on August 23 of that year. Hosting the morning show was the popular Alex Bennett, who had left KMEL in a disagreement over station direction a few months earlier. KQAK was a personality-oriented album-oriented rock station for its first eight months of operation, and was partially influenced by the programming of WLUP in Chicago, a station that Elias and Heymann had previously managed. A talented air staff was assembled for the station. In addition to Bennett was Joe Regelski as co-host, continuing their collaboration from KMEL, and Richard "Big Rick" Stuart, future KROQ jock Jed "Jed the Fish" Gould The 3rd, Mike Koste, Richard Gossett, Belle Nolan, Rob Francis, Oscar "Oz" Medina, Paul "Lobster" Wells, comedian Tim Bedore and others worked at The Quake at one time or another. A month after KQAK's debut, another Bay Area station, KFOG changed its format from beautiful music to rock. This change left the Bay Area with six very similar-sounding stations (KMEL, KRQR, KQAK and KFOG, plus San Jose stations KOME and KSJO). Until 2019, KFOG was the only one of those stations still carrying a rock format, when it switched to a simulcast of sports station KNBR. In April 1983, Elias and Heymann decided to reposition the station (under the programming guidance of Rick Carroll from KROQ-FM) as the "Rock of the '80s," emphasizing new wave, punk, reggae, 2 Tone ska, first generation Gothic rock, tracks from the 1960s and 1970s by musicians whose work influenced later punk and new wave performers, and the occasional novelty track. The modern rock format of The Quake has become much more memorable than their AOR incarnation, and its later demise was an important catalyst for a shift to a similar but more polished presentation at "Live 105" (KITS) in 1986. Popular programs on The Quake, in addition to shows like, "The Alex Bennett's Morning Program", "The Quake's Early Tremors", "Midnight Dread" and a syndicated program called "The Rock Over London". The KQAK broadcast studios were located at 1311 Sutter Street in San Francisco. The final song broadcast before The Quake went off the air on June 18, 1985 was "Around The Dial" from The Kinks; this featured a re-edited version of the 'radio tuning' intro for the song which made reference to the demise of the station. Later, another station, progressive talk radio KQKE, went on to use the same "Quake" nickname. Paul "Lobster" Wells