The Radio Kitchen

It was kind of hard to be in a bad mood that Wednesday morning. At least for many of us. Barack Obama had won the big election. Fair and square. It almost felt like optimism. Then I wondered about all those right wing propagandists who have taken over the AM dial across America… What the hell would they have to say on a day like the fifth of November?

This led to an online scavenger hunt for conservative talk radio from that fateful day. And I found plenty. It was like putting buckets out in a heavy thunderstorm. When it was all over I had captured close to a hundred hours of right wing radio broadcasting from November 5, 2008 (as MP3 files). I’ve gone on archiving binges like this before. And typically what I do is sample some of what I collected (just to get a flavor of the stuff) and then store it away in a digital attic for historical purposes. And you never know. Archival collections like this can come in handy for some future project.

Then I got to thinking… Hey I have a radio blog. And gosh, the future is now!. And wouldn’t it be so much fun to post a bunch of clips of all these deflated propagandists having a bad day. Just to make it simple, I came up with a plan. I’d post the opening monologue of each show. Nothing more. What would come out of their mouths on day one of this new reality? Of course, this meant that I would have to listen to each one and write a litter teaser/synopsis to lure you into listening. Right? I mean I guess that’s what I do here. It didn’t seem like an insurmountable task.

Anyway, the only problem was that I had to really listen. I wasn’t going to put up vile propaganda without providing some context. Then again, perhaps I hadn’t thought the process through very carefully. And in a sense, I was defeated by the very material I had assumed I would enjoy (in a schadenfreude fashion).

Okay, I wasn’t defeated (It didn’t turn me into a Republican or anything). But ingesting hours of right wing radio propaganda is probably not a very good idea (unless your a dittohead or a masochist). In fact, there was something rather toxic in the strange amalgam of boredom, nausea and repulsion that swept over me in all that listening. I began to feel like I was trapped in a Room 101 of my own creation.

As it happened, the great media buffoon, Glenn Beck, just brought this whole blogging experience to a halt for me. It was just the final straw after listening to awful radio for days. I became increasingly averse to putting myself through one more minute of Beck’s thoughts. After all, I did have other things to do. And for a while I did them, intending to eventually finish this post… soon.

Of course, this is why Media Matters for America was founded. For a long time, the smears, lies and distortions aired on right-wing talk radio were barely noted and rarely challenged– because unless you subscribe to the consensus reality of the media right (Fox News, Murdoch papers, talk radio, etc.), you will find getting immersed in it for any length of time to be an unnerving and uncomfortable experience. Now we have intelligent and thoughtful people to monitor these broadcasts for outrageous and false content. But just like the people who take care of your trash at the curb (or what you flush down the toilet), they need to be paid. It’s thankless work.

The truth is I spent way too much time attempting to get a grip on the slippery Mr. Beck. I’d listen to the same few minutes repeatedly trying to ascertain his point, or viewpoint, or something. But each time my brain would naturally tune out. I’m human. I have limits. In retrospect, it felt rather like getting trapped on a barstool next to a loud mouth drunk. Which kinda makes sense. Not only is Glenn Beck a recovering alcoholic, but a key element of his persona is flaunting that fact.

Just recently I came across a news story where Beck admitted that during his last spree of championship drinking (the late 1990′s) he had become quite an asshole. Now if you ask me, I doubt Glenn Beck has changed all that much. Except he’s apparently quit drinking. Which I guess is a good thing, but it all kind of reminds me of a certain president we used to know.

Glenn Beck Intro Monologue – 11-05-08 8:36

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Then it all started to make sense. For me, lending an ear to a meandering egoist like Glenn Beck is a constant struggle against a visceral urge, not just to ignore him, but to physically move away from the radio (or just shut off it off). Then again, I guess some people are really inspired by Glenn Beck. His radio show has proven to be quite popular. And he’s traded in his gig as a right-wing CNN gadfly for a shiny sideshow booth over at Fox News. (Check out Steven Colbert’s humorous parody of Beck’s new show here.) Although I must admit that I am heartened to hear that Glenn. Beck (and other conservative media types) aren’t giving up on Sarah Palin anytime soon. (There’s a balloon to pin your hopes on.)

And how grandiose Beck sounds, making the Obama election a national "self-help" event and invoking the founding fathers. Beck is the master of cocky half-wit profundity. And all discussions on Becks’ show seem to lead back to his throbbing self-importance and sense of drama.

If you’re not familiar with Glenn Beck’s radio antics or the huge rightist talk radio industry in general, I can’t blame you. If I hadn’t developed a taste for talk radio a long time ago, I would never wallow into that mess either. But if you’re wondering what it’s all about, the machinations of right-wing talk radio are pretty simple. It’s a massive and effective propaganda machine that masquerades as informative entertainment. It’s become a massive media movement employed by the moneyed interests of the US and their corporate associates to convince people of lesser means to happily support laws and lawmakers who favor the privileged and the upper class (and to habitually vote against their own economic interests). While Rush Limbaugh kind of invented this method of political warfare on a national scale, in the last twenty years it’s proven to be a very effective method for electing Republicans for local and national office. Of course, over this last election cycle rightist talk radio just didn’t provide the kind of political support it generated in previous years. Which in a sense, led me to put together this post.

While there’s always been political opinion in talk radio, since the Fairness Doctrine was scrapped at the end of the Reagan Administration, there’s been something else– Political radio warfare. It has gotten so bad after Bush took over, that there was a grassroots movement to develop a left-wing talk industry to counter the many-headed media monster the right had developed (which I talked about here).

And since there’s so many varieties of independent and moderate Americans, there’s all sorts of right-wing talk hosts (each with their own approach and style) working day and night to make them angry and blind– to inspire people who should know better to hate Democrats and fight the "evils" of liberal policy and progressive politicians. After some consideration, I’ve decided against offering all of the thirty-five propagandists I’ve archived. Instead, what you’ll find here is a reasonable and representative sampler of conservative bile and blather collected during the first full day of "President-Elect Obama."

And one thing to keep in mind that the far-right propaganda performers hate political moderates. That’s why they didn’t really have their heart in supporting McCain. While they loved Sarah, they suspected old John might not be the far-right ideologue he portrayed himself to be during the campaign. And remember Bill Clinton? Very moderate. Almost a Republican. The talk radio mob really hated him. Pounded on him daily. They still do.

So, let’s take the temperature of the golden goose of the 1994 Republican revolution at the dawn of a new era, and see if he’s cooked yet.

Rush Limbaugh Opening Monologue – 11-05-08

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The top dog of right wing talk, Rush Limbaugh set the tone for the genre over twenty years ago. And although there’s all sorts of shapes and sizes of rightist talk these days, the basic mold created by Limbaugh has proven effective– putting forward a host who is provocative, haughty and unwavering– in your face. Provide an over-confident rightist asshole with a microphone, and don’t apologize for the indignities that arise from the all the entertainment that ensues.

With so much joy and relief sweeping around the world after Obama’s win, it was only natural that the news industry would start seeking out the disgruntled right-wing pundits who didn’t get their way. Just to keep everything fair and balanced. And you would think that with McCain getting thrashed in the polls for weeks that Limbaugh would be better prepared for what was bound to be the most scrutinized intro monologue since his drug addictions became public knowledge.

It would appear that Limbaugh didn’t put much thought into this big moment. The material he brings to the table is scattershot at best. He starts out congratulating Obama for defeating Hillary Clinton (which of course happened months ago), and then he gets lost in an extended train wreck of football metaphors. (With only a high school education, football is where Limbaugh usually goes for analogies and comparisons in most of his oratory).

Toward the end of this clip you ll hear Limbaugh somehow re-imagine that the crowd at Grant Park on election night started to turn on Obama when he mentioned they might have to sacrifice and work harder to bring a better world. Notice the cute way Limbaugh embodies "black thought" by ending each exclamation with the familiar black to black slang noun "bro."  (as in "That wasn’t the deal here bro!" ) This is a constant Limbaugh theme, to create fictitious scenarios where where blacks openly lack the ambition and initiative of white folks.

Considering the bad news, Rush comes off as rather carefree and chipper on November 5th. As a somewhat moderate Republican, John McCain has been a topic of derision on Limbaugh’s program for years, and his approach here is that there wasn’t a real conservative in the race anyway, so no big deal. "This wasn’t any big landslide," Limbaugh mocks the portly Limbaugh.  “And how many of those votes were stolen?”

Yeah, right. No hard feelings I guess, eh? It sounds to me that Limbaugh is the one who’s going to have to work harder to make things happen over the next four years. It’s bad enough when your job is to publically denigrate and mock an inspirational figure who has so many important qualitites you lack (like class, intelligence and grace), but it’s gotta be even worse when the inspirational figure is black and you obviously have a big problem with that fact. Barack Obama makes life a little harder for Rush Limbaugh. He forces him to edit himself.

When the big man gets to talking, now and then something rather racist falls out of his mouth. Whether he’s telling black callers to take the bone out of their nose or contending that all newspaper composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson.  Another dumbass comment he made about a black quarterback cost Limbaugh his coveted gig on ESPN a few years ago.

Angry and white radio rightists like Limbaugh and Michael the Savage Weiner energize racist factions within their core audience by saying racially insensitive stuff that doesn’t quite go over the line. And it seems that Obama and his media operation is more than aware of Limbaugh’s vulnerabilities, and the way he magically repels moderates, women, Latinos and younger people away from the Republican party. Maybe you noticed how the administration has been teasing and taunting the opiated blowhard into more public foolishness than usual. And Limbaugh’s swollen ego makes it impossible for him to avoid taking the bait.

While getting pushed into the top arc of the news cycle has to be driving up his listenership in the short term, it also makes Limbaugh much more vulnerable. When he says something fatally stupid, or some new Limbaugh scandal breaks, it’s going to happen right square in the public spotlight. Of course, when Humpty Rush takes his fall there is a prince in waiting…

Sean Hannity Intro Monologue – 11-05-08

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Like Rush, Sean is rather sloppy out of the gate on day one of the new era. And I just have to wonder if all these righty talkers just never considered the most likely scenario would really come true. And then a shocker– Hannity theorizes that "the left" has been fighting dirty, spending years orchestrating a failure of President Bush just for their own political benefit! (I tend to think that the thousands of lives that might have been saved was a little more of an incentive, but okay) I guess that means that all of Bush’s failures have been caused by those evil genius liberals. Who knew?

Compared to the portentous Mr. Limbaugh, Hannity is able to at least feign some measure of momentary grace in defeat. Only to note that the Obama win wasn’t quite the election landslides of Hannity’s heroes– Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon. You see, Hannity walked a fine line that Wednesday, trying not to sound too much like a bitter partisan hack while never missing a chance to demean or denounce Obama. Yet, although Hannity is pretty repulsive, there are more vile and ridiculous voices on the radio.

Michael Savage Intro Monologue – 11-05-08

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It would be easy to write off Michael Savage as a hateful xenophobic little prick, but he’s really so much more. If you listen carefully, what you’ll hear is a really boring self-absorbed old fart, who seems to drop in something outrageous, vicious or crazy every once in a while– just to make sure you’re still paying attention. In fact, I don’t know that I’ve heard a man on the radio who seems to need so much attention (Remember, Randi Rhodes is actually a woman…).

Not surprisingly, Savage has no allegiance toward McCain or the Republicans. Actually, there’s not quite enough hatred toward gays and brown people in either major political party for Michael Savage. He says in this clip that he spits in McCain’s face. Nice. However, most of what you’ll actually hear is a just pathetic homely man who needs listeners so bad. It’s odd. A couple of people I actually respect actually find Savage’s act entertaining (or at least compelling). It just reminds me of early onset dementia.

Speaking of dementia…

Bill O’Reilly Intro Monologue – 11-05-08

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Okay, O’Reilly isn’t really so much demented as depraved. But that’s beside the point. Mr. O’Reilly imagines himself a bigger and better version of the average American, and a righteous media advocate for religious and fact-deprived Americans. And when he tries to explain complex and profound issues and current events on the radio or TV there’s something poetic in his inarticulate and ignorant analysis and insight that might either help you understand why the U.S. has been the laughing stock of the world or make you feel even more enlightened by your own lack of knowledge and curiosity.

With a relatively successful TV show underway, I ve always wondered why O’Reilly wanted a daily radio show too. Perhaps just because Sean had one. And any hotshot talk host has a staff at hand, some hosts are more involved in the process in their own preparation than others. But here, O’Reilly sounds like he might have rolled into the studio fifteen minutes before air time with a hot coffee and a roll of Tums.

In fact, not long after the election O’Reilly announced that he was getting out of radio. Perhaps the looming election kept old Bill at the microphone another year or so, but not long after this broadcast he called it quits. Supposedly this will give Bill more time to make his TV show even better. How exciting.

Okay, I’ve had enough of the highly paid hacks and hucksters. Bring on the freak show! Ladies and gentlemen, the mostly highly decorative officer in Phoenix, Arizona history. (Or maybe she said “decorated”…)

Jack McLamb Intro Monologue – 11-05-08 8:36

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For me, full-bore kookiness is a lot more fun than hardcore RNC talk radio. Officer Jack has retired from the force, and today he conducts his conspiratorial talk radio program from America’s survivalist playground, the high Rocky Mountains of Idaho, USA. Like many fringe and freaky rightist radio shows, McLamb’s daily program is carried by the Genesis Communications Network. Many of their shows can be found on a few little AM stations scattered across the countryside (mostly in the south and out west). But the main outlet for McLamb’s (and most GCN content) is WWCR (World Wide Christian Radio), the shortwave multi-frequency international powerhouse in Tennessee (and on the web).

A retired cop (who can’t seem to give up the uniform), McLamb also founded an organization called "Police Against the New World Order," which should give you an idea where he’s coming from. And Jack doesn’t like Obama much. But the far right wackies never liked Bush much either. I don’t think the conspiracy fetishists ever like any elected president, or any leader for that matter. Government is always the enemy, run by monsters in cahoots with the infamous elites and the secret societies. “Well, you see who the international criminal elite chose to be our President,” McLamb tells us. “We now have an Obama-nation as President of the United States.”

McLamb is concerned that this election may bring on the great American “race war” that so many survivalist/patriot extremists have been predicting for so long. And how might that happen?. According to McLamb, the satanic international criminal elites don’t like brown people, and they might have Obama killed, and then blame all the white supremacists. Thus starting a “race war.” All of which might make you wonder if McLamb might be a bit of a bigot himself.

And maybe his is, but doesn’t want you to think so. In fact, this monologue kicks off with one of the more extravagant “some of my best friends are black” expositions I’ve heard in quite a long time. To hear McLamb tell it, he has a real passion for people “of color.” The problem with Obama however, is that he’s a communist. And MAYBE a Muslim. And McLamb hates Communists (He might not like Muslims much either.) And on the day after the election there’s just something very creepy about getting on the radio and talking about Obama getting shot in the head.

And then the more you hear McLamb ramble, the more you begin to see how the conspiracy paranoia and religious mental illness all dovetails into a colorful worldview that’s very popular on U.S. shortwave radio (and in the dark corners and back roads of the internet). It’s a general fear of the “new world order,” which often translates to worries about elites in general, the pro-Satan forces, and space aliens. And then there’s the concerns about immigrants (at least they exist). As you might imagine, there’s more than a little bit of racial hatred at the heart of all this conspiracy thought as well, but the true nature of the bigotry is often masked or coded into the public presentations of all the kooks and preachers spreading their messages of fear and intolerance. Actually, if you take away the religious apocalypticism and the science fiction, and it’s really not that all that different than the worldview of Limbaugh or Michael Savage.

In closing, Jack brings up what has become the lynchpin topic for most of the Obama hating paranoids on the air and on the web. Out of all the rumors and smears spread during the campaign, the meme that Obama is not a natural born citizen is the one that continues to fire up the hoards of fringe fraidy-cats out there. Despite substantial proof debunking the rumor, the idea that Obama is some foreign agent (or just not quite American enough) is very appealing to people who already feel ill at ease about Obama’s skin color, or that he has Muslim relatives.

Perhaps we can take McLamb at his word and assume he really does “love people of color.” I guess that would make Obama one of McLamb’s “black brothers and sisters.” It’s the people who employ Obama (and Bush as well) who concern him– the international criminal elite. And of course, you know what Jesus called them: “The Anti-Christ Communist Synagogue of Satan.” (Hmmm.)

So, let me wind up with post with another talk host on the outskirts of radio. This one’s kooky, but not quite a kook. And while I don’t think he’s a racist, I’ll bet I wouldn’t be the first to say he’s  either. And back in the 1980′s, he seemed to be on the verge of hitting the big time.

David Paul Intro Monologue – 11-05-08 8:36

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It’s David Paul, a guy who used to have one of the sleaziest overnight talk shows in radio history on WSB in Atlanta (which could be heard probably a couple dozen states on their 50,000 watt signal) during the 1980′s and 90′s. It was called “Off The Wall with David Paul,” and that’s just what it was. It was stupid and entertaining and often irritating, and it was hard not to listen when you came across Paul’s oily voice and goofy persona in the middle of the night. His show was his own blend of soft-core shock jock fare, with lots of slutty girls calling in keeping David interested in the proceedings and keeping a lot of dirty old men up all night long.

I’ve intended to write about David Paul in more detail for a little while now, so I won’t say so much here. But the short story is after his gig at WSB ended he ended up in Florida (WIOD) I think, and maybe another station or two. And then he disappeared. Occasional internet searches to check if Paul had popped back up somewhere never panned out. Until a year or two ago, when I found out he’s doing a morning drive show at a teeny tiny little radio station down in Georgia.

I’m not totally convinced that David Paul is a right-winger. Although he may be. It’s just that Cartersville, Georgia is such a Republican zone in an already Republican state that it’s probably a good idea for his radio persona to be Republican, whether he is or not. After all, he did need a job. Who doesn’t these days?

As Paul comes on the air he has good news for his listeners. Except for Obama, just about every local and state candidate down there went for the GOP. Although Chambliss would have to call in Sarah Palin some other big Republican stars to help him finally re-secure his Senate seat in a run off election.

Did you know the Democrats want to control everything you see, hear and read? Right. For chrissake, only a hard core Republican (or a dumb ass) would believe that. I know this has been a big talking point bandied about by a lot of right-wing nutballs and crazy Christians out there, the idea that the power hungry Democrats are going to legislate the end of the dominion of right-wing talk radio. It’ll never happen. But I suppose it could be interesting if somehow the voters could became more educated on the corruption and collusion between the far-right in this country and a number of corporations that has led to the vast majority of American talk radio hosts doing shows that are both political and very right wing. It didn’t used to be that way. And America has always been home to a whole range of political beliefs, and has never been a rightist (or leftist) nation.

According to David Paul, without having a radio dial full of right-wing voices people (let’s assume he means Georgians) wouldn’t know what to think and how to vote. And he gives an impassioned reason why his listeners should fear the Democrats: “People can be led.” Exactly. People can be led. “You have a choice!,” Paul says, raising his voice. And his listeners do have a choice, probably between two or three right wing talk show hosts at a time. While progressive talk radio has a foothold in the business these days, there’s plenty of towns and counties where it’s almost impossible to find anything resembling progressive talk radio or any talk radio that isn’t obnoxiously espousing hard right Republican talking points. While Paul is kind of a hoot some days, when it comes to politics he really is a maroon.

Since Obama’s election I’ve heard many in rightist media scream like monkeys about how the Democrats are going to bring “fairness” back to talk radio (and shut down the far right wing dominance of talk radio). While I don’t believe anything quite like the “fairness doctrine” of old will return, I do believe that all the conservative talk radio hosts on the air don’t want their monopoly of talk radio to become a topic of discussion in the media, and especially in the halls of congress. It just wouldn’t be fair.

I have a hunch that right wing talk radio may take a big hit in this new post-bust era, as more and more Americans find they’ve lost their savings and/or their job (and their health insurance), the rightist media figures who have championed illegal and very expensive wars and all of the toxic corporate and financial deregulation that took our economy into this ditch. And all the while smearing unions, environmentalists, anti-war activists, and promulgating specious arguments against the minimum wage, universal health care or anything else that might benefit the middle-class, the working poor or the unemployed. And just like folks who turned over their millions to Bernie Madoff, millions of listeners turned over their common sense, compassion and cultural outlook to contrarian ideologues like Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage and Beck. And one day they’ll realize they have nothing to show for it, besides a seasoned ignorance on how government policies and economic principles play out in the real world. And a lifetime supply of mega-dittos.

In four-hundred ways, we’re in uncharted territory these days. Especially when it comes to media, information and politics. And the political talk radio industry that rapidly grew during the Clinton administration, and became more diverse during the eight years of Bush and Cheney, now finds us in an era that still doesn’t have a name– where the rules keep changing and nobody knows where we’re heading. And when Obama quoted from the King James Version at his inauguration, saying– “The time has come to set aside foolish things,’ I think he was really onto something.

And so let me put aside these foolish voices, and move on. Occasional casual monitoring of conservative talk radio just to get a flavor of the RNC media machine is one thing, but sitting down and getting personally acquainted with dozens of hours of this garbage is something else all together. I’m not saying I was damaged, exactly. But from the beginning, this blog has been a labor of love. Although I occasionally do find right wing talk fascinating, I find nothing to love while I’m immersed in the dogmatic swill of it all.

There are changes afoot in the talk radio scene. To what end? I don’t know. But you wanna hear something really weird. I think it’s weird. It’s Rush Limbaugh– all spastic and sullen and bitter. It’s quite a change from the cocky pill-head strut of Clinton impressions and chuckle-packed regular features demeaning activists and thinkers and the poor. Listen to his petulant whine as he complains that those awful Democrats are “mean-spirited…heartless….horrible winners.” Is he serious? When I first heard this clip I really thought he was going to fucking cry (as some Republicans do, at the strangest times). But he never really does.

Actually, instead of the audio, here’s the video! I’m sorry. I know it’s not easy to watch. And the man does not look healthy or happy. And one wonders what might be taking the place of his beloved painkillers. I imagine it’s hard to be Rush Limbaugh… without a little numbing now and then. And if you’re wondering why you should waste bandwidth on a chubby Republican emoting, let me tell you that the arm flapping is worth the ticket to the show.

Is that just sad, or what? And while I think right wing talk radio may be in for a world of hurt, the progressive talk radio format that organically rose to challenge the chorus of scary repug voices on the AM dial has always been a problematic commercial undertaking. It doesn’t help that many of the hosts espouse political positions quite different from the official positions of corporate interests who sponsor, syndicate and promote radio shows and radio stations. And the simplistic solutions and god and country mumbo-jumbo of the rightist talkers has a broad easy appeal that trumps any real discussion of the issues or accidently bumping into the true complexity of human affairs. Then again, maybe the Democrats are just lousy businessmen, and hard-selling a harsh reactionary political agenda on behalf of big money just makes people feel good. I sure don’t have all the answers.

While I’m not going to drag this post on any further, I should mention that there has been a lot of news in the progressive talk radio business. Let’s see if can get all I’ve heard and read lately into a few quick coda paragraphs here…

Amid lots of drama and a little mystery, liberal talk syndicator “Nova M” is gone. Their home station in Phoenix has switched back to Spanish programming. And of their two big stars, Mike Malloy is scrambling to syndicate himself without missing a week, and Randi Rhodes will probably show up back on WNJO sometime soon. And I’m sure she’s land some type of syndication deal somehow. While Malloy was live on the web last Friday night, I have no idea if he’s going to be on the air this week. And as of this writing Rhodes is still sulking in her Florida bungalow, or condo, or whatever she calls home down there.

And Air America? You gotta wonder. They finally lost their biggest star, Rachel Maddow. All that’s left is a vestigial morning hour where they broadcast the audio from her previous night’s TV show on MSNBC. And Thom Hartmann (who just cracked the top ten of Talker’s Magazine’s “Heavy Hundred” talk show hosts) has abandoned Air America as well. One time CEO Mark Green is pulling out as well, to get back into NYC politics. And in the vacuum created by Rachel pulling out of AAR’s evening lineup has come Ron Reagan, son of the oft-heralded Republican hero. And I must admit, he’s not bad.

Perhaps the most interesting thing going on over at Air America is what former hosts Sam Seder and Marc Maron are up to. They’ve created a daily web-only videocast (which is also a free audio podcast) where they can freely be ridiculous and creative and even utter dirty words now and then. It’s called “Break Room Live,” and it takes place at 3pm every weekday in a real break room at the Air America headquarters. While it’s rather unprofessional, it is produced. Actually, it’s a Brendan McDonald production, and fans of McDonald and Maron’s efforts on Morning Sedition will probably enjoy this somewhat primitive progressive news sitcom. Perhaps it’s an acquired taste, but I Iike this show. And occasionally it is hilarious. 

I don’t know how long Air America is going to spend money on this offbeat experiment, but there’s worse ways to waste an hour or two sitting at your computer. Like listening to Michael Savage or Glenn Beck or Dennis Miller (oooh, that’s really bad). But I am starting to think that Rush Limbaugh may just go down in a ball of flames. And it might happen sooner than you think. Until something wonderful like that happens, I think I’ll take a vacation from conservative talk radio for a while.

Let me get back to something more whimsical and heartwarming? Like shortwave radio perhaps. And maybe I’ll see you at the SWL fest!

I know. It’s been a while. And I apologize. With all the holidays and hullabaloo coming at me, I kinda took a break from the blog. And then somehow I got bogged down in a painful post. And that post will be up here shortly, but I wanted to come up for air just to let you know I’m still here, typing and listening and fooling around.

Actually, I have been sorta busy. One of the things I’ve been doing is playing around with a new webstream, which (at least for now) I’m calling “Radio Kitchen Radio.” And you’re welcome to check it out, by clicking on the little icon below that happens to match the media player scenario on your computer.

RADIO KITCHEN RADIO

What’s playing? Well, the same kind of crap that I feature on the blog– airchecks and bandscans of shortwave and AM radio broadcasts. It’s kind of a grab bag, some good music, some odd talk radio, and then there’s that wonderful sound of throbbing faraway stations bumping around in the dark. And of course, all sorts of people talking and squawking in languages I don’t understand. I like it. Maybe you will too. If you’re looking for some interesting background noise while you toil away online, try it out. There’s a bunch of scary radio from September 11, 2001 I recorded here in New York in the rotation. And if you like WHVW half as much as I do, you’ll be happy to know there’s a couple dozen hours of that station in the rotation too. And I’m just gonna keep adding more radio recordings to the pile.

I’ll be in a day or two or three with a real post. Honest.

My friend David Goren is contributing some interesting odds and ends for my little radio station. And if you’ve got some compelling AM or SW airchecks, bandscans or tidbits, drop me an email. I’m interested. And I’m equally curious to hear any feedback on the stream content.

Meanwhile, let me finish up this post that has taken me too much time already. I’ll be back…

Ho ho and happy happy! It’s getting to be that time of year (if you know what I mean). While I don’t hate Christmas and all the accompanying festivities– the absurd shopping rituals, the ripe holiday cliches and all immature spirituality of the season have always been not just problematic, but almost tragic to me every year. Even after having a kid a few years ago it didn’t completely quell the queasy feelings of the season. The coming of the winter holidays still feels more like a saccharine onslaught every year rather than something… sublime (Okay, I kinda like the dead tree thing. And all the lights…) But what really gets my gut churning is ALL that old-fashioned Christmas music.

So, with this post I wrestle against my better judgment and go beyond my personal limits of good taste and present you– Christmas music. And before I say anything else– I am sorry. But I won’t apologize for great radio. And that’s what you always got when John Parker was bumping around in the dark.

One of the most popular posts here at the Radio Kitchen has been “Trucking Radio As It Used To Was,” which included a few hours of the great John Parker as the weekend host of the Road Gang on WWL. Just look at the comments on this post and feel the love. Not for me (of course), but for Mr. Parker. And that makes me happy. While getting a web obit on an obscure radio blog isn’t exactly a star on the walk of fame, it’s better than nothing. When I went to write the piece I was saddened (and almost shocked that) there was almost no web presence representing John Parker and his legacy of great overnight radio across America.

If you’re not familiar with John Parker or the Road Gang, let me briefly explain. From the 1970′s into the 1990′s or so, there were three or so all-night radio shows that ran on clear channel AM stations in the south, with programming that specifically catered to cross country truck drivers. And while advertising from obscure trucker gear and services made them exotic and fun for kooky night owls like me and others, what made these shows truly wonderful was the music– lots of classic country and western music. And plenty of songs about trucking life.

These days, what’s left of that trucking and country music radio legacy has been compressed into one XM (now Sirius-XM) satellite radio station, known as “Open Road.” But sadly, old John Parker didn’t make the move up to the new technology, and has since passed on. And if you want to read more, check out my original post on the man and his music (and especially the comments).

While I’ve planned to put together another post (or maybe more) of Parker’s airchecks, the other day I recalled that I probably still had these particular tapes at the bottom of a closet here at headquarters.– a couple of Road Gang programs hosted by Parker from the 1988 Christmas season. And now they’re yours too (If you want ‘em).

WWL – The Road Gang w-John Parker 12-23-88 pt 1  47:14
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This first tape is actually not so painful, as far as holiday nausea potential. It’s still a couple days before Christmas, so the seasonal stuff is just part of the mix anyway. In fact there’s some deliciously weird stuff that I’d forgotten, like a Red Sovine holiday melodrama I haven’t heard in years. And lots of trucker-style corn (And I do mean corn).

WWL – The Road Gang w-John Parker 12-23-88 pt 2  45:34
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However, tape number two is full pedal to the metal Christmas carol baby Jesus birthday from end to end. After all, it is Christmas Eve 1988. I think even I might have been a little less seasonally cynical way back then. Maybe.

WWL – The Road Gang w-John Parker 12-25-88 pt 1  44:10
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So, if you like your holiday sounds maudlin and religious and soupy, you’re gonna have a good time with this hour and a half of the Road Gang. However, this Christmas Eve fell on a Saturday night, when Honest John offered his weekly music history lesson (AKA “Country Music The Way It Used To Was”) for the last two hours of the Road Gang. So the tunes may be hard for a Christmas curmudgeon such as myself to bear, but the second part of this aircheck does offer some the rarities, as well as Parker’s insights and historical perspective.

Unlike just about any other audio I might post here, when I encoded this deep Christmas aircheck I had to turn down the volume. Sorry. I couldn’t do it. But I hope you enjoy it, if you’ve got the stomach (or the spirit) for a big dose of xmas audio, you’ll probably have a good time.

WWL – The Road Gang w-John Parker 12-25-88 pt 2  46:49
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Meanwhile, I’m off to finish up some preparations. And to gather a little fortitude. I do wish you well, and hope you get and give all the jolly and joy and jingle that you can handle during these trying times. And thanks again to John Parker, for plenty of inspired overnight radio, and for sharing the love and lore of country music. Which reminds me, I have a New Years Eve tape of Parker on the Road Gang around here somewhere. When I get a chance, I’ll root though those boxes in the closet again soon and see if I can dig it up.

I do hope you have fun, however you interact with the solstice and the coming new year. And good luck to you (and yours)!

Almost exactly a year ago, I put together a post (The Hip Spot On Your Dial) about anachronistic wonders of WHVW in New York’s Hudson Valley. We have family up that way, so it’s always on mind (and on my radio) when we come to visit. And I always record a little.

Just a little AM station with a little signal, WHVW is the vision of Joe Ferraro (AKA Pirate Joe), a guy who likes his music musty– old, funky, swingin’, stompin, and rockin’. Music that makes you wanna beat on something. In a good way.

WHVW – 11-28-08 part one  58:24
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You can certainly read more about who, what and where of WHVW in my earlier post, but suffice to say that other than weekday drive time and certain hours over the weekend, WHVW is an automated affair. Which doesn’t bother me. In fact, it’s just about the best radio automation I’ve ever heard. And that’s what you get in these two files from last week– “Murray the Machine.”

Last year after I wrote about WHVW, I stopped by the studio for a short visit. I met Pirate Joe, who was very gracious. And every bit the unique character I expected to meet. Boring people don’t create magical radio stations that shouldn’t exist.

One thing that puzzles me. I recall taking a few pictures while I was there, and I haven’t been able to locate them on any of my stray hard drives here at headquarters. It’s too bad. Because I got a look at Murray, the “machine” that fills most of the hours of programming on WHVW. It’s a set up that would make a lot of sense, if it was 1992 (when Pirate Joe bought the station). In a small hot little closet at WHVW there are three 100 CD changers all hard-wired into a vintage late 1980′s computer running some DOS based radio automation program. And I asked Joe about it, wondering in particular about the hard drive in that thing. And you guessed it, the tiny old thing is just about as old as the computer itself. Of course it could blow any day and as I recall I think he said he doesn’t have a back up. Ouch.

WHVW – 11-28-08 part two  62:01
(download)

I remember a friend of mine had a pirate radio station for a while in the mid-90′s and he filled all the hours without DJ’s with a 100 CD machine, and I thought it was quite an amazing device. Then again, nowadays you could fit over 100 albums on a micro memory card as big as a fingernail. That is, if you compressed them as MP3′s. I happened to mention to Pirate Joe that he might wanna get that library converted to MP3′s and run it all off of a more contemporary machine (with back-ups of course). But he would have none of it. He said MP3′s just sounded horrible.

Now I know a thing or two about MP3′s and I’ve done quite a bit of encoding and listening, as well as reading a thing or two about MP3 compression. I’m no scientist, but I can tell you that if WHVW switched to MP3 music tomorrow, as long as they were encoded at appropriate bitrate (I’d say at least 96K mono, w-high quality set) that no one could ever tell the difference (even Joe). Specifically after going through the WHVW audio chain and the AM transmitter, nothing would ever be missed. In fact, I’m sure you probably encode much lower and most ears would never notice. However, as an opinionated curmudgeon myself, I knew better than to question Pirate Joe’s ears or expertise. Not a chance in hell I could change his mind, and that’s okay. He runs a wonderful radio station– creaky old DOS box and all.

The studios are in a small office in the center of Poughkeepsie. While downtown Poughkeepsie isn’t all that appealing, the WHVW studio and office were quite fine. I guess they’re in newer digs since the New York Time’s article a few years back. Although small, it was quite a modern little two or three room affair Pirate Joe has for his radio nest.

And I asked him about his great show (AKA: “Pirate Joe’s Country Music Show and Blues and R&B Extravaganzo”), which has been on hiatus for a few years. A damn good show. Heavy on the 78RPM. Anyway, he had some convoluted technical reason he couldn’t do the show. Problem with playing the 78′s he said. Something about the needles or cartridges or something. Seems to me that it wouldn’t be all that hard to fix or figure out. But who am I to question Pirate Joe…

In my intermittent recording of WHVW I did catch most of one particular Extravanzo broadcast, which I offer you here. And it’s one long piece of radio, over an hour and a half in one file.

WHVW – Pirate Joe Show 12-03-03  102:48
(download)

What a great meandering prosaic style Joe has on the mic. And the music is top notch. Rhythmic and raw. And as it comes from almost exactly five years ago, the seasonal topics are appropriate to the time this post is planted atop the blog. And as far as Joe’s Christmas music phobia… Can I hear an amen? It’s already driving me insane. Nothing chases me out a store faster than some holly and jolly shit spewing from the speakers.

It’s funny. Joe’s patter reminds me more than a little bit of WBCQ’s Allan Weiner. Which makes sense, because they were friends at one time– fellow radio pirates in fact. Sadly, they had a falling out, which I once heard Allan mention in passion on his show. Apparently money was a problem and maybe some broken promises too. I don’t know the details. But it occurred to me as I was listening to Joe’s show, that if you could somehow combine WBCQ and WHVW into one radio station, it could be a killer combination. Then again, they already kinda did that, as two kids sharing an illegal frequency back in the 1970′s.

Maybe someday Pirate Joe will once again air his 78′s in the afternoon. Meanwhile he continues to host a classical music show each weeknight, which doesn’t do much for me. But I’m sure it makes someone happy.

But other than Curt Roberts excellent morning drive rock and roll show, most of the great human (as opposed to automated) programming happens on the weekends. Like Dungeon’s Serenade. A Sunday afternoon offering, and I think it’s a relatively new arrival on the WHVW roster. This recording is from March of last year.

WHVW – Dungeon Serenade 03-25-07  66:47
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I’m a sucker for a good doo-wop show, and this is the real thing. Tony O has this old school nasal edge to his voice, a warm kinda crooked sound. It’s a quirky announcer vibe that goes perfect with all the boom-boom-pa-boom shoo-wah stuff.

Then right when I getting into that 1959 Buick feeling Tony kinda blew it by talking about his new friends on his MySpace page. But that’s okay. He’s on a real radio station in the 21st century playing some awesome aching harmonies from someone else’s youth. And not only is that all right with me, it’s also not WCBS-FM. If you know what I mean.

What you get with Tony O is lots of passion for the records. His playlists are well-crafted, and it’s not the standard oldies fare to be sure. I haven’t listened to the whole thing again, but I do remember an amazing old Miracles song in there somewhere. And this clip is over an hour as well. And if you’re like me, you might find that these airchecks stand up to repeated listening. Which (if you happen to like WXHD) is a good thing. Especially considering that won’t be streaming the station online anytime soon.

I recall Pirate Joe had all sorts of reasons why he was holding off on putting WHVW on the web. And you know, even though the cost to do so would be infinitesimal compared to running that megawatt sucking AM transmitter, and there’s probably quite a few people who don’t happen to within a tight radius of Poughkeepsie, New York who might wanna tune in to the hip spot now and then…

But hey, I’m not gonna argue with Pirate Joe. It can’t be easy keeping an eccentric little radio station on the air these days. And he’s doing a pretty damn good job. I do wish we could all hear it at home, live. But I have my recordings, and when I cruise up the Taconic Parkway, it’s always there waiting. And you have over four hours of WHVW. Right here. And don’t forget, there’s more WHVW archives back here.

Have fun. And thanks Joe! Keep up the good work.

How much right-wing talk radio can you take? I have limits. And there’s been plenty of times I couldn’t stomach any of it. But I will admit that I have a multifaceted fascination with it from time to time. I wouldn’t say that I enjoy much, but I do learn a few things. More precisely I feel like it fills in some background knowledge for me, and provides a laugh or two now and then. While it does provide insight on how the right-wing noise machine is addressing the flock, often the more interesting side of these propaganda operations are the participating callers.

Let’s be honest. An integral element of all political talk radio is a support group scenario, where the audience and the host do a little dance of reassurance, where they repeat the days talking points with varying levels of indignation and ask enciteful rhetorical questions they all answer the same way. All that said, my point is that if right-wing talk radio makes you angry and disgusted, or outraged and indignant, or maybe just really sad and gloomy– if you can get past a lot of discomfort I’ve discovered there are occasional brief moments on these conservative talk shows that are almost beautiful– either n the raw purity of the ignorance (and/or misunderstanding) on display, or just the way some people so poetically reveal their abject nature, or their messy religious (or racial) problems.

Okay, my fingers are crossed, but I’m going to say it anyway– With the Republican party about to get trounced on Tuesday, and the old crapshooter they nominated for President about to suffer a well-deserved defeat, it’s an understandably interesting time to sample the glut of conservative talk that poisons the AM dial across our great nation.

Let’s listen. All these snippets are from the other day. Halloween, last Friday. Instead of the big names in conservative talk, we’ll wade into the lower ranks of the genre. Starting with the biggest doofus in talk radio, ever– Mike Gallagher, the happy conservative warrior (or worrier in this clip…) And I apologize for the lo-fi digital sound on these files. They’re web grabs, not actual radio recordings (like usual).

WNYM – Mike Gallagher – Fight The Fight  8:32

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This is more than sad. It’s exploitive and fascist and desperate. Apparently there’s a popular YouTube video out there, where an Iraq War veteran spouts off against Obama and endorses John McCain. The dramatic moment Gallagher can’t get enough of comes at the end of the video as the vet walks away from the camera and it becomes evident he has a prosthetic leg. Which of course, is tragic. Losing a limb is sad. But what this young guy has to say is scary. That something he calls “freedom” is worth any price, and that any lives lost or destroyed (or country plundered) is worth the cost to promote “freedom.” The concept is simple enough, the tragedy of this soldier trumps not only the charisma and historic nature of Obama and his campaign, but the fact that this guy lost a body part means the war was a good idea. Or something like that.

“It’s a video that could make a real difference,” Gallagher insists. As I’m typing this my better half is sitting across the room listening to Gallagher’s jingoistic slobber. “They don’t have anything else,” she said matter-of-factly. “How stupid could these people get.”

Hmm. Good question.

WNYM – Dennis Prager – Obama is Too Smart  6:02

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Self-righteous blowhard Dennis Prager makes the case against intelligence. Did you know that America is intoxicated by brilliance? (Me neither.). Best to stay away from the universities, which could increase your intelligence, but acually make you dumber (or less Republican).But Sarah Palin? Prager likes her a lot. She’s so genuine. Don’t look for smarts in a candidate, Prager says. It’s more important that our poliicians have “values,” “courage,” and “stability.” (Like John McCain, I guess…)

Okay, the point here is that Obama is really smart, but you know… so what? And he speaks well, which is even worse. And then the female caller at the end of this clip drives home my point about support group radio. It was like a big gooey hug between host and caller. Expect more of this behavior on Wednesday’s show.

WABC – Bob Grant – Caller Theories  3:44

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On the other hand, Meredith from D.C. is quite intelligent. Even smarter than Bob. Not only does she know that Obama’s a Muslim, but she knows that the Muslims know that he’s a Muslim. And more importantly, Obama is a Shia Muslim (his middle name gives it away…), which is going to really piss off Al Qaeda and just screw up everything. Like I said, you can learn a lot…

Old Bob sounds like he’s actually in a good mood and notes that there some great insight on the program that evening, like from Fred from Tarrytown. Fred offers a brief but insightful lecture on Black theology, and then wonders aloud what it’s going to be like when Obama wins and the Black militants take over.

In the Dennis Prager spirit, these two are smart cookies who obviously didn’t go to college. If they had they might have learned things that could have smothered that special innate wisdom inside that drives them to do things like endorse John McCain and cook up unlikely conspiracy theories.

So, I don’t know about you but I’m going to listen to more than my fair share of right wing talk radio this week. (After all there’s a new crappy rightist talk station in town.) I’m wondering what else they got? And how much I can take…

And I’m voting tomorrow. And for the first time in a long time I’m voting FOR a President, not just against one. I hope you might be doing the same thing.

Do you ever find yourself waiting for something to be invented? I take that back. What I really mean is– do you ever wait for a specific type of gadget to hit the market, so you can buy one? I’m not talking about science fiction, but just wishing for a practical tool to be created, built and sold; one that seems well within reach of current technology. I want an MP3 player/recorder with AM & shortwave radio. Is that too much to ask?

My desire is a utilitarian thing. A simple tool (and not too big) which will easily record and store MP3 recordings of reasonable quality from an onboard SW/AM radio. It’s not a crazy idea. Plenty of cassette boomboxes in the early 80′s did almost all that more (but took up more space). Of course, I want it to work well. And I’d prefer that I could also schedule automated recordings, like a VCR or a TiVo does for video. FM band? I don’t need it, but other consumers will probably want that too. This whole idea is not beyond today’s technology. Yet, I wait.

When I record radio for this blog, I use old-fashioned audio cassettes (which I then digitize). It’s still a reliable technology for which I have admitted affection. But in practical terms it using them eats up critical time and space in my already cramped and cluttered lifestyle. Unless I’m just recording a strong or local station, I generally have to rig together a tape deck and a favored shortwave portable with a patch cord. This can be more problematic than you think. Cords and connections may short out when moving the radio or antenna around to improve reception. (And I don’t know enough about electronics but there’s some kind of a buzz that seems to get into some kind of a feedback loop that at least seems to be caused by the patch cord.) And then everything takes twice as long as I end up dumping all the audio into my laptop, and then compressing them to MP3 for my archives. Recording straight to MP3 would just make sense for me. And while there’s probably not a mob of radio consumers who actively archive shortwave radio out there, as I do. However, the ability to schedule MP3 recordings of AM or shortwave would benefit all sorts of folks.

Actually, there is such a device. The Kaito 1121 (or DE1121) does record radio as MP3 files, but the online reviews have kept me from investing in one. Although the reception is supposed to be pretty good (as most of the Degen made radios), but firmware is supposed to be rather quirky and difficult to use. Sadly, it’s notoriously buggy and has only a half a gig of storage. The general consensus I’ve seen online is that it’s a cool concept when you can get it to work, but more research and development could have come up with a better product. And for all the excitement generated by the new and innovative shortwave receivers coming out of China, that’s a consistant problem. Instead of perfecting the engineering of their new radios, the Chinese companies end up putting them on the market too early and let the consumers find the flaws.

To be fair, those of us in the states who care about shortwave radio are happy the Chinese care. Almost every heritage brand name in consumer shortwave portables has gotten out of the business, or like Sangean and Sony they just keep selling their 1990′s era models (perhaps until they run out of stock). Unlike here, for people in China and around the globe (especially in the third world and isolated areas) shortwave is still a significant source of news and information. So for an ignored and oppressed minority like North American shortwave radio consumers, we look with hope to China via the web to see what the Chinese radio manufacturers like Degen, Tecsun and Redsun are putting out on the market overseas. And with the vast success of the MP3 format over the last decade (not for the record companies, but for electronic manufactures, their consumers and podcasters and more…), but the marriage of MP3 technology and shortwave reception hasn’t gone well. At least not yet.

Before the 1121, there was a great radio of the decade that was never was– The Degen 1108. There was a fanboy conga line booming along for a while a couple years ago, where more and more features were anticipated into the damn thing that it was eventually imagined as some great merging of the Sony 2010, the Bose wave radio and an iPod… only better. Okay, even I was stupid enough to join the Yahoo group for this fantasy radio. It never happened. I’ve never heard for certain, but it seemed like the project was simply killed without warning and the development work on the 1108 probably was cobbled together to put out the mediocre but interesting 1121.

Then there was the Grundig G4. Man, this thing sounded like a winner. Announced with a smattering of fanfare at the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas a year ago, the G4 (otherwise known as the DE1122 in China if you’re keeping track) was going to solve some of the problems of the 1121. No nifty pull-out MP3 recorder like the 1121, but easier to navigate controls and firmware with an SD card slot wisely included to add digital storage if desired. And the MP3 technology was piggybacked on a radio that was already well-liked– the Kaito/Degen 1102. I blogged about the G4 not long after it was announced, and the post was followed by quite a number of comments and people interested in the radio continue to find that post. And now, it appears that the Grundig/Eton G4 radio has been discontinued. Wow.

Oh, you can still buy it. There seems to be quite a few around from online sellers like Amazon, ebay, Universal, etc. However, it’s been listed on Eton’s site as part of their “Past Collection.” And then Passport’s Receiver News blog announced the demise of the G4 last month. But while the radio did and does exist, as far as what most of us thought it would do, it’s practically a vapor-gadget like the Degen 1108.

Since I researched and wrote a post about it several months ago, I’ve occasionally strolled onto the web to follow up on the G4. Generally, when I’m interested in a radio I go to sites like eham or Radio Intel where almost any shortwave radio worth much gets a round of reviews and write ups from consumers and people who know radios. At this writing, there’s still not one review of the G4 on either site. Strange. And then there’s Amazon, where any electronic gadget usually gets quite a bit of feedback. Sometimes the people who write there are less than knowledgeable about shortwave radios, but there’s usually dozens of critiques to wade through. Last I looked at Amazon there were only three reviews of the G4. One very favorable (but short on feature specifics), and two panning the portable. Actually, one seems to have been written about a completely different radio. (In case you’re wondering, there seems to be no real quality control for Amazon reviews in general. Plan on reading some ignorant customer reactions, and figure that a few favorable write-ups are probably planted by the manufacturer.)

What I’ve finally learned is this– the G2/1122 is an overpriced dog. Period. The reception isn’t bad, but the original Kaito/Degen 1102 receiver is around half the price. The recordings are reportedly awful. Instead of recording MP3′s like its sister gadget– the 1121, the 1122 records down and dirty lo-fi wav files, like a budget voice recorder. Now I don’t want to get into a big discussion about digital recording and audio compression, but believe me this is a big mistake. The fact is, large full-fidelity wav files (like those ripped from a commercial CD) are HUGE. And when you try to make a wav file small by cutting way back on the resolution and sampling rate, instead of using a carefully long-developed compression algorithm like MP3, you create something that sounds pretty nasty. And while there are valid arguments for more efficient compression algorithms (ogg or AC4 for example), MP3 is ubiquitous now, and can be utilized in almost any contemporary application imaginable. The fact that all reviews I’ve read say the recordings made with the G4′s recordings sound muddy and godawful is not surprising. I understand the radios will actually playback decent MP3 files until the cows come home, but all it can create are buzzy and hollow sounding recordings like a twenty-five dollar digital voice recorder, and you won’t be able to play them back on most MP3 players on the market.

Meanwhile, it’s important to note that not only has there been a dearth of shortwave/MP3 devices on the market, but it’s been almost impossible to find an MP3 player with a mainstream medium wave (AM radio) receiver on board. Many, if not most, MP3 players now have FM radios but up until recently only a company called Pogo Electronics actually made an MP3 player/recorder with an AM/FM radio. They had their fans online, but storage was an issue with their “Radio YourWay” products. As I recall they used to have one with only 128MB of storage, and eventually graduated up to an LX model with a half a gig of room for files. I don’t recall that any of their players have had a card slot, and their latest model is listed on Amazon, although unavailable. And now I notice their website is gone too. Oh well. Bye Pogo.

The C. Crane “Witness” seems more promising. Although their toys are pricy, C. Crane does cater to the AM and shortwave radio geek in a more real and sincere fashion than Radio Shack these days. And they have comprehensive customer service. Their “Witness” seems to be a viable and well thought out AM/FM radio MP3 recorder, with the ability to pre-program the recording of up to 20 shows. Impressive if it works as well as they say. I’d like to get my hands on one, but at well over two-hundred dollars I’m just not ready to pay that much for an AM radio, or an MP3 device. I don‘t own an iPhone either.

And lately there’s been more rumors wafting across the Pacific about a MP3/shortwave combo toy in the works in China. And this time it’s not only a brand new design, but it’s also a real pocket shortwave/AM/FM radio and MP3 player. And it’s also a Degen product, one model number up from the failed 1122– the DE1123.

Honestly, most of what I’ve seen has been on Chinese language sites. So most of what I’ve known about the radio has been gleaned from photos and short cryptic feature lists in English. Then there’s been a couple updates at these two sites (the second requires a simple free membership login to read the article). But after the DE1108 radio mirage of a couple years ago, I wasn’t sure if this was a real product yet. Now I’ve seen it on ebay, so it seems to be both real and for sale in the real world. But again, it’s apparently not exactly what it should or could be.

So far, the good news is that the radio isn’t going to cost a lotta dough. About the price of the DE1103, which is less than half the cost of the CC Witness (with shipping from China). And it’s cute. Of course, we have no idea of how well the radio or recorder works, or whether it’s easy to operate. It actually sports a built-in speaker, but will undoubtably sound better through headphones. But the bad news? Only one gig of storage. And NO card slot to upgrade the storage yourself. But worse? Like the G4, according to the feature list on the ebay auction it only records crappy voice recorder quality (wav) files. Why? While it also plays MP3 files, who cares? Just about any digital toy will do that these days.

So we’ll see what happens. But if you wanna take a risk, you can go to ebay and buy one from China right now. But I’d advise waiting for the reviews to start coming in. And be aware that Degen and Tecsun occasionally improve their radios while in production and later models may be better buys and less buggy. In fact, I was just reading that the Tecsun PL200, otherwise known as the Eton 100 (link requires login) here, has recently been upgraded from a single conversion receiver to a dual conversion model with no public announcement or price increase. But on the other hand, there’s something more fundamental that makes the DE1123 interesting, and perhaps exciting as well. It’s a different kind of receiver, with a recently invented DSP chip serving as the brain and guts of the device. It’s known as the Si4734/35. And this chip, or just the technology it introduces, could reinvigorate shortwave radio for the masses. Or maybe it’s just my imagination on the loose.

The Si4734/35 is a first, squeezing a whole circuit board of an AM/FM/SW radio into a little teeny wafer. It’s kind of like shortwave radio crossed over into this century. Not only does DSP technology open up the possibilities of vastly improved noise reduction and other audio enhancements, but the incredible shrinking radio chip could bring shortwave functionality to almost any audio appliance out there (including pocket devices like MP3 players or cell phones). Almost any radio or audio appliance could have AM or shortwave radio on board with practically no sacrifice of space inside the machine, all at a low cost and with almost no extra labor (from what I understand there’s no need for tuning at the factory, which has always added to the cost of the production of SW receivers). There are certainly issues like RF shielding to avoid interference in the HF bands (I guess the CC Witness radio recommends that you shut off the display to reduce noise on the recordings), but these problems shouldn’t be that difficult to solve. But what’s really interesting about this chip, is that you’ll be able to actually upgrade the radio yourself, without breaking out a soldering iron or a repair manual. Just like almost any digital device with onboard memory, you’ll be able to flash the chip and upgrade the firmware (the software that controls the gadget) whenever a new version is available. This is a big plus.

So here’s what I don’t know (besides whether this chip is actually hot little receiver or a dud). When or if this radio will be marketed here as an Eton/Grundig, Kaito or C. Crane radio. But I’ll tell you one thing, Eton seems even more confusing and convoluted promotion and marketing schemes for their radios in action. They’ve been changing colors and nameplates at will and making about 36 different varieties of emergency hand-crank radios (collect ‘em all, trade ‘em with your friends). And right now on their front page they have these two “Porche designed” monstrosities that are supposed to be shortwave radios, as well as twelve other things. I don’t know who or what is the target market for these bizarre looking objects, but I’ll be they’re really expensive. And I’ll bet they fail almost as quickly as the G4 World Recorder.

And I also don’t know if the recorder can be upgraded to MP3 capability with a firmware upgrade, but it seems within the realm of possibility. There’s a number of open source projects online (like Rockbox for digital audio players and CHDK for Canon digital cameras) where sharp geeks and consumers have created completely alternate firmware for these gadgets, and they are constantly improving it. I love this whole concept, taking control of your gizmos and making them better and more useful.

Speaking of useful, between the economic meltdown and the (increasingly unlikely) threat of Sarah Palin possibly becoming one frail John McCain heartbeat away from the helm of our nation, I’m starting to think that it might not be a bad idea to have one of those emergency crank up radios around the house. I mean, you never know. If you can’t afford batteries, at least you’ll be able to crank out some armegeddon updates.

Okay, I’m letting my imagination run wild again. But don’t forget to vote.

And you can find a follow-up of sorts to this post right here.

Here’s some more transmissions out of my grab bag of Hudson Valley reception that I started going through in the last post. Reception was solid and the ambient RF noise was quite low. I wish I had more time to receive when I was there. As I mentioned a couple posts ago, the growing political friction between the US and Russia was sure to bring back some flavor of the cold war to shortwave listening. And as you can hear in this first extended clip, that’s already happening.

Voice of Russia – 9480kHz 0206 UTC 08-28-08  62:38

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It’s the Voice of Russia, otherwise known as “Radio Moscow” back in the Soviet Era. For thirty years, they’ve maintained a 24-hour English language radio service, with an emphasis on reaching North Americans. And in this hour or so of the Voice of Russia from late August, you hear news and opinion presented Radio Moscow style– with the leading headlines and featured commentaries focused on ongoing political and military differences with the US and NATO. Of course, the main points of contention are the recent conflicts in Georgia and the two provinces Russia has since sucked away.

And despite all the changes in Russia and the new mob glamor of Moscow, their international English language radio service almost sounds like it’s popped out of a time capsule buried decades ago. The news sounders are ancient, and the announcers all sound so disciplined, clipped and old fashioned. Listen to the political “analyst” who skewers the west in the “News and Views” segment. He has that cigarette-roasted-larynx sound I kind of miss on the radio. You just don’t hear that warm Pall Mall “voice of authority” in amplitude modulation much these days. The AM dial used to be full of that sound. Too bad those smokers don’t live a little longer.

I don’t know enough about hardware or physics to know why, but it seems to me that Radio Moscow (and now the Voice of Russia) has always had a particular “sound” to their signal– a particular texture to the radio waves as they come ashore here. And it seemed to be kind of a closed shop, without much more than a handful of announcers who seemed to stay on the air for decades. I think I recognize a couple from my Radio Moscow listening back in the 1980′s.

And lets face it, any government putting up the dough for an external broadcasting service has a direct hand in the news and information it presents. Typically the slant is subtle, and the news and editorial content is a mixed bag. However the vibe of the broadcasting here is much more like you would have heard in the Soviet era, with unmistakable defiance toward America. I suppose you could get so swallowed up in Putin’s soulful stare that you might just miss that breakaway province-size chip on his shoulder. 

Then in the middle of this hour is one of their many sprawling mythic Russian history/heritage features, of which the Voice of Russia seems to have an endless supply (Who knows how old they are? And I wonder if they’re still producing new ones?) As usual the classical music is thick the voices are rich. When the orchestra is really flying and the boomy baritone guy jumps in, it’s as high fidelity as you’re going to get from five thousand miles away. And when the music is dense on the signal like this, you can really hear the ghostly pulsing of the skywaves rushing in and falling back. This is shortwave radio, done in a traditional style. The way mom used to make it. If they didn’t mention websites and email addresses, you might think it was 1979.

However, right before this side of the tape ends, the ever-chipper Estelle Winters chimes in with an update on all the happenings in fun and fab Moscow (or something like that). Alas, it’s actually 2008 and she just doesn’t have that grumpy Soviet sound.

Voice of America – 7340kHz 0312UTC 08-28-08  18:10

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Officially, the Voice of America is our country’s official propaganda channel on the shortwave dial. VOA fact, it started out as a division of the “Office of War Information” during World War II. Their original mission was to counter the worldwide presence of Nazi propaganda on shortwave (and later as a radio bulwark against the old “Iron Curtain” states). But these days the U.S. Government focuses specific foreign radio (and TV) services to states we don’t like so much (in their native language), like Radio Marti (for Cuba) and Radio Farda (for Iran). From what I’ve heard in recent years, the English language service of the Voice of America sounds rather dowdy and seems fairly apolitical these days (I wonder if their Russian service is more strident?). The presentation is a little dry and sparse, which is fine with me. But it does sound like there’s been some budget cuts over the last few years.

Of course the signal isn’t aimed our way, and the reception is somewhat hollow and fady considering the distance. The scratchy sound you hear in the beginning is me, adjusting the active antenna. It goes away… and comes back briefly as I try to clarify the signal a bit later. A better antenna or radio could have nulled out the other station bleeding in.

This is “Daybreak Africa,” a daily news-magazine program which typically is pretty heavy with news and issues on the African continent, but as the Democratic convention is coming to a close there’s a big focus here on what’s happening in Denver.

The U.S. Presidential election is big news around the world this time around, especially in Africa where many in the Sub-Saharan region feel a literal kinship with Barack Obama, whose father was born in Kenya. There’s a short feature from Senegal about how locals there view the U.S. election. The guy says he’s doubtful Americans would accept a President with African ancestry. Another man watches Obama speak a couple times a week on TV, and he thinks he’s both an eloquent speaker and a gentlemen. (Personally, I think the fact that our President for the last seven years is neither has everything to do with all the international interest in the election. Even more than Obama’s racial profile.) But of course, beyond the worldwide antipathy toward Bush and Cheney there’s a real excitement around the world that a member of an oppressed minority in America possibly getting the high office.

While VOA is official U.S. external radio service to the world, the unofficial (and much more prevalent) American radio services to the world comes from the vast number of Christian broadcasters, on both American soil and stationed around the world.

And while I’m there are a number of shortwave broadcasts from every continent featuring religious content, Christians far outnumber any belief system on American radio stations– local, national or international. And while it’s hard to begrudge “evangelists” (or whatever they are) from communicating or communing with their radio “flock,” there is an element of “fleecing” the weak and ignorant for money that’s distasteful (but hell, it works for public radio…). The really extra-creepy business about Christianity on the radio is the “missionary” factor. They’re out to convert everyone. Which is not only crass (if not gauche) in practice, but also a divisive mindset that is both anti-culture and anti-intellectual. And their mythology and anti-enlightenment rides atop the vast majority of short radio waves bouncing away from our continent into homes around the globe.

One of those afternoons upstate, I made a cup of coffee and turned on the shortwave radio and heard the following conversations. And maybe I’m more sensitive these days, but instead of chuckling off these two clowns, I found who the discussion both strange and depressing. So I started a tape, to share with you.

WWCR Nashville, TN – Warning with Jonathan Hansen 12160kHz 08-29-08  2028 UTC  7:34

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This clip features a couple of these defacto ambassadors of U.S. intolerance. Although the host and his guest bemoan the loss of “Judeo-Christian values” in America, make no mistake about it, these guys are authoritarian WASP trash. Period. The use of the word “Judeo” may be a polite nod to the Jewish roots of Christianity, but they don’t like the Jews any more than they like Catholics or Buddhists or thinkers. It doesn’t make a lot of sense, but in their minds the best elements of Judaism just gradually begat the Bible Belt-style Protestant movement of the U.S. of A, thanks to Jesus and the Pilgrims (and that swell bible King James wrote…)

What you’re actually hearing here is a radio/TV show called “Warning.” The host– Jonathan Hansen, a bush league doomsday evangelist. Of course, he’d rather you just call him a prophet. And if Protestant prophesy is your game, you gotta get out there and call for the painful and messy end to humanity.

A strong cult of apocalypticism that runs through Protestant America. It’s bad enough that they can’t quit talking about blood and fear and martyrdom, but the fact that guys like this gets a constant hard on by talking and thinking about suffering all the time should tell you everything you need to know. Although it’s an old game (or fetish?), there’s something particularly American about this strange and viral brand of Christianity. It all dovetails with the isolated xenophobia of pale-Americans and their old-fashioned heartland jingoism. Ultimately is that special American spirit, that we’re just better than everybody else, especially if you’re a Christian. And you get extra points if you become a follower of a doomsday nutbag, like Hansen. (If you’re a glutton for punishment, you might wanna check out his website. However, he doesn’t call it "Warning" for nothing. Watch out. Hansen is out to "shake you with a shake that has never shaken you before!" Sounds a little shakey…)

And finally, notice that same paranoia about the coming New World Order I discussed in the last post. While it’s equally as dark as the new high-tech paranoia of Alex Jones disciples or the UFO/alien obsessed, the Christian fear of the New World Order is even more bizarre in that they actually looking forward to more wars and famines and natural disasters. Things just never quite bad enough for these folks, the want more DEATH until sweet Jesus steps out of the sky to save the day. Or is it that they float up in the sky to meet him? I can’t remember how that all works.

Anyway, it doesn’t matter. Sometimes I think that the more you think about that garbage, the more you encourage them. Or perhaps get a little infected by the stupidity yourself. But the main thing, is that these people want to tribalize the world. The USA Jesus tribe versus everyone else: The foreigners. And the apostates and heathens and demons. And the Muslims. And especially all the brown people, everywhere.

I don’t want to go so far as to say religion is a disease. I understand it’s often a comfort and traditions are important to people. But I am convinced that evangelical Christianity is most certainly a personality disorder, if not an outright mental illness. There’s an old adage that used to get a lot more play a few decades ago– "God is Love." Which makes me think of John Lennon, and that idea kind of made sense to me. A god who might be something like "love" seems a lot more reasonable than a higher power who’s just an ill-tempered sky geezer on a power trip. Or maybe I’ve been looking at all this wrong way– taking the phrase literally somehow instead of enjoying it’s full Orwellian flavor– War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength: God is Love. Got it. Maybe that’s what the pope was talking about.

So, let’s end this post on a high note, with some music.

7190 Tunisia RTV 0615 UTC 08–29-08

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Here’s some Arabic music from the north coast of Africa, including a version of Happy Birthday in there somewhere. There’s some fading at one point and I try to adjust the antenna again, adding noise. Then the station comes back. It’s a half-million watts. Hard to stop this signal.

The reception is poor, and then OK again. The music is fine. And the best part? Mr. Hansen and his globetrotting missionary friend would surely dislike this show and this music.  And they’d rather you and I are perpetually unhappy– looking forward to death. So, I say– enjoy the music. Enjoy the noise. Enjoy life until death, for god’s sake. Get a clue.

And did you hear? Bill Maher has a new movie coming out.

It’s not that often that you know the exact time a news story breaks. Obviously, massive acts of nature or great violence (earthquakes, bombings, etc) generally become information almost within seconds. However, many news items enter the media stream at a carefully chosen day and hour. After all, the news is first and foremost a “product” these days, and news providers, news makers and anybody with a hot tip all have financial and political interests to consider when letting a news story out into the wild.

An interesting case study might be former Presidential candidate John Edwards’ public confession the other day. I thought it was interesting that how the story was released to the world precisely at 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time (or maybe 2:58).

Everybody paying attention knows that late summer 2008 has three major events that are going to be big news and generate lots of stories around the world. Of course there’s a big presidential election going on here in the states, but it’s not until the party conventions are over and done in early September that the campaign warfare and election media overload really begins. Meanwhile, the other BIG news event began on Friday the allegedly cosmic 08/08/08– The opening ceremonies in Beijing.

I'm not much for spectator sports. Even the Olympics. But I did catch some highlights of those ceremonies. Wow. As big and amazing as anything I've ever seen. Lots of pomp. Yet disturbing, at least to me. And our President himself was there for all the fireworks.

But it was BIG. The Olympic opening had been the single most anticipated event around the world for weeks. And nobody's surprised at the estimate of roughly a billion people who tuned in for the TV mega-pageant. All in all, it was an opportune time to get the least bang for the bump for a major news event– like invading a neighboring country or explaining to a national TV audience why you've been lying about your sex life.

So the reason I'm wading into this sordid media quagmire is because I have radio moment of sorts to share– the sound this big news story actually breaking, live, on WABC here in New York. Although Disney sold off their talk stations recently, their ABC News network is still intertwined with the format of the former ABC stations for ten years as part of the deal.

WABC – Breaking News at 3:00 – 08-08-08

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This clip begins just before 3:00 p.m. on WABC. It’ the official hand-off time between Limbaugh and Hannity, where the right-wing radio rocks of Gibraltar almost touch. And as the media storm sweeps over the horizon, the thunderclaps begin. Boom! Rush Limbaugh emerges with just enough time to dish the dirt. Then, boom! Sean Hannity kicks in on cue, barely more prepared than Limbaugh: “All right, we’ve got some breaking news… “

Although the story is barely a minute old, Hannity promises to get to the “bottom line on that.” (After all, if anybody's going to go straight to the bottom of a story, it’s Sean). Despite the hot Edwards story, Hannity promised to hit hard on some Clinton non-story anyway. (Beating up on Bill Clinton? It's all they really know how to do when they're not being fed any juicy red meat from Republican headquarters that day).

And then– Boom, boom, boom-boom– ABC News with Bob Schmidt. A media cloudburst begins… As newsrooms around the country are suddenly scrambling in preparation to have the story by their next newscast, ABC news hits play on a breezy Barbara Britt piece on Edwards' predicament. If you know anything about this situation, you know the version (his version) of the story as it went out that Friday. This is followed by what would have been the lead story, the Olympics are underway!

So why the story launch at 3 o'clock? Well apparently the interview was conducted late that morning. ABC wouldn't need much time to slap a web item and a radio piece together and it was hours before the nightly news. But Edwards certainly would want to have himself, his family and Ms. Hunter secure when the story went out, and to have certain people in his circle informed before they heard it on the news. So while every mention of Edwards confession in the media that day would be a de facto promotion for Nightline that evening, the network probably agreed to give Edwards a head start to prepare for the media fallout.

And while I'm apt to add that the timing would also bump the story into Saturday's newspaper, which is as Rachel Maddow always says is the skinniest and least read edition of a weekly paper, I think that 24/7 cable news and the constant web news stream trumps the print reality these days.

The Nightline interview itself was a sad exercise. For such a full-throttle effort to get in front of a story, Edwards certainly seemed less than candid all through the thing. And what's worse, is he couldn't get out of "campaign mode," going as far as thanking Bob Woodruff for showing up to grill him (like he was invited to a TV debate or something). And why does the supposed fact that he had the affair while his wife's cancer was in remission. And why is important to me or anyone besides his wife if fooled around with Rielle Hunter (i.e. Lisa Jo Druck), but didn't actually love her. And yeah right, the baby's not his. Sure. It would probably be easier to get to the truth if the lady in question would come forward and spill the beans. But apparently she's hiding… somewhere. (The Virgin Islands?)

OK, I gotta admit it. There deeper you go into this story, it just gets dumber and creepier. And like so many sordid airings of celebrity dirty laundry in the public square, once you get a whiff it's hard to turn away. I really brought the whole thing up here blog because I was fascinated with the precision clockwork of the news cycle caught in a few minutes of radio. But I ain't proud that I ended up spending hours researching the kind of stupid celebrity scandal crap that clogs up the works of the news industry with indulgence, lifestyle porn and tragedy. So I'll cut off this discussion of the fall of John Edwards by leaving you with a few links of interest, if you need to know more.

This Newsweek writer's piece on his casual friendship with the lady in question during the Edwards affair speaks volumes. And the youthful shenanigans of Ms. Hunter (Druck) in downtown NYC in the crazy 80's was immortalized in some infamous and trashy fiction titles you may know. And lastly, if your really want to get a fly on the wall flavor of the last temptation of John Edwards, take a gander at the first "Webisode" Hunter produced. You can easily see (and hear) why they were taken down once he was busted by Mrs. E. Watching them may make you wonder how they ever ended up there in the first place. More Edwards dirt can probably be found at this trash compost than anywhere else, starting here and here. And there's more on the way…

And, I'm sorry to page six on you like this…

As far as the other big news of 08/08/08, besides the Olympics… the ongoing situation between Russia and Georgia (and NATO and the former Soviet satellite states and the U.S. and E.U…. everybody else) looks like it's going to get ugly. And that mess just adds more sorts of complexities and variables to an already unpredictable and turbulent (and corrupt) international situation that always seems to be on the verge of turning into something far worse. And something strange.

If you do own a shortwave radio, keep in mind that your connection to the rest of the world is less vulnerable to a cyberattack. And as far as keeping informed, the U.S. and most EU countries may have cut way back on shortwave broadcasting to the west, Russia and many of the states within its historic sphere haven't given up on old fashioned world broadcasting yet. And when the world's on fire, it's always best to not to trust any one version of current events, or recent history.

And then there's China. Proving every day that they can filter all the news and all the information (and entertainment) and suppress all the dissent AND be super-fantastic all at the same time. That really is incredible. I didn't see much of the Olympics, but it looked incredibly colorful and everybody seemed really happy.

Next week the Democratic convention in Denver. John Edwards won't be there. Last month his name was still mentioned as a possible VP pick for Obama. Instead, he may be trying to figure out if he's still married.

This is the second installment of an edited collection of radio recorded on a 1988 roadtrip from Detroit to New Orleans and back. It was initially made (and edited) for my own entertainment and there was no log, and many stations are unidentified. However, twenty years later I think there’s enough radio history to make it worth sharing with you. The first post (and further explanation) can be found here.

In the 1980′s, I became infatuated with black radio. Not only was the music better than the commercial pop and rock stations at the time, but the overall approach was more sincere and spontaneous. And in Detroit we had the genius of Electrifying Mojo on WGPR, mixing Prince and the Gap Band with the B-52′s and all the George Clinton you could handle. But by the mid-80′s I was rediscovering AM radio, and when the funk and groove on the FM “urban” stations was overrun by sequencers, beatbox rhythms and banal production the AM dial was still a refuge for many of the heritage R&B where an oldies heavy contemporary soul/blues format had emerged. Through the 80′s around Detroit there were two retro-black choices on the AM dial– WCHB and WQBH, and they were the most popular presets in my car for a few years. (I have recordings I plan to post.)

My infatuation at the time with the last vestiges of soul broadcasting on the AM dial actually influenced the routing of the initial trip south, adding just a few more miles to trip by strategically driving through a few large southern cities. And this section of this aircheck montage contains the fruits of that plan, as my Buick wagon rolls by Nashville, Memphis and Jackson. 

While the old Mason-Dixon line never stretched this far west, the defacto border of where the American south begins in the Midwest would have to be the Ohio River. That’s where this segment of the trip begins, either right before or right after crossing the river at Cincinnati. It’s hard to say exactly where we were. The signals don’t stop at the river. And once you get within an hour of the river (which is also the Kentucky border) the locals may have a drawl and you’re more likely to find grits or hush puppies on a diner menu. As rust-belt kid, the gradual changes in culture and inclinations once you rolled deeper into the old confederacy was always kind of invigorating. Even exotic.

With no written records of the trip or the stations I recorded, I’m left to depend on memory and the re-edited recorded record. What I do know is that we entered Kentucky sometime in the mid to late afternoon and that by the time we got to Tennessee it was dark outside. The sun didn’t rise until sometime in Southern Mississippi or Louisiana. As I mentioned in the last post, my radio recording along the way was impulsive and intermittent. What you hear in this post is what I edited together from the rest of the nonstop drive to Louisiana.

1988 Trip to New Orleans (part 1) – Into the South  14:29

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If was going to pick a logo or a mascot for a radio station, I wouldn’t be thinkin’ of semi-aquatic rodents. But then again I’m not from Kentucky. This clip kicks off with a full promotional dispatch from “The Beaver” (WBVE) a country FM not far downriver from Cincinnati in Hamilton, KY. If you didn’t have anything to do that weekend you could have gone out to Campbell County Equipment to hang out with one of their DJ’s for day and taken home some Beaver bumper stickers or keychains. Perhaps a coffee mug! And if you got really lucky, you might have loaded up a new lawn mower in your trunk before the end of the afternoon.

I always find it kind of sad when a radio station never really captures the imagination of a community and keeps changing its call letters (and usually the format) to reboot its fate in the marketplace. This north Kentucky outlet at 96.5 MHz had already been through several sets of call letters and format changes by 1986 when it scabbed over into the incarnation you hear on this recording– “The Beaver” (“The Real Country Giant”) in September of 1986. A couple years later the station would switch to format again, and then call letters, and then format, and then call letters once more. Then, I think it may have even changed call letters one more time.  But right now the station is back to a country format as “The Wolf,” which seems to offer a little more animal charisma than a rodent. However, the beaver concept itself lives on. Another FM station in Kentucky grabbed up the catchy WBVE call letters, and is proudly “The Beaver.” And there’s a sister Beaver– WVVE, also in Kentucky. And you can hear country music on either one.

Then the next signal comes from Dayton– WING. And as you might guess, there’s a legacy that goes along with memorable call letters like that. From the mid-50′s until the 1970′s WING was the hottest radio station in that expanse of Ohio– a community media hub with hit music, regional and national news and DJ’s who were local stars. By 1988, the radio group had spun off the top-40 format to wacky Z-93 on the FM band (which I came across in the first post in this series) and WING was a hybrid oldies/talk station at the time. And in this brief clip you hear a promo that sounds kind of strange today:“news doesn’t happen in newsrooms, it happens out there"… (ya think?)

By the late 1980′s, the AM band had become desperate territory. Many stations left out in the cold by the massive listener migration to the FM band were desperately seeking a profitable programming niche that would keep luring listeners to their AM frequencies. And the point of this promo is to point out that WING still had a news department (with real reporters and everything). Which certainly counts for some bragging rights, compared to getting by with a canned oldies music format. This was the era when music radio stations were jettisoning their news divisions, leaving all news and news/talk stations in the market to continue to offer the headlines and the local stories. In fact, a few years later WING switched to a CNN-based news format, which sadly didn’t work out either.

Today WING and its 5000 watts at 1410kHz has met the pitiful fate of many forgotten frequencies– it’s another ESPN sports drone (with another two or three sports stations already on the dial). For many years, people loved this station and depended on it, now it’s an anonymous portal for gossip about spectator sports. I’ll never understand the appeal of that. This is the last verifiable station from Ohio in this trip south. The next few stations may also be from the Dayton/Cincinnati area, or they may have been recorded near Nashville, where I seem to have started recording again.

Want something good in your hair? This wacky ad for B.B. hair products was probably grabbed from a black AM radio station between Dayton and Nashville. I love the relaxed reverb baritone and cheap audience response bits straight out of a sound effects package. I believe B.B. stands for “Bronner Bros. Enterprise,” one of the large African American hair and skin care corporation based in Georgia. (However, the company’s website has recently disappeared.) This is followed by some canned feature about women in the workplace. Are you more likely to get that promotion if you’re hot and flashy? Or kinda fat? Apparently, both have their drawbacks.

Then you get some rural voices of the Caucasian persuasion. Like the Beaver people coming to the Equipment depot, this seems to be a radio remote already underway. These traditional pseudo-events are promotional orgies where a business sponsors a live radio broadcast at a retail site, and the radio station and the business both seduce listeners in for free crap and alleged bargains, while they sell their brand-name into the broadcast zone. It’s a radio tradition. Hard to say what service or goods these good old boys were selling, but it was a family operation. They helped each other. They had their problems, but they work good. That’s the way it should be.

The next ad confirms it, we were in Tennessee. John Watson, the owner of Jay’s Wilderness Outfitters wanted us to “come on in and browse around.” Makes sense. From the address (465 Bell Road) it appears that we were somewhere near Nashville. John is no longer luring browsers. There’s a cleaners there now. This is followed by an ID for Nashville’s WNAH and a short discussion regarding Smitty’s Restaurant, “now with two Nashville locations!” Today an ad like this would be pushin’ a grilled chicken salad or some other vaguely healthy foodstuff. But back in 1988, offering a big cheese burger, batter-dipped fries and jumbo soft drink for a buck fifty was a point of pride. The intro jingle and music under the announcer is a canned and corny “donut” production  where the announcer reads the Smitty’s commercial over the the instrumental break with finger snaps (the “hole” of the donut) of a generic pre-produced restaurant-style advertisement, that will end with more jingle or an announcer. It’s like "just add voice talent" instant spot production. And Smitty’s? I believe there are no longer any Nashville locations.

Then something more substantial, a "classic soul sweep" on WVOL. The song intro under the sultry female announcer sounds like typical 80′s style soul-blues from a label like Malaco. Then a barrage of wacky electro radio sounders, that are still part of radio production today. Then cut to a drop-in. The big baritone R&B voice of god intones– “W-V-O-L – Here yesterday, today and tomorrow.” Damn straight. This black music outlet is indeed still alive and well at 1470 AM. Not every heritage frequency has surrendered to sports, or right wing talk, or the Jesus problem. And you can hear their "Urban Oldies" format by going here. As I was writing this I tuned into "The Mighty 147" online and I heard the Dramatics, which still warms the heart of a middle-aged kid who grew up in the shadow of the Motor City.

This clip is followed by a low-pitched pitch man doing some serious promotional push for the Y-107 Visa Card from the radio station on "the cutting edge of innovation." This bit of bragging set off my internal radio sniffer, and thought I might have gotten a whiff of… Jacor! And a little research bears me out. This station was one of Jacor’s big success stories in the 1980′s, turning a bumbling-along ordinary adult contemporary station into an aggressive CHR (top 40) monster. And by 1987 it had become the number one station in Nashville. A pretty big deal. And the radio station Visa card? Long gone, just like Y-107. And I don’t know that radio station credit cards ever meant much in the scheme of things, but what it does tell me when I hear this brief promotional bit from the past is that it probably came from a sales and promotional staff on overdrive. And Jacor was always on overdrive.

And here’s where digging around in the past led me to the future, or at least today. The programmer that made Y-107 a smash in Nashville, Marc Chase, moved on to Tampa to create "The Power Pig," an even more aggressive and raunchy CHR powerhouse that also took the number one spot in Tampa and killed Q105, the previous CHR champion there. It was quite a time. I don’t know if Jacor had a bigger success story with a station make-over before they merged with Clear Channel, but it’s the one I know. And two of the men (Randy Michaels and Marc Chase) who made the Pig so big have both defected from Clear Channel (and so have others) to rejoin their old Jacor boss brash billionaire Sam Zell over at his Tribune Corporation (the 2nd biggest newspaper publisher in the U.S. and a major media operation which Zell recently purchased). Chase just came over recently (and brought a couple associates along), and Clear Channel is pissed off enough to file a suit against Tribune for stealing company secrets. And if you know anything about how Jacor used to operate, and then take a look at a recent flippant press release announcing bringing Chase on board and you get a feeling that Zell might be looking for a way to get in as a major radio player once again. So far, he only has one station.

Meanwhile, back to the radio. After the "outrageous FM" we have Marcia Griffiths chugging along with the "Electric Boogie.’ As a northern record collector, to me this song was just some side project from that odd funky disco album Bunny Wailer did in the early 80′s, "Hook, Line and Sinker," which I happened to like but went nowhere on the charts. However, the night I heard this on my way to New Orleans I discovered that this Marcia Griffiths dance number (produced by Bunny) had become a huge hit down south. And specifically the dance it created– "The Electric Slide," which was the hit. But no identification on this one. Certainly a black station, probably in Nashville. The DJ is buried pretty deep into the boogie as he signs off. And what an impressive bleepy electronic waterfall flowing around that WXXS, Memphis station ID. I’m not sure if WXSS was still R&B at the time, or had switched to gospel. But these days at 1030kHz in Memphis you’ll hear Español on WGSF.

After that, a happy bland mic break from a young lady on what I believe was the Satellite Music Network‘s "Heart & Soul" service back then. It was a syndicated oldies-based black hits format that had some success in the 1980′s. "Well you all tightened up now? Got some George Benson for ya right now…"

And now, Bill Mack, "The Midnight Cowboy" doing his long-running trucker show from 50 thousand watt WBAP in Dallas. One of the legendary big trucking radio DJ’s since the 70′s, Mack now has his own spot on the XM trucker’s channel, "The Open Road." But here’s he’s lusting after his producer’s feet. It’s well past midnight at this point, and we were probably tooling down 1-55 in northern Mississippi. Unfortunately, Memphis radio (still an interesting and vital scene) is barely sampled in this collage. I guess I was at the wheel by that time. Something I haven’t mentioned about this trip– by the midpoint of this nonstop drive from Michigan to New Orleans I had tired of repeatedly asking my friend to stop gradually veering the Buick toward the shoulder of the highway. I don’t know if it was white line fever or what, but it was driving me insane. The lesson I learned was to never go a roadtrip with someone until you’re familiar with their driving skills. I ended up doing most of the driving for the rest of the trip, and didn’t record nearly as much radio on the road as I had intended.

After the Midnight Cowboy you hear a WBAP Metrocel Cellular Phone promo (Those were big clunky "car phones" back then. Nothing like that shiny sliver of wonders you carry around these days…) and a couple bites of cracklin’ holy roller oratory, which is ubiquitous on the AM dial in the deep south. Then there’s a little harbinger of good things to come, a static-ridden station ID for 13-Kixie, WKXI– "Your power music station." Then there’s something about Martha Reeves and Ben E. King singin’ in Little Rock for a tour of historic houses. Then it’s "67 beautiful degrees with the Chi-Lites on Little Rock’s Favorite, K-Lite" (which I’m sure was on the FM band where there was a lot of "lite" radio back then). And ever so briefly, you hear a station ID for the great WDIA in Memphis.

This is followed by a little talk radio interlude. My best guess is that this is Ray Briem, an overnight talk host based in L.A. (KABC) who was doing a syndicated show around this time for the ABC Talk Network. (I’m not familiar with Briem and could find no clips online. Leave a comment if you can verify if this is him, or some other talk host.) And I believe the conversation is regarding the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which was getting its finishing touches in the legislature around this time, and in a few months would pass with broad bipartisan support and the signature of President Reagan. The bill served as a giant apology to the thousands of Japanese Families living in America (a majority who were U.S. citizens) who were forcibly relocated into internment camps during World War Two, as well as providing them with over a billion dollars in reparations.

However, Betty doesn’t like the idea. Full of rum and rancor and barely able to complete a sentence, Betty’s angry half-thoughts have stumbled onto Ray’s late night radio show, and it’s not pretty. Instead of taking Betty to task or having fun with her ignorance, Ray just milks the call for all the outrage he can squeeze out of it– "We didn’t start that war Ray." And while Betty didn’t advocate dropping a few more A-bombs on Japan, and never referred to them as "nips" or "japs," but you know she probably has. And Ray (who’s apparently rather conservative and not in favor of allotting much cash to the cause) seems taken aback that Betty wouldn’t even sanction an apology to the victims. And if old Betty’s still up and around (which seems in doubt) she probably feels right at home in today’s era of terror-racism, border xenophobia, and the new growing fear of "they." After all, they attacked us.

Then, late late into the night, the whole kooky idea of recording radio in transit with a boombox really paid off.  Even if I wasn’t making these recordings I think the moment I turned in loud clear and clear Lightnin’ Hopkins while crossing the country in the middle of the night might have been etched in my memory anyway. But it’s nice to have the memory archived. Either way, it’s home cooked amplitude modulation of southern music and culture. It was the "Mid-South Power Connection, 13-Kixie."  This was the station I’d hoped to find. At the coolest darkest time of the night and after sixteen hours on the road, the Blues was all right.

The DJ, Paul Anthony Hickey, has a great night vibe and voice– clipped and warm, with a little urgency to keep you awake. Perfect. I find no reference to him on the web, but i like to think he’s still doing radio somewhere, possibly under another name. Following the talking blues of Lightning Hopkins, the funky Bar-Keys fueled blues of Detroit harp man Little Sonny kicks in hot and thick and the drums hit like a round of gun fire. And if you want to hear an example of why I still love the sound of music mutated through AM broadcasting, just listen to the intro to Sonny‘s "A Woman Named Trouble." And then if you compare it to the CD or vinyl and the keyboards, harp and drums will certainly sound more correct or real, but the compression and limiting of AM brings the funky sound up front and center– meaty, the way I like it. So clear, that we must have been pretty close to that 1K transmitter when this was recorded. And then there’s the beginning of a Jimmy Reed track. Jimmy Reed was made to be heard on an AM radio.

Anyway the recording is scoped, so you don’t get the full song. If I had made this collage today (instead of twenty years ago) I probably would have let Little Sonny play on. However, I did keep a lot of the flavor. I kept a couple commercials from the stop set that followed the music, and they’re both representative of a radio station that’s more connected to its community and culture than most are today. And speaking of meaty? If you like delicious home-cooked food (and who doesn’t) you might enjoy the ad for "Jobe’s Family Restaurant." Unless you’re a vegetarian, you may have a little Pavlovian response as you listen to this savory list of soul food fare. And yes, you could get your chitlins fried or boiled.

However twenty years after the fact, Jobe’s Family Restaurant is ancient history. Not only is there no references to it on the web, but the photo snapping vans of Google Maps’ "Street View" division archived the visual information from that strip of Jackson, Mississippi not long ago, and as you can see from the image at right, the lot at 1940 J R Lynch Street in Jackson has been stripped of its building. Looking at this blank sad piece of land reminded me of so many similar empty lots where the good times used to roll in Michigan cities like Detroit, Pontiac and Flint. That said, I’m sure you can still find plenty of home grown diners where you can order a hot greasy plate of ribs or fried chicken in Jackson, Mississippi. Just not at that piece of land on J R Lynch Street.

What can I say about the ad promoting the "Big Kickapoo Blues Festival." I lived in the deep south for a spell and was fortunate enough to attend a few of these big blues festivals in the summertime. The line-up at this one was typical– Little Milton, Artie "Blues Boy" White and Gary B.B. Coleman. Other regulars on a bill like this would be legendary artists like Denise LaSalle, Bobby Bland, Tyrone Davis, Johnnie Taylor, Betty Wright or Marvin Sease. It’s hard for me to tell you how much fun I had at these events, and the memories of total strangers sharing fried chicken, ribs, hard liquor and good times lives on somewhere at a cherished picnic table in my memory. Yes, there really is something about the south…

And WKXI is still broadcasting blues and soul in Jackson, although a few years ago a frequency swap with sister station WOAD moved them a hundred kilohertz down the dial to 1400 AM (which I guess would make them 14-Kixie these days). They used to have a website, and you can’t listen to them online either. But if you’re driving down I-55 that way you might consider turning on your AM radio.

As my friend and I approached New Orleans in the predawn hours, I had no idea that I’d actually be moving there in a few months and would end up spending the next ten years bouncing around the Gulf Coast. How that all happened is a rather convoluted tale that probably doesn’t really belong in a blog post. But beyond the personal journey, all my time in the south was also a radio journey for me. And thankfully, it came at a time when I was mindful of capturing some of that radio from the yawning jaws of time. And all those cassettes have provided a hell of a lot more pleasure than those old baseball cards I used to covet. And they’ve provided me the with options, like sharing them here with you. And it all began with this brief vacation.

The next few installments in this series will be recordings made within the city limits of New Orleans. And then eventually, some aircheck bits from the trip back north. So, if you’re in the neighborhood come back again to 1988 again and we’ll browse around the dial.

It’s a funny thing. Just ten years ago our country was wasting so much time and resources pursing the impeachment of a Democratic President for lying about a clownish series of sexual liaisons with an intern. And the righteous hordes of right-wing talk hosts were having a field day barking at the President’s heels for his dishonesty and depravity. And how history repeats itself. Finally, the tables have turned!

But there really are a cadre of liberal talkers across the land today, which really didn’t exist in the 1990′s. While the far right wing and the neocons are way ahead of the game (with many more hosts, affiliates, and listeners ), and all the syndicated warmongers, xenophobes and anti-environmentalists are sitting pretty on stations with the best AM signals in almost every market, more and more there are competing voices out there separating facts from fictions and directly challenging the mouthpieces of the powerful and malevolent all across the dial.

The truth is, commercial left-wing talk radio is an unlikely American invention– a relatively new creation born of necessity. And contrary to what you might read from conservative clowns and stooges around the web, it isn’t going away anytime soon. But it is a work in progress. Some of it is sloppy, some great, some is just satisfying as a prescription for your outrage burden. And sometimes it’s just good to actually hear it, because affiliates do come and go. And often the liberal talk stations have ended up with some of the shabbiest signals in their market. Even with some success with certain shows in some markets, Progressive Talk remains a series of politically powered radio experiments looking for a stable business model.

In this demented and urgent media environment, the “progressive talk” radio format became a reality as a reaction to (and a bulwark against) this expansive and oppressive dominance of right-wing talk radio on the AM dial. Actually, it’s been almost eight years since the UAW’s i.e. America first toyed with the idea, and roughly four years since Air America and Clear Channel made it real. And there’s been new energy and enmity crackling through the broadcasts, that’s to the protracted and convoluted race for the Democratic Presidential nomination. And the question remains, whether a radio format that combines activism and entertainment from a left wing perspective (which is often explicitly anti-corporate) can thrive in the marketplace.

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Seder was filling in for Rhodes during this week long disengagement between Air America and their most popular talk host. By April 10, it was over. And Seder again was given the official duty of announcing that Rhodes would never again appear on Air America. (Just imagine those smokin’ board meetings at Air America…) He took calls. It’s actually very rare to hear a radio station (let alone a radio network) allow their talent (or worse, former talent) to get on the air and openly trash the station. But like I said, progressive talk is unlikely and experimental. What you’ll hear in this clip is some messy and somewhat intriguing radio, including a phone-in walk-on from Seder’s former co-host, Janeane Garofalo. And while he used to defer to her wacky outbursts when they were a team, after Garofalo has put all her complaints against Air America on the table Seder quickly motions her call toward the exit.

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Now Rhodes has since moved on to Nova M, a fledgling progressive talk network started by the Sheldon Drobney, who was one of the original founders of Air America. Nova M really only has two significant talk show hosts, Rhodes and Mike Malloy. Interestingly, both of them were more or less cast off by Air America for controversial behavior. Right-wing talk hosts really never have this problem. (Unless you consider Don Imus right-wing. But he’s really more of a libertarian old grump…) And although Malloy and Rhodes tend to mouth off, they were actually the two Air America hosts who actually were radio veterans. The fact is, these two Nova M talk hosts probably have more collected years of experience behind the microphone than all the rest of Air America’s talent roster. Not only that, but they seem to have full control of their “flagship” station in Phoenix. So far, with a network run on a shoestring, Nova M has proven to be a more agile and thoughtful operation than the bloated and overwrought Air America.

Have a listen to Mike Malloy on the day Rhodes Air America suspension was announced. Not only does he express his anger at his former employers for screwing Ms. Rhodes, but he also recounts the strange day he was let go by Air America,.And what I find most enlightening of all in this screed is how Al Franken (the vastly overpaid AAR poster-boy who never figured out talk radio) insisted that no Malloy promos run during his program (which would make him both boring and gutless).

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One thing for sure, Malloy invests more raw id into his broadcasts than any liberal talk host you’ll hear. Once he begins to unload you can feel the burden lift and perhaps experience a chuckle escaping from under the load. Here’s an inspired Malloy roasting of Hillary Clinton that certainly warmed my heart.

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What you get in investing your time into Malloy’s show is to feel that warm glow of having your outrage voiced. Although Malloy can occasionally get a little hysterical for me, in general I find Malloy’s nightly rages medicinal, and look upon his complete and total disrespect for the "Bush Crime Family" as the most legitimate and clear-headed treatment of this administration than I hear just about anywhere.

And did you notice how Malloy passionately plugged Nova M’s “Founder’s Fund?” Nova M charges a little more than most radio operations for its podcasts, selling the fee as more of a contribution to the cause. And the podcasts and occasional online videos are just gravy. In fact the CEO of Nova M, young Clear Channel/Jacor vet John Manzo, has made this public-radio style “listener support” part of his business model to help his upstart syndication outfit afford experienced radio hosts like Rhodes and Malloy.

Meanwhile, Seder was left to hold down the Rhodes’ slot while the dispute between talk network and talk host carried on. Sam Seder has been the good soldier in the many battles between Air America and their disgruntled hosts, somehow staying loyal to the company and their former air personalities. After Malloy was fired, Seder actually had him come in as a guest on his program. And after Marc Maron and AAR parted ways, Seder continued to have him as a phone-in guest and still has a regular video webcast (on his website, not affiliated with AAR) with Maron. Not only that, but he’s been the only Air America employee to do fill-in slots (for Malloy) on the competing Nova M network.

When Air America launched, their big innovation (and often their downfall) was to take on a lot of talent from cable television comedy. Although this proved to be a big budget drain on the fledgling network (and SOME TV talent never translated well to radio), the successful transformation of comedian Marc Maron into a new breed of talk host was a real success story. He’s spontaneous and twisted and honest, and really funny. When “Morning Sedition” (the AAR show he co-founded) was kind of drowned in the bathtub in late 2005 by former AAR CEO Danny Goldberg. The show had a hardcore following, and a fan website remains where you can find a continuous stream of comedy bits and interviews from the defunct show. I’ve written plenty about the demise of this wonderful radio program, which you can read here and here.

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While Maron is pointedly curious about Randi’s allegations of Air America bad behavior, if you listen carefully you realize that he never really jumps in with Rhodes to twist the knife. Why not? Well, this isn’t the same Maron (or reality) in 2008. They’ve been through a few management configurations since then, and Maron’s going through a divorce and trolling for a radio gig. And while he sympathizes with Rhodes, and is certainly curious about her what happened between her and the network, he doesn’t pile on. In fact, a less then a month after this conversation on Nova M, Maron did a three-day tryout for Rhodes’ old afternoon slot on Air America. More on that in a minute.

In just a few days, Rhodes was back on the air broadcasting around the country from her old roost at WJNO in West Palm Beach. She still has her own home down there, and plenty of friends and family. And while she doesn’t have quite the affiliate reach she did with Air America, she already does have a majority of her old stations back in her camp. While it’s difficult to know how this will play out, right now Air America has lost a number of affiliates in the all-important afternoon drive slot (on the east coast), and some of their mojo along the way.

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And what’s Air America going to do without Rhodes? Not mourn, that’s for sure. Here’s Air America’s kooky and cosmic host of “Clout,” Richard Green. It’s a couple days after Rhodes and Air America have parted ways and he’s turned his show into “Healing Friday” for the evening and he’s taking calls from listeners so they can vent and share their feelings about Randi Rhodes departure. And this first caller is rather entertaining, she’s a middle-aged Hillary fan full of wine who’s quite upset about how Randi (and MSNBC and the media in general) aren’t giving the Clintons the respect they deserve.

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I’ve never been sure if I like “Clout” or not, but it’s not like any other show I’ve ever heard (but the Police bumper music is so tiresome). While I’ve never heard of Richard Green before he started doing a program on Air America, he seems artful at keeping close relationships with radio management types. In fact, he came in when the Green brothers took over Air America. And after I heard a show for a few days I assumed he was in the same family. Green often offers inside information on what’s going on at the network. And he says in this clip that he’s a loyal team player. And when Rennie Bishop moved Al Sharpton into the “Clout” time slot Green was quite good natured about in on the air. But more importantly, he was able to somehow make a deal with Bishop to remain on the air in the city by having his show time-shifted into a late night slot. Which is a better deal than Thom Hartmann got.

And you also hear Green announcing the stopgap solution to fill the Randi Rhodes slot– celebrity hosts! Oh oh… They’ve been through a number of them so far, and it’s been a mixed bag. Richard Belzer was bearable, but flat. Joy Behar? Rosanne Barr? Let’s just say they don’t seem to grasp the magic of radio. Lately it’s gotten better, as Air America has started giving a trial run to people who actually have some radio chops, including Ron Kuby and Ron Reagan. Not bad. Reagan’s a little too warm and cozy for my taste, but Kuby is a consummate radio professional and certainly deserves to find another gig since WABC gave him the boot. And somewhere in there they gave Sam Seder a tryout as well, even though he’s been on the network since the beginning. But his contract hasn’t been renewed, so his fate at AAR remains unknown at this writing.

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To be fair, Lionel’s show on Air America is more serious and political than he’s been in the past, and he’s had great guests and there are insightful moments and funny bits that aren’t naughty bits. But as far as Lionel on Air America, the writing’s already on the wall. And the fact that he wasn’t pegged to tryout for the afternoon drive hours seems to confirm it. It was already tragic when WWRL pulled the plug and Lionel lost his audience in New York, where he’s had his greatest successes, and unless he moves to another time and perhaps retools his show, it’s only a matter of time before Air America tries something new from nine to noon (eastern time). If I was consulting Air America, I would tell them to move him to an evening slot, or even late night where he was before. Then Lionel might have a chance to regain the affiliates (many beyond Air America) where he thrived while he was with the WOR Network.

While I think almost everything Bishop did to overhaul the WWRL schedule was misguided, moving Ed Schultz (with his respectable ratings track record) into the noon to three daypart has an undeniable logic you can probably understand, even if you don’t agree with the idea. But for me as a listener, taking Thom Hartmann completely off WWRL was the most painful change of all. It’s not that Schultz is  horrible (though not my cup of tea), it’s that Hartmann’s show can be such a daily gift. While there’s not as much "edge" as I might like in Hartmann’s style, his daily show is arguably more nutritious than any call-in radio show on commercial radio.

It was long suspected that Hartmann was on deck to replace Al Franken on Air America, once he got serious about running for the Senate. That finally happened last year, and what a relief it was. Franken’s slow and sloppy ego party had become the most smarmy and careless three-hours in radio. And it was costing the network a fortune. When Hartmann took his place it immediately made more sense. A writer and a thinker with a long list of respected books to his credit, Hartmann has a national conversation five days a week that is remarkably intelligent and without malice. He has many guests in small digestible segments, and always takes plenty of calls. And between smart screening, setting a respectful tones and good pacing, Hartmann’s show is bracing and thoughtful.  And conversationally he’s as apt to run with the news cycle as he is against it, depending on his mood and what he wants to talk about that day. Hartmann’s grasp of history and trends is impressive and topics and issues are often approached new ways with new ideas.

To offer a flavor of Hartmann’s program, here’s a recent "Brunch with Bernie" segment, which is a weekly Friday feature on the program. Almost every week, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders talks with Thom about what’s happening in the legislature and other issues of the day and takes calls from listeners. As an independent and socialist who’s served the better part of twenty years on Capitol Hill, Sanders is the ultimate Washington insider and outsider with a unique take on American politics and social issues. A former Vermont resident and a declared independent as well, Hartmann is more political than partisan and his weekly hours with Sanders is always packed with insight and information beyond the headlines.

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And then the question becomes – can a brainy and thoughtful talk show host take on Rush Limbaugh in his time slot and beat him at his own game? He does in Portland, where his show is based, as well as Seattle. But WWRL’s signal in New York is mediocre at best (just listen to the WWRL clips on this post…), and it will be interesting to see if Ed Schultz makes any headway here in that same slot.

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Frankly, only the most loyal disciple of the “reverend” could find much to love Sharpton’s ham-handed talk radio vibe. Hardly a fount of information or insight, Sharpton offers nothing more and nothing less than the particular social issues he is pursuing on that day, period. It’s not progressive talk. It’s Sharpton talk. Instead of rising to the occasion, as a talk host Sharpton sinks to the bottom of the punch bowl every day. How long will it go on? Maybe another year or two, depending on how deep the pockets are over at Syndication One.

Strangely, Sharpton’s program is preceded by a disclaimer that the station isn’t responsible for anything Sharpton says, just like ones that run before the vapid infomercial blocks that glut the WWRL schedule. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a disclaimer before a political talk show. I suppose this means that either the WWRL management really doesn’t want to be responsible for anything he says, or if Sharpton is actually paying for his air time, just like an infomercial.

Then if you consider the big splashy over-staffed debut and all the financial treachery at the founding, you start to get an idea why the network has seen such rough times. And although it  remains the biggest brand name in the progressive radio business, with Rhodes gone the only significant daypart where Air America stands above their competitors (Jones Radio & Nova M) is Rachel Maddow’s slot from 6 to 9pm EDT. A lot rides on whether they will be able to find the right host and create a compelling afternoon drive package. But that alone isn’t going to be enough to get the network out of trouble.

Perhaps the greatest and most consistent flaw I hear in the overall sound of Air America’s programming is getting by on the cheap by using off-air staffers as co-hosts. While integrating subservient underlings and creative backstage types into a show can occasionally be fun and interesting, non-talent types rarely provide the chemistry and/or ego-balance that a real air-talent or partner can provide. Some hosts are better flying solo. Others benefit from having a sounding board, or just a partner on the air. And it shouldn’t be a surprise, it’s better to find a worthy co-talent and pay them accordingly, instead of letting the host try to milk some situation comedy out of banter with his or her producer.

Given their track record in taking on (and apparently succeeding with) Air America’s cast off talent, I’d bet that if either Marc Maron and/or Sam Seder are not integrated into Air America’s schedule sometime soon that they will end up over at Nova M. Possibly together. They’ve been working together on their own, and both have their own fan base in the progressive talk web-sphere. And while I’m offering suggestions (I had a pretty good scorecard the last time I tried this…) I’ll just repeat what I said about Lionel, that he might stand a fighting chance in a night slot. In the last slot he thrived, Lionel ran concurrently with Malloy, who certainly would attract a different kind of audience. And I’d bet quite a few of his old late night affiliates might be willing to take his show on again. Otherwise, when Lionel’s contract runs out he’ll probably be back on the block looking for yet another syndication deal.

But locally, it’s hard to be optimistic about WWRL. Once a radio station gets the strong stench of infomercial, rigor mortis is probably on the way. And WWRL’s schedule is loaded with snake oil. While cynical fake talk shows certainly bring in cash, they attract a demographic that is death during normal programming– the infirm and the aged. And beyond that, if Mr. Bishop really thinks the same people are going to listen to Shultz, Maddow and Sharpton, and perhaps enjoy endless hours of discussions on fish oil and the digestive track, he’s not thinking clearly. While Bishop does seem to have a vision, it seems as doomed and misguided as the "Sammy & Army Show."

And I don’t know where Air America might find opportunity on the AM dial in New York. Certainly the strongest underutilized frequency on the dial is the 50,000 watts of WQEW, the current home of Radio Disney. I mean, how many kids listen to AM radio? The New York Times sold this powerful NYC frequency to Disney a couple years ago. If the Times was actually as liberal as the right wing insists, it seems like they might have made Air America a reasonable offer. Instead, it’s a non-stop infomercial for Disney’s products and theme parks, which also happens to reach all the way to Canada and the Midwest after dark. 

To summarize, as a WWRL listener I feel like we’ve been seriously jerked around. And I don’t think I’m going to feel better about it anytime soon. Before Air America debuted here in 2004, I had to rely on the internet for the few liberal talk shows that were available. Now four years later, Bishop has finally created his masterwork– the worst progressive line-up in America. And personally I’m back to square one, and relying on the internet for my input of liberal talk all over again. In fact, I’ve ended converting an old computer with a wireless connection into a kitchen radio. WWRL used to be my main media source when I’m cooking, cleaning and hanging out at the dining room table. No longer.

I suppose that in the scheme of things, this is a bump in the road. How long can it be before we can stream internet streams in our cars? Or anywhere? But I’m a radio guy, and this is a radio blog. I mean, the public airwaves and all that. I prefer the convenience, the sound of amplitude modulation, and the fact that anybody within range of a transmitter can tune in for free. And where’s the piece of the broadcast band that’s supposed to be our birthright? Or just peace in general? How many radio stations are supporting that? I suppose that kind of summarizes where I’m coming from.

It seems like it was a long time ago (but it wasn’t) when I was fairly satiated through getting my radio news and information from NPR, or the BBC, or CBC, or any of the various sources on the shortwave band. And I would also glean a few shavings of fact and opinion from what I might hear on talk radio, which was increasingly of a right wing flavor (but not yet totally so). That media diet doesn’t work for me these days. Of course, getting news from international sources remains important, but public radio here at home has been shameful in the age of Bush. At least PBS has Bill Moyers speaking truth to power on the public TV airwaves. But I can’t think of anybody in all of NPR’s national talent roster who has begun to express the outrage and shame we should all feel as Americans (Daniel Schoor, is the only one there who seems to have balls in this regard.)

For example, there’s this sick angry feeling I get sometimes when I hear another news actuality of George W. Bush saying something incredibly stupid. It’s not just that his grammar and word choices are usually a mess, but that what he’s saying is patently a calculated lie he’s been spoon-fed by someone a little more intelligent. But he’s never challenged. And if he is, he makes up some non-response and there’s no follow-up to put him on the spot. And the NPR newscaster or show host will further reference the quote or talk about the responses to the quote, whatever.. But the simple facts are never noted– that the man speaks poorly at a third-grade level, or that what he just said was an obvious lie. No, they can’t say that. But Mike Malloy will. And just for fun, he’ll refer to Bush with nicknames like "chuckle nuts," bunny pants," and my favorite– "the giggling murderer." Call me crazy, but it’s something I crave now and then. I mean, if the congress can’t impeach him it seems our only recourse is to make fun of the rat bastard.

And if I didn’t make it clear, within progressive talk radio Malloy is the extreme. Other hosts are more diplomatic and less angry, but even a Hartmann, Rhodes, or Maddow are still likely to call a liar a liar, and a criminal a criminal, or point out any outstanding bit of hypocrisy without mincing words. And with the documented unpopularity of Bush, his policies and his ongoing wars, you don’t have to be a radical lefty or even a Democrat to have your anger verified, and to learn what is being hidden and obscured from us by compliant network TV news, newspaper chains and NPR. The need is there for a growing number of us. At least for now. And I’m not such a partisan. It’s just that I find living in a country directly responsible for so much indiscriminate death, torture , and  widespread despair profoundly depressing. And Then there’s the loss of our rights, the signing statements, the sinking economy and tragically bungling the disaster relief after Hurricane Katrina. The list of Bush Administration crimes and errors is much longer of course, and the side-effects of their policies– the spread of religious ignorance and intolerance and shameless xenophobia.

And so ends the blog post that couldn’t stop… I apologize for letting this burst of thought carrying on at such a length. But I’ve been typing this thing in circles for weeks, while election news and progressive talk itself has been going through a number of changes. I had originally planned on all this content becoming a series of posts here. Instead I decided just to boil down all the better parts into a full overview, and get it out before something else happens. And I’ll leave it that. I have other things I want to write about here besides all this pessimism and talk of Presidential politics. Although I’m sure I’ll return to these subjects again some time.

If you wanna check out (or keep up with) progressive American talk radio, but live in New York City or some other market where you’re poorly served or ignored by the liberal talk radio industry (such as it is), then you may have to either spend a little money and/or do a little research to listen. If you want to hear the shows broadcast live, and especially if you’re interested in participating in the programs that take calls, there’s two ways you can go. For many the most simple (and computer free) way to hear progressive talk shows is to subscribe to one of the two satellite radio services. Both XM and Sirius have liberal talk "stations" that feature the major hosts from Air America, Nova M and Jones Radio. Sirius also has a couple of their own shows with radio vets Alex Bennett and Lynn Samuels. Then again, the free digital solution is just to stream the shows live via the web. LTR (Liberal Talk Radio) is a good place to get started, with links to streams for just about every progressive talk show on the air, and information on when to listen. The site also has a blog ("The Latest Buzz") featuring the latest news and gossip surrounding left-wing talk.

However, for people with MP3 enabled lives the most convenient way to listen to these programs is to download podcasts. If you don’t know what podcasting is, you can look here or here, but suffice to say it’s a way you set up an online computer to automatically download radio programs after they’re broadcast. Then you can listen to them at your leisure on your computer or with your MP3 player. While you do have to pay for most of these podcasts, if you do they’re almost always commercial free

As I mentioned, Nova M has a "Founder’s Fund" which ostensibly supports the network financially and allows your podcasting software to download both Randi Rhodes and Mike Malloy for that one price. Air America has an "On Demand" service that gives you podcasts of just about all their programs. If you want Ed Schultz or Stephanie Miller, you have to pay for their podcasts individually. All that said, if you’re cheap and net savvy (or just want to sample some shows) there is software out there that will record the streams via scheduling like a VCR. Yes, it is possible to make your own podcasts.

However, two of my personal favorite programs are available as free podcasts– A daily podcast (with all the commercials) of Thom Hartman can be found here, and the best interview show in progressive talk, Air America’s "Ring of Fire" (with Mike Papantonio and Robert Kennedy Jr.) can be found here, and NO advertising! Lately, it’s the one show I never miss.

Although a lot can happen between now and November, at this writing we seem to stand a good chance of electing a decent human being to steer this country toward some semblance of sanity, but the chances of some high-profile war crime trials or a truth and reconciliation committee hearings or two seem pretty unlikely. And the right wing noise machine isn’t shutting down anytime soon. Yes, progressive talk will continue because we live in stupid times, in a country full of dumb people. But at least they’re hard working.

Speaking of that, it looks like Hillary’s long and tenacious campaign for the Democratic nomination has just about played out. Of course, that doesn’t mean she’ll admit it when it happens. But one can hope. And her bizarre campaign has certainly livened up the progressive talk radio scene, and made the call-in shows more dynamic than usual. However, once former first lady and the former first man have their big celebration of themselves at the party convention in Denver, it sure would be nice if they would dance their way off the world stage for a while. And maybe get a room or something. And you know, do not disturb…me.