Spring cleaning

Hi kids! Miss me?

Okay, news has been slow lately. So, I've been taking a bit of a break. Lots of things going on in the outside world, ya know.

Not to mention that this beautiful spring weather brings other things that are not so beautiful - namely every airborne allergen one can possibly imagine. Needless to say, I've been feeling pretty crappy as of late.

But there's oh so much to talk about. so without further ado, here we go:

Yes indeed, Lionel is now on Air America Radio. Lionel wrapped up his WOR gig just over a week ago, and some right-wing dork named Steve Malzberg has been hired to take his place. Nonetheless, Lionel fans (and I know you're out there) can tune in every day now, twelve hours earlier than normal, to hear "The Lionel Show" on Air America.

The rest of Air America's roster changes will be phased in starting this weekend, with Sam Seder's new Sunday afternoon show debuting this Sunday, May 20. Next Monday sees the weekday shuffle, as they launch "The Air Americans" weeknights (8P-midnight ET), bump Jon Elliott to three hours later (midnight-3AM ET) and make other changes. You can see the rest here.

And soon, you'll see a whole new Air America website. That is, if you can actually pull up their website (which seems to have been on the fritz too frequently as of late). I dunno, when I redesigned my site, I worked on it offline, then launched it in mere seconds, with no disruption. Then again, it doesn't seem like a real web-saavy bunch over there. Nonetheless, look for a redesigned presence and allegedly a new logo for Air America sometime soon. Perhaps prior to next week's on-air makeover. So if you haven't listened to or downloaded those year-old airchecks currently at the bottom of their front page, better get a move on. Stop procrastinating.

One show that will be displaced is "EcoTalk" with Betsy Rosenberg. Air America programmers dropped it from the weekday lineup, in order to roll out the new lineup. They did however reserve a Sunday slot for the show, 10A-noon ET. Only thing is, Rosenberg and company are trying to line up sponsors to keep it going. Doing a radio show isn't cheap, and they actually have to pay out of their own pocket. You can read more here.

As Lionel makes his Air America debut today, another liberal talk show makes its return today. After pondering the shuttering of the whole operation, Radiopower.org has rebounded, deciding to rebuild instead. And today, they welcome Tony Trupiano to the fold, with a new show airing exclusively on Radiopower. It will air from noon-3P ET weekdays, displacing Thom Hartmann, who will no longer be on the service. Trupiano has been around talk radio for awhile, mostly syndicated around his home state of Michigan. A few years back, he left radio to run for Congress. As of late, he has returned to the airwaves, often as a fill-in for Ed Schultz. Now, he's back on the air. Other shows on Radiopower currently include "American AM," a Tampa-area morning show, "KC Live," which I have absolutely no information on, and Peter Werbe's Sunday night show, which airs on WRIF in Detroit. Replays of the shows fill out the remainder of the schedule.

Another web radio service serving up liberal talk is Head-On Radio Network, which I regrettably don't get around to covering much (and some of those guys have been getting on my ass about it). Like Radiopower, they carry a generous slate of original programming, running a live lineup from 10A to 9P ET weekdays, with replays filling out the remainder of the lineup. There's been quite a bit of shuffling as of late, a new website layout (take THAT, Air America!) and other tweaks. You can check out shows such as "The Cup-o-Joe Radio Show" with Joe Vecchio, "Fox'd Up" with Jon Fox, Jeff Alan Wolf, Bill O' Brien, Guy James, Mark Levine and Bob Kincaid. They do a pretty bang-up job, pay out of pocket to provide quality talk radio to the streaming masses, and generally kick ass and take names. So instead of bitching and moaning about Air America and their balancing act of trying to please fickle listeners and terrestrial radio people at the same time, you can check out some legitimate alternatives. Check them out at Headonradionetwork.com.

Fans of Stephanie Miller are still gushing over her MSNBC simulcasts a few weeks ago. Don't look for this to become permanent. Miller said she would not want to do it again, whatever that means. MSNBC, in the wake of the whole Imus fiasco, has been in the process of throwing things against the wall to see what sticks. Last week was Moral Court radio clown Larry Elder. MSNBC has also been shuffling their own hosts in and out of the slot, and this week White House correspondent David Gregory steps in, and he may get the gig permanently.

If you're a fan of fine theater looking for something a little more esoteric, then head over to Chicago, where "Jerry Springer: The Opera" has made its trek across the Atlantic from 609 performances in London. The production, about the talk show host and former Air America personality, starts on May 14 at Bailiwick Repertory in Chicago. How intriguing is this? David Soul, the former "Hutch" of "Starsky and Hutch" played Springer at one point, and both Harvey Keitel and Kevin Kline have reportedly been courted to play the role. Wow. Just plain wow.

Last we checked, WCMI in Asheville KY/Huntington, WV was still on the air and carrying Air America Radio programming. And they're evidently getting some attention, since the local paper even wrote an article about the syndicated radio show that appears on the station - The Young Turks. "They're one of the hottest commodities in progressive radio," WCMI Assistant Program Director Brandon Millman said recently. You can read more courtesy of the Herald-Dispatch.

Another newspaper article about a talk radio station came Sunday, as the Traverse City Record-Eagle did an article about Petoskey, MI move-in WJML. As you read here last week, the owner of WJML consummated some station-swapping, dealing mostly liberal talk WWKK and a quarter million in cash to another company in exchange for their high-powered Traverse City station. As a result, the best of the former WWKK and WJML have been combined on one station, simulcast in both Petoskey and Traverse City. So, liberal talk fans in Traverse City can now hear Ed Schultz every afternoon right before Michael Savage, and maybe even tune in to Air America, albeit delayed into the wee hours. Provided they don't sleep at night, of course.

Conservodorks are paranoid and live in perpetual fear that liberals are coming after them to force Limbaugh, Hannity, et. al. off the airwaves. Oh boo fucking hoo!

Oh shit. It's back. Just what we need - more unfunny comedy on television.

And finally, a side note to President Bush: Never, NEVER accidently joke about a 281 81-year old woman being alive during the the time of the 13 colonies. Especially if she's the Queen of England. Just plain embarassing. I'm beginning to worry about the 28% that still like this guy. Perhaps expected incoming British Prime Minister Gordon Brown will remember this, as he's expected to be less of a lapdog to the Bush Administration. We shall see.

Ratings Roundup Fall 2006: Part 4

For the fourth part of LTR's Arbitron ratings analysis of the liberal talk format across the USA, we take a trip down to red state country (though they are turning a rather bright shade of purple at this point). Yes, we're going down south!

And what better place to start than the southernmost commercial liberal talk station in the country? WINZ in Miami (market #12) has been relatively successful since they signed on to the format two and a half years ago. For this past fall, they have held on to their listener base and maintained a 1.5 share, similar to what they've gotten in the past year's ratings books. This puts them just a fifth of a share behind all-sports WQAM, a station that features their own liberal talker, Neil Rogers. Due to the racial and ethnic makeup of the market, The top talk station in the market is Spanish-language WAQI. Second place belongs to WIOD, the Limbaugh/Hannity station (every market has one), which finished with a 2.5 share. There is another sports station in the market, WAXY, at a 1.0, and finishing dead last is Fort Lauderdale's WFTL, which carries the likes of O'Reilly, Savage and Ingraham. They eke out a 0.3 share. WINZ has gotten more aggressive in their scheduling in the past few months, as they've dropped Al Franken, moved Ed Schultz to a live slot and began airing South Florida's own Randi Rhodes in a live afternoon slot. Mike Malloy was recently added for nights.

Up the coast in West Palm Beach (#46), Rhodes' original flagship station, WJNO, aka "The Palm Beaches' Home for Rush Limbaugh & Randi Rhodes," holds on to its top five ranking, jumping half a point to a 3.8 share. Granted, this is not an all-liberal talk station, as they do carry Glen Beck and Limbaugh in middays, but they do air Rhodes and a delay of Schultz' show in late afternoons and early evenings respectively. Rhodes has historically outdrawn Limbaugh in regard to number of listeners. The other talk stations are farther down the list, including WZZR, an FM 'hot talk' station. WINZ, WIOD and WFTL are all tied at a 1.9 share. In the fall book, WINZ more than doubled their ratings since last summer for this market.

Up the coast in Daytona Beach (#89), independently-owned WPUL is a station that carries all the Jones Radio syndicated talkers (Bill Press, Stephanie Miller and Schultz), Al Franken, and evening sports show ("2 Live Stews"), Lionel and conservotalker Rollye James in overnights. They are basically a hybrid station that airs a combination of liberal talk and African-American talk. They carry no Air America Radio product. WPUL is fighting an uphill battle, as they are hampered by little promotion and a very weak 1000 watt daytime signal (32 watts at night). They are dead last in the book (as far as rated stations go) with a 0.4 share.

In Asheville, NC (#161), WPEK ("880 The Revolution") is the little station that could. They put out some pretty strong daytime power, as 5,000 watts goes a long way at 880AM. However, they are a daytimer, meaning that they must sign off the air from sunset to sunrise. Nonetheless, they're doing quite well, as they maintain a 2.6 share, good for 9th place. Ratings have improved over the past year. Local Clear Channel management have been pretty aggresive in building this station, as they carry local programming, offer podcasts and seem to do some promotion of the station around town. See what happens when management actually does something with a station besides ignore it?

Across the state, WCHL in Chapel Hill perhaps fits in best with the Raleigh/Durham market (#43). The station, which carries Miller, Schultz and (for now) Franken, in addition to lots of local shows, sports programming and Air America's weekend and overnight slate of programming, superserves the Chapel Hill area, due to its limited signal that realistically only covers the western half of the market. The station's owners, Vilcom Interactive Media, have wisely chosen to target the affluent Chapel Hill area as a local station rather than trying to fight it out with the Raleigh stations. In short, they are a no-show in the marketwide ratings book, and it doesn't really matter. WCHL is one of those stations that doesn't really cater to ratings.

In Memphis (#49), Entercom-owned WWTQ has recently taken on the call letters from its New Orleans sister station, WSMB. Unfortunately, they did not take this opportunity to update (or even clean up) their outrageously ugly and outdated website. I mean, just look at that hideous logo! And I'm sure their on-air presentation isn't too impressive either. It's a shame, since this station really puts out some serious power, with a 10,000 watt daytime signal that reaches parts of six states (not that tough in Memphis, however) and as far as Little Rock and Tupelo. Unfortunately, it's a neglected station. While they did at one time put up a few billboards and even make a few bumper stickers, the station has obviously been neglected as of late. WSMB comes in with a 0.5 share, tied with something called "Family Values Radio" (if you consider Neal Boortz, Bill Bennett and a bunch of advice shows to be 'family values'). Ironically, they are both tied for #2 in the market as far as talk radio is concerned. As the saying goes, you get what you pay for. As for other stations in the market, the most successful ones are targeted toward African-Americans, which make up almost half the market population. Hopefully, Entercom gets their act together and gives this station the attention it deserves. Then again, the same company did do a half-assed job with the original WSMB, and is horribly neglecting WWKB in Buffalo. On the other hand, they're not doing too bad with KCTC in Sacramento or WROC in Rochester.

In the West Virginia/Kentucky border market of Huntington/Ashland (#156), WCMI, which assumed the liberal talk format of sister station WRVC a few months ago and expanded on it, enjoyed an actual presence in the fall ratings book, going from virtually no listeners under its previous sports format to a 0.9, edging out WRVC, which holds at a 0.6. This station flip seems to have worked, as it seperates the sports programming of the two low-powered AM stations and gives a 24/7 clearance to liberal talk in the market. So far, it seems to be paying off.

In the next and last installment of this series of reports, we'll take a look at the upper East Coast and the Northeastern United States, from Pennsylvania to Main. Look for that tomorrow.

WRVC and WCMI do a switcheroo in Huntington/Ashland

Several people have emailed me regarding WRVC in Huntington, WV, and their flip to sports talk.

Well, there's good news and there's bad news in this. First, the bad news is obviously WRVC, a station that previously dropped all of their progressive talk programming except for Al Franken and Ed Schultz a few months ago. As of today, they are a fulltime ESPN Radio-affiliated sports talk station.

But there's also some good news. Co-owned WCMI (1340AM), in nearby Ashland, KY, cedes its sports programming to WRVC and picks up a full-time progressive talk roster, consisting mostly of Air America Radio programming and Ed Schultz live.

The only semi-bad news in this is that WCMI's 700 1000 watt signal may be a bit weak in Huntington, though its city grade signal does cover the city's outskirts. Plans are in the works to upgrade to 1000 watts in the future. WRVC is currently the most powerful signal in the area, blasting 5000 watts during the day, though a bit hampered with a highly directional 1000 watts at night.

WCMI's schedule is mostly Air America, though they will air Thom Hartmann's midday show in place of Al Franken's, and also pick up Schultz live. Randi Rhodes' show will be delayed to the 6-9PM slot. The skipping over of Franken lends more credence to rumors that he will leave radio in the near future, a rumor I still have not been able to confirm or debunk.

UPDATE 1/11/07: Thanks to KCMI chief engineer Cameron Smith for an email update on the station's signal:

I saw on your blog that you had WCMI listed as 700 watts.

WCMI is licensed by the FCC for 1000 watts - non-directional fulltime.

http://www.fcc.gov/fcc-bin/amq?list=0&facid=21588

The license was granted 7/5/2005 and the facilities are at the full licensed power of 1kW.

(Now you have a nearly-30% power-increase just by doing a little fact-checking).

Thank you for your time,

Cameron Smith
Director of Engineering
Kindred Communications
WDGG-FM, WRVC-AM/FM/FM-1, WCMI
Marshall University / ISP Radio Network

Thanks for the update, Cameron. Obviously, I put too much faith in sites other than the FCC's (which can sometimes lag in updating). And it looks like the other guys have their information straight as well. Sorry about that, especially considering how seriously engineers take their masterwork.