Radio stations that are "chestnuts"/anomalies

[RF101]

Most unusual station in my travels has been WXJK in Farmville, VA. Classic rock that’s programmed almost like a 70’s progressive rocker. Lots of live tracks…and peppered in several times per day is the owner preaching from the Bible.

They stream last time I checked. Not many (if any) commercials and the ones you get come immediately after the TOH ID.

I don’t know how David Layne and his family keep it from running in the red, but last time I checked he lived at and owns the studio/transmitter shack/tower.

I agree with the WXJK comment. Despite the 32K sometimes "humming" stream I find myself coming back to its unique mix of rock and blues.

Local coverage is hampered by being in a relatuvely low spot. Farmville is somewhat of a college town but I doubt many students tune in or even own radios. (Longwood University does have WMLU.). Troubling is that the ad load on WXJK has really dropped over the years.

 

[RF101]

Doubt forget radio fans of the existence of KZRO Dunsmuir - Mount Shasta, California. Well-programmed, that's another stream worth a listen. It carries some deep tracks of classic rock along with some great weekly syndicated rock shows.

The owner has occasionally made posts to this website - bonus points for that one. KZRO makes the I-5 drive north of Redding a "real trip".

 

[Bongwater]

It seems like every small town in the Midwest with an historically German or Polish population has a polka show somewhere on the radio every weekend.

 

[Mark Roberts]

It seems like every small town in the Midwest with an historically German or Polish population has a polka show somewhere on the radio every weekend.

Actually, it's not a thing among the Rhineland-descended German people (of which I am one) in Missouri.

 

[Bongwater]

Humboldt County, California has an entire cluster of them:

93.1/94.5 KSLG - a new music/indie/alt station that plays more new tracks in a week than KROQ in a year.

WEQX Manchester, VT - independently owned and new music heavy, excellent specialty features

I also love that WEQX is in a beautiful old Victorian house. Not some tacky corporate office building.

 

[Oldie919]

WEQX's first CD player was up on a shelf --- BEHIND the board op!!
It was quite a trick to point the remote control BEHIND YOUR BACK....and HOPE you hit the "PLAY" function!!
Hopefully, things have changed there....It's been more than 30 years since I visited them....
Their studio had a GREAT view of their transmitter site on Mt. Equinox!!

 

[boombox4]

It seems like every small town in the Midwest with an historically German or Polish population has a polka show somewhere on the radio every weekend.

I've heard the same shows on Saturday nights on some stations out of Canada. CJWW 600 Saskatoon is one of those.

 

[vchimpanzee]

Actually, it's not a thing among the Rhineland-descended German people (of which I am one) in Missouri.

I live in a heavily German area myself. No one has played polka in years, but the Germans are outnumbered by the Scotch-Irish. At least among those who have been here for more than a century.

 

[Mr Tony]

It seems like every small town in the Midwest with an historically German or Polish population has a polka show somewhere on the radio every weekend.

weekend? Hehe we have a local station that plays POLKAS every day. Listening right now
95.5 KCHK New Prague, MN

local from 5am-6pm
local news/talk/polkas from 5-9 (live music Fridays)
classic country from 9-11:25
trading post from 11:25-noon
news from noon-1
polkas from 1-3
oldies (50's/60s) from 3-6

Then the classic country satellite format (Westwood One formerly Dial Global)

Saturdays local from 5am-2pm
Sundays polkas from 5am-11pm sans 3 church services

On Sundays there are 4 or 5 local/regional stations that do polkas

 

[CCBInMI]

88.3 WCBN, U of M's student-run station in Ann Arbor, runs a half-hour polka show right in the middle of the week - on Wednesday evenings. The same station also has a show called "EZ Livin'" which plays a mix of Beautiful Music and some more contemporary chill-type sounds.
In Michigan, most of the polka programs otherwise seem to be on stations that run Country formats of some sort. 1530 WYGR (FM translator 94.9) in Grand Rapids' Saturday "Polka Pops" show has been on the air for years, and though they're a Classic Country station now, it's survived several format changes - including Urban AC! Another exception is 1400 WSAM (FM translator 92.3) in Saginaw, which normally simulcasts the Soft AC format of sister 104.1 WSAG (The Bay), except on Sunday mornings when they break away to do polka.

One Canadian station that does something unusual, and not just because of CanCon, is 560 CFOS in Owen Sound, ON. Mainly an Oldies/Classic Hits station, each weeknight from 8pm to midnight they go to an Adult Standards format that sounds something like Music of Your Life, with its eclectic mix of chart hits dating back to the 1940s, the Great American Songbook, and deep MOR/AC album cuts. Few other places will you hear Ann-Margret's one and only hit record, "I Just Don't Understand" (1961), or the Sergio Mendes/Brasil '77 rendition of "I Can See Clearly Now." or Olivia Newton-John's "Help Me to Heal" (from one of her last albums). Fascinating listen to say the least.

 

[SomeRadioGuy]

88.3 WCBN, U of M's student-run station in Ann Arbor, runs a half-hour polka show right in the middle of the week - on Wednesday evenings. The same station also has a show called "EZ Livin'" which plays a mix of Beautiful Music and some more contemporary chill-type sounds.

That just sounds like your typical college station

 

[crainbebo]

Continuing my listen to WEVR-1550 the last few days...this station is in a time warp to approximately 1990. One announcer throughout the day with detailed weather, the 'Suppertime Summary' at 5PM with news, weather, farm markets, obituaries, sports (which uses sweepers/bumpers going back decades), and an adult contemporary music mix that stops at the early 1990s. I have heard The Triplets ('Sunrise', only #16 on Hot AC chart in 1991!!), Julio Iglesias, and rare Michael Bolton songs, also Amy Grant, Chicago, Natalie Cole, random B/EZ instrumentals that Shazam can't identify, etc.

I would *not* be surprised if WEVR was using analog carts. Long pauses (10 sec. or so) between songs.

 

[Bongwater]

Continuing my listen to WEVR-1550 the last few days...this station is in a time warp to approximately 1990. One announcer throughout the day with detailed weather, the 'Suppertime Summary' at 5PM with news, weather, farm markets, obituaries, sports (which uses sweepers/bumpers going back decades), and an adult contemporary music mix that stops at the early 1990s. I have heard The Triplets ('Sunrise', only #16 on Hot AC chart in 1991!!), Julio Iglesias, and rare Michael Bolton songs, also Amy Grant, Chicago, Natalie Cole, random B/EZ instrumentals that Shazam can't identify, etc.

I would *not* be surprised if WEVR was using analog carts. Long pauses (10 sec. or so) between songs.

The song I remember from The Triplets is "You Don't Have To Go Home Tonight"

 

[ftballfan]

WEMP has been mentioned before, but about 50-60 miles up the Lake Michigan shoreline is WDOR (93.9 FM/910 AM simulcasting pair). They play mostly AC and classic hits music, have long form newscasts, read obituaries over the air, and air lots of local summer league baseball games. Also, WDOR-FM's 77,000 watt signal can be heard in most of northeast Wisconsin and parts of both peninsulas of Michigan. The AM is 1,000 watts day and flea power at night with no translator.

 

[Oldbones]

I don't know if they're still this all-over-the-place, but WIRY in Plattsburgh, N.Y. was kind of a free-form AC for many years, not unusual to hear some old Patsy Cline weeper cold-segued into "Footloose", followed by something by Pink or the Backstreet Boys. At the time they seemed to have a decent spot load, no idea what their rates were/are.

Same general neighborhood there's WDEV Waterbury, Vt. Real old-timey mish mash of programming, including the long running "Music To Go To The Dump By" on Saturday mornings. Other than some specialty shows don't think they play much music anymore, and no real logic to their talk programming. Rumor has it they're not doing well financially.

 

[CTListener]

I don't know if they're still this all-over-the-place, but WIRY in Plattsburgh, N.Y. was kind of a free-form AC for many years, not unusual to hear some old Patsy Cline weeper cold-segued into "Footloose", followed by something by Pink or the Backstreet Boys. At the time they seemed to have a decent spot load, no idea what their rates were/are.

Same general neighborhood there's WDEV Waterbury, Vt. Real old-timey mish mash of programming, including the long running "Music To Go To The Dump By" on Saturday mornings. Other than some specialty shows don't think they play much music anymore, and no real logic to their talk programming. Rumor has it they're not doing well financially.

WDEV recently changed hands after owner's death. They still play music -- old-timey country and folk, plus miscellaneous singer-songwriter stuff -- weekday afternoons. I listen occasionally in the car.

 

[cc333]

Do stations like this exist anywhere in California, particularly in the north?

I have searched, and there don't seem to be any anymore; there used to be some, but most of them either no longer exist or have long since flipped to other formats.

There are some oldies stations that are coming back (KEJB, KYNO, and KYOS on weekends, to name a few), but none are local to the SFBA, or even fringe, nor do they seem to have the more easy going stuff like WEMP or the like does.

Streaming is okay I guess, but how can I stream when I'm driving up in the mountains, where there's little to no cell service? Sirius/XM is an option I suppose, but I don't want to pay for yet another subscription. As it is, I can barely afford the ones I've got!

c

 

[wildthangjim]

I'm up in Mendocino County California a couple of times a year and always enjoy listening to KOZT "The Coast" 95.3 in Ft Bragg. It's owned and operated by some San Francisco and LA radio veterans and sounds a lot like a station of that progressive rock era. Lots of deeper cuts and live versions of classics, plus some newer AAA music as well. Very enjoyable and interesting listening, you never know what you'll hear. Maybe a typical Fleetwood Mac hit, then the full 11 minute version of the Doors' "When the Music's Over" (a segue I heard on a Saturday at ~6pm in December). Streaming at KOZT.com

The AAA in Santa Rosa CA, KRSH, is very eclectic for a commercial AAA station.

Northern California (north of the Bay Area) is an interesting area for radio, especially if you like eclectic rock. As mentioned earlier in this thread, Humboldt County has several interesting stations.

 

[crainbebo]

Even though they are now a Classic Rock station, KSRW 'Sierra Wave' in Independence CA, 92.5 FM, is still VERY freeform. Local news multiple times a day and a playlist that is not found on many, if any, classic rock FMs in other parts of the USA. Many album cuts. They aired Genesis' 'Robbery, Assault & Battery' about an hour ago, from 1976. Plenty of Neil Young, CSNY, Eagles, Moody Blues, etc., even songs from the Eagles' 2007 album. 'You Are Not Alone' was one of them, which ironically was on the playlist in their adult contemporary days, prior to September 2015.

I still have no idea how many songs they had on the old AC playlist. Still, it was designed like the early days of KTWV, with a smattering of Gulf & Western rock (tons of Jimmy Buffett album cuts), yacht rock, smooth vocals, some soft rock staples, more recent singer-songwriter cuts, AAA songs from Shawn Colvin, Suzanne Vega, etc. and at least 1-2 smooth jazz cuts an hour, or instrumentals. Lots of album cuts that I had never heard before, and for some songs - Shazam has still never identified them to this day! I still have 39 airchecks from the old format that need to be posted, in mediocre 16kbps mono quality - and I really hope there were other people out there who rolled tape as well.

 

[SomeRadioGuy]

I mentioned the one chestnut/anomaly I work for. but didn't mention the second one.

KSKO 89.5 McGrath, Alaska. We are what one Scott Fybush would call "nominally" an NPR member station.
We have a 2 hour morning show thats all country music, with a heavy lean on 80s and 90s. (hosted by me)
We have a lunch/afternoon show 12 to 5pm (i do 12-3, someone else does 3 to 5) that is all over the road musically.... can be/usually is what some would consider wide classic hits/classic rock.... but depending on the day, the mood, the weather, what we havent played in awhile, i toss in some ALt-ish stuff and a good heaping helping of AC gold.

We do tons of local info within those shows. .detailed weather, local messages is what we call it (think community bulletin board of the air).. person messages (hey so and so call me... etc)

We dropped Fresh Air because it just wasnt what my listeners liked..... we dropped any jazz and classical syndicated stuff, listeners hate that even more than fresh air...we do jazz with 2 classical songs per hour 4 to 5am weekdays and 4 to 6am saturdays just to have something non jarring on air for early risers.

I have several syndicated shows on air.. classic country, yacht rock music, a car repair show, im about to add a tech talk/new electronic gadgets show... i carry a hit music show.

The moment anything is going on thaty listeners need to know about, especially in the realm of heath/safety/weather, im on it and its on air, regardless of day or night...... often times i dont even give a damn whats on air, i fire off the news sounder music, pause whats on air.. let the sounder play for 15 secs or so then fire off the intro. you name it, ive had it on air. .wildfire info, info when the town floods.

We air christmas plays, we air special stuff from the school, high school graduation.. (did that this past year.. 4 students graduating in a school of 35...... had the principal tape his phone to the podium, connect to me at the station with an audio only zoom call and put that on air)

If it is local and or important.... if someone comes to me with an idea for something.. or wants something on air, i find a way to make it work and fit it in... im known for never saying no to anything local.