The Year In Radio, 2018

Time to start the year-end wrap up. Over the next week or so i'll be blethering about my favourite books, CDs and movies of 2018

My year in radio was based, naturally, on the stations i listen to, and by far the station i listened to the most – and therefore my Radio Station Of The Year – was Radio Paradise (www.radioparadise.com) (They're based somewhere in Southern California but originated in, and are named after, Paradise, California – a town which, you may recall, was virtually destroyed by wildfires not that long ago.

The playlist is eclectic if nothing else. Here's what they played for two hours on Christmas morning:

Zola Blood – Play Out

Remy Zero – Hermes Bird

R.E.M. -- Belong

Counting Crows – Anna Begins

Sonic Youth – New Hampshire

Dire Straits – Single-Handed Sailor

Ry Cooder & Manuel Galban – La Luna En Tu Mirada

Peter Schilling – Major Tom (Coming Home)

Oi Va Voi – Yuri

Creedence Clearwater Revival – It Came Out Of The Sky

Kesha – Spaceship

Mark Vidler – Rapture Riders

Shpongle – The Epiphany Of Mrs Kugla

Eddie Vedder – Rise

Neil Young – Old Man

Radiohead – Subterranean Homesick Alien

The Smiths – What Difference Does It Make?

The Clash – Clampdown

Githead – Take Off

Glen Hansard – Don't Leave Me Waiting

James McMurtry – Off And Running

Tom Petty – It's Good To Be King

Elephant Stone – A Silent Moment

Dar Williams – Mercy Of The Fallen

Patti Smith – Because The Night

Quite a few performers there i've never heard anywhere else, but only one song i truly couldn't stand: The Smiths. Ugh, Morrissey.... Otherwise all very enjoyable.

The station is commercial-free and listener-supported, in fact i contribute $10 (U.S.) every month and i think it's well worth it.

The station i listen to the most otherwise is KSHE from St Louis (www.kshe95.com), but i only listen for four hours a week now. I used to listen more often, but early in the year Emmis Communications sold the station to Hubbard Broadcasting and things went downhill almost immediately. I can't listen for more than about thirty minutes anymore, before they play something i hate (like KISS, Aerosmith or REO Speedwagon) – their playlist used to be much wider – and they let go their overnight deejay and my Facebook friend Tommy T. I used to listen to his show every day.

Now i only listen to their Sunday morning Klassics Show – about which i blog every week, of course. Four hours of mostly wonderful classic rock that's rarely played elsewhere. It is the highlight of my week and it's my Radio Program Of The Year for sure.

There are only a couple of other stations i ever listen to: KOCI from Newport Beach California, and KCLC from St Charles Missouri and they're both all right, KOCI plays a lot of blues-rock along with classic rock and KCLC plays mostly classic rock – the usual suspects but with quite a few surprises -- but, like most stations nowadays they're all automated overnight and technical screw-ups are rife. A song will start and end abruptly so that another song can play and then the first song will start again. It's very disconcerting.

Finally, my favourite Estonian deejay of the year is Maie Pauts, but as i never listen to her station any more, i don't think i can give her an award. Sorry, Maie!