How predictable is Classic Rock radio in your area???

Journey and Boston. At least once an hour each.

 

Or, (Big ole) Jet Airliner, or The Joker

How many more years will AOR continue to play this stuff?

 

I still have the crazy idea that an FM station could make it if they programmed it like the FM "underground" stations of the early 70s. Let the DJs pick the music, play a wider mix of artists and music. Granted, it probably would not fly in all cities. But, I think it would in cities that had FM underground stations years ago. This would take a lot of baby boomers back to the radio they remembered.

Now if I could just afford to buy an FM station.....

 

Here's a small example of what we're all talking about: Peter Frampton. You can hear the following three songs every day on your typical classic rock station:

- Baby I Love Your Way
- Show Me The Way
- Do You Feel Like We Do

I'm okay with these tracks, but in 20 years of listenting (on and off) to classic rock and probably hearing these songs at least 100 times each, they play the Frampton Comes Alive version EVERY SINGLE TIME. It would be nice if JUST ONCE, they deviated from the formula and played the studio cuts. Heck, I've never even heard 'em. For all I know, they blow away the live versions. But these stations are so afraid to deviate from the formula that they won't even play a different version of one of their playlist songs just 10% of the time. Even this small change would keep things a little fresh.

 

It's sad that playlists & formats have gotten so tight that you hear the same stuff over & over. I remember when a DJ might say "coming up next, it's the Stones!" and it literally might be anything by them. Now it's either Start Me Up, Satisfaction, Brown Sugar or Beast Of Burden. Midnight Rambler will never be heard by this generation.

But what I find sadder is the number of groups/artists that didn't make the final cut. I haven't heard Joni Mitchell or Little Feat on the radio in years. They used to be classic rock staples, and now they're just ..... gone. Unless you tune into an adult contemporary station and hear either Amy Grant or Counting Crows doing Big Yellow Taxi, you'd never know Joni Mitchell ever existed.

 

WXRC vs. WRFX. See my post above.

 

so predictable that I stopped listening over 20 years ago.

 

If they were in decent shape, I'd probably have all these sold in a year at $4.00 a piece (except the Three Dog Night, too AM). Eagles, Zep, Southern Rock, heck, even Night Ranger doesn't hang around long where I consign.

 

So predictable that I am trying other stations. They don't even add new songs or play anything but the equivalent of the Top 40 for Classic Rock. As far as they know, Another Brick in the Wall is the only song Pink Floyd created.

 

I don't know if this is still the case, but I noticed a few years ago that the classic rock stations in the NY/NJ area tend to have more adventurous playlists during the day than they do during "drive time." Between 5pm and 6pm, the only songs I'd ever hear from Pink Floyd (to choose a random example) were the obvious tracks from Dark Side, WYWH and The Wall, but during the day I'd occasionally hear "Pigs" from Animals or another semi-obscurity.

 

Agree completely about WZLX, etc. I have Sirius and am also not thrilled about their classic rock channels. "The Vault" is now gone.

I just read "FM" by Richard Neer, who was a DJ at WNEW in New York. Slightly OT, and not the best-written book, but still an interesting perspective on the "decline and falll" of FM radio.
FM @ Amazon

 

It seems that compared with what's out there The Bone here in the Bay Area is a slight improvement. The gal in the afternoon is a Ramones fan and will sneak in I Wanna Be Sedated. A Zappa track like Yellow Snow or I'm The Slime is not impossible. The Zombies or Be Bop Deluxe might suprise you during your commute. I also find the DJs to be quite likeable. On Sunday night we get Little Steven's show and local critic Joel Selvin gets an hour to explore some aspect of BA music history. This is sold as a return to "free form" radio for 3 hours. They will play a Zep or Floyd track twice in 3 hrs but I'm sure they have more than 100 songs. I believe advertising has increased recently and I may be a man starving in the desert willing to pick through camel doo in search a partially undigested date but I can't hate the station and hope it can suvive. The new KFRC (60s, 70s, 80s) only lasted a year.

 

Gee, "I Wanna Be Sedated" - now THAT's daring.

And I can't imagine the Zombies song is anything other than one of the three obvious chocies.

 

I thought I was of your opinion until my daughter told me I should check out their lunch time oldies show. However I haven't listened to it for long enough yet to be able to notice certain "cycles". I am sorry that I don't have any specific examples to give (of not-too-beat up classic rock tracks), but it often seems I hear stuff from way back that I had completely forgotten about... Perhaps their obligatory Canadian content (I imagine they are bound to by our CRTC) makes for a little more variety (Mashmakan... Pagliaro...) than we would normally expect from such a station... I mean I haven't heard the old Rush stuff and Stairway there yet!...

...Now if only they'd realize there >are< good tracks on Ram besides UNCLE ALBERT...

 

I just moved to the Sacramento, CA area and the local classic rock station 96.9 is doing an end of the year A-Z song playlist. They describe it as playing every song in their catalog in alphabetical order. This afternoon I heard Jambalaya by Creedence. I've never heard that on the radio before.

 

Not ony has ANY classic rock station I've ever heard in any given state sounded almost EXACTLY the same (the only thing that gives them character are good, likeable DJ's), THEY ARE THE SAME AS WHEN I WAS A KID IN THE EARLY 80's!!! - I'm serious, they're playing the exact same stuff now (for the most part) as they did back then, it's like stepping back in time.

 

Do Ya by ELO must play every hour on one of the stations I get on my car radio.

 

People can't seem to get enough of hearing those old warhorses again and again and again and again and again, day after day after day after day after @#$%ing day.

Where I work there's no real radio reception, so a guy who works near me actually has his own classic rock playlist on an iPod, and it's even *more* repetitive than the FM version! "Old Time Rock 'n' Roll", "Sweet Home Alabama", "Walk This Way", "Start Me Up"...again and again and again, day after day after day.

One I tried to shake things up by putting on my own tunes - stuff like Little Feat and the Band, all from the same era and nothing too weird or obscure, stuff I thought he might dig - but I needn't have bothered: "What the hell's *that* crap?!!" Within a couple of days it was back to "You Shook Me All Night Long", "Smoke on the Water", "The Boys Are Back in Town", etc. This guy is about 40-45 years old, and I imagine he quit expanding his musical horizons around the time Reagan went into office.

 

Have you tried "Deep Tracks", channel 16? As a longtime XM subscriber I think you would be pleased with that one, they've even got Pat St. John and Michael Tearson on their on-air staff now.

 

A great game to play on a long road trip is "The Seger Game". Everyone in the car picks a particular time in a predetermined period (usually an upcoming hour), and you hit the scan button on the FM dial. Then when the inevitable Bob Seger tune comes on the radio, the person who guessed the closest time wins! Fun (?) for the whole family (or at least a bunch of bored musicians stuck in a van for hours on end)! It works all across America, on stations large and small.

 

Yep, exactly!

 

Damn! That actually does sound fun. Or how about this one: nobody stops to go to the bathroom until Boston's "More than a feeling" comes on?

 

I think you've just come up with a sure-fire bonus round.

 

KQRS here in the Twin Cities is just as predictable as every other "classic rock" station. The funniest thing I learned from the few times I have listened to the station lately is they have "call in requests." Except it became very obvious to me that the station has pre-recorded clips of people "requesting" songs because I heard the same guy within a three hour time span call to hear "Behind Blue Eyes" twice.

While its not "classic rock" I do love having LOVE 105 around here. Nice variety of music, good DJs that are down to earth, and the biggest shock of all.... GREAT SOUND QUALITY WITH DYNAMICS AND LITTLE COMPRESSION! I wish we had more stations like this around here.

 

I stopped listening to our "main" classic rock station in town: KGB. They have Aerosmith's greatest hits on CONSTANT rotation, along with: Bob Seger, STYX, Foreigner, Floyd, LZ, and what they consider deep tracks are what they used to play often back in the '90s. Evil bastards. I am fortunate to have a great local Jazz station, so I've been pretty into that lately.