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Recently in a discussion about local radio stations, noted local actor Ryan Girard mentioned that 97.1 ‘The River‘ was “all Eagles, all the time”.

While not literally true, you know what he meant.  So the question is: “How often does WFOX play the Eagles?”.  Here’s what a recent sample found…

At random times of day over the course of a week, the station was hit 20 times.  And the results?

• 3 times commercials
• 6 times an Eagles song was playing
• 4 times Fleetwood Mac
• 7 times something else

So… more than a third of the time when not playing commercials, Don Henley is thrust upon you.  What makes this happen?  Here’s a theory…

70s FM radio and album sales were largely dominated by 3 groups:  The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, and Steely Dan.  Each took a specific genre of music and reconceived it for the pop rock audience.  Steely Dan took jazz, Fleetwood Mac remade the blues, and the Eagles (and their even more insidious alter egos… Poco) were instrumental in creating California Country Rock.  The River is trying to appeal to primarily white boomer aged classic rock fans whose taste for anything that could be confused with R&B or Rap is minimal at best.  As a result the more corporate rock and country infused you can make it, the more it sends the message that this is music for Cul-De Sac oriented white suburban folks.  Not a lot of MC5 on that station.  Not even as much of the Dan as folks might like.  Too Risky.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 1st, 2007 at 10:23 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.