SHANIANUTS!
05-27-2002, 9:54pm
Date: May 27, 2002 | Local time: 5:42PM www.lasvegasweekly.com
Music to a driver’s ears
Satellite radio restores confidence in this technophobe
By Gary Dretzka
Nothing has done more for the popularity of in-dash CD players and tape decks—or, for that matter, Books on Tape and streaming audio—than the radio industry. This includes all of the Morning Zoo-keepers, liberal-bashing loudmouths, syndicated jockstrap sniffers, boy bands and Britney wannabes, Nashville hat acts, fundamentalist preachers and shock jocks who have contributed to intellectual gridlock on the nation’s airwaves.
There was a time in this country when freeform, imaginatively programmed FM stations provided an exciting antidote to the payola-driven excesses of AM radio in the ’50s and early ’60s. But that sense of relief only lasted long enough for a new breed of blow-dried, razor-cut executives to figure out how to suck every breath of life out of the format.
By 1980, the only difference between AM and FM radio stations were an occasional blast of static on AM and the decimal point on FM frequencies.
Buckle up, America. Help has arrived from the heavens, and not a moment too soon.
For the past six months, XM Satellite Radio has been beaming 100 channels of imaginatively programmed music, comedy, news and features to listeners across the United States. Most of the entertainment channels are commercial-free, while some of the news and talk networks do insert some ads.
The only competing service, Sirius Satellite Radio, promises to keeps its music programming “100 percent commercial-free.” It will expand to Las Vegas and other major markets by mid-May, and the entire nation by the end of June.
Just as DirecTV and EchoStar have provided a solution to the arrogance of cable TV companies, satellite radio offers motorists crystal-clear reception and a surprisingly diverse menu of entertainment and news options. Listeners don’t, however, need to install a pizza-size dish on the roof of their car to receive them, just a small knob of an antenna.
What’s that? You’ve heard all this before and aren’t about to buy into yet another digital pipe dream?
Pardon this digression into the first-person. It’s the only way I can share my opinions with you on the technology without sounding like a shill for the consumer-electronics industry.
When it comes to digital hype, I’m quite a bit more skeptical than the average technophobe. That’s because I’ve been assigned to cover the Winter Consumer Electronics Show for the last seven years and regularly attend the Comdex and National Association of Broadcasters luaus here. I’ve heard a thousand broken promises and seen hundreds of products come and go.
After holding my breath for the last 10 years, I’ve finally given up hope of ever watching high-definition television at home. I have never downloaded a piece of music onto an MP3 player and probably never will. Why bother?
My faith in 20th-century engineering was partially restored, however, after being assigned by the Chicago Tribune to begin monitoring the progress of personal video recorders (TiVo, Replay, UltimateTV). I’ve also written extensively about DirecTV, EchoStar and UltimateTV, e-books, DVDs and hand-held computers.
Against all odds, most of these contraptions worked as promised. In fact, my love is such that the only way I will give up my PVR and satellite dish is if someone is able to pry all five of our remote controls from my cold, dead fingers.
Still, I was only cautiously optimistic when I took the wheel of the XM-equipped Cadillac DeVille, loaned to me three weeks ago by General Motors. I was pleased to see that the car’s in-dash audio unit offered plenty of other options besides satellite radio, so if the service sucked, all I had to do was dip into my emergency supply of CDs and tapes.
Without wasting too much time, I pointed the Caddy in the direction of Death Valley—the graveyard of radio signals—and began surfing. Given a hundred channels to choose among, I decided to concentrate first on XM’s half-dozen niche country stations.
No format has degenerated more in the last 20 years than country music. All one needs to know about the vast majority of country stations is that they no longer are compelled to play records by such singers as Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Johnny Cash, Hank Sr., Hank Jr., Hank III and the dozens of artists relegated to the “alt-country” and “AAA” ghettos.
Blessedly, only two of the six channels were reserved for the songs Nashville laughingly calls “country” these days. The four others provided a steady stream of unexpected treasures, with selections from artists ranging from Woody Guthrie, Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family to Kasey Chambers, Lucinda Williams and Wilco.
Somewhere near Bakersfield, I heard Roy Clark sing “Thank God and Greyhound (You’re Gone)” one minute, and Jimmy Lafave do “Elvis Loved His Mama” the next. I knew, then, I was on the right road to heaven.
Like everyone else I’ve met who’s already subscribed to satellite radio, I also become addicted to the three channels dedicated to comedy, two of which arrived uncensored. Listening to bits from Sam Kinison, Phyllis Diller, Richard Jeni, Jackie “The Jokeman” Martling and Richard Pryor—in quick succession and unbleeped—was nothing short of exhilarating.
At Zabriskie Point, I decided to listen to some real desert music from Pakistan and India; nearing Pahrump, I searched for some Jackson Brown and Neil Young. I could just as easily have tuned into channels dedicated to blues, Broadway show tunes, Latin jazz, “classic” rap or “old-school” soul.
Naturally, turning onto the Strip, I headed straight for “Frank’s Place” and what I hoped would be an overdose of Sinatra.
It was.
To my utter surprise, in five days and a thousand miles of driving—many way above and below sea level—I hadn’t lost a single signal or channel, or heard a scratch of static. The only song I remember being repeated was a bluegrass version of Pink Floyd’s “Run Like Hell” by Luther Wright and the Wrongs.
A few days later, I was invited to drive a Sirius-equipped SUV—manufactured by BMW—from Denver to Telluride and back. If XM worked in Furnace Creek, I wanted to make sure Sirius would perform 12,400 feet higher in altitude, at Independence Pass.
It did.
Sirius’ commercial-free entertainment roster was broken into formats and niches similar to those offered by XM. The most obvious difference was that Sirius gave its low-key announcers a bit more time to chat between songs, while a few of the newer and more popular songs were repeated once or twice a day, which will appeal to many listeners.
The bluegrass channel made sense on the stretch of highway that crossed the Continental Divide, but if I actually cared about what was going on in the rest of the world that day, all I had to do was tune into the BBC World Service News or CNN Headline News. Besides Radio Disney, there also were talk stations dedicated to science, old-time radio, women’s issues, “guy talk” and “scandal.”
Sirius’ comedy outlet was family-friendly. Given listener response, however, it might add one more channel for less sensitive ears.
Both services offer stations that cater to the specific interests and needs of long-haul truckers. (They also market heavily in truck stops and place ads in magazines that cater to the nation’s one million over-the-road drivers.)
The only place I lost a signal during my entire field test was in the long tunnels cutting through the highest peaks that bisect I-70 in central Colorado. The signals cut out after four seconds, but they returned quickly in the open air.
In some regions of the country, this problem has already been fixed. “Repeater” devices have been placed at the entrances of a few dozen tunnels and underpasses, as well as in the concrete canyons of Manhattan, Chicago and San Francisco.
Even in major markets, where there are plenty of listening options, there are many compelling reasons to buy into satellite radio.
As Joe Capobianco, Sirius’ senior vice president for content, points out, “Right now, New York is about to lose its only country music channel, and that wasn’t even a full-market signal. San Francisco doesn’t have a country station and countless markets have no classical music station.
“We’ll meet those voids, no matter who or where you are.”
Meg Griffin, who programs Sirius’ Alt Country and eclectic E1-7, says that people who love any form of niche music are being vastly underserved by the radio industry. In this era of consolidation, anonymous Arbitron junkies—chained to their desks in offices hundreds of miles from the nearest truck stop or blues bar—create play lists for their chain’s far-flung affiliates.
“When we talk about the kinds of music that you can’t hear on regular radio channels, I like to point to what happened with the ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou’ soundtrack album,” Griffin says. “There was very limited commercial airplay for it, but it’s sold more than four million copies. To me, that proves there’s still an audience for that kind of music, which is the kind they’re not getting.
“We’re not trying to program each station for the broadest number of people, so it opens up all sorts of options.”
Artists will benefit in several ways, including having their names and song titles appear on the tuner when their songs are played. Besides being paid royalties for music that otherwise might never have been heard, the exposure to a potentially huge audience of uninitiated listeners should translate into a boost in album sales and concert dates.
“We service both stations with CDs on all our clients for radio airplay,” says Mark Pucci, an Atlanta-based publicist for alt-country acts. “Over the next few weeks, I have XM interviews scheduled for both Eliza Gilkyson and the Flatlanders. The artists I represent are rarely heard on mainstream radio, so any opportunity to gain airplay visibility is worthwhile.
“Also, the programming and on-air jocks are just so much more receptive and knowledgeable about this music.”
Charles Robbins, director of corporate communications for XM Satellite Radio, also points to his service’s depth of content.
“We have a digital database of between of 1.5 to 2 million songs, 10,000 pieces of classical music for those three channels,” Robbins said. “We went national in November of 2001 and had 76,000 subscribers by end of first quarter. It’s the fastest-growing audio product in 20 years
“We expect 350,000 subscribers by (the) end of year.”
Chicago-based singer-songwriter Robbie Fulks is among the many exciting performers typically lumped together under the Americana, or “roots-rock” banner. Blessed with an imaginative writing style and authentic country voice, his music is rarely heard on mainstream stations.
“As someone who has never been called a Pollyanna, I have to confess that I think XM and Sirius are near-miraculous developments,” he says. “They’re a deus ex machina for fringe acts, like me, who have been puttering along for years, and the best publicity tool that’s come along since I started putting out records.
“If XM and Sirius conduct proper ad campaigns, I don’t see what can stop them. The stinking irrelevance of radio is no big secret.”
Fulks has every right to be optimistic. Nonetheless, he raises the same note of caution as those who were around during the blossoming of FM in the mid-’60s, and, 10 years later, its deflowering by media conglomerates in the ’70s.
“The airing of my music on digital TV already has spiked my sales and produced a lot of word-of-mouth response,” Fulks continues. “I don’t think commercials would kill it, but its being co-opted by the labels surely would. Even if we get a few good years out of it, though, won’t it be great?”
Years? Some of us would settle for a few good hours.
Some commercial-radio conglomerates are countering XM and Sirius with promises of digital transmission within three years, just like their pals in the television industry. Even if it rolls out as planned, however, there’s no reason to believe the programming will be any less uninspired than it is right now.
So why wait?
Music to a driver’s ears
Satellite radio restores confidence in this technophobe
By Gary Dretzka
Nothing has done more for the popularity of in-dash CD players and tape decks—or, for that matter, Books on Tape and streaming audio—than the radio industry. This includes all of the Morning Zoo-keepers, liberal-bashing loudmouths, syndicated jockstrap sniffers, boy bands and Britney wannabes, Nashville hat acts, fundamentalist preachers and shock jocks who have contributed to intellectual gridlock on the nation’s airwaves.
There was a time in this country when freeform, imaginatively programmed FM stations provided an exciting antidote to the payola-driven excesses of AM radio in the ’50s and early ’60s. But that sense of relief only lasted long enough for a new breed of blow-dried, razor-cut executives to figure out how to suck every breath of life out of the format.
By 1980, the only difference between AM and FM radio stations were an occasional blast of static on AM and the decimal point on FM frequencies.
Buckle up, America. Help has arrived from the heavens, and not a moment too soon.
For the past six months, XM Satellite Radio has been beaming 100 channels of imaginatively programmed music, comedy, news and features to listeners across the United States. Most of the entertainment channels are commercial-free, while some of the news and talk networks do insert some ads.
The only competing service, Sirius Satellite Radio, promises to keeps its music programming “100 percent commercial-free.” It will expand to Las Vegas and other major markets by mid-May, and the entire nation by the end of June.
Just as DirecTV and EchoStar have provided a solution to the arrogance of cable TV companies, satellite radio offers motorists crystal-clear reception and a surprisingly diverse menu of entertainment and news options. Listeners don’t, however, need to install a pizza-size dish on the roof of their car to receive them, just a small knob of an antenna.
What’s that? You’ve heard all this before and aren’t about to buy into yet another digital pipe dream?
Pardon this digression into the first-person. It’s the only way I can share my opinions with you on the technology without sounding like a shill for the consumer-electronics industry.
When it comes to digital hype, I’m quite a bit more skeptical than the average technophobe. That’s because I’ve been assigned to cover the Winter Consumer Electronics Show for the last seven years and regularly attend the Comdex and National Association of Broadcasters luaus here. I’ve heard a thousand broken promises and seen hundreds of products come and go.
After holding my breath for the last 10 years, I’ve finally given up hope of ever watching high-definition television at home. I have never downloaded a piece of music onto an MP3 player and probably never will. Why bother?
My faith in 20th-century engineering was partially restored, however, after being assigned by the Chicago Tribune to begin monitoring the progress of personal video recorders (TiVo, Replay, UltimateTV). I’ve also written extensively about DirecTV, EchoStar and UltimateTV, e-books, DVDs and hand-held computers.
Against all odds, most of these contraptions worked as promised. In fact, my love is such that the only way I will give up my PVR and satellite dish is if someone is able to pry all five of our remote controls from my cold, dead fingers.
Still, I was only cautiously optimistic when I took the wheel of the XM-equipped Cadillac DeVille, loaned to me three weeks ago by General Motors. I was pleased to see that the car’s in-dash audio unit offered plenty of other options besides satellite radio, so if the service sucked, all I had to do was dip into my emergency supply of CDs and tapes.
Without wasting too much time, I pointed the Caddy in the direction of Death Valley—the graveyard of radio signals—and began surfing. Given a hundred channels to choose among, I decided to concentrate first on XM’s half-dozen niche country stations.
No format has degenerated more in the last 20 years than country music. All one needs to know about the vast majority of country stations is that they no longer are compelled to play records by such singers as Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, Emmylou Harris, Johnny Cash, Hank Sr., Hank Jr., Hank III and the dozens of artists relegated to the “alt-country” and “AAA” ghettos.
Blessedly, only two of the six channels were reserved for the songs Nashville laughingly calls “country” these days. The four others provided a steady stream of unexpected treasures, with selections from artists ranging from Woody Guthrie, Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family to Kasey Chambers, Lucinda Williams and Wilco.
Somewhere near Bakersfield, I heard Roy Clark sing “Thank God and Greyhound (You’re Gone)” one minute, and Jimmy Lafave do “Elvis Loved His Mama” the next. I knew, then, I was on the right road to heaven.
Like everyone else I’ve met who’s already subscribed to satellite radio, I also become addicted to the three channels dedicated to comedy, two of which arrived uncensored. Listening to bits from Sam Kinison, Phyllis Diller, Richard Jeni, Jackie “The Jokeman” Martling and Richard Pryor—in quick succession and unbleeped—was nothing short of exhilarating.
At Zabriskie Point, I decided to listen to some real desert music from Pakistan and India; nearing Pahrump, I searched for some Jackson Brown and Neil Young. I could just as easily have tuned into channels dedicated to blues, Broadway show tunes, Latin jazz, “classic” rap or “old-school” soul.
Naturally, turning onto the Strip, I headed straight for “Frank’s Place” and what I hoped would be an overdose of Sinatra.
It was.
To my utter surprise, in five days and a thousand miles of driving—many way above and below sea level—I hadn’t lost a single signal or channel, or heard a scratch of static. The only song I remember being repeated was a bluegrass version of Pink Floyd’s “Run Like Hell” by Luther Wright and the Wrongs.
A few days later, I was invited to drive a Sirius-equipped SUV—manufactured by BMW—from Denver to Telluride and back. If XM worked in Furnace Creek, I wanted to make sure Sirius would perform 12,400 feet higher in altitude, at Independence Pass.
It did.
Sirius’ commercial-free entertainment roster was broken into formats and niches similar to those offered by XM. The most obvious difference was that Sirius gave its low-key announcers a bit more time to chat between songs, while a few of the newer and more popular songs were repeated once or twice a day, which will appeal to many listeners.
The bluegrass channel made sense on the stretch of highway that crossed the Continental Divide, but if I actually cared about what was going on in the rest of the world that day, all I had to do was tune into the BBC World Service News or CNN Headline News. Besides Radio Disney, there also were talk stations dedicated to science, old-time radio, women’s issues, “guy talk” and “scandal.”
Sirius’ comedy outlet was family-friendly. Given listener response, however, it might add one more channel for less sensitive ears.
Both services offer stations that cater to the specific interests and needs of long-haul truckers. (They also market heavily in truck stops and place ads in magazines that cater to the nation’s one million over-the-road drivers.)
The only place I lost a signal during my entire field test was in the long tunnels cutting through the highest peaks that bisect I-70 in central Colorado. The signals cut out after four seconds, but they returned quickly in the open air.
In some regions of the country, this problem has already been fixed. “Repeater” devices have been placed at the entrances of a few dozen tunnels and underpasses, as well as in the concrete canyons of Manhattan, Chicago and San Francisco.
Even in major markets, where there are plenty of listening options, there are many compelling reasons to buy into satellite radio.
As Joe Capobianco, Sirius’ senior vice president for content, points out, “Right now, New York is about to lose its only country music channel, and that wasn’t even a full-market signal. San Francisco doesn’t have a country station and countless markets have no classical music station.
“We’ll meet those voids, no matter who or where you are.”
Meg Griffin, who programs Sirius’ Alt Country and eclectic E1-7, says that people who love any form of niche music are being vastly underserved by the radio industry. In this era of consolidation, anonymous Arbitron junkies—chained to their desks in offices hundreds of miles from the nearest truck stop or blues bar—create play lists for their chain’s far-flung affiliates.
“When we talk about the kinds of music that you can’t hear on regular radio channels, I like to point to what happened with the ‘O Brother, Where Art Thou’ soundtrack album,” Griffin says. “There was very limited commercial airplay for it, but it’s sold more than four million copies. To me, that proves there’s still an audience for that kind of music, which is the kind they’re not getting.
“We’re not trying to program each station for the broadest number of people, so it opens up all sorts of options.”
Artists will benefit in several ways, including having their names and song titles appear on the tuner when their songs are played. Besides being paid royalties for music that otherwise might never have been heard, the exposure to a potentially huge audience of uninitiated listeners should translate into a boost in album sales and concert dates.
“We service both stations with CDs on all our clients for radio airplay,” says Mark Pucci, an Atlanta-based publicist for alt-country acts. “Over the next few weeks, I have XM interviews scheduled for both Eliza Gilkyson and the Flatlanders. The artists I represent are rarely heard on mainstream radio, so any opportunity to gain airplay visibility is worthwhile.
“Also, the programming and on-air jocks are just so much more receptive and knowledgeable about this music.”
Charles Robbins, director of corporate communications for XM Satellite Radio, also points to his service’s depth of content.
“We have a digital database of between of 1.5 to 2 million songs, 10,000 pieces of classical music for those three channels,” Robbins said. “We went national in November of 2001 and had 76,000 subscribers by end of first quarter. It’s the fastest-growing audio product in 20 years
“We expect 350,000 subscribers by (the) end of year.”
Chicago-based singer-songwriter Robbie Fulks is among the many exciting performers typically lumped together under the Americana, or “roots-rock” banner. Blessed with an imaginative writing style and authentic country voice, his music is rarely heard on mainstream stations.
“As someone who has never been called a Pollyanna, I have to confess that I think XM and Sirius are near-miraculous developments,” he says. “They’re a deus ex machina for fringe acts, like me, who have been puttering along for years, and the best publicity tool that’s come along since I started putting out records.
“If XM and Sirius conduct proper ad campaigns, I don’t see what can stop them. The stinking irrelevance of radio is no big secret.”
Fulks has every right to be optimistic. Nonetheless, he raises the same note of caution as those who were around during the blossoming of FM in the mid-’60s, and, 10 years later, its deflowering by media conglomerates in the ’70s.
“The airing of my music on digital TV already has spiked my sales and produced a lot of word-of-mouth response,” Fulks continues. “I don’t think commercials would kill it, but its being co-opted by the labels surely would. Even if we get a few good years out of it, though, won’t it be great?”
Years? Some of us would settle for a few good hours.
Some commercial-radio conglomerates are countering XM and Sirius with promises of digital transmission within three years, just like their pals in the television industry. Even if it rolls out as planned, however, there’s no reason to believe the programming will be any less uninspired than it is right now.
So why wait?