Lucy

Lucy, classic alternative hits, is a relatively new addition to XM and I might add, a welcomed one. It's the Top Tracks of alternative music (Fred is the Deep Tracks of alternative). If you're into alternative music, then you'll recognize just about every song played on Lucy. At times it's just what I want, good familiar tunes albeit without a DJ. That's right, there are no DJs on Lucy, but I like the music so much it doesn't bother me. I can leave Lucy on for hours and I do severl times a week. Did I mention that Lucy is a preset of mine?

Lucy XM 54, classic alternative hits

Heard on Lucy:
"Jumper", Third Eye Blind; "Sweet Surrender", Sarah Mclachlen; "Island in the Sun", Weezer; "Corduroy", Pearl Jam; "I Alone", Live; "Flavor of the Week", American Hi-Fi; "Not Sleeping Around", Ned's Atomic Dustbin; "Somebody to Shove", Soul Asylum; "Never Let Me Down", Depeche Mode; "Chains of Love", Erasure; "Los Angeles", Frank Black; "There There", Radiohead; "Where It's At", Beck; "Cuts You Up", Peter Murphy; "My City was Gone", the Pretenders; "Save It for Later", English Beat.

Time spent listening: 1 to 2 hours, evening

Tomorrow: no channels are scheduled for Sundays. I'll reflect on the past week and look ahead to the upcoming week. Also I review a non-music channel that I frequently listen too.

Kiss

Kiss is XM's pop hits channel. I'm not a real big pop music fan and Kiss isn't well done at all, so I rarely listen to it and it certainly isn't a preset. So what's wrong with Kiss? It's biggest problem is that it has no personality of its own. This is largely due to the fact that there are no DJs on Kiss. A pop channel has to have DJs that can hold my interest when there are a few songs that are "duds", otherwise I'm not listening for very long. I'd like to see XM get rid of Clear Channels's influence on Kiss and create their own pop channel (and drop the stupid 'Kiss' name), but I'm not going to hold my breath. It's been like this since I first subscribed to XM almost two years ago and I don't see it improving any time soon.

A good pop channel could be one of XM's flagship channels; a channel that everyone talks about and makes a point of listening to at least a little bit. Kiss is most definately not that channel.

Kiss XM 21, pop hits

Heard on Kiss:
"Ocean Avenue", Yellowcard; "Come Clean", Hilary Duff; "Seven Days", Craig David; "She Will Be Loved", Maroon 5; "Goodies", Ciara/P. Pablo; "Naughty Girl", Beyonce; "One Thing", Finger 11; "I Wanna Be Bad", Willa Ford; "My Happy Ending", Avril Lavigne; "Work It", Missy Elliot; "Toxic", Britney Spears; "Breaking the Habit", Linkin Park; "Give Me Just One", 98 Degrees; "Leave (Get Out)", JoJo; "Slow Motion", Juvenile.

Time spent listening: 1 hour (I couldn't take it any more), evening

Tomorrow: Lucy, classic alternative hits

Ethel

Ahhh, the first preset of the Bootcamp! Ethel does a decent job of playing a nice mix of current alternative rock and I tune in several times a week. In other words, I like Ethel. The borrowing of Fred's DJs is a plus for me; jukebox-mode is not radio to me. Stabwalt was DJing while I listened tonight and he, like most of XM's DJ's, is personable, conveys a bit of information and doesn't talk over the music.

Ethel XM 47, 90's and today's alternative.

Heard on Ethel:
"Cish Cash", Basement Jaxx; "Transistor", 311; "Always", Blink 182; "Stacked Actors", Foo Fighters; "Pain", Jimmy Eat World; "Fell in Love with a Girl", the White Stripes; "Heart-shaped Box", Nirvana; "Black Betty", Spiderbait; "No Surprises", Radiohead; "Chain", the Fire Theft; "Jumper", Third Eye Blind; "Sgt. Baker", Primus; "Bam Thwok", the Pixies; "You Get What You Give", the New Radicals; "Run", Snow Patrol.

Amount of time spent listening: 1 to 2 hours

"Basically, I was trying to rip off the Pixies."
Kurt Cobain, talking about "Smells Like Teen Spirit"

Tomorrow: Kiss (Pop hits)

the 80's

I graduated high school and attended college in the 1980s so you would think that this channel was made for me. Wrong, I spent the eighties listening to mostly punk/alternative music and this channel plays mostly pop hits. However a greater variety of music is played on the 80's than is played on the 70's. I recognized and remembered just about every song played and in many cases it's video (remember when MTV played videos?). So there is a nostaglia factor for me that makes me like this channel slightly more than the 70's channel, but it still doesn't rate a preset.

Amount of time spent listening: 3 to 4 hours

Heard on the 80's:
"Waiting on a Thin Line", Huey Lewis & the News; "Jesse's Girl", Rick Springfield; "Karma Chameleon", Culture Club; "I'm So Excited", Pointer Sisters; "Super Freak", Rick James; "Let's Groove", Earth Wind & Fire; "Brilliant Disguise", Bruce Springsteen; "9 to 5", Dolly Parton; "Don't Forget Me", Glass Tiger; "Pride", U2; "Bad Boy", Gloria Estefan; "Take My Breath Away", Berlin; "All This Time", Tiffany; "Heart Beat", Don Johnson; "Cum On Feel the Noise", Quiet Riot; "Mexican Radio", Wall of Voodoo; "New Sensation", INXS; "Lick It Up", KISS, "Turning Japanese", the Vapors.

Tomorrow: Ethel, 90's and today's alternative

the 70's

I've never listened that much to any of the decades channels. They largely play pop hits and I'm just not into that. Today I did listen to the 70's for two to three hours. Just after mid-night I caught some of a Chicago special that was well done. Also there were a few suprises that I didn't expect, like Bob Dylan, Patti Smith and Lou Reed. The audio montages of 70's sounds and the theme to WKRP in Cincinnati help to distinguish this channel.

Overall it is a good background channel, but not good enough to make it a preset. There was a rich diversity of music in the 1970's - glam rock, heavy metal, punk, disco, singer/songwriter, progressive (to name a few) - it's a shame that so little of it is played on the 70's channel.


Heard on the 70's:
"Take Me Home", Cher; "Deja Vu", Dionne Warwick; "Gotta Serve Somebody", Bob Dylan; "You've Got A Friend", James Taylor; "Peace Train", Cat Stevens; "Thank God I'm A Country Boy", John Denver; "Low Rider", War; "Shining Star", Earth Wind & Fire; "I'd Love You to Want Me", Lobo; "Never Been Spain", Three Dog Night; "Anticipation", Carly Simon; "Because the Night", Patti Smith; "Walk on the Wild Side", Lou Reed.

Random web site: SuperSeventies.com

Tomorrow: the 80's

Starting Tomorrow

XM Radio Bootcamp 3 starts tomorrow!

I plan to listen to the featured channel for at least an hour each day. However if I can find the time, I'll listen for three to four hours before blogging my thoughts and comments.

This week's schedule:

Tue, The 70's (1970's decade channel)
Wed, The 80's (1980's decade channel)
Thu, Ethel (90's and today's alternative)
Fri, KISS (Pop hits)
Sat, Lucy (classic alternative hits)
Sun, no channel scheduled