The Homoginization of America

Well, I'm back home after spending a week on the road to attend a wedding up in Ohio. My niece and her long-time boyfriend finally decided to tie the knot. It was a happy occasion, complete with bagpipes, dancing, wedding cake and a free-flow of alcohol. The better half and I spent five days on the road, touching parts of eight states which, as far as I could tell, looked pretty much the same.

I blame it on the homoginization of America.

Two news items caught my eye which seem to reinforce the notion. For one, the company which absorbed the Budweiser people made noises about absorbing the Miller people. For the other, the large radio conglomerate Clear Channel changed its name to I (heart) Radio.

Well, I (heart) radio, too, but I have for years loved my radio stations because they were all quite different from each other. When I got into radio some years ago, there were essentially two local stations in town, WBEX and WCHI. WBEX had an FM counterpart which, when I started there, ran elevator music on a couple of huge reel-to-reel tapes which needed to be changed every once in a while. Not long after I got there, we had a fellow come in who decided that instead of elevator music, we should play "country" music on the FM. The AM stations essentially ran the same programming, except with different people doing the announcing. WCHI was a daytimer - running sunrise to sunset... WBEX ran 1,000 watts in the day and 250 watts at night, usually signing off at eleven thirty or so.

Then, everything changed.

About 10-15 years ago, all of the local radio stations were purchased by Clear Channel, including a stand-alone FM which had popped up twenty years earlier. Now, everything is run out of the same building using mostly the same air talent - two guys - who put on different hats on different times. Efficient, sure. Both men in question still have the same voice they did when I was working with them back in the '90's and God love them both. They're moderately well taken care of and they will undoubtedly enjoy their pensions when they finally retire.

That being said, WBEX and WCHI sound quite a bit like other "local" radio stations run by the group formerly known as Clear Channel. I know, I tuned in similar Clear Channel stations on the way up and on the way back to Ohio. There are certain set formats which are shared, so the radio stations in Chillicothe, Ohio sound an awful lot like radio stations in West Virginia, in Kentucky, in Indiana... and so on and so forth. One format I've heard almost everywhere was something called JACK. Again, the same music is on the same stations from coast to coast at the same time, leading to sheer boredom, especially on long drives. The economy of scale takes away the uniqueness which used to be part of the many small, independent radio stations out there competing for the ear of the listener.

We have become homoginized in our listening habits.

The day of the fellow spinning records on a remote in the front window of a supermarket is gone. Local people getting on the air to sell used household items very seldom get airplay any more. Those days are missed by this blogger. Instead of unique voices for unique communities, radio has become a single voice from coast to coast, owned by stockholders who could probably care less about the communities they supposedly serve.

The fellows I told you about in Chillicothe... I maintain them as friends. I know other people who work for Clear Channel whom I like as friends. I am also loathe to be too critical of I (heart) radio, especially since I was given some air time in the past week to help create a demand for my writing. Those who know me know how I feel about the gradual disappearance of locally owned and operated radio. Saving Magnolia touches on that theme. I would hope that the situation would change sometime in the future, but I ain't holding my breath.

So I guess that I'll attempt to stick out like a sore thumb.

Be Seeing You!