From Christmas Eve until New Year's Eve, Artisan Radio will be celebrating Christmas in its own inimitable fashion. Tune in ( http://www.artisanradio.com) to hear everything from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir (Still, Still, Still) to The Jingle Dogs and Cats (Blue Christmas), The Arrogant Worms (Santa Got Arrested) and Kay Martin & Her Bodyguards (Hang Your Balls on the Christmas Tree).
As always, The Best Music You've Probably Never Heard.
Holidays are good for checking the performance of local AM radio, since they always seem to give live staff the day off. So far it's been fun and I'm only on the second station.
The first station, at 550, was running "Manheim Steamroller Christmas Special" which was also on last evening.
Second station at 590 was and is a dead carrier. After 20-minutes a group of commercials and promos aired, and now it's back to dead air.
Let's try 630. A religious station, they have stock church Christmas music, the kind that is all crescendo with no pianissimo. Like 100% sugar paste.
690 is also religious, but their church music is the good kind from a black church with excellent and enjoyable musicians.
770 is always interesting because they carry the mixed ethnic programs, and right now we are hearing music from a european country, excellent arrangements and fine performance, in the foreign tongue. Normally 770 has a poor signal, but this morning it's right up front.
850 yet another church station, running a prolonged flute solo that seems to be finding ways of sustaining so as to fill as much time as possible. Give it another minute. Hmm. A Christmas message from a financial institution. But it's a non-commercial station. Oh well, none of my business, now we get choir, bells, organ and plenty of reverb.
920 a couple of guys talking about sports, an amazing feat from my point of view, since I don't think there is much to say on the subject, yet they go on all day. Oh, now they have a sport's personality on the phone, and except for his mumbled speech, I can almost follow along.
1010 is yet another religious, and there's a guy talking into what sounds like a cassette recorder, selling books. He's asking a question, "Why is the New Testament so Jewish?" I've never heard that question before and wonder if Jewish people would agree with it. None of my business.
1080 another religious station talking about passages which speak to "The power of God." The station could use a little power. It's got a very weak signal.
1120 is usually in some kind of sports action, but today we hear a song repeating the phrase "In a winter wonderland." It sounds like Manheim Steamroller."
Let's quickly go back and check on 590. Somebody must have awakened, there is a phone conversation about sports. Oh, and an "all girl band." Good mix.
Up to 1190. Dependable 24-hour country music machine with no live staff, plugged in and running full tilt.
1260 is the Disney music station, and we'll tune past as quickly as possible to minimize brain damage.
1320 is straight from the pulpit, and we're hearing about "The Gift." Excuse me, just passing through.
1380 is "The Woman," with two or three women holding a frantic and somewhat loud conversation about how crazy Facebook causes users to be.
1430 the oldies machine, no staff, just the songs we heard in grade school.
1490 sports entertainment. Green Bay Packers, Chicago Bears, some guy missed a lot of games because of a broken collar bone, college football, fumbled a touchdown, over 4600 yards. I'm jotting it down as fast as I can.
1550 is a dead carrier. Oh, that's me. My programming hasn't started yet.
1600 another Christian station talking about "Christianity," bible study, something about a bishop, and some kind of description of things the Holy Ghost does. Even if you don't believe in ghosts. "You've got to get past the milk of the word and into the meat of it."
1680 is not even on the air. Oh, that's me. I'm not on the air yet.
Dumb On Down with Dull Dial Radio.