I’m Just Sayin’….
I’ve written before about why I think satellite radio is great – here and here. Basically it boils down to the fact that the satellite services can take advantage of the fact that they have the Power of the Platform.
And while that’s all still true, I want to take a brief break from discussing radio “strategery” or any other serious, well thought out concepts or points about what makes radio (especially satellite radio) tick. I just want to talk about the experience of listening to radio as a listener.
Here in the States, we are just coming off the three-day Memorial Day holiday weekend. It’s the weekend that officially celebrates the men and women who have given their life in service of our country while also serving as the unofficial kick-off of the summer season. Over this weekend, radio stations traditionally do something “special” and this weekend was no exception as stations trotted out their countdowns and what not. But what made me stand up and take notice was something that one of the Sirius channels did – it reinforced to me why I was a Sirius subscriber and why I thought satellite radio is a powerful medium.
For the record, I’m a Bruce Springsteen fan – a big one. I spend a lot of time listening to Sirius’ “E Street Radio” channel – a channel which, as you may have guessed, plays nothing but Springsteen music. The fact is that even though I have all of his music loaded up on my iPod and can play any Bruce song that I want at any time, I still really like listening to the E Street Radio channel. One of the reasons for this is that I enjoy the serendipity of it all. I like hearing ‘random’ songs – songs that I wouldn’t dial up on my iPod, but for some reason I enjoy hearing when the channel plays it. But another reason I like the channel as much as I do is that they play stuff that I don’t have! Since they’re officially sanctioned by the Springsteen camp, they have access to lots of things that I only wish I had.
So over the Memorial Day weekend, E Street Radio featured nothing but live Springsteen shows. Shows from all different time periods and from all different tours. Shows with the E Street Band, without the E Street Band and solo shows without any band; basically everything a Springsteen fanatic would love. And as great as all the live shows played were there was one that stood out in particular. It was a benefit show recorded just over two weeks ago at a small 1,500 seat theatre in New Jersey. In addition to the intimate nature of the show, what set this show apart was that Bruce and the band did something they have never done before – ever. They played two of their classic albums, Born to Run and Darkness on the Edge of Town in their entirety. The songs were played in the exact same order as they appeared on the original albums. People literally paid thousands of dollars to be at this show and a mere two weeks later we were hearing it on the radio. If you’re a Springsteen nut, hearing this was nothing short of incredible.
From a fan’s perspective the whole weekend was awesome. I didn’t change channels once throughout the whole weekend – and I’m a constant channel-changer. And even though gas prices are through the roof, I did some driving around I didn’t really have to do because I didn’t want to miss anything. That’s powerful. And that’s the power of the platform. The fact that Sirius could do this is due to the fact that they have a Springsteen channel to showcase it on. And the only way you can have a whole channel dedicated to one artist is when you have a platform enabling you to provide this kind of variety.
So that’s it. No serious strategy discussion, insight into programming mechanics or anything else like that. Just observations from a listener who spent the weekend listening to something he really liked and was damn glad about it.
I’m just sayin’.
Tagged: Music, satelllite radio, Sirius, Springsteen