102.1 KAHM Prescott, Arizona has had a B/EZ music format for years. They can be picked up in Sun City and parts of Phoenix as well.
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Radio stations that are "chestnuts"/anomalies
- Thread starter jp1996
- Start date
If you'd have asked that question a year ago, WCFW 105.7 in Chippewa Falls, WI would've qualified. The station had been owned by the same couple for over 50 years, and they were still heavily involved in the programming. I seem to remember the husband did the morning show up until the station was sold. It also aired the Jack Raymond Show, who has been dead almost as long as I've been alive, until the new owners took over. It recently took the WCFW calls back after another recent ownership change, but it's not the same unique station it used to be.
Of course, being an anomaly typically doesn't draw a large audience. If you've owned the station for decades and have no debt on it, as the couple who owned WCFW did, you can make money off of it. The kids, unfortunately, didn't want to take over the operation of the station, and the new owners incurred new expenses in buying it, which pretty much necessitated the format change.
Of course, being an anomaly typically doesn't draw a large audience. If you've owned the station for decades and have no debt on it, as the couple who owned WCFW did, you can make money off of it. The kids, unfortunately, didn't want to take over the operation of the station, and the new owners incurred new expenses in buying it, which pretty much necessitated the format change.
Since I'm still in Albuquerque (leaving soon for home), I'll put in a word for KANW, the station of the Albuquerque Public Schools. Mornings, it's a fairly conventional NPR station. At 12 noon, though, it totally changes, becoming a music-oriented station featuring the Spanish (that's what they call it here) music of New Mexico. While there are a lot of Mexican influences, it probably sounds old-timey to Mexican ears. Guitars are just about mandatory for every tune. Announcing is in English, the music is mostly in Spanish. There are jingles, traffic and weather reports, all-request hours, and promos for NPR shows. It's a huge influence in northern and central New Mexico. Perfect for a dinner of carne adovada with green chiles! KANW also has been expanding its network of stations, recently buying New Mexico Highlands University's KEDP in Las Vegas, and now operating (but not owning) community station KXNM in Encino.
KANW is building out a second network as well for its HD2 channel,"KANW-2", which is entirely spoken-word oriented, and carried mostly on translators. There is one station for this service on Mt. Taylor west of Albuquerque, licensed to Grants; and KANW-2's Española translator is being upgraded to a full-power station which should improve its coverage to Santa Fe. Albuquerque coverage is with a translator that seems fairly effective within the city and in Rio Rancho.
KANW isn't the only New Mexico station playing that state's unique genre of Spanish music: KDCE ("Qué dice") in Española also features it, as do some dayparts of Santa Fe's KSWV.
The NPR situation in Albuquerque and Santa Fe is a bit odd, as the University of New Mexico's KUNM also is an NPR member station. KUNM has blocks of "freeform" programming interspersed with NPR shows, "Native America Calling", and "Democracy Now". KUNM has its own network of stations and translators as well.
KANW is building out a second network as well for its HD2 channel,"KANW-2", which is entirely spoken-word oriented, and carried mostly on translators. There is one station for this service on Mt. Taylor west of Albuquerque, licensed to Grants; and KANW-2's Española translator is being upgraded to a full-power station which should improve its coverage to Santa Fe. Albuquerque coverage is with a translator that seems fairly effective within the city and in Rio Rancho.
KANW isn't the only New Mexico station playing that state's unique genre of Spanish music: KDCE ("Qué dice") in Española also features it, as do some dayparts of Santa Fe's KSWV.
The NPR situation in Albuquerque and Santa Fe is a bit odd, as the University of New Mexico's KUNM also is an NPR member station. KUNM has blocks of "freeform" programming interspersed with NPR shows, "Native America Calling", and "Democracy Now". KUNM has its own network of stations and translators as well.
WJLD, Birmingham. Classic Soul, locally owned. I can leave it on for hours.
KMGK 107.1 in Glenwood, MN. Soft AC/standards format, but in reality it's the station with "no format". Something like 2,200 songs in the playlist according to owner/PD Steve Nestor. There are songs ranging from the 1950s up through 2011 or so (Gotye's 'Somebody That I Used to Know' segue into Doris Day 'Que Sera Sera', segue into a smooth jazz or guitar instrumental).
They often will play a classic TV theme song at the bottom or top of the hour to hit the TOH ID. I've heard L.A. Law, Barry Manilow's American Bandstand song, Newlywed Game, Bonanza, Star Trek, Seinfeld, oh heck I think I've even heard Bert Parks singing 'There She Is, Miss America'.
Core artists seem to be soft AC and standards staples, but mostly soft AC. Gloria Estefan, Air Supply, Little River Band, Billy Joel, Carpenters, Bee Gees, Dionne Warwick, and Gordon Lightfoot. Some classic R&B/soul too, including Marvin Gaye, Earth, Wind and Fire, The Undisputed Truth, and The Supremes. Usually one smooth jazz song an hour, and Kenny G is rarely if ever heard. This would be Chris Botti, Rick Braun, Larry Carlton, etc. They USED to be a JRN Smooth Jazz affiliate before the network folded.
They are devoted to community at all timeslots. A noon news/information hour with classic Paul Harvey repeats, the Farmer's Almanac Radio Report, BirdNote, and various church services on Sunday mornings are aired. Saturday mornings at 9AM bring Value Plus Shopping, where you can call the station and buy gift certificates to local businesses in Alexandria and Glenwood. Old-time radio nightly from 10-midnight, as well as 11am Saturday morning with Gunsmoke.
Another example is WMGJ-1240 in Gadsden AL. Not only is it a graveyard AM with no FM translator, but they air a jukebox of R&B and occasional urban talk on weekdays. The R&B ranges from vintage Barry White to recent hits by Maxwell and Christina Aguilera. Many B-sides and album cuts are included, I think I've heard almost every song from the 'We're Movin' Up' album by Atlantic Starr...album cut OR single ("My First Love," which went to #1 on the R&B charts in 1989). Commercials are also an anomaly, I rarely hear advertising on this station and often will go straight through TOH IDs especially overnights/evenings. I don't know how they stay on the air, but it's worth a listen!
They often will play a classic TV theme song at the bottom or top of the hour to hit the TOH ID. I've heard L.A. Law, Barry Manilow's American Bandstand song, Newlywed Game, Bonanza, Star Trek, Seinfeld, oh heck I think I've even heard Bert Parks singing 'There She Is, Miss America'.
Core artists seem to be soft AC and standards staples, but mostly soft AC. Gloria Estefan, Air Supply, Little River Band, Billy Joel, Carpenters, Bee Gees, Dionne Warwick, and Gordon Lightfoot. Some classic R&B/soul too, including Marvin Gaye, Earth, Wind and Fire, The Undisputed Truth, and The Supremes. Usually one smooth jazz song an hour, and Kenny G is rarely if ever heard. This would be Chris Botti, Rick Braun, Larry Carlton, etc. They USED to be a JRN Smooth Jazz affiliate before the network folded.
They are devoted to community at all timeslots. A noon news/information hour with classic Paul Harvey repeats, the Farmer's Almanac Radio Report, BirdNote, and various church services on Sunday mornings are aired. Saturday mornings at 9AM bring Value Plus Shopping, where you can call the station and buy gift certificates to local businesses in Alexandria and Glenwood. Old-time radio nightly from 10-midnight, as well as 11am Saturday morning with Gunsmoke.
Another example is WMGJ-1240 in Gadsden AL. Not only is it a graveyard AM with no FM translator, but they air a jukebox of R&B and occasional urban talk on weekdays. The R&B ranges from vintage Barry White to recent hits by Maxwell and Christina Aguilera. Many B-sides and album cuts are included, I think I've heard almost every song from the 'We're Movin' Up' album by Atlantic Starr...album cut OR single ("My First Love," which went to #1 on the R&B charts in 1989). Commercials are also an anomaly, I rarely hear advertising on this station and often will go straight through TOH IDs especially overnights/evenings. I don't know how they stay on the air, but it's worth a listen!
Sounds a lot like what WERT Van Wert, OH does but it's somewhat more focused. Wikipedia says it's a former Stardust affiliate, and "Unforgettable Favorites" after that. I like to say, instead of "middle of the road" it's "all over the road". Smooth jazz isn't that common but is familiar songs. Nothing like Gotye (I think the only post-1990 recordings are actual standards) but "Bette Davis Eyes" by Kim Carnes (Unforgettable Favorites did play that), "Imaginary Lover" by Atlanta Rhythm Section", "Happy Birthday" by Little River Band and "I.G.Y." by Donald Fagan are some of the strange choices. A number of big band tunes from the 40s are still played. Bob Hope's duet "Thanks for the Memory". Some early rock and roll, which the person in a Facebook who recommended this station said he didn't like. A lot of songs I never heard anywhere else but they fit a standards format. And pretty much every "Hooked on Swing" or "Hooked on Tchaikovsky" type record. And some country songs that don't sound crossover, many of them by Johnny Cash. There is a classic country station in the market, although a lot of WERT's advertising is farm-related. I've finally concluded WERT is playing the owner's personal collection in addition to what was on Stardust.
I haven't listened any time when they would be doing anything like this, but a brief Fox News Radio newscast is followed by Ohio News Network each hour.
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Again, WERT is in a tiny market with tiny population coverage. It is not rated, and likely bills less than your lo cal bank branch manager makes. Why do you find it of any interest?
Many regulars on this site frequently exhibit weird fascinations with what could be considered 'underdogs', or stations that have fallen into obscurity. Anything else, or successful, is many times considered evil, or "corporate radio".
If it streams and a lot of the songs sound good and are familiar, why not? I rarely have to turn it off because there is a bad song.
On a good day I can listen for four hours straight and maybe turn it off once or twice if I have to do that at all. The songs that weren't familiar have become familiar because I've heard them so many times. It was recommended by someone when people were asking what to listen to do when KABL (traditional definition of standards, online only) was having problems. No one told me it wasn't a major market station so I didn't know or care. Someone is making enough money to keep it going.
KABL is too high energy for my taste. KTUC is a mix of standards and oldies but keeps repeating the same few songs over and over. WLML West Palm Beach is nearly all traditional standards but even if a song is familiar it's not the familiar version.
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WGPA (1100 AM / 98.5 FM) in Bethlehem, PA plays what they call "Ameripolitan" music: mostly '50s-inspired Rockabilly and Doo-Wop, plus Oldies, Classic Country, and Polka.
Probably because it plays the music he likes to hear. No listener is motivated to tune into a station by how much money it bills. Granted, a station that makes money is likely to be around longer, but, as we've seen repeatedly (with Buffalo and Memphis our latest examples), even making money is no guarantee that you'll be staying on-air.
a LOCAL country artist into a well known rock n roll tune coming up on my show later this week on KLMI/Hits 106. WE do use the tag line "the best music variety for laramie and albany county"
I can't edit it, but the Little River Band song is "Happy Anniversary".
In our area probably the closest one left is WDOG 93.5 in Allendale, SC, about 70 miles from Charleston. Absolutely eclectic station. They usually play country music, but they start the day with a trading post show with two guys who might have the thickest southern accents I’ve ever heard, with one guy who has been on since the station signed on in 1966.
They mix in classic soul at night, plus Sunday gospel. They also carry the local statewide sports talk show every night from 6-8. One of the last stations with truly block programming.
big-dog-radio.mixlr.com
They mix in classic soul at night, plus Sunday gospel. They also carry the local statewide sports talk show every night from 6-8. One of the last stations with truly block programming.
Big Dog Radio
Big Dog Radio is on Mixlr. | Mixlr is a simple way to share live audio online. Broadcast using any source and invite others to listen and chat in real-time.
big-dog-radio.mixlr.com
I don't think that is particularly surprising for folks who are, after all, hobbyists when it comes to radio. As a hobbyist, there isn't much interesting about finding another station that sounds just like a couple hundred stations of the same format across the country, but the oddballs make for fun discoveries. Sometimes it can be the fascination of finding the radio equivalent of a wreck ("Why on earth are they playing that?"), other times, the fascination of hearing something that we haven't heard in a very long time. Frankly, sometimes it is both.
As an example, I can love hearing some of the obscure oldies that show up on both KEOM Mesquite, TX (88.5, non-com run by the Mesquite school system in the Dallas area) and KRXY Shelton, WA (94.5, commercial station serving Olympia and the South Sound area) -- but recognize that if I were trying to make a living running a radio station it wouldn't be a good idea to play some of those songs.
At the same time, I also recognize that somewhere in the radio industry you do need to have companies that are willing to experiment and try something new/different on a station or else the industry will just stagnate and become irrelevant to listeners. Alas, the nature of experiments is that most of them will fail. Still, it can be fun to hear those experiments -- and that applies to both the successful and unsuccessful experiments.
As to the anomalous stations, I already mentioned my two favorites, which are KEOM in Mesquite, TX and KRXY in Shelton, WA (which I discovered visiting family in the area years ago).
KEOM is a non-profit station operated by a school district to provide training for their high school students and plays a "classic hits" format covering the 70s, 80s, and 90s. While that is a common enough format for commercial stations, what makes KEOM unique is that they go both deeper and wider than the commercial stations. They'll play stuff from the early seventies that has mostly dropped off commercial stations, and they'll play songs that weren't really huge hits (the ones that maybe peaked at #25 on the Billboard Hot 100). I understand why the commercial stations don't (and can't) play those songs that were basically stiffs when they came out -- but even "stiffs" have some listeners who did like them at the time, so they can be fun to hear. And while I don't expect commercial stations to play these songs, it is nice that KEOM can get away with mixing some of them into their format.
KRXY, on the other hand, is a commercial station and so far as I'm aware it is a standalone and not part of a group or cluster. It is a Hot AC station that plays a lot more older music than typical for that format. It is a place where you might hear Kansas and Lizzo in the same hour. I do notice that the advertising load on this station doesn't tend to be heavy, but somehow it does seem to have been able to stick around with this format for quite a while now.
KRXY is owned by a Michael Marohn, He use to Co-own Premier Broadcasters Which operates KITI-AM/FM a bit further South.
He also operates a Few HD to FM Translators that run as other stations, K270CJ is "Boomer Rock & Roll" and K262CY "Olympia's Classic Rock"
So somewhat of a cluster/group.
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I have thought for awhile, these 3 were related.. but i could never figure out where that thought came from and i had a hard time finding evidence of it
Thinking of another one that I make a point to listen to… West Virginia‘s MetroNews network. Still on live close to 10 hours a day with 4 local shows each day syndicated across the state.
WAJR in Morgantown, WCHS in Charleston the main stations. Hoppy Kercheval’s TalkLine is still very important along with Tony Caridi’s SportsLine. Very unique in this day and age for a statewide network to have so much influence.
WAJR in Morgantown, WCHS in Charleston the main stations. Hoppy Kercheval’s TalkLine is still very important along with Tony Caridi’s SportsLine. Very unique in this day and age for a statewide network to have so much influence.
This goes back 35 years or so, but I was fascinated by 95.7 WBGK Milwaukee. Anyone else here remember it?
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