Does Anyone Miss How Music Sounded on an AM Radio?

Got my first transistor radio in 1965 - a gift from one of dad's friends. I'd listen to it late at night with the little ear plug. Stations would crackle and fade in and out as I turned the knob. Late enough, and I could hear a mysteriously far away station, maybe Boise, or Denver or somewhere in California. I'd wonder what is was like 'there' - so far away. I'd imagine palm trees and fragrant scents, warm nights, the sound of the waves on the beach, in far off exotic California.

The world was a larger place then. My own country seemed a bit mysterious and fascinating. And the music? Awesome, for the most part.

 

I miss hearing WNEW's Chuck Leonard here in Montreal late at night/early morn. Hello, night person...

He was really great.

 

Don't miss it at all.

 

Was it too little for the radio?

 

When I was a kid, I did notice the obvious sound differences, but I didn't care. I was just happy to hear my favorite songs.

I also fell asleep listening with my little earplug. Except, by 1972, I did that with my cassette player, rather than the radio. I didn't dare do that with my little reel-to-reel recorder, though. I didn't want the full reel spinning around all night after the tape ran out.

 

Yep, them was the days. In Philly, you could hear Jerry "The Geator With the Heater" Blavat or WIBG's Hy Lit or the soul-tending DJing of Sonny "The Mighty Burner" Hopson and Georgie "Guy with the Goods" Woods all day long, then drift off at night with exotic jocks broadcasting from Memphis and Chicago, their voices and 45s drifting in and out of distant static. I'd stash my transistor under my pillow and nod off, listening to singers I'd never heard of--grinders like Earl Gaines and James Carr and belters like Baby Washington--and wake up wanting to hear so much more....

 

I remember laying in bed with my 12-transistor AM radio pressed firmly to my ear (the earplug didn't sound as good), slowly turning the dial ever so slightly, picking out whatever I could. WSM in Nashville came in the best and was the farthest away from Detroit. I think I could pick up something in Philadelphia, but I'm not sure. Everybody's far-away signal seemed to pulse back then. Coming and going every few minutes.

On another note, I owned a 64 Impala for about 2 years in the mid-80s. All it had was the factory speaker in the center of the back seat. I frequented a lot of car shows and I'd always listen to Honey Radio's AM oldie station in Detroit. It was mostly 50's stuff back then. Most everything they played seemed like mono and it was great! I never upgraded for that reason.

 

I wouldn't say I miss it but I definitely liked it. I know in terms of fidelity it wasn't greatest but it had a certain charm about it.

Brings back lots of memories. I used to love it when they played the old motown tunes.

Eddie

 

I remember on occasion, in the late '70s/early '80s, buying a hit single and being disappointed that, while it had higher fidelity on the record than what I'd heard on AM radio, it didn't seem to pack the same punch.

It's funny how many of us used to hide a small AM radio under our pillows at night. I remember around the ago of ten tuning into radio dramas and music documentaries and being spellbound by them, seven years before I started a career out of making them myself.

Then I got into shortwave radio and would listen to the BBC playing the UK Top 10. In the early '80s these songs would be hits in the UK months before getting a release in New Zealand. It was very exciting tuning into a broadcast from halfway around the world. I'm less nostalgic about the sound quality of those broadcasts than the AM ones, mind you!

 

We could listen to Oldies 1090 AM from 1993 to 2009 on transistor radio's but in 2009 they switched to FM; KFUN 99.5. I sometimes listen to the station while I'm on the internet but it's not the same thing
Back in 1963 I remember listening to AM on my transistor radio at my grandfather's when he said "They play the same songs over and over, back in my day I liked military marches like Colonel Bogey March"(he was in the first world war). I said "Well, it's called top 40 radio." Funny thing is, the same amount of time elapsed between his Colonel Bogey March to 1963 and 1963 till now...I guess what goes around comes around

 

I still get chills when I recall hearing for the first time, "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" punching out that guitar riff over my transistor radio.

 

I do miss surfing the AM dial at night and picking up far away stations. When I was a kid (late 70s-early80s) the stations still sounded different and there was local programming. It was thrilling.

I scan the dial now sometimes when I'm driving at night, but everything is the same syndicated crap you get everywhere.

dan c

 

The 1st thing I remember about AM is listening to baseball games (usually at night) on trips to and from GA. My dad would pick up the Atlanta station and we'd get 5 or 6 innings before the signal would fade away.

When I installed a radio with FM in my car, I was constantly surprised when the music kept playing as I passed under a bridge. I had accustomed myself to those half-second fade outs with AM and it was a bit unnerving as FM played on.

 

I remember, when I was living in Newcastle in the late 1970s, listening to AM radio stations in far away lands like Papua New Guinea and New Zealand, and sometimes as far away as SE Asia. I always thought it was amazing. Could never do that with FM.

For quite a while my favourite station was 2ZB Wellington; 1035 on the AM dial (I'm amazed that I can still remember it so clearly today)!

 

Here too.

Evan

 

Good point, LH.

In Grand Rapids, Michigan, there is an AM station bucking the trend. Last year WGVU began playing "real oldies," a wide range of fifties and sixties music, not just the same ten mega-hits. They promote their AM sound as "the way oldies are meant to be heard." There's a twist: WGVU is an NPR affiliate. They claim to be the first public radio station to adopt an oldies format. The concept seems sound, as non-commercial radio has already embraced formats long ago abandoned by commercial radio, like jazz. Now that oldies FM's are shifting their emphasis to 80's hits, public radio AM's are a logical place to return older music to the AM dial.

As forum members well know, many sixties hits were mixed to sound right on a car radio speaker, not a hifi rig. A well processed AM station like WABC in its heyday sounded fantastic on a wide-band table radio with a decent speaker. Newer more selective tuners gave better reception, but tinnier sound was the unintended by-product.

WGVU Real Oldies

 

I certainly heard enough AM radio. Even back when I was a little kid, I was hyper-aware of sound differences. I realize this sounds ridiculous, but back in 1966 I noticed that I preferred the sound of tube AM radios to Transistorized—they sounded smoother and had more of a 'singing' tone.

But I don't miss bandwidth limited, noisy and sonically variable AM sound even a little bit.

 

Nostalgia yes, sound no

 

No. If listen to a needledrop through the speaker of my Droid phone, I pretty much get the same effect.

 

If we miss it...why are we spending all this time and tech to make it sound better to us?

Nostalgia is all well and good; wishing for better variety/music is natural. But, back when I was listening to AM radio, I was also...bored...poor...less interested in the world...less educated...less in control of my destiny...

 

No

 

Three pages in most of the responses completely miss the point of my question. Oh well. Thanks for participating anyway!

 

In Central Texas in the mid 60's I would be waiting in bed every night until WLS Chicago would come out of the nether world of static and tune in and connect me with the real world. I would listen through a single earpiece as long as I could stay awake, hearing new music that I could order through the PX on base, because nobody was stocking it in the stores back then. Austin was maybe 50 miles away, but may as well have been 500.