The best commercial radio station (at least the best one that plays rock music) that I've ever found in the United States is WXRT out of Chicago. I've never figured out quite what the story is with this station. It's commercial, and titularly what they call "AOR" format, but in truth it's a good bit more eclectic and interesting than that. Not exactly what you'd call college radio, but the closest you'll find in a comemrcial radio station.
I don't know who owns them, I don't know how they've managed to keep their format clear of the horrible formula of most commercial radio around the country. I'm burningly curious, honestly, but regardless, I'm glad it's there.
Especially because, I just discovered I can listen to it whenver I want over the web! I'm psyched!
Friday night just got a little better here. :-)
(God I wish I still lived in Chicago.)
Unbelievable--and Terri Hemmert is still there! Oh yeah, they're going to have to drag me out of the way-back machine now. Great find, Dean!
Do they still have the lesbian disk jockey in the plaid flannel shirt who hates guns because one was used to kill "her man" John Lennon?
If I had sound drivers for my current desktop system, I would be listening to KHYI out of Plano, Texas, Americana music like "May The Bird of Paradise Fly Up Your Nose" and ads for a restaurant so homestyle you don't have to wear shoes if y'all are from Oklahoma. I also recommend WMSE which plays music by Magic Sam, Dropkick Murphy's, Aphex Twin, Dick Dale, Xolotl...
I loved XRT when i lived out there. Last station on earth that let DJs program their own music. And the movie reviews from The Regulat Guy....
You would have to give up your firearms to live in Chi town wouldn't you?
I don't remember the station when I lived there but that was a longgg time ago.
Dean:
I just discovered I can listen to it whenver I want over the web! I'm psyched!
Yeah, you're psyched. But I'm bummed. Get this, from their FAQ page:
—And I remain yours truly, running my IBM ThinkPad T20 under Mandrake Linux 9.1... :(
Starhawk: I'd have to live in the suburbs. That's okay, lots of good suburbs around Chicago.
Paul: Yeah that's pretty dumb. Wish I had an answer for you on that.
Starhawk: That was one of the clinchers when we decided to move.
It apparently doesn't work on Mozilla (Firefox) either. Keeps telling me to "upgrade" to IE. It may be a great station, but this site has a few accessibility problems to work out...
Doesn't like Opera, either... and wants to install some AOL "media plugin". I don't even let AOL CD's within 30 feet of my computer.
I used to spend the holidays in Chicago (grew up in Aurora) and would tape WXRT so I'd have some decent music in Florida and Alabama. The Regular guy, blues, "album rock", a good mix of new and old music, ... I still have those tapes from 20 years ago. yeah, I miss Chicago too.
I turned down a real attractive job offer today, because the job was in Chicago.
Isn't it kind of sad that you have to listen to a Chicago radio station, considering that Detroit used to be a hotbed of hip and original radio stations before deregulation of the radio industry took place. It's funny that here in Detroit the only decent radio station is WDET, a public radio station, and they don't play music 24/7(not that there's anything wrong with NPR)but when they do play music, it is like a breath of fresh air(pardon the NPR pun.) Radio needs to be original and eclectic, not formulated and dull like the Clear Channel owned stations.
Well Alan, I'd have to say the problem was not "deregulation" so much as the wrong kind of deregulation.
What really needs to happen is for the FCC to loosen up the rules and expand the spectrum and reduce the licensing requirements to make it easier for smaller companies to start up radio stations.
The demand is there. Just look at the explosive growth of internet radio over the last few years. It's a market that's almost completely deregulated, and it's awesome compared to what you can find on the airwaves.