Grex Music2 Conference

Item 234: Radio (a)musings

Entered by hhsrat on Sun Feb 13 03:37:52 2000:

What do you listen to on the Radio?  What station?  Which shows?  Any 
DJ's in particular that you like?  What DJ's will you positively avoid? 
 What stations will you not listen to if paid?  And on.
67 responses total.

#1 of 67 by gelinas on Sun Feb 13 04:07:05 2000:

I usually listen to either WUOM or WKAR.  Sometimes, WEMU and WKQL.  I've
also put a Windsor station on my preset, for its Classical music.  Finally,
there is either a country station or WCBN that sometimes gets my speakers.


#2 of 67 by pfv on Sun Feb 13 06:03:28 2000:

        Up here, the Bear, is the only station.. I want classic R&R, and
        the less said about sports and news-BS, the better.

        Golden-Oldies is a viable alternative for a time, and classical?
        Forget it in this area. C/CW? I'd kill to reach the off switch.

        OTOH, I miss ol' Dr. Demento on Sunday..


#3 of 67 by scott on Sun Feb 13 13:32:55 2000:

NPR news, and the occasional talk show.  The goal is to spend little time
driving my car, so not much radio listening occurs these days.


#4 of 67 by keesan on Sun Feb 13 22:03:17 2000:

I don't have a car.  I listen to lots of radio.  CBN (?Windsor - sometimes
they play classical).  WKAR.  WDTE (Toledo).  WUOM only in the middle of the
night when they play canned classical.  Tapes from 4-7 pm and weekends.


#5 of 67 by glenda on Sun Feb 13 22:14:28 2000:

I pretty much quit listening to radio when I noticed that the Oldies stations
were playing the music that I had switched to the Oldies station to avoid.
I switched to 105 for a while a couple of years ago when they were playing
classical.  Dropped that when after listening to pratically non stop ads for
their classical Christmas party they changed to rock the week before the
party.

When I think about it and remember, I will try to listen to Prairie Home
Companion and most of the rest of WUOM's Saturday night line up.


#6 of 67 by bruin on Sun Feb 13 22:45:24 2000:

I switched to the local NPR member stations at about the time the Bill
Clinton/Monica Lewinsky business began to dominate the news, and now I have
the darndest time listening to commercial radio, even in somebody's car or
being played on some PA system.


#7 of 67 by gull on Mon Feb 14 00:35:23 2000:

I mostly listen to the radio when I'm in the car.  Usually it's WOLV, WMTU,
or NPR.  Depends on who's playing something listenable.  I only listen to
NPR for the news programs, since I'm not a big classical music fan.  Every
once in a great while I'll listen to Rush Limbaugh on WMPL, to see what he's
going on about lately.

(I've noticed an interesting phonomenon, here.  With the exception of WOLV,
people tend to pronounce the call letters of local stations.  WMTU is often
referred to as 'wimtoo', and even WMPL's own promotions often refer to it
as 'wimple.')


#8 of 67 by eprom on Mon Feb 14 01:12:24 2000:

I like falling asleep listening to Art Bell on this AM station in Philly
(1210 WPHT) but then come 5  or 6 in the morning Imus is on...there is some
thing about his voice I can't stand...


#9 of 67 by carson on Mon Feb 14 01:37:20 2000:

(WUPX, unless it's my alarm clock in the morning, which is set to WNMU.)


#10 of 67 by krj on Mon Feb 14 01:50:33 2000:

   (( winter agora #138  <--->  music #234 ))


#11 of 67 by gnat on Mon Feb 14 02:07:37 2000:

I used to have my car radio set to WCBN, CIMX, 96.3, WDET, WIQB, and
whatever the station that used to be WQRS is called now... but I
mostly listened to WCBN.  Then my car battery got replaced and the
settings got erased.  Now I only listen to WCBN, or else I listen to
tapes.  I got tired of turning on the radio and hearing a song I
hated that I'd heard fifty million times before, or else hearing
fifty million ads.


#12 of 67 by rcurl on Mon Feb 14 02:10:16 2000:

None at home and WKAR in the car - until I get out of range, when I 
hunt for NPR stations, until they all fade. Then I listen to NOAA
Weather Radio on 162.55 (etc) MHz. 


#13 of 67 by krj on Mon Feb 14 02:14:55 2000:

My birthday present from Leslie is a tape recorder which will timeshift 
3 hours (four cassette sides) of radio.  So, I can tape "A Prairie Home 
Companion" on Saturday and have it for my commuting enjoyment during the 
week.
 
Other radio shows I try to catch include the "Progressive Torch & Twang"
country music show on MSU's student radio station -- not audible in Ann 
Arbor except on the web -- and Bob Blackman's Sunday folk show on WKAR-FM.

Sometimes I listen to WKAR-FM's classical music during the day, WUOM's 
syndicated "Music Through the Night" show around bedtime.
 
I listen to a lot of talk radio, most often WWJ-AM news.  In the morning 
and in the evening I'll listen to WJR-AM, but I refuse to listen to 
Dr. Laura on that station.  Late at night I have two favorite crazy 
preachers on clear-channel AM stations.   On 870, there is David Jay Smith
and "Newswatch Magazine: The Interpretation of Current Events in the Light 
of Bible Prophecy," from about 11:30 pm -12:30 am.  And on 1530, from 1:30 am
to 2:30 or 3:00, is the even more surrealistic Brother Stair,
"The Last Days Prophet of God."
 


#14 of 67 by tpryan on Mon Feb 14 02:43:23 2000:

        Strangly, it's Sunday night, and I'm listening to Dr. Demento....

...timeshifted by about 4 years.  This week, Silly Love Songs.

        Why wouldn't WOLiVe be pronounced wolive?  Is that the 1400am
some FM combination that used to be WipHDiF?
        In the olden days WiMToU used to be WoRSe.


#15 of 67 by keesan on Mon Feb 14 04:15:05 2000:

Jim experimented with recording Music Through the Night on an old VCR, which
would let you record audio without also recording video, for three hours
at low resolution or 6 hours at even lower resolution (mono).  But it is
easier just to record library CDs onto ordinary tape.  Three hours of recorded
music would get us through the 4-7 pm gap in the broadcast music when all you
can get is NPR.  Or Saturday evening.


#16 of 67 by krj on Mon Feb 14 07:47:27 2000:

I have done the FM-radio-recorded-to-VCR trick a number of times, 
mostly for Metropolitan Opera broadcasts.  I have been able to do it with
every VCR I have tried; with a 4-head "VHS Hi-Fi" machine, there are some 
60-cycle hum artifacts from the rotation of the video heads, 
but I think you would find the sound OK for casual listening.  
The trick is to find out where the "auxiliary audio/video input"
is selected, and if I remember correctly, one usually finds it by 
clicking the channel selector down below channel 0.  The VCR is supposed 
to make up a "black" video signal if only an audio signal is present, and 
that lets the recording system do its work without being confused.


#17 of 67 by gypsi on Mon Feb 14 15:39:14 2000:

The presets on my car are, in order, 96.3 (old and new alternative, punk,
trance, etc), 102.9 (rock), 105.1 (groovy oldies and funk), 88.3 (UM's
station...various student programs), 93.9 (rock/pop that is tolerable), and
I think 94.7...  not sure.  I mostly listen to 96.3, so the other ones are
just preset stations that are good for backup.  I also use seek to find other
things like classical, jazz, and oldies.  My tastes run too broad to narrow
it down to six presets.  =)

I love Darren Revell's Big Sonic Heaven program on 96.3 Sunday nights.  He's
a great DJ,very entertaining and knowledgable of the music he plays, and the
show is perfect.  I get a lot of ideas of things to buy from that program,
and in four weeks time, he'll play *maybe* one song I don't like.  If you know
how picky I am about music, then you'll know why I like him.  =)

(It's stuff like the Cure, Depeche Mode, Siouxsie, Clan of Xymox, Cocteau
Twins, New Order, Portishead, etc, plus LOTS of bands I'd never heard of but
wish I had)


#18 of 67 by jep on Mon Feb 14 16:21:28 2000:

I listen to WJR in the morning so I can catch Frank Beckman's sports 
report at 7:40.  I have little respect for main host Paul W. Smith, 
after hearing him lose control of himself when talking to a couple of 
his guests, but haven't switched much because I'm too lazy.

I've been listening to WJR in the afternoon because the radio is set 
there, but the Mitch Albom show can be pretty painfully bad.  I switched 
to 99.5 a couple of times last week.  I might keep doing that.


#19 of 67 by gull on Mon Feb 14 21:20:33 2000:

Re #14: Actually, WOLV is known simply as "the wolf," because that's the
name they use in their promos.


#20 of 67 by orinoco on Mon Feb 14 21:33:06 2000:

When I was in Ann Arbor, I listened mostly to 88.3 and to whatever the number
was for the CBC2 station we got.  Usually I only listen to the radio in the
car, so I didn't bother to keep track of all the format changes.


#21 of 67 by jep on Mon Feb 14 21:47:39 2000:

When WOLV was started, it was WHUH.  (Really.)


#22 of 67 by tpryan on Mon Feb 14 23:23:14 2000:

My car radio buttons, first is the one tap button, second is the two tap
button:
1) 93.9/ ??.?
2) 94.7/ 95.5
3)101.1/101.9
4)102.9/105.1
5)104.3/107.1

106.7 might get one of those.


#23 of 67 by danr on Tue Feb 15 01:31:42 2000:

I listen to radio all day:  WUOM, WKAR mostly, but I'll also listen to WTKA
when I want a hit of U-M sports radio.

Right now, I'm listening to the English language service of Radio Nacional de
Espana from Madrid.  I also like to listen to the BBC, Radio Havana, Radio
Nederland, and other shortwave stations.


#24 of 67 by gnat on Tue Feb 15 03:15:43 2000:

Oh, and at work (where I have better software than at home) I sometimes
listen to Radio K, which is a Minneapolis college station, and I also
listen to something called Orange Twin radio, one o'them new-fangled
MP3-streaming stations, which plays all sorts of crazy stuff from
Harry Partch to Bulgarian folk music. 


#25 of 67 by hhsrat on Tue Feb 15 03:22:17 2000:

My alarm clock is set to 107.1 (WKQL) .  My car radio bounces around, 
but usually either 107.1, 94.7 (WCSX?), or 950 (WWJ).  At work, the 
radio's usually on 107.1, 101.3 (WRIF), or 1130 (WDFN) because that's 
almost all we can get.  Saturday mornings I usually try to listen to Car 
Talk on 91.7 (WUOM).

I don't really have favorite DJ's, although there are a few that I can't 
stand.  Notable terribles are Dick Purtan (WOMC mornings), Delilah (WQKL 
evenings), and Stony & Wojo (WDFN afternoons).  Lately, WDFN has had 
Damon "The Dawg" Perry on as a guest anchor, he was annoying when he 
was with One on One sports, and he's still annoying.  He's got a really 
nasal voice that just grates after a while.


#26 of 67 by senna on Tue Feb 15 05:32:49 2000:

Dan, do they broadcast Real Madrid football matches?


#27 of 67 by danr on Tue Feb 15 12:47:13 2000:

No. They're only hour-long broadcasts.  They sometimes have sports news,
though.


#28 of 67 by senna on Tue Feb 15 18:38:00 2000:

Rats.  It was worth a shot :)  

I like listening to distant AM stations at night, particularly during 
football season.  870 AM from New Orleans comes in rather crisply, and 
they have rights to LSU football.  One night I was amused to find that 
they were broadcasting something with local flavor.  A fishing show.


#29 of 67 by lumen on Tue Feb 15 21:28:28 2000:

No one will recognize the stations I listen to, of course, so I'll have 
to briefly explain a few.

88.1 "The 'Burg," which is CWU's radio station.  I usually switch to it 
when I'm tired of the mainstream stuff on heavy rotation.  The station 
pretty much covers all the things a college radio station is capable of-
- audio coverage of some sports games, plenty of promos and shows for a 
variety of genres, and DJs that aren't bound by commercial obligations.

90.7, which is our area NPR.

102.1, Wenatchee's soft rock station.

103.1, KQBE, Ellensburg's mainstream station that covers anything else 
that is not country.  It's a pretty narrow niche.  It's a smattering of 
adult contemporary, boy bands, and 80's pop rock.  Forget the DJs; 
there is ABSOLUTELY no talent here.  I'm also annoyed by the fact that 
they like to cover high school sports games.  I want music-- if I 
wanted sports, I'd attend the games.

105.7, Yakima's soft rock.  One of my wife's favorite stations.  I like 
Delilah, personally =P but I can see why some people would tire of the 
saccharine, syrup, and cheese.

107.3, KFFM, Yakima's pop mainstream station.  The target audience 
seems to be women 18-34, and the type of music is based on the industry 
formula-- mostly dance, pop, r&b, and any hiphop that crosses into 
those areas.  Not too far off from whatever MTV is playing on the tube.

That's what I can get here; I add 92.5 Sunny FM when I'm in Yakima and 
can get better reception.


#30 of 67 by keesan on Tue Feb 15 23:11:15 2000:

I could hear a Texas AM station in Skopje (Macedonia).  Along with the three
local stations.  Don't know if they have FM now, it does not do well in
mountainous areas.  Skopje, Sofia (Bulgaria) and Thessaloniki (N. Greece) all
broadcast loudly at the same frequencies so that you could only hear the one
in your own area - political differences were greater than the language
differences.  In the seventies.


#31 of 67 by mcnally on Wed Feb 16 01:09:46 2000:

  With the exception of a couple of shows on some of the area's college 
  radio stations (primarily Wayne State's WDET, and Eastern's WEMU and
  Umich's WCBN to much lesser extents) not much of the music I like these
  days gets any radio play to speak of.

  As a consequence I primarily look to the radio for news coverage and
  stick to selecting my own music from my CDs..


#32 of 67 by keesan on Wed Feb 16 02:00:59 2000:

Does anyone listen to WDTR? They seem to have dropped their 1.5 hours of
classical music in the evenings.  It used to stop abruptly in the middle of
whatever they were playing at 8:35 p. m.


#33 of 67 by gnat on Wed Feb 16 02:21:57 2000:

What stations are playing classical music these days?  There's the
Canadian station and WUOM (sometimes)... anyone else?

I really miss WQRS and the "Cheap Pencil Contest."


#34 of 67 by krj on Wed Feb 16 02:28:00 2000:

WKAR-FM (90.5) from Michigan State is mostly classical, with the 
following key exceptions:
    NPR morning and evening drive time news blocks
    Sunday night: 4 hours of folk programming
    Friday night: jazz
    Saturday evening:  A Prairie Home Companion

WKAR can be received in Ann Arbor in mono with a good receiver and 
antenna.

WJR-AM plays the broadcasts of the Detroit Symphony: I think they have moved
to Sunday nights.


#35 of 67 by scg on Wed Feb 16 04:27:34 2000:

Also WGTE (91.3 from Toledo).


#36 of 67 by bruin on Wed Feb 16 14:07:46 2000:

And WKAR also has a low-power, daytime only, AM sister station.  And, during
the Clinton Impeachment malarky, the AM station carried the hearings and the
trial, while the FM station continued with regular programming.


#37 of 67 by gypsi on Wed Feb 16 15:18:17 2000:

Does anyone know if the local NPR affiliate carries "Thistle and Shamrock"?
I used to listen to that all the time in Kalamazoo.


#38 of 67 by jiffer on Wed Feb 16 16:28:51 2000:

"Thistle and Shamrock" is carried on Sundays on NPR in Ann Arbor.. I believe
91.7.


#39 of 67 by gypsi on Wed Feb 16 16:32:07 2000:

What time?


#40 of 67 by keesan on Wed Feb 16 17:05:08 2000:

WGTE plays classical music Friday evenings.  Nobody does Sat. eves.


#41 of 67 by katie on Wed Feb 16 19:32:16 2000:

T & R is also on WDET on Sunday afternoons.


#42 of 67 by drewmike on Wed Feb 16 22:00:42 2000:

michiganradio.org should be able to tell you.

Theoretically I *should* be able to tell you, but I don't remember.


#43 of 67 by hhsrat on Thu Feb 17 01:57:00 2000:

Does anyone know what the call letters for AM 1050 WTKA mean?

I know WAAM is Ann Arbor Michigan, WDET is Detroit, WPLT is Planet, WQKL 
is supposed to be Kool (not quite sure how on that one either).

WHYY and KRAP (also CRAP in Canada) are pretty obvious :)  So is KRUD


#44 of 67 by mcnally on Thu Feb 17 03:34:19 2000:

  One of the few interesting things about the totally pre-fab highly-
  formatted radio networks (like "the Planet") which have a presence
  in cities across the country is the amusing scrambling for call 
  letters that occurs when you have to find 3- or 4-letter variants
  for their trademark name in seven or eight major markets..


#45 of 67 by bruin on Thu Feb 17 14:14:14 2000:

WTKA-AM 1050's call letters used to mean "The TalK of Ann Arbor," but now that
it's primarily a sports station, they now mean "The Ticket."

Interestingly enough, when Tom Monaghan owned the station in the late 1980's
and early 1990's, the call letters were WPZA (can you figure out why?).


#46 of 67 by gypsi on Thu Feb 17 14:50:22 2000:

Pizza!!! Now gimme my Scooby Snack...


#47 of 67 by mcnally on Thu Feb 17 16:45:03 2000:

  First you have to make that "arooooo?" Scooby-noise..


#48 of 67 by gypsi on Thu Feb 17 17:36:28 2000:

Arrooo?


#49 of 67 by gull on Thu Feb 17 19:05:43 2000:

My favorite examples of station "vanity calls" are KORN (Mitchell, South
Dakota -- home of the famous Corn Palace) and KAOS (Evergreen State
College's station.)


#50 of 67 by mcnally on Thu Feb 17 20:23:44 2000:

  Weren't they the ones who were always trying to Get Smart?


#51 of 67 by gnat on Thu Feb 17 23:39:21 2000:

I thought there was an album called "Radio KAOS" by whatsisname from
Pink Floyd (whose name totally eludes me now).



#52 of 67 by mcnally on Fri Feb 18 00:15:30 2000:

  yeah, Roger Waters..  he did have an album by that name..


#53 of 67 by danr on Fri Feb 18 04:27:44 2000:

How about WOOD in Grand Rapids?  Do they much of a furniture industry there
anymore?


#54 of 67 by mcnally on Fri Feb 18 05:50:42 2000:

  Except for Steelcase and Herman Miller, hardly any..  ;-)


#55 of 67 by drewmike on Fri Feb 18 14:34:36 2000:

I heard that the only station whose call letters formed the unabbreviated name
of its location is KING, the NBC station in Seattle. (King County).


#56 of 67 by tpryan on Fri Feb 18 15:42:02 2000:

        I know they had the template name before the call, but I would think
CYDR would be "Cider" or "The smashed Apple" before it would be
"The River".


#57 of 67 by omni on Fri Feb 18 19:12:37 2000:

  My primary station is WOMC. They play a nice assortment of songs. I have
been known to be a horrible flipper, though.


#58 of 67 by tpryan on Sat Feb 19 14:59:39 2000:

        What a wonderfull thing it is to have the receiver remote next to 
me at the computer here.  No station wants to pay just one or two 
commercials, it has to be a 4-5minute commercial fest.  Well, if they
have commercial breaks that are longer than tunes, I can always change
stations and get more tunes.
        Ok, except at about 10 minutes before the hour, when all stations
go to their long set of commercials.  Even WDET, NPR stops in that time
to give a thank you shout (commercial) to one of their sponsors.


#59 of 67 by keesan on Tue Feb 22 03:01:11 2000:

Classical stations all do news for five minutes past the hour.


#60 of 67 by krj on Sun Feb 27 00:13:57 2000:

A Prairie Home Companion is touring Scotland and Ireland, which might
interest a few of you.  Tonight's broadcast is from Edinburgh, Scotland;
it will be repeated on WUOM at 1 pm Sunday.  The March 4 broadcast
(Saturday at 6 pm) will be from Dublin, Ireland.


#61 of 67 by bruin on Sun Feb 27 01:18:00 2000:

I also noticed a broadcast from Limerick, Ireland, on February 29, 2000.  Any
idea if Michigan Radio plans to air it?


#62 of 67 by drewmike on Sun Feb 27 02:10:48 2000:

If it's part of "A Prairie Home Companion"'s regular series, they're planning
on airing it. Garrison Effing Keillor. The man blows his nose and public radio
listeners ooh and ahh about how whimsical it is. Yeah, don't think for a
second he'd do something like that without getting stateside mileage from it.
 
www.prairiehome.org should have more official information.


#63 of 67 by krj on Sun Feb 27 04:01:35 2000:

The website says that the Limerick show is not a broadcast.
It's being taped for an unspecified future date.


#64 of 67 by carson on Sun Feb 27 04:38:08 2000:

(I thought it odd that GK referenced buying football tickets during
this weekend's show.)


#65 of 67 by kewy on Sun May 14 01:53:58 2000:

I have not been able to find much of interest on the radio lately, AT 
ALL.  Ive started listening to some Rap/Hip-Hop on the radio, but most 
other stations have been rubbing me the wrong way.  Im also pretty sure 
that -hoe how much do you cost?- songs are gonna get old quick.  My 
presets are-
88.3 WCBN
88.7 CIMX
93.1 WDRQ
93.9 CIDR
94.7 WCSX
95.5 
96.3 WPLT
97.9
99.5
105.1
105.9
106.7 WWWW


#66 of 67 by other on Sun May 14 06:36:35 2000:

the only @*$%!@#!! stations i can get are WKQL 107.1, WIQB 102.9 WCBN 88.3
and WUOM 91.7, and the last one only with a notch filter to block 107.


#67 of 67 by tpryan on Sun May 14 14:50:25 2000:

        I drove thru Chicagoland last Saturday and stopped listening to 
CD and tapes to listen to the radio.  It was easy, my main pre-sets
worked for Chicago.  Oldies 104.3 was still Oldies 104.3, but 101.9 
was Classic Rock, not NPR-like.  105.1 was not "The Groove" at least
not as I could tell as it was neuvo _______, uno nuno ceico pointo uno,
and sounded like a broad range spanish station.


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