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17 August 2007

What do you listen to? [More:]

What are your favorite radio stations?

In the car I mostly listen to Sirius:

134 NPR Now
135 NPR Talk
6 60's Vibrations
and 114 Lime. Until they start talking about a vitamin elixir miracle cure, and I can't take it anymore.

71 Jazz cafe is great when I hear it out in stores and such. Not so great for driving entertainment.

At home I love XM channel 836, "The Loft", on Direct TV. Every song is good.

What are your favorite stations?
KSTX 89.1 FM NPR News and Talk
KZET 104.5 KM Classic Rock (when NPR sucks or is a repeat).

That's all I listen to on the radio.
posted by muddgirl 17 August | 10:05
woxy.com, the internet ghost of the old bricks-n-mortar 97X oxford, ohio college station. they haven't played a bad song in the nearly 30 years i've been listening to them... well perhaps an REM song or 2 back in the day (i loathe REM), but still.

don't have a car but in & around boulder our best local indie station is 97.3 KBCO. they've gotten a li'l commercial in the past five or six years but their internet station (kbco.com) is also good stuff.
posted by lonefrontranger 17 August | 10:06
KNOW MPR News
MPR eclectic music, AKA "The Current"
and, if I'm at home I sometimes listen to my old college radio station, KUMM
posted by cobra! 17 August | 10:07
89.7 WUWM, Local NPR station which meant my college had no college station

88.9 (Not sure of the call sign), collegy radio owned by MPS, usually an interesting mix of eclectic music.

91.7 WMSE our big "college" station, (though a distant third)

620 AM for Baseball games, though I try to listen online.

posted by drezdn 17 August | 10:08
I should branch out. Pour moi, nothing but the local NPR/PRI station (that also plays some Canadian stuff like CBC's As it Happens), and CDs.

And audio books! GREAT for long drives. Most recently Neal Gaimen's Stardust, read by Himself. Only coincidental that the film is coming out. Ya see, prose stems from a time when we all sat around the campfire at the end of a tough day and a storyteller made us forget our aches and pains and hunger and the uncertainty of tomorrow. Spoken stories are brilliant.

I think we listened to 71 Jazz cafe on Sirius at my last job. It was one of Sirius's jazz stations. Just a little "lite", but not bad at all. Lots of cool stuff like Babatunde Lea. TONS of jean Luc Ponty.
posted by shane 17 August | 10:10
I play my MP3 player in the car, or listen to our local NPR station. At home it's NPR or the CD player. At work I'll listen to Sirius (via a friend's account) and I usually listen to either channel 80 (Symphony Hall), channel 22 (First Wave- I love my 80s music) or channel 26 (Left of Center- indie type stuff).
posted by BoringPostcards 17 August | 10:12
BP, I like 22, First Wave too. I need to listen to 26 more often. Thanks for pointing that out. I used to listen to Coffee House, 30. It got old quick. It's lame acoustic renditions of popular music.

I think the reason why I listen to 50's and 60's music in the car because it's not so bad for children's ears. We can go on a Surfin' Safari or Let it Be without resorting to kid stations. :)
posted by LoriFLA 17 August | 10:17
DC Stations in order of often-ness

1) Progressive Talk 1260 (also Stephanie Miller streaming online)

2) WAMU (NPR)

3) SportsTalk 980

4) Junkies in the morning

5) CSPAN Radio

I'm hoping my commute becomes a lot shorter soon though ... cross yer fingers for me.
posted by danostuporstar 17 August | 10:18
I don't listen to the radio much, but I make occasional exceptions for the local NPR affiliate, the local community radio station (some of my pals have shows) and old-school hip-hop days on the big-money hip-hop/r&b station.
posted by box 17 August | 10:18
CBC radio one, BBC World service, and BBC 5. Sometimes WNYC and Deutsche Welle. I don't really listen to music radio at all any more. I listen to my own music or internet radio like mecharadio.
posted by arse_hat 17 August | 10:26
I really only listen to a couple radio things.

1. A local high school station - I think they only buy about two tracks per year but they somehow have a huge huge catalog of 80s stuff. The high school kids do on air stuff during the day and sometimes it can be quite good.

2. The Bob and Tom Show. (I listen to think for work and because they do give comedians air time.)
posted by fluffy battle kitten 17 August | 10:33
(listen to THIS...not listen to think. Although thinking does take place occasionally.)
posted by fluffy battle kitten 17 August | 10:34
The dial on my AM radio is broken, so my faves are, starting with the knob at zero (all the way counter-clockwise):

1/4 turn clockwise: Mets Games
about 1 full turn: Bloomberg news & weather, sometimes a national baseball broadcast
1 1/2 turn: gospel radio
1 3/4 turn: Spanish-language radio
2 turns: francophone African radio

I read with the radio on, often tuned to a game, and I rarely care who's playing, as long as it's not the Yankees. Not just because the Bronx Bombers are my least favorite team in sports (even the Dallas Cowboys rank higher), but because the radio broadcast team is a pair of unbelievable jerkoffs.

I rarely care what sport is on, actually. So during football/hockey/basketball season, I listen to national games of the week, Giants, Jets, Rangers, Isles, Devils, Knicks, Nets; I just turn it on to occupy the part of my mind that isn't occupied with reading. I seem to concentrate better when there's some idiot nattering on about sports.

And if it's gonna be music on the radio, I wanna hear praise or bomba or plena or juju.
posted by Hugh Janus 17 August | 10:35
People listen to the radio?
posted by cortex 17 August | 10:40
I don't listen to radio at all. I like my music uninterrupted by jingles, fade-outs, adverts, news, weather, vox-pops, quizzes, phone-ins, inane chatter and so on.
posted by TheDonF 17 August | 10:45
radio: NPR or local jazz/blues station (although they don't play enough blues for my taste)

other: Sirius stuff mrs chewie has - I think that left of center one, some jazz ones, and some reggae ones

online: radioparadise.com usually. sometimes groovera.com for mindless ambient spaceaghetti
posted by chewatadistance 17 August | 11:09
WDUQ - NPR station
WYEP - Independent non-profit music station.
Radio Paradise
posted by octothorpe 17 August | 11:32
At the house: Clock radio wakes me to Morning Edition on NPR. Otherwise, iTunes on shuffle.

In the car: Air America on XM on the way to from work. During commercials or shows I'm not interested in, I listen to Fred, Ethel and Lucy.

At the office: iPhone w/some podcasts or a subset of my mp3s.
posted by birdherder 17 August | 12:09
At home, I wake up to WNCW - local mostly NPR/alternative. Listen to them in the car a lot too although they're mostly too mellow & too much jazz & too much bluegrass for me and lately I kind of hate them. Which is why I've started listening to the new crock station 105.9 The Mountain in the car. They are loathesome but kind of weirdly hilarious, also, about every third song is really good in spite of themselves. And I like driving fast with the windows down listening to horrible 70s anthem rock. At work I listen to WFUV Fordham University radio online. I love them and I even like the NY traffic & weather; also, they're mellow enough for the museum front desk. Or if I'm in my office I listen to Pandora. Pandora is the best.
posted by mygothlaundry 17 August | 12:24
I don't like the radio unless they're broadcasting something live; I'd rather sing, in the car or at home, opera arias -- or 1970s cartoon theme songs. I have a pretty burnished baritone, but what I'd really like to be is a tenore di grazia
posted by matteo 17 August | 14:37
I stopped listening to radio about the time when Journey's "Wheel in the Sky" became a hit.
posted by mischief 17 August | 14:44
I listen to WFUV Fordham University

Them's fightin' words! (WFUV went up against my team, WFMU, when they moved their antenna and blocked some of WFMU's signal (90.7 vs 91.1)
posted by StickyCarpet 17 August | 15:02
Count me as another public radio junkie. I live in a magical triangle where I can receive NHPR, MPR, and WBUR. I love it because I'm learning something constantly; right now I'm learning about music that goes with voodoo ceremonies. Every day starts with Morning Edition. At work the public affairs shows tend to be on in background. I love Here & Now, On the Media, and Studio 360, and for a long time the musical highlight of my week has been American Routes. For the last few weeks I've really been appreciating Speaking of Faith, a really sane and intelligent show on religion in modern life. Incidentally, I think the host might be a MeFite.

I spend a lot of time listening to our local community radio station, WSCA, because I am on the programming team there.

The River in Boston plays a surprisingly good mix of things grownups like, both contemporary and oldish.

Online streaming is also a big part of my listening. I stream old-time music at Sugar in the Gourd, and this Tennessee station, have a couple Pandora stations of different genres. I got into WWOZ after Katrina and still tune in every now and then. WFMU is the second quirkiest station in America (after wildly lefty and barely professional WBAI), and has incredible shows to stream. I love listening to WMVY, the Martha's Vineyard station, which is also free-form AOR/adult contemporary. It reminds me of trips there.

Now that my iPod Shuffle works again I want to start downloading podcasts of really absorbing talk programming I like. That would be the perfect thing to go running to. I keep meaning to ask for recommendations or search AskMe for past threads.

I love love love radio, much more than TV or movies. If our only media were dead trees, internets, and radio, I'd be happy as a clam. Radio is amazing.
posted by Miko 17 August | 15:05
Incidentally, I think the host might be a MeFite.

parmanparman hosts Interfaith Voices. Is that who you're thinking of? (Though it's certainly possible MeFi has two faith-topic radio hosts, I suppose.)
posted by danostuporstar 17 August | 15:35
Oh, yeah--there's some BBC mixed in with the CBC on my PRI/NPR station too.
posted by shane 17 August | 16:38
Chicago stations:

WCPT 850AM - Progressive talk. Unfortunately it is only sunup-sundown, but they do stream. (Dano, Stephanie Miller = awesome)
The Score 670AM - Sports talk (local)
WMVP 1000AM - More sports talk. (ESPN Radio) I mostly listen to this when I want to hear sports talk and the Score has a White Sox or Blackhawks game on or late at night (I love All Night with Jason Smith)
WGN 720AM For Cubs games
Newsradio 78 780AM For Bears games and traffic and weather together

As far as music stations, I flip around quite a bit, but my favorites are WONC (89.1 FM - North Central College station), 93XRT (93.1 FM), Nine FM (99.9 FM), and Love FM (100.3 FM)

posted by sisterhavana 17 August | 17:13
Oddly enough, music has not been in the forefront for me lately. So, mostly I just listen to the cricket at my feet.
posted by MonkeyButter 17 August | 17:36
Radio 1 until it becomes so awful that I have to change it to Radio 2 or Radio 4 (usually less than one song or one monologue from one of their moronic DJs).

No one will ever replace Peel.
posted by chuckdarwin 17 August | 19:35
I grew up with my ear glued to my transistor radio, so it pains me to admit that I live a virtually radio-free existence these days. I used to be able to depend on KCMU, but then they got in bed with Paul Allen, changed to KEXP and began the long slow slide into mediocrity that continues to this day. I’ll listen to it every now and again on my way home from work. It’s a twenty minute drive, but most nights I turn it off before I’m halfway home. They’re just not playing what I want to hear.

When I was driving a truck all day, NPR was my friend. It’s great to drive to, but I can’t seem to listen to it while doing anything else.

There are a few specialty shows on local non-commercial stations that are worthwhile. Science Girl’s friend Brian does a punk rock show Saturday nights on KEXP, but we’re always doing something else when he’s on. I always forget about the psychedelic show Chris Martin (from Kinski) does on KBCS because it’s on so late on Monday nights/Tuesday mornings; KBCS used to have a really good soul program, too, but it was on in the morning before I get up and now it seems to have disappeared.

I guess the only “radio” I listen to with any regularity is the jazz channel my employers subscribe to through Comcast. It’s OK, although they need to broaden their playlist a bit. I haven’t heard satellite radio. I suppose I should look into it at some point, but from what I’ve heard it’s as tightly formatted as broadcast radio. I’m just old enough to have caught the tail end of the free-form era, and it marked me for life. Why restrict yourself to one genre of music? It’s much more interesting to throw them together and see how they play off of each other.
posted by bmarkey 17 August | 20:19
I used to listen to WNEW-FM back when it was a really good rock station and WCBS-FM for oldies. and WFMU for the weird stuff. Now that I don't drive, I just listen to my iPod. Ironically my dream job would be being a radio DJ, but that's like wanting to be a blacksmith or biplane repairman.
posted by jonmc 17 August | 20:26
parmanparman hosts Interfaith Voices. Is that who you're thinking of?

Yes!
posted by Miko 17 August | 21:53
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