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First Thoughts on The Harbor

It's signal blows!

Medford is a MUCH better location for this station. They ran non-d 1.75 kW at around 460 feet AAT, which gave them a solid signal inside 128 and a usable signal all through 495. What you don't know about Medford is how it was never 'optimized'. I did the install there. The Phoenix was so desperate to sign on they never did antenna patterning. If that antenna had been swept, tuned and patterned towards Boston (remember, they were running non-d fully spaced towards Falmouth). The vertical field towards downtown would have increased to around 5 kW ERP. Even worse, I had used stock patterns from Shiveley for a 5 inch pole and due to the Phoenix' screwup of the lease we only got a 3.5 inch pole (I also had received an antenna with radomes, but could not use it due to the screwup mentioned above, so I redrilled the mounts, installed the antenna without radomes and later on replaced the bays with 'heatered' ones (again not sweeping the antenna).

The patterning and sweeping was done on WAAF's Shiveley (main) site in Paxson and I'll let that antenna's performance speak for itself.

Some might not might not understand all this tech stuff, but some here will .
 
I hear Kiss 108 promoting The Harbor including one voiced by Matty where he mentions that they are playing stuff he has played one time or another in his history.
 
diamondj said:
I hear Kiss 108 promoting The Harbor including one voiced by Matty where he mentions that they are playing stuff he has played one time or another in his history.
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So does Matty segue over to mornings at The Harbor at some point so CC can get a much younger morning show? They could still be an automated jukebox the rest of the day at WHBA with a very strong morning show as the anchor.
 
Richard J. Cabral said:
It's too bad that FNX didn't keep the 101.3 translator through it's last years. If CC was able to get that in the sale, they could have used 101.3 to relay Talk 1200 or Mia.
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I always thought that was a mistake, after all you don't just "turn in" a license, especially on a frequency 400 kHz away. They should have been able to move it someplace such as Cambridge or to the original tower in Medford, which according to LA_Guy was the best place for the 101.7.
And yes, another mistake, WAAF should have stayed in Paxton...
 
Mark Jeffries said:
WFNX isn't coming back. LIsten to WBOS, "Record Hospital," WMBR or WZBC, susbscribe to Sirius XM or find an Internet stream. Like wfnx.com. :)
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I can listen to WBRU sometimes. I am fine.
The Harbor is quite lame. The $14,000,000 Harbor is even worse.
 
Very...dull. Compared to Mike. Mike, I felt, had more upbeat variety than the Harbor has shown. CC's others, such as SHE in Miami, are better because they have a bit more upbeat, rock lean to them.
 
Each morning in the car, when I hit preset number one formerly for FNX, there’s a different and eerie sound coming across the airwaves. I grew up with FNX, first in my college years in the early 90s, attending FNX events in my 20s and listening to various morning shows on my way to work in my 30s. As I grew up over those years, the music became less interesting, the news became more slanted and the station’s emphasis on being cool over functional waned in attraction. In the end, I didn’t fit the profile of the hipster that FNX was catering to. It wanted listeners who thought every word out of Billie Joe Armstrong’s mouth was worth hanging on, who waited with baited breath for each new Chilli Peppers album and who wasn’t the least bit offended whenever Henry referred to the former Massachusetts governor as “Mitler.” FNX lost me, not because I didn’t like the music they played, but because they reminded me, every time I listened, that I wasn’t one of them.

Now there’s the Harbor and it cracks me up to no end envisioning the ultra-hipster, encouraged and refined from years of listening to FNX, turning on their Prius radio, automatically hitting any of the 6 preset buttons as they’re all programmed to 101.7, and hearing Phil Collins signing Sussudio. There’s an immediate wince of their torso and a painful cringe across their face. Yes, ultra-hipster, FNX lost you too. I wish you luck in your quest to find a new station to program all 6 presets to. Meanwhile, whenever I’m feeling down and near a radio, I’ll flip over to 101.7 and laugh at that offended look on your face when I hear “we play anything!”
 
jaybirddog said:
Each morning in the car, when I hit preset number one formerly for FNX, there’s a different and eerie sound coming across the airwaves. I grew up with FNX, first in my college years in the early 90s, attending FNX events in my 20s and listening to various morning shows on my way to work in my 30s. As I grew up over those years, the music became less interesting, the news became more slanted and the station’s emphasis on being cool over functional waned in attraction. In the end, I didn’t fit the profile of the hipster that FNX was catering to. It wanted listeners who thought every word out of Billie Joe Armstrong’s mouth was worth hanging on, who waited with baited breath for each new Chilli Peppers album and who wasn’t the least bit offended whenever Henry referred to the former Massachusetts governor as “Mitler.” FNX lost me, not because I didn’t like the music they played, but because they reminded me, every time I listened, that I wasn’t one of them.

Now there’s the Harbor and it cracks me up to no end envisioning the ultra-hipster, encouraged and refined from years of listening to FNX, turning on their Prius radio, automatically hitting any of the 6 preset buttons as they’re all programmed to 101.7, and hearing Phil Collins signing Sussudio. There’s an immediate wince of their torso and a painful cringe across their face. Yes, ultra-hipster, FNX lost you too. I wish you luck in your quest to find a new station to program all 6 presets to. Meanwhile, whenever I’m feeling down and near a radio, I’ll flip over to 101.7 and laugh at that offended look on your face when I hear “we play anything!”
Click to expand...

Let's quit with the pretensions and recognize that, for many people, current bands like Passion Pit and Mumford and Sons are more enjoyable to listen to than Journey. WFNX was a place to hear them first.

Listening to the Harbour reminds me of the time when I was thirteen, I tuned into Buffalo's legendary WKBW's countdown, and found out that Air Supply's "Even the Nights Are Better" was their #1. That disappointment in the blandness pop radio was quelched when I discovered that CFNY and CHUM-FM were playing the extended version of Tainted Love. The point is that there was stimulating music in the 80s, but I hear a lot of the boring or annoying fluff on WHBA. I wouldn't say that makes a listener a "hipster"; just someone who likes the stimulation of ideas in pop music.
 
OFFICENERD said:
Has anyone else noticed the bad sound quality? They are most likely working out bugs but they are striving to sound like an AM station at night. The sound qulaity is horrible, sounds like the inside of a barrel
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I was thinking this as well. I thought the sound quality sounded good in the first few days, but I'm not sure what happened.
 
jaybirddog said:
Each morning in the car, when I hit preset number one formerly for FNX, there’s a different and eerie sound coming across the airwaves. I grew up with FNX, first in my college years in the early 90s, attending FNX events in my 20s and listening to various morning shows on my way to work in my 30s. As I grew up over those years, the music became less interesting, the news became more slanted and the station’s emphasis on being cool over functional waned in attraction. In the end, I didn’t fit the profile of the hipster that FNX was catering to. It wanted listeners who thought every word out of Billie Joe Armstrong’s mouth was worth hanging on, who waited with baited breath for each new Chilli Peppers album and who wasn’t the least bit offended whenever Henry referred to the former Massachusetts governor as “Mitler.” FNX lost me, not because I didn’t like the music they played, but because they reminded me, every time I listened, that I wasn’t one of them.

Now there’s the Harbor and it cracks me up to no end envisioning the ultra-hipster, encouraged and refined from years of listening to FNX, turning on their Prius radio, automatically hitting any of the 6 preset buttons as they’re all programmed to 101.7, and hearing Phil Collins signing Sussudio. There’s an immediate wince of their torso and a painful cringe across their face. Yes, ultra-hipster, FNX lost you too. I wish you luck in your quest to find a new station to program all 6 presets to. Meanwhile, whenever I’m feeling down and near a radio, I’ll flip over to 101.7 and laugh at that offended look on your face when I hear “we play anything!”
Click to expand...

You're surprised that a radio station owned by the Boston Phoenix espoused a left-wing slant at times? I can see the monocle falling into your champagne all the way from here. There were comments here and there, but WFNX wasn't overtly political. Keep in mind too that what popularity Mitt Rmoney had in Mass declined as his term progressed (or digressed, rather), and he was never very popular with the 18-34 Eastern Mass demographic.

You did make one thing clear - you have no clue what a hipster is. Hipsters don't hang on the words of Green Day or foam at the mouth at the thought of a new Chili Peppers or Offspring album. In fact, anyone who fits that description is probably spending most of their radio listening over at WBOS.

The overplayed 90s alt rock was in the mix because it was familiar and studies show repeatedly that even new music fiends want to hear familiar songs in the mix.

Hipsters listen to WZBC, WMBR, NPR, WJIB... and sampled FNX but didn't listen for long, because bands like Muse and Florence & The Machine are old hat to them. WFNX took more chances with baby bands and buzzworthy acts than most, but a bulk of their format was still very familiar music - 90's hits and popular modern rock acts that sell a lot of record (Black Keys, Mumford, Foster The People, etc).
 
This morning, in need of my daily laugh, I switched over the Harbor and Footloose was playing. You have to admit the thought of one of those deeply loyal former FNX listeners enduring Kenny Loggins is pretty funny.
 
The station is a waste of space on the dial, but I have to admit that I was driving around earlier today and I tuned in. And they were playing the Great White version of Ian Hunter's classic 'Once Bitten Twice Shy.' Perfect song for the moment. I don't think I've heard any New England radio station play that band since that unfortunate incident in Rhode Island over eight years ago.
 
jaybirddog said:
This morning, in need of my daily laugh, I switched over the Harbor and Footloose was playing. You have to admit the thought of one of those deeply loyal former FNX listeners enduring Kenny Loggins is pretty funny.
Click to expand...

schadenfreuder!
 
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