I spend a lot of time rummaging around SoundCloud. Some of this energy goes into following the service’s engagingly sporadic use by community radio stations.

WFMU in New Jersey, for example, has a SoundCloud page titled WFMU Marathon. “Share an MP3 only (for size & compatibility) telling us what you love about WFMU,” the account requests. “Keep it under thirty seconds and no obscenity, please.”

Among the many consequent recordings, I’m partial to this little ersatz march routine:

. . . and this bongo homage has its moments:

At many stations individual programmers post shows every week, or just a group of shows, or just one. About a year ago, for example, Colorado based KGNU’s Morning Magazine posted one of its episodes, but no more. Then the Boulder Weekly uploaded a KGNU Morning Magazine episode, but no more (again). On the other hand, Austin signal KOOP’s Wildcraft Radio Show regularly publishes its deejay dedications, many of which are quite touching. Here are several for Mothers Day:

In other instances, community radio station content surfaces because musical groups post their interviews on them to their SoundCloud accounts  (see, for example, the Kenan Rainwater Band’s interview on WFHB out of Bloomington, Indiana). But I’m particularly partial to this plug for the From Ark to Microchip show on KKFI-FM out of Kansas City, Missouri, which is purportedly endorsed by none other than former United States President Harry Truman (who, it should be noted, has been dead for some time). “Although I haven’t got a dime’s worth of interest in it, I hope the show is a great success,” Truman allegedly says:

Many community stations have official SoundCloud pages, but they have no content. Or, they’re full of tunes that appear to be there for no reason or rhyme, other than, presumably, some respective staffer or programmer with access to the account liked them; or they’re filled with a potpourri of songs, manager’s reports, and assorted on air moments.

Bottom line, it’s hard to figure out what exactly to do with SoundCloud if you’ve already got a radio station. How does your staff use the application? Please let us know.

The post Community radio: how do you use SoundCloud? appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Several weeks ago I gave a rather bad grade to SoundCloud’s “explore” classical channel, but I’ve been checking out other channels, and the service’s “world” stream is much better. A lot of really marvelous Japanese, South Korean, Chinese, Arabic, and Indian content there.

Among the best tracks I’ve heard: Time and Fallen Leaves. A fine piece from the South Korean K-pop duo group Akdong Musician. These kids are originally from Mongolia, but made their way back to South Korea to get into the music biz. Seems like it’s working so far. Light guitar playing accompanying a beautiful soprano vocal track.

Meanwhile SoundCloud user H. Salah has an outstanding stream of classic Egyptian vocals; I would definitely check out the Bollywood tracks being offered by Old Punjabi Gold; and Africa Groove has a lovely Tiwa Savage hit, My Darlin.

Why does SoundCloud’s “world” channel work so much better than its classical channel? I think that the amorphousness of the concept of World Music lends to its success in this instance. World Music was always a sort of neo-Colonial idea, after all. Think about it: when was the last time you saw Justin Bieber or Miley Cyrus on a World Music playlist? Never, yet they’re part of “the world,” right? In the end, “World Music” is generally the First World looking at and listening to the Third. But the sheer messy globalness of the genre makes it much easier to curate via categories and tags.

SoundCloud is just vacuuming up users and listeners, it should be noted. Tech Crunch says that its heading for no less than 200 million listeners a month. And its revenues are also jumping, Euro-wise: from 8 million in 2013 to 14 million in 2014. But the service’s operating losses have more than doubled, from around 12 to 23 million over the same period.

We cover Internet DJ content every Monday at Radio Survivor.

The post Internet DJ: why SoundCloud’s world music channel works appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Most Radio Survivor readers have doubtless forgotten my effort to create a hybrid classical music room at plug.dj. Alas, I tried to pull it out of thin air without any of the real life connections you need to make an Internet music chat room work. Happily, someone remembered and brought a new one to my attention: Ost+ Piano and Strings Music. The community has a nice rules page that lays out its mission very clearly. Basically the focus is on music from film, anime, and the classical traditions. So you’ll hear some Chopin, followed by some great anime and game soundtrack tunes. A lot of good spirit among the users, and the community is supported by ClassyBot, a smart room management program.

One of the coolest things about plug.dj is that it has a DJ History feature. This was pointed out to me by Nantes, one of the Ost+ community staff. Just go over to your playlist area, and the top purple colored item should be titled “DJ History.” It is searchable, so community participants can refer each other back to memorable tunes played earlier. I was able to get a real sense of the flavor of the room from this feature. Definitely worth a visit.

While we are on the subject of classical, I am totally digging SoundCloud’s classical channel, which is featuring some amazing stuff. SoundCloud programmer Ahmed Gado from Mansoura, Egypt has been queuing a host of nice slow sensuous Oud/jazz/Hector Villa Lobos-ish pieces. I could listen all day. During my Saturday visit this was followed by Kiev based composer Benzab Abdi‘s Mowlavi Opera. And if that wasn’t beautiful enough, next came a user fan of the exquisite Danny Norbury with selections from his album Light in August.

This stuff is all so great, and when mixed in with traditional classical music (I caught a great track of JRhodes performing an Alkan piece) it is redefining classical music, making it come alive again. While we are at it, a second shout out to WQXR’s Q2 living composers channel. In a recent post I missed mentioning the excellence of Q2 late morning deejay Phil Kline. I caught him the other day and was struck by his eloquence and enthusiasm. The problem is that, situated as I am here in San Francisco, I tend to listen to west coast morning radio shows, rather than the east coast ones. But below check out a YouTube of his community cassette, CD, and mp3 ensemble composition, Unsilent Night.

The pieces’ website describes its origins as follows:

“It all started in winter 1992, when Phil had an idea for a public artwork in the form of a holiday caroling party. He composed a multi-track electronic piece that was 45 minutes long (the length of one side of a cassette tape), invited a few dozen friends who gathered in Greenwich Village, gave each person a boombox with one of four tapes in it, and instructed everyone to hit PLAY at the same time. What followed was a sound unlike anything they had ever heard before: an evanescence filling the air, reverberating off the buildings and city streets as the crowd walked a pre-determined route. Phil says: ‘In effect, we became a city-block-long stereo system’.”

Enjoy! BTW: Reports have it that YouTube is working the release of some kind of SoundCloud-esque service. And Deezer may show up in the USA this year!

We cover social music sharing communities every Monday in our Internet DJ feature.

The post Classical communities at plug.dj: if you can’t make one, join one appeared first on Radio Survivor.

I am enjoying Epic Dance Music, a beta application that draws from SoundCloud searches to create terrific dance playlist stations. Over the weekend I listened to a list riffing off of my initial pick: “Catgroove” by Parov Stelar. This was followed by a Decibel Junkies tune, DJ Trademark’s “Uncontrollable,” MGMT Kids, “BlogsDemodaCE,” Hello’s very amusing “Arrow in the Knee Remix,” and Klayplex, “Lights.”

Epic Dance progenitor Nicholas Abramovic sent us a brief description of the project. “While the website is designed with an EDM [electronic dance music] focus (since there’s a clear lack of discovery in this genre) you can find tons of non-EDM music such as Drake and John Mayer,” Abramovic explained. “Currently we’ve generated over 600k song-specific stations and this list is growing every day.”

In other SoundCloud news: looks like progress is being made on BBCode formatting to embed the SoundCloud music player on PHP/Mysql powered discussion boards. Developer Muhammad Rahman has the announcement up on the vBulletin discussion list. The BBCode formats as so:

[SOUNDCLOUD]https://soundcloud.com/jenniferlopez/jenniferlopezliveitup[/SOUNDCLOUD]

You can take a look at a sample embed here. BTW, I totally agree with what the Dope Music blog says: “Despite the numerous bugs and updates experienced over the past year or so, I personally believe SoundCloud is the best music hosting platform there currently is.” SoundCloud is such a terrific resource—full of unpredictable yet high quality stuff. If you are doing anything interesting with the application, please drop me a line.

Meanwhile Plug.dj (which also lets you search through SoundCloud tunes) has announced a couple of improvements to its community turntable room environment. These include the ability to scan the various room communities that your friends haunt, and listing your favorite communities, too. Now users can “filter” communities based on a variety of criterion: friends, population, favorites. Users “favorite” a community by clicking a star next to it on the list.

“This is just the first of many planned updates to the community list to make it easier to find communities relevant to you,” the blog post says. “Fixing the community search (we know it’s unreliable right now) is something we will be tackling soon, as well.”

Interestingly, over at Cult of Mac they’ve concluded that, despite all its troubles, Last.fm is still the best Internet radio music service, especially since it tapped into YouTube and Spotify. Here’s CoM’s bottom line:

“It was only recently that Last.fm was struggling to keep afloat due to the success of other, better supported services such as Pandora and even Spotify itself, with the abandonment of its service altogether in almost every country except the UK, US and Germany, for which it announced its intentions to put its desktop radio service behind a paywall. However, with this most recent collaboration [Spotify], alongside the YouTube partnership, all Last.fm web users worldwide will not only have access to a vast majority of exclusive and obscure music, but they’ll also have the ability to choose from a vast catalog comprising the two libraries, for both free and premium users.”

Interesting. I haven’t used Last.fm much of late. Maybe I’ll run over there and update myself on the improvements. Next week I’m going to write about YouTube’s oddly charming relationship with AM/FM radio stations.

We cover social music sharing communities  every Monday in our Internet DJ feature.

The post Epic Dance Music: tapping into SoundCloud dance power appeared first on Radio Survivor.

We’ve got an interesting discussion going on our reader forum about the best automation/music library software for Low Power FM and indie radio stations. The winner, so far, is Station Playlist, a software package that comes out of New Zealand.

“We’ve been using StationPlaylist Studio, Creator and Streamer for almost 4 years at Crescent Hill Radio,” writes Kathy W. “Our entire music database is local music. Once I’ve tagged the music by one of 8 genres I have created, I can create templates for each hour of the day. This program is awesome, I highly recommend it. Great support, and after 4 years I still haven’t tapped into everything it can do.”

Ditto, says johnthebru:

“Stationplaylist is a reliable automation program with a fast learning process. At manoradio we only use it when no one is live in the studio, it runs non stop so all someone has to do is monitor and pot it up. It has great capabilities that could work as a more than entry level automation program. A read of the yahoo group will show you how programmers are using it in many, many ways. The response to problems is very fast and if you buy the highest level tier you can lock out the ability for people to mess with the details of the setup something I would recommend.

I have no connection with the company or any interest other than that of a happy camper.

I actually looked at other automation programs and selected stationplaylist. Hope this helps.”

Full disclosure, I’ve got no connection to StationPlaylist, either. In fact I never heard of it until Journogal asked for advice on a good playlist automation package. I very much enjoyed her list of requirements for her LPFM startup.

“This is what we plan to do to date—and this is subject to change, obviously,” Journogal wrote:

“1) All our music will be digitized as time allows to .wav or FLAC files so the fidelity will be as close to the source material as it can be. We’ll probably have volunteers get their feet wet with this task, which is essential but time-consuming, especially with vinyl that has to be digitized in real time. We’ll invest in lots of storage – mass quantities of storage, as the Coneheads would say; possibly on a separate RAID drive or server – to house this music. The database we use must allow this library to be tagged and searchable by artist, era, genre, album title, song title, song length, etc.

2) Right now we’re planning for one studio, but we have contingency plans for two if things work out. Both will be connected via Ethernet to the music library for use by show hosts, and to automate the station when no live talent is scheduled. These computers will be accessible by Internet to the Station and Programming Managers via password so that they can tweak things without having to come into the station, but there will be no browser and regular Internet access on these computers. We’ll have dedicated computers in the office area of the studio for volunteers to use, and one in each studio to be used only for browsing and answering emails. This is to keep the music database and its software safe from viruses and casual hackers.

3) A third computer will be in the main office/CD and vinyl library area (with headphones but no speakers), also connected to this digitized library, and serve as a “listening post” for show hosts to audition music for their shows. A printer will be on the same desk so hosts can generate printed lists of their planned shows to take home or into the studio with them, or for reporting purposes to fulfill licensing obligations.

4) The listening area will also have a turntable and CD player so volunteers can either rip music into the station library from their own collections, or pull physical CDs and vinyl that has not yet been digitized and audition those directly on the equipment for airplay.

5) We want the software to allow program scripting and scheduling.

6) Whatever automation software we choose should also allow us to import sweepers, spots, underwriting mentions and station IDs and add them to the mix, or better yet, record them and then add them without having to go to a separate recording and editing program.

7) We want to be able to put live playlists (or a link to live playlists) on our website.

8) Integrated streaming support would be nice.

9) We want to record shows for airchecks and archival purposes and to download to the website as podcasts.

10) We want the software to support the greatest range of audio formats possible, including but not restricted to .wav, FLAC, AAC, AIFF, Mp3, etc.

And, finally,

11) We don’t want the software to require an advanced degree in Computer Science to configure, learn and operate.”

To which Brian Seim responded: “If you like scripting, Station Playlist is inexpensive but has very nice features. For budget minded outfits, it may be worth some research.”

I hate to interrupt this lovefest, but surely there must be some other playlist software package worth considering. If you know about it, please add your voice to our forum page. And thanks!

The post Need a music automation program? StationPlaylist gets high fives appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Some unexpected excitement for iTunes Radio, digital radio future for Sweden and an online shortwave archive are in today’s round-up of radio news not to miss.

• Music blogger Tyler Hayes published an excited mash note to Apple’s new iTunes Radio for FastCo.Labs, based upon sampling the beta version. Our own Matthew Lasar expressed his own doubts about yet another automated “radio” platform, Apple-magic or not.
• Sweden plans to turn off analog FM broadcasts in favor of the DAB+ digital radio standard, reports blogger Gunnar Garfors (via @DIYmediadotnet). In a letter to a Swedish paper, that country’s Minister of Culture says that the transition should be accomplished in nine years, and will permit private broadcasters to more easily reach the entire country.
• Thomas Witherspoon, the man behind the Shortwave Listening Post, has created the Shortwave Radio Audio Archive in order to preserve and document broadcasts from this long-lived global information service. Audio is uploaded to Archive.org, and then indexed at the Shortwave Archive.

The post Monday radio news round-up: love for iTunes Radio, Sweden chooses digital, Shortwave Archive goes live appeared first on Radio Survivor.

The 2013 International Consumer Electronics Show kicks off on Tuesday and runs until Friday. As usual, I will be monitoring the announcements and news from the show for anything of import to radio, broadcast and online, podcasting and streaming.

Announcements for the show are just getting started. Monday is “press day” at CES, when there’s a heady stream of press conferences and press releases, which should reveal a large percentage of the show’s announcements.

Pandora’s CEO Joe Kennedy is scheduled to present at the Citi 2013 Global Internet, Media and Technology Conference happening with CES. His presentation is scheduled for 2:15 PST on Monday, the 7th. It will be streamed live at the Pandora investor relations site. There hasn’t been any word about what he’ll be talking about, though I suspect he’ll be discussing Pandora’s fight to have its listenership ranked along side terrestrial radio, as well as a Nielsen exec’s recent statements saying that after its Arbitron acquisition the company will start monitoring internet radio services.

While Pandora still rules the roost in online radio, a prominent Apple analyst says he believes that the company will debut its competitor service, which he dubs “iRadio,” this year. Apple doesn’t participate in CES, so it’s unlikely we’ll have an announcement this week.

In terms of hardware, I don’t expect to hear about any monumental new radio gear this CES. Internet radios continue to be a niche item, and HD Radio seems to hold little appeal outside of car radios. There will probably be some product updates announced, but I don’t imagine anything truly new or groundbreaking.

However, I predict we’ll hear about more Bluetooth-enabled devices that make listening to mobile devices even easier by cutting the cord between your smartphone and car or home stereo. That’s the kind of step forward that will greatly assist the growth of listening to internet radio on the go.

The post What might be in store for radio at the 2013 Consumer Electronics Show appeared first on Radio Survivor.

SXSW 2012

Once again it’s that time of year when my social media world is flooded with reports about BBQs, Austin weather reports, band showcases, and panels happening at the annual South by Southwest (SXSW) conference. The interactive portion is wrapping up to make way for the start of the music conference today.

Some radio-related events have already occurred, including the session Public Radio is Media’s Future. You Heard it Right last Friday, a University of Texas, Austin Radio-TV-Film Department party on Saturday, and a Sunday session on transmedia radio producers, but the bulk of the radio action starts today.

As is often the case (see a flashback to 2011), radio stations are out in full force at SXSW with live broadcasts, concerts, and happenings. There’s even a Radio Day Stage at the Austin Convention Center, at which various stations will be presenting live performances throughout the week.

A few college stations will be in attendance, including Radio K (KUOM at University of Minnesota). See their tumblr page for their coverage of SXSW 2012. KEXP will be doing free shows from Mellow Johnny’s Bike Shop (March 14-16), featuring music performances and sets by KEXP DJs broadcast live. NPR Music (which has already compiled an essential mix showcasing 100 SXSW artists) will also be there webcasting live from performances and from the Bruce Springsteen keynote. Public radio station The Current will also be airing shows live, as well as providing updates from the festival. KCRW will be doing a bunch of events, including showcases, panels, and broadcasts.

Here’s my quick guide to some of the radio events happening in Austin this week. All times listed are Austin time (Central time). Some events are free and open to the public, whereas others require badges, a ticket, or an admission fee; so be sure to double check before you head out.

Tuesday, March 13:

3:30 – 4:30pm: The Evolving Role of Radio. On this panel, Pandora founder Tim Westergren discusses the future of radio (Austin Convention Center, Ballroom EF).

3:30 – 4:30pm: Forget Radio. Let Your Fans Market Your Music. Ironically, this session is up against the Evolving Role of Radio panel. Although this is ostensibly anti-radio (the description states: “Radio no longer drives music sales – social does.”), it’s good to add this to the mix. No radio folks are on this panel. (Omni Downtown, Lonestar, 700 San Jacinto).

5:00 – 7:00pm: Pandora holds a “DJ-hosted” Happy Hour Casino at Antone’s (213 W. 5th Street, Austin).

Wednesday, March 14:

11:30am to 8:00pm: KEXP live broadcast from Mellow Johnny’s Bike Shop (400 Nueces Street, Austin, TX) featuring Howler (11:30am), The Barr Brothers (1:30pm), Wussy (3:30pm), Allen Stone (5:30pm) and Of Monsters and Men (7:30pm).

12:00 – 1:00 PM – Music Streaming and Online Radio Meetup at Austin Convention Center, Exhibit Hall 3/4. At this event, “Broadcasters, podcasters, programmers, music supervisors, developers, artists, and users are invited to meet and network at the Meet Up Pavilion in the SXSW Trade Show.”

12:00 PM – 3:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by Radionica include Providencia (12:00pm), Francisca Valenzuela (1:00pm),  and Monsieur Periné (2:00pm).

12:00 PM – NPR Music webcasts the Bruce Springsteen SXSW Keynote live.

12:30 PM – 1:30 PM – Music in Devices- What is Working? This panel featuring representative from TuneIn and other companies, will look at music on devices, including “curated radio” and “streaming services.” (Austin Convention Center, Room 15).

12:30 PM – 7:00 PM – Pandora Discovery Den at Antone’s (213 W. 5th Street). “Featured artists will cross genres from Rock to Hip Hop. Afternoon shows followed by DJ-hosted Casino Happy Hour.”

3:00 PM – 6:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by KCRW include Michael Kiwanuka (3pm), Alabama Shakes (4pm), and Honeyhoney (5pm)

5:00 PM – 6:00 PM – Pandora Live Music DNA Analysis. Get the inside scoop on how music tracks are analyzed before being added to Pandora. (Austin Convention Center, Room 10C)

8:00 PM – NPR Music Live from Stubb’s -Performances and live webcast featuring Fiona Apple, Sharon Van Etten, Dan Deacon, Alabama Shakes, and Andrew Bird.

8:00 – KCRW Showcase at Haven (409B Colorado  Austin, TX). Performances by Blood Orange, Oberhofer, Ki:Theory, Band of Skulls, Kimbra, and Apparat.

Thursday, March 15:

11:30am to 8:00pm: KEXP live broadcast from Mellow Johnny’s Bike Shop (400 Nueces Street, Austin, TX) featuring Imperial Teen (11:30am), The Wedding Present (1:30pm), Choir of Young Believers (3:30pm), Tennis (5:30pm), and Shearwater (7:30pm).

12:30 – 7:00 PM – Pandora Discovery Den at Antone’s (213 W. 5th Street). “Featured artists will cross genres from Rock to Hip Hop. Afternoon shows followed by DJ-hosted Casino Happy Hour.”

1:00 PM – 9:00 PM: mtvU Woodie Awards Festival and Live Stream: Live performances will be streamed online from Austin. It’s unclear if the College Radio Woodie will be announced on this date or if it will be revealed during a special broadcast on MTV and mtvU on Sunday.

1:00 PM: NPR Music Presents Live from the Parish: Performances and live webcast of La Vida Boheme, Sugar Tongue Slim, Poliça, Lower Dens and The Magnetic Fields.

3:00 PM – 6:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by WXPN include The Lumineers (3pm), Delta Spirit (4pm), and Father John Misty (5pm).

5:15 PM – 6:15 PM – In the iCloud Era Who Can You Trust to Find Music? This panel includes a radio personality (from Hot 97) as well as writers and record industry professionals discussing music discovery. The panel description states: “…finding the music that you love is not as simple as tuning to a radio station. Digital curators have emerged to share their expertise via blog post, playlist, tweet, and status update.”

Friday, March 16:

11:00 AM – 12:00 PM –Adult Rock Music Meeting: “The music meeting is a time-honored tradition at radio stations in which new music is played and judged. The SXSW version will feature an esteemed panel of music and radio pros listening to previously unheard songs…How will these songs fit into radio? Who’s the next big thing? The audience and panel will offer their opinion in this always-lively panel.” Panelists include Program Directors and hosts from KCSN, WXRT, KBCO and WBEZ. (Austin Convention Center, Room 12AB)

11:30am to 8:00pm: KEXP live broadcast from Mellow Johnny’s Bike Shop (400 Nueces Street, Austin, TX) featuring Pickwick (11:30am), The War On Drugs (1:30pm), JD McPherson (3:30pm), The Men (5:30pm), and Youth Lagoon (7:30pm).

12:00 PM – 2:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by WFUV include Gary Clark Jr (12:00pm), Shearwater (12:25pm), and Punch Brothers (1:15pm).

12:30 PM -1:30 PM – Format Shmormat: Radio Breaks Bands. Panelists from radio (Jim McGuinn from KCMP The Current, Bruce Warren from WXPN, and Garrett Capone from 91X), TV (Matt Pinfield from MTV2), and the record industry discuss radio formats and how bands can utilize radio airplay (Austin Convention Center, Room 17B).

12:30 – 7:00 PM – Pandora Discovery Den at Antone’s (213 W. 5th Street). “Featured artists will cross genres from Rock to Hip Hop. Afternoon shows followed by DJ-hosted Casino Happy Hour.”

2:00 PM – 4:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by The Current include Fanfarlo (2:00pm) and Ben Kweller (3:00 pm).

3:30 PM – 4:30 PM – Snacky Tunes: Food, Music and Internet Radio. This panel discussion focuses on the food-oriented Internet Radio show Snacky Tunes, which airs on Heritage Radio Network (Austin Convention Center, Room 16AB)

4:00 PM – 6:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by KUT include Blitzen Trapper (4:00pm) and Heartless Bastards (5:00pm).

8:00 PM – 2:00 AM: KCRW’s Friday Night Showcase at The Parish (214 E. 6th Street, Austin). Performances by Willy Mason, Quantic + Alice Russell, Clock Opera, Crystal Fighters, and The Temper Trap.

Saturday, March 17:

12:00 PM – 3:00 PM – Live performances on the Radio Day Stage presented by KEXP include: The Big Pink (12:00pm), Justin Townes Earle (1:00pm), and Plants and Animals (2:00pm).

8:00 PM – 11:00 PM – WFMU Showcase and Live Broadcast at Beerland (711 Red River in Austin, TX) featuring performances by 6 bands, including Death of Samantha and The Supreme Dicks. There will also be live DJ sets from WFMU DJs Liz Berg, Jason Sigal, and Brian Turner. The $10 entry fee benefits the bands (no SXSW wristbands or badges accepted at this show).

Sunday, March 18:

7:00 PM: mtvU Woodie Awards special will air on MTV and mtvU. The College Radio Woodie, for the “best” college radio station will be announced at the ceremony out of a pool of ten finalists.

The post Radio Guide to SXSW 2012 appeared first on Radio Survivor.

This thing seriously looks like a radio geek’s dream come true. All it’s missing is shortwave. Grace Digital touts its new Mondo Wi-Fi Music Player and Internet Radio as receiving over 18,000 stations. Starting with analog and HD AM and FM station, that number also includes internet stations, plus the ability to browse and tune in stations via major online platforms like iHeartRadio, NPR, Live365 and CBS Radio. If you want customized stations it offers Pandora. It also lets you access radio programs that you’ve recorded using the DAR.fm service.

One might think that’s all well and good, but you can pretty much do that using your computer, tablet or smart phone, maybe adding in a pocket radio for those few stations you can’t find online. But wait, there’s more!

The Mondo ups the ante by throwing in SiriusXM and 100 local NOAA weather stations. Oh, and it’s also a clock radio with five programmable alarms. Seriously, somewhere Ron Popeil is wishing he’d invented this first. It would look great sitting next to your Veg-O-Matic in the kitchen. And when you’re done cooking you can carry it to the dining room or back porch because it’s portable and connects via wi-fi, too.

While I am seriously tempted by this device, I also wonder if I would just be overwhelmed by the volume of choices. I definitely think I could lose a whole weekend playing with it. Although I know I can seek out most of these stations without the Mondo, there’s something about having them all grouped together in a device made specifically for radio that makes them seem all the more accessible.

I had a similar experience when late last year I purchased a new A/V receiver that has built-in internet radio. Stations are categorized by region and format, and I definitely spent a number of hours tuning around the world and listening to formats I barely knew existed. But after a while the novelty wore off and I went back to listening to the same old stations I typically gravitate to.

Nevertheless I’m still quite interested to get my paws on the Grace Digital Mondo and put it through its paces. I’d be glad to do a review if a certain manufacturer wanted to lend us one for a bit (hint, hint).

The post Grace Digital’s Mondo Wi-Fi looks like the Swiss Army knife of radios appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Radio Sound Only Sign at KZSC (Photo: J. Waits)

Happy 2012.

Over the past few weeks, Matthew, Paul and I have written up our obligatory “year-end” pieces, summarizing some of the big radio trends from 2011.

I covered college radio in my article, 2011: The Year that College Radio Fought Back, Paul wrote about some of the technological changes in music in his piece, 2011: The Year Radio Entered the Cloud, and Matthew covered Internet radio and social networking in 2011: The Year that Internet Radio Went Social.

All three of these topics were covered throughout the year on Radio Survivor, but there were some additional stories that proved to be compelling for readers. The biggest radio story of the year in terms of traffic was about Family Radio and its founder Harold Camping. In fact, the majority of our top ten stories were about Harold Camping’s role in predicting Judgment Day and the end of the world (May 21 and October 21, respectively). Additionally, one of the top search terms bringing people to Radio Survivor was “Harold Camping.” Recent changes at KGO also drew in a lot of readers and even though these changes took place within the past few weeks of 2011, “KGO” jumped to 2nd place in terms of search terms bringing people to Radio Survivor. Others came to the site looking for information on the following topics: Pandora Alternative, Zune, KUSF, Spotify, Opie and Anthony salary, Lynn Samuels, and Randy Michaels.

Here are the Most Read Stories of 2011 on Radio Survivor:

1. Family Radio Counts Down to Judgment Day on May 21

2. Harold Camping to Issue Statement Today on Non-Rapture

3. Harold Camping Explains that Judgment Day was Spiritual

4. KGO Cuts Talk Shows, Angers Many San Francisco Listeners

5. Microsoft Cancels Zune HD, Leaving One Last Portable HD Radio on the Market

6. Family Radio’s Harold Camping Speaks, End of World “Probably” on October 21

7. Harold Camping Issues Vague Apology, Says World Will End Without Warning

8. My Kindle Fire is an Internet Radio

9. Behind the Scenes at Family Radio as May 21st Judgment Day Approaches

10. Talk Radio Lovers Facebook and Tweet Pain over KGO Host Bloodbath

The post Radio Survivor’s 2011 Year in Review appeared first on Radio Survivor.

Spotify has released its top 100 lists for 2011. They include staff favorites, too. Here are the first ten user picks from the Spotify United States top 100 roster, which leads with Foster the People‘s rather disturbing (but very listenable) song, “Pumped Up Kicks.”

1. Pumped Up Kicks, Foster the People

2. Stereo Hearts – feat. Adam Levine, Gym Class Heroes

3. Rolling In the Deep, Adele

4. We Found Love, Rihanna, Calvin Harris

5. Helena Beat, Foster the People

6. Moves like Jagger, Maroon 5, Christina Aguilera

7. Super Bass, Nicki Minaj

8. Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites, Skrillex

9. Give Me Everything, Pitbull feat. Ne-Yo, Afrojack & Nayer

10. Party Rock Anthem, LMFAO, Lauren Bennett, GoonRock

Foster the People’s “Pumped Up Kicks” is definitely an underground tune with its scary, creepy lyrics:

Robert’s got a quick hand.

He’ll look around the room, he won’t tell you his plan.

He’s got a rolled cigarette, hanging out his mouth he’s a cowboy kid.

Yeah, he found a six shooter gun.

In his dad’s closet hidden with a box of fun things, and I don’t even know what.

But he’s coming for you, yeah he’s coming for you.

Foster the People singer Mark Foster explained the meaning of the song to Spinner UK.

“‘Pumped Up Kicks’ is about a kid that basically is losing his mind and is plotting revenge. He’s an outcast. I feel like the youth in our culture are becoming more and more isolated. It’s kind of an epidemic. Instead of writing about victims and some tragedy, I wanted to get into the killer’s mind, like Truman Capote did in ‘In Cold Blood.’ I love to write about characters. That’s my style. I really like to get inside the heads of other people and try to walk in their shoes.”

Interestingly, the clip isn’t anywhere near the top of Billboard’s 2011 Year End Most Popular Radio Songs list (it is number 29). This scotches my theory that music social network users still follow the lead of commercial radio when constructing their playlists.

On the other hand, if Billboard is to be believed, “Pumped” isn’t a top 75 downloaded song either. So I guess there are now at least three categories to follow: radio, downloaded, and played-on-the-cloud. Actually, there are five if you include ringtones and videos, but that’s too much complexity for me to handle on the cusp of New Year’s weekend.

I’m not sure how much sociological fatalism to attach the popularity of “Pumped.” The echoey, distant sound of the vocals make the lyrics difficult to understand, so what emerges is the cheery, almost marching-band mood of the piece.

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