Joseph's first high-profile success story with the Hot Hits approach came in the spring of 1975, when he switched WTIC-FM (96.5) in Hartford, CT, from a long-running but low-rated classical music format to hit radio as ""96 Tics"". Classical music fans were outraged; but, the move paid off for WTIC-FM, as the station was top five-rated in the Hartford market by the end of that year. Although WTIC-FM dumped the "96 Tics" name, the Fusion jingles, and the Mike Joseph formatics in the spring of 1979, it continued as a Top 40 station until tweaking its sound to Hot Adult Contemporary in 1994.