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What makes some of the smaller town stations better?

FreddyE1977 said:
Sometimes the secret is engineering. There are some small AM stations in my area which really care about the way they sound. Listening to music on them is a pleasure.
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The problem is; as compared with just about every other form of modern media, AM audio performance will always be noticibly inferior. That includes frequency response, distortion, and noise. especially with the ever-increasing level of terrestrial-consumer product noise.

FreddyE1977 said:
Whereas some other stations (many owned by large companies) appear to be just mailing it in when it comes to
audio quality.
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That's because there is no business upside to doing more than making the audio intelligible. Advertisers care very little about AM, and potential listeners under 50 don't even know it exists.

It's like owning a delivery business using delivery trucks built in the 1950's. Keeping them on the road becomes a burden, and they can't keep up with modern traffic anyway.
 
Well researched radio stations have better ratings regardless of market size. Small market stations with big budgets typically do the same research as the major market stations, if not outright copy the large market playlists. Add some local content and you have yourself a top rated radio station.

Sherman/Denison has been brought up, the Dallas signals commonly outperform the locals in the ratings because they are NOT good. Nearly every radio station that market is completely run off satellite with little local content outside of the morning dayparts. KLAK plays bad MP3s (not to mention their studio is in MCKINNEY), KMAD always has technical problems, KJIM is a hobby, KQDR is an afterthought by its owners and is currently up for sale with sister KISY. The only signals performing well in their respective Texoma markets are KMKT and KFYN and they're still #2 behind some Dallas signal.
 
I disagree with the earlier post that it is sometimes good engineering that makes a successful small market station. I do agree it is an essential element. I agree you must have good engineering. Everybody makes such a big deal about the 'nuances' of the quality of the signal at site like this but honestly since 1978 I have never heard a listener complain about the 'sound'. I have had audiophiles say the signal was bad, such as the highs were cut short or the signal wasn't bright enough, etc. but I don't think the average person ever has an issue. Good engineering doesn't make a station with no local content a popular local station. A good local station, as far as content goes, that has bad engineering practices can be made to sound good when an engineer that still has good hearing comes in. A music industry guy once told me a crappy song recorded in a crappy studio is crappy. When the same song is recorded in a great studio with great talent working the mix is still crappy. As he stated you put crap in and no matter what you do, you get crap out.
 
FreddyE1977 said:
Sometimes the secret is engineering. There are some small AM stations in my area which really care about the way they sound.
Click to expand...

That may be because the owner himself is an engineer. I've seen a lot of small market AMs have been bought as hobby stations by former large station engineers.

On the other hand I know a lot of small market AMs where they outsource the engineering to a service to save money.
 
vchimpanzee said:
Salt Lake City and Green Bay aren't exactly "smaller".
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Funny thing you should mention green bay in the context of this thread.

Step back in time. I'm a Chicagoan. Born, raised, etc... However, for a few years of my formative life (my late years of high school), my Mother got transferred to a job in small-town green bay wussyconsin. What a freakin' culture shock!

Anyway, the big dog then, as it is today, is 101 WIXX. Back then I think they were more Top 40 than the CHR they claim now, but in that time frame (the mid to late 80's), they pretty much nailed it in terms of music mix and one big thing... Playing new stuff, both mainstream and "out in left field" music that I would NEVER, in a million years, hear here in Chicago on either Z95 or B96 at the time. One of the things WIXX was good at was running the middle of the road on every music genre and hitting the sweet spot. Whereas here in Chicago, all the stations adhere to a more specific demo and tend to go in to certain genre's much deeper. Using the Z95 and B96 examples above, even though they were the two top40/hit radio stations here at the time, it was clear Z95 went more to the rock side and B96 went more to the rhythmic/urban/dance side.

Now with that said, they (WIXX) weren't in the same league when it came to air talent, promotions, production quality, etc vs. a Chicago station. Sometimes listening to the weather update on IXX was painful. It always sounded like the TV meteorologist that they used (A WBAY TV one most likely), sounded like he recorded it on an Optimus cassette deck and sent it (the cassette) over to the air staff. Or Menards commercials... Then moments of dead air between things... Terrible production quality...

I remember recording the Murphy in the Morning show from Q101 here in Chicago at the time, and playing it for my friends in GB. Or at night, Crazy Man Alan Kable on Z95 or Bubba the Love Sponge on B96... Their jaws were on the floor hearing what craziness was happening on Chicago airwaves.
 
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