Bye bye Indie. It was nice knowing you.

[davideduardo]

No matter how much the EVC stations fail, they will never go back to Indie.

What is the true big difference is that LA has two alternative varieties now, and does not need a third. Indie served sort of a purpose as a second station. With the terrible terrible signal, 103.1 can not carve out a niche between two players as it, sort of, did to one side of KROQ.

 

[briancraig]

"What is the true big difference is that LA has two alternative varieties now"

L.A. has two stations that both play the same songs from the 1990s over and over. I wish one of the "alternative varieties" would play more currents.

 

[RBB05]

No matter how much the EVC stations fail, they will never go back to Indie.

What is the true big difference is that LA has two alternative varieties now, and does not need a third. Indie served sort of a purpose as a second station. With the terrible terrible signal, 103.1 can not carve out a niche between two players as it, sort of, did to one side of KROQ.

neither of them break new or local artists the way Indie did.

 

[TheBigA]

neither of them break new or local artists the way Indie did.

There's also KCRW, where Chuck is going.

 

[davideduardo]

neither of them break new or local artists the way Indie did.

And the PPM showed what "real" listening was for a station constantly playing many unfamiliar songs... in this case, Indie. The station's image was much larger than its actual listening.

 

[Michael Rivers Kramer]

And the PPM showed what "real" listening was for a station constantly playing many unfamiliar songs... in this case, Indie. The station's image was much larger than its actual listening.

That seems to bee the case for KCRW as well. David, what are the numbers for KCRW's morning music show? It looks like it hurts KCRW's numbers. NPR seems to be weak in this market.

That leads me to NPR in the Southland...

NPR seems to be weak in this market.

KPCC kills KCRW in the ratings, but it's no KQED in San Francisco. In fact, KQED's cume is about 40 percent higher than KPCC's and yet the Bay Area market is a little over have the size of the LA market. Both markets have two NPR stations...KQED does much much better overall.

Is it a higher ethnic make-up in the market? Is it a case of the LA market being much less sophisticated? A combination of Both? What about KPCC's weaker signal?

 

[musicfan101]

neither of them break new or local artists the way Indie did.

There's also KCRW, where Chuck is going.

Calling KCRW an alternative for Indie, is not only an insult, but it's annoying as heck! KCRW will NEVER fill the void of Indie. They only play music on certain times of the day! Any other time, that station is annoying listeners with boring talk, and playing "world music".

 

[Buckethead]

Just because they continued to use the logo and the name doesn't mean it was in any way the radio station that was on air for 5 years.
The station officially died the day they fired TK, Steve Jones, Mr. Shovel, Darren Revell, Henry Rollins, The Crystal Method, and everybody that made that station great. The web stream site was generally considered a joke and a farce among those who knew and loved Indie. Chuck will fit in well at KCRW playing painfully obscure and inaccessible music after midnight.

The only reason Entravision has kept the stream running at a loss was that they hoped to sell off the name and logo.
This is faulty thinking, as the name and logo are nothing without the talent and content that made the station so loved.

98.7 and KROQ can not be considered Alternative Rock stations. They are top 40 rock stations (actually more like Top 25). There is no Alternative Rock station in the LA market.

Some genius will see the value in a truly alternative new rock format that would be both familiar and accessible while also being as radically different from KROQ and 98.7 as the early KROQ was to the AOR stations of the day.

 

[TheBigA]

Calling KCRW an alternative for Indie, is not only an insult, but it's annoying as heck! KCRW will NEVER fill the void of Indie. They only play music on certain times of the day! Any other time, that station is annoying listeners with boring talk, and playing "world music".

I think it was Mick Jagger who said "You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you'll get what you need."

Indie's not coming back. Their experience was such that no commercial station will drop what they have now and replace it with their format. So get used to it. Perhaps if Indie's former audience donates enough money, the station will consider more music and less talk. But don't expect to get what you want for free.

 

[davideduardo]

Is it a higher ethnic make-up in the market? Is it a case of the LA market being much less sophisticated? A combination of Both? What about KPCC's weaker signal?

The signals in LA don't help.

And the market is nearly 70% ethnic and first generation immigrants. This is not to say that Blacks or Hispanics don't use NPR, but they tend to underindex. And among Hispanics, first generation Hispanics are quite unlikely to use it at all. Add in the significant Russian, Armenian, Thai, Philippine, Persian and other first generation immigrant groups who are less likely to listen and you have a scenario where a large percentage of the population just would not cume NPR.

KQED has a very good signal, and is well established.

And then there is the hard-to-define quality of the level of politization, interest, involvement, etc., of each city. Based on no hard facts other than income and education levels, I think the Bay Area has an advantage in indexing higher on the base qualities that define a potential NPR listener.

Even Pacifica does quite a bit better in the Bay Area than in LA.

 

[JimmyJames]

And of course, we continue to leave out the fact that the typical listener of KCRW or Indie has no real interest or motive in rearranging their lifestyle to participate in either diary or PPM surveys.

 

[Buckethead]

Then why do you suppose KPCC's listeners do?

For all the bluster and self importance of KCRW, KPCC has been quietly kicking their snobby arses.

 

[davideduardo]

And of course, we continue to leave out the fact that the typical listener of KCRW or Indie has no real interest or motive in rearranging their lifestyle to participate in either diary or PPM surveys.

So explain why KQED in San Francisco is PPM rated between #1 and #4 in every book?

There is no more rearranging of one's lifestyle to participate in the PPM than there is in carrying a cell phone.

 

[Michael Rivers Kramer]

And of course, we continue to leave out the fact that the typical listener of KCRW or Indie has no real interest or motive in rearranging their lifestyle to participate in either diary or PPM surveys.

So explain why KQED in San Francisco is PPM rated between #1 and #4 in every book?

There is no more rearranging of one's lifestyle to participate in the PPM than there is in carrying a cell phone.

It's just easier for fans of the esoteric type of stations to say that they are above participating in ratings surveys to protect their argument.

 

[davideduardo]

It's just easier for fans of the esoteric type of stations to say that they are above participating in ratings surveys to protect their argument.

Yes, it's just another variant on the "shoot the messenger" theme.

Or, a friend at Arbitron told me many years ago...

"There are three kinds of clients. The ones whose ratings went up believe they are programming geniuses. The ones that stayed the same brag abut the long-term preservation of the listener base. The ones that went down believe that the ratings are flawed."

 

[Buckethead]

Indie was profitable for 5 years. That's a pretty good run in todays business.
When the market tanked Entravision opted to remove the operating expenses from it's books to help them with
their shareholders report.
In the debt laden publicly traded world of post deregulation that is how decisions get made.
Pre-consolidation, before the the property values were driven through the stratosphere and gargantuan debt was taken on to gobble up properties
a less than mainstream station like Indie would have fared quite well, as did Jazz and Classical stations.

 

[LKellerIII]

Indie was profitable for 5 years. That's a pretty good run in todays business.
When the market tanked Entravision opted to remove the operating expenses from it's books to help them with
their shareholders report.
In the debt laden publicly traded world of post deregulation that is how decisions get made.
Pre-consolidation, before the the property values were driven through the stratosphere and gargantuan debt was taken on to gobble up properties
a less than mainstream station like Indie would have fared quite well, as did Jazz and Classical stations.

I'm not so sure that's true - at least not since FM became commercially viable. I'm not as familiar with the LA market since I haven't lived there in decades, but when I look at the "less than mainstream" radio stations in the Bay Area - few of them lasted even five years. The radio graveyard of the late 60s thru the 80s up here includes KMPX, "The City" (KKCY), KFAT, KRE-FM (jazz fusion era), KTIM, and the original Live 105 - all either changed formats, or saw their formats morph into the mainstream - either by their existing owners, or by new owners who bought the stations and flipped them. All this was before deregulation. KJAZ was a real jazz station here that lasted almost 40 years, but from what I've heard, the station was run by a jazz aficionado that didn't care about profit, and the station was always in financial trouble.

KPIG may be one exception you can point to, but their main signal is in Freedom CA (near Monterey), hardly a "mainstream" market.

 

[RBB05]

Indie was profitable for 5 years. That's a pretty good run in todays business.
When the market tanked Entravision opted to remove the operating expenses from it's books to help them with
their shareholders report.
In the debt laden publicly traded world of post deregulation that is how decisions get made.
Pre-consolidation, before the the property values were driven through the stratosphere and gargantuan debt was taken on to gobble up properties
a less than mainstream station like Indie would have fared quite well, as did Jazz and Classical stations.

You could not be more correct. The station was already operating literally off credit cards, so that the overhead was dropped dramatically. Look, EVC got their delisting notice from the NYSE, and they were operating outside the terms of their debt covenant. They sold off their outdoor company, which was the only form of radio station promotion, since they were unwilling to pay for any. Then they still needed to refinance their loans, and the banks told them they had to drop Indie, stop contributing to the employee 401k plan, slash their contributions to the employee insurance plans, and cut another 100 people across the country. From January '09 to April '09, they did. Stock prices went up, not because they were doing so much better, but because they cost their costs. But sooner or later there is nothing left to cut and the chickens come to roost. Walter Ulloa should have sold the company long ago instead of continuing to wave the white flag in many areas.

 

[RBB05]

It's just easier for fans of the esoteric type of stations to say that they are above participating in ratings surveys to protect their argument.

Yes, it's just another variant on the "shoot the messenger" theme.

Or, a friend at Arbitron told me many years ago...

"There are three kinds of clients. The ones whose ratings went up believe they are programming geniuses. The ones that stayed the same brag abut the long-term preservation of the listener base. The ones that went down believe that the ratings are flawed."

Indie's ratings, as Indie, never really went down. You have said so yourself. They always sucked. Look at the people that Indie had in studio for interviews. Look at the people they had as guest hosts. Those were the most hardcore fans of Indie, for better or for worse. Do you really think the Hollywood types and industry types are going to care about a stupid PPM pager? That doesn't make what Indie did correct. It means that in order fr Indie to survive, EVC had to have a conceptual understanding of how to make it work, and vision is one thing EVC sorely lacks.

 

[davideduardo]

Indie's ratings, as Indie, never really went down. You have said so yourself. They always sucked.

The share decresed from around the one-share range in the diary book to low single digits in the 11 PPM books before the format was killed off.

Look at the people that Indie had in studio for interviews. Look at the people they had as guest hosts. Those were the most hardcore fans of Indie, for better or for worse. Do you really think the Hollywood types and industry types are going to care about a stupid PPM pager?

That kind of people are so few, whether they are represented in the sample or not is irrelevant.

That doesn't make what Indie did correct. It means that in order fr Indie to survive, EVC had to have a conceptual understanding of how to make it work, and vision is one thing EVC sorely lacks.

In a transactional market, a station without a good signal and with PPM numbers in around a 0.3 was not going to make it with any amount of creativity, innovation or genius.