Radio: It’s All About the Train Wrecks

Friday’s Wall Street Journal had a front page piece on how radio is coping with the twin assault of ipods and satellite radio, causing revenue losses for giants like Viacom and Clear Channel. The secret weapon? Engineering “train wrecks,” that mimic the ipod’s eclectic mix of totally different songs playing back to back.

“It’s all about train wrecks,” said Mike O’Reilly, of KCJK-FM in Kansas City. “If you hear MC Hammer go into the Steve Miller Band, I’ve done my job.” They’re also playing more songs, to be more like the ipod, where thousands of tunes are stuffed into the cigarette pack-sized device. Once for KCJK it was 300-400 songs, with the same 30 or 40 playing every day. Now, the station is going against the grain, playing more than 1200 songs, so each gets on the air every few days. Progress, indeed. But we still have to listen to the damn commercials!