3/7/05
It's always been stunning to me that such musically rich places like, say, New York City and Chapel Hill have had such wretched excuses for radio stations. Sure, you can hunt for the little college broadcasts, but these, too, are often a dreadful bore (and yes, that means WXYC too, you pretentious shits - THAT'S what you get for not hiring me in 1991!).
XM Radio has made most of this redundant to any true music fan, but this trip to Chapel Hill revealed a new station: 100.7 FM, The River. It's a terrible name, and I was only tuned to it because it also carries the Tar Heel games, but they have a new format that is self-described as "we'll play anything."
Obviously, they didn't play Tibetan throat singing, Mahler's 8th Symphony or even any country music for that matter, but their playlist was truly massive and seemingly random. They played Julian Lennon's "Too Late for Goodbyes" and followed it up with a Green Day song, then "Two Hearts Beat as One" by U2, then the Sundays, then Dave Matthews, then some old Bowie.
If this idea gets good ratings and catches on, then American radio culture will truly have evolved into something interesting: the endless Balkanization of music genres will have led to "formatless" radio stations that can play almost anything on earth. In essence, radio will become the commercial apotheosis of the current technological metaphor for randomness: the iPod Shuffle.
I think the iPod Shuffle is a hit because nobody in the music business (except Steve Jobs) understood that we, as lovers of music, basically love to be free of being our own fucking DJ all the time. Sure, we want to curate our collection and only stick to the stuff we like, but we LOVE to be surprised and titillated by the essence of not knowing what comes next. If you all remember correctly, that was why the radio was so magical when we were between the ages of 8 and 16.
I will stick with a radio station - or any other entertainment, for that matter - if I'm even slightly excited to find out what happens. And if this "formatless format" sticks to about a 3:1 decent-to-crap ratio (which is true of "The River," XM Channel 43 and VH1 Classic) you're going to have a winner.
A radio station like that in a big metropolis will even give the iPod a run for its money, because radio can do something an MP3 player cannot: allow you to bask in the glow of your random culture, knowing that you are part of a larger brotherhood that is doing the same. That's why we never turn off a song on the radio that we already have in our collection - it means more if we're all listening to it.
Posted by Ian Williams at March 7, 2005 11:30 AMAtlanta has that station: 92.9 DAVE FM. Great random mixes The Clash, Police, U2 and Rolling Stones and Dave Matthews.
Helluva game in Chapel Hill. I know of at least two friends who were sporting your shirt--Amanda, who I mentioned in my game recap, and Trish.
Keep up the good work.
While visiting San Diego a few weeks ago I discovered 91X - truly the best radio station I've heard in years. DC radio bites.
Not sure what you listen to when home in NY or if it even comes in clear in your borough on your street of stoops, but WFUV 90.7 (Fordham's Jesuit Radio)is eclectic and fresh enough 4 me. It's public radio, so I do feel bad I've never donated all that appreciably, just enough for the occasional stainless steel coffee cup (good for roadtrips that cross the Mason-Dixon).
Just to add my day-late 2 cents, the Tar Heel born and bred purist in me says no gloating allowed over the escape we pulled Sunday. There's lots left 2B done this year.
In my house, we keep bedtime mantras very simple-
NC
North Carolina
National Championship
Kiss index fingers
Kiss goodnightYeah and I agree, little kids think it's shockingly fucked up and very scary to have to wear all that cute-ass Carolina stuff and watch their parents go ass-backwards about the games; I'm scarring mine for life.
The pre-sets on my XM radio are *exactly* what you are describing, and I don't know why it's so thrilling to have someone play something for you on the radio, even though you own a copy of it. You're gonna point out that I have the Broadway channel on a fair bit, but the truth is I rotate between Fred and Ethel and The Sinatra Channel and even Top Tracks (which will play Sweet Home Alabama irony free).
XM Radio has been fantastic. On one trip, Jonathan Schwartz, the DJ on the Sinatra Channel, played Sinatra's "Girl From Ipanema" and, for the first time in my life, I understood why Dad loves Sinatra.
Oh, and WFUV is really great, Cullen. Before XM, it was that and WXYC only.
Hi Ian. Sounds like you are having a good trip to NC.
I too have been listening to the river (very bad name) but they cannot continue too long without ad revenue. Let's hope local businesses pony up. Without XYC,XDU,KNC(sometimes), and SHA, then the dial locally would be a wasteland. I can't get cozy with XM yet.. it seems too sterile without local content.
Have a safe trip home. k
I have also enjoyed the river's playlist even though the name sucks. Still, I am such a cynic with mass media that I don't believe them when they say "we'll play anything". I'm sure there are 1000 hours of focus groups behind their song choices and even if the focus groups are people just like me I am still hesitant to jump on board. It's only a matter of time before their format gets labeled as "Classic Album Oriented Adult Alternative" or some shit like that.
Ian Darling,
Leave it to you to be in town for less than a week and find the coolest thing that's happened here in terms of media "stuff." :) I have been wondering what the deal is with this River thing. I am actually glad to hear a commercial or two every so often, only because it brings me hope that perhaps this radion station - well, the format at least - will survive. I think it's only been on a month or so. If we get a morning DJ, then I'll know it was just a temporary fluke, and it'll get f*ed up like the rest of them. In the meantime, I will delight in the occasional old school INXS that they play. I heard "Don't Change" this morning and nearly drove off the road in surprise!
"The River" is a Garth Brooks song isn't it? Didn't catch that frequency my last time down the tobacco road this past fall, but sight unheard, I'd say the nomenclature sucketh rightly. When tooling the sticks of Orange Co., I usually stick w/WUNC for clASSical and front porch music, new country minus ads (since you can't get it in NY), and 1360 for too-local and los deportes.
And btw, what NC beach did you guys see for those of us living vicariously until this summer's annual family jaunt to the grandest strand?
I agree with you about WFUV, love 'em. We visited WFUV once for an 8 am live performance - it turned out to be one of the best radio experiences we've had with Hobex to date. They treated us very well.
A visit to Sirius showed us the possibilities of longform satellite radio. The interviewing DJ, Michael Anderson, had played percussion with Sun Ra among others. He was very familiar with our music, asked great questions and played some tracks over a nice, long interview. very cool, much different than commercial radio.
WNCW, Spindale NC, is a good listen. Great bunch of people there. It might be considered the western NC version of WFUV, just add a whole lot of bluegrass on the weekends...
greg
Screw XM, the Internet has a radio station for almost every possible taste and it's free. (With my Treo phone I can even listen to it at the gym on in the car!)
I recommend http://somaFM.com and http://BoombasticRadio.com . Also, a lot of people like http://www.RadioParadise.com , but it's not my thing.
On this side of NC, the serious radio shizzle is WNCW (a service of Isothermal Community College in Spindale). They play a wonderfully eclectic mix of roots and world music, with NPR news. Online at http://www.wncw.org/
At least two area radio stations have entered the market exactly the way you describe what's going on with "The River." In 1994, that's how Charlotte's 106.5 ("The End") came on the scene, complete with no commmercials, no DJs--even no censoring out the F-bombs in songs like Nine Inch Nails's "Closer." They now have Bob & Tom in the morning and a crappy mix of "new rock" and "alternative" oldies all day. Lots of commercials now, and really annoying DJs.
Then there's 95.7 ("The Ride") which plays a fairly eclectic mix of Boomer-era "deep cuts." For instance, they're the only commercial station I've ever heard play Springsteen's version of "Blinded by the Light." Four years on, still no DJs, and fewer commercials than other stations. I listen to it a lot.
But I'll go so far as to say WNCW is my favorite station in the Universe.
New York City's dirth of an enjoyable major radio station blows me away. The dinosaur rock station seemed real good when I first moved here, and still will impress about once every four months (twice I've heard Queen songs I've never heard on the radio before), but you would thinks the djs get blowjobs every time they spin "White Room." I almost sprained my index finger last week jamming that once glorious song off. I was talking to Gwen Stefani the other day and even she said, "Fuck. Aren't there any other songs they can play?"
Jason H CRUST, wtf is up with these stupid radio station names? Are call letters not good enough for us anymore? "The River", "The Edge", "The End", "The Point" -- those aren't radio stations, those are geographical features! And generic ones at that. "The End" is everywhere, and they always have the same format.
Then there's the trendy new kind of station name. JACK-FM. DAVE-FM. BOB-FM. Fred. Ethel. MORONS! All of them!
Give me good old call signs like KJET AM 1600 or KYYX 96.5 and fuck all this market research driven KRAP-FM: "The Crap"!
Aw, I had a link to the KJET tribute page in that post and it stripped it out.
See www.theacf.com/kjet/
I discovered the River around Thanksgiving, one month after getting XM radio and I listen to the River more than XM Radio. I feel like I am in the radio studio picking out the music. Believe me, eastern NC has never had access to a radio station this good.
I also love the Spindale station when I visit Asheville.
"I think the iPod Shuffle is a hit because nobody in the music business (except Steve Jobs) understood that we, as lovers of music, basically love to be free of being our own fucking DJ all the time. Sure, we want to curate our collection and only stick to the stuff we like, but we LOVE to be surprised and titillated by the essence of not knowing what comes next."
Hey, even though you crapped all over WXYC, I'll do the service of telling you that they've got an entire biweekly specialty show devoted to the iPod's shuffle function. it's like a dj battle, except with randomly selected sets and listener voting. REBELLIOUS JUKEBOX, every other sunday, 5-6pm, wxyc-fm
Kevin- I'll always have a soft spot for XYC. My feelings are purely sour grapes.