Because the albums don't fit. My record crates are stackable, and the weight doesn't sit on the tops of the records.Why can't you use milk crates?
What Are Vinyl Crates, and Why Should You Use Them? - The Sound of Vinyl
If you’re the owner of a growing record collection, storage should be one of your highest priorities. The more records you get, the more necessary it becomes to have a system of safely and effectively storing each one when they’re not spinning on your turntable. In this post, we’ll be...thesoundofvinyl.us
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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
Are there any Christian Contemporary stations that are live all week and into the night? Are the K-LOVE/Air 1 personalities voicetracked at all? Obviously here, Positive Life is definitely voicetracked. Some personalities hail from other radio stations and voice-track for Positive Life. Jerry Woods is the morning guy at WGTS in DC, but he worked for PLR (and KTSY Boise) for several years. So he does the weekend PM shifts.
Yes, K-Love is live hosted 24/7.
K-LOVE Expands to 24/7 Live Hosting As 'Scott & Kelli' Ends - Radio Ink
The K-LOVE Christian radio network lineup will now feature live air-talent-hosted programming 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
radioink.com
And the format is basically "regional Mexican" oldies. Stuff from the later 50's and 60's, too. It leans very old, but Lotus is a skilled company in selling this sort of niche format.
Same.
It would be nice if secular stations could follow that example, but the realities of commercial radio in 2026 make it pretty much impossible financially.
c
They could do it if they operated like K-Love, with one national live feed and no local studios or offices.
Indeed they could, which brings up a point I totally forgot about: K-Love can be life 24/7 all it wants, but there's no local programming.
If secular radio followed that model, US radio would start looking more or less like it does in Europe, where you have national networks of stations all broadcasting the same programming.
Is that what we want? I don't know....
c
It depends. Right now 34 million people are paying for Sirius.
This is also what we see in dominant positions in most nations of Latin America and much of Asia where there is commercial radio... even in some of the more stable and developed nations in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The question is whether it has failed anywhere it has been introduced.
I see. Good point.
I see. Interesting.
It probably depends on the region, I'd expect.
c
Here's something to consider: There was a time in this country when national radio was big in this country. Local radio was very small time, and the national networks had all the big stars performing in what seemed to be very romantic places like New York and Hollywood. For the most part, listeners heard live performances by bands or actors. Playing records was the cheap way out. Then TV came about, and all the exciting national radio shows moved to TV, and all that was left was DJs playing records. For the people who grew up with radio in the 1930s, that was a step down.
Imagine what might happen if radio became national again, and instead of recorded music, there was exclusive live music that wasn't on streaming services. Instead of hearing smalltown local hosts, everyone was the caliber of people like Dick Clark or Casey Kasem. Instead of local DJs trying to be funny, you had actual touring comedians who did professional quality comedy live from all over the country. That's what national radio is like in other countries. That's what it was like here before 1950. That's what it could be like again.
Add in that in the middle of that transition, the musician's union, under Petrillo, lost most of its extreme influence. So stations could, "all of a sudden" play records all day without having to have union musicians on staff and running live band and orchestra shows.
And this was when the "hit song" became the "song by a hit artist". Previously, every band and singer had a version of the big songs of the day.
No, it is not. If you look at the "big" national stations such as Los 40 in Spain or Nostalgie, NRJ and RTL in France or similar ones in nearly every nation in Europe and Latin America and much of Asia, they are music stations that are very much like our local music stations in the US but with transmitters all over the nation.
But those were shows that are like TV became by the early 50's... hour and half hour drama, comedy and variety shows, live sports, news... but with pictures now. Radio became predominantly recorded music with hosts.
The BBC has live music performance shows where listeners get music they can't hear on streaming services. Radio companies are talking about ways to distinguish themselves from streaming. A big part of that is talent, but music is also part. Having a national platform provides them with the impact record labels and artists want. They can't get that now from iHeart or any other company. Sure, most of it will be recorded music, but artists and talent all want to reach the biggest audiences. Local radio is inefficient. Artists want to do fewer interviews, make more targeted appearances that reach the most people. Top hosts aren't satisfied being big fish in small ponds. Radio as an industry needs more national names like Casey Kasem and Dick Clark.
National stations, via many separate FM signals, are an interesting idea. As noted, SiriusXM has 34 million subs (I'm one of them).
Other than Howard Stern and Rush in the past and a few others, do we have any national shows now that are getting consistently great ratings outside of their home markets?
In Philly, Elvis Duran is on mornings on Q102 via Z100 in NYC. I remember when that started, people said, since he had done afternoons on Q102 previously, this would be a good fit for Philly. I don't hear anything about his ratings being stellar in Philly. The top morning listening is all local: WMMR Preston and Steve, WIP and KYW.
Therefore, would the real purpose of these national shows be just to keep costs down and not achieve the best ratings in the market?
And: Even though SiriusXM seems to make this work, I keep reading articles that state that we are a divided nation ... the coasts get all the media attention and the "middle" of the country gets very little. Will "middle America" like shows originated in NYC, DC or LA?
I think it was also raised elsewhere in this thread the difficulty of our four (lower 48 states) time zones. A 6-10 am show from NYC would air live in Pacific time from 3-7 am. I suppose time shifting for other time zones is a possibility ... or two national shows, one for Eastern and Central, another for Mountain and Pacific.
Could regional shows be an answer? There are some of these out there already.
Just asking a bunch of questions. Interested in what others think about some of these thoughts.
Other than Howard Stern and Rush in the past and a few others, do we have any national shows now that are getting consistently great ratings outside of their home markets?
In Philly, Elvis Duran is on mornings on Q102 via Z100 in NYC. I remember when that started, people said, since he had done afternoons on Q102 previously, this would be a good fit for Philly. I don't hear anything about his ratings being stellar in Philly. The top morning listening is all local: WMMR Preston and Steve, WIP and KYW.
Therefore, would the real purpose of these national shows be just to keep costs down and not achieve the best ratings in the market?
And: Even though SiriusXM seems to make this work, I keep reading articles that state that we are a divided nation ... the coasts get all the media attention and the "middle" of the country gets very little. Will "middle America" like shows originated in NYC, DC or LA?
I think it was also raised elsewhere in this thread the difficulty of our four (lower 48 states) time zones. A 6-10 am show from NYC would air live in Pacific time from 3-7 am. I suppose time shifting for other time zones is a possibility ... or two national shows, one for Eastern and Central, another for Mountain and Pacific.
Could regional shows be an answer? There are some of these out there already.
Just asking a bunch of questions. Interested in what others think about some of these thoughts.
The purpose is to create the best radio. You need resources to create great radio. The resources simply don't exist in every town. They just don't. People want live & local 24/7, but there just isn't enough money in every town to pay for that.
As for ratings, Sirius has over 100 national stations. Not all of them are popular or get great ratings. But they have national resources, so one of those channels may be popular in one place, and a different channel is popular someplace else. Spotify doesn't sell one format or one service. They sell a national service with multiple formats. That's what we're talking about.
Seacrest and many other shows are delivered in segments that can run any time of day. No one is going to do two national morning shows.
By “major” I mainly meant not non-commercial and full-power. K-Love is a cult but nice that they’re at least live (though obviously not local, national feed running on stations with zero people there.)
Regional will have less of an impact than national. If you're a top talent, you want what you do to be heard by everyone, not just one area. If you're a musician, you want your music to be heard by everyone. If you're an advertiser, you want to sell your product to everyone. That's what Amazon does. That's what the internet has provided. A national platform for music, talent, and products.
Would there still be small local radio stations? Of course. Public non-commercial radio would likely be unaffected by this. Small owners might still choose to hang on to their stations. But they'd be competing for audience with stations that have more impact than they do. It's like comparing independent TV stations with network affiliates.
I appreciate the answers about the object being to create quality programming where local resources don't exist, and the mention of how Ryan Seacrest's show is distributed. Those two things lead me to another question:
Sean Ross has, more than once without mentioning specific examples, written in his Ross on Radio posts about how lacking it is to have a national voice tracker do a short break that mentions a celebrity tidbit which was available via social media or elsewhere online the day before. Why would you be interested in something you've already read/heard elsewhere? When stations are playing back Ryan Seacrest, is his material already stale?
It's one thing if you're a locally employed DJ whose shift is afternoon drive and you're recording your breaks earlier in the afternoon ... and you may be around the station doing other things (programming, production, online work) or have access to a home studio where you could update a break if appropriate. I think "same day" and a minimum of time ahead are keys to recording good breaks.
I mentioned I subscribe to SiriusXM. They have many DJs whose breaks I really enjoy listening to. And they're voicetracked too!
When I volunteer and hear some of the local FM stations, there is one station in particular where I know most of the DJs are nationally voicetracked ... I hear their breaks and I think, "Why bother?" Just get rid of the DJs altogether and play music with generic liners like many Adult Hits Bob/Jack stations do if that's the best the national voicetracker can do.
I'm not against voicetracking. In regards to the answer about the object being quality programming, I agree. I just think there are examples out their on FM which don't meet the bar of "quality programming."
Sean Ross has, more than once without mentioning specific examples, written in his Ross on Radio posts about how lacking it is to have a national voice tracker do a short break that mentions a celebrity tidbit which was available via social media or elsewhere online the day before. Why would you be interested in something you've already read/heard elsewhere? When stations are playing back Ryan Seacrest, is his material already stale?
It's one thing if you're a locally employed DJ whose shift is afternoon drive and you're recording your breaks earlier in the afternoon ... and you may be around the station doing other things (programming, production, online work) or have access to a home studio where you could update a break if appropriate. I think "same day" and a minimum of time ahead are keys to recording good breaks.
I mentioned I subscribe to SiriusXM. They have many DJs whose breaks I really enjoy listening to. And they're voicetracked too!
When I volunteer and hear some of the local FM stations, there is one station in particular where I know most of the DJs are nationally voicetracked ... I hear their breaks and I think, "Why bother?" Just get rid of the DJs altogether and play music with generic liners like many Adult Hits Bob/Jack stations do if that's the best the national voicetracker can do.
I'm not against voicetracking. In regards to the answer about the object being quality programming, I agree. I just think there are examples out their on FM which don't meet the bar of "quality programming."