How do radio stations store all their music?

[Yzzim]

Do radio stations just have a massive collection of all the cds & records ever made? Do they store all the music digitally?

Whenever the radio station has an all request day, I just picture some person running around like mad looking for the exact song/album in this monster room packed with cds

 

[PHiuR]

digital.

 

[Yzzim]

when did they start doing that?

edit: and what format do they use? mp3?

 

[NutBucket]

Can't be digital. One of the stations I listen to will have a cd that skips every so often. This isn't small market radio either.

 

[Yzzim]

Originally posted by: NutBucket
Can't be digital. One of the stations I listen to will have a cd that skips every so often. This isn't small market radio either.

I have some mp3s that seem to skip once in a while

 

[SXMP]

My sister used to DJ for one of the big stations in Lansing Michigan. Let me assure you it isn't digital. She herself owns thousands of cds, but as for the station, it has massive collections.

 

[mpitts]

We have a radio station as a client and they use CDs for music and mp3's for promos/commercials/etc

 

[TommyVercetti]

I guess they have HUGE CD changers all organized and some device which controls and catalouges all CDs.

 

[SlangNRox]

Can't storing music on CD mean the same thing as storing music digitally?

 

[WinkOsmosis]

Originally posted by: TommyVercetti
I guess they have HUGE CD changers all organized and some device which controls and catalouges all CDs.

That's it.

 

[JHoNNy1OoO]

94.9 Zeta(ClearChannel) here in Miami must use some type of format that skips because you would here a song skip, repeat about a minute, skip again, repeat, and then dead silence for about 2 minutes. I've heard it happen 4 or 5 times in the past 3 years or so and the DJ just comes on and says, "Sorry about that, technical difficulties."

Pretty funny.

 

[Yzzim]

Originally posted by: SlangNRox
Can't storing music on CD mean the same thing as storing music digitally?

stfu

you know what I meant

 

[SlangNRox]

Originally posted by: Yzzim

Originally posted by: SlangNRox
Can't storing music on CD mean the same thing as storing music digitally?

stfu

you know what I meant

yeah. I knew what you meant

 

[Chaotic42]

Children, children, children.

The answer is that some store their music only on CD, and some use CD and digital. That's what we do here.

We use scheduling software called AXS. Every song, commercial, liner, legal ID, etc has a cut number. What you hear is just a sequence of those cuts. Example:

9005/Legal ID/:08
6049/Funkadelic Psycho Chicken/4:24
7000/Bob's used cars/0:30

There are stops, continues, blanks, time syncs, skips, etc included in those numbers.

We also use CDs. Any decent studio will have at least 2 CD players to keep the music sounding fluid. We also have cart machines and even a reel. Music playlists are created using software that can seperate artists and make sure that the transitions are right (like not going from "Bark at the Moon" to "Yesterday").

Hope this helps, let me know if I can answer anything else.

Edit: Oh, we have about 1800-2000 CDs and probably on the order of 20,000 records.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: Chaotic42
Children, children, children.

The answer is that some store their music only on CD, and some use CD and digital. That's what we do here.

We use scheduling software called AXS. Every song, commercial, liner, legal ID, etc has a cut number. What you hear is just a sequence of those cuts. Example:

9005/Legal ID/:08
6049/Funkadelic Psycho Chicken/4:24
7000/Bob's used cars/0:30

There are stops, continues, blanks, time syncs, skips, etc included in those numbers.

We also use CDs. Any decent studio will have at least 2 CD players to keep the music sounding fluid. We also have cart machines and even a reel. Music playlists are created using software that can seperate artists and make sure that the transitions are right (like not going from "Bark at the Moon" to "Yesterday").

Hope this helps, let me know if I can answer anything else.

Edit: Oh, we have about 1800-2000 CDs and probably on the order of 20,000 records.

What's wrong with going from "Bark at the Moon" to "Yesterday"?! :frown:

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: Eli
What's wrong with going from "Bark at the Moon" to "Yesterday"?! :frown:

Nothing, as long as they're separated by about 5:00 of commercials.

When my friend was first teaching me about this stuff, he accidentally went from "Sweet-Fox on the Run" to "Lennon-Imagine".

He said "Damn it... Well, that's what I mean when I say it goes from level 9 to level 1."

 

[5ayle]

Pretty interesting thread...

Chaotic
How do they do callers? Is it live all the time?

Sometimes it feels like a call is prerecorded then played back.

 

[atom]

I'm positive more than a few radio stations pre-record "live" call ins and announcements.

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: 5ayle
Chaotic
How do they do callers? Is it live all the time?

Sometimes it feels like a call is prerecorded then played back.

Sometimes it's live, sometimes it's recorded.

Many times contest winners are recorded, at least where I've worked. It keeps people from being stupid on the air and cursing and whatnot.

I do a show where the calls are live. I haven't had to drop anyone or anything, but I can just flip a switch to take them off. There's a box that puts the phone audio into a pot on the board. I can just flip it off or turn them down.

 

[xchangx]

Here at Alabama Public Radio, we do live feeds plus pre-recorded feeds from NPR via satellite. Any music is done via mp3.

We have an automated sytem that runs everything

The student radio station uses MP3's.

 

[royaldank]

I was a DJ for a couple years.

Our music was mainly on CDs. We had 3 different 100 disc changers stacked on top of each other. Those were hooked to a computer which controlled everything. Setlists were spit out by a program which had plenty of input variables we controlled. You could change out anything you wanted and so forth.

Commercials were recorded digitally and inserted where needed. Some were done on cart, but we'd just transfer them over to digital.

I filled in for the afternoon guy quite often. (I hosted a specialty show on the weekends mainly) Since I was working another job during the days, I would pre-record the 11-3 shift the night before. I would go in and get a list of what is happening during the 11-3 shift and where the breaks are. I would then sit down and use the main computer to record the DJ breaks. Looking at the playlist, I would know RATM's Bulls on Parade just finished and Metallica was coming up. So, I'd start my music bed (music in back while DJ talks) and hit record. "You're listing to so and so station. Wrapping up another block of music just now. That was Rage...Stick around, we got plenty more lined up. Metallica next." On a good night, I could knock out the 11-3 shift in 20 minutes. That included the elevator ride up, gathering everything I needed, and recording 3-5 breaks per hour.

So, the next day while I was at work or driving out to get lunch, I got to listen to myself DJ'ing on the radio. Most shows we did live, but pre-recorded breaks was an option if you couldn't be in studio.

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: royaldank
So, the next day while I was at work or driving out to get lunch, I got to listen to myself DJ'ing on the radio. Most shows we did live, but pre-recorded breaks was an option if you couldn't be in studio.

It's weird being somewhere and hearing yourself give a sports report while you're talking to someone. They get a weird look on their faces.