After being on the precipice of shutdown since 2014, Ireland’s long wave (LW) RTÉ 252 is finally leaving the airwaves on April 14. I was alerted to the news thanks to James Cridland’s International Radio Trends, and realized I had not given the station much thought since September, 2021 when it returned to the air after two months of maintenance. 

As Radio Survivor contributor Paul Bailey explained in a 2016 post, RTÉ 252 has a storied history. The station was founded as a commercial station in 1989, broadcasting rock music to the UK. It was acquired by the Irish public broadcaster in 2002, seeing an opportunity to reach the Irish diaspora. Protests from those listeners in the UK motivated the broadcaster to forestall 252’s demise several times in the last decade, but it appears April will see the final shutdown. 

The 252 KHz signal rebroadcasts the RTÉ Radio 1 signal, which is otherwise available on satellite TV in the UK, and online worldwide. A primary argument for keeping it running was that it served older listeners, less savvy with internet streaming, and those tuning in while in their cars. Those rationales seem to have lost their power. 

Though never used for broadcast in North America, the long wave band was once used throughout Europe and the Middle East in order to reach audiences over broad distances of hundreds of miles. LW propagation could be even better than medium wave (MW) AM, which served that function in the US, Canada and Mexico. 

But the catch is that LW and AM broadcasting are expensive, especially to accommodate the high power needed to significant distances. According to RTÉ the 252 transmitter requires a full 2.5% of the organization’s total energy use. The antenna arrays also take up a lot of real estate to function at such low frequencies because, as the name implies, they have long waves. However, RTÉ has not announced plans to dismantle the transmitter site in Summerhill. 

Across Europe both LW and AM/MW are in steep decline, principally due to these high costs and overall declining demand. For instance, the BBC is planning to wind down its own Radio 4 LW service and Radio 5 Live MW/AM transmitter network. AM is under threat in the US, too, as automakers drop support in their electric vehicles, citing interference caused by the motors that is difficult to mitigate.

As an aside, I own a Subaru Crosstrek plug-in hybrid, which has both electric and gas motors. I rarely listen to AM radio in the car, but I’ve noticed that performance on the band is significantly worse than I’ve heard in other gas-engined cars. By comparison, the FM receiver is quite good, especially on HD Radio stations.

It’s probably still too early to write AM’s obituary in North America, though additional life support may be needed. However, the end is likely nigh for LW and MW/AM in Europe. 

While I’m always a little sad to see such an historic service phase out, I do find the energy consumption argument rather convincing. I also suspect internet radio is even more accessible to RTÉ 252 listeners than it was in 2014. But I will admit a little part of me is waiting for the 11th hour stay of execution.

The post It’s the Final Shutdown for Ireland’s Longwave RTÉ 252 appeared first on Radio Survivor.

High school radio station KBPS AM in Portland, Oregon is celebrating a very special anniversary this week: 100 years on the air. It’s an accomplishment that few radio stations can lay claim to. And it’s especially remarkable that this particular radio station has always been a student-focused educational radio station. It’s very likely the longest-running high school radio station in the United States, having launched in 1923.

I was lucky to visit KBPS in 2015 and even before that trip was enamored with its incredible history. Festivities for the 100th are ongoing, with a special live broadcast on KBPS AM 1450 (and KBPS.AM) at 9am on Thursday, March 23, 2023. Alumni are invited to join live on the air or by sending in audio. Details can be found on the KBPS website.

Additionally, KBPS is having a public open house on Thursday, April 20 and Friday, April 21st at 100th Tech Show. Visitors are invited to come by the station at the Benson Polytechnic High School, Marshall Campus in Portland, Oregon for live broadcasts, studio tours, and more. Historical memorabilia will be on display.

KBPS’ license is held by the Portland Public School District. According to the station’s website, “On March 23, 1923, the student body of Benson was licensed by the federal government to operate a radio station using 200 watts of power at 834 kilocycles. The first call letters of the station were KFIF. The station made its formal debut on the air and was officially dedicated in early May of 1923, between the hours of 9:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m., on the opening night of the 5th annual Benson Tech Show. In spring of 1930, the call letters changed from KFIF to KBPS, for Benson Polytechnic High School.”

The post Happy 100th to High School Radio Station KBPS appeared first on Radio Survivor.

A number of months ago I was scanning around the AM dial late in the evening from my Portland, Oregon abode. I stumbled upon a station playing hard rock, which I thought to be an unusual find. As the AM dial has become mostly the domain of conservative and sports talk, I rarely encounter music that isn’t a bumper or part of some leased-time foreign-language programming.

In fact, at first I thought perhaps the music was a lead-in to just another talk show, but eventually I heard a full set of three songs. The station identified itself as “The Bear,” but curiously gave an FM frequency, not one on the AM dial. 

An internet search the next day confirmed that “the Bear” is indeed an active rock formatted station located in Merced, California. Its logo features 105.7 FM prominently, with the 1660 AM frequency tucked in the corner. Yet, the AM signal is actually the primary one – the FM is a 250 watt repeater (translator) station. 

Here’s a quick aircheck of the Bear’s station ID, during a break in the syndicated hard rock “Loudwire” program.

Now, AM stations have been permitted to get FM translators for a few years now as part of the FCC’s so-called “AM revitalization” initiative. But mostly I’ve heard sports and news/talk stations get repeated on FM. 

I filed away this experience in memory, but kind of considered it a one-off. That was until my recent vacation in the Wallowa Mountains of Northeastern Oregon. Stowed away and social distancing in a mountainside cabin with limited internet and no cable, I spent quite a bit of time scanning the AM and shortwave bands in search of interesting sounds.

This time I heard a full set of contemporary hip-hop. At the break the station identified as “The Game, nothing but hip-hop.” After the commercial break, the next ID gave a frequency of 103.5 FM. Listening for about 45 minutes while I made dinner, I never heard the AM frequency mentioned once. 

Here is a short aircheck of two station IDs for “The Game.”

“The Game” was coming to me out of Spokane, Washington, 200 miles north of my Joseph, Oregon location. A later search also identified KGA as an AM station, first licensed in 1927, with translator at 103.5 FM. Unlike “the Bear,” branding for “the Game” has no indication of its AM signal. The station’s website curiously makes no mention of AM, either.

For “the Game” it really seems like the AM signal – with a powerful 50,000 watt daytime power – is just a feeder for an FM that broadcasts with less than 1% the power. Granted, I get that few hip-hop fans are likely to scan the AM dial looking for the station, but they might give it a try if they knew about it – especially if they’re on the fringe or outside the FM’s constrained broadcast radius.

It’s refreshing to hear music on the AM band that isn’t being used as a bumper or bed, and isn’t easy listening. But it’s also a little disheartening to realize that it’s likely few listeners actually tune in to the AM signal. 

December 2020 ratings for the Spokane market still list KGA as a sports talk station, ranking at #22 out of 26 stations in the book. Only the AM frequency is listed, and I’m not entirely sure they’d list the FM frequency, too. So there’s no way to really tell which signal has the listeners.

Merced, home to “the Bear,” is no longer measured by Nielsen, and the new ratings company doesn’t share their rankings online. 

With most medium-to-large market FM dials packed to the gills, it only makes sense that some enterprising AM operators would try music as a way to better leverage their FM translators. I understand this has become a bit of a tiny trend, though I’ve not been able to figure out just how widespread.

It seems like music on AM may get even another boost, thanks to the FCC’s authorization of all-digital HD Radio on the dial in October. Stations that already use hybrid HD Radio – where the digital signal is squeezed in next to the analog one – have higher fidelity when received on an HD-capable receiver. Because more bandwidth will be dedicated to the digital signal, all-digital AM stations should have even better sound quality. 

In December, Radio World reported on KMZT-AM in Southern California, which actually flipped from oldies to classical music on its hybrid HD signal. The programming is also heard on the HD–4 channel of a co-owned FM station. The owner says he’ll consider switching to all-digital when there are more HD receivers in use. 

The downside to all-digital AM is that analog receivers – the vast majority of AM radios that aren’t in cars – won’t be able to hear these signals. That is, of course, unless these stations also have FM translators.

I imagine AM stations that have these translators will be some of those more willing to take the risk of trying all-digital AM, since they can still reach analog listeners on the other dial. At the same time, the tiny broadcast areas of translators mean that the potential audience will be smaller, at least in the daytime, when many AM stations run at full power. 

Only one AM station so far has filed paperwork to go all-digital, WMGG-AM in Egypt Lake, Florida. It is simulcast on both a full-power FM and an FM translator.

Even though many of the largest radio owners have signaled little interest in all-digital AM, it should still be a fascinating year for the dial. I’ll be on the lookout for more music formats cropping up. Let us know if you hear anything interesting.

Feature image credit: Michael Curi / flickr (CC BY 2.0)

The post Why There’s More Music on AM Now appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Though there are many good reasons why one might not want to look back at the year that was, we still see some aspects worth noting. In particular, radio and podcasting proved to be resilient media, with broadcasters and podcasters rallying to meet the challenges of quarantines and social distancing brought on by the COVID-19 epidemic. This also brought on renewed interest in legal unlicensed Part 15 radio broadcasting, while the FCC authorized the first-ever terrestrial all-digital radio broadcast service, on the AM dial, no less.

The murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor refocused the nation’s attention on systematic racism and the racial and gender inequality that continues to permeate every aspect of American society. This brought about fresh calls for public and community broadcasters to address the effects of this within their own walls, along with efforts to provide mutual aid, support and guidance to BIPOC and advice to white allies.

An eventful year, it was, and we’re here to run it all down.

Show Notes:

• Social Distancing Sparks Interest in Part 15 Unlicensed Broadcasting, but Caveat Emptor
• FCC’s All-Digital AM Plan Likely Will Be Weak Sauce
• Public Media For All
• Podcast #270: Public Media for All
• FairPlay
• WFUV’s EQFM
• Podcast #240 – WFMU is Still On the Air During the Pandemic
• Podcast #239 – Hunkering Down with Raven Radio in Sitka, Alaska
• Podcast #238 – Social Distancing, Going Remote and Automation during Global Pandemic
• Podcast #237 – How Community & College Radio Can Deal with COVID-19
• Voicemeeter Banana is the free software Jennifer has been using to recorder her radio show from home

The post Podcast #276 – 2020 the Year in Radio and Sound appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Eric, Jennifer and Paul reconvene to catch up on all that is news to us in the worlds of radio and sound. The FCC just unanimously approved all-digital operation on the AM band, while commercial radio – born on the AM band – celebrates its centennial. But keep in mind that broadcast radio is older than that first commodified broadcast.

We also reflect on the very first virtual Grassroots Radio Conference and the history of radio dealing with earlier epidemics.

Show Notes:

• FCC’s All-Digital AM Plan Likely Will Be Weak Sauce
• YouTube: Re-enactment Commemorates 100th Anniversary Of First Commercial Radio Broadcast In Pittsburgh
• YouTube: Should We Hate Spotify? [An Objective View From A Professional Musician]
• Podcast #234 – Community Access Radio in New Zealand
• Prof. Kyle Barrett guested on Podcast #221 – The Intertwined History of the Radio and Recording Industries
• Matthew Lasar explains the history of the rise and fall of “turntable style” music community websites on Podcast #26 – Celebrating Radio Stickers & Turntable Rooms
• Podcast #263 – Broadcasting High School Radio through Wildfires and a Pandemic
• 2020 Virtual GRC Sessions on YouTube
• Podcast #240 – WFMU is Still On the Air During the Pandemic
• WHIV-LP New Orleans, Human Rights & Social Justice Radio

The post Podcast #271: AM Radio Goes Digital as It Celebrates a Centennial appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Eleven months after opening a proceeding to consider allowing AM stations to go all-digital, the FCC appears ready to render its verdict later this month. According to Radio World’s Paul McLane, “[B]ased on anecdotal evidence, the commission will likely approve it.”

To recap, the Commission is considering proposals to allow AM stations to voluntary convert to all-digital HD Radio transmission, turning off their analog signals entirely. The purported benefits are better fidelity with no audible noise or interference. The tradeoff is that digital stations will effectively disappear from analog AM receivers, which make up the vast majority of radios.

It is true that about half of all car radios on the road now are HD Radio capable, and that the car is the site of large proportion of terrestrial radio listening. However, HD Radio has very little presence outside the car. It seems to be a big bet to cut off anywhere from a quarter to nearly a half of your listeners by ditching analog radios.

That is the takeaway from the experience of oldies station WIOE-AM in Fort Wayne, IN, which converted to all-digital this past May as an experiment. According to Inside Radio, the station turned the analog signal back on in early June after getting complaints from listeners, some of whom assumed that technical difficulties were to blame.

On the surface, an oldies music format would appear to be a fitting application for digital AM, with the tunes better served by the increased fidelity and reduced noise. At the same time, the older audience is probably less likely to be listening in cars, and even less likely to have an HD Radio capable home receiver.

For what it’s worth, the other station conducting experimental all-digital broadcasts in Maryland reports more positive results, saying that an HD Radio awareness campaign has resulted in it showing up in the Nielsen ratings for the first time.

True All-Digital AM Very Unlikely

Gazing into the crystal ball, Radio World quotes a “veteran engineering professional” who predicts that no major radio company is likely to invest in all-digital AM. Of course, those are the companies that own the vast majority of stations.

If the FCC chooses to authorize voluntary all-digital AM broadcasts, it will be consistent with the Commission’s overall strategy on digital radio. HD Radio, the current digital standard, is also voluntary and squeezed into the current analog dial. By comparison, most other countries with digital radio dedicated separate spectrum to use the DAB or DRM standards. While those systems also required new receivers, the promise of fresh and differentiated programming – like BBC 6Music – gave listeners an incentive to invest in new radios, which cost as little as $50.

On the other hand, the commercial radio industry has provided little incentive for listeners to switch to HD Radio from a content perspective. Mostly it’s just been the promise of lower noise digital sound. While there are at least a dozen different HD2 or HD3 digital-only signals in any major market, they’re generally poorly advertised, and many of them are just repeaters of an AM or just used as a way to feed an analog translator repeater station.

US Digital Radio Continues To Be Weak

By failing to commit the US to a true all-digital broadcasting standard, the FCC and Congress have consigned the nation to a digital radio system that is still unknown by the average person because it offers nebulous benefits. Certainly the broadcast industry has been successful in forging adoption of HD Radio in dashboards, but since the average car is on the road for more than a decade, this has been a very slow road. The adoption outside vehicles is pretty much a failure.

Letting AM stations voluntarily switch to all-digital will be just as weak and ineffective.

My principal concern for all-digital AM broadcasting is that it would undermine the vital emergency communications service these stations provide. During a hurricane, super storm, wildfire or other natural disaster when power and cellular service are cut or intermittent, a person’s lifeline is often that battery operated analog radio receiver. Who is going to run out to the car to tune in that HD station in the midst of 75 MPH winds?

But if it turns out that most major broadcasters won’t be interested all-digital AM, then the worst-case scenario of a disappeared analog band probably won’t come to pass.

Instead it will be just another weak step in the so-called AM revitalization initiative, which has really just been about giving FM translator stations to AM broadcasters. And that’s just a bribe to entice them to keep their AM stations, by making the FM frequency contingent on staying on the AM band.

Seems like a lot of time in the kitchen to cook up a very weak sauce.

Feature image credit: N Migo / flickr (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

The post FCC’s All-Digital AM Plan Likely Will Be Weak Sauce appeared first on Radio Survivor.

It seems that social distancing has made unlicensed Part 15 radio a bit more popular. “Part 15” refers to the part of the US broadcast regulations that cover unintended transmissions and radio frequency interference. Essentially, this means tiny radio signals whose transmission can’t be avoided or are negligible. It also covers tiny radio transmitters, like the kind that fit into your cars 12-volt socket to broadcast your smartphone into your dashboard FM receiver, or, less commonly, AM transmitters used by real estate agents to create “talking houses” for drivers by. 

With restrictions and good sense preventing many churches from holding in-person services, many apparently have looked to Part 15 broadcasting to transmit sermons to parishioners parked in their car. With a broadcast range of several hundred feet on the AM dial, it’s a way to bring people together for a shared experience while keeping them safely apart. All without requiring attendees to have smartphones or use up their mobile bandwidth (assuming a church is somewhere with reliable wireless coverage).

While a variety of Part 15 AM transmitters have been on the market for years, a new system actually calling itself “Parking Lot Radio” is in development right now. Suggesting uses for the system, the project’s website says,

In the current climate of Covid–19, the Parking Lot Radio allows churches to hold “drive-in” services. Other organizations can hold lectures, film screenings and other events, while maintaining social distancing.

While a few hundred feet or broadcast range is probably sufficient for a large percentage of worship houses, I can imagine it’s still not enough for some larger mega-churches, which might want to reach hundreds of cars in acres of parking lots.

It’s possible this limitation is behind a letter from Tennessee Rep. Mark Green, who wrote to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai asking for temporary waivers be issued to houses of worship for “long-range FM transmitters.” He specifically asked for the ability to “operate FM transmitters with an effective range greater than 200 feet.”

Careful with that FM Transmitter, Pastor

It’s notable that Rep. Green’s request was for FM transmitters, which are far more limited under Part 15. While the regulations for the AM dial put significant limits on transmitter power and antenna length, there’s no explicit limit on the signal distance. Clever and careful engineering can wring out a little more reach, and distances closer to a half-mile or more can be achieved.

But the FM band is regulated by a tight signal strength limit (250 uV/m) at 3 meters from the antenna, causing one engineer writing in Radio World to summarize the situation as, “[b]asically if you can hear them more than 250–300 feet from the site they’re not legal.”

Yet, a simple search for “FM Transmitter” on Amazon quickly turns up a product advertised as “Transmitter for Church, Dual Mode Long Range Stereo Broadcast with Antenna,” that promises, “[t]ransmission distance more than 300 meters (In the line of sight, field, open land).” It even promises, “FCC certified,” leading the average shopper to think they’d be ready to broadcast legally more than 900 feet away.

Don’t hit that “Buy Now” button yet. 

Digging deeper into the product description we see the transmitter clearly listed as delivering “0.5W” which very like means a half-watt of power. Though it doesn’t sound like much compared to even LPFM’s 100 watt power limit, that’s still way too much. 

Compare this to a truly legal and FCC certified Part 15 FM transmitter from the radio company C.Crane. The company states in the product’s FAQ that,

Most of our customers achieve 40 – 60 feet depending on their situation. The signal will travel up to 70’ under good conditions. 

That’s less than a tenth the distance the Amazon until promises.

C.Crane doesn’t list their transmitter’s output, only specifying that it measures at “the maximum allowed by the FCC.” Though if we just look at the power consumption of 22.3mA and the fact that it runs on two AA batteries that provide three volts, then we can safely estimate it consumes less than a tenth of a watt. It most certainly transmits only a fraction of that.

What this means is that there is no way the Amazon half-watt transmitter is legal to use under Part 15 regulations, and the likelihood that it’s actually FCC certified is about a snowball’s chance in Hell. However, the fact that transmitters like these sell for about $100 and have the patina of legality probably means there are dozens, if not hundreds of churches and other well-meaning organizations using them all over the country. I wouldn’t be surprised if even just one of Rep. Green’s constituents has fired one up on Sundays, and maybe got tipped off that they could run afoul of the FCC.

The Challenge of Expanding FM Part 15

It’s not surprising that Chairman Pai recently denied Rep. Green’s request. In effect, he writes that the existing regulations are there for a reason, and that applications for licenses require proof that the proposed station would not interfere with existing ones. 

I certainly would love to see a more robust legal unlicensed radio regime in US. Ideally it would be like New Zealand’s, which reserves a few frequencies for transmissions up to a one watt of power. I’d even settle for something tinier.

That said, I can actually empathize with the FCC on this one. The Part 15 rules are set under law; any changes would be difficult and slow. An attempt to provide waivers would result in howls of protest from the broadcast lobby, who are already in a tizzy about the rampant pirate operators in places like Brooklyn, Boston and South Florida. 

I can also imagine the waivers would be challenging to enforce. Without a license to revoke, how would the FCC ever verify that anyone is keeping to the new limit, without basically further stepping up overtaxed field enforcement operations? Moreover, there aren’t commercially available FCC certified transmitters that would fit the bill. I doubt the Commission would want to tacitly authorize the currently-illicit transmitters that are all over online marketplaces.

Of course, a Sunday morning half-watt broadcast on an otherwise empty frequency in a small Tennessee town is unlikely to generate much harm, nor much attention. There are relatively few FCC field agents, and it’s hard to guess how many would enjoy spending their Sunday mornings cruising around looking for churches to bust. That doesn’t make it any more legal, and I’m not advising any law-abiding house of worship do this. I’m merely assessing the real-world risks. 

Yet I would also agree that there’s a slippery slope from the well-meaning, conscientious and non-interfering broadcaster to the also well-meaning, but more loosey-goosey operator who decides to go for even more power, or to try squeezing their station onto a frequency that really isn’t that clear. On top of that, I understand that a lot of the transmitters you can get online put out a pretty dirty signal that cause additional interference by “splattering” onto adjacent frequencies. Using one responsibly is difficult or – as some would argue – impossible.

It takes knowledge, research and skill – and proper equipment – to broadcast cleanly above Part 15 limits without causing problems. So, caveat emptor.

Ultimately, this is why the Part 15 rules exist, even if some might argue that they’re too conservative and stringent.

Legal Unlicensed Part 15 Options Abound

That doesn’t mean churches, theaters or other organizations can’t leverage Part 15 broadcasting. As I mentioned earlier, there is a whole industry around manufacturing well-engineered and reliable transmitters, particularly for the AM band, where the achievable distances are greater. Despite the AM band’s diminished reputation, you can still get very good sound for voice and many kinds of music. Plus, the vast majority of cars still have AM receivers built in, which are also well optimized for the band.

Hobby Broadcaster should be the very first place you visit, where proprietor Bill DeFelice has done the hard work of testing and reviewing transmitters and writing guides for broadcasting legally and effectively without a license. We talked with Bill on episode #120 of our podcast, and I humbly suggest it’s a must-listen if you’re thinking at all of getting into Part 15 broadcasting. 

Radio World also published a series of editorials and letters on Part 15 this summer, which might be of interest to the more technically minded. 

Admittedly, the better FCC certified Part 15 AM transmitters are quite a bit more pricey than the sketchy FM ones on Amazon. You can expect to pay anywhere from $700 to $1000 for something like a Hamilton Rangemaster or ChezRadio Procaster.

But I’m also happy to report that the venerable Talking House transmitter – originally designed for real estate agents – can be had new for around $130. I own one of these that I use for my own tiny Part 15 broadcasts, transmitting experimental radio sounds to the surrounding neighborhood and passing cars. Using the stock antenna and very little optimization I can get the signal about a block away on a portable radio (that’s just 200 feet here in Portland, Oregon). In a car I’ve heard it faintly as much as four blocks away when the wind is blowing just right. That performance meets my expectations, and it sounds just fine for what I’m doing. 

We at Radio Survivor love a tiny radio station. We’ve written and podcasted about the topic many, many times. If your interest is piqued, dig into the world of Part 15 with us:

• LA’s KCHUNG Radio Demonstrates the Power of Part 15 Broadcasting
• Radio Station Visit #117 – KCHUNG Radio in Los Angeles
• Podcast #74 – Station or Static? KCHUNG Is L.A.’s Underground Radio
• Podcast #51 – Carrier Current is Cool
• A Middle Ground Between Unlicensed Micropower & LPFM?
• Reviving the southwest with community radio
• Pacifica’s KPFK to try unlicensed radio

P.S. I wanted to note that while Part 15 FM radio is limited compared to the AM band, if you prefer to try the FM band there are a number of fully-legal and FCC certified transmitters out there. Beyond the consumer-grade C.Crane model mentioned above, Progressive Concepts has been building and selling sturdy pro-grade transmitters for a couple of decades. Their ACC100 models promise a 200 foot radius transmission distance, which pretty much the most you can expect while staying legal.

Photo credit: Lorie Shaull / flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

The post Social Distancing Sparks Interest in Part 15 Unlicensed Broadcasting, but Caveat Emptor appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Thanks to our intrepid and loyal readers I’ve learned a bit more about the mystery signal I reported on last week.

To recap, I DX’d a station at 1700 AM – a frequency with very few stations assigned across the continent – that simply played 80s pop music, with station IDs that were difficult for me to suss out, though they seemed to be in Spanish. I surmised it to be XEPE-AM in Tecate, Mexico.

Two readers emailed to confirm my identification. Eric, who lives north of me in Lake Stevens, WA, wrote that, “XEPE on 1700 kHz does indeed play English pop songs, especially from the ’80s or so, when it needs to fill time between the Spanish language talk shows. I was confused the first time I heard that as well.”

Chris, a “a fan of casual DXing AM,” shares his journey:

I checked that frequency right away to see what was there.  (I am in Pleasanton, near the SF Bay Area of California.) Being only about 4:00pm or so at the time, there was nothing to hear, no surprise there…

Later, my wife and kids and I drove out to a park at about 9:00pm to try to see the Neowise comet, and on the way I told them I wanted to try the station I read about.  They know I like to find oddball AM stations and the kids (11 y.o. twins) “allowed” me a minute away from their pop FM stations.

Well, that same station in Tecate made itself apparent, with the Four Seasons’ “Who Loves You” from 1975, clear as a bell.  Didn’t even get the whole song in before the kids shut it down, from the rear console of our ‘03 Odyssey, their own little radio command center, but I was satisfied that I had found it.  On our way back home, after not seeing the comet, I hit the station again and caught a few crumbs of Carol Douglas doing “Doctors Orders” from 1974.

Chris was later able to tune it in from home on his (Jay Allen approved) Sangean PR-D18. Awoken by his cat a little before 5 AM, he heard the transition from music into talk programming.

Teacher and scholar Sonia Robles authored a book on border radio from the Mexican perspective, “Mexican Waves,” and dropped us a line to assure us, “-honestly- that Mexicans love 80s and 90s US music.”

Of course, we were very excited to hear from Sonia, and have booked her for a forthcoming episode of our radio show and podcast. You can read a review of her book in Humanities and Social Sciences Online.

We also heard from our old friend Tha Dood, who reminded me that a rare breed of AM pirates like to use 1700 and 1710 AM, for two reasons. First, these frequencies are relatively clear of licensed stations. 1710, in particular, is reserved for Travelers Information Stations (TIS), operated at low power by state and local governments to provide travel advisories and tourist information.

The other reason is that because these are the highest frequencies on the AM band, they also have relatively short wavelengths, making it a little more efficient to transmit with a shorter antenna. Mind you, the word relative is operative here – 530 kHz AM has a wavelength of 1800 feet, while 1700 kHz AM is 578 feet. Generally speaking, you want your transmission antenna to be like a half or quarter of that length, but could get away with a smaller fraction. (For comparison, 88.1 mHz FM has a wavelength of just 11 feet.)

I’ve never heard an AM (mediumwave) pirate here in the Pacific Northwest, and the ones I’ve seen reported on message boards like HF Underground seem to be primarily on the US East Coast or in Europe. Greece, Turkey and the Netherlands seem to be particular hotspots.

All of this should be an incentive to take a journey to the right end of the AM dial with a decent radio every so often. You never know what you might hear.

The post Confirmations of 1700 (AM) appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Before going to bed I often enjoying scanning the radio dials, listening for signals that don’t come through while the sun is out. A couple of weeks ago the AM band was particularly fertile, especially at the upper end of the dial. These frequencies north of 1600 kHz are known as the “expanded band” because they were added to the service in 1990.

Some factors aiding the reception of distant signals on these frequencies are that there are relatively few stations, and they are limited to a maximum of 1 kilowatt of power at night. That limited power of course is a limitation on overall propagation, but when conditions are right it can mean pretty good long-distance catches.

I received one station over the course of several nights that particularly fascinated me. At 1700 kHz I heard continuous 80s pop music – think Huey Lewis and the News – with an intermittent station ID that was hard to make out, as the signal faded in and out. On the occasions when the ID was clearer I’m pretty sure it was in Spanish, but difficult to understand. Even over the course one hour-long listening session I never heard even one commercial, or anything but the short ID or pop songs.

Very few stations are assigned this frequency – just seven in North America in fact. Looking the list of 1700 AM stations in the US, none is closer than 1400 miles away from my Portland, OR location (that station is in Des Moines, IA). While a couple stations have a Spanish language format, they don’t seem like they’d be playing American 80s pop.

At 949 miles, the closest station is actually in Tecate, Mexico, part of the Tijuana metro area. Unlike the US stations, XEPE-AM broadcasts with 10,000 watts at night. While still about a fifth of clear-channel power, that much signal in a relatively uncrowded band also helps explain why it can come in well on occasion in Oregon.

According to Wikipedia the station has a news-talk format, but that’s not what I’m hearing after dark. It might be that’s the daytime format, and perhaps it reverts to automated music at night just to fill the time. I don’t have a better explanation.

I wasn’t equipped to get a recording of the station, and it hasn’t been coming in clear since about July 6. The radio I’m using is a C.Crane CCRadio 2, which was designed to have excellent AM reception. Radio guru ‘Radio’ Jay Allen says, [f]or raw sensitivity the CC-2 is right up there with the best.”

I’ll keep trying with a recorder handy to see if I can’t get an aircheck to share. Otherwise, let me know if you have another theory on the station’s identity.

The post DX Adventures at 1700 appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The Federal Communications Commission is all about radio at the end of 2019, and we catch you up on what you need to know. We all have questions about the possibility of AM stations going all-digital, including the FCC. The regulatory body released the things it wants to know about how digital stations would work, and how it would impact listeners, especially those in rural communities.

Also, the Commission is reconsidering restrictions on duplication programming between AM and FM stations, and the fate of Channel 6 TV on the radio, a/k/a FrankenFMs, hangs in the balance.

Then we dive into the reports that CMJ – the publication and event series that documented and supported the cultural influence of college radio – will come back from the dead. Will it return to print? Will there be an annual Music Marathon in NYC? We ponder.

There was more to discuss about the CMJ return than we had time for, including provocative questions, like: Do we even need a CMJ anymore? Our Patreon supporters get to hear this unvarnished exchange in a Patron-exclusive bonus episode. You can hear it, too, when you sign up to support our work at Radio Survivor, starting at just $1 a month.

Show Notes:

• Call for Papers: ‘Century of Broadcasting: Preservation and Renewal’ Conference
• Podcast #192: Saving Radio History with the Radio Preservation Task Force
• FCC Opens Proceeding for All-Digital AM Radio
• Radio World: FCC Takes Your Questions on AM All-Digital
• Multichannel News: FCC Seeks Input on Analog Radio as Digital TV Service
• Davis Wright Tremaine LLP: FCC Seeks Comment on All-Digital AM and Radio Non-Duplication NPRM
• The Rise and Possible Fall of FrankenFMs Is One of the Most Important Radio Trends of the Decade
• College Radio Watch: CMJ to Return in 2020 and More News
• College Radio Watch: CMJ Lawsuit, WREK’s 50th, Station Tours, and More News
• Podcast 62 – The FCC’s Legacy of Failure & CMJ’s Uncertain Future
• What is the Future of CMJ?
• College Radio Participants Meet Up at CMJ’s Inaugural College Day on Tour in Portland

The post Podcast #223: Will CMJ Return, Will AM Go Digital and Will FrankenFMs Disappear? Plus Other Big Questions appeared first on Radio Survivor.

On Nov. 22 the Federal Communitications Commission voted unanimously to adopt a proposal for rulemaking to allow AM radio stations to convert to fully digital broadcasting, using the MA3 all-digital mode of HD Radio. There was no dissent, and all three Republican commissioners issued separate statements of support. As I noted earlier, if approved, all-digital AM broadcasting would be voluntary.

In addition to deciding if AM stations can convert to digital, the proceeding will also pose questions about how these new all-digital signals will be required to protect adjacent stations from interference. The FCC hasn’t published the full proposal for these details in docket 13–249 yet. Once published in the Federal Register a 30-day comment period will open up where any interested party may let the Commission know their opinion on the idea.

If approved, stations that go all-digital will no longer be receivable on analog receivers, which includes most portable and home radios. About 50% of new car radios feature HD reception. Though because the average vehicle on the road is 11 years old, a smaller percentage of them are HD-capable. 

The question AM broadcasters will need to consider is if the gain in fidelity is worth the potential loss of half or more of their audiences. For listeners and radio enthusiasts, the question is what is the toll for communities when more than half of listeners lose access to a station’s signal. Even if the programming is of interest to just a fraction of listeners, many AM stations still serve an important community service function.

The thought experiment is to consider what it would be like if a major top-rated AM news broadcaster like KFI in Los Angeles, WCBS in New York or WLS in Chicago went all-digital. These are the stations that millions depend on during an event like Superstorm Sandy, major blizzards or wildfires, when electric or cell service may go down for hours or days.

Of course, just because they can go all-digital doesn’t mean these stations will. But I also don’t expect millions of people will rush out to buy HD capable radios if their favorite station converts. They’ll just switch over to listening online or stop listening altogether. It won’t be like the 2009 digital television transition, where it was a case of buy a new TV or coverter box, or lose free over-the-air television altogether. 

Also under consideration is removal of the programming duplication rule, which has been around in some form for decades. Since its last modification in 1992, commonly-owned or operated AM and FM station in the same market may only air the same programming for a total of 25% of airtime during a week. The rule already excepts FM translators, which are permitted to full rebroadcast AM station programming under certain conditions.

We’ll take a closer look at both of these full proposals when released. 

The post FCC Opens Proceeding for All-Digital AM Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

When Jim Bolt was in college at Sacramento State University in 1989 college radio was exerting unprecedented cultural influence in the U.S. But this campus no longer had a radio station. Though he had heard stories of an earlier student-run AM station – KERS – he couldn’t get to the bottom of why it no longer existed. In the same period the university transferred its FM license over to Capitol Public Radio.

Convinced that the school and the Sacramento community deserved real college radio, he and a group of fellow students pushed hard for two years to finally get KEDG off the ground and onto the AM airwaves in 1991. Today that station continues to thrive online as KSSU. But the struggle to bring college radio back to Sacramento State is why he says it’s “a startup that shouldn’t exist.”

Jim tells this founding story and explains why he and his fellow co-founders endeavored to keep the founding story alive with words and archival materials. He shares hard won advice for college students looking to build their own stations, and for alums who want to preserve their broadcast legacies.

Show Notes:

• KSSU
• KEDG Online Archive
• New York Times: The Power of Tower Records
• The State Hornet: KSSU radio station celebrates 25 years of giving voice to Sac State community
• Sacramento News & Review: Radio Control
• CollegeRadio.org: Sac State Students Refuse to Be Sacked: A Story of Student Radio Startup and Survival in Sacramento
• Inside Radio: Radio Plays Outsized Role In Small And Mid-Market America

The post Podcast #220 – The College Radio Station ‘That Shouldn’t Exist’ appeared first on Radio Survivor.

In April 2020 the FCC will open up the next auction for FM radio licenses. This is the next, and only currently scheduled opportunity to build a new radio station in the U.S. Jennifer, Eric and Paul discuss this news, along with celebrating the 60th birthday of KFJC-FM at Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, CA. We reflect on how KFJC and other college stations were trailblazers in programming and service, functioning a lot like public radio in the years before National Public Radio was created.

We also dive into the proposal to allow AM radio stations to all-digital, using HD Radio. These stations would be unreceivable on the millions of radios that don’t receive digital HD signals. We survey the supposed benefits of the idea, and the deficits.

Finally, we celebrate another momentous occasion, the 25th anniversary of a terrestrial station simulcasting on the internet. And, wouldn’t you know it – both stations credited with being first are college stations.

Show Notes

• Happy 60th to College Radio Station KFJC
• Can We Save AM Radio by Killing It? Considering All-Digital AM Radio
• Inside Radio: FCC Is Auctioning 130 FM Signals. Here’s What You Need To Know
• Internet Radio Is Older Than You Think

.@DVD points out that today is the 25th anniversary of @wxyc debuting the internet simulcast stream of its broadcast radio signal. This was indeed the birth of modern streaming media as we know it (not just streaming audio, but streaming media, period) 1/4 https://t.co/F4RDHkx5By

— Andrew Bottomley (@abottomley) November 7, 2019

The post Podcast #219 – The Next Chance To Get an FM Station License; a College Station 60th; All-Digital AM appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Can you save AM Radio by killing it?

The original broadcast band gets little love as it prepares to celebrate its 100th birthday. Plagued by electromagnetic interference from wi-fi routers, LED lights and all sorts of other modern electronics, and dominated by tired right-wing and sports talk programming targeting a shrinking demographic, there’s not much love for AM radio these days.

While the FCC has talked about revitalizing the AM band for something close to a decade, all that’s resulted is letting AM broadcasters have translator repeater stations on the FM dial. That’s not so much AM revitalization as welfare for AM broadcasters.

Another idea that’s been floating in the ether is taking the band all-digital. Just like the FM band, there are digital HD Radio stations on AM right now. Because AM stations have just a fraction of the bandwidth of FM channels, they don’t feature additional channels, like FM’s HD–2 and HD–3. Instead HD Radio stations on AM just have a digital channel accompanying the analog one which offers audio that is stereo and markedly free of noise and static, provided you have an HD Radio tuner and are in range of the lower-powered digital signal.

The idea behind an all-digital AM band is that stations would drop their analog signals altogether in favor of a digital HD Radio signal. The supposed benefit is that the new digital signals would be higher fidelity, free of noise, and somewhat more resistant to interference. The downside would be that they would be unreceivable by the hundreds of millions of analog AM radios in use around the country. Only HD Radio equipped car radios and the much-rarer home receivers would get the broadcasts.

As of now, approximately 50% of new cars are HD-capable. Taking into account that the average vehicle on the road is nearly 12 years old, a much lower percentage of all vehicles have the capability, meaning the majority of radio listeners still can’t hear HD Radio signals.

Nevertheless, for the first time this month the FCC is officially taking up the idea of letting AM stations go all-digital. The proposal, docket 19–311, wouldn’t force stations to go HD Radio. Instead, if approved, it would allow stations to choose this route.

Arguing All-Digital AM

To understand the motivations for this, we can look to a Radio World editorial, in which the petitioner behind this proposal, radio group GM Ben Downs, argues for the sonic advantages of HD Radio on AM. I admit that on its own the fidelity argument is hard to find fault with. But there are many more significant nits to pic. He takes up several common objections.

To the argument, “there aren’t enough [HD] radios,” he answers: “And if we broadcasters don’t step up, there won’t be any listeners either. Every year more and more HD Radios are hitting the market. Can we say the same about AM listeners?”

I think what he’s saying is that listeners are fleeing AM because of the noise and interference, but a growing segment of them are using HD-capable receivers that would relieve them of the sound constraints. I’m not certain there’s much evidence for this. Fidelity is not much of an issue for listening to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, or endless listener calls debating NFL stats. Audiences interested in anything else naturally turn to FM.

Downs anticipates this critique, writing, “There are always people who say poor programming damaged AM. I suppose that’s possible, but those choices were forced on us by radios that had such poor performance we were embarrassed to try to compete against FM music stations with what we had to work with.”

That seems a selective view of the past, at best, and ahistorical at worst. FM music radio became predominant in the early 1980s, way before the AM dial became so noisy. Moreover, I’m not sure when this mythical time of wide-spread high fidelity AM receivers was, but that’s one I wished I’d lived in (and I was a radio listener in the early 80s).

He also takes up the argument that, “I’ll lose listeners when I switch [to all-digital],” answering: “The beauty of the AM revitalization process was that it allowed us to pair our AM stations with FM translators. Your translator can carry the audience load while the audience becomes accustomed to all-digital AM.”

I find this just as paradoxical as the idea of FM signals for AM broadcasters representing any kind of “revitalization” for the band. My question is: if listeners have to hear your station on the FM dial, why would they ever go back to find it on AM? Would they even know to do so?

While much of radio listening has moved to the car, and HD Radio is far more prevalent in vehicle dashboards than in home receivers, my own experience is that most listeners are relatively unaware of HD Radio. Their tuners may bring in the signal, but since it sounds roughly identical to the analog one, it’s all in the background. I don’t think most seek it out. This is evidenced by the fact that there are no HD–2 or HD–3 stations – only receivable with an HD capable receiver – at or towards the top of the ratings for any U.S. market.

Now, I agree that the fidelity difference on AM is more pronounced and noticeable. But I’m still not sure that listeners really notice the difference as their radios shift between analog and digital signals. Any AM listener is accustomed to the signal strengthening and fading as they travel, and the analog to digital shift doesn’t really sound all that different.

Importantly, we’re only talking about listeners in vehicles here. AM stations that switch to all-digital will most certainly lose nearly all their listeners outside of a car. No doubt there are nerds like me who own HD Radio home receivers, or some die-hard fans who will go out to buy one of the handful of HD-capable models when it becomes necessary. But the vast majority will just listen to something else.

I have a hard time seeing how going all-digital will save stations. More likely, it will just alienate listeners, and make those stations even more niche and less viable.

The Problem Isn’t Digital Radio, Per Se

I do want to be clear that, despite my cynicism, I don’t actually wish for stations to fail, nor do I think digital radio is a bad idea. I think it would be good for the U.S. to have a truly viable digital radio service. However, it would be better as an additional service, rather than a replacement for analog radio. Something more like the DAB service prevalent outside the US.

Even with its limitations, there are significant advantages to analog AM radio. It’s a proven technology that has lasted a century, and there are millions upon millions of receivers out there. Heck, it’s so simple that you can build a crystal set receiver that doesn’t even require electricity. Moreover, AM signals can easily travel hundreds to thousands of miles.

All of this means that AM is an efficient want to broadcast to large groups of people over a large area. That is particularly important during emergencies, natural disasters or other times when communications by cellular phone or internet is compromised.

Who Loses When Stations Go All-Digital?

What I’d hate to see during a wildfire, hurricane or earthquake thousands of people resorting to their emergency radios, only to find that where there used to be a reliable source of local information there is only digital hash.

Though I have doubts that all-digital AM broadcasting will be any more successful, nor as sustainable as analog, I certainly prefer it to be optional rather than mandatory. On the one hand I suppose it’s not terrible to let station owners to make their bets and choose their own fates.

On the other hand, these consequences are not borne only by stations alone. Communities continue to depend on broadcasters, and there is still something of a remnant public service obligation in exchange for the monopoly license to use a frequency on the public airwaves. If going all-digital ends up driving a station out of business, what’s the likelihood that another one will take over the license and take its place?

I honestly don’t doubt the sincerity of many all-digital AM proponents, that they honestly would like to see a higher fidelity, “improved” service on the dial. However, they may be naïve.

Is This Even About Radio?

A more suspicious take would be that a drive to all-digital AM has nothing to do with radio as an audio service. Rather it’s an effort to turn the band into a data service, with audio as a justification, but more of an afterthought. That’s not unlike the required, but mostly useless video signal of channel 6 low-power TV stations, that mostly serve as “Franken FM” radio stations sneaking onto the FM dial at 87.7 FM. Think of all-digital AM as a cheap way to send traffic, weather and other commercialized data to in-car receivers without the need for mobile internet.

That said, I also have doubts about how many broadcasters would take advantage of all-digital operation. I have difficulty seeing top rated big-city AMs dump the millions of analog listeners that keep advertisers coming back just to gain a little bit of fidelity for a minority of the in-car audience.

The question becomes: Is all-digital AM Radio actually AM Radio? If we’re being pedantic, no, it isn’t. AM means Amplitude Modulation, which is an inherently analog technology. If all the stations on the AM dial were to go digital, that would in fact mean the death of AM broadcasting in the U.S., along with the death of many of the technology’s advantages.

It’s possible this wouldn’t be as tragic as I predict. Maybe analog FM and more robust internet technologies would pick up the slack. Maybe even such a transition would stimulate the production and sales of more HD Radio receivers.

I’m not committed to being a luddite, and I wouldn’t mind being wrong. I just won’t bet on it.

The post Can We Save AM Radio by Killing It? Considering All-Digital AM Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

One of life’s little pleasures is tuning around the radio dial late at night before drifting off to slumber. I especially enjoy this while traveling, touring foreign radio dials, encountering strange and distant signals.

This means that a small portable radio is my constant traveling companion. I prefer to travel light, so said radio must also be as tiny as practical. In the last couple of years the Tivdio V–115 has been my choice, given its small size, AM, FM and shortwave tuning, reasonable sensitivity and ability to record air checks to a microSD card. I’ll refer you to my YouTube review for more details.

Even so, my ears are always wandering, urging my eyes to admire other receiver suitors. About a month ago the Eton Mini Grundig Edition caught my attention, and at a sale price of less than $25 delivered. Grundig is a venerable name in radios, and the Mini has received decent reviews, so I bit.

Small and Capable

The radio lives up to its name, measuring up to about the same size as an iPhone SE, including a decent speaker and retractable antenna. It comes with a nice nylon case to help protect it in your bag.

Though the Mini includes shortwave, the coverage is more limited than my Tivdio, only covering two bands, from 5 – 10 MHz and 11.65 – 18 MHz. That said, shortwave is more of a “nice to have” than a necessity for my travel radio, so this limitation is fine with me.

Taking it along for an extended trip to New York City and northern New Jersey, I was impressed at how well it pulled in FM stations inside my Midtown Manhattan hotel. It was no problem tuning in public radio WNYC, along with college radio from NYU, Columbia University and Fordham. The same could not be said of the room’s supplied clock radio.

Though small, the Mini’s speaker is adequate for a travel radio, with pleasing sound that’s loud enough for hotel room listening. You’re not going to disturb your neighbors, and that’s probably a good thing. I also appreciate its simple thumbwheel tuning. It’s not quite as convenient as the number direct-dialing keypad on my Tivdio, but the Tivdio’s buttons are stiff and make a loud click, which can annoy others around you if you’re scanning the dial wearing headphones.

For late night listening a sleep timer is a necessity, since I’m likely to drift off, sometimes to the soothing sounds of inter-station static. The Mini comes so equipped. I also appreciate its control lock that prevents it from turning on inside my baggage, draining batteries and annoying fellow passengers.

Patience Pays for DXing

After dark is the time for AM band DXing, and here I found the Mini’s performance curious. When I first spun the dial, I was only picking up the strongest local stations. Then I started clicking through frequencies more slowly, stopping when I heard a faint signal. Leaving the radio tuned, the signal grew in volume and strength – patience paid off. I suspect this is an artifact of the DSP-based tuner, keeping the volume more muted with a weak signal so as not to assault the listener with loud static, then gradually increasing sensitivity as needed.

Moving from noisy Manhattan to the relative quiet – both in terms of noise and RF interference – of upper Passaic County, I enjoyed many fun DX finds. Keeping the gradual technique in mind, I had no problem bringing in signals from Quebec, Michigan, Ohio, Western Pennsylvania, Upstate New York and Boston. I didn’t formally log the stations because I was already tucked into bed with the lights out.

On Halloween night I dived into the shortwave band a little after dusk, wondering if I might encounter some pirates. I wasn’t hopeful, and so I wasn’t disappointed when none emerged from the ether. I was, however, pleasantly surprised when Radio Havana came blaring through at 6 MHz.

At home in Portland, Oregon, I’ve found shortwave reception inside my house to be very hit and miss, and mostly miss. I do think geography is partly to blame. New Jersey is simply closer to many more shortwave stations than Oregon. Nevertheless I was impressed with how good the Eton Mini’s indoor shortwave reception is.

On the whole, the Eton Mini Grundig Edition proved itself a capable and pleasant traveling companion. The one thing I miss is the easy ability to record airchecks direct to a memory card like my Tivdio can. However, I think the Mini outclassed it with AM sensitivity and selectivity, provided you’re patient and allow maybe a half-minute for a station to slowly come into focus through the static. Also, the Tivdio’s recording circuit can be a source of interference, which means it can thwart recordings of weak signals which will just disappear when you hit record. Moreover, if I’m listening to the Mini through the speaker I can make quick-and-dirty aircheck recordings using my smartphone or a portable voice recorder (yeah, I often travel with one of those, too).

There are better performing portable radios, and ones with more features or frequency coverage. But I don’t think I’ve encountered one this small and also this good. Carry on and tune in.

The post The Eton Mini Grundig Edition Is My New Travel Companion appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Radio waves don’t obey borders, and stations have been taking advantage of this fact since the dawn of the medium – often despite the rules of government regulators where the signals go.

Dr. Kevin Curran of Arizona State University has been studying border radio stations extensively, making it the subject of his doctoral dissertation. Everyone has a ton of radio nerd fun as he takes us back to the 1920s, when Canadian and U.S. regulators struck a treaty to split up the AM dial and limit maximum broadcast power, but left out Mexico. That opened up an opportunity for stations in that country to cover the continent with hundreds of kilowatts, attracting broadcasters from north of the border wanting to take advantage.

Many infamous and colorful personalities were amongst this group, from Dr. John Brinkley, who promoted goat glands to cure male potency problems, all the way to man named Bob Smith – later known as Wolfman Jack – who blasted rock and roll that most American stations wouldn’t touch.

Dr. Curran explains why stations along the Mexican border remained popular with U.S. broadcasters even after that country lowered maximum power levels, in treaty with its northern neighbor. He also explores the relationship of U.S. stations to Canadian markets, where stations are more highly regulated. If you’ve ever wondered why radio is different along the border, you’re curiosity will be satisfied.

Show Notes:

• Radio World: Goat Gland Man Has Enduring Appeal; Though His Remains Are Safely Entombed in Memphis, Dr. Brinkley’s Legend Lives on
• Wide Open Country: How Border Radio Helped Popularize Country Music
• Texas State Historical Association: Border Radio
• SpectacularOptical: Clap for the Wolfman
• The Classic CKLW Page
• Wolfman Jack biography
• Wikipedia: XEROK-AM

The post Podcast #212 – Border Radio in North America appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Nearly a decade ago I reflected on The Professor’s quest to find a decent way to record airchecks, especially from the interference-prone AM and shortwave bands. As a side note, in the intervening 10 years that wish has been granted, with the proliferation of small portable radios with MP3 recording features, like the Tivdio V–115, which I reviewed last year.

I also identified with his adventures in taming all sorts of electromagnetic and RF interference mucking up radio reception in his apartment. In the hands of a lesser scribe this could be a tedious tale. But as he relayed in his entertaining last Radio Kitchen post, after much troubleshooting, he discovered an overlooked source only when they took their leave.

While I was a fan of The Professor’s writing – and pined away for his blog to return for the last seven years – Thomas actually knew him, calling him his “radio arts mentor” in a touching eulogy.

Thomas also reminds me that The Professor had his own show on WFMU, “The Audio Kitchen,” in which he “[served] up an hour of homemade recordings freshly liberated from thrift stores and junk shops, as well as some amateur audio spirited away from the closets and computers of their creators.” Archives are still available at the station’s website.

First reading The Professor’s “Adventures in Amplitude Modulation” posts some 14 years ago (and four years before Radio Survivor began) I knew I’d found a kindred spirit, the likes of whom I likely would never have encountered offline. Such was the rush of connecting to people with shared niche interests in those earlyish internet days, before social media and always-online smartphones, and before we took such niches for granted. It’s a testament to his spirit that my memories are so strong all these years later, despite never having met him. I’m sad to learn he’s gone, but glad to know that The SWLing post intends to keep some of his legacy alive.

The post R.I.P. Radio Adventurer ‘The Professor’ appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Did you know that upwards of 350 radio stations were established at summer camps across the United States? Dan Braverman, President of Radio Systems, Inc., joins us to share the history of summer camp radio, including his own experience setting up a camp radio station when he was just nine years old. Still involved with his youthful camp, Radio Free Ramah (WCRP) at Camp Ramah in the Poconos, Braverman chats about the power of hyper-local radio and how he built a radio business by initially setting up AM carrier current radio stations at summer camps.

Show Notes

• The End of Carrier Current? (Radio World)
• College Radio Watch: Uncertainty at KUCR, New Stations, and Carrier Current History
• Radio Systems, Inc.
• Camp Ramah in the Poconos
• Radio Survivor Podcast #146: Volunteer Radio from Antarctica
• Radio Survivor Podcast #147: Prison Radio and a High School Station in a Band Room
• Radio Station Visit #144: KVCB-LP at Vacaville Christian Schools
• Wet Hot American Summer (IMDB)
• The Voice of Peace (YouTube)
• Information Station Specialists
• Radio Survivor Podcast #51: Carrier Current is Cool
• Radio Survivor Podcast #145: Hip Hop Radio Archive
• Radio Survivor Podcast #133: Preserving Brooklyn Pirate Radio
• Unlicensed Low-Power Transmitters Fuel SXSW Dance Party

The post Podcast #148 – Solving the Mystery of Summer Camp Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Back in March I released a video review of the Tivdio V-115 portable digital radio. I praised it for being very nice sounding – especially for being so small – having decent reception, and for being able to record airchecks to a microSD card.

After using the radio during some travels I decided to record a follow-up review based on its performance. While it’s been a good travel companion for listening to strong local stations, I wasn’t able to tune in some of the smaller, funkier little local stations that I hoped to record air checks of. Earlier I had heard some of these stations with an analog receiver, the Kaito WRX-911.

That isn’t a deal killer; I still use this radio nearly every day. But I thought it was worth a follow-up. I’ve also purchased another little radio with similar features, the Kaito KA29, which I will test out on my next trip to see if it performs any better. Already I’ve heard some results that make me optimistic.

Learn all about it in this video follow-up review:

The post Radio Review Follow-Up: The Tivdio V-115 – Still Great, But Not a DX Champ appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Late night talk radio innovator Art Bell has died at the age of 72. He passed away in his sleep, at home in Pahrump, Nevada on Friday, April 13.

For the night owls, insomniacs, late-shift and early-morning workers, Bell was a comforting voice crackling through the AM airwaves on his shows “Coast to Coast AM” and “Dreamland” from the late 80s until 2007, when he left broadcast radio. He was known for lending an open mic and an open ear to all forms of beliefs and experiences lying outside the mainstream, from alien abductions and near-death experiences, to conspiracy theories and pirate radio. Guests and callers alike could expect a respectful reception from Bell, who yet managed to balance his receptivity with a mild skepticism, sometimes signaled only with a drawn out “Ummmm hmmmmm.”

In many ways Bell popularized and nationalized a form of freeform radio that had been in existence for at least a couple of decades prior. It’s actually not a far leap from Bob Fass’ “Radio Unameable” show, airing on New York community radio station WBAI since 1963, to “Coast to Coast AM.” Sure, Fass’ program has always been more distinctly political, strongly aligned with the counter-culture, giving airtime to Abbie Hoffman and the Yippies and broadcasting live from the 1968 DNC in Chicago. But Bell was not allergic to politics. Though it tended to be embedded in a foundation of a cynical sort of libertarianism, wary of government conspiracies and cover-ups, rather than forthrightly oppositional, left-wing or anti-capitalist.

Yet, “Radio Unnameable” is just one of the most well-known examples of late-night call-in radio born in the 60s, that then found a home on community and college radio stations when the taming of FM corporate rock radio exterminated freeform from the commercial airwaves. Talk of conspiracies, fringe health practices and even aliens have nearly always had a home on community radio, especially in the hours when management and other staffers aren’t listening, and may barely care about what’s being broadcast, especially since the FCC’s “safe harbor” rules pretty much eliminate the risk of fines for accidentally (or purposely) airing a profane caller’s rant.

For instance, last year my colleague Matthew Lasar recalled Mae Brussell, who held forth on shows like “Dialogue Conspiracy” on community stations in California during the 1970s and 80s. And that’s just one particularly durable example. Certainly many overnight conspiracy call-ins have come and gone, leaving nary a trace.

Yet Bell, himself, was always careful to maintain the role of moderator more than an evangelist for conspiracy theories, even though his choice of guests and repartee with listeners revealed his sympathies. Perhaps he was at least a little aware that his national prominence and job security might rely on such balance. He couldn’t rely on the bigger national advertisers that his daytime counterparts like Rush Limbaugh had, giving them significantly greater revenue leverage when their more indiscreet partisan (and worse) ravings triggered public blowback.

By the late 90s “Coast to Coast” could be heard just about anywhere in the U.S., on hundreds of stations. One taking a late-night road trip across the country could easily stay tuned in to the show just by hitting the seek button every couple of hundred miles. Of course, this was thanks to the industry consolidation wrought by the Telecom Act of 1996, and the fact that airing his show was likely the most economically viable choice for many AM stations.

It should be noted that “Coast to Coast” was (and is) distributed by Premiere Radio Networks, the nation’s largest radio syndicator, owned by the nation’s largest radio owner, iHeartMedia, formerly Clear Channel. It’s likely that “Coast to Coast” replaced dozens of local talk shows, as stations got bought, budgets got cut, and airing a satellite feed became cheaper than having a live human in the studio. While living in Central Illinois I can remember when Chicago’s clear channel WLS-AM dropped the locally produced Nate Clay show from weeknights in favor of “Coast to Coast,” sometime in the early 2000s.

Still, when the receivable late night alternatives often were limited to right-wing garbage, endless sports talk, tightly-playlisted automated music and easy listening, listening to Bell could be an entertaining relief. You didn’t have to believe in order to find interest, and not everything on the show was unbelievable. I enjoyed listening to him interview folks like Merle Haggard, physicists Michio Kaku and pirate radio expert Andrew Yoder.

Because of his willingness to give airtime to all manner of conspiratorial thinking, pseudoscience and fringe views, some might draw a line from Bell’s work to the post-truth, “fake news,” conspiracy-mongering broadcasters and internet media outlets of today. But I think it’s unfair to target him with much individual blame. He was never a fire-breathing partisan, and he didn’t invent this form of open-minded call-in radio so much as refine it and popularize it.

I think his friend and fellow broadcaster Whitley Strieber clearly identifies in his own remembrance what was unique about Bell:

“He was more a listener than a talker by nature, and he had a very open mind. It wasn’t that he would believe anything, but rather that he wouldn’t disbelieve things simply because they violated consensus reality.”

I’m not here to defend Art Bell, nor is his work and legacy immune from criticism. He certainly made some of his living selling an unknown fortune in MREs, gold and other survivalist accoutrements to paranoid listeners preparing for the meltdown of global order. Not every idea he gave platform to was benign or harmless. But I think that even if he had never taken to the airwaves, politically we’d still be where we are today.

Radio, however, wouldn’t be the same. And for a good two decades, syndicated corporate talk radio would never have been as colorful or entertaining.

Although “Coast to Coast” has continued on with replacement host George Noory, Bell acolytes would contend it’s a pale imitation of the original. I agree with that sentiment.

For better or worse, Bell didn’t leave behind a school of broadcasters following in his footsteps.

To learn more about Bell’s life, career and influence I recommend The Washington Post’s obituary as the best I’ve read so far.

The post RIP Art Bell, Who Brought Freeform Call-In Radio Nationwide appeared first on Radio Survivor.

On a trip last fall visiting my parents in northern New Jersey, during the evening the I tuned around the AM dial and encountered some fascinatingly unique local stations. I wished I could record some airchecks but didn’t have any easy way to do so, and I couldn’t find any sort of online program archives.

That set me looking for a portable radio with recording capability, and I found the Tivdio V-115, which received some good reviews from other radio nerds, a number of which can be found at the SWLing Post. It turns out to be a powerhouse of a little radio, available for under $20 on Amazon here in the U.S.

Here is my video review, followed by my review summary:

Pros:

• Very compact and portable
• Receives AM, FM and Shortwave
• Digital tuning with DSP
• Fantastic sound for a small radio
• Records radio to MP3 on microSD cards
• Will function like an MP3 player with better speaker sound than most smartphones
• Rechargeable battery, powered by USB
• Sleep timer

Cons:

• Headphone sound is sub-par and doesn’t work with smartphone headphones that have an integrated microphone
• Buttons are stiff and make a loud click when pressed
• Only the strongest shortwave stations come in with the short built-in antenna

As mentioned in the video, here’s our podcast interview with Radio Jay Allen with his advice for improving your radio reception, and his FM radio recommendations: https://www.radiosurvivor.com/2017/03/14/podcast-84-improving-radio-reception/

The post Radio Review: The Tivdio V-115 Records Airchecks on the Go appeared first on Radio Survivor.

First conceived in the 1930s, there is a type of tiny little radio station that anyone can operate legally, without a license. Bill DeFelice of HobbyBroadcaster.net joins the show to tell us about so-called ‘Part 15’ radio stations, and how you can get on the air today, to broadcast around your house, or even your neighborhood.

Radio Survivor is a listener-supported podcast. We dedicate hours of time and effort for each weekly episode.

Help us sustain and grow this show by contributing as little as $1 every month. With four episodes every month, that’s just 25 cents for each one.

Make your monthly pledge of support at http://pateron.com/radiosurvivor.

Show Notes:

• HobbyBroadcaster.net
• HobbyBroadcaster.net – History of Low-Power AM Transmitters & Phono Oscillators
• HobbyBroadcaster.net – Directory of Part 15 stations in the U.S.
• Found in the Attic: LPB Carrier Current AM Transmitter
• The End of Carrier Current?
• A hands-on review of a vintage Radio Shack electronics kit for children

The post Podcast #120 – Have Your Own Tiny Radio Station appeared first on Radio Survivor.

We catch up on news that’s important to podcasters and broadcasters. Soundcloud received emergency investment to keep running, but is it still a sustainable host for podcasts? The podcast patent troll is totally dead, finally. And, responding to reader and listener questions, Paul reviews the history of proposals to create a low-power AM radio service in the U.S.

Radio Survivor is a listener-supported podcast. You can support us two ways:

Make a monthly contribution through our Patreon campaign.

Make a one-time or recurring donation with any major credit card via PayPal.

Show Notes:

• Podcast #103 – The Popular Community Radio Movement in Argentina
• Groucho Marx and Truman Capote on the Dick Cavett Show
• SoundCloud saved by emergency funding as CEO steps aside
• “Podcasting patent” is totally dead, appeals court rules
• What about Low-Power AM (LPAM)?

The post Podcast #104 – Soundcloud, Patent Troll & the Legacy of Talk appeared first on Radio Survivor.

With the last group of low-power FM stations approved in the 2013 licensing window now going on the air—and no new LPFM windows scheduled—many folks are wondering what other licensed low-powered broadcasting opportunities might exist. So far this year we at Radio Survivor have fielded quite a few inquiries from people who would like to start a station, or who are simply curious about the subject.

A handful of them asked about the possibility for a low-power AM radio service. It’s a reasonable question, especially since in the last decade the FCC has made so-called “AM revitalization” one of its broadcast priorities, and the Netherlands approved its own low-power AM service last year (machine translation from Dutch).

As it turns out, several proposals to create a LPAM service have been submitted to the FCC, with the first coming in 1997. However, it’s obvious that none have become reality.

The proposal that received the most serious consideration came from a coalition of groups led by Don Schellhardt and Nick Leggett—the latter responsible for the first 1997 proposal—two members of the Amherst Alliance which also contributed to the proposal that kicked off the eventual creation of LPFM. Filed in August, 2005, this petition suggested a commercial low-power service. Commercial, because petitioners contended that stations would need advertising revenue to be economically viable, in addition to providing advertising opportunities for small businesses unable to afford time on full-power stations.

I interviewed Schellhardt about it back in 2004 for my old radio show and podcast, “Mediageek.” The archive audio is still available.

That proposal was itself a follow-up to one filed two years earlier by broadcast engineer Fred Baumbartner, which was never taken up by the FCC. This time around the Commission did open up a proceeding, RM–11287, in which about 75 comments were filed. The filing didn’t escape the attention of commercial broadcast industry groups, which generally opposed the idea. The National Association of Broadcasters wrote, “the LPAM Petition threatens to undermine the Commission’s efforts to clean up and improve the AM band,” presaging the current AM Revitalization effort.

A year later the original petitioners, joined by REC Networks, submitted a “streamlined proposal” to use technical specifications inspired by 10-watt Travelers’ Information Stations. Those are the stations which you’ll see advertised on the highway offering road condition updates and tourist information.

Ultimately the LPAM proposal received no additional action from the FCC, and the proceeding was closed formally on January 30, 2015.

Gone, perhaps, but not forgotten. Only seven months later Radio World published a commentary by independent broadcaster Jim Potter advocating for LPAM in order to revive “live and local” radio.

Making no reference to the earlier Schellhardt/Leggett or Baumgartner petitions, Potter called for stations to be licensed at 250 to 500 watts of power (Schellhardt/Leggett originally proposed just 100 watts, the same as LPFM), but did not specify commercial or non-commercial service. “ He argued that high-powered AM stations, “are doomed to wither because large mass-appeal stations cannot serve the ever-increasing diversity of large urban populations.” The solution would be low-powered AM stations for communities to,

“satisfy their own local needs, including radio swap shop; city council and school board meetings; ask the mayor call-in shows; high school ballgame remotes; community calendar, school lunch menus, local news and views and inexpensive spots read live by the local announcer. In other words, live and local content, reasons for folks to dust off their kitchen AM radios and find the new station in town. Fancy that!”

(The tenor of this argument ought to sound pretty worn in to anyone familiar to community radio and LPFM.)

Though the FCC decided not to carry low-power AM forward, that doesn’t mean the idea doesn’t have merit and isn’t technically feasibly. Rather, as it is with communications policy, the barrier is political. Not political as in Republican or Democratic, but political with respect to the power of numbers.

Looking over the comments to the Schellhardt/Leggett proposal it’s clear there just wasn’t a groundswell of support. By comparison, the push for LPFM in the late 90s joined together a broad coalition that even included the United Church of Christ, alongside a multitude of broadcast professionals, public interest groups, musicians, artists and individuals, with tens of thousands of filings submitted to the FCC.

I don’t fault the original LPAM petitioners for the outcome. Building the needed coalition and overwhelming grassroots support is hard, hard work, and only a tiny fraction of proposals to the FCC are ever granted any kind of consideration, never mind actually becoming policy. My sense is that AM radio simply isn’t that attractive to enough groups and people. Moreover, many of the advocacy groups one might expect to back a new low-powered radio service are likely preoccupied (if not overwhelmed) with supporting existing and new LPFM stations, or focused on other enormous public interest battles, like net neutrality and media ownership.

So, I have to conclude that a new low-power AM broadcast service in the U.S. is very unlikely. That said, anyone can submit a fresh proposal and dig in. However, it would be wise to learn from the previous proposals and the success of LPFM and think about how to build a movement—especially one that can meet or beat the expected resistance from the established broadcast industry, which has consistently opposed all low-powered radio efforts of the last twenty years.

That said, if you’re interested in getting on the air I’d strongly recommend researching to see if there’s an existing community radio station or new LPFM in your area. To aid in your search, Wikipedia has a reasonably accurate list of community stations (though unhelpfully listed alphabetically, rather than geographically), and REC Networks maintains a list of low-power FM construction permits that have been granted since 2013. Odds are there’s a station somewhere that could use some help and some new programmers. It may not be as exciting as starting your own station, but it’s also not nearly as expensive or labor-intensive. In any event, any opportunity to broadcast is valuable, and shouldn’t be dismissed.

The post What about Low-Power AM (LPAM)? appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Brazil is embarking on a grand experiment with the radio dial. AM stations have the opportunity to relocate to FM, and plans are afoot to expand the size of the FM dial. However, don’t be surprised that you haven’t heard about it. We hadn’t either until listener Álvaro Burns brought it to our attention.

Álvaro is a community broadcaster and podcaster from São Bernardo do Campo, and he joins us to explain the AM migration, and what it means for community radio. Then we reflect on the implications for the United States, where the FCC is about to open a licensing window for AM stations to get FM translator repeater stations, and is weighing other options for so-called “AM revitalization.” Álvaro also tells us about community radio in Brazil, and that country’s approach to licensing community stations.

Next week we celebrate 100 episodes of the Radio Survivor show with all four Radio Survivors reflecting on some of our favorite moments.

Radio Survivor is a listener-supported podcast. You can support us two ways:

Make a monthly contribution through our Patreon campaign.

Make a one-time or recurring donation with any major credit card via PayPal.

Show Notes

• Álvaro Burns’ “A Hora Do Cafezinho” podcast
• Radio Paraty – www.radioparaty.com.br – Álvaro’s station
• Brazil’s AM Phase-Out Proceeds Slowly – Radio Magazine
• FM Band in Brazil Being Extended 50 % – Digital Radio Insider
• FCC’s AM Revitalization = Move AM Stations to FM
• Podcast #83 – How AM Revitalization Pressures LPFM

Community radio stations in the ABCD Region of Greater São Paolo:

• São Bernardo do Campo
  • Radio Nova Riacho – www.radionovariacho.com.br
  • Radio Lírio dos Vales – www.liriodosvalesfm.com.br
  • Radio Represa – www.radiorepresafm.com.br
  • Radio Princesa – www.fmprincesa.com
• Santo André
  • Radio Zummm – www.zummmfm.com.br
• Diadema
  • Radio Nova Diadema – www.novadiademafm.com.br
  • Radio Navegantes – no site
• Mauá
  • Radio Z – www.radiozfm.org (Álvaro worked here)
  • Radio Mauá – no site
• Ribeirão Pires
  • Radio Pérola da Serra – www.radioperoladaserrafm.com (were Álvaro started in radio)
  • Rio Grande da Serra
  • Radio Esplanada – no site

The post Podcast #99: The Beginning Of The End For AM Radio In Brazil appeared first on Radio Survivor.

In January FCC moved to allow AM stations to acquire and geographically locate FM translator repeater stations a little further away from their main AM transmitter than previously permitted—within either 25 miles of their station, or within their daytime broadcast area, whichever is larger. Before this ruling those translators were limited to being located within the smaller of those two areas.

As we discussed on podcast #83, the LPFM advocacy organization Prometheus Radio Project sees this change as a threat to low-power community stations. That’s because these translators can be moved more freely, potentially placing them closer to existing LPFM stations. While the FCC does protect LPFMs from interference caused by translator stations, translators can take up spots on the dial surrounding low-power stations preventing them from being able to relocate their transmitters.

Prometheus is petitioning the FCC to reconsider this rule change. As explained in a press release,

“Radio stations in general, and LPFMs more than most, need to periodically relocate for financial and practical reasons, and are allowed to move within 3.5 miles of their location, or within a circle 7 miles in diameter. FCC rules allow a translator to move closer to an LPFM than an LPFM can move toward the translator, and prevent the LPFM from thereafter moving any closer to the translator. It is as if the translator draws a line in the sand which the LPFM cannot cross. When an LPFM is located between two nearby translators in different directions, or “short spaced,” the LPFM is boxed in between two lines it cannot cross, which can remove the vast majority of its relocation area. As a result, LPFMs may be forced to move away from their audiences when they inevitably relocate, or may be unable to move and lose their transmission site.”

Prometheus illustrates how a LPFM can get “boxed in” with this map, showing how Houston’s KBLT-LP (represented by the pushpin) is prevented from moving by two translators within the red circle.

Read the entire Prometheus petition to the FCC: PDF

The post Prometheus to FCC: Protect LPFMs from AM Translators appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Though FM has a part of the dial reserved for non-commercial radio, along with the LPFM service, there are still plenty of interesting sounds to be found on the AM dial if you’re willing to do a little scanning. Having a good AM radio will make this a more pleasant and successful endeavor.

We met radio testing guru Jay Allen on our podcast last week when he shared advice for improving reception of lower powered FM stations. But, as he told us, his real specialty is AM receivers, and I certainly learned about Jay from his epicly exhaustive AM radio “shootouts.”

Jay just posted his newest, most updated AM Radio Shootout, pitting more than 100 different models–new and vintage–head to head. Along the way he explains the technical qualities of radios that make them perform better, but in plain English that any radio lover should be able to understand.

As it turns out, one of the Jay’s five-star AM receivers amongst “the Crème de la Crème” is also one of the top radios he recommended to us for FM reception, too: the C. Crane CC-2E. I own an earlier version of this receiver (the CC-2) and can attest to how well it brings in both AM and FM signals. It’s my go-to for bringing in distant signals and the new LPFMs here in Portland, OR.

A few more of his top FM radios also rank highly in the AM Shootout. The Sangean PR-D4W garners four-and-a-half stars, and the HD Radio capable Sangean HDR-16 and HDR-18 rack up three-and-a-half stars, along with stablemates Sangean WR-50/WR-50P.

All available new, these radios seem like good choices if you’re looking for a good all-around performer for college, community and low-power FMs, as well as AM.

However, Jay doesn’t limit his tests only to new radios, and there are many great options that are used or vintage. Heck, you might even unknowingly have a great AM radio stashed on a shelf or in the garage.

Get the whole list at his site, Radio Jay Allen.

The post Jay Allen Tested All the AM Radios For You appeared first on Radio Survivor.

One of the more unusual radio stations that I’ve visited is KCHUNG in Los Angeles. Around since 2011, the station has caught the ears of not only the artist community in its home town, but also the attention of the national press. Visiting journalists typically paint a portrait of KCHUNG’s diverse programming and quirky lair, perched above a Vietnamese restaurant in Los Angeles’ Chinatown. Although I’m accustomed to navigating to stations in strange locations, KCHUNG felt particularly mysterious on the summer morning when I made my way up a darkened stairwell to the station’s headquarters. Luckily a KCHUNG volunteer arrived at the same time and we used our cell phone flash lights to light our way.

Sign on the path to KCHUNG. Photo: J. Waits

Although ostensibly a community radio station, KCHUNG operates a bit differently than any other radio station that I’ve visited. It broadcasts over a low power, unlicensed terrestrial signal at 1630 AM, which is allowed under the FCC’s part 15 rules. However, during my August 10 visit, I wasn’t able to pick up the station’s signal on my car radio, although I did catch UCLA’s “Emergency Advisory System” station on that frequency while driving around LA. Because of its short range, chances are that most KCHUNG listeners are tuning in online, either during live shows or to archived programs.

KCHUNG lobby. Photo: J. Waits

The station’s funky space is reflective of its creative programming. We arrived a bit before our hosts and plopped down on a couch in one corner of the room. To our right was a window with a view of neighboring buildings, foothills and palm trees and in front of us a large blackboard was covered with handwritten notes, both pragmatic and poetic. My favorite missive was: “Broadcast into the Void.”

Chalkboard messages at KCHUNG. Photo: J. Waits

A few items from a recent meeting dotted a coffee table, including a Nolo Press book about forming a non-profit as well as a booklet on leadership and creativity. The studio is housed along the back wall of the room and is separated from the lobby by a sliding glass patio door. Just outside the booth, there’s a small record library, containing CDs, cassettes and vinyl LPs.

View of the KCHUNG studio. Photo: J. Waits

Throughout the entire KCHUNG space, there’s some wonderfully weird decor, including a monkey face carved out of a coconut, a stuffed sock monkey-esque rat, painted denim shorts, a plastic fog fluid container, and a small teddy bear wearing a tiny KCHUNG shirt. The studio seems to be the scene of someone’s personal art project, with a number of items hung on the wall (including a beer can, styrofoam cup, vinyl record and a coat hanger) accompanied by labels with the f-word, followed by the name of the adjacent object.

KCHUNG studio. Photo: J. Waits

Of course there’s also all the requisite radio equipment in the studio, including turntables (one has a particularly psychedelic slip mat), tape decks, CD player, sound board, microphones, monitor speakers and headphones. A handful of records, tapes and CDs were also dispersed within the studio space.

Cassettes in KCHUNG studio. Photo: J. Waits

During my summer visit, I met up with KCHUNG General Manager Chrysanthe Oltmann and Michal Kamran, KCHUNG’s Minister of Internal Transparency for the grand tour. Both have college radio connections. Kamran got her start at University of California, Santa Cruz station KZSC (my most recent visit was for the UCRN conference in 2016) and although Oltmann started doing radio at KCHUNG back in 2013, she now moonlights at her college alma mater’s station KSPC at Pomona College (see my 2015 tour) over school breaks.

View out of window at KCHUNG. Photo: J. Waits

Around 200 people are involved at KCHUNG, with approximately 40 serving as Station Managers; which means that they take responsibility for the station and the equipment during multiple shifts throughout the week. A freeform station, KCHUNG has always had deep connections with the local arts community and many of its shows reflect its experimental roots. Kamran mentioned that one program (“No”) often features its hosts yelling the word “no” for an extended period of time during the show, for example.

KCHUNG card. Photo: J. Waits

The AM channel is also very much a part of KCHUNG’s mission as a locally-focused station. Kamran shared, “I like being hyper localized,” but also admitted that at times it can be hard to discern if the experimentally-focused station’s AM signal is working. She joked, “Sometimes I’m not sure if I’m hearing like static or somebody’s actual show and it’s kind of cool when that happens.”

KCHUNG lobby. Photo: J. Waits

When I asked about the history of KCHUNG, Kamran told me “…the station was pretty much founded by Luke Fischbeck, Solomon Bothwell and Harsh Patel and it kind of started when Solomon went to see a Mountain School talk from KPCC…after that he…looked into making his own station. Luke started up the actual, physical…engineering stuff.”

Another really interesting aspect of KCHUNG is its work with Los Angeles-area arts organizations. Later this month, the station will doing a radio residency at the Getty. According to the The Getty Center’s website, “Los Angeles’ artist-run community radio station KCHUNG is in residence for two weeks at the Getty Center to broadcast in-depth news programming and build opportunities for spectacle, performance, and live engagement that imagine alternative uses and definitions of the news. Complementing the exhibition Breaking News: Turning the Lens on Mass Media, the residency will produce between 6 to 10 episodes, featuring a diverse breadth of content from KCHUNG’s artistic community including interviews, performances, and live reporting, to explore both exhibition themes and current events.”

LPs at KCHUNG. Photo: J. Waits

Thanks so much to Chrysanthe Oltmann and Michal Kamran for the great visit and tour of KCHUNG. You can hear more from my tour on Radio Survivor Podcast #74. This is my 117th radio station field trip report. Future posts will cover my travels in Arkansas and Pennsylvania. See my most recent field trips on Radio Survivor and peruse a full list of my station tour reports on Spinning Indie.

The post Radio Station Visit #117 – KCHUNG Radio in Los Angeles appeared first on Radio Survivor.

University of Colorado, Boulder’s college radio station KVCU Radio 1190 was the next stop on my tour of Colorado radio stations a few weeks ago. On July 12, after my trip to KCSU in Fort Collins, I headed south to meet up with Radio 1190’s General Manager Mikey Goldenberg. The station’s only professional staff member, Goldenberg has a background in commercial radio. He’s supported by a staff of 8 paid student managers.

Lobby of college radio station Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

As a 10,000 watt AM station, KVCU has an enviable broadcast range and can be heard through much of the state. Goldenberg told me that the signal reaches as far north as Cheyenne, Wyoming and as far south as Colorado Springs. For that reason, I found myself tuning in to the station during many of my travels in Colorado. Radio 1190 hopes to reach even more listeners in the future with the addition of its FM translator at 98.9 FM in Boulder Valley.

DJ in Radio 1190’s on-air studio. Photo: J. Waits

When asked about the expansion into FM, Goldenberg told me that it “strengthened the legitimacy of all that we are doing,” explaining that “FM is something that people hold dear.” He added that “AM hindered us,” pointing out that sometimes its audio quality “is not very palatable.” With FM, he believes that it will “re-enliven” interest in KVCU. That’s not to say that Radio 1190 isn’t already an active station with engaged DJs and listeners. During the school year there are around 75 to 100 people involved with the station and Goldenberg describes the student and community members as a “pretty diverse group.”

Old KUCB stickers at Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

I was interested to see that University of Colorado has a lengthy radio history, with the first licensed station on campus in 1922. According to Education’s Own Stations, the Electrical Engineering Department received that first license for station KFAJ and used the station “…almost entirely for experimental work by the Department of Electrical Engineering and as a means for instruction in radio communication.” See some anecdotes about those early years in a 1926 issue of The Colorado Engineer. In the 1924-25 school year, a variety of programs aired, including shows playing recorded music (on phonograph records), sporting events, concerts, lectures and educational programming. The license was allowed to expire in December, 1925 for a variety of reasons, including funding, lack of support and unavoidable interference from another radio station (KOA, which is still in existence today). Some educational programming from University of Colorado continued on over KOA in the following years.

Box of old KUCB playlists at Radio 1190, including this one from 1988. Photo: J. Waits

Although it’s unclear if a student station was built in the following decades, University of Colorado is listed as a trial member of the Intercollegiate Broadcasting System as of November, 1942, indicating that a carrier current station was either in the planning stage or under construction. According to a Radio 1190 history website, efforts to bring student radio back to campus started in the 1970s at University of Colorado. Initially a satellite station for community radio station KGNU was built during the 1978-1979 school year. Several carrier current stations followed, including KAIR (by at least 1985) and student-run KUCB (in 1987). Throughout that time, there was interest in obtaining a terrestrial radio license and those efforts finally resulted in the acquisition of 1190 AM (the former KBCO license was donated by Jacor Communications), which went on the air in 1998.

Vintage KUCB T-shirt at college radio station Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

Today, KVCU operates out of the basement of the University Memorial Center and is tucked away near the Ski and Snowboard Club office and a loading dock. Goldenberg told me that he was proud of Radio 1190s’s welcoming lobby, which looks like a professional radio station, complete with high-countered desk and fancy Radio 1190 sign. One wall has a hand-painted mural featuring artwork and logos from a wide range of record labels and bands.

Radio 1190 mural. Photo: J. Waits

Past the lobby is a familiar-looking college radio space: a record library/hang out area that is full of couches, colorfully decorated walls and shelves full of CDs. The on-air studio opens into that room and a hallway leads to some offices, a vinyl library, and production studio. A couple of offices, including Goldenberg’s, are just outside the main Radio 1190 space.

DJ in record library at college radio station Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

Programming runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, with live DJs and hosts from around 7am until 9-11pm-ish. Automation runs during late night hours. Summertime is a bit quieter, with maybe 25 station participants and during my visit I saw a handful of student managers and DJs working at the station, including an on-air DJ.

Hallway and CDs at Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

The music at Radio 1190 aligns closely with the CMJ charts and from 7am to 7pm during “rotation” shows about 70-80% of what the station plays is new music championed by CMJ subscribers. Additionally, DJs can take advantage of the station’s huge music library, which includes a large vinyl library of 10,000 records as well as 25,233 CDs at last count. Six songs per hour are programmed for DJs and the remainder of the hour is made up of DJ picks.

Vinyl records at college radio station Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

For Goldenberg, it’s important to provide students with a “great radio foundation” and a “real world” experience that will prepare them for future careers. He told me station alumni leave KVCU “equipped” for careers in radio, television and media and that some are now working in music, television, and media in general. Even though he’s serious about providing a solid learning experience at Radio 1190, Goldenberg added that, “We’re engaged in the fun aspect of radio.”

Mikey Goldenberg in music office at Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

Although one must be a student to be a paid manager at Radio 1190, there are plenty of non-student DJs who are mostly hosting specialty shows. The range of programs includes shows focused on hip hop, spoken word, metal, electronic music, and a Louisiana-themed show. Bands play on Radio 1190’s “Local Shakedown” show every Friday and edited performance videos, KVCU Studio Sessions, can be viewed on the station’s website.

Whiteboard with Radio 1190 schedule. Photo: J. Waits

The station is devoted to new music and local music and Goldenberg said that they like putting up and coming artists on the air and enjoy promoting even the smallest house shows. More broadly, KVCU is a member of various radio organizations and has participated in College Radio Day, with Goldenberg serving on the College Radio Foundation’s Board of Directors.

Turntables in on-air studio of college radio station Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

In reflecting on the role of college radio, Goldenberg told me that he “loves the conversation that it affords,” telling me that it’s nice to not have to worry about the “bottom line.” Drawn to music and radio as an undergraduate, Goldenberg ended up working as the executive producer on a morning show in Denver for more than 6 years. Although he never did college radio when he was a student (also at CU-Boulder), the sights, sounds and smells of Radio 1190’s basement home bring back vivid memories. Now five years into his stint at KVCU, he seems to relish the opportunity to work with students and the campus community.

Records on the ceiling at Radio 1190. Photo: J. Waits

Thanks so much to Mikey Goldenberg for the tour of Radio 1190. This is my 110th radio station field trip report, with more to come from Colorado and Southern California. See my most recent field trips on Radio Survivor and see a full list of my station tour reports on Spinning Indie. September 13 Update: Hear more about my tour of Radio 1190 on Radio Survivor Podcast 63, which also includes audio from my interview with Goldenberg.

The post Radio Station Visit #110 – Radio 1190 at University of Colorado, Boulder appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Editor’s Note: Fred Krock is a retired broadcaster who worked in commercial broadcasting in San Francisco and New York City. An electrical engineer, he got his start in radio at KZSU at Stanford University in 1950. Fred offered to share his memories of KZSU and radio in the Bay Area from that time, and we jumped at the chance to publish them here. In part one of this three-part series Fred sets the scene for what the region’s radio dial sounded like at mid-century. -Paul

I started college at Stanford in 1950. College was very different in those days. Some veterans were finishing their college education using the GI Bill. They were about ten years older than most students and concentrating on getting their meal ticket to a good financial future; they were not very interested in other college activities. Since they were over 21 years old, they had no problems buying liquor for student parties.

Radio broadcasting also was very different. The FCC had authorized many new radio stations following the end of the war. In the San Francisco Bay Area we had new AM radio stations in San Jose, Palo Alto, San Mateo, San Rafael, Pittsburg, and other suburban communities. Some were licensed for full-time operation and others were daytime only. These stations had a very hard time competing with established San Francisco stations for listeners and advertising dollars.

Radio networks dominated listening. Only 9% of US homes had a television set in 1950 and public television also was in the future. KQED signed on April 4, 1954 and it was one of the first public television stations in this country. Big stars had network radio shows that did not move to television for several years. Much network radio, however, was cheaply made popular garbage like “Mr. District Attorney” and soap operas.

Every summer Stanford participated in the Stanford-NBC Radio Institute. NBC had similar programs in a few other cities around the country. The Institute was not restricted to Sanford students, although those who had matriculated at Stanford could get class credit. Total class size was limited to 75 students. Classes were given on campus and at the NBC studios at 420 Taylor Street in San Francisco, in which NBC employees described their jobs in very intimate detail. I attended in 1952. It was fascinating and I learned a lot.

1952 also was the last year of the NBC Pacific Radio Network. Most of the programs came from the NBC national radio network but some programs distributed only to the West Coast originated in San Francisco. NBC employed fifty-two engineers in San Francisco. But after the Pacific Network closed, it was all downhill. Some of the laid off engineers were able to get jobs with the NBC Television Network in Los Angeles. However, NBC, unlike the other networks, did not own a radio station in Los Angeles or a television station in San Francisco. So, the radio network continued without any San Francisco programs, except for “One Man’s Family.”

At this time FM broadcasting had come, and for the most part, gone away. Many existing AM stations had also gotten FM licenses, but because the public had not bought many FM receivers, those stations had tiny audiences. Wide-spread listener-supported public stations were many years in the future. One of the very first was KPFA in Berkeley, founded by a group that had bought very cheaply a failed commercial FM station and put it back on the air. That’s why KPFA has a license in the commercial part of the FM band.

Other FM broadcasters had gone off the air and returned their licenses to the FCC. Many now empty FM channels were available in the Bay Area. Used FM transmitting equipment could be bought for about 10 cents on the dollar of original cost that was slightly over the scrap metal value.

A few FM stations were kept on the air by AM stations because simulcasting their main signal did not cost much. In a few cases they filled in holes in the AM nighttime signal coverage. That gave their owners brownie points with the FCC for keeping them on the air at a loss. In actuality, they had cost a lot of capital to put them on the air and they were providing tax deductions for depreciation.

Those few independent FM stations that managed to survive had other sources of income. The San Francisco Chronicle operated KRON-FM in addition to television channel 4. Both lost money in the beginning. KRON-FM had one full time employee who broadcast the minimum time required by the FCC to keep the license: six days a week. The FCC did not require operation on Sunday.

KDFC leased space for other transmitters such as land mobile radio at its Mt. Beacon location behind Sausalito. KDFC broadcast the Musicast background music that competed with Muzak. It transmitted a 15 kHz tone when anything other than music was broadcast, and special receivers were required to hear the music programs. The Musicast receivers muted whenever this tone was broadcast so that all that ever came out of the receiver was music. Later the FCC prohibited these so-called “simplex” broadcasts so they moved to an SCA channel on KDFC.

KSBR in San Bruno was owned by Eitel-MacCollough, manufacturer of Eimac transmitting tubes. It was put on the air in 1947 to demonstrate the product, and the station had a small studio in the Eimac factory, with the transmitter on Mt. Diablo. ERP was 300,000 watts on 101.5 mHz making it one of the most powerful FM stations in the United States. The signal covered the entire California Central Valley from Redding on the north to Bakersfield on the south.
After Eimac no longer needed KSBR to demonstrate transmitting tubes, no one would buy the station. So Eimac turned in the license to the FCC. It sold the transmitter building and tower on Mt. Diablo to KOVR-TV in Stockton.

There were several stations at educational institutions. KALW, owned by the San Francisco School District, began broadcasting in 1941 on the original 42-50 MHz FM band. It had to buy a new transmitter in 1946 to operate on the new FM band. Run by the John O’Connell trade school, a San Francisco public school, KALW broadcast programs for classroom listening, primarily was used for teaching radio and television technicians.

The College of San Mateo had KCSM, and both were located in downtown San Mateo; the new campus on the hilltop was years in the future. KCSM trained electronic technicians but it also taught announcers.

In Stockton KUOP was owned by the University of the Pacific. It had a 7 kW ERP signal that reached into parts of the San Francisco East Bay, up to about 30 miles from the campus. It was a typical college station operated by students but was fairly tightly controlled by faculty.
I don’t remember any local full time religious stations on the air in 1950. Some commercial stations sold time to churches to broadcast Sunday morning services. A few ministers bought commercial air time then asked on the air for donations.

All stations were required by the FCC to dedicate part of their broadcast time to education. So there were programs that could be logged as educational on commercial stations. Most were on Sunday morning.

In the Bay Area commercial stations broadcasting the same music format during the entire broadcast day were just beginning. Top 40 radio came later. By broadcasting a unique format to the entire area, a station could get enough total listeners to be viable. KSMO in San Mateo broadcast classical music full time. KVSM in San Mateo broadcast country music, and KWBR (later KDIA) in Oakland programmed for black listeners. But these stations were the exception. Most stations were block programmed with different programs for separate audiences at different times of the day.

College radio stations took two forms. A very few had FM licenses; most were carrier current. A low power transmitter fed signals into dormitory wiring so that any AM radio plugged into the dorm wiring would receive the carrier current signal exactly like any other broadcast signal. The FCC did not license carrier current stations since technically they did not broadcast. But the FCC would reserve the carrier current station call letters so they could not be used by any other station.

In part two Fred takes up his days at Stanford’s KZSU.

The post Radio Recollections: the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1950s appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Editors note: Paul Bailey writes the Goodbye AM blog, covering the decline of broadcasting on that band, particularly in Europe. We asked him to share his perspective with Radio Survivor readers, and we look forward to his future contributions.
-Paul

In Europe we call the AM band the “medium wave” band (there is also a “long wave” AM band). Until recently, the medium wave band was crowded with all the stations in Europe. There are still small local stations active on the band, but for 90 years it was dominated by the state broadcasters and their high power transmitters which enabled their services to be heard in neighbouring countries in daylight and all over Europe in night time conditions.

Not anymore. Tune along the band today–if it isn’t drowned out by the interference from broadband equipment and digital television power supplies–and count the gaps.

The state broadcasters have been hit by the soaring cost of energy, coupled with audience change and recession, which has reduced their operational incomes. So (apart from the UK, so far) the high power transmitters have been shut down to save money, and their radio services moved to cheaper platforms such as FM and the digital radio DAB system implemented in Europe.

The infrastructure of the high power broadcasters–the masts–is 70 years old and crumbling, and is deemed too expensive to repair or replace. Just weeks ago, one of the two masts at Start Point in England, which relays BBC high power services, was damaged in a winter storm and demolished. It will not be replaced.

The state broadcasters in Europe were traditionally financed by a television license scheme. Some countries have now changed the funding model for their state broadcasters.

In the UK, the BBC has secured a further 11 years of funding through the TV licence, which raises around £4 billion a year to fund its domestic services. If you watch or record television you are required to have a license; not having one is a criminal offense.

Unfortunately for the BBC, the last decade has seen more households ceasing to own televisions, further reducing their income. The number of households without television is now 1.3 million, or 4.7% of all households. If they watch BBC content on mobile devices, they don’t owe the BBC a penny.

On top of that shrinking income from TV licenses, which are price-capped, the government will stopp meeting the cost of free television licenses for senior citizens. The BBC now has to fund those, taking a further £650 million out of the operational budget. It also now has to hand over some of the license income to commercial broadcasters, to help improve their services.

We are waiting to hear from the BBC how they intend to balance their books but we already know that some radio services are being combined and others are going internet only. There is particular concern for the BBC’s network of local radio stations, which cost more per year than the BBC’s major radio network, but have declining audience.

There is also a decline in the ownership of radios. Generations have now grown up who have never owned a radio, they just have phones. This is impacting the local commercial radio stations, as advertisers are reducing their spend. Young people do not consume TV channels or radio stations like I did when I was a teenager; they download. This is reflected in the pop charts, which are largely compiled from download activity.

After 20 years, and much hype, the take-up of digital radio has not met expectations. The low power has proved to be too low to provide a reliable signal, coverage remains incomplete, and the only major manufacturer of DAB digital radios has ceased production.

A new Radio Curtain has descended on Europe, shutting many of us into our own countries, unable to hear each other’s services, many of which are only available on the internet in their home countries.

This has caused concern in the European Parliament, with MEPs (Members of the European Parliament) calling for all the services of all the state broadcasters to be available in all of the countries in the European Union. But where will all the money, frequencies and audience come from?

The post The Radio Curtain Descends on Europe – the State of AM on the Continent appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The top item of concern is a proposal to reduce the protections of the most powerful so-called “clear channel” class A stations. These stations–like Chicago’s WGN, Los Angeles’ KFI and Denver’s KOA–were originally intended to serve large swaths of the country, epsecially at night. As such, they have enjoyed protection from interference that might be caused by lower powered stations on adjacent frequencies, which are typically required to reduce power or even go off the air at night, when AM transmissions propagate farther via what are called skywaves that bounce off the ionosphere.

This impact on local stations that have much reduced or nonexistent service at night is the reason why the Commission proposes to eliminate clear channel stations’ skywave protections altogether. In particular, the FCC is seeking comment on how listeners in rural areas without local stations, and therefore rely more on clear channel stations, might be affected.

This is a very controversial proposal because, if adopted, it would effectively end the 75-year reign of clear channel stations. The stations themselves wouldn’t go away, but they would not have the same impact. Yet, there are serious doubts about how valuable such nationwide powerhouses are anymore.

On the one hand the powerful clear channel stations continue to be amongst the most financially successful ones on the dial. Moreover, one of the chief complaints about the AM dial is that it is noisy and interference-prone, especially after dark. So, there are legitimate concerns that allowing local stations to up their power at night will only exacerbate the situation.

On the other hand, the Commission suggests that local stations which power down or go off the air at night are being unnecessarily hobbled. At the same time, there’s a legitimate argument that in today’s media environment there is simply less of a need for clear channel stations that broadcast for hundreds of miles.

Comments on this question should make for interesting reading.

Also up for debate are other questions on power levels and interference, ending the ability of stations in the 1610–1700 KHz “extended band” to retain another signal below 1600, as well as a proposal to effectively allow more FM translators to rebroadcast AM stations by expanding the permissible distance from the main feeder station. Translators are only intended help fill in within a station’s expected reception area, not extend it, and the current rules for AM stations are on the conservative side.

Read Oxenford’s full post for all the details.

The post FCC Weighing the End of Clear Channel AM Stations appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Radio Survivor readers are well aware of my passion for radio history and my appreciation for high school radio. For those reasons, it was a thrill to finally visit KBPS 1450 AM in Portland, Oregon a couple of months ago. Licensed to Portland Public Schools, the station is housed at Benson Polytechnic High School (thus the call letters, K-B-P-S). The historic AM station launched in 1923 and has been a haven for Portland Public School students ever since.

Plaque at high school radio station KBPS-AM. Photo: J. Waits

KBPS’ Storied Past

Last summer I wrote up an account of the early history of KBPS after reading a fascinating dissertation by the station’s former General Manager (from around 1947 to 1994) Patricia Green Swenson. The station launched in May, 1923 with the original call letters KFIF (changed to KBPS in 1930) and the early days of the station included mostly live programming ranging from music performances to lectures.

KBPS history and Patricia Swenson photo on wall of station. Photo: J. Waits

Over the years students played a large role in the station (Benson students ran the station from the beginning) and starting in 1939, students from all of the Portland public schools were invited to participate, including kids as young as elementary school age.

Equipment in studio at KBPS. Photo: J. Waits

Touring KBPS in 2015

On Sunday, November 8, 2015, I headed to Benson Polytechnic High School and met up with KBPS’ Operations Manager Kevin Flink. It was a treat talking to Flink as he has a long history with the station, beginning as a student sportscaster probably in the fall of 1969. After graduation he continued to work at the station over summer vacations and was hired in 1975 as a producer/production assistant. He eventually went on to teach radio classes and manage the station, retiring from teaching in 2007. The call of the station lured him back, however, and he’s been a part-time manager since 2012.

Entrance to high school radio station KBPS-AM. Photo: J. Waits

As he toured me through the station, Flink spoke passionately about not only radio, but about the station and the students. He said, “It’s been a wonderful ride.” Housed in its own building on campus, KBPS moved into its current location in 1992. Flink recounted, “When we moved in here I thought I’d died and gone to radio heaven.” I visited with my Radio Survivor colleague Paul Riismandel and when we approached the entrance to the station, it was impossible to miss the large call letters above the door and the welcoming entrance. We initially hung out in the station lobby, eyeing a collection of plaques commemorating those who helped fund the current station building.

Paul Riismandel and Kevin Flink in KBPS lobby. Photo: J. Waits

KBPS as a Learning Lab for High School Students

The lobby also has piano, some seating, and an homage on the wall to KBPS’ long-time General Manager Patricia Swenson. As we walked down the hallway, there were more displays, including student posters from radio classroom assignments. I was charmed to see posters about topics like the history of radio sportscasting and about important radio figures, including physicist Heinrich Hertz. There was also a poster outlining the Benson High School Bell Schedules. To an outsider, that might seem rather mundane, but the daily high school schedule is critical to know when running a high school radio station operated by students who are ruled by their schedules.

Student poster at KBPS. Photo: J. Waits

During higher budget years, KBPS had a large staff of around 23 people, but today there’s just a Flink along with a full-time teacher (Broadcast Program Teacher Steve Naganuma) and contractors who provide help with engineering and other areas. For a time, the KBPS space also housed KBPS-FM, which began in the 1980s as an all classical station. KBPS-FM (now All Classical Portland KQAC-FM) later separated from the school district and moved out of the building in 2014.

KBPS 90th anniversary poster. Photo: J Waits

Off of a long hallway are several classrooms where radio students take classes and do work for the station. Flink told me that between 25 and 30 sophomores rotate through a 9-week radio class each quarter, which is around 80% of the entire sophomore class. Sophomores have their own radio classroom, which also has two production rooms attached to it.

Classroom at KBPS. Photo: J. Waits

KBPS also has a classroom for high school seniors, where I spied a collection of LPs, 7″s and carts. There were also quite a few carts in the other classroom and Flink told me that some of them came from other radio stations and were used for assignments. I also noticed many with KBPS work on them, including a cart that hints at the period of time when KBPS offered up its airwaves to Portland State University station KPSU (which didn’t have its own terrestrial signal – see my KPSU tour here).

Carts at KBPS. Photo: J. Waits

Flink said that the main senior project requires doing a 30 minute radio program. After spying the records, I asked Flink if there were turntables and he told me that there was one turntable and one stylus, joking that it’s like Barney Fife with “one bullet in his pocket.” The stylus is kept under lock and key mainly because of issues in the past with students trying to do scratching maneuvers using the turntable. Flink guessed that around 65 students take radio classes each quarter, when one accounts for sophomores, juniors, and seniors.

Vinyl records at KBPS-AM. Photo: J. Waits

As we made our way to the KBPS studio, Flink told me that the control room could only be used by radio majors, which means that no sophomores have access. When on the air, students can play pre-screened music on the station’s computer. They are asked to stick to a particular format, which could include new music, rock, or teen music. During our visit there were no students at the station and we heard a mix of music, including David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” Flink said that they were splitting the station’s stream during the weekend of my visit in order to run sports over AM and music over FM. For cases like this, they have two separate control rooms, one for the AM broadcasts and one for streaming broadcasts. Ultimately, Flink said they’d like to run two streams simultaneously so that more students can get on the schedule.

KBPS on-air studio. Photo: J. Waits

Besides sports broadcasts and music shows, KBPS also airs school board meetings. In addition to playing music, DJs also do breaks to report on news and weather and Flink said it’s typically “2-man shifts.” That phrase piqued my curiosity about the number of girls at the station. When asked, Flink told me that up until 1972 the station was all boys, but that things have changed dramatically and that today there are probably more girls than boys in the radio program. In part he surmised that it’s because “it’s a clean major,” as opposed to say the school’s building construction major.

Sign at KBPS. Photo: J. Waits

As we continued our tour, Flink pointed out a room that is being converted into a workroom for music production. The school is in the process of getting keyboards and guitars and already has some work stations where students can produce music. He explained, “not everybody wants to be a DJ.” When we reached Flink’s office and the end of our tour, we got to see some historic gems, including old black and white photographs of the station and vintage transcription discs containing KBPS-AM programming dating back to the 1940s. Flink had just found the stack of dusty records and it was amazing to glance through them and see the types of programs that the station used to produce with elementary through high school-aged kids.

Transcription disc containing KBPS-AM programming from 1949. Photo: J. Waits

Back in the days before tape recorders, radio transcription discs were used to archive live radio. Housed on oversized records (around 16 inches compared with the 12 inch records that we are generally familiar with), the discs at KBPS contained a variety of educational programs, drama, and even a 1948 interview with the U.S. Office of Education’s Chief of Educational Radio. I’m sure this would be a fascinating listen, as it’s from around the time that he published a short Office of Education book on FM educational radio.

1940s transcription disc at KBPS. Photo: J. Waits

After wrapping up inside, we took a short walk to the back of the building to take a look at the KBPS AM radio tower. It was a rare opportunity for me to see such a commanding radio tower close up, made even more special because of its location at a high school station and its incredible legacy.

Radio tower at high school radio station KBPS-AM. Photo: J. Waits

Thanks so much to Kevin Flink for the great tour of KBPS-AM, particularly since it was on a Sunday morning! You can hear some of my interview with Flink on Radio Survivor Podcast #24, which is worth a listen if you want to learn more about high school radio and KBPS. This is my 97th station tour report. I have one more tour recap left from 2015 and I’m already planning for some radio station tours in 2016. It’s hard to believe that one of those stations will be my 100th tour. See my most recent field trips on Radio Survivor and see all of my station tour reports on Spinning Indie.

The post My Visit to the Oldest High School Radio Station in the U.S.: Portland’s KBPS appeared first on Radio Survivor.

For those who have been waiting with baited breath since 2013 to find out how the FCC plans to revitalize the FM dial: your wait is over. The Commission released its First Report and Order on Revitalization of the AM Radio Service late on Friday after its October open meeting. The order covers a few policy changes, and opens an inquiry on several other issues.

But the big solution for revitalizing the AM dial is… make it easier for AM stations to get stations on the FM dial.

OK, then.

All-HD Still M.I.A.

Before I dive deeper, it’s important to point out that the solution for revitalizing AM is not all-digital HD Radio broadcasts on the AM dial. Though the FCC poses the question of perhaps allowing all-digital broadcasts on the so-called “expanded band” from 1610 to 1700 KHz, it also acknowledges that “ the record is not yet established on the technical standards needed to establish interference protection for digital-to-digital stations… The absence of a technical record leads us to believe that it may be premature to discuss limiting the Expanded Band to all-digital operation(.)”

Some Tweaks to Actual AM

Lest ye think that the actual analog AM radio dial has been entirely left out, the FCC eliminated the so-called “ratchet rule.” In effect, this rule required stations to “ratchet back” their after dark broadcast power when making certain upgrades to their transmission plant. The unintended effect was that it discouraged AM broadcasters from making upgrades that might ultimately improve the quality of their broadcast for fear of losing transmission strength, which is why the rule has now been dropped.

The Commission also loosened requirements that existing stations to cover 80% of their community of license, along with eliminating the nighttime coverage standards for existing stations. These changes are intended to account for growth in community size and provide stations greater flexibility to relocate.

AM on FM

The AM on FM aspect of the order is far and away the most significant aspect of this order. Beginning in 2016 AM stations will have two opportunities to obtain translator repeater stations in order to rebroadcast their signal on the FM dial. Although they operate at low power–under 250 watts–and have similar technical constraints as noncommercial LPFM stations, translators are not the same as LPFMs in that they may be commercial or noncommercial, and may only rebroadcast programming from a full-power station. Translators may not originate programming.

First, next year the FCC will open a window to allow AM stations to buy a translator license or even a construction permit for a translator. That license and permit may be anywhere within a 250 mile radius of the AM station. Then the AM will be able to request to move that translator to any open FM frequency in its home market.

As John Anderson points out, there are hundreds of translator construction permits that are close to expiring. These all come from the last translator application window in 2003, which John terms “The Great Translator Invasion,” because an unprecedented 13,306 applications were filed, an overwhelming number of which came from applicants whose only apparent purpose was to resell them at a profit.

Second, in 2017 there will be a separate application window for AM stations to get new FM translators. Lower powered class C and D stations will have priority in this window. Stations that win translators will be required to hold on to them and maintain the AM rebroadcast for four years, ostensibly to put a damper on that window triggering another speculation frenzy, with AM broadcasters cashing in on the translator market instead of using the stations for their intended purpose. Still, that doesn’t mean there won’t be a chance to profit beginning in 2020.

Effect on LPFM

Given the similarity between FM translators and LPFM stations, and the close quarters in which they sometimes sit on the dial, some LPFM broadcasters are understandably a little nervous about a slew of new translators hitting the FM band. One reason for concern is the fact that the FCC considers low-power FM stations to be a “secondary service,” which means that they must endure interference caused by an adjacent full-power station, or can be made to move or modify operation based upon qualified complaints or approved changes made by an adjacent full-power station.

Luckily, translator stations are also considered a “secondary service,” which means they have no trump card over an existing LPFM. As Rec Networks explains, new translator stations on the same or adjacent frequencies must protect LPFMs and may not cause interference.

However, since LPFMs and translators can use many of the same spaces on the dial, the bigger question regards how many eligible LPFM frequencies will remain after the 2017 application window. Given that there are 4,692 AM broadcasters in the US, that’s a lot of potential applications and translators going on the air. Especially in the top 20 largest markets the space on the FM dial is extremely tight.

Folks who missed the 2013 LPFM application window and are hoping for another shot are probably in for a long wait, as well as an unwelcome surprise. If and when a new LPFM window opens up, it will be after 2013, and the opportunities will likely be far outside most major cities. It’s a stiff reminder that broadcast spectrum is truly a limited resource.

Revitalization or ‘Migration’?

What does this mean for the average AM radio listener? It means that in many cases she’s going to become an FM listener, choosing to tune in her favorite station’s translator in order to get a clearer, less noisy signal.

Depending on how existing stations take advantage of the new flexibility the FCC grants with this order, some may end up slightly cleaner broadcasts over the next five years or so. The next round of decisions also may offer minor improvements, particularly in the extended band.

But if all that sounds to you like it hardly revitalizes the actual AM dial, you’re not alone. John Anderson argues that this just begins the slide toward “the sunsetting of the band entirely.” He concludes,

“Broadcasters will argue that the economics of running an AM station are no longer sustainable, at which point they’ll lobby to “upgrade” FM translators into stand-alone primary stations along with a loosening of local market ownership caps to keep this ploy within the bounds of legality. In the end, these policy efforts should be categorized more accurately as migration, not revitalization.”

The post FCC’s AM Revitalization = Move AM Stations to FM appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC released its quarterly list of the total number of licensed broadcast stations. Following the same trend that we’ve seen, the number of licensed stations continues to grow, with the current grand total at 15,470 licensed full power radio stations as of September 30, 2015. 

As we saw last quarter, the biggest increase this quarter is in the number of low power FM (LPFM) stations, with 1,364 licensed LPFMs at the end of September. This is 215 more LPFMs than at the end of June, 2015. The next highest gain was in FM translators and boosters, which increased by 56 this quarter, making for a grand total of 6,422.

For the quarter ending September 30, 2015, the number of AM stations decreased by 6, the number of FM commercial stations increased by 22, and the number of FM educational stations (including college radio, high school radio, public radio, religious radio, community radio, etc.) decreased by 1.

Here’s a run-down of the count:

As of September 30, 2015:

AM Stations:                        4,692     (down from 4,698 in 6/15 )

FM Commercial Stations:  6,688     (up from 6,666 in 6/15)

FM Educational Stations:   4,090    (down from 4,091 in 6/15)

Total Radio Stations:   15,470  (up from 15,455 in 6/15) 

Not included in Total Radio Stations:

FM Translators and Boosters: 6,422  (up from 6,366 in 6/15)

Low power FM (LPFM):          1,364    (up from 1,149 in 6/15)

To see more quarterly statistics about the total number of radio stations in the United States, take a look at all of our station count reports here.

The post Number of Radio Stations in the U.S. Grows this Quarter According to FCC appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Monday night at midnight Eastern Time is the much anticipated return of Art Bell. Though originally planned to be an online-only show on the Dark Matter network, 21 AM and FM stations and two shortwave stations have now picked it up. Most of the stations are outside major markets, with the exception of affiliates in Salt Lake City, Toronto and my city, Portland, Oregon.

I was happy to learn about KXL-FM signing on to Midnight in the Desert. When I first reported on the new show, I noted that while I welcome Bell’s return to broadcasting, I prefer being able to simply tune it in on my bedside radio rather than having to use my smartphone or laptop. Now I’ll be able to do that here in Portland. *Midnight in the Desert* will replace two hours of the paranormal themed Ground Zero with Clyde Lewis, which is based at KXL.

Last Tuesday Bell participated in a Reddit Ask Me Anything. Although most of the questions were about past interviews and other paranormal topics, he did field some about his new show, and radio in general.

The biggest reveal is that he plans a test show for Sunday night, where the central question is, “what do you want to see?” Odds are that most of the show will be listener calls on just that topic. He also assured that all calls to Midnight in the Desert will not be screened, and that Fridays will be “open lines,” meaning that listener calls will make up most of the show.

One reader asked him what he thinks of iconic radio host Phil Hendrie’s impression of him. Bell said he “loved” them, and that “they really are funny.” For the equipment geeks, he shared that he uses a Beyerdynamic microphone (he didn’t specify a model, but I’d guess it’s the M99) and a Symetrix vocal processor.

Responding to a question about what inspired him to get into radio, Bell said that he got started with ham radio at age 12, and was on commercial broadcast by 13.

First radio job, small FM on top of a mountain in Franklin, NJ. Religious FM. Read the news every hour. Station manager didn’t like people too close to the mic. So he’d come in and yank the chair out from under you while live on the air!

And, certainly to the delight of his fans, Bell also made clear his opinion on the condition of his old show Coast to Coast AM. “I think the current host of that show does it a disservice,” he said. "The current state of that program is the genesis for Midnight in the Desert.

I’ll definitely be tuning in for Sunday’s test show–though I’m not sure it will be on broadcast–as well as Monday night Midnight in the Desert debut. I will also report back my impressions of the new show.

The post Art Bell Returns Monday Night, Possible Test Show on Sunday Night appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Recently a reporter asked me how common independently-owned commercial radio stations were. I told him that they were a dying breed and another example of this disappearing category is talk radio station WYBG-AM in Massena, New York. After 57 years on the air, the station shut down on June 30. Its owners still hold out hope that someone will save the station by purchasing the license so that it can potentially resume broadcasting.

According to Watertown Daily Times, local owners Wade Communications (Curran E. Wade and his wife Dorothy M. “Dottie” Wade) have held the station’s license for 27 years and made attempts to sell the license. The article states,

Mr. Wade said a number of factors figured into the decision to close the radio station. As the only live and locally owned and operated radio station, he was handling 99 percent of the sales, was traveling about 700 miles a week and will turn 79 years old in two months. A transmitter problem in 2013 kept the station off the air for two months, from October to the beginning of December, and Mr. Wade said it never recovered from that. ‘It’s hard on small businesses,’ Mrs. Wade said.”

The post Farewell to Small Town AM Station WYBG appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Last last year I received an email inviting me to visit high school radio station KBCP (aka “the Bell”) at Bellarmine College Preparatory School in San Jose, California. I’m always excited to see stations and it’s rare that I get to visit high school radio stations. After exchanging a few emails, I arranged to visit the nearby station last week. KBCP’s General Manager Robby Leano met up with me on the afternoon of Tuesday, April 14 and took me on a quick tour of the station at the all-male Jesuit school.

Entrance to KBCP. Photo: J. Waits

This was excellent timing, as High School Radio Day is coming up this Wednesday, April 22. Leano said that KBCP is planning to bring out the station’s banner to display while DJs play music in the school’s quad to celebrate High School Radio Day.

Bellarmine College Prep’s campus. Photo: J. Waits

A high school senior, Leano joined up with the station when he was a freshman and said that it’s been a “fantastic” experience, telling me, “I really enjoyed it from day one.” I joked with him that kids in his generation are rumored to have little interest in radio and asked how he’d decided to work at his high school station. He said that people had told him that he had a “radio voice” before he even got to high school. He found out about the station after arriving on campus and receiving an email from the station’s advisor at the time (they call them “moderators” at KBCP). Leano said he was really surprised to find out that there was a Bellarmine radio station and subsequently joined the club.

Board at KBCP. Photo: J. Waits

Over the years Leano has gotten more and more involved with KBCP, not only doing music shows with his friends, but also doing sports broadcasts. He told me that it’s been fun to “talk about what I was seeing” during games. He also explained that there have been some ups and downs at the station and during his sophomore year it was in a bit of a downturn. A new advisor stepped up and things seem to be on an upswing now, after a bit of a “rebuilding year” last year.

Robby Leano in KBCP studio. Photo: J. Waits

Leano’s passion for radio has grown and in addition to his work at KBCP, he’s also interned at local commercial radio station KLIV. He definitely wants to do college radio after he graduates from Bellarmine and he told me that the presence of a college radio station on campus definitely factored in to his decision-making process for college. He said that for him having a college radio station at his future school was a “huge priority.” He’s also on Bellarmine’s student newspaper staff and plans to major in journalism in college, with an emphasis on sports and broadcasting. He told me, “I’ve had my most fun doing play by play and color commentary for baseball games.”

Disclaimer statement at KBCP. Photo: J. Waits

According to the KBCP website, the station was founded by a student in 2007 as KBEL. Initially broadcasting at 1670 AM out of the basement of O’Donnell Hall, it subsequently changed its call letters to KBCP and moved to a new arts and humanities building on campus (Sobrato Center). With around 50 participants, KBCP airs live programming before school, at lunch and in free periods during the school day, and immediately after school.

Promotional artwork for lunch-time show at KBCP. Photo: J. Waits

The station functions as a club and the faculty advisor has to always been present when students are in the studio, which means that there are no night or weekend broadcasts. Luckily the station’s advisor is a Photography teacher and the station is located in a room just off of the photography room. KBCP’s broadcast also gets piped in to that room so that one can listen to the station while in the photography classroom.

Photography classroom, with radio station in background. Photo: J. Waits

KBCP is an unusual high school radio station in that it broadcasts over very low power AM as a legal, unlicensed station at 1650 AM. I was able to pick up the station on my car radio in the school’s parking lot and Leano told me that the range is so limited that it “barely gets off campus.” Most listeners tune in to the station’s online stream and some of the biggest audiences have been for sports events, with Leano saying that a Bellarmine/De La Salle football game his freshman year is rumored to have garnered the largest number of listeners.

Sign in KBCP studio. Photo: J. Waits

Sports is a big part of KBCP and the station mainly covers football, basketball, and baseball games. Leano said that he’d like the station to cover a wider range of sports and said that they have also aired some volleyball games, have tried to do hockey, and are interested in broadcasting track meets. With around 15 to 20 members in the station’s sports department, they are pretty well-staffed to do extensive coverage of games.

Poster for old KBCP show from 2010-2011. Photo: J. Waits

As far as music, DJs generally play digital music, but people also bring in their own music on iPods or can play tracks from CDs. I was surprised to see that KBCP uses a CD jukebox that Leano told me holds up to 400 CDs. He guessed that there are around 120 CDs in it currently and this is what is used as a make-shift automation system when there isn’t a live DJ at the station. He said that there is a wide range of music in the CD player, so a pretty diverse mix is played when it’s on shuffle. Leano said that there hasn’t been discussion about playing vinyl records at the station and most DJs opt for playing digital music.

CD player at KBCP. Photo: J. Waits

The station’s hosts and DJs seem to have pride in their programs, as the station’s walls are covered with promotional flyers and posters for KBCP shows. Some are super professional looking (including a beautiful water color painting pictured earlier), hinting at the artistic talents of participants. Leano also pointed out a hand drawn promotional message for his show, which a fellow student had etched in pencil on a post-it. The station itself is starting to attract more notice on campus too and Leano said that it’s even beginning to become a tour stop when prospective students are led through campus.

Promo on a post-it at KBCP. Photo: J. Waits

The small studio has an interesting mix of pop cultural references from many different eras, including 1980s movie posters from Gen X classics like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and The Breakfast Club, the classic poster of the artwork from Nirvana’s 1990s Nevermind album, as well as more contemporary artifacts like an abandoned Minecraft costume part, a sombrero and an accordion.

KBCP studio. Photo: J. Waits

Thanks so much to Robby Leano for inviting me to visit KBCP. I wish the station a very happy High School Radio Day on Wednesday! This is my 84th station tour report. I have one more Kentucky field trip to go (coincidentally, at Bellarmine College), as well as a few visits to stations in D.C., and Virginia. See my most recent field trips on Radio Survivor and see all of my station field trips on Spinning Indie.

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The FCC just released its quarterly list of the total number of licensed broadcast stations and the total number of radio stations in the United States remains about the same as it has for the past few quarters, with a grand total of 15,442 licensed full power radio stations.

For the quarter ending March 31, 2015, the number of AM stations decreased by 3, the number of FM commercial stations increased by 7, and the number of FM educational stations increased by 6.

The big news this quarter is the increase in the number of licensed low power FM (LPFM) stations. By the end of March, 2015, there were 87 more LPFM stations than there were at the end of December, 2014. At the same time, the number of FM translators and boosters increased by 63 this quarter.

Here’s a run-down of the count:

As of March 31, 2015:

AM Stations:                        4,702     (down from 4,705 in 12/14 )

FM Commercial Stations:  6,659     (up from 6,652 in 12/14)

FM Educational Stations:   4,081    (up from 4,075 in 12/14)

Total Radio Stations:   15,442  (up from 15,432 in 12/14) 

Not included in Total Radio Stations:

FM Translators and Boosters: 6312  (up from 6,249 in 12/14)

Low power FM (LPFM):          1029    (up from 942 in 12/14)

To see more quarterly statistics about the total number of radio stations in the United States, take a look at all of our station count reports here.

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When last I meditated on my recent experiences at SXSW in Austin, I was commenting on the lack of interest in AM/FM among musicians with whom I spoke. It is unclear to me, however, whether those artists were representative of the broader creative population. I am certain that staffers and deejays from NPR and the BBC who attended SXSW 2015 would say that they were not. Both services ran panels at the conference offering tips on how musicians can get tunes on their respective shows. Panelists at the events reported being deluged with music from artists and their promoters.

I wonder, however, whether the performers in the respective rooms who received this advice found it encouraging or daunting. In any event, here is some of what I heard, first from the BBC.

BBC: UK music comes first

BBC Music 1 head George Ergatoudis started out with a caveat for international artists who want to “crack” the BBC. “Because of the way we are funded, we are strongly supporting UK music first,” Ergatoudis advised. So how do you gain access if you are ‘non-domestic’? “It has to start with being bloody amazing first of all,” he continued. “You need to stand out one way or another . . . you have managed to create a noise, a fan base interest. Any metric, any way you look there is a story that’s a reality about why you are different and exciting.”

But Ergatoudis did add that BBC radio does introduce UK listeners to new artists. At the early stage there’s very little to look at in terms of profile, “so it does boil back down to ears, and having people on the stations that frankly have that taste, have that ability to spot something in the music that excites them.”

What this suggests, at least to me, is that BBC 1 is open to non-domestic artists, even relatively obscure ones. But the process of picking them is very subjective. One of the things that struck me was how uninterested the BBC deejays and managers on the panel appeared to be in tapping into social media resources like Spotify or Last.fm to see what fans on those sites were enjoying.

“You’ve just got to be great,” panelist Sarah Stennett, an artist agent, concurred. “You can be seen if you are doing something that’s exceptional.”

Send us a letter

Steve Lamacq, presenter for BBC 6 offered some immediate practical tips to the audience. “We get sent a lot of stuff,” Lamacq said. Most comes from promoters, “most of it terrible, or impersonal.”

“And this is an important point,” he added. “With so much stuff out there,” how do you make yourself different? “If there are 100 bands, of those, 20 are good, and of those 20 we are only going to play two, how do you make yourself stand out?”

Lamacq’s’ answer: “Send a letter. I know it sounds absolutely ridiculous in this technological age. But making a personal connection. If you want to get noticed by one of the specialist deejays or a tastemaker in the UK, make a personal connection. I think that everyone in this room knows that that’s valid.”

“Even an e-mail is ok,” Lamacq added, “but it’s not as good as a letter.” (BTW: here is Steve Lamacq’s snail mail address: Steve Lamacq, BBC 6 Music, London, W1A 1AA).

NPR: We’re not all in it together

Meanwhile NPR also held a panel, this one titled “Public Relations, Public Radio, & Music.” Bob Boilen, host and creator of All Songs Considered, attended to offer advice (I found Boilen’s counsel the most useful of the panelists). First, he pointed out, when you send music to NPR, keep in mind that the service is not a monolith.

“From your point of view,” Boilen told the audience, “from the point of view of people who are trying to reach us, we are a mystery and hard to figure, because it’s not like NPR, even though there is an NPR Music, it’s not like there is one central thing that you send things to. You have the choice to send it to any one of the shows. And they’re all little independent silos. There is some interaction, but think of them independently. So if you want to be on All Things Considered, or you want to be on Weekend Edition Saturday, that’s completely different from being on Morning Edition.”

The point is that when you try to get music on NPR, you really have to listen to the individual shows and figure out where your music would best fit in. Just generically sending your content to the service won’t get you very far. You have to find “the right marriage” of music and place, Boilen emphasized.

The music goes in and out . . .

“I’m going to say something that these people won’t say,” noted panel moderator and music publicist Dmitri Vietze. “There are times when I’ve heard back: ‘no more Tuvan Throat Singing, or no more banjo, or no more something. There are these sort of waves of stuff where something will rise in popularity . . . Bulgarian women’s choir . . . ”

“I’m Bulgarian!” interjected panelist Monika Evstatieva, Director of All Things Considered. The audience laughed.

“It’s been said to me, literally,” Vietze insisted. The point, Boilen quickly added, was that if some kind of music has been used recently, the host isn’t going to interested in using it again. “We have to be careful and do things that aren’t in our comfort zone.” So again, you have to listen to the shows to get a sense of what is appropriate for you to send to NPR.

Boilen, who sometimes appears on other NPR shows to talk about music, also urged prospective music pluggers to remember that music sent to the service needs to have a “really good and engaging story.” Most people who tune into NPR tune into listen to news, he observed, “and so when they hear music, a lot of people really get upset: ‘What are you doing? I want to hear news!” And so you have to have an engaging story and someone who can tell that story. So if you are a publicist and you are trying to pitch something, your musician has to have something to say beyond ‘Well, we met when we were in high school and . . . ‘ ”

The bottom line for getting your music on BBC and NPR: know the people, know the shows, and know the context. Neither you nor your publicist will be able to get on these programs by going on autopilot, just sending them CDs or e-mailing SoundCloud links and hoping for the best. But difficult questions flow from all this good advice. Are the efforts put into cultivating relationships with these services worth it? Are musicians better off building up a social media presence than trying to cipher the sometimes Vatican-like exteriors of radio networks? I’m not sure. My next SXSW post will explore a musical genre where getting on AM/FM is still absolutely essential: country music.

The post SXSW journal: how to get your music on BBC radio and NPR appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Take our poll on whether AM/FM radio still helps young musicians.

After sitting through the Celebrity Economy in Music panel at last week’s SXSW, which featured economist Paul Krugman and the principals of Arcade Fire, I sat down outside and collected my thoughts. If touring is overwhelmingly the main way that artists make their money, I wondered, what is everything else for? I scribbled out a rough “everything else” list:

AM/FM radio
CDs, vinyl, cassettes, downloads
online videos (YouTube, Vimeo, DailyMotion)
SoundCloud
T-shirts
posters, stickers, tote bags
Pandora, Spotify, etc.

This struck me as a very crowded taxonomy of supplementary revenue generators. How much was AM/FM radio still in the picture, I wondered, and proceeded to buttonhole younger musicians at the conference with a single question: how important is broadcast radio to you?

The answer I received in a series of informal off-the-record discussions was, overwhelmingly, “not that much.” This statement should be qualified. Most of these musicians told me that they would like to be on the radio, but it either was not a sine qua non goal for them or seemed too difficult a task. Their responses also depended on their music genre.

Take the young garage rock, transgender singer I spoke with at my hotel while we waited for rides to the convention center. “Radio just isn’t that important to us,” s/he explained while smoking a gold filter colored cigarette. The top priority of the band in which s/he sings is getting gigs and touring, I was told. “Working, performing, and getting paid, that’s everything. We just want to play.” What was next in the order of priorities? Getting on all the online venues: BandCamp in particular. But this artist’s group had solved that problem by getting an account with Tunecorp, which does all kinds of online distribution for music groups. Tellingly, Tunecorp’s partners, with the notable except of iHeartMusic, are all overwhelmingly digital. Hardly any of its roads lead to AM/FM.

I received similar responses from the various hip hop deejays, performers, composers, and producers with whom I talked. The main priority for them is getting gigs at clubs and houses, obviously. So the immediate Holy Grail is making connections with the people who book acts across networks of cities, and getting noticed by huge online news/review venues like AllHipHop.com. As for radio? Not really, a young hip hop composer/producer told me while we waited for our Korean barbeque tacos (yes way) outside the convention center. “I mean, I know of individual artists who have gotten hits because they got on the radio, but most of what’s on radio stations just doesn’t feel like it has a lot to do with what I do.”

When I started a conversation with one hip hopper between panel discussions, he proudly informed me that he had finally gotten some “rotation” on one show at a popular FM station in Washington, D.C. “Once you get on the radio, you blow up!” he exclaimed. But when I asked him how long it had taken for him to make that connection, he smiled a bit ruefully. Two years, he conceded. “It’s great that I’m getting some play, but I’m just not going to put all that investment into promoters and materials to get on the radio. We’re talking thousands of dollars.”

A performer offered some impromptu lines at the SXSW Hip Hop “deep dive”

One of the most informative SXSW panels I attended was the Hip Hop Deep Dive, in which a group of aficionados played new tracks off of SoundCloud and the audience, mostly artists and fans, discussed them. Nobody talked about radio until the subject came up (I asked). Then it was, like, oh that too.

“Sure, radio’s important,” one panelist said. “There’s a lot of people who still listen to radio: families, people who, believe it or not, still can’t type in a URL address.” Nobody used words like “rube” or “bumpkin” in this conversation, but they might have well have. A young man sitting in front of me handed me a free DVD of his latest opus. “Is radio important to you?” I asked him. “Somewhat,” he hastily replied, then scurried off to promote his work to other producers in the room.

People with whom I spoke did acknowledge one kind of FM to which they felt they still had access: college radio. Both that hip hop producer with whom I enjoyed tacos and a young middle school teacher at the hip hop panel praised college radio as available and accessible. The teacher mentioned that his music had been repeatedly played on a college radio outlet in his town. But both also suggested that college radio was exceptional—very different from the commercial version, where they see far more promotional potential.

This is all anecdotal evidence, of course. Everybody I spoke to noted that there were still genres where AM/FM radio is very important, most notably country music. I’m going to share the comments of a country music promoter who spoke at the conference soon.

But compare the ‘meh’ attitude towards radio of those aforementioned hip hop promoters to the fond remembrances of various older rap artists who spoke at an SXSW panel on the legacy of the Roland TR808 drum machine. These included Arthur Baker, Hank Shocklee, and legendary radio deejay Funkmaster Flex, who worked at New York’s WRKS and WBLS in the late 1980s. They spoke reverentially about the access that rap artists had in New York back then.

“What was dope about the eighties,” Flex recalled at the panel. “I used to love [going to] Danceteria and different clubs. You would see the record label person hand the deejay the record, the radio deejay . . . It used to be amazing for me to watch Chuck Chillout get the record, listen to the record, and play the record.”

“He would play the record right away,” another panelist noted.

“It was amazing,” Flex agreed. “The [radio station] program director would give control directly to the street deejay – he had the date – to play that record. And they would monitor the 12 inch chart that was controlled by the mom and pop stores, and that’s how they would put a record into daytime rotation.”

From the street to the club to the radio stations, followed by a check-in with local record stores. I don’t want to fall into the nostalgia trap, but it does seem like a more transparent world. My next post will report on two SXSW panels that discussed how to get the attention of music producers and deejays at NPR and the BBC. They say they’re still getting tons of inquiries.

The post SXSW journal: do young musicians want to get on AM/FM any more? appeared first on Radio Survivor.

[polldaddy poll=8757028]

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The radio/music world is now a veritable aviary of possibilities: podcasts, Pandora, Spotify, YouTube, satellite radio, and webcasts, just to name a few. But a new survey says that when you get into your automobile, the chances are very good that you’ll do what someone in 1975 would do: tune into an AM or FM radio station.

The latest Triton/Edison report says that AM/FM is the audio source choice of 81 percent of consumers when they get into their primary car. A CD player is the second option (55 percent). An MP3 gadget playing personally owned digital music comes in third (38 percent). 21 percent access online radio and 17 percent check into satellite.

Edison Research / Triton

The good news (if you are an Internet radio booster) is that 81 percent is slightly down from Triton/Edison’s survey percentage in 2014: 86 percent. And online radio in car use is way up from 2013, when it clocked in at a mere 12 percent.

The less good news is that the researchers asked their survey cohort how important an Internet in-dash receiver will be when they make their next auto purchase. 24 percent said “not very important.” A whopping 41 percent said “not important at all.” That’s 65 percent of the next wave of auto buyers.

How the survey was conducted: “A total of 2,002 persons were interviewed to explore Americans’ use of digital platforms and new media. From January 6 to February 10, 2015, telephone interviews were conducted with respondents age 12 and older who were selected via Random Digit Dial (RDD) sampling. The study includes a total of 900 cell phone interviews.”

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Today REC Networks announced that it has begun work on the REC Radio History Project. It has started to mine the FCC database for historic AM station information and will be adding that material to the REC Broadcast Query tool. So far, it’s added information related to Los Angeles stations KFI and KHJ. According to REC,

Prior to 1979 and going back to the 1920s, all broadcast license records were typed on 3 x 5 index cards and kept in a card catalog.  These cards maintained a basic history of the station including every application that was placed and their outcome.  When the FCC moved their offices to the Portals in 1999, the 3 x 5 cards were transferred to microfilm and eventually destroyed.  The FCC has made the History Cards accessible to the general public.

REC has set up several database tables that would permit information from these history cards to be transferred to the database and be displayed with the automated records from CDBS in the REC Broadcast Query tool (recnet.net).  The REC Broadcast Query now supports the history card database for AM stations.  If you look at the Broadcast Query records for KFI or KHJ in Los Angeles, you will see the updated Broadcast Query result for these stations which now includes application data going back to the 1920s.”

REC notes that records are incomplete and that “Some items such as renewals and information about auxiliiary facilities are not recorded.” In order to make its way through the vast amount of information housed in these history cards, REC is seeking volunteers who would be interested in working on culling details for stations in a given metro market. REC writes, “Not only would this help others who wish to research these stations but it is an excellent learning experience in the history of broadcast radio in your area.”

REC plans to work on Los Angeles-area stations first, followed by New York and Chicago. If you have an interest in helping with this project, REC Networks can be contacted through its website. REC estimates that compiling station information will potentially take about two hours for each station.

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As I perused the list of the most recent call sign changes issued by the FCC, I found some interesting tidbits. The call sign for the former Vanderbilt University FM radio station, WRVU, is making a terrestrial radio comeback of sorts (WRVU.org is still used by an online station at Vanderbilt, but the now sold FM station is known as WFCL), as it will be used by a new low power FM (LPFM) station in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Iglesia Del Rey applied for the call sign WRVU-LP and it became effective for the station as of December 6, 2014.

I was sad to see that another station has given up its legacy three letter AM call letters. WIP 610 AM in Philadelphia is now known as WTEL AM, after its new owners had the call letters changed (this became effective as of December 1, 2014) after a deal with previous owner CBS. The owner, WCHZ License LLC, is now opting for call letters once used by another Philadelphia-area station.

The disappointing thing for me about WIP is that the AM station was one of the first commercial radio station in Philadelphia, launched by Gimbel Brothers in 1922. WIP’s history also intersects with the history of radio of Haverford College (which I’m quite interested in). Students at Haverford College established WABQ AM in 1923 and ultimately sold the station to the Keystone Broadcasting Group (WFAN) in 1927. By 1928 WIP and WFAN were sharing 610 AM (apparently following frequency moves made by the Federal Radio Commission) and had formed a partnership by 1931 in order to coordinate programming (see this fascinating dissertation about the origins of department store radio for more details) and by 1932 the call sign WIP was used.

So, farewell to WIP AM in Philadelphia and welcome back WRVU (albeit in Michigan).

The post The Latest FCC Call Sign Changes Herald the Return of WRVU (LP) and the End of WIP appeared first on Radio Survivor.

I’ve always wanted to build a radio and luckily Santa brought me three radio kits last month. So, the day after Christmas, I enlisted my dad and my daughter to help make a few. For my first project, my dad and I constructed a crystal radio using a kit made by Go Lab/Tree of Knowledge and distributed by Elenco.

Crystal Radio Kit. Photo: J. Waits

Designed for ages 8 and up, the Elenco Crystal Radiokit’s box (the packaging looks slightly different from the one that I link to here, but the components look the same) warned, “This product is intended for use by adults and children who have attained sufficient maturity to read and heed directions and warnings attached or enclosed.”

Since this one looked more complicated than some of the others, my dad and I embarked on this project while my 8-year-old daughter was off playing at the park. My dad is an engineer and built  radios in his youth (and also attempted to build a crystal radio a few years back–more on that in another post), so I was appreciative of his technical know-how.

Components of radio kit. Photo: J. Waits

As we examined the parts included in the Crystal Radio kit, my dad was thrilled to see that it included a pre-wound coil of copper wire. That was part of the reason why we attempted this kit first, as another kit that I have requires one to wind the wire. After taking a look at all the pieces, we got underway with building the radio.

Our first step was to release about 6 inches of wire from the pre-wound coil. Probably 4 inches of wire was already released on each side, but we assumed that we needed to release more (in retrospect, I wonder if that was actually the case). To do this, I had to remove some tape holding the wire in place. As soon as I removed the tape, wire started to rapidly uncoil from the tube. In a panic, I put my hand on the wire so that the entire spool wouldn’t uncoil. This was the first instance of us realizing that the instructions could use a few extra tips and tricks.

The dangers of releasing the wire from the coil. Photo: J. Waits

After rewinding the wire that needed to be back on the spool (which we never got as perfectly wound as it was out of the box), we decided to affix some tape to it so that it wouldn’t unspool again. Then, after a few more steps, we attached the coil to a plastic triangular base. It was a bit hard to get into place, so my dad suggested that we rub wax on the plastic parts and that helped considerably).

Attaching the variable capacitor. Photo: J. Waits

We then attached a variable capacitor on the bottom of the base, using screws to secure it in place. Following that we attached a triangular cardboard card, as well as a dial for our radio.

Attaching the radio dial. Photo: J. Waits

We had to then push the capacitor wires through various holes and then attach the earphone wire. Then things got tricky. We had to attach and thread through specified holes various wires for an an included diode, the antenna and for an earth wire, while also threading coil wires through different holes. Although we were given step by step instructions so that we could make the proper connections, confusion ensued because there were multiple numbering systems. It was also challenging because many of the wires were white, so it was hard to keep track of the purposes for each wire. If I were to do this again, I’d probably use different colored permanent markers to label the different wires.

Threading the capacitor wires (white) and the earphone wire (orange). Photo: J. Waits

Steps were numbered 1, 2, 3, 4 and on the radio base there were holes that were numbered 1, 2, 3, and 4. We assumed that the steps corresponded to the same order as the holes, but after building a few connections, we realized that they did not.

Additionally, after making various connections (with the earphone wire, the diode, the coil wire, antenna wires, capacitor wire, and the earth wires), some holes had multiple wires threaded through (between 2 and 4 total), making it hard to discern which wire was for which purpose. To make the connections, we attached brass paper fasteners to washers, as you can sort of see in the picture below. Additionally, some of the wires were not stripped enough on the ends to make proper connections, so my dad used his wire stripper to remove some of the coating on the wire.

Threading wires. Photo: J. Waits

After we realized that we had threaded some wires into the wrong openings, we redid some of our work. Finally, we were done making the crystal radio and we were eager to try it out.

Per the instructions, we took our radio to a metallic, cold water tap. We held the earth wire to the metal tap while holding the antenna wire into the air. With great anticipation, I put the earphone to my ear and listened intently. I turned the dial, hoping to hear a signal, but got silence.

Completed crystal radio. Photo: J. Waits

After several hours of work, we were proud to have completed all the steps, but were disappointed to not hear anything on the radio. It’s possible that we messed up the wire connections or are having issues because our copper coil overlapped in parts. It also may be the case that we weren’t close enough to an AM radio transmitter in order to pick up a signal. I didn’t even hear static, so I’m not entirely sure. The included booklet doesn’t provide much in the way of troubleshooting tips, but it does give some suggestions on how to improve reception using different antennas (aerials) and grounds. It also gives a nice overview of how radios work.

In any event, it was a fun process making this radio and I’m still hopeful that I will be able to eventually build a radio that can pick up a signal. Note: this kit was recommended for ages 8 and up. Due to the insufficient directions, I wouldn’t advise giving this kit to young kids.

After making the crystal radio, I moved on to an easier kit, which I will write about in another post.

The post Building My First Radio – Elenco’s Crystal Radio Kit appeared first on Radio Survivor.

I am continuing to follow the Federal Communications Commission’s proceeding on saving AM radio. A recent comment submission comes from iHeartCommunications (formerly Clear Channel) Executive Vice President Jeff Littlejohn. Among his observations at an ex parte meeting with the FCC:

Mr. Littlejohn noted that many commenters in the AM Revitalization proceeding have called for increased enforcement of existing Commission Part 15 rules to address interference to AM signals from non-broadcast sources. iHeart supports those views, and in particular, would find valuable Commission involvement and mediation when AM stations bring to the Commission’s attention interference complaints from sources such as power utilities, which often require education to resolve.

Part 15 transmitters are called this because they are taxonomized within Part 15 of the FCC’s rules. They deploy or are activated by very little radio frequency power, in many instances jolts smaller than a milliwatt. Because of their scale, their operators don’t have to request a frequency license from the Commission to use them (although they may need authorization pending proof that their device radiates very little wattage).

All sorts of electronic gadgets fall under the rubric of Part 15, including refrigerators, juice extractors, paper shredders, coffee makers, deep fat fryers, and other fun machines. There are even some Part 15 community radio stations, such as KCHUNG of Los Angeles.

Speaking personally, I have a Part 15 voice activated Halloween Spider. When I bought it, the packaging explained that the Spider assiduously obeys the agency’s Part 15 rules. As the YouTube video below shows, all I have to do is shout “Trick or Treat!” and it creepily crawls along my refrigerator. If this activity interferes with any local AM stations, on behalf of the Spider, I apologize.

I do have one question about iHeart’s filing. I know that some Part 15 devices are powered by power lines (although my Spider is battery operated). But do power “utilities” actually come under the Part 15 rubric? I am no authority on this, but the National Alliance of AM Broadcasters’ submission to the FCC seems to offer more nuance here. ”RF [radio frequency] Noise levels from Power Lines, Part 15 and Part 18 devices [scientific/medical] are the greatest problem for AM Broadcasters,” NAAMB writes. This would seem to distinguish between Part 15 gizmos and power providers. The FCC’s explainer on Part 15 gadgets mentions utilities not once. I appeal to the Radio Survivor community for guidance on this question.

There does seem to be a consensus among most AM station owning filers, however, that Part 15 devices are a problem. What exactly the FCC should do about them is less clear.

I usually do InternetDJ on Mondays; will resume the schedule next week.

The post Look out FCC Part 15 devices: AM radio is gonna getcha! appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC released its quarterly list of the total number of licensed broadcast stations this week and once again the number of radio stations has increased since last quarter. As of September 30, there were 15,433 licensed full power radio stations in the United States. The only category that decreased was the number of AM stations (down 6 stations since the end of June).

As we’ve been seeing for the past few years, the number of non-commercial educational FM radio stations (including community stations,  public radio stations, college radio stations, high school stations, and religious broadcasters) continued to grow, with 3 more stations this quarter.

Additionally, there were 45 more FM translators/boosters this quarter and 59 more low power FM (LPFM) stations. As the FCC continues to process all of the LPFM applications submitted last fall, we will see the number of LPFM stations continue to rise. Here’s a run-down of the count:

As of September 30, 2014:

AM Stations:                        4,715     (down from 4,721 in 6/14 )

FM Commercial Stations:  6,633     (up from 6,622 in 6/14)

FM Educational Stations:   4,085    (up from 4,082 in 6/14)

Total Radio Stations:   15,433  (up from 15,425 in 6/14) 

Not included in Total Radio Stations:

FM Translators and Boosters: 6186  (up from 6,141 in 6/14).

Low power FM (LPFM):          873    (up from 814 in 6/14)

To see more quarterly statistics about the number of radio stations in the United States, take a look at all of our station count reports here.

The post Number of U.S. Radio Stations on the Rise, Especially LPFM, according to New FCC Count appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Darryl Parks is the former corporate brand manager for Clear Channel talk stations and was program director for Cincinnati news/talk WLW-AM. Now independent, Parks keeps a blog where he recently has trained his sights on his old business.

A couple of weeks ago he dissected the plummeting ratings across the mostly-conservative AM talk radio format. “The monthly ratings for many talk stations are in a free fall,” he wrote, “displaying a product detached from all but an old, small, shrinking and worthless audience.”

Parks observed that some of the few stations which experienced a bump in ratings did so because they acquired Rush Limbaugh’s show in their markets. However, he pointed out that, “When you have no audience to begin with, tripling the audience isn’t all that hard. 0.0 to 0.3 is a 300% increase or an index of 300.”

Last week Parks dug deeper into “why nothing changes,” in talk radio.

One of his most striking reasons is that, “the program director of today has no say in programming decisions and the corporations don’t want a market PD with thoughts, ideas or any clue on how to correct talk radio’s problems. They don’t get a vote.”

Even from a cynical and jaded commercial radio critic like myself, that tidbit merits a hearty, “Whoa!” I already knew that commercial radio DJs had no role in picking actual songs, as Clear Channel’s classic rock chief Eric Wellman recently confirmed, saying, “I know there are some stations and some companies where if you change a song it’s a fireable offense.” And while I certainly figured that program directors were increasingly under the thumb of corporate management, even I didn’t think the situation was quite so bad.

Parks also blames the vertically integrated structure of commercial radio.

“One company owns the distribution platforms, the syndicator, the rep firm and the chosen talent. Clear Channel, for example, owns stations and the syndicator Premiere Networks. They signed Rush Limbaugh to a reported multiyear, $400 million contract. The media has reported on Limbaugh’s contract for years. For a company to have any chance of making that type of investment back, the show must be broadcast on hundreds of stations. Conveniently, a company like Clear Channel owns many of these radio stations in most cities. Even if the show gets poor ratings the local station has no say in continuing or canceling the show.”

Of course, Clear Channel is in debt to the tune of about $21 billion (or, about 52.5 Limbaughs). Parks compares that number to the $17.6 billion in revenue for the entire radio industry in 2013. “The companies that control the stations and distribution platforms that can reinvent talk radio are handcuffed to invest anything in a dying format and are handcuffed to investing anything in a new genre of talk,” he concludes.

I’ll add that one way that Clear Channel racked up so much debt–that even the entire radio industry can’t pay off–was buying up hundreds of stations, only to decimate local hosts, staff and management. To compete the other big companies had to chase Clear Channel to the bottom. That’s why their collective version of creative programming is to dump Hannity for another syndicated 50-something angry, conservative white guy.

The nation’s largest radio owners have shown very little penchant for change or creative renewal since the ink dried on the Telecom Act of 1996, so there’s no reason to think any changes to the talk/radio format are remotely imminent. Instead, we’ll probably see a continued shift of the AM dial to sports talk, until that format is even more saturated than it already is and the bottom falls out.

The more things change…

The post The Death Spiral of AM Talk Radio appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The FCC released its quarterly list of the total number of broadcast stations this week and once again the number of radio stations increased from the prior quarter. As of June 30, there were 15,425 licensed full power radio stations in the United States. The only categories that were on the decline were AM stations (down 5 stations since the end of March) and FM commercial stations (down 2 stations since the end of March).

As we’ve been seeing for the past few years, the number of non-commercial educational FM radio stations continued to grow, with 25 more stations this quarter. For some perspective on this growth, there were 569 more non-commercial FM stations at the end of June, 2014 than there were at the end of June, 2011. During this same 3-year period, the total number of radio stations increased by 615.

Additionally, there were 59 more FM translators/boosters this quarter and 40 more low power FM (LPFM) stations. As the FCC continues to process all of the LPFM applications submitted last fall, we will see the number of LPFM stations continue to rise. Here’s a run-down of the count:

As of June 30, 2014:

AM Stations:                        4,721     (down from 4,726 in 3/14 )

FM Commercial Stations:  6,622     (down from 6,624 in 3/14)

FM Educational Stations:   4,082    (up from 4,057 in 3/14)

Total Radio Stations:   15,425 (up from 15,406 in 3/14) 

Not included in Total Radio Stations:

FM Translators and Boosters: 6141 (up from 6,082 in 3/14).

Low power FM (LPFM):          814    (up from 774 in 3/14)

To see more quarterly statistics about the number of radio stations in the United States, take a look at all of our station count reports here.

The post FCC Reports that the Number of Radio Stations in the U.S. Increased last Quarter appeared first on Radio Survivor.

This weekend I’ll be immersing myself in college radio history during some special events honoring the 90th anniversary of student radio at Haverford College (see the full alumni weekend schedule here). I’m hopeful that many alumni will attend, as I’m looking forward to learning even more about the storied past of the many stations at Haverford.

Students built commercial AM radio station WABQ in 1923 and its first test broadcasts were in December of that year. Within a few years it grew to be one of the most powerful AM stations in the Philadelphia area, yet many Haverford alumni are completely unaware of the story of WABQ. By 1927 the station was sold off and broadcasting didn’t resume on campus until the early 1940s. Campus-only carrier current broadcasting revitalized the Haverford Radio Club and students began experimenting with dorm-based stations around 1941.

Soon after, a carrier current station, dubbed WHAV, was built in the cramped attic of the Union building where it remained until the early 1970s. Its call letters were changed to WHRC in the late 1940s. From the 70s to the 90s radio was a popular campus activity, with students now broadcasting from a larger space in the basement of the dining center. Radio petered out on campus beginning in the late 1990s, was revived again with the launch of an Internet station in the early 2000s, died again, and was again reborn within the past couple of years.

Through all the ups and downs, Haverford’s radio stations were an important campus activity for many students. In the course of my correspondence with alumni from the 1940s through 2000s, I’ve been struck by all of the vivid and fond memories that have been shared with me. I can’t wait to meet many of these former college radio participants this weekend and look forward to their tales.

If you are in the Philadelphia area, please stop by to see an exhibit documenting Haverford radio history in the Magill Library (maybe we’ll get to see this vintage stamp!). There will be an opening reception for the exhibit on Saturday beginning at 3:30pm. Midway through the reception, we’ll take a walking tour of some old Haverford College radio haunts, pointing out all of the places where radio has taken place over the years. We’ll also peek into some former and current WHRC spaces to reminisce and see how radio is being done in 2014. On Sunday, there will be a panel discussion from 9am-11am, featuring WHRC alumni from the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and present-day. I’m also hopeful that many other radio alumni in the audience will contribute to the discussion.

As I’ve researched Haverford’s radio history, I feel like I’ve become closer not only to my college, but also to fellow alumni. It’s pretty incredible to connect with people based on the shared experience of college radio, especially when it happened at the same station during different eras.

The post Haverford College Celebrates 90th Anniversary of Student Radio on Campus appeared first on Radio Survivor.

NPR has added its voice to the Federal Communication Commission’s proceeding on revitalizing AM radio. Although the filing supports the FCC’s general recommendations for improving the service, it also functions as a vehicle for promoting one of NPR’s favorite causes: getting the Commission to license more translators for Non-commercial Educational (NCE) FM radio stations.

Still, I did not know the following: “Almost 80 AM public radio stations are affiliated with NPR or receive operational funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting,” NPR writes. “These stations serve communities as urban as New York City in the case of WNYC-AM, as well as remote areas of Alaska, and are among the oldest continuously operating stations in the country.”

That would be nearly eighty out of the 975 public stations across the country for which NPR produces and distributes content—in other words, roughly eight percent of public stations broadcast on the AM band.

Further reading: New England Public Radio’s comments to the FCC on AM revitalization.

The post NPR: there are still almost 80 public AM radio stations appeared first on Radio Survivor.