. The tickets are 30, 40, or $50, but you’re offering real quality for it.”
Fifty-some years after telling Rick Sklar he got the countdown wrong, Ed Levine is still running the numbers — and still betting on the next hit.
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