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Dream Station

Mike Sheridan

Mike Sheridan

What is your dream station? Here is mine:

Format: Smooth Jazz, Oldies, or Full Service A/C

Approach: Live 24/7 personality in all dayparts who are not restricted to reading liners over intros. Talks about the music played and what is going on in the community. Topical humor as local as possible. A short newscast every hour (TV news tie in possible). 4 or even 5 very short stop sets per hour with no more than 3 spots (commercials) in a stop set. Focus should not be on the station but on the listener. Contests and promotions would require some creativity on the part of the listener to win and also would be topical in nature. Not just call in and win. The station website would be fluid and made so that it could be easily updated frequently. Advertising on the website would be sparse and tasteful so it stands out.

Overused words "new", "the most music" to describe the station are a waste and would seldom be used.
 
^

I would use the same approach for the jazz station, but instead of having a 24/7 personalities, I would maybe voicetrack a night segment to save money. I would definetly focus on the content and play more than the "top 20" list over and over again. I would use a lot of "deep" tracks or one's you wouldn't normal here, like internet radio stations or even V-101.9 Sunday jazz brunch, since they play a lot of tracks from an artist album, not just the top hit. I like the newscast idea at the top of the hour, and I would include traffic/weather in the mix during rush hour, but not with the typical traffic reports around town, where you here a reporter hurrying through a list of accidents in 5 seconds and missing most of everything.

Another dream station I wouldn't mind seeing is a REAL 24/7 news channel here like WTOP in Washington w/out the talk. Some people want news/traffic w/out Rush Limbaugh and people calling in running there mouth about issues that have no real clue about. It would be like a CNN/News 14 Carolina type operation and give local 24 hour local, national, financial news, technology, travel, home/garden tips and get much of its content from the AP, Charlotte Observer, CNN, and other sources. The station would have its on traffic operation and would give detail reports. No, "the usually traffic spots, and an accident on Sharon Road, North Tryon Street at Mallard Creek Church, Harris at Research" in 5 seconds or less. Not everyone knows where the "usual" traffic spots are and giving me a list of accidents doesn't really tell me much. It would be something like "I-77 north is congested from Exit 1 "Street X" to Exit 6 "Street Y", Providence Road south highway 16 at Sharon Amity Road has a single car accident not causing any real delay and north bound North Tryon Street or highway 29 has a multi-car accident at Mallard Creek Ch Rd, traffic is slow from the scene of the accident to JW Clay". It would also let drivers know if there is a big accident on I-85 or I-77 in other nearby cities, like XM's Corridor traffic alerts. The weather report would include local reports as well as travel forecast, international forecast, and weather tips at different segments of every hour. As for the commericials, I wouldn't mind having them between segments (since an operation like this would probably cost a lot of money), maybe only having "big" commercial breaks, like where commercials run for 2-3 mins.
 
60s-70s Oldies...BUT doing it right. Not the same 200 titles over and over, with a consultant at a desk 500 miles away telling us.."No, you can't play that, it didn't test well"! A killer Jam or Pams jingle package, AND reverb! A good carefully picked deep list. None of this "I have never heard that song" stuff either. Magic 96 did a pretty good job with it, BUT they had the annoying Clear Channel mentality holding them back.
 
JoshB said:
^

I would use the same approach for the jazz station, but instead of having a 24/7 personalities, I would maybe voicetrack a night segment to save money. I would definetly focus on the content and play more than the "top 20" list over and over again. I would use a lot of "deep" tracks or one's you wouldn't normal here, like internet radio stations or even V-101.9 Sunday jazz brunch, since they play a lot of tracks from an artist album, not just the top hit. I like the newscast idea at the top of the hour, and I would include traffic/weather in the mix during rush hour, but not with the typical traffic reports around town, where you here a reporter hurrying through a list of accidents in 5 seconds and missing most of everything.

Another dream station I wouldn't mind seeing is a REAL 24/7 news channel here like WTOP in Washington w/out the talk. Some people want news/traffic w/out Rush Limbaugh and people calling in running there mouth about issues that have no real clue about. It would be like a CNN/News 14 Carolina type operation and give local 24 hour local, national, financial news, technology, travel, home/garden tips and get much of its content from the AP, Charlotte Observer, CNN, and other sources. The station would have its on traffic operation and would give detail reports. No, "the usually traffic spots, and an accident on Sharon Road, North Tryon Street at Mallard Creek Church, Harris at Research" in 5 seconds or less. Not everyone knows where the "usual" traffic spots are and giving me a list of accidents doesn't really tell me much. It would be something like "I-77 north is congested from Exit 1 "Street X" to Exit 6 "Street Y", Providence Road south highway 16 at Sharon Amity Road has a single car accident not causing any real delay and north bound North Tryon Street or highway 29 has a multi-car accident at Mallard Creek Ch Rd, traffic is slow from the scene of the accident to JW Clay". It would also let drivers know if there is a big accident on I-85 or I-77 in other nearby cities, like XM's Corridor traffic alerts. The weather report would include local reports as well as travel forecast, international forecast, and weather tips at different segments of every hour. As for the commericials, I wouldn't mind having them between segments (since an operation like this would probably cost a lot of money), maybe only having "big" commercial breaks, like where commercials run for 2-3 mins.
Click to expand...

An expensive idea but I like it. I used to enjoy NIS the NBC News and Information Service. It was carried on WINZ Miami and WSOC here in Charlotte among other stations. In addition to the hard local and national news the entertainment news and features were also very interesting. This was in 1975-1977, it seems like now with the technology we have that one of the big radio groups could do this much cheeper. I'm sure local TV stations, newspapers, and even some of the entertainment shows would provide content in exchange for the promotional value.

As for the traffic I agree. When I did reports on Lite I mentioned more than just where the accidents are because there are places that jam up just due to the volume of cars. Many times I have heard about and accident in a traffic report and there is nothing there. It was either cleared away a long time ago or it might have even been in a parking lot! I seldom listen to the radio for traffic reports.

Radio needs to get out of the current rut that it's in and think outside the box.
 
>>>>>>>>Radio needs to get out of the current rut that it's in and think outside the box.

It did...it's called XM or Sirius
 
My dream station is one that actually serves its local service area and isn't on a computer or bird. Radio would be AMAZED how audiences would grow if they had someone "local" (not voice-tracked or nationally-syndicated) to know on their radios.
 
wncmacs said:
My dream station is one that actually serves its local service area and isn't on a computer or bird. Radio would be AMAZED how audiences would grow if they had someone "local" (not voice-tracked or nationally-syndicated) to know on their radios.
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I agree with that 100%. I work 3rd shift and would listen to the radio if there was someone LIVE and LOCAL playing music I like.

I did an overnight show for 4 years and one thing I loved was the listeners who really paid attention. Let's face it if you're listening to the radio at 3 am it's likely there isn't much going on the distract you! I was also allowed to throw in some comedy cuts so I could take a break. Ever heard of "The Bickersons"? The audience loved it!

A programmer once told me he likes voice tracking because then each break can be perfect. Radio is at it's best and most relateable when it's not perfect. Some mistakes can be funnier than a planned bit. Look at all the bloopers featured on movie DVD's.
 
I've been in radio and television for over 30 years. My ideas for a "dream station" would never be tried by today's broadcasters! The "dream station" would actually be a cluster of stations. One would be "Southern Rock and Outlaw Country." The second station would be "Jazz and the standards from Sinatra and others mixed in with Beautiful Music." The third would be "Country Gold"--something Clear Channel should do with 105.7 WFMX. {As of this morning, the format has changed to a "KISS" presentation with clips of songs from different formats with "kiss" lyrics.} The fourth station in my "dream cluster" would be a format I dub "Ralph!" It is a "Simon" format...but you play hot songs from ALL FORMATS! (I also D-J in nightclubs and at private parties. This format sings!) You would hear such artists as Elvis, The Beatles, Al Green, K.C. & The Sunshine Band, Madonna, The Embers, Marty Stuart, Toby Keith, Etta James, and so on. My fifth and final "dream station" in the cluster would be "Bluegrass." These are formats, which really aren't around on the radio dial unless you find some Mom-and-Pop station that knows the big secret--use a format that's different--one you can call your OWN instead of copying someone else's playbook, which has been overused! The same cookie cutter crap that's out there now is what is driving people to satellite radio, their C-D players or their Ipods.
 
Mike Sheridan said:
A programmer once told me he likes voice tracking because then each break can be perfect. Radio is at it's best and most relateable when it's not perfect. Some mistakes can be funnier than a planned bit. Look at all the bloopers featured on movie DVD's.
Click to expand...

You are so right here, perfection on radio is BORING.

Someone else mentioned NBC's News and Information Network. I used to get to listen to it a lot because they used it as Jukebox on the network line when there was no other network programming going on.

One night I was working on the transmitter at WMNC after sign off. I was listening to the network feed. There was a lot of background noise from jackhammers as NBC was involved in some kind of remodeling project. I started a tape just on a whim and got some great bloopers of the host such as the bumper:

"This is your News and information NOISE" (as if on cue, the jackhammer started!!!)

It was easy to tell that he was very frustrated.

I still have that tape somewhere.
 
OK Here's what we do. We ALL get our lottery tickets and the first one that hits buy a station and hire the rest of us. I get Powerball AND Megamillions in my travels just to cover all the bases. I would most likely make more playing Bingo every weekend where my father-in-law goes in N.H.
 
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