Alternative rock on AM?

Schuyler said:

BMR said:

Perhaps you could enlighten us?

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The Telecommunications Act of 1996 allowed Big Corporations to own nearly as many broadcast outlets as their chubby hands could carry. They snapped up Mom and Pop operations and whole chains at a single gulp. With high hopes and even higher debt, they "consolidated" operations, eliminated thousands of jobs and -- under pressure to be as profitable as possible as soon as possible -- cut budgets, stopped experimenting, gutted local programming, automated and neetworked up the wazoo, etc. etc. "Alternateev? We don' need your steenking alternateevs!"

I hope this answers my earlier question. Absolutely nothing will ever enlighten the bean counters who made good radio nearly impossible. They're sure they did the right thing, as defined by short term monetary gain.

I would submit that owners STILL don't know what to do with their AMs short of whoring them out to financial con artists, brimstone for bucks bozos and colon-cleanser pushers.

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It may be wishful thinking on my behalf, but this is a shame. Of course, this is what happens when corporate big-wigs lobby the government for rules which allow them to get greater control of the media. Then when they get too big for their britches, they ask the government to subsidize their losses in one form or another.

I don't think these smaller AMs have to die. I think there's a place for them. They should be locally owned and run. They should not be overvalued the way they are today! They should look for sources of income other than advertising; such as donations, promotions, etc. They can and should also be a means for those starting out in broadcasting as a means of 'getting their feet wet'.

Denver just got an new AM alternative as KVOQ (1340) just signed on as "Open Air 1340".
http://www.openaircpr.org/#

klutch00 said:

bgfred said:

I don't know call letter or frequency, but in the very early 90's (before the format really broke out) there was an AM station in Portland OR for a time that was alternative.

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That may have been KUFO at 970, but I'm not sure.

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I don't remember the call letters or frequency but I very much remember listening to an AM alternative station on a visit to Portland in early 1991.

That seems pointless. AM doesn't sound good for sports games, how would it make rock music sound good.

FlyersPhilliesFan said:

That seems pointless. AM doesn't sound good for sports games, how would it make rock music sound good.

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I don't see the point in it now. But things were different 20 years ago. I think back to my 1991 Portland trip. Music on AM had been over for years by then, especially anything contemporary. But alternative was considered a special kind of music back then and fans felt they were lucky to have any type of outlet. My hipster friends in Portland listened to that automated AM station all the time and they loved it...I can't imagine such a scenario today.

FlyersPhilliesFan said:

That seems pointless. AM doesn't sound good for sports games, how would it make rock music sound good.

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So sad that you don't know.....

AM when done right, can sound better than FM. Not just in the superficial manner,
but immense and huge in a way that can only be described as 3D audio.

I devised a certain mastering process in the mid 80s for taping, which, when played back on a good deck,
and put to AM rf modulation, was equivalent to mega-$$ multiband processing. I called it NAR, for "New Annoying Realism".

It took advantage of compression resulting in cramming as much signal as possible into a chromium dioxide cassete,
and the soft-compression that also clipped vinyl clicks neatly.

Now I can afford Breakaway Broadcast Processor and get an even better result in more-or-less real time.

Big> BUT BUT BUT
Omnia does have some perceptual tricks available to make FM breathe as big as a 150% mod AM,
thanks to Mr Claesson and others.

I suggest anyone who thinks AM must sound bad to Google themselves up a crystal radio of some sort, ideally with an earpiece
that is either a crystal (piezo) type linked to a thin diaphragm, or an input directly to some sort of high-gain hi-fidelity input.
Recording software on a computer is a fine ampliifer. If you hook up a crystal radio (with a good antenna) to a
wide-range audio amplifeir, the clarity, purity, gradiance, and depth of AM modualtion would suprise most people.

What is presented in the marketplace is designed to provoke the opinion in the heading.

I don't remember the call letters or frequency but I very much remember listening to an AM alternative station on a visit to Portland in early 1991.
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I believe that station was AM 970 "The Beat". Don't remember the call letters. I just remember streaming them via dialup while stuck in South Dakota going to college where there are only two formats available: country and western. ;D

AM 1220 in Sanford Maine was simulcasting alternative WFNX Boston (they were co-owned) until that stations sale earlier this year.

I don't remember the call letters or frequency but I very much remember listening to an AM alternative station on a visit to Portland in early 1991.

I believe that station was AM 970 "The Beat". Don't remember the call letters. I just remember streaming them via dialup while stuck in South Dakota going to college where there are only two formats available: country and western. ;D

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Cool, yeah, a broadcaster on Live365 has been doing a tribute station for the last 15 years or so to "the beat", here's the link, http://www.live365.com/stations/skeptical

Here's info from Wikipedia on The Beat:

On May 1, 1991, the station changed their call letters to KBBT and began stunting. 18 days later, the format was changed to an alternative rock format known as "970 The Beat". In July 1996, KBBT began simulcasting on KDBX 107.5 FM (now KXJM). On October 2, 1996, the alternative rock format was moved to FM [where it aired a softer alt. format that didn't last] and 970 changed their call letters to KUPL and changed their format to country.

After Skin Radio folded, someone else in the Philly Mainline area tried Alternative Rock on a daytimer at 1520 WCHE, but it was short lived.

In the mid 80s, there was Alternative 1600 KJET in Seattle (actually they broadcast on 1590). No doubt, it was a favorite for Kurt Cobain!

Around 2000-2001 in Ontario, CA (outside of L.A.) there was full-time Alternative format on 1510 KMXN. With 10,000 watts, at certain times of the day, it covered a good portion of Southern California. It proved a good testing ground for the owner who eventually moved the format to FM sister stations in San Diego and Orange County, CA. He has since sold those FM sticks.

EasyBakeOven said:

In the mid 80s, there was Alternative 1600 KJET in Seattle (actually they broadcast on 1590). No doubt, it was a favorite for Kurt Cobain!

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Kurt Cobain has mentioned KJET as an influential station. So have Soundgarden, Alice In Chains and Pearl Jam members. To this day, KJET is fondly remembered by many older folks in Seattle's alternative rock community.

It was a scrappy little operation. It was automated and mostly voice tracked and sometimes the tapes got out of synch. Their studio was a glorified broom closet. But somehow, they made it work for 6 years. Aside from a few FM upstarts that came and went, KJET was Seattle's only commercial alternative rock station.

They were big on the album features (being an AM station, they were seen as less of a home-taping threat by the labels) Lots of indies and import rock album cuts (back when such things were actually hard to find ANYWHERE beyond your very best college stations and record stores.) It's no wonder KJET had THAT level of rock influence, in spite of their technical limitations.

KJET at the same time was also considered the "bratty stepchild" of KZOK-FM. During most of it's life, KJET never turned in a real profit for their-then parent company, the SRO Theaters company.

Finally, SRO decided to get out of the radio biz and sold their radio stations in 1988. But prior to that, they felt KJET's format wasn't "worthy enough". Since KZOK-FM had changed to something called "Classic Rock" in 1987, and had trouble incorporating the idea of some New Wavey/Alternative AM (of all things!) radio station into their sales package to whatever prospective buyer was. The idea was to genteel it bit..What a WASTE!

And so, I present you THIS....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpaomLDU19Q

....And KJET's ONLY major TV commercial (from 1982):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO6ywKTBJQU

With authentic AM radio noise included, here's a link to hear over an hour of KJET from September 1984....featuring morning host Bill Reid and midday jock, Debbie Payne.

http://www.spreaker.com/user/bleek/kjet_fall_1984

WBZH-AM 1370 in Pottstown, PA dabbles in Alternative among its largely Classic Rock library; Foo Fighters - Regina Specktor - Smashing Pumpkins - The Killers (just off the top of my head)

www.wbzh.net

EasyBakeOven said:

After Skin Radio folded, someone else in the Philly Mainline area tried Alternative Rock on a daytimer at 1520 WCHE, but it was short lived.

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I was thinking with WNWR not doing much of anything, maybe they could be an outlet for underground or free-form programming.

RadioFanBoy said:

WBZH-AM 1370 in Pottstown, PA dabbles in Alternative among its largely Classic Rock library; Foo Fighters - Regina Specktor - Smashing Pumpkins - The Killers (just off the top of my head)

www.wbzh.net

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That's got to be the coolest station Pottstown has ever heard!

Bongwater said:

EasyBakeOven said:

In the mid 80s, there was Alternative 1600 KJET in Seattle (actually they broadcast on 1590). No doubt, it was a favorite for Kurt Cobain!

Click to expand...

Kurt Cobain has mentioned KJET as an influential station. So have Soundgarden, Alice In Chains and Pearl Jam members. To this day, KJET is fondly remembered by many older folks in Seattle's alternative rock community.

It was a scrappy little operation. It was automated and mostly voice tracked and sometimes the tapes got out of synch. Their studio was a glorified broom closet. But somehow, they made it work for 6 years. Aside from a few FM upstarts that came and went, KJET was Seattle's only commercial alternative rock station.

They were big on the album features (being an AM station, they were seen as less of a home-taping threat by the labels) Lots of indies and import rock album cuts (back when such things were actually hard to find ANYWHERE beyond your very best college stations and record stores.) It's no wonder KJET had THAT level of rock influence, in spite of their technical limitations.

KJET at the same time was also considered the "bratty stepchild" of KZOK-FM. During most of it's life, KJET never turned in a real profit for their-then parent company, the SRO Theaters company.

Click to expand...

I've come to believe that what a station like KJET should've done is rely on non-commercial sources for its income. Besides donations, this could involve the station sponsoring concerts, a car/bike rallies or other event. They might've had better success this way, but then again, that was the 1980s.

Bongwater said:

Finally, SRO decided to get out of the radio biz and sold their radio stations in 1988. But prior to that, they felt KJET's format wasn't "worthy enough". Since KZOK-FM had changed to something called "Classic Rock" in 1987, and had trouble incorporating the idea of some New Wavey/Alternative AM (of all things!) radio station into their sales package to whatever prospective buyer was. The idea was to genteel it bit..What a WASTE!

And so, I present you THIS....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpaomLDU19Q

....And KJET's ONLY major TV commercial (from 1982):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO6ywKTBJQU

Click to expand...

EasyBakeOven said:

With authentic AM radio noise included, here's a link to hear over an hour of KJET from September 1984....featuring morning host Bill Reid and midday jock, Debbie Payne.

http://www.spreaker.com/user/bleek/kjet_fall_1984

Click to expand...

Seattle New Wave Pop group The Visible Targets had a track on that tape "Autistic Savant" I hadn't heard that song in DECADES! Definitely one of those "Should've Been Bigger Hits", but sadly never reached beyond KJETs coverage map......Thanks for posting this!

Bongwater said:

EasyBakeOven said:

With authentic AM radio noise included, here's a link to hear over an hour of KJET from September 1984....featuring morning host Bill Reid and midday jock, Debbie Payne.

http://www.spreaker.com/user/bleek/kjet_fall_1984

Click to expand...

Seattle New Wave Pop group The Visible Targets had a track on that tape "Autistic Savant" I hadn't heard that song in DECADES! Definitely one of those "Should've Been Bigger Hits", but sadly never reached beyond KJETs coverage map......Thanks for posting this!

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Another one of those tracks would have been that one by Pure Joy that was played on KJET frequently.

Sorry for dredging up an old thread, but I'm new here, and reading this thread brought back a few memories, as I used to listen to KJET all the time. They played a mix of post-punk rock and alternative pop rock that their only Seattle 'competition', non-comm. FM stn. KCMU, wouldn't really touch (the folks at KCMU referred to what KJET played as "jangly rock").

I got to visit KJET once, and it was basically a kitchen sized studio with an audio console on one side, and a wall of rack mounted reel-to-reels on the other. The guy who programmed the station (can't remember his name) had his own band, and their song was pretty good, if I recall. Of course, the song got played on KJET. I also remember DJ Mike Fuller made a commercial for KJET called "KJET World Service", because he was into shortwave.

KJET were AM only, but outlasted their FM commercial competitors KYYX and KHIT, who both sort of rode the new wave thing and then collapsed.

Re: other NW area alt rock AM's: The Beat from Portland has already been mentioned here, and it was audible nightly in Seattle. But there was also a Calgary station that was heard at night in Seattle, that played alternative. I think they were on 1060, but I could be mistaken.