Category: listening to the radio

A Jobs Half Done

Steven Jobs was an Albert Einstein type guy that shows up every fifty years or so relative to where the rest of us stand on the ladder of brilliance. There are social commentators who state that he changed our culture three times. Once for the computer, another for listening to music and the third for how we talk on the phone.

Having probably lived longer as an adult than the people who made these profound judgments, I’d have to disagree with this trifecta assessment. For one, his contribution to how we use a computer is not so singular. Jobs is the guy who taught us to look at things spatially rather than linearly by adapting the mouse and iconic graphical screen for the computer. The jury is still out on how pragmatic that is in a work environment where the majority of the application interaction is for accounting and database retrieval. If the purpose of a computer is for playing games and looking at pictures and videos on the Internet, you could make a case.

The true innovator will be the one who makes an all-in-one I-pad type device that integrates business apps, voice and video, chatting, television and radio into a seamless and less obtrusive communicator. The I-pad is clumsy to work with unless you are adept at and satisfied with dragging your finger all over the screen. Okay, maybe it is a generational thing. I concede.

What about listening to music? Again, maybe this old fogey is the not the guy to ask but I haven’t had a transistor radio in years. The clock radio in my bedroom is used only for a few minutes in the morning as I get dressed while I listen to the news. At night, it lulls me to sleep listening to old-time radio shows. In the car, I listen to political talk shows, news and sports conversations. Once in a while if the news is bad along with the local sports teams, I flip to FM and dial in on the fine arts station. No, I’m not the guy who cares what can be downloaded from a podcast. I got other ways to waste my time.

As for talking on the phone- I’ve had a cell phone since they first came out 20 years ago or so. It was a Motorola flip phone that was big and bulky I still have a flip phone- obviously more trim and better featured- and do not pay for a data service option to receive and send text messages. It’s a phone for holding conversations, dammit and not to write notes. I have an email program on my computer, duh!

In baseball, they say that even if you go one for three, that it’s a pretty good batting average. For my team, I see Mr. Jobs with a .333 batting average at best. Okay, I’m not with it and out of touch. I was waiting for Steven to finally come out with something that others of my ilk and vintage and I can relate to. Sadly, we’ll not be able to witness this but hope that one day someone else will pick up and carry on his mantle.

Chicago Radio Daze

Do kids listen to the radio for music anymore? Apparently less and less are doing so and broadcasters are taking notice. A new 24 hour all-news radio station is taking to the airwaves in Chicago with the call letters of WWWN-FM , 101.1 on the dial. Most recently the same spot had been WKQX, a music station. In addition, WBBM-AM in Chicago, a CBS-owned radio station, has just started duplicating their AM signal on 105.9 FM. It had until recently been WCFS, an adult contemporary music station.

CBS officials say that by adding the FM signal for their all-day newscasts, other than seasonal sports broadcasts, those in downtown, high-rise congested areas as well as far out suburbs will now be able to pick up their signal. AM stands for amplitude modulation which relies on the strength or loudness of the signal. This is why some stations covet having 50,000 clear watt signals that get picked up at night as well. There are some AM stations that are even mandated to go off the air after sundown. WGN was chartered an all clear 50,000 watt station because they were willing to air a decent amount of farm related news to the Midwest.

FM stands for frequency modulation. The ability to pick up these signals are based on the proximity, not the loudness, to the transmitter. This is why it is often easier to pick up FM radio stations than AM in areas with tall buildings. The signal strength is not interfered with as much especially if the FM transmission tower is nearby.

This jockeying for supremacy of the Chicago airwaves and changing of the guard in listener tastes brings back several memories for baby boomers listening to radio in the 1960’s. Before the Beatles showed up we used to listen to rock and roll stars like Elvis, The Beach Boys, Frankie Avalon, Fabian, Leslie Gore and many others. The music played loud and it all sounded pretty much the same. But to us the real stars were maybe the disk jockeys who fought for our attention on the various music radio outlets.

At one time or another three stations- WLS, WJJD and WCFL rocked us for loyalty and ratings numbers. Dick Biondi was king of the hill on WLS. By 1964 he was gone and returned to Chicago on arch-rival WCFL in 1967. Biondi as of most recently was still on the airwaves doing nostalgic radio, some fifty years later.

Art Roberts took the baton at WLS in the mid 1960’s and was the top dj for a while. Larry Lujack went on to super stardom first at ‘LS and then ‘CFL in the late ’60s and early ’70s.

By the late 1960’s, I didn’t care much to listen to the British rockers who inundated American culture. As I was in my late teens then, I was more interested in sports and talk on the radio to help me fall asleep.

In the morning, I’d wake up to, as did most kids, Wally Phillips on WGN radio because that’s what our mothers were listening to in the kitchen as they prepared breakfast. In my case, it was something I could not avoid. I slept in the dining room adjoining the kitchen as we only had three bedrooms and five kids- three sisters and a baby brother. I drew the short end of the stick in a stacked deck.

Wally presented a hodgepodge of news, weather, sports, talk, bits of humor, topical discussions, and a sliver of music. Until the day he retired, he was at the top of the radio Arbitron ratings.

In the early ’60s, to help me fall asleep, I’d listen to Jack Eigen on WMAQ in the Palmer House Pump Room, or was it the Chez Paree, interview celebrities passing through town. Or, if I was in a different mood, it would be good old Franklin McCormick on WGN playing his big band music and lullabies. His mellifluous cadence was enough to hypnotize anyone to sleep in 10 minutes or less.

Today some of these call letters are used on different frequencies and the station formats are a far cry from those in the 1960’s. Some, such as WMAQ and all-news WNUS have been retired. WIND is now
a conservative talk station as well as WLS. WCFL which had 1000 on the dial has given up the spot to an all sports talk station owned by ESPN. During the past twenty years, with the migration of Mexicans to Chicago, Spanish language oriented stations have developed large followings and big numbers in the ratings. Incredibly, WGN is still what it was 50 years ago, catering to sports and mostly middle-age tastes. As always , they host the Chicago Cubs games on radio and despite a few blips of post-season success, no announcer has yet to be able to boast that one can hear the World Champion Cubs on WGN. I think when it does happen, radio programs will just be transmitted over the Internet. And the announcer will be called a podcaster. Transistor radios will be shown in museum exhibits and clock radios will be thrown out when seniors sell their homes and move to assisted living facilities. But, don’t touch that dial!- or should I say website address url?

YouTube Vision

There is a great divide out there and I’m not referring to some geological site in Colorado. I’m referring, instead, to the way we get our entertainment. Its got the ratings people such as A.C. Nielsen concerned. Time out- For the record, I don’t like the Nielsen people because I often have to wait when driving home from a client in nearby Wheeling while the cars exiting the Neilsen parking lot pile onto an already busy Willow Road in North Suburban Chicago. It seems as if they have a “most favored nation” status with the local police who provide cover for them. Traffic stops for up to five minutes until their lot empties out. I say take a screwdriver to them and let their employees wait until traffic dissipates like everyone else has to. Or make them pay for a freaking stop light that is timed to work at certain hours of the day. Okay, time in.
Continue reading “YouTube Vision”

Radio Nights

By Larry Teren

 

My dad gave me a pocket transistor radio with an earphone in the very early 1960’s. I had eclectic tastes even then. Depending on the mood or what was available, I would listen to Dick Biondi spin rock and roll records on WLS or Franklin MacCormack and his “All Night Meister Brau Showcase” on WGN. If the Chicago Cubs were on the road, especially a West Coast night game in Los Angeles or San Francisco, I’d be sure to listen in on the broadcast.

There was something cool about listening with the earphone plugged in even though there was no one else in the bedroom to disturb. I’m sure I fell asleep countless times this way only to wake up with the earphone somehow laying under the pillow.     Continue reading “Radio Nights”