Your local FM market

Aaron

Moderator
Oct 10, 2008
15,634
10,634
168
South Louisiana
I'm going to ask you to do the painful act of putting on your FM radio, scanning the dial and seeing what your local FM market has to offer. (besides commercials)

If anything else, it will make you appreciate your satellite radio even more! :jj:


Here's what I get...

Classic Rock - 2
Top 40 / Hits - 1
Talk - 2
Oldies - 1
Country - 1
Urban / Hip-Hop - 1
Modern Rock - 1
80's-today format - 2
Jazz - 1
Swamp Pop / Cajun - 1
 

JoeTan

Well-Known Member
Oct 14, 2008
1,425
26
48
horrible. We just lost WBCN...there is no more "FM" unless you are picking up a relay Sirius broadcast
 

xan_user

Banned
Dec 16, 2008
3,234
74
48
Nor-Cal
When driving up and down 101

KPFA 94.1 FM Berkeley: Listener Sponsored Free Speech Radio / all types

KMUD - Redwood Community Radio - Home listener supported/ all types

KRSH ::: The Krush ::: Wine Country Radio 95.9 locally owned for 30+ years/ Blues, jazz, americana

Bob

Alice

A few each of top hits crap. country-pop-RnB/ ad,ad,ad music,ad,ad,ad,music,talk,ad,ad,talk,ad,ad,music....

and a bunch of latino stations.
most notabbly KBBF RADIO
"iLa Primera Estacion Bilingue Publica en Los Estados Unidos."
The first bilingual public radio station in the United States.

And a whole bunch of religious nuts./ lies
 

Jon

Well-Known Member
Dec 16, 2008
15,259
5,279
168
Here in Denver we lost what was a damn good Indie radio station that played a great deal of local artists for 'Conservative FM Talk' that has no local content whatsoever. We also lost a good Americana station that is now Jack.fm.

We have 3 heritage stations (One Modern Rock, One Alternative and One Active Rock) that are mere shadows of what they once were, all owned by Clear Channel coincidentally.

If I can sum up the Denver market in three words, it'd be 'Bring your iPod.'
 

kingchuck69

Joker! Joker! Joker!
Oct 11, 2008
5,860
3,830
168
Grand Rapids, MI
chuck69.com
I live in Grand Rapids and used to live "up north" in Traverse City. BOTH towns make me appreciate Sirius to the max.

Here in Grand Rapids, we only have one (!!!) rock station that plays new rock: Regent Alternative WGRD, which is the main hub of the Free Beer and Hot Wings show. The station is #2 in the ratings. Up until a few months ago, we had two other new rock stations: Citadel Active Rocker WKLQ 107.3 and Clear Channel Alternative (both a AAA lean) Radio X 9-6-1, both stations now carrying a Sports format.

GR has three Classic Rockers: Citadel's WLAV 96.9, Clear Channel's 101.3 The Fox and Regent's 98.7 WFGR, which recently flipped from Oldies to Classic Hits. The town also has two Country stations: Citadel's Thunder 94.5 and Clear Channel's B93, which received some negative publicity for a recent concert they sponsored where the parking area just happened to be a flood plain. There's also two CHRs: Clear Channel's WSNX 104.5 - which has a Rhythmic lean - and Citadel's 105.3 Hot FM, which is quite vanilla.

There's also three ACs and quite a few Christian stations since the area's population's mostly of Dutch decent. One station, WFUR 102.9 has been owned by the same family for 60 years and has no ratings.

On the AM side, it's mostly right-leaning news-talk from Clear Channel's WOOD 1300 (Rush and Hannity) and WTKG 1230; as a matter of fact, both stations air Dave Ramsey. 1230 does air Thom Hartmann and Ed Schultz, but they also have Glenn Beck and infomercials in the morning. GR AM also has a couple of Spanish stations and WGVU 1480, the nation's first-ever NPR station playing Oldies

Up in the Traverse City area, there's no Clear Channel or Citadel; instead, the stations are owned by local owners or out-of-towners who only own the station for real estate purposes. Sadly, most of these owners could care less about how their stations sound, since advertisers are their only concern. Therefore, crap is what you get on both AM and FM.

Rock-wise, none of the stations come close to Octane. The closest is probably Alternative WJZJ 95-5 The Zone, which has a douchebag named "Cartman" (I have a personal grudge against him, long story) for mornings and Dial Global's "Alternative Now" service for the rest of the day. The station plays its share of Rage, KoRn and Tool, but mixed in with the indie and emo junk of today. The other (somewhat) new rocker in town is the recently-launched WOUF 99.3 The Wolf, which an "Everything That Rocks" station that does play some of the more-recent rock stuff, mixed in with a lot of Aerosmith, Led Zep and AC/DC. Sadly, that station's signal doesn't get much east of Traverse City.

Sadly, northern Michigan radio has a penchant towards the lowest-common denominator, ie trailer trash. There's two other rock stations up north: the severely-overrated WKLT 97.5/98.9 and Classic Rocker The Bear. KLT does play a few token new tracks from Nickelback, AC/DC and Kid Rock, but if you love crap from Journey, REO Speedwagon and Foreigner, you'll love this station. As for The Bear, they're the northern Michigan home of (barf) Bob and Tom, whose career started at WJML in Petoskey in the 1970's.

Sadly, KLT and The Bear were the only two rockers during my formidable years up north; just imagine a radio market without KoRn, Metallica and Tool! ARRRGH! The Zone started in '98, but their definition of "Modern Rock" was pretty much Lillith Fair, The Goo Goo Dolls and Barenaked Ladies for two years until they FINALLY got a clue and started playing real rock. Too bad I moved away to GR after they switched.

The TC area has three Country stations: WTCM 103.5, WLDR "Sunny Country" 101.9 and WMKC "Big Country" 102.9. WTCM is always on top of the ratings. There's also two Oldies stations: WCCW 107.5 and The Fox 94.3/92.5.

The main CHR is 106 KHQ and it has been since the top-rated WKPK 106.7 The Peak started morphing into an AC WSRT in 2000. That station received some negative attention a few years back when the PD was caught sending in false Arbitron diaries, distorting their ratings. They're still AC, but as "You FM" with no ratings. As for KHQ, they are a little bit on the conservative side. Then again, they're much better than Hot AC 92.9 The Breeze, which has 60-year-olds playing Flo Rida.

Damn are my fingers tired! Then again, now you know why I love my Sirius. :)
 
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Argji

Member
Oct 14, 2008
400
21
18
Oklahoma City, OK
Honestly, I'd listen but I disconnected the FM antenna from my car so the Sirius FM Direct Adapter would work better......

Seriously it can be summed up in this way - two major players (Citadel & Clear Channel) battling it out with the same formats (Country, Classic Rock, Active Rock-type format, Top 40 & Spanish) to get whatever ad dollars they can with a few local outfits looking for crumbs. Oh, there are the stray news and talk formats and lame local sports talk.

I'll give credit though to Citadel. Back around late 2003 or 2004 they created an Indie/Alt station called "The Spy" that was incredible. Sort of like a mix of First Wave, Lithium, Alt Nation, SiriusXMU, with a bit of Boombox and Area. All the good stuff. It failed of course because it couldn't bring in the ad dollars, and this is why we fled to Satellite Radio. It's all about the ad dollars for these guys anyway - they couldn't give a crap about the music.
 

AZJoe

Member
Oct 11, 2008
267
16
18
Phoenix, AZ
My two locations:
Anchorage, Alaska
College/Ind- 1
Religious/Christian- 6
Americana- 1
NPR/Jazz- 1
Adult Hits-1
Hip Hop- 1
Alt/Rock- 2
Classic Rock- 1
Classic Hits- 1
Classical- 1
Adult Contemp- 2
Top 40 - 1
Hot AC- 2
Country-4
R/B Oldies- 1
Smooth Jazz- 1
Sports -1
News/Talk- 5
Standards- 1

Phoenix, Arizona
Spanish- 16
Reggaton- 1
Classic Hits- 1
Oldies- 1
Hip Hop- 2
News/Talk- 5
Classic Rock- 2
R&B Oldies - 2
Adult Hits- 1
Easy Listening- 1
Sports- 3
Smooth Jazz-1
Religious- 8
Classical- 1
NPR/Jazz - 1
Old School Rap- 1
Rock- 2
Hot AC- 1
AC- 1
Country -4
Top 40-1
Standards- 1
Jazz- 1
Kids- 1
 
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IdRatherBeSkiing

Sherbet is NOT and NEVER WILL BE ice cream.
Oct 11, 2008
27,230
13,833
168
Toronto, ON
I won't do it. Here is what I know from advertising and my distant memory. Toronto stations only not Buffalo stuff which we also get.

92.5 was JACK now KISS playing today's crap.
93.5 plays today's c-rap (urban).
95.3 plays country.
97.3 plays ACC
98.1 plays ACC
99.1 is the CBC Radio 1
99.9 plays today's crap 24/7
102.1 plays new alternative
103.5 plays today's crap
104.5 plays today's crap
107.1 play's classic rock
107.9 plays either dance or country. They keep flip flopping.

We also have CBC Radio 2 and CBC Radio 3 and some French and foreign language crap here but no idea where.
 
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hexagram

Medicinal & Recreational.
Oct 11, 2008
2,760
97
48
Seattle, WA
I'm going to ask you to do the painful act of putting on your FM radio, scanning the dial and seeing what your local FM market has to offer. (besides commercials)

If anything else, it will make you appreciate your satellite radio even more! :jj:


Here's what I get...

Classic Rock - 2
Top 40 / Hits - 1
Talk - 2
Oldies - 1
Country - 1
Urban / Hip-Hop - 1
Modern Rock - 1
80's-today format - 2
Jazz - 1
Swamp Pop / Cajun - 1

Regurgitated and God awful "Jack FM format - 1
Public Radio - 1
Country -1

That's ALL that's on the FM dial. I could not survive in this hellhole without SIRIUS :siriusdog:
 

microbob

Well-Known Member
Oct 14, 2008
624
307
63
Country 2
Classic Rock- 3
Top 40/Hits- 2
ModernRock/AOR- 2
Talk/Syndicated - 4
Urban/Hip Hop - 1
NPR/Classical -2
Oldies/ AM Only -1
80"s Retro - 1
 
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NoWayHozay

Member
Jan 5, 2009
51
4
8
We get stations from 4 different markets here but just for Asheville and surrounding:

Modern Rock - 1
Modern Rock w/Classic Rock - 1
Bland Modern Rock (Dave Matthews, etc) - 1
Classic Rock - 2
Classical/NPR - 2
Country - 2
Top 40 - 4
Oldies - 2
Christian - 6 or 7, maybe more

Don't know about AM, haven't used it in 20 years.

Our modern/classic rock station is pretty good, but like every other radio station they have some crappy syndicated morning drive time show - this one is Lex & Terry, total garbage. :blah:

If you want to listen to music on the way to work, you're screwed with terrestrial.
 
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kingchuck69

Joker! Joker! Joker!
Oct 11, 2008
5,860
3,830
168
Grand Rapids, MI
chuck69.com
Since my last post on this forum, The Zone in northern Michigan has flipped to Active Rock as "Rock 105.1/95.5" There's also talks of flipping 92.9 The Breeze to CHR as Z93.

So many flips, but who gives a damn? I just put a new Sirius antenna on my car.
 

Jon

Well-Known Member
Dec 16, 2008
15,259
5,279
168
Since I don't have Sirius in the car anymore (maybe next new car purchase) and there are almost NO real good FM frequencies to play a transmitter on, I stick to public radio and ESPN Radio. When I absolutely must have music I usually put it on a country station that isn't bad for the time I listen to it (about 10 minutes on school commutes).
 
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IdRatherBeSkiing

Sherbet is NOT and NEVER WILL BE ice cream.
Oct 11, 2008
27,230
13,833
168
Toronto, ON
I won't do it.

Last night I did it. I was frustrated when Rewind was playing some obscure crap and I was in the mood for classic rock. I flipped to Q107 the local classic rocker for a reality check. The music was a mix of Rewind and Vinyl much like the old Top Tracks. I don't know how often they repeat but the music played was fairly nice mix. The DJ was pretty good -- talked mainly about the music played and Q promotions. But every 3 songs -- commercial break. They seem to have moved back away from long music blocks and 6 minute commercial blocks for the 3 songs then 2 minutes model. I only tolerated 2 commercial breaks.

Interesting note about my radio. It showed the song title, artist, station name, and category (cycled through). Its not an HD radio (we don't have HD up here). I guess they must have found some way to put a digital stream in.

I will stick with XM but please fix Rewind!
 

hyson

Forum Jerk
Oct 19, 2008
11,844
1,061
113
Interesting note about my radio. It showed the song title, artist, station name, and category (cycled through). Its not an HD radio (we don't have HD up here). I guess they must have found some way to put a digital stream in.

Most newer radios have this feature but it takes the broadcaster to provide the data. I forget what it's called but not every channel supplies the data to the radio - but it's nice when they do.
 

Jon

Well-Known Member
Dec 16, 2008
15,259
5,279
168
Most newer radios have this feature but it takes the broadcaster to provide the data. I forget what it's called but not every channel supplies the data to the radio - but it's nice when they do.

RDS, although I couldn't tell you what it stands for. On certain channels it also gives time temperature and traffic.