Jeff on Sirius radio Wednesday morning

This Old House isn't shot in High Def anyway. :)

Sirius talk breaks are sometime around the top and bottom of every hour, depending on who you are and what they can get away with. Stern breaks less often sometimes going for more than two hours, but then he has to catch up to some extent which end up being longer breaks.

Since I record the show every day and listen to it one day delayed, I can tell you that the breaks are almost always 4 min at 7:15, 10 min (including a song and 1-2 phony phone calls) around 8:00, 4-5 min at 9:00, 10 min at the beginning of news and a 3-minute in the middle of the news. They're rarely much different from that pattern, but being on a 1-day delay, I can just skip through with Windows Media Player :) (and know the break times pretty well by now ...)

Almost had a panic attack today because I forgot to hook up the recorder for the Roast ... thank you West Coast replay!

Rob, I've had that weak signal and also "No Antenna Attached" problems just within the last week or so. I've found those problems usually happen in like 1-2 week intervals every couple of months. Not sure if having a hardwired system would help that or not. I gotta start getting into Ferrall more ... a guy that's all about hockey and Pittsburgh sports to boot and I don't listen to him ... something wrong with that ...

Ferrall actually grew up in Pittsburgh.

So you folks listen to your commercial free radios (which aren't really all that commercial free after all) on your way to SF parks where you get bombarded with advertisements from one end of the park to the other?

Where's the Sirius version of Q-bot? -- pay even more for fewer commercials and maybe you'll even get to hear the jocks a few syllables ahead of everyone else.

I also have the week signal problem in Pittsburgh, Impulse. I live down here in the the Wheeling, WV(Bellaire, OH) area and have no trouble with signal. I've been traveling back and forth To The Burgh this week to be with my wife and newborn while they recover from a tough delivery. Whenever I get to the Carnegie exit(I think) the radio goes haywire. What FM setting do you use?

Clear Channel has ruined all of our local radio stations. Nothing local anymore. Just bunch of syndicated radio shows. Even the stations not owned by CC have gone to that stupid JACK format and the other has some stupid frog gimmick. CC even managed to ruin Jamboree in the Hills.

Wow. I'm way off topic.

Would you give us a heads up when the show becomes available on a podcast Jeff?

I just think it's stupid that I live in the number one rated radio market in the country (New York City Metro) and I can't have access to a country or an oldies station.

Trust me, most terrestrial stations play from thier "safe" list of about 500 songs that have been "tested" over and over again.

Think about it. Suppose you like classic rock. Has your local classic rock station changed a lot in the past decade? Freebird played in 1990 still sounds the same as in 2007.

I am very thankful that I can listen to a great oldies station (WLNG) on the internet. My AOL subscription has most of XM's country line-up, so I can keep up to date with that too.

What I see that has happened is that radio programmers have painted themselves into their respective corners. If they play what isn't 100 percent safe and the ratings take a hit, they are out.

I miss the great wit of jocks like Dan Ingram or the sincerity of Harry Harrison. (When he said "Good Morning" you had a sense that he really meant it).

Stations in most formats sound the same now all accross the country.

One last thought. When New York's WCBS FM changed to Jack FM, there was, and still is a lot of outrage. Advertisers, they said, didn't want the older demographics. (Despite the fact that these listeners had large Time Spent Listening Ratings and very deep pockets). Prior to thier switching of the format, the station went from playing a great mix of 50s, 60's, 70s and a few early 80s, to a safe list of about 300 songs form the 60s and 70s.

"Baby Love" and "Stop In The Name Of Love" were monster hit records for The Supremes, but I also want to hear "Up The Ladder To The Roof," "I'm Living In Shame," and "Love Child."

Shock Jocks (Except for the Greaseman) don't do it for me, thought I would listen to Imus every once in a while.

Very few people do quality radio anymore.

PS - > I worked for about 10 years for Westwood One. (I mixed syndicated shows and ran a few satellite feeds) I miss it at times, but the creativity aspect was rarely part of my job. And it's true, back then we used razor blades and editing tape.

I use 88.7 Mr. Ninja, I've found that works in most of Western PA and Northern OH for what that's worth. Right around Cleveland might have to jump a station or two up or down, but the only 88.7 in the area appears to be a religious station out of Akron (which is a nice weird contrast when I pull the plug on Stern to get out of the car and someone's singing church music through heavy static :) ). But, I also have a radio that's older than the recent FCC regulations. If you bought a radio (or anything with an FM transmitter for that matter) after like June of last year, I found out that the FCC cracked down on the strength of FM transmitters because Soccer Moms were complaining that their radios were being blasted out by people with iPods and satellite radio. Now never mind that this makes no sense because no one's actually listening to the frequencies "we" use for FM transmitters, that's how they work in the first place, but the FCC put out new regs and the signal strengths are much weaker. I tried to buy my wife a Sirius and we couldn't find a single station in the Pittsburgh area that worked for her radio's FM transmitter and found out this was the reason.

RGB - I have no problems with static commercials that are just there. If you want to put up a billboard and ads along the entire midway, go ahead. But (at least as far as Sirius is concerned) no one's stopping the trains at the MCBR and giving you 1 minute of ads that you have to listen to/watch before you're allowed to continue your ride. That's what I pay $12.95/month for. That, and to be able to hear whatever words and topics I want to hear on the radio (and I still have the power to change the channel or turn it off if I don't like it, instead of complaining to a government oversight agency)

The *one* complaint I have with Sirius *is* the whole weak signal bit. The FM transmitter is fine to me (Starmate Replay), but there are several areas where I get the 'aquiring signal' bit. The one thing I *can* say though, is that these spots seem to be persistant and not random. That is to say, that I *know* which spots will give me trouble if I stay in them too long. Usually, the interuption is brief as long as I'm not caught at a particular light.

The only area where I have a near complet black out is around the Pentagon. Though I just assume that that is not completely the fault of Sirius. ;)

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Richie Reflux said:
I just think it's stupid that I live in the number one rated radio market in the country (New York City Metro) and I can't have access to a country or an oldies station.

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Or a modern rock station, since K-Rock got killed in favor of Free FM (which, besides for O&A, is pretty much awful, and the ratings show it). But if you like soft rock, pop hits, rap, R&B, or Spanish music, living in New York Metro is like a dream come true.

--Dave (does not like soft rock, pop hits, rap, R&B, or Spanish music...)

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Richie Reflux said:

Trust me, most terrestrial stations play from thier "safe" list of about 500 songs that have been "tested" over and over again. Think about it. Suppose you like classic rock. Has your local classic rock station changed a lot in the past decade? Freebird played in 1990 still sounds the same as in 2007.

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When I was a teenager in high school, I loved classic rock stations because I was getting into music like Pink Floyd, The Who, Zep, Rush and Neil Young. Those stations played all the stuff that I wanted to hear. But now I absolutely hate them because they play the same songs they've been playing for years- stuff that any classic rock fan surely has on CD. The novelty wears off pretty quickly.

What really gets me is that these stations sometimes play new stuff from the bands they highlight- for example, the local classic/modern rock station around here that we're pretty much forced to listen to because it's the only station that comes into our office without any interference, has been playing the new Rush song from their Snakes & Arrows album. They'll play the living crap out of it )meaning I'll have no choice but to skip over it when I play the CD in the future) and in another three months, they'll go back to playing nothing but Tom Sawyer, Spirit of Radio and Roll the Bones as if the new album no longer exists.

You're right, it's like stations have a playlist that includes a couple hundred (if that) staple songs and maybe a few dozen slots for "songs of the hour" that quickly fade away rather than getting tossed into the mix. I know it's "classic" rock, but why does classic rock fail to encompass anything outside of the 1970 to 1985 time period?

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When New York's WCBS FM changed to Jack FM, there was, and still is a lot of outrage.

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I think a lot of the outrage was because WCBS switched from oldies to newer stuff.

I happen to like Jack because the songs aren't modern radio fare, but the station started out as something unique and has been homogenized during the past year. Gone is the "nothing but music" mentality and in its place is a regular radio station with DJs and promotional gimmicks.

Rob - - - > Perhaps "Jack" finally found their list of safe songs.

I wish there was one station that played EVERYTHING! Picture Otis Redding into The Who into Merle Haggard into The Carpenters into Benny Goodman.

It will never happen.

That's why I-pods, Satellite Radio and Internet Radio are chipping away at terrestrial radio ratings.

Also, (In the old days) Record Companies needed radio to break and push new acts and songs. Today, there are many media outlets for companies.

Now the Record Compaies [Why do they still call it record companies since they havne't sold a record in years] are crying poverty because consumers no longer need to buy entire albums to get the hot songs they want. A simple download is enough.

That is why they aggressively went after file sharing websites.

You know what...if the product was better and more money went into talent development, maybe things would be better. That won't happen either because record companies want to please their stock-holders (this quarter) instead of develing long term quality relationships with thier acts and consumers.

I don't mean to preach, but most radio stinks because there isn't too much quality new stuff to play either. My wife loved josh Groban when he first came out. Now she can't stand him. Why? Marketing made most of his songs sound alike. You could say the same thing about most new or recent acts in most formats.

When the moey isn't coming in from sales, the record companies are going to try to get it from wherever they can.

Listeners though aren't stupid either. They can simply turn the dial or put on the I-pod so they can hear Merle Haggard into The Carpenters, etc...

Onme final thought - - - > When people aren't happy with current music, that's when stations playing 80s and 90s or oldies (50s - 70s) start doing better again.

OK, sermon over.

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Richie Reflux said:

I wish there was one station that played EVERYTHING! Picture Otis Redding into The Who into Merle Haggard into The Carpenters into Benny Goodman.

It will never happen.

Onme final thought - - - > When people aren't happy with current music, that's when stations playing 80s and 90s or oldies (50s - 70s) start doing better again.

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Richie, it already happened. It was called AM radio in the 60s and 70s.

As far as "oldies" go, we seem to be in a 20 to 25-year lag. In the 70s, we had the 50s (Happy Days and American Graffiti). In the 80s, it was all about the 60s (The Big Chill, 60s songs in every movie soundtrack). The 90s brought back the 70s, and now the "classics" are from the 80s. "Remakes" seem to be songs from 20 years previous. Even a number of 50's classic songs like "Blue Moon" and "I Only Have Eyes for You" are from the 30s.

It isn't only music though, it's clothing, lifestyle (avocado refrigerator anyone?) and decorating trends. I figure in another 2 or 3 years teal and mauve will once again be the hot colors like they were in the mid 80s. Maybe it's that each generation tunes into what their parents were into when they were teens and young adults.

Bear - - - > Granted! AM Radio in the 60's (& 70s) had the best of everything (at the time)...soul, rock, country, sappy love songs, hard rock, pop.....

But in the 2000s, a station that played everything would have 9 decades of music in several genres at its disposal. It would never work. Instead of broadcasting, it became narrow-casting.

Yes, this is a week since this conversation died, but I should at least point out the prescience of this discussion, given that K-Rock came back on the air in New York at 5:00pm today.

Steps in the right direction, at least. :)