Radiothread

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

We shall start this roundtable discussion of any and all things radio (terrestrial only: your satellite shit is the bane of the industry, and ruining what's meant to be a medium dominated by local origination, though surely there are other factors to blame as well) with this new format called Fresh FM.

 

The Opie and Anthony show is gone from the Chicago market. That's good. It's been replaced with Menstrual Radio. That's bad.

How does this differ from what the Lite FM is doing? I can't imagine it being a major departure from that at all. They play wussy John Mayer shit too. If you have lots of CBS Radio stations in your market, and one of them is at the bottom of the pack, watch out! I suppose this was a better fate for the erstwhile WCKG than going Spanish, though. I believe the old WNEW-FM out of New York that pretty much pioneered progressive FM radio is also a Fresh FM station now, which is an especially sad fate, given what used to go on at that spot on the dial.

 

http://www.radioandrecords.com

A useful site.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

I have XM in my car.

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

I hate you and I hate your ass face. Unless Washington radio sucks, which I could believe.

 

I'll never grasp the concept of paying for radio. I'm a dinosaur.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

How is satellite radio a "bane" to an industry that had had been doing a fine job of ruining itself prior to its existence?

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

As I said, consolidation had been sending terrestrial radio down a wayward path, but satellite just makes things worse, in my opinion. Also, blame the FCC. The obscenity/profanity crackdown is simply preposterous. As if it weren't bad enough when they were making sure you hired enough blacks to "serve the public interest."

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

But how is it not helping? I'm not very informed on the politics of the radio business, but you seem to have some ideas. Tell me.

 

EDIT: Re satellite. I don't know where you're going with the race card thing you edited into the post.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

The only radio station I listen to with any regularity is 101.5 The Point out of Tampa, which is the best 80s station I've ever heard. Whenever I visit my parents and have cause to drive around, that's what I choose. It's like a special little treat 3 or so times a year.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

I've been thinking of getting XM/Sirius, but I fear I'd quickly get sick of what few channels I'd listen to.

[treble 0]

Every station I can pick up here sucks. Or, at least it's not something I'd spend any length of time listening to. 2 rock stations that play pretty much the same thing, 2 classic rock stations that play pretty much the same thing, 2 BOB stations (and maybe a JACK and a JOE, too), a few easy listening station, and there has to be at least 4 or 5 country stations. AM is even worse, as I can't listen to anything close-by, really, at night.

 

So I have XM and bring that with me in the car if I'm going to be in there for any longer than 10 minutes or so.

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

But how is it not helping? I'm not very informed on the politics of the radio business, but you seem to have some ideas. Tell me.

One more outlet to subtract from terrestrial radio means you're reaching smaller audiences, which means you're billing lower. That's not going to affect the news-talk monoliths at the top, but it's going to hurt smaller stations.

 

One result of satellite radio that I dislike--though it's sports, so it's meaningless to you--is how it's affected baseball coverage. As it stands, the terrestrial rightsholders get no money for allowing baseball to be aired on satellite, so CBS Radio is now letting all its baseball contracts expire without renewal, except for WCBS and WSCR, from what I can tell. This is relegating coverage to smaller stations when they had been on much larger ones (50,000-watt clear channels, in many cases), which means a smaller coverage map, ergo a smaller audience, which again, means lower billing. The Pirates are on some FM station now, rather than KDKA, a blowtorch. As far as I can tell, that's a bad thing.

 

Again, coming from a family that was in radio, I have a soft spot for some perceived way of how things ought to be, so I'm sure I can be easily rebutted here, but I don't see how satellite radio is worth it.

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

I have three "classic" rock stations to choose from: one that plays what you generally consider to be classic rock; one that plays rock from the 70s and contemporary rock (but little in between); and one that plays rock ranging from the 70s to the 90s. Oh, the selection!

[Giuseppe Zangara 0]

But how is it not helping? I'm not very informed on the politics of the radio business, but you seem to have some ideas. Tell me.

One more outlet to subtract from terrestrial radio means you're reaching smaller audiences, which means you're billing lower. That's not going to affect the news-talk monoliths at the top, but it's going to hurt smaller stations.

What do you consider a smaller station? I don't believe there's such a beast in my town anymore—well, I'm completely ignorant of local AM stations—all stations here (save for the local NPR affiliate) are owned by major corporations.

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

Well, now that CBS, Clear Channel, and Entercom pretty much dominate, I guess smaller companies have to be considered. Alternatively, even weaker signals owned by larger corporations that don't reach the same large audiences as others within the family can take hits from satellite. The Stern-->Sirius move not only hasn't been the promised windfall for Stern, but also took down a lot of his affiliates, such as the aforementioned WCKG, which like other CBS stations, tried the Free FM thing and free-fell to the bottom of the Arbitrons, lower than some Spanish and gospel, I believe. In the case of this station, I feel especially bad for Garry Meier, who had finally gotten his career back on track, only to get fired because of a format change. Guy is always in the wrong place at the wrong time, listening to the wrong people. My mom knows him, and he's friends with her cousin. (I hope we're not to blame, too.)

 

EDIT: unrelated thought

Milwaukee has two sports stations. This can't last much longer; Milwaukee isn't a large enough market nor a strong enough sports town to sustain both stations. Maybe Invader can chime in. I think he's a bit of a radio junkie?

[Scroby 0]

I drive a truck for a flooring company and I don't want to pay for satellite radio so I'm stuck listening to the bay area/sacramento stations for most of my work day.

 

A few years ago I used to listen to a morning show called The Doghouse. They would talk about everything and anything, weather it was sex, polictics, or just random crazyness and I loved their show. The show actually opened my mind and sense of humor to a lot of things. I listened to them when they first got hired in San Fransisco in 1995...but they got fired a few years ago and got hired in New York.....where they got fired again during the whole Don Imus bullshit, so now they're on the internet doing a show, uncensored. They actually do two shows, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. I can only listen to the afternoon show because I get home from work right before the show starts but between 3 and 5 I'm glued to my laptop listening to the show.

 

Mornings in the bay area

I listen to about 3 or 4 stations in the morning, depening on how much I want to hear a topic talked about or if I want to hear music.

 

Music wise I listen to a public radio station that play rock/alt music and broadcats out of a school. Less commericals, really no dj's talking, and just more music that isn't played on the other rock/alt stations.

 

Live 105, The Woody Show: Talk morning show that broadcasts out of San Fransisco modern rock station. I used to enjoy the show a lot, but I'm starting to find it stale and kinda boring. The only time it seems intresting is when they have a certain guest on or something goes unplanned and someone gets mad about the unplanned thing. Otherwise it's someone will bring up a topic, one or two people will complain about it while the others will try to explain how that dj or two who are complaining about it are wrong and if a caller kinda agrees that the one or djs are wrong, the caller is just made fun and is hung up on. Basically the lead dj of the show Woody is the main complainer. He's normally followed up by a the news guy about the complaining.

 

1550 AM; The Adam Carolla Show: I really enjoy the Adam Carolla show. I don't know what it is about the show but I can just listen to it and enjoy the entire show without much of a complaint. My only complaint about the show is that they take to many commerical breaks and each break is pretty long, but the AM station the show moved to after Free FM in San Fransisco got format changed does a news break and will play a song so people don't get competely bored during the long commerical break.

 

and when I'm able to get in, 104.1 The Hawk; The Bob and Tom show: Comedy talk show that has a slew of comedians that come on the show. Really love their show but the only problems is that the station that airs the show is based out of a city called Modesto and Modesto is kinda farm land area so it doesn't really boradcast in the Bay Area well, so when I'm able to get the show in because I'm in a certain area, I listen.

 

Sacramento Mornings

Adam Carolla or The Rob, Arnie, and Dawn show: I prefer Adam Carolla when I'm in that area but if Adam is on commerical, I'll listen to the Rob, Arnie, and Dawn show. It entertains me for about 5 to 10 minutes then I go back to Adam Carolla, so it's more filler radio for me.

 

Bay Area in the Mid Day

 

Live 105: Modern Rock station but it'll end up annoying the crap out of me because they basically play the same bands/songs every hour or so, or the mid-day DJ will end up talking for a good 2 or 3 minutes inbetween songs and will be talking about nothing related to the song. For some reason he likes to pretend he has a talk show when he doesn't. I remember this one time when I was listening they played some band's song then the DJ broght up "She Wants Revenage" and I thought he was going to play a "She Wants Revenage" song because it sounded like a lead in, he then played "My Chemical Romance". I then turned the channel. He also likes to talk over the intro to just about every song so it makes it a bit harder for me to enjoy the song. Basically he'll talk over the song until someone starts singing, it's annoying as hell.

 

107.7 The Bone: The Bone plays Classic and Modern Rock and I tend to listen to this station more as the DJ don't talk all the time and they seem to play a good chunk of songs before going to a commerical and their commericals are only 3 minutes long. One station I can listen to for most of my day.

 

90.5 The Edge: Station that broadcasts out of a school, plays music most of the day, and plays music that Live 105 and 107.7 the bond won't play. More Indy/Metal kind of station.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

7:53pm: Ashlee Simpson - Pieces of Me

7:57pm: Eric Clapton - Tears In Heaven

8:01pm: Alanis Morissette - Hand In My Pocket

8:06pm: Plain White T's - Hey There Delilah

8:09pm: Sheryl Crow - If It Makes You Happy

8:13pm: Nickelback - Far Away

8:18pm: Edwin McCain - I'll Be

8:22pm: Santana - The Game Of Love (w/ Michelle Branch)

8:26pm: John Mayer - Waiting On The World To Change

8:31pm: Bon Jovi - It's My Life

8:34pm: Marc Anthony - You Sang To Me/Muy Dentro De Mi

8:38pm: Goo Goo Dolls - Give A Little Bit

8:42pm: Hootie & The Blowfish - Time

8:46pm: Dido - White Flag

8:51pm: Five For Fighting - 100 Years

8:58pm: Sugar Ray - When It's Over

9:03pm: Jennifer Lopez - Waiting For Tonight/Una Noche Mas

9:06pm: Daughtry - Home

9:10pm: Sophie B. Hawkins - As I Lay Me Down

9:15pm: Beyonce - Irreplaceable

9:19pm: Gin Blossoms - Hey Jealousy

9:23pm: Lee Ann Womack - I Hope You Dance

9:27pm: U2 - One

9:31pm: Pink - Who Knew

9:36pm: Eric Clapton - Change The World (w/ Babyface)

9:39pm: Santana - Why Don't You & I

9:43pm: Kelly Clarkson - Behind These Hazel Eyes

9:50pm: Michael Buble - Home

9:54pm: Tom Petty - Free Fallin'

9:57pm: Michelle Branch - Everywhere

10:02pm: Des'Ree - You Gotta Be

10:06pm: Colbie Caillat - Bubbly

10:10pm: Dave Matthews Band - Crash Into Me

10:13pm: Nickelback - How You Remind Me

10:17pm: Natasha Bedingfield - Unwritten

10:21pm: Howie Day - Collide

10:25pm: Omc - How Bizarre

10:29pm: Sheryl Crow - My Favorite Mistake

10:33pm: Five For Fighting - Superman

 

Totally uncompelling and hardly a "new format" as touted, but it's pretty much what I expected. It'll do better than Steve Dahl's kid, even though I hardly see any spots in the log. I guess this is what consultants say that twentysomething women like. They're probably right, those consultants.

[the max 0]

I didn't see the point in paying for radio either, but I'd rather pay thirteen bucks a month than listen to the smartasses who play edited songs for a living. And then play ridiculously long sets of commercials. With as much driving that I do for work, it really is worth it. Plus, I got the XM inno that doubles as an mp3 player so I didn't have to buy an ipod.

[kkktookmybabyaway 0]

I'll never grasp the concept of paying for radio. I'm a dinosaur.

 

What about paying to watch television? (Not trying to derail your thread. Just want to see the difference between the two in your opinion. I'm guessing it has more to deal with the "local" issue you talked about earlier.)

[sfaJack 0]

EDIT: unrelated thought

Milwaukee has two sports stations. This can't last much longer; Milwaukee isn't a large enough market nor a strong enough sports town to sustain both stations. Maybe Invader can chime in. I think he's a bit of a radio junkie?

There are now FOUR sports stations in Houston and only one of them (1560 AM) is any good. Not coincidentally, it is the only one that is independently owned. The problem is that, while they have a 50,000 watt signal during daytime, their nighttime signal is only 100w which kills them off for anyone outside the 610 loop (hello!).

 

I really don't know how this market can sustain four such stations. I mean, there are only so many ways you can discuss how much the Texans suck for not drafting Vince Young and how you might convince the Twins to accept Adam Everett, Luke Scott, and Chad Qualls for Johan Santana.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

I really don't know how this market can sustain four such stations. I mean, there are only so many ways you can discuss how much the Texans suck for not drafting Vince Young and how you might convince the Twins to accept Adam Everett, Luke Scott, and Chad Qualls for Johan Santana.

That's my biggest problem with the concept of local sports radio. It's nearly all delusional and simple-minded, not that far off from terrible AM band discussion of your local high school football team. Access to people with reasonable thoughts via the internet is pretty close to rendering that useless for any serious fan.

 

The only way I can see being heavily focused on radio is if you have a job like Smues does, where you're locked down with minimal options the whole time.

[Cheech Tremendous 0]

I have Sirius in my car and home and it was the best purchase I ever made. I can't even listen to terrestial radio anymore. Embrace the future, Czech.

[Guest Pizza Hut's Game Face]

I'll never grasp the concept of paying for radio. I'm a dinosaur.

 

What about paying to watch television? (Not trying to derail your thread. Just want to see the difference between the two in your opinion. I'm guessing it has more to deal with the "local" issue you talked about earlier.)

Think about where you are for television and where you are for radio, how much time you spend with television vis-a-vis radio, how many additional and superior options are provided by pay television compared to radio, and so on. It's an entirely different service. While picking up television over the air usually results in five VHF channels and a handful of UHFs, you can pick up considerably more radio stations for free in a variety of formats. We Americans, unless we're doing the whole too-cool-for-the-room "oh, I don't watch TV" thing, take in a high amount of television programming, whereas we generally listen to considerably less radio: usually in the car, where it's fighting a losing battle against our iPods and CDs. Since television is a far more active medium than radio, what you're paying for, especially with the premium tier of cable TV, is going to be programming of a very high quality that radio, as a passive medium, simply cannot match. If you fork over the cash for HBO, you get Curb Your Enthusiasm and The Sopranos. If you pay for satellite, you get out-of-town baseball and Howard Stern saying "fuck." To me, there's just a clear-cut difference in justifiable pay programming between television and radio, further underscored by taking into account the price of the receiver itself, in addition to the subscription fees. That's part of why I have no qualms with the XM/Sirius merger: it's not as if a monopoly will bring the market to its knees. We're talking about a small-niche luxury product here.

[King Kamala 0]

Back home, radio is generally shit. The classic rock station has some cool stuff late at night and occassionally during the day. They do the A to Z thing once or twice a year, where they take up two or three weeks playing "every song" from A to Z and there's usually a good deal of deep cuts. And they just had a Top 500 Classic Rock albums of All Time Countdown where for the Top 250 or so they played at least 3 or 4 songs and for the Top 100, they played entire sides and for the Top 10, they played the whole album. Good stuff. I like the oldies station here in doses.

 

Up here where I go to college, I can get three stations on the shitty radio I have; two country and a stereotypical small town radio station that plays "The Best of the 60s,70s and 80s" and has a daily program where people try to sell shit. That's what I get for going colleges in the sticks.

[PLAGIARISM! 0]

fuck a radio

[The Metal Maniac 0]

I didn't see the point in paying for radio either, but I'd rather pay thirteen bucks a month than listen to the smartasses who play edited songs for a living. And then play ridiculously long sets of commercials. With as much driving that I do for work, it really is worth it. Plus, I got the XM inno that doubles as an mp3 player so I didn't have to buy an ipod.

 

Okay, this makes no sense to me.

 

If you A: Don't like regular radio, and B: Don't really wanna pay for satellite, why would you buy a satellite radio that functions as an MP3 player, when you could've just bought *an MP3 player*, put a bunch of music on it, and listened to THAT?

 

I generally don't give a rat's ass about the radio. We have one popular music station, one alleged classic rock station that plays half the stuff that's on the fucking other channel, and a real classic rock station. That's it.

 

 

[Timmy8271 0]

Here in Orlando, Clearchannel has basically taken over and killed regular radio. They own most of the top spots in the ratings. Like almost everywhere, they play the same songs all the time and the stupid jocks try to be funny. The CBS stations are like this too since they follow Clearchannel since they have the ratings. There use to be a great talk radio station here called Real Radio. They are still the best in Orlando but have fired more people because they are too "ranchy". I fucking hate Clearchannel.

 

We have two local college radio stations. One is the UCF station that only plays Jazz music. The other one is from Rollins College that is a private college. It plays all kinds of music from Spanish to Heavy metal to Rap to Rock to Anime music. It's the best non talk station.

[EVIL~! alkeiper 0]

I hate you and I hate your ass face. Unless Washington radio sucks, which I could believe.

 

I'll never grasp the concept of paying for radio. I'm a dinosaur.

XM user. The big thing is the out-of-town baseball. You know how big a fan I am, so paying for such a package is a good deal.

 

On the radio market itself, I live two hours away from any major city amidst hilly terrain, so my options are limited. If not for baseball, I would not own satellite radio but I would likely stick with CDs while driving. I can't stand to listen to any terrestrial radio in my region.

[the max 0]

I didn't see the point in paying for radio either, but I'd rather pay thirteen bucks a month than listen to the smartasses who play edited songs for a living. And then play ridiculously long sets of commercials. With as much driving that I do for work, it really is worth it. Plus, I got the XM inno that doubles as an mp3 player so I didn't have to buy an ipod.

 

Okay, this makes no sense to me.

 

If you A: Don't like regular radio, and B: Don't really wanna pay for satellite, why would you buy a satellite radio that functions as an MP3 player, when you could've just bought *an MP3 player*, put a bunch of music on it, and listened to THAT?

 

I generally don't give a rat's ass about the radio. We have one popular music station, one alleged classic rock station that plays half the stuff that's on the fucking other channel, and a real classic rock station. That's it.

 

Because with an mp3 player, I can't listen to live Opie and Anthony or Ron and Fez.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Aaaand...?

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

And O&A are fucking hilarious. Especially Jim Norton, or Patrice O'Neal when he comes in (usually to over for Norton when he's on tour). I'd rather listen to something streamlined and sent out all over the country if it's funny than a local morning show just blabbering on about the Red Sox and about politics with a couple songs (usually KoRn or Papa Roach, or something equally atrocious like Tool or Radiohead) in-between pointless "rants." Then again, I get Boston stations, so during the morning commute and/or early deliveries, it's either I listen to my iPod (I have the iMonster adapter that plugs into the iPod and into the car lighter and sends out a small FM signal, so I just tune my radio to the station I set the adapter on and then can listen to my music of choice) or O&A, since listening to the "award-winning" Hillman Morning Show is an exercise in suicidal thoughts. My co-worker listens to the local hip-hop station, Jam'n 94.5, which plays the same fucking songs over and over and over and over...etc. Fuck Soulja Boy, fuck T-Pain, and fuck whatever R&B they play and try to disguise as rap.

 

Yeah...I don't see the argument against satellite radio at all. I've listened to the Sirius and XM metal channels, and while they both play a lot of fashioncore (more It Dies Today, Chimaira, and similar MTV bands than should be played) it's better than anything I'll hear outside of my iPod and MAYBE Harder/Faster (a late-night metal show on WAAF hosted by Mike Hsu, which recently changed from heavy HEAVY metal - Mandatory Slayer to start, likely some Cannibal Corpse, Iron Maiden, and then some new shit - to more mainstream stuff - Mandatory Slayer has been changed to Mandatory Metallica, which I do believe actually cut the already-small audience down a little bit). If smaller stations want to compete, why not try playing music people want to hear instead of the same old shit? Why not hire talent and develop them into something that's entertaining rather than just reciting the name of the station, giving an update on weather, and talking about the local sports teams?

[EricMM 0]

College radio is the only good radio.

 

My times at the local gym when they play the local radio always remind me why I bought an MP3 player.

 

That thread, "Worst songs of the year" had like three representatives played in a row.