Does anyone listen to the radio anymore?

We listen to "Wait, Wait, Donʻt Tell Me" on NPR, on our Tivoli table radio. I also listen to NPR in the car. Thatʻs it for FM. No reason to tune into AM.

I pitched out my FM tuner 25 years ago. We had just bought our home in the San Francisco area and at last, I had a home on which I could put up a high end FM yagi antenna with a rotator! I was pulling in stations 150 miles away!

But it was all stuff I didnʻt want to listen to. KJAZ was gone by that time. KCSM was playing jazz, but I didnʻt like what they programmed. Other than that, FM was pop and rock music, Country & Western, Christian rock, Christian talk radio, Right-wing talk radio and Spanish Language stations.  The classical stations kept repeating the same limited play list and they never played a symphony all the way through.  Theyʻd play one movement, then play something completely different.  It was classical MUZAK.  

There was nothing I wanted to hear, so I pitched it all out. GONE.

Internet radio sounds just as good and you can find stations from all over the planet for free.

FM tuners are audio buggy whips. You may get great reception, but reception of what?

Unfortunately, it seems too much airtime is going to the advertisers...too many commercials, and not enough music.

Also, here in Chicago, the rock stations are too afraid to veer off the "safe, don’t take a chance" path. I recall a DJ talking about how much fun Robert Plant had with Alison Krauss. So much so, that they were going to do another album. Did they play a Robert and Alison song? Of course not, Communication Breakdown.

Luckily, there’s WONC down at 89.1 out of Naperville (North Central College).. Thank Goodness I have Shazam to find out who sings all this awesome stuff I’ve never heard before. I don’t know who’s doing the actual programming, but it is funny to hear these kids let me know that I just heard "Jessica", by the ALL - MAN brothers. : )

I’ll take it tho, as long as they keep doing what they’re doing.

I have a Magnum Dynalab MD-102 that I use in my system for FM.

There’s a good college station, a classical station & several others.

The sound quality is excellent, using that tuner.

I also stream a San Diego station 91X, Radio Huaraki from New Zealand, and 8Radio from Dublin.

There are some great radio stations out there…

I have an Onkyo T9090 tuner that was recapped and it now also allows me to swap out the OpAmp output stage - akin to rolling tubes. Makes for a really good sound.

Has amazing sensitivity and I use it for the lesser known stations that still broadcast live versus simply sending their internet feed across the air waves.

Gets really interesting at night when Skywave propagation kicks in and you start pulling in stations from all over. I can get Cleveland from Toronto :-)

Everyday. I have a MR88 in my reference system that's fed by a combination FM/HD/Sirius outdoor antenna.