Post by ErinB on Mar 29, 2004 16:57:12 GMT -5
Liberal Talk Network, Left Out in D.C.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27321-2004Mar26.html
By Marc Fisher
Sunday, March 28, 2004; Page N02
You will hear a whole lot of hype in the coming days about the new liberal talk-radio network that's been designed as a counterweight to conservative heavies such as Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Laura Ingraham and Laura Schlessinger.
What you won't hear, if you live in the Washington area, is what the Air America Network really sounds like: whether Al Franken can sustain three hours a day of radio, whether Janeane Garofalo can talk as well as she can act, whether liberal callers can be as righteous and bloodthirsty as their counterparts on conservative radio.
Air America will debut Wednesday in four cities -- New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco -- but not here.
Why? Because there's nowhere to put that programming on our local radio dial. (And Air America isn't yet streaming its broadcasts on the Web.)
There are two kinds of talk radio, AM and FM. The AM kind is usually political talk, aimed at an audience that's generally too old to care much for pop music. AM talk is nationally syndicated conservatives such as Limbaugh, Schlessinger and Sean Hannity, and the dwindling ranks of local talk hosts, such as WMAL's Chris Core and WTNT's Paul Berry. FM talk is known in the industry as "hot talk" -- that's the ever-raunchier stuff inspired by Howard Stern and designed to appeal to young male listeners. (A very few talk hosts manage to bridge the two categories, most notably Don Imus, whose New York-based show airs on both AM and FM stations around the country.)
Washington, playing contrary to reputation, has been the most dependable and creative producer of hot-talk talent, from Stern, who developed his shtick at DC-101 in the early '80s, to Doug "Greaseman" Tracht, to our town's longest-running local bad-boy act, WJFK's Don Geronimo and Mike O'Meara.
But among the top 20 markets, Washington is the weakest for AM radio. We have only a handful of AM stations with signals strong enough to be heard throughout the metropolitan area, and those stations already have reasonably successful programming: all-news WTOP and mostly conservative talk WMAL are the only AM stations in the area that draw big ratings. Black talk WOL, sports talk WTEM and political talk WTNT (home of Imus and Berry) attract much smaller, if devoted, followings. Otherwise, the local AM dial consists largely of weak signals offering foreign-language programs and syndicated talk to barely measurable audiences.
The liberal talkers could try to find a home on FM, but that, too, seems unlikely. The big radio companies that bought up thousands of stations in the consolidation rush of the late '90s own most of the stations in town, and they are generally committed to the music formats they now air.
In Washington, Air America has nowhere to land.
Washington Post columnist Marc Fisher is the author of a forthcoming book on radio and American pop culture.
© 2004 The Washington Post Company
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27321-2004Mar26.html
By Marc Fisher
Sunday, March 28, 2004; Page N02
You will hear a whole lot of hype in the coming days about the new liberal talk-radio network that's been designed as a counterweight to conservative heavies such as Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Laura Ingraham and Laura Schlessinger.
What you won't hear, if you live in the Washington area, is what the Air America Network really sounds like: whether Al Franken can sustain three hours a day of radio, whether Janeane Garofalo can talk as well as she can act, whether liberal callers can be as righteous and bloodthirsty as their counterparts on conservative radio.
Air America will debut Wednesday in four cities -- New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco -- but not here.
Why? Because there's nowhere to put that programming on our local radio dial. (And Air America isn't yet streaming its broadcasts on the Web.)
There are two kinds of talk radio, AM and FM. The AM kind is usually political talk, aimed at an audience that's generally too old to care much for pop music. AM talk is nationally syndicated conservatives such as Limbaugh, Schlessinger and Sean Hannity, and the dwindling ranks of local talk hosts, such as WMAL's Chris Core and WTNT's Paul Berry. FM talk is known in the industry as "hot talk" -- that's the ever-raunchier stuff inspired by Howard Stern and designed to appeal to young male listeners. (A very few talk hosts manage to bridge the two categories, most notably Don Imus, whose New York-based show airs on both AM and FM stations around the country.)
Washington, playing contrary to reputation, has been the most dependable and creative producer of hot-talk talent, from Stern, who developed his shtick at DC-101 in the early '80s, to Doug "Greaseman" Tracht, to our town's longest-running local bad-boy act, WJFK's Don Geronimo and Mike O'Meara.
But among the top 20 markets, Washington is the weakest for AM radio. We have only a handful of AM stations with signals strong enough to be heard throughout the metropolitan area, and those stations already have reasonably successful programming: all-news WTOP and mostly conservative talk WMAL are the only AM stations in the area that draw big ratings. Black talk WOL, sports talk WTEM and political talk WTNT (home of Imus and Berry) attract much smaller, if devoted, followings. Otherwise, the local AM dial consists largely of weak signals offering foreign-language programs and syndicated talk to barely measurable audiences.
The liberal talkers could try to find a home on FM, but that, too, seems unlikely. The big radio companies that bought up thousands of stations in the consolidation rush of the late '90s own most of the stations in town, and they are generally committed to the music formats they now air.
In Washington, Air America has nowhere to land.
Washington Post columnist Marc Fisher is the author of a forthcoming book on radio and American pop culture.
© 2004 The Washington Post Company