Just a Gwai Lo - fun within prescribed limits

Mark Rahner: “KEXP's content and vibe fall somewhere between college radio and NPR. Its music is either eclectic or obscure depending upon your mood, but as far as you can get from the sameness and heavy rotation of a few artists, played by the strenuously unfunny morning hosts on most commercial pop stations. If there's one thing that fans and detractors agree on, it's that you can listen to KEXP for long stretches without hearing a familiar tune.”

Tricia Romano: “Shocking news: New York City doesn't have everything! Seattle radio station KEXP is a hit with New Yorkers. New Yorkers love the station so much they comprise the largest number of listeners outside of the Seattle area, tuning in online and donating $20,000 to the station.”

AccordionGuy: “one of the best radio stations out there is Seattle's KEXP, which broadcasts both on regular analog radio and online. They are an independent, commercial-free radio station with amazing DJs, playlists to die for, and have shows and guests that nobody else could have possibly landed (one recent treat was french synthpop duo Air peforming live in their studios).”

Since WOXY Cincinnati sold its air license and ended its Internet broadcasts, (see below), and after hearing about it from the AccordionGuy, KEXP replaced has been my radio station of choice. Vancouver has nothing like WOXY or KEXP, which both have great music without the left-wing politics talk shows during the day like Vancouver's independent and university stations, and KEXP is so good that I'm considering junking my MP3 collection, small as it is. KEXP's playlist is constantly updated, so if you don't recognize the tune but really like it, there's a listing of the track title, artist and album the song came from, sometimes with notes about the song.

Check it out though: WOXY Cincinatti is coming back: “Like Phoenix rising from the ashes, 97X - just as we have always loved it - will be returning soon. It will take us a few weeks to get set up for the future, but be assured that Mike and Barb and Shiv and Bryan Jay are already hard at work to bring it all back.”

Andy Baio notes that a Clear Channel radio station has changed over to alternative rock in response to alternative rock's originator KROQ's general suckitude. The station evidently calls itself "Your Independent Radio Station", but I have a hard time believing a station belonging to a nationwide chain is "Independent". The playlists that Andy cites [1, 2] aren't actually that exciting compared to my favourite station, WOXY Cincinnati. It has a more legitimate claim to being actually independent. For a for-profit radio station—it doesn't claim to be otherwise—it also has a more interesting playlist. Does Indie 103-1 have Lyrics Born (from the Quannum crew) on its playlist? (Now that I think about it, it's an honest question, seeing has how both 103-1 and Lyrics Born are straight outta California.) Plus I have to wonder how open they are to listener requests.

In the past two years or so, I've requested WOXY to play songs twice (both times DJ Shadow, and both times I left it up to the radio DJ to pick which song) and got them played. And I don't even live in the same country as the station! One of the local radio stations here in Vancouver—Jack FM—purports to play what the DJ's want to play. That's opposed to most commercial radio stations which, despite what they tell you, have songs picked out, often by a computer, often from head office (which may or may not be in the same city as the station), and not by its listeners. Whenever Jack FM says "we play what we want", but—and I still get mileage out of this—I yell back "stop playing what you want and play what I want to hear!". [first link via Adam]