your song on the radio

[@?,*???&?]

This will be my only soapbox moment here. If you don't know this by now, every song you hear on the radio is a paid advertisement with no public disclosure about that fact. That makes those songs getting played with a method we know as payola- which is illegal. Corporate radio has exclusive contracts with indie record promoters which makes this the case. For those of you who labor over tracks, it ain't about your mix or production, but rather the money the ownership of the station (Clear Channel ring a bell with anyone) can get paid to play it. The FCC is considering what it did with the Telecommunications Act of 1996 and also what it should do with TV and Newspaper ownership. They are to be making a decision by June 2. Visit this link and voice your opinion. www.moveon.org/stopthefcc The airwaves belong to the people and are being misused in a way that is not in the public interest.

[soundguy]

man, that has been going on for 30 years. Granted, radio is at all time suckdom, but so long as business own radio stations, PD's will find away around whatever nonsense the FCC hands them, or they'll keep firing PD's until they hire one that can.

Fighting this kind of thing sounds all cool on paper, but ultimately its calling for an entire restructuring of the industry, which would be fantastic, but until these companies start losing money, I dont think too realistic. Dont get me wrong, Im all with you, but Im not holding my breath on some FCC lobby or 20 years of FCC lobby really effecting the machine that significantly.

but how we would benefit from a change, damn!

dave

[markpar]

At least there's still college radio. I used to work at the campus station when I was in college many, many years ago and we played whatever the hell we wanted. Man, that was great! One night I decided to play all the songs I could find where each was at least 10 minutes long.

Those were the days....

Now, I listen to college radio and indie radio to find stuff I wouldn't normally hear. KEXP (http://www.kexp.org) is pretty cool and they play lots of stuff I've never heard before.

-mark

[cbcmusic]

I'm with markpar, I'm all about my local college stations. There's such a wide format of music going on that it keeps you on your toes. It's been over a year or more since I've voluntarily listened to those mainstream corporate rock or whatever stations and life has been better ever since.

This is how I see all those mainstream rockers
combined with and

The world could be so much better

[@?,*???&?]

I worked high school, college and commercial radio- all succeeded with gut level programming. I agree non-commercial and college radio have a much more broad musical pallette. Strange thing was how the concept of 'Low Power FM' was squelched shortly after the Telecom Act of 1996 was passed. LPFM would provide community style radio within the reach and under the noses of corporate owned signals. If digital broadcasting was a standard put forth by Washington, D.C., then it would open up an enormous amount of frequencies that could then be licensed to folks like you and I for providing community diversity. Do a little research on the internet for that. It's mind-blowing what's been happening. As a side note- there are to be more Senate hearings on May 13. Check CSPAN or CSPAN2 for coverage. They are always entertaining! The hearings are headed by John McCain who is the Chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee. Don't think we can't change this- we can- musicmakers have to stand up and be counted!

[uqbar]

Another trend to watch is the way the religious right is attacking the bandwidth. Small stations that rely on remote repeater-like stations for their range are especially vulnerable to losing their left end dial space. They don't like college radio, with it's politcally progressive news programming like Pacifica and local shows that feature grassroots progressives. But it's easy to smash the college and np stations range by playing the system.

mark

[bert]

[soundguy]

my brother is the PD at a well known college radio station in NY. Ive been hearing this moaning for years, and greanted, its a lot to moan about. I think the bottom line to a lot of this is that people, for the most part just dont care about radio, not at all. Its what they get when they get in their car and thats about it. Personally, I value radio more than television as a whole, but this attitude is a severe minority. Without having a bunch of people stand up for radio, which frankly in this culture is just not going to happen, I think its sad to look at the future of the medium. I mean, I think even most musicians that I know dont even really get it about the whole radio thing.

Another thing worth noting, everyone bitches and moans about all the stations being owned by big companies, and all the companies being national. This may be the case, but there is still diversity between what these monsters are programming on a regional basis, and I think anyone who is on the road alot can attest to this. There really shouldnt be a reason why radio in a market like NYC should be severly different than radio in a market like LA. Having just spent 6 weeks in LA, radio there, while all the same crap, is nothing short of amazing compared to the horror of commercial radio in NYC. NYC, which claims to be the number one market in the US, currently is a wasteland for radio, and its really a shame.

I would love to see this change, radio can be the coolest thing in the world, but with all the other communication americans are posed with, my impression is that people cant be bothered with it. Perhpas such a negative attitude isnt good for anything, but realistically, thats the way Ive been watching things change. The day O&A got pulled from the air really set the precedent for a lot of bad for the future of free FM.

dave

[thunderboy]

What, you don't like the new format on 102.7?

[soundguy]

I cant possibly understand how ron and fez were generating less money for that station than the new manure they are shoveling. Its all sterns fault. All the FM talk in LA is on one station, and ohh, big suprise, it does well. The whole situation in NYC with that was doomed from the start. Argh.

one year countdown to O&A on XFM.

dave

[uqbar]

Ok, so I'm one of those who gets teary eyed about radio. No lie. When I was a kid being able to get Detroit radio (very cool in the day) pretty much saved my life (just like in the Velvet Underground song).

So to this day, I can get pretty choked up by songs like VU's "Rock and Roll", Joy Divisions "Transmission" or the Modern Lover's "Road Runner."

So that said, I find it hard to believe that no one cares. I just think that things have gotten to an ugly point, and people just think it's futile to save radio (and from an economic standpoint it might be).

My hope now is that cheap internet bandwidth brings us back to the early days of FM...

But there are plenty (clear channel and the majors among them) that see to be trying hard to make sure Internet radio never takes off...

mark

[biasvoltage]

This just made me realize that I haven't had a tuner in my home stereo since 1997 when my old tube Fisher receiver died...I haven't missed it, and honestly didn't even really notice until now... I guess I've turned into one of those 'radio on in the car and that's it' people. In the car it's NPR or the Loyola-Marymount college station, KXLU.

cv

[NewYorkDave]

You might be surprised to know that "liberal, progressive" NPR, along with religious broadcasters, has been instrumental in squeezing college stations off the left side of the dial, and squashing LPFM.

I was once engineer at a large NPR-affiliated station in the Bronx, while at the same time operating a tiny pirate station (with a transmitter I built myself) at night. I only did this for a short time; I just needed an antidote to all the folk and "world music" shit I had to hear all day. I'd come home and fire up my little transmitter and pump Ramones, Stooges, Dictators, etc. out to anyone who was checking out the low band in my neighborhood.

[soundguy]

I swear to god, I think KXLU is one of the top ten reasons I want to move to LA.

Dave, what was your radio name?

your listening to New York Dave bringing you the solution to the Po-Town blues...

dave

[NewYorkDave]

I didn't really do any talking on the air; I just played the tunes without comment. A friend who knew my little secret pointed out the irony of this since I happen to have a "radio voice" and actually ended up doing some VOs when I moved into television.