What are your radio presets?
 

I was driving to work today, listening to the radio, and it occurred to me this might be an interesting topic. Not only do I think it will be interesting to see what other people listen to, I also think this might be a fun way to be exposed to interesting radio stations around the country (or world, hopefully). These days, a lot of radio stations have live webstreams. I may not be able to listen to these other stations in the car (where I do the vast majority of my radio listening), but it'd be cool to check out radio from other regions while at home. Try to provide a link to each station's website so we can listen in :) Oh, and I realize some cars have like 30 presets these days, but let's try to limit it to no more than 10 stations.

1) 91.5 FM - WBEZ Chicago Public Radio
This is the station I'm listening to 90% of the time when I'm in the car. It has news, music, theatre, human interest, comedy, documentaries... there's almost always something interesting to listen to.

2) 98.7 FM - WFMT Chicago's Classical and Folk Music Radio Station
Thankfully, this station is 90% classical; I don't listen when they play folk. This station has gotten me into trouble in the past - lulled me to sleep while I drove home from my junior prom in HS - but it's great that it has managed to remain successful as radio becomes more homogenized. Like Chicago Public Radio, there are no commercials. Instead, there are pledge drives and occasional announcements about a sponsor. Even better, the people who run the station are truly passionate and knowledgeable about the music.

3) 780 AM - WBBM Newsradio
I used to listen to this station a lot more, until I found Chicago Public Radio. They deliver the news almost 24/7 with timely precision. For example, traffic and weather together on the 8's. The problem is it's all headlines, little substance, and often feels rushed. Sometimes that's what you want though, and it's nice to have a place you can go every 10 minutes for a traffic update on the road.

4) 92.7 FM - Dance Factory Radio, or WCPT Chicago's Progressive Talk
Most of the time I put this station on late at night when it's Dance Factory Radio. If it's late and I'm driving, especially if I'm alone, sometimes it's nice to have some upbeat dance music playing. I only occasionally listen to it during the daytime, when it's the progressive talk station. If I'm going to listen to the news, I'm going to listen to public radio.

5) 101.1 FM - WKQX Q101 Chicago's Alternative
As with most corporate radio stations, it used to be decent but now the majority of music played here sucks. Occasionally they come to their senses though.

6) 97.1 FM - WDRV The Drive
This is Chicago's classic rock station. Not much more to say than that.

7) 88.3 FM - WZRD The Wizard
This one is a college radio station. I've stumbled upon a lot of gems while listening. I'll let them describe it though: "We play whatever, whenever, and it is not unheard of to hear trip hop directly following some African chant. Many shows will follow a theme or mood, but genre reflects neither of these. The Wizard does what it wants."

So what do your radio presets look like?

To be honest, if I'm not listening to music on my iPod or iPhone, the only radio stations I ever listen to are the two big Public Radio stations in LA: 89.3 KPCC in Pasadena, and 89.9 KCRW in Santa Monica.

1. 93.9 Kiss FM

Default station. The music is unoffensive adult contemporary and very ambient. Good for driving at all times.

2. 105.1 G105

They play Radio music that I often do not like and very repeatedly. But their morning show, "Bob and the showgram", ROCKS!!!!

Thats is all the radio I listen to.

1. WJQB True Oldies 106.3

2. Tampa Bay's Classic Hits Online. Listen Live! on 1073theeagle.com

Much to my teenaged son's chagrin, and my 12 year old's mischieveous delight, I've allocated all 12 presets on my car's FM bands to two radio stations. Both of which are playing non-stop Christmas music:

97.3 Toronto EZ Rock - all Christmas Music All the time this month ( Home Page | 97.3 EZ Rock )

&

98.1 CHFI - Toronto's official Christmas Music Station ( 98.1 CHFI - Toronto's Lite Favourites )


Every Car ride is a joy!

- The AM band has alternating settings between The Fan 590 (Sports) & AM 640 Toronto's Official Leafs Station.

I tend to leave my radio on one station and not pay attention to it. I often get lost in thought when I'm driving. I have 12 pre-sets, but I only use 2 of them.

1. 106.5 The End: 90's music with some rock thrown in. Bob & Tom in the mornings. I will be on that show one day. I swear to god, I will.

2. 99.7 The Fox: Classic Rock, only changed if I can't hear 106.5 for some reason.

I usually listen to CDs when driving, but the radio station I listen to when I'm tired of CDs is WDST 100.1 http://wdst.com which is a local, independent radio station. Once in a while I will listen to WPDH 101.5 http://wpdh.com, classic rock on my afternoon drive home

I've got 12 presets on my car stereo, but I only listen to my ipod. If I forget the ipod or its not working, there is only one station that I listen to:
103.9 FM - The Hawk. Nothing but classic rock. RAWK! \m/

I listen primarily to my iPod, then to my CDs (6 disc changer), then I turn to radio if I can't find something I want to hear.

I'll go through my FM1 presets, since I can't remember all of them on FM2 (I usually don't have to go that far to find something to stop and listen to).

1. 91.7, WVXU Cincinnati. NPR! I miss WAMU in DC like crazy when I listen to WVXU, but at least they have some of the better shows on there.

2. 92.9, WGTZ Dayton. This station used to be top 40-ish, but they changed it over relatively recently to a "variety" format.

3. 94.1, WNNF Cincinnati. This station used to be touted as a "mix" station but now is a little more top 40 with a lot of mix thrown in.

4. 94.9, WREW Cincinnati. This is called "Rewind 94.9" and is touted as "feel good hits from the 80s and more." It's seriously the best radio station out there, and I can listen to it for the most part without ever wanting to change the station.

5. 101.9, WKRQ Cincinnati. Q-102, this is the local top 40 station and is extremely popular.

6. 107.1, WKFS Cincinnati. This is Kiss 107 and is a little more hip hop than Q-102's top 40. It's very much club music.

My FM2 presets are generally more of the country variety, and I usually only go there if I can't find something to listen to on any of these stations.

BBC World Service
Radio 4, a classical music station.

I don't have a cable connection or I would add more classical music stations and a jazz station if I could find a good one.

94.9 KUWO - the local NPR station. This is the station I listen to the most. The only time I turn it away is when they have celebrity guests or gardening talk shows. I care for neither.

92.5 - Old school and new hits

93.3 KUBE - main stream hip hop stuff....I'm tired of this damn station actually, but they do have some good songs

106.1 KISS - main stream popular stuff, includes rock, hip hop, alternative, etc...

106.9 - soft hits, mostly pop music and "family" stuff. It also has Delilah

Technically, I have 18 FM presets and 6 AM presets at my disposal. FM1 is set to all the stations I get where I live, FM2 is set to Portland, and FM3 is set to Seattle stations.

Locally, I listen to:
103.1, which is a FM translator in my area for KOPB radio, our public radio network. This is the station I listen to the most, whether I'm at home, at work, or in the car. My SO and I have very different tastes in music, but we can always agree to listen to public radio. My favorite shows are Car Talk, Fresh Air, and the Moth Radio Hour. I also really like to catch World Have Your Say, the BBC's global call-in show. I love hearing where people are calling from.

106.3, KLOO-FM, the local rock station, though they really play a variety of stuff. It's not uncommon to hear Amy Winehouse back to back with Eric Clapton. They are my favorite music station because they play such an interesting variety.

96.1 KZEL-FM, rock station out of Eugene that mostly plays classic rock. If KLOO isn't playing a song I like, I flip over to KZEL.

99.1 KOOL-FM, a 80s, 90s, and today station; right now they're playing all Christmas music. I like to listen to it once in a while, when I catch a song I grew up with.

94.5 Mix FM, which is similar in format to KOOL.

Lastly, my favorite Portland station is on my dial, though reception is spotty where we are: 101.9, KINK-FM, which is adult alternative. Basically, they play Neil Finn, and other singer-songwriter/acoustic/ambient stuff that I love. But mostly I love them because they play more Crowded House than just "Don't Dream It's Over."

When I'm in Portland, I also like to listen to KBOO, 90.7. If you are ever in Portland, I insist that you listen to it! KBOO Community Radio And hey, thanks to this thread, I've learned that KBOO operates a translator where I live! Score! They play a super-eclectic variety of music, lots of world music, hip-hop, reggae. When I was a teenager we used to cruise around town in my friend's tiny BMW when the reggae show was on, and just BLAST it.

Though it's not on my dial, I will also pop over to 88.7 KBVR (my college radio station) from time to time. I don't really care for the way they format the station, so I really only ever listen to try and win prizes if I know they are doing a promo. I won free tickets to Rita Rudner (the Mom's Weekend comedy show) thanks to KBVR.

I don't drive so I only listen to my iPod.

I listen to CBC Radio 3 podcasts a lot. In the house, I rarely listen to the radio. When I do, I listen to BBC Worldservice.

In Canada, when I did have a car, I had CBC Radio One on the radio the vast majority of the time. If I moved around the dial, I would have 102.1 The Edge on a preset as well as a couple of the campus stations. Other than that, radio was pretty shitty.

I too usually only listen to the old ipod in the car...although I dust off the cds on occasion for that old school feel. Although when I do wind up on short drives or forget my music I usually go to either:

102.9 out of Nashville for the rock...if I REALLY want rock, the station is pretty mainstream and boring most of the time.
WMOT 89.5 out of MTSU in Murfreesboro because I'm kind of a snot head jazz fan

Other then that I don't much care for all the talk, country and bad pop festering on most radio stations around here.

:)Just having a chuckle over cd's being old school.....

Mine are almost identical to smeth's, in no small part because we often share cars along with similar likes and dislikes. :) However, the main difference is that I also have 101.9 The Mix and 103.5 KISS FM, because every once and a while I'm in the mood for some fun and catchy pop music.

I know! It dawned on me recently that cds are becoming a little old fashioned, its amazing how few people seem to use them anymore. Whats really funny is digging out the old cassette tapes I owned in high school...they aren't quite retro enough to be cool yet like vinyl so I just wind up getting wierd looks.

I love my presets...I also have it set up so I can hit all the stations within 4 clicks.

1. 97.7 Max FM - Their tagline is "you'll hear everything," which is why I love it. It's usually a pretty good mix of everything from the '60s til now.

2. 95.3 the Eagle - Dayton's classic rock station

3. 97.3 the Wolf - Used to be the Sound, which played a heavy dose of 90s alternative, with really cool DJs. Sadly, the Sound is no more, but since I like country, too, I kept it on the preset.

4. 92.5 the Fox - Cincinnati's classic rock station.

5. Mix 107.7 - Okay, so I like the mix stations. This one also has the Time Warp Lunch (and sponsors the Time Warp Prom every year), as well as the Saturday Night Mix (which synchs with what's playing at a Dayton dance club.) I'm pretty sure they do a "90s at 9" show, and Nina Blackwood's Absolutely 80s as well.

6. Q102 - 90s & Now... this one has Holly Morgan DJing, and I like her. She's not as good as Luka was a few years ago, but that's okay. This one plays a lot of recent pop trash, but the station's been around for...jeez...30 years? And of course, I indulge in top 40 bubblegum quite a bit :)

7. Frequency 94.1 - Another Top 40 station... format's changed a bit over the years, but this is the station that used to host Pillow Talk, a request & dedication show I fell asleep to every night. Mostly a mix of 70s-now.

8. 105.9 the Rebel - Yeah, so I like country. Mostly newer stuff, but they'll play some 80s & 90s stuff, too.

9. WGRR 103.5 - Another station that's shifted format over the years... it used to be all 50s & 60s, and while it still plays older music, it's more late 60s-mid 80s now.

10. 104.7 WTUE - Rock, ranging from classic to recent.

11. WHKO 99.1 - Another country station. This one mixes in older stuff with the newer stuff.

12. WGUC 90.9 - Cincinnati Public Radio. I ignore the talky bits, but I like the classical music.



Aaaand there you have it. I have radio ADD, I think

I have 18 FM presets and they are all different.

My main two stations are

X96: ((X96)) LOCAL, INDEPENDENT, ALTERNATIVE ROCK which is an alternative station
101.9 the End: 101.9 The End - Home of the Chunga Show which is another alternative station

If I'm not listening to one of them, I listen to classic rock, hard rock, adult contemporary, a little country, mix stations like Jack FM or classical. I hate top 40/hip hop crap and I can't listen to talk radio in the car. It puts me to sleep.