radio stations: search and DESTROY

Hot 97 is pretty good. I listen to oldies a lot on the ra-di-o.

Of course the more stations there are the more homogenous and cross- owned they get, in the UK and the US. I'd agree with the well-worn belief that the UK has an incredibly fast-moving and, at best, very surprising singles chart, and the opening up of the chart to hip-hop and R&B in the last two years has a lot to do with Radio 1 moving such music from the fringes to the centre, but I'd also agree with Kris that it's all on the internet now so we have less and less reason to concern ourselves with radio.

And no "destroys" for 102.7 WNEW either? Easily the worst, for no other reason than Opie and Anthony (all of those "WOW" bumper- stickers scream out "Drag a Key All Over Me!" even more so than an SUV with a "Nader/LaDuke 2000" bumpersticker).

Good calls on WFMU -- def. a search. I'd also add WSOU, 89.5 FM, if for no other reason than Monday Night Mayhem (3+ hours of nothing but death/black metal, from 12 am-3 am) and my alma mater's flagship WRSU, 88.7 FM, if you're ever down in Central Jersey

S'funny tho, Tracer, cuz all you US guys going lyric — it SOUNDS romantic — about the possibility of area radio station suddenly playing what you don't expect, well, you CAN get that in the UK. You just don't, much. Bhangra stations etc a bit round Birmingham/ Wolverhampton (and equiv.presum.near other cities I don't go near), and mad techno-w/o-DJs veering off into electronic tester signal territory, and hilariously incompetent high-street ragga stations ("Respeck goes out to Monty's Hair Palace, which is two doors down from us"), but not THAT much — charming quaint crapness aside — that you don't get on the Big Mother Network. Plus the BBC don't have ads. AND(to contradict myself) it has the Only True UK Chart Top 40 Rundown. And the Dreem Team on Sunday morning, who make me laugh.

(this may become very important as I may be transferring to Philadelphia in a year or so).

as for 102.7, does anyone remember when THAT was a classic rock station? i have to say that opie and anthony made my commute easier at one point. sure the fans are loathsome, but can you hate them for that? ("hey, sounds like a thread!" he jests.) more than occasionally they're humorlessly puerile, but usually they bring a laugh.

As fer Opie and Anthony -- never liked them, probably never will. Stern imitators, and not even very good ones at that -- they do all Stern's "dirty" stuff and have none of his wit or intelligence. That's just my opinion. WNEW wasn't very good as a "classic rock" station -- "All Buttrock, All the Time" or Scott Muni's endless spieling about the f**king Beatles -- though they did have Vin Scelsa and Idiot's Delight.

Still remember one tape I made, must have been the spring of 1985 or 1986 can't remember when, of a typical WPRB broadcast back in those days. The tape had "Warrior in Woolworth's" by X-Ray Spex, a live version of Zappa's "Don't Eat the Yellow Snow," "White Light/White Heat" by the Velvet Underground, "I Wanna Fuck Your Brains Out" by G.G. Allin, "Look Back and Laugh" by Minor Threat, "Bitchin' Camaro" by the Dead Milkmen, "Hamburger Martyr" (can't remember who did that one, it'll come to me), some long-forgotten gem of a punk song called "Go to a Party and Act Like an Asshole" by some long-forgotten band, and various other gems ... I think I wore that tape out that summer from playing it so much. Wish I still had it, in fact, one of the best "sampler" tapes I've ever had.

God, I gotta stop this ... I'm getting misty-eyed just thinking about it.

i remember hearing wfmu when we used to drive up to pier platters and princeton record exchange. it was musicologist stuff, very dry, but their playlists are interesting.

I like current Radio 1 for much the same reasons Mark does, though arguably there's nothing quite as great in mid-late-evening as the old Mark Radcliffe show.

Anyone interested in the non-corporate side of UK radio should read Simon Reynolds's chapter on London pirate radio in _Energy Flash_ / _Generation Ecstacy_, obviously.

rural American radio is vanishing

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2019/jun/06/radio-silence-how-the-disappearance-of-rural-stations-takes-americas-soul-with-them

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/05/13/am-radio-electric-cars/

Ford and other car makers want to remove AM radio from car radios. Boo.

This is fun – pick a country and a decade and it serves music from that time and place:

https://radiooooo.com/