Radio Waves Podcast #179

Radio June 30, 2017

Some fun channels have been added to SiriusXM Satellite Radio if you have the right tuner and subscription package to receive them.

Road Trip Radio has returned on Channel 301 ... music to drive to. Eagles, AC/DC, Sheryl Crow, The Beach Boys, The Doobie Brothers, Michael Jackson, Avicii, Tom Petty, The Rolling Stones, Kenny Chesney, and Prince star on this channel.

Channel 303 is ONEderland, playing one-hit wonders from bands such as The Shocking Blue, 4 Non Blondes, The Proclaimers, Wild Cherry, Yello, Gary Numan, Chumbawamba, and The Georgia Satellites.

Yacht Rock Radio on Channel 311 plays “smooth sailing” music great for the Summer ... Michael McDonald, Steely Dan, Christopher Cross, Hall & Oates, Kenny Loggins, 10cc, and Toto.

These are the best, though there are some others as well. The Covers Channel ... songs you like done by others ... is a bit weird but I am sure there is a market (Channel 302). Velvet (Channel 304) plays songs from contemporary vocalists. And songs you might hear being played on a bar jukebox are on Rockbar (Channel 313). Those and a few more are only around for the Summer, so listen while you can.

Go Lane Country

Country star Chris Lane will be the July guest DJ on Go Country’s (KKGO, 105.1 FM) mid-day show. Lane is an artist on Big Loud Records and replaces Michael Ray, who was the mid-day DJ during the month of June. Hear him weekdays from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Big Ratings

“My FM” KBIG (104.3 FM) earned it’s highest rating ever, or at least as high as I can remember, in May: 5.8, easily beating second-place KTWV The Wave’s (94.7 FM) 5.3 share of the audience. Looks like family-friendly KBIG is the new era’s KIIS-FM (102.7 FM) which at one time was the station the whole family tuned in ...

Rounding out the top-5 were KIIS-FM and KRTH (101.1 FM) tied at 4.8 and KOST (103.5 FM) at 4.7.

Abuse of Power

I envisioned the possibility of great things with the merger of CBS and Entercom. Even though I am against large group owners, this would be one in which there is no debt due to the merger structure, leaving the company free to do great radio.

From what I’ve been observing, however, it appears that Entercom is no better and may in fact be worse than debt-laden competitors iHeart and Cumulus.

In a column from respected industry observer Jerry Del Colliano at InsideMusicMedia.Com, Del Colliano talks of Entercom CEO David Field using his power to prevent competitors from growing by refusing to sell stations to companies that directly compete; that they have turned down an offer for The Sound (KSWD, 100.3 FM) precisely for that reason; and that Entercom hopes to build what could be called a sports monopoly through shrewd moves.

Add to that the secret and small cutbacks at stations in cost-cutting moves that management hoped no one would notice.

That is frightening, and it is why Congress needs to put pressure on the Department of Justice and the FCC to not approve this merger. Entercom is acting as an essential monopoly with as much power as Standard Oil had prior to antitrust laws; this is bad for radio and bad for listeners.