Musical Diversity on Alt. Stations

[Saladressing]

FM 94.9 / San Diego is playing a doubleplay of Prince right now b/c he’s playing Coachella this weekend. Here’s the thing: These adventurous alt. stations (KNRK, KRBZ, WLUM, KBZT, etc.) could get away with a LOT more of this kind of programming. There’s a reason REV 105/Mpls. (which played James Brown & Korn on the same station) STILL has a cult following 10 years after it left the air: it’s because they would play more than just one style of music.

After all, hearing a bunch of white dudes in their 20s and 30s playing guitar-based tracks over and over and over gets old, even if the music’s good.

Indie 103.1 is probably the only station in the country that does this stuff (you could hear Van Halen on there on a Tuesday at 2PM for instance), but they’re really the only one, and even *they* aren’t near where REV 105 was on this issue.

 

[BlueWanderer]

Well, you're right about how hearing a bunch of white dudes in their 20s-30s playing guitar-based tracks repeatedly gets old. Because of this, lead singer female or all-female bands and other bands of different races tends to be more interesting to me than their white all-male counterparts.

Mixing new rock with Prince or James Brown? That's something I haven't heard before. But since I don't like new rock being mix with classic rock, I suppose I wouldn't like this mixing of genres either.

 

[WBIMDJ]

It's funny, what gets talked about most on the Boston board lately is how our Alternative station WFNX tends to play artists like Peter Gabriel, David Bowie etc. that may not seem "Alternative" (What IS alternative?) to the average observer but helped paved the way for alternative acts of today...but yet gets criticized on the board on a almost daily basis for this. (usually by the same 2 or 3 people) I personally think variety is great and for stations like Indie and WFNX to realize this makes radio even more fun. Those other stations can keep their close minded, cookie cutter playlist of less than 100 songs.