WXXK's main rival for the country listeners up here, WXLF, also has a 5 p.m. feature, but it's not a request hour but a "top 5 at 5," which is billed as the five songs that have received the most requests that day. These songs are always currents and, curiously, there's quite a bit of variation in them from day to day. I'm not sure how legit this feature is -- whether every single request that comes in is tallied and tabulated for an accurate countdown at 5:00 -- but if it is, wouldn't it be more logical to see the same songs come up for days or even weeks, given how long currents stay in the playlist and how power currents get maximum exposure for at least two weeks?
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Are there any major stations that DON'T do voice-tracking and are 100% live?
- Thread starter Alan Smithee
- Start date
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Odds are that your skepticism is justified.
At Y97, in 1988, my afternoon shift started with the "top 3 at 3" and it was pre-programmed by the music scheduler ... three powers in a row. Ditto "top 9 at 9" although that was during the MD's shift and he was the one who ran the scheduler so he could tweak it in terms of which secondaries played that night.
The listeners never knew any better.
Sorry, gotta correct the record here. KCBS/KFRC is live and local 19 hours a day. So is KNX. But between midnight and 5am, the stations operate in tandem. Tues–Sat originates at KCBS and is simulcast in Los Angeles, Sun-Mon originates out of KNX and plays in SF. There's less localization now in the tandem hours, but they're still a live broadcast in those hours.
When I did nights for CHR we had a Top 9 at 9. Throughout the day, and especially in the 8pm hour, we encouraged listeners to call in and request what they wanted because, as the promo said, "every night you (the listener) control the countdown!"
The log for the Top 9 at 9 was scheduled in selector like any other hour. It just wasn't the usual mix of categories.
Well, if that's true then LISTENING to that station isn't a great way to spend anyone's time either.
I keep saying this, but one thing traditional radio is losing listeners to is INTERNET radio stations. Most of those aren't live either, but they play a deeper range of music, there's ones for almost any genre you would want to hear and many of them don't even have commercials (I don't know how they keep operating without them, but I've listened to several for a number of years. Enough people must at least donate to them.) I listen to most broadcast stations at home through the internet also, as the FM reception at my place has always been bad, but I usually just do that to check up on what stations are doing with format changes and such, they don't hold my interest long enough to listen extensively. I usually do settle for normal radio in the car as I don't have internet there; lots of stations play promos letting you know you can hear them online and I have to laugh at that- When I have access to internet radio I can listen to stuff that's interesting and takes chances, and you suggest I still listen to your tightly-formatted commercial station there instead?
Being LIVE is the biggest advantage that broadcast radio (and TV) can still have. In many cases a good DJ can even save a bad music format if they're interesting enough to listen to on their own. In the best cases, they're allowed to be creative with the music selections and make the listener feel like they're hanging out with them. Back when Live 105 was good, their nighttime show was called "The PJ Party." Just that name was cool enough compared to now where it's just a computer playing the same songs every night from an empty studio. They might as well be saying "We left this computer playing songs for people who have no life. Sucks to be you if you're listening."
I guess texting is an easier way to interact with radio now, though I don't know what they do if they actually get hundreds within a few minutes. It used to be the phone lines were jammed and you were lucky if you even got through. I've seen enough live shows on YouTube where the typed comments fly by so fast I can't keep up with them, good luck to anyone hosting the show to even read them all. On the last day of analog TV, a morning news show was taking text comments and they showed one that I had sent as a joke (I asked if a long-departed kids' host who'd since been replaced by news would be coming back on the digital channel- their answer of course was no.)
Aren't most of the NYC FMs, due to union rules, live and local for at least 19 hours a day? I thought Z100 was live in all other dayparts besides Seacrest.
I am sure that there are some tiny-market stations, not owned by any of the big corporations, that are still mostly live and local.
I am sure that there are some tiny-market stations, not owned by any of the big corporations, that are still mostly live and local.
KCHK FM and AM are mostly live & local
They are in New Prague, MN (40 minutes south of Minneapolis) and are live and local daily from 5am to 6pm. They are a small town station so after 6 pm they do carry tons of high school sports and the MN Twins on AM. Otherwise is a classic country feed overnight.
Sundays they are live with POLKAS from 5am to 7pm (sans 3 church services) then play a polka show from 7-10pm.
It very much is not. Internet radio certainly has its niches, but internet radio has been dominated by services like Spotify and Apple Music, starting in 2010 or so.
I think we've established, at least for spoken word stations, what the live and local list is...
1) All-News: WINS New York and WTOP Washington. You can give an honorable mention, as said above by Weiserguy, to KNX Los Angeles and KCBS San Francisco. They're live and local around the clock although overnight, they simulcast. News anchors and traffic reporters are covering both markets but they are live. All the other All-News stations do prerecorded news overnight. Usually the traffic reports are live except for WBBM which even does prerecorded overnight traffic, just construction and lane closures.
2) Sports: WFAN New York is live around the clock weekdays with a few network shows on weekends. WIP-FM Philadelphia is live overnight most nights with some network shows on weekends and "Best of" overnight on Sundays. WSCR Chicago had been live overnight until recently and WZGC Atlanta was until a couple of years ago. Now they run Westwood One Sports Radio (successor to CBS Sports Radio) overnight.
3) Talk: No talk radio station I know is live and local all the time. WABC New York is local most of the time but it does run two hours of Brian Kilmeade's national show in the morning and two hours of Mark Levin in the evening. Several of WABC's local shows are syndicated. So while Lionel is doing his show from WABC overnight, it's heard on a handful of stations nationally. Same for a few other shows. WGN Chicago is live and local most of the day but runs Lionel on weeknights, simulcasts WGN-TV news in early mornings and airs some national shows on weekends. KFI Los Angeles is live and local most of the time, even weekends, but it runs Coast to Coast AM from 10pm to 5am. And WLW Cincinnati is live most of the time on weekdays but runs Red Eye Radio overnight. So I'd give honorable mentions to KFI, WLW and WGN.
4) Music: I will defer to others on this board on this question. I know WLTW New York has local DJs at all times except 8pm to 1am when it runs Delilah. But is Victor Sosa doing his show live overnight? He only works five days a week so maybe he is? But he also voicetracks for some other iHeart stations. I guess for music stations, we should differentiate between DJs who do a generic voicetracked show, such as those on some iHeart stations like Big Rig and Mark Coppola, heard on dozens of stations nationally. But suppose a DJ just voicetracks for one radio station, talking about local things but maybe it was prerecorded earlier in the day? Shouldn't that be counted as "almost" live and local?
1) All-News: WINS New York and WTOP Washington. You can give an honorable mention, as said above by Weiserguy, to KNX Los Angeles and KCBS San Francisco. They're live and local around the clock although overnight, they simulcast. News anchors and traffic reporters are covering both markets but they are live. All the other All-News stations do prerecorded news overnight. Usually the traffic reports are live except for WBBM which even does prerecorded overnight traffic, just construction and lane closures.
2) Sports: WFAN New York is live around the clock weekdays with a few network shows on weekends. WIP-FM Philadelphia is live overnight most nights with some network shows on weekends and "Best of" overnight on Sundays. WSCR Chicago had been live overnight until recently and WZGC Atlanta was until a couple of years ago. Now they run Westwood One Sports Radio (successor to CBS Sports Radio) overnight.
3) Talk: No talk radio station I know is live and local all the time. WABC New York is local most of the time but it does run two hours of Brian Kilmeade's national show in the morning and two hours of Mark Levin in the evening. Several of WABC's local shows are syndicated. So while Lionel is doing his show from WABC overnight, it's heard on a handful of stations nationally. Same for a few other shows. WGN Chicago is live and local most of the day but runs Lionel on weeknights, simulcasts WGN-TV news in early mornings and airs some national shows on weekends. KFI Los Angeles is live and local most of the time, even weekends, but it runs Coast to Coast AM from 10pm to 5am. And WLW Cincinnati is live most of the time on weekdays but runs Red Eye Radio overnight. So I'd give honorable mentions to KFI, WLW and WGN.
4) Music: I will defer to others on this board on this question. I know WLTW New York has local DJs at all times except 8pm to 1am when it runs Delilah. But is Victor Sosa doing his show live overnight? He only works five days a week so maybe he is? But he also voicetracks for some other iHeart stations. I guess for music stations, we should differentiate between DJs who do a generic voicetracked show, such as those on some iHeart stations like Big Rig and Mark Coppola, heard on dozens of stations nationally. But suppose a DJ just voicetracks for one radio station, talking about local things but maybe it was prerecorded earlier in the day? Shouldn't that be counted as "almost" live and local?
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That's not true. There isn't a single "internet station" that gets better ratings than the broadcast stations. But they ARE losing listeners to the internet as a platform. Spotify isn't a radio station. It's a music delivery service with an unlimited number of "stations." There are no DJs on Spotify. People use it to avoid the DJs and the commercials, and to make their own playlists. There's nothing broadcast radio can do to compete with that.
Once again, not true. The biggest advantage broadcast radio has is it's free and doesn't require a subscription. It's omnipresent (if you own a radio). You don't need a username and password. Just turn it on, and it's there. No questions asked. No action required by listeners.
The internet is live. When I sign on to Spotify, it's live in that moment. I hear the songs I want to hear in real time. It responds to me immediately. I don't have to wait for the DJ to play my request. Spotify plays it immediately. In fact, Spotify will only play the music I request, if that's what I want to hear. Find me a broadcast station that will do that.
The texts are sent into a system that compiles them in a usable format. Very simple. Same with phone calls.
It's not the 70s anymore. You want all the conveniences you have now, including the internet, cell phones, and computers. But you want radio to be stuck where it was 50 years ago. Radio can't be what it was then because you now use the internet and computers. Most of the places you used to shop are gone too. You're part of the reason why radio has changed.
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K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
Alan's misstatement is repeated just about every time the subject comes up, and the response by BigA, or David, or Lance, or myself is always also repeated as both a rebuttal and an attempt to help people understand the realities of the business. Yet the repetition continues.
What A says is true. If you took the entire listening of the most-listened to "internet station", nationwide, and combined it into a single rating, it wouldn't even break a 1-share. Now realize that the listening is split across a couple hundred rated markets and a huge unrated cumulative unrated area, and the argument falls apart completely.
I have to ask, in desperation, why people think "INTERNET radio stations" (carrying over Alan's capitalization to show how SHOUTING the word doesn't make the statement a fact) are a colossal threat to radio. It is true that online listening to various services has eroded radio listening, but I think of Spotify as being akin to someone's personal MP3 player, without having to find all the songs to load on it before listening. And we have experienced that kind of erosion since the days of the Walkman.
In fact, when broadcast stations stream their signals, by definition they become internet radio stations. In that way, broadcast stations are competing with themselves. But the fact is that most people carry portable phones, and they don't carry portable radios. So if a radio station wants to reach people out of the house or car, the best way to do it is on their phone.
Per iHeart New York's SAG/AFTRA contract, they are allowed one daypart that is syndicated from outside the market. Because Z100 runs Ryan Seacrest in middays and WLTW runs Delilah at night they are BOTH local in overnights. WKTU, Q104.3, and Power 105.1 all use out of market trackers in overnights. But there are other music stations that are staffed overnights. WIXX Green Bay was local 24/7, but I am not sure if they still are.
Note they keyword there being local and NOT live. EVERY radio station where they have a modern playout system, utilizes voicetracking even if the tracking is recorded minutes before airing at times.
This should not be a debate in 2026. It is not financially viable to be staffed live AND local 24/7 anymore. If it was, more stations would be. The ship has sailed.
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
That is a distinction that also goes unnoticed, and I am glad you brought it up, Lance. "Live and local" is a listener-view myth these days ... for years now, in fact.
The late Jim Carson was a good friend and we talked often. He told me he used to do exactly what Lance describes: He would nearly always pre-record his talk segments on KRTH while the automation was handling the "mechanics" of the on-air presentation, and he always liked having the ability to give his best performance as a result.
Hell, I did the same thing in 1978 with a Schafer 903, VT-ing middays on cart. If I tripped over my own tongue while recording, I could bulk erase the cart and start over (or, if I did an entire hour's tracks on one cart, I would use a different cart and change carts at the appropriate point in the hour). So this is nothing new, and I am sure our audience also perceived us as "live and local".
So I will happily echo Lance's statement that this is no longer a subject for debate. Since he already used the "ship has sailed" metaphor, I will use another well-known one in modified form: The horses started leaving the barn decades ago, and the changed financial realities of the business only threw the barn doors open wider.
Isn't Delilah 7 to midnight?
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
It says 8pm to 1am on the station website.
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That must be new. All the stations where I heard it (not wanting to, so I changed) in the past had it at the earlier time.It says 8pm to 1am on the station website.
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Discover Saturday's shows for 106.7 Lite FM in New York, NYlitefm.iheart.com
K.M. Richards
Program Director, The Eighties Channel™
My friend, just because every station that you know of carries a show at a specific time does not automatically make that canon for all stations.
As an example, look at the variety of timeslots for American Top 40. Back when Casey Kasem was doing the show, 90%+ of the affiliates ran it Sundays 8am to noon. Definitely not the case today.
Still, every station where I ever heard Delilah had it at the same time, so I assumed that would be the case for all stations.
I know shows like "American Top 40" air at different times.
Agreed on this one. How much of this stuff about stations not doing voice tracking and are live and local goes back to the era when Tom Joyner had to commute from Dallas to Chicago for shows back in the 1980’s. But today shows are voice tracked from wherever Iheart and Audacy wants the show to take place. Plus those shows are podcasts made for Iheart and Audacy apps.