Anybody out There Still Listening to Music on AM or FM Radio?

Megalith

Megalith

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CNET’s audio guru Steve Guttenberg is reminiscing of the good old days when music was largely acquired and consumed via radio. Of course, AM and FM are considered relics now by many due to the plethora of streaming options available, but some still wonder whether music could ever make a comeback to local stations.

I fell out of the habit of listening to music on the radio 10 years ago, but millions of people still do. Even so, news, talk and sports radio seems to be where the money is in radio in 2018. Broadcast radio from stations that have good sound -- usually but not always NPR, public or college radio stations -- heard over the very best tuners can sound quite good. So here's hoping that broadcast local radio stations will survive and prosper.
 
I listen to radio once I've run thru all my weekly podcasts. There's probably 3-4 stations I listen to regularly. Streaming is ok but since I have Project Fi as my cell provider is hard to justify the increase in bill just cuz I want to hear basically the same stuff without the occasional commercial. (That's usually when I station hop anyway).

Ohh I live around Los Angeles, so that's probably helps. Imagine in less populated places you'd have less radio options.
 
FM in the car..sometimes. cd players been jammed for years. most of the time a blown V8 sounds better so it's off. High pitched scream of a ported blower is something to behold at 16 pounds of boost. Simply crushes you into your seat. Second only to med to heavy shot of Nitrous.
 
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In the car I have it on quiet for background noise more than anything. We have a shitty selection of only a few radio stations here, and they all have about 10 songs that they rotate thru.
 
I like Steve Guttenberg. His articles usually come up with great low cost audio configurations, and he doesn't fall for the car-priced audio-jewelry like so many in the business.

That being said, I don't know why radio should be missed and lamented. It's mostly garbage.

I remember listening music on the radio in the early 90's when I was a tween and still had a radio.

Then at some point in the mid 90's I was able to burn mix CD's. Why would I choose to have some random DJ play music I may or may not like, when I can play exactly what I like when I want to?

Then I pretty much stopped listening to new music in the late 90's. Nothing new appealed to me anymore. It was just plain garbage, and since most of the music on the radio is new stuff, I had even less incentive to listen to the radio.

One summer in college in 2002 I had a paid internship and commuted to and from it in my car which didn't have a CD player, so I did listen to some music during my drive. I was disgusted at the horrible crappy state of new popular music in 2002. That was the last time I intentionally heard music on the radio.

I have essentially sworn off commercial radio all together. These days I have my radio in my car pretty much permanently tuned to the local news station, and that's all I ever hear in the car. I rarely ever listen to music at all in the car anymore, but when I do, its via the aux in, with Spotify as the source.

At home most of my music comes via Spotify as well, through to my custom 3 room setup, based around Spotify Connect on a HTPC receiver.

Funny thing is, for the first time since I was like 12, I actually have had a radio in the house for the last year or so, in my HTPC receiver, but I don't think I've used it more than once or twice to test if it was working.
 
Just in the car. Or usually at dads (radio on most of the time in the garage).

Been wanting to make a nice playlist on a USB drive for the radio in my Blazer. Thought about tracking down the GTA radio commercials to mix in there.
 
In the car. Sometimes I just don't want to pick a playlist or not sure what the hell I want to even listen to.. I switch between the rock station and talk radio.
 
To and from work- have an AUX port and a Bluetooth receiver, but only bother with it on longer drives.

Would prefer digital radio and satellite radio on a newer car; I miss Octane!
 
My alarm clock is set to play the FM radio for an hour.
However, someone above mentioned ads and repetitive playlists which do bother me, so I might look into some sort of mp3-playing alarm clock thingy.
..however I have repetitive playlists of my own. Hmmm......
 
I'm not sure if it was moving from east to west coast, or just timing, or aging, or what.. but sometime around that move a dozen years ago or so, FM just became unbearably bad. Where I am now, which is a pretty metro area, the radio station choices are abysmal. I bought a car recently that they activated SiriusXM for me (despite me asking them not to) and it turns out that wasn't as bad a thing as while it's a far cry from the XM of old (which was genuinely good), SiriusXM is light years beyond FM. The only thing I really listen to on FM is NPR, with the occasional college radio. Commercial music channels are painful. Even the classic rock station, which should be a safe bet, tends to just pick bad songs ALL THE TIME.
 
I remember listening to FM radio: 55minutes of music and 5min of ads. Now it's all fucked up: 55min of ads and 5min of music. I may be exaggerating, but that's how it is now every time I tune my car stereo to FM.
I don't bother with AM. Nothing there but static/hiss.

Thanks goodness for XM radio & MP3's
 
I do listen to FM, but they abuse playing the same music.. There is only so many times I listened to Ed Sheeran and Taylor Swift before I developed a visceral near hate reaction.... But, unlike cable it is free.
 
Every day. XM radio sounds like ass and drops out constantly, and I'm not paying $200 a month for unlimited data on my phone to stream whatever.
 
Yes, bluetooth to FM adapter for my old bmw E46 beater.
They've shut down FM net in Norway for some hilarious reason, now it's only DAB so now I don't get any news, information in my life..

It's kinda nice actually.
 
pandrora, mp3s off my phone, or albums on youtube for me 100% of the time. i go through ~3 gb of data for music a month
 
I'm a musician, and since I was about 15, FM radio started to be grating.

I have a google play music sub and typically use the "thumbs-up" playlist (about 2k songs atm) in the car.

Only hear stuff I like, and I have a deep enough pool to keep it fresh. It has taken about a year to build the playlist though.

Every couple months I'll sit and listen to some deep cut and b-side type stuff, to stay educated.

I listen to podcasts on long solo trips.
 
I listen to an FM station when I get out and about in the AM hours (I'm on a 3rd shift schedule). Any other time it is usually a Hulu/Netflix/Amazon/etc. streamed in the car.
 
Only in the work van because there is no cd or aux connection, i hate the radio 2 songs then 3 min of adds with limited playlists
 
Yes I do, but I also realize most of the good radio stations are gone, victims of incompetent cost-cutting management. Thank god we sill have KQRS here in Minnesota. I thought that HD Radio would be a gimmick, but it does sound better and I like seeing the artists and song names on the display.
 
In the truck a lot as the system has no usb, aux or Bluetooth. Sometimes at home for a quick fix in the morning if I'm in a rush or cranked up on summer afternoons so I can hear it on the patio and don't have to interrupt the beer/BBQ managing playlists from my Server. My house amp is a little older and doesn't have Sirius/XM and the interface is unwieldly with the internet radio function so I've rarely used it. I agree with some of the other posts tho in that it can be somewhat repetitive but I get a fair selection of stations here so changing things up is not too hard..
 
I use an app to wake me up to my favorite FM station. I also listen to FM on the way to work and on the way home. Any other time, almost never listen to the radio. Then again, I almost never listen to music that isn't on FM radio. There are a few good FM variety stations in my area.
 
NPR in the morning drive in and music from a USB thumb drive on the way back home in the evening if I listen to music. Unlimited mobile data has really spoiled me to even listening to music, since i can just have YouTube TV running instead - even if I have the screen off and just listen to it.
 
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