Thursday, April 9, 2015

4.9.15 Bee-otch of the Day: northern Michigan media


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Name: northern Michigan media
Age: ageless
Occupation: supposed entertainers and informers
Last Seen: Cadillac, Traverse City, Petoskey, et. al.
Bee-otched For: making horrible, horrible decisions
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Earlier this week, we Bee-otched Resurrection Life Church in Grandville because they announced that they would not return $300,000 stolen from a Ponzi scheme back to its victims. Well, yesterday, ResLife announced that they simply just don't have the money and are now asking their followers to help out.

Gee, and how big are the houses of their several dozen pastors?

Well, it turns out that ResLife is in the televangelism business with a weekly show called Walking By Faith, hosted by lead pastor Duane Vander Klok. It can be seen on a few cable channels (TCT and TBN-owned The Church Channel) and a few religious TV stations. But guess what's the only secular TV station airing Vander Klok's weekly drivel?

If you guessed Fox 32 in northern Michigan, pat yourself on the back.

Yep! Fox 32 WFQX airs WBF alongside Kenneth Copeland and The 700 Club as part of their daily asshole televangelist block from 9 to 11 a.m. daily. In a market where more-reputable programming like Jerry Springer is AWOL, you get to see Vander Klok lie to you that he doesn't have $300,000, even though the church is one of the biggest in west Michigan with a satellite in Rockford.

But, that's what happens when you're in a market where there's virtually only two TV station owners for four stations, which is technically illegal. Less owners, less choice. It's one reason why the only decent news source on TV these days up north is MiNews26. You don't have the fact that 7&4/29&8's owners, Sinclair force-fed Republican BS onto their viewers during the Bush administration and 9&10/Fox 32 bowing to religious nuts, either.

Of course, there's also the radio. Recently, I've noticed that WGFM Rock 105's sound is more newer and ballsy as of late. Previously, they were slacking when it came to adding new music and playing bands that simply just didn't fit the format, like Gin Blossoms and Counting Crows. In a typical hour, Rock 105 plays some current stuff (Incubus' "Absolution Calling", The Pretty Reckless' "Follow Me Down" and AWOLNATION's "Hollow Moon"), 2000s ("Alive" by POD, Foo Fighters' "All My Life" and White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army"), 90s (Green Day's "Longview", STP's "Unglued" and Smashing Pumpkins' "Zero") with some 80s (Motley Crue, G'nR and Metallica) splashed in.

However, they're also spinning some 70s as well, namely Led Zeppelin. One listener wasn't pleased and posted this to Rock 105's Facebook page:

"When did the home of "new rock" turn into classic rock the bear? There's already like 6 classic rock stations up here. Zeppelin, tesla an ozzy are great but damn there's plenty of stations playing all that. What's up with this?"

Well, the station did respond, and here it goes:

"Arthur, we have a set plan to keep the station successful. It's working. We play new rock. We play alternative rock. Hard rock. And yes... some classic rock as well. Expect it. Cus it's how we do and always have done things."

It's not known which member of Rock 105's staff wrote that, but methinks it's Cartman, the station's PD and morning host.

The REAL reason for Rock 105's change in direction is because the station is now using Westwood One's "Rock 2.0" format. It's basically a satellite-fed format but since they use a special computer system called STORQ to program things, they have the power to add songs, delete songs, have local jocks or even use WW1's canned jocks (which they do nights, overnights and weekends).

Want proof? Listen to Rock 105's webstream, and then listen to the webstream of a station that uses Rock 2.0 24/7

Of course, I still have a grudge against Cartman for the fact that he claimed that a Photoshopped image of him urinating on 106 KHQ's van that he made (ironically, with current KHQ employee Fish) and posted on his MySpace page many years ago was actually made by me. He apparently told some folks on a popular message board to save his sorry ass, and I got the blame. It's sad that people actually like this big, fat blob, even though he doesn't have the balls to tell the truth.

But that's northern Michigan radio, where if you don't like what you see on TV, there's the radio. Mind you that you will be subjected to ultra-bland crap loaded with overplayed oldies, country and classic rock, oh, there's that Bill Wirtz wannabe who owns several stations up north, even though a few of them are silent because of a "broken pipe". Might as well go to a movie instead, even though the movie theatres in Bellaire, Petoskey, Gaylord, Cheboygan and Mackinaw City are owned by a convicted felon.

The point is, it's sad when companies do what's best for them and not their customers. I love northern Michigan, but the media blows. Maybe that's one good reason why I'm down here in Grand Rapids. At least the only moronic religious show that airs here locally is In Touch With Charles Stanley, which airs Sundays on not one, but TWO(!!!) stations: WOOD-TV 8 and WXMI Fox 17. Why? Good question, but as somebody who doesn't give to religious folks, it's shameful.

I guess my point is that even locally-owned stations make their mistakes. They are just as boneheaded as the iHeartRadios and Cumuluses of the world. They don't realize that I can listen to satellite or internet radio anywhere on God's green Earth, and I can decide to skip a song I don't like or not. Maybe that's why in northern Michigan, some radio companies are barely breaking even and some are being left for dead. Maybe radio station owners need to watch more Jon Taffer or Gordon Ramsay and learn that being delusional won't benefit any business.

Listen to the listeners, not yourselves.


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