Radio

noah | October 5, 2009 10:50 am
noah | October 5, 2009 10:50 am

Lol, "Urban"... get it? Obama Radio is off the air in Athens, Ga., and replacing it on the dial is “Power 100.1,” a top-40 station. (NB: At this moment, it’s playing an oddly pitch-shifted version of “Single Ladies” that makes the song sound kind of sad!) Now, let us never speak of this stupid stunt again, unless it’s to talk about how great Patrick Hernandez’s “Born To Be Alive” still remains to this day. [Radio-Info / Earlier] More »


Get Ready For The Second Coming Of Michael Jackson Radio Marathons

noah | August 25, 2009 10:30 am
noah | August 25, 2009 10:30 am

57874118Michael Jackson would have turned 51 on Saturday, and to celebrate the fallen pop star’s memory, New York dance-pop station WKTU will flip to an all-Michael format from 5 p.m. Friday all the way through Sunday evening. I’m sure that the ratings spike WKTU saw in the wake of Jackson’s death, when it switched to a similar programming strategy, has nothing to do with this flip! More »


“Stripper Radio” May Actually Be Slightly Preferable To The Format Replacing It

noah | August 11, 2009 9:00 am
noah | August 11, 2009 9:00 am

thepole-192x1201Last week, we noted that the Denver metropolitan area had a new radio format geared toward “stripper music,” the sort of stuff that one might hear in a gentleman’s club like “Crazy Bitch” and, uh, “Life Is A Highway.” As we figured, the format was basically a way for the station’s management to transition from the knowledge-worker-friendly Indie 101.5 to something a lot louder. And angrier. More »



“Stripper Radio” May Be A Stunt, But It’s Still A Pretty Depressingly Plausible Format

noah | August 6, 2009 2:00 pm
noah | August 6, 2009 2:00 pm

thepoleAt the end of July, the formerly Indie-formatted Denver station KTNI flipped formats from a low-rated blend of knowledge-worker hits to something at another end of the spectrum: It became 101.5 The Pole, and branded itself with the tagline “Our Hits Are Bigger!” Yes, Stripper Radio has hit America, complete with a club who’s sponsoring the whole shebang and pole-dancing tracks like Buckcherry’s “Crazy Bitch” and Warrant’s “Cherry Pie” among its most-requested tunes. The general manager of the station’s parent company, Max Media of Denver, explains: More »


Should Pop Radio Force Every Song To Clock In At Under Two Minutes?

noah | July 20, 2009 5:15 pm
noah | July 20, 2009 5:15 pm

airstream-safari-sport-travel-trailer-2008Everybody’s got a crackpot scheme to save the music industry these days—giving away songs for free, sending people on wild goose-chases, just giving up and waiting for the current global mess to blow over. One radio analyst has thrown his own proposal in the ring, and it not only plays to the shortened attention span of the modern age, it eliminates the possibility of piracy from home-taped radio rips! Edison Research co-founder Larry Rosin thinks that programmers should turn pop radio into an endless stream of sub-two-minute “trailers” of songs, so that hits would be both distilled down to their essence and only available in full to people willing to pony up 99 cents. Hmm. It sounds so crazy, it just might work! Let’s hear more! More »


Internet Radio Finally, Possibly, Maybe Saved

noah | July 7, 2009 4:30 pm
noah | July 7, 2009 4:30 pm

radioForget those tussles over royalties–Internet radio is sticking around, everybody! Yes, those stations that didn’t get a reprieve from paying what they saw as oppressive royalties for playing music back in February have reached an agreement with the Copyright Royalty Board, a federal agency that collects fees from broadcasters. And judging by the vaguely begrudging statements given by spokespeople from both sides of the table, this deal may close the book on the struggle between Webcasters and the CRB that’s been going on since 2007. The numbers: More »



Casey Kasem To Reach For The Stars For The Last Time Next Week

noah | June 24, 2009 11:00 am
noah | June 24, 2009 11:00 am

americas_top10_1988b-thumbCasey Kasem hasn’t hosted American Top 40 since the overemployed Ryan Seacrest took the reins in 2004, but he still had a hand in the American Top franchise thanks to his hosting of American Top 20 and American Top 10, which counted down songs topping the liter side of pop radio. Kasem’s tenure of bringing America its biggest hits will come to a close for good on July 4–the 39th anniversary of the very first American Top 40 broadcast–when his final episode of AT20 is scheduled to air. (He’ll still be a presence on the radio, though; reruns of AT40 shows from the ’70s and ’80s will continue to be syndicated around the country.) More »


The Zune HD: Ooh, It’s So Shiny

noah | May 27, 2009 11:00 am
noah | May 27, 2009 11:00 am

zune-hd_hi-rez_01Microsoft’s much-maligned media player, the Zune, has announced a new version of its product, and it’s kind of iPhone-looking–I don’t see any brown anywhere in the above pic, which is a good sign. This iteration, scheduled to hit stores in the fall, will also have a Web browser, meaning that after years and years, Microsoft is finally allowing users to use the device’s wi-fi capability to do things other than “squirting” songs to Zune-owning pals. But why does it have the “HD” moniker? Is it because the mirror power of the shiny side will allow you to look at yourself in super-closeup? More »


noah | April 28, 2009 2:00 pm
noah | April 28, 2009 2:00 pm

johnny_feverHey, remember when Clear Channel’s bigwigs were blustering about “localism” and making the radio stations they own from coast to cast more vital to their immediate communities? Yeah, well, the company just laid off a bunch of people, including morning hosts in Cleveland, sports guys in Cincinnati, and a whole mess of other DJs and program directors around the country. Can you say “Seacrest in”? [FMQB] More »



What Are The Ingredients In This Nasty Soup We Call “Modern Rock”?

Al Shipley | April 24, 2009 11:30 am
Al Shipley | April 24, 2009 11:30 am

blind-melon-soup-tfLately, I’ve been thinking about the narrative surrounding the ‘90s alternative rock boom, and how oversimplified it’s become over the years. Too often, we get a simple line like “Nirvana changed everything,” and if we’re lucky, a little follow-up along the lines of “Limp Bizkit ruined everything.” So I decided to identify the scenes, subgenres, and trends that most influenced the Modern Rock charts over the past two decades; I figured I’d come up with a dozen or so. Instead, I ended up with almost 30, which I’ve broken down below. (I’m sure in the comments we can argue about which ones I left out, or which bands shouldn’t have been lumped together.) More »


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