KDYL 1060....

[amanuensis]

Wow, what an amazing playlist for Classic Hits 109. www.classichits109.torontocast.stream/70spopup_tc.html

Joan Baez, BeeGees, Barry Manilow, Foreigner, Elton John, Four Seasons, Kenny Loggins, Bruce Springsteen, Three Dog Night, Bad Finger, Terry Jacks, Anne Murray, Eddie Money, Wings, ABBA, Toto, Seals & Croft, Moody Blues, Bread, Stevie Wonder, America, Kenny Rogers, Olivia Newton-John, Jackson Five, John Denver, Carpenters, Orleans, Eagles ...

I would LOVE for a SLC station to play such a broad-format hits playlist.

[David]

I agree, and classic hits is a popular format for many AM stations. Classic hits usually encompasses music from the 1970's through the 1990's, so the tunes are new enough to appeal to a younger demographic than "real oldies" from the 1950's and 1960's or adult standards. However, KDYL's owner is going to have to be realistic about his asking price to sell the station before anyone will buy it. KDYL is obviously a fixer upper, and the price needs to reflect that.

[CAwasinNJ]

David, the lack of legal ID I was referring to was in reference to your posts of the 19th. Was there music playing when you didn't hear the ID's that day?

As for classic hits on AM, I can't think of many running a mainstream music format of any kind that aren't a nominal primary for a translator. At the moment that doesn't seem likely.

Also, I'm not sure I agree with the definition of classic hits as 70's to 90's but that's another subject.

[David]

RE: My post on the 19th. That was during the time KDYL was airing new age music, and I never heard a legal ID. In fact, I haven't heard a legal ID on KDYL since the Radio Unica programming disappeared. I haven't listened much to the Classic Hits 109 music yet, so I can't comment on whether or not KDYL is airing any ID's now.

[David]

I finally heard an ID this morning about 10:30: it was dropped in right in the middle of Styx's "Come Sail Away". ID was a female voice with an Asian accent, and it sounded like she said "KDYL, Salt Lake City". If the FCC wanted to nit pick, I suppose they could cite KDYL for not using their COL in the ID, which is South Salt Lake. But since they haven't fined KDYL for an off frequency transmitter and using day power at night, I doubt not using the station's COL in the ID is going to matter.

Speaking of the off frequency transmitter, last night was the first time I didn't hear the low rumbling sound on 1060. And it's too bad the "Classic Hits 109" format is likely just a placeholder until KDYL is sold. I'm really liking the variety of songs and artists they're playing. It's nice to hear something on AM radio besides sports yak, Spanish language stations, and endless re-hashing of politics. :-)

[CAwasinNJ]

I heard a rumble on 1060 early this morning though the only audio seemed to be some kind of talk programming. I didn't stick around long enough to figure that out and I don't understand the technical stuff on how stations being slightly off frequency from each other would cause a rumble.

If one were an optimist one might think that the classic hits format is from an LMA. The likelihood of a web stream LMAing KDYL seems pretty remote though. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if the streamer didn't even know about it. Come to think of it, has anyone checked if the Torontocast stream matches what's on air?

[David]

Classic Hits 109 has two different streams on Tune In, and neither one matches what's playing on KDYL unless there's a delay on either the streams or the over the air broadcast. FWIW, I listened to the legal ID more closely, and it does indeed announce South Salt Lake as the COL. It's given so quickly that my 50 something ears took a few listens to hear it clearly. :-) It's being dropped in on the hour and half hour, and it's taken on a strange new twist. After the legal ID was given at 11:30 AM Friday, the same female voice said "Jeffrey Epstein did not kill himself" right after the legal ID. What in the heck is that about??!

Even though the listing for KDYL on the RadioTV Deals site says the owner is willing to LMA the station, I still think the web stream is unfortunately just a placeholder. There seemed to be some automation malfunctions with the new age music that led to long periods of dead air, so a web stream is probably a more reliable feed. And given the shaky history of LMA arrangements on KDYL, the owner would probably be better off selling the station outright.

[CAwasinNJ]

In my experience there's always a delay between and OTA signal and a web stream because the stream provider is accounting for hiccups in receiving the signal over the internet to redistribute, but that's when the stream is a copy of what's going over the air. Here it's the other way around. If I were doing this on air I might be doing the same thing and buffering a minute of the downloaded Classic Hits signal to make sure the air feed went smoothly.

As for the legal ID, it sounds like the kind of thing Radio China might have said. A snippet of an aircheck maybe?

[David]

The ID with the Jeffrey Epstein reference was only airing on the half hour. In fact, it sounds like a different female voice is doing the ID now, and it kind of sounds like the ID might be computer generated. I'm guessing the Epstein ID isn't aired at the TOH because the FCC takes a dim view of that sort of content in a legal ID. I remember many years ago when 107.9 was KRPN, but they branded the station as "WKRP" because of the format. The legal ID got them in hot water with the FCC because it said "KRP IN Roy" instead of just giving the call letters and COL. It seems ironic that KDYL's owner is suddenly concerned about FCC regulations now that the station is for sale. I can tell the station is finally reducing its power at night, because at 5:00 PM Saturday afternoon, there was a noticable reduction in signal strength. Right now KDYL is getting wiped out by a Catholic station on the same frequency, which I'm assuming is KRCN in Boulder.

The only other reason I can think of for the Epstein reference is that KDYL is stunting for a new right wing fringe talk format similar to what KYAH 540 in Delta has. The reference sounds like something one might hear on Alex Jones' show.

[tuttle]

I had never followed the many adventures of James Su and his foray into American broadcasting but here's the link to an interesting read about his efforts. It offers some good background on KDYL and similar signals all over North America.

www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/china-radio/

[David]

Mr. Su has been selling some of his radio stations recently, or at least trying to. Besides KDYL being up for sale, Su recently sold his station in Oregon. I guess the financial strain of operating a network of radio stations with only a handful of listeners has become too much of a liability for him. BTW, I don't think anything ever came of the DOJ investigation mentioned in the Reuters article. However, it seems like the marketplace has determined there's not a need for a network of radio stations relaying programming from China Radio International in the U.S.

[David]

The Classic Hits 109 re-broadcast on KDYL has been replaced by dead air theater again. There's been nothing but an open carrier on 1060 for at least two days now. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted.

[CAwasinNJ]

The FCC hasn't made editorial judgements on content for many decades, let alone what's before or after a legal ID. As long as they say "KDYL South Salt Lake" then anything before or after it is irrelevant. I don't know about the specific instance of a problem with KRPN you're talking about, but if they had said "WKRP 'N Roy" that would be perfectly legal. There's a very famous legal that was done for years by WGTZ in Ohio. The COL is Eaton and they used to have some fun with that. You can hear it at tophour.com/audio/index.php?q=f&f=%2FDayton+OH Look for the WGTZ June 1996 aircheck.

It's also worth noting that I've heard many live reads on KUER sticking the word "in" between the callsign and the COL, as well as Doug Wright on KSL almost always saying "KSL AM Salt Lake City". Nope, neither is permissible and as far as I know neither has been fined. And then there are the music stations that bury the ID in the middle of a 5 minute stopset at :20 before the hour and only run a big sweeper with no ID at the actual top of the hour. No, that isn't "as close as possible" guys. If you can run a big sweeper you can take 2 seconds to put the legal in too. Again, no fines.

It seems to me the whole CRI thing was a tempest in a teapot from day 1. Politicians got all in a lather over China broadcasting propaganda over our airwaves and gave the stations a ton of free publicity. Had they just kept quiet nobody would have even noticed. Once the publicity died down it turned out, to no great surprise, that nobody was listening and the whole thing was a waste. and now they've thrown in the towel. And while we're on the subject of Chinese propaganda, how about the incessant ads for Shen Yun? Ugh.

[David]

I seem to recall Michael J mentioning something about the WKRP/KRPN call sign during the time he worked there in the early 1990's, but I could be wrong. As for the Shen Yun ads, I guess I'm listening to the wrong radio stations for those. I haven't heard any ads for Shen Yun since KLO aired them last year when they were performing at Weber State.

[David]

Update: The open carrier on 1060 has been replaced by a re-broadcast of "soft rock radio dot net", which bills itself as the singer/songwriter hits of the 1970's, 1980's and 1990's, and your favorite soft rock classics or something similar. So apparently that's the format of the week on KDYL for now. ;-)

I'm wondering about the legal ramifications of re-broadcating an internet music feed on a terrestrial broadcast station. Is it a violation of FCC rules to do what KDYL has been doing, since royalties are likely not being paid for broadcasting music over the air?