From today's Nashville Digest. Congratulations, Mike!
Cyber Country
Internet 'Station' Redefining Country Broadcasting
BY REBEKAH GLEAVES
Everybody has an opinion on what s wrong with country radio today.
General
consensus seems to be that country music has lost its soul that it sold
out
to slick production and pop music-type marketing. Everybody has an
opinion,
but only a few are actually producing alternatives. Fortunately, these
few
include Mike Hays.
Hays, born in Pulaski, Tenn., and now living in Lawrence, Va., operates
Twangcast, an Internet-based radio "station" which plays assorted country
music with a particular emphasis on relatively unknown artists and
classic
country hits.
"There s a whole lot of music going unheard," says Hays. "I have a
background in country and commercial radio, and I ve found that a lot of
good music can t be played in a commercial setting."
So far, listeners seem to be responding to Twangcast in consistently
growing
numbers. According to Hays, 3,000 listeners tuned in to Twangcast in
January. By February, that number had grown to 4,000. March brought 6,000
people tuning in, and Hays is predicting 8,000 people will listen to
Twangcast by the end of April. At this rate, Hays says his Internet
broadcasting organization is on track to reach 10,000 people by June.
However, these numbers can be misleading in, for Hays, a good way. The
aforementioned figures represent only those tuning in solely to the full
Twangcast site. But people can also elect to have the service playing as
background music throughout the day, and these numbers are not being
monitored.
Listeners seem to be drawn to Twangcast s unusual playlist. Because it is
not limited by ratings, Twangcast is able to play music from artists who
typically are never heard on country radio, be they emerging upstarts or
classic country masters.
"It s a crying shame that Mandy Barnett and Heather Mills are not being
played on country radio. But country radio has its head so far up its ass
that no one is playing those artists," says Hays.
Twangcast also regularly features artists like Ferrin Young and Dale
Watson,
and will venture into commercial country music only far enough to play
non-single album cuts from Nashville artists like Alan Jackson, Sarah
Evans
and Lee Ann Womack.
But Hays claims the bulk of the new music he features is made by artists
currently based in Austin and songs recorded by traditional country
performers. "I can play the people beyond their prime," says Hays. "Those
that don t have the tight butts and belly-buttons you need to make it
commercially."
It seems that no one even misses these entertainers. Boasting a slogan
that
reads, "We play the best twang Nashville never heard," Hays has plenty to
keep himself and his listeners busy.
Currently, Twangcast has no advertisers, but Hays says that as the
listener
numbers increase, advertiser interest is likely to as well.
"If the listeners come, the advertisers will follow. We ve had some
interest
from advertisers already, but we just now have the statistics to show
them,"
says Hays.
As the stats rise, certainly advertisers will take notice. And as more
country fans denounce the genre in its current state, perhaps country
radio
will too. Until then, Twangcast can be found at www.twangcast.com.
