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Clogged Channel

By Elizabeth Trickett

In a time when McDonalds' golden arches welcome us into every town and city and a Wal-Mart is always looming in the distance with people slowly incubating under its fluorescent lights, we are left to wonder if there is any personality left in America. We're all living in Anytown, USA, challenged to define and reconnect with our local roots. However, what we often don't realize is that our radio, for the most part, isn't even local anymore and there's another Wal-Mart looming inside of our speakers, feeding on deception as well as the consumer dollar. Chances are you'll never run into the person in the grocery store who broadcasts the local news and weather on your radio station. And chances are your “local” DJ doesn't even reside in the same time zone as you and has never been to your town. Welcome to the world of Clear Channel Communications and to the future of radio.

The Federal Communications Act of 1934 was enacted in an effort to promote diversity in radio and other media as well as to serve the public interest. It set guidelines for ownership, stating that no single broadcaster could own more than 40 stations nationwide or more than four in one city. This all changed with the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996.
On the day the bill was signed, President Clinton said that reforming the telecommunications laws fulfilled his administration's promise and that this reformation took place “in a manner that leads to competition and private investment, promotes universal service and provides for flexible government regulation.” In a series of recent articles investigating Clear Channel for Salon.com, Eric Boehlert explained that in essence, this bill allowed for the unlimited ownership of the media and marked the beginning of major consolidation as well as a decrease in fair competition between companies.

The day Clinton signed the bill was like Christmas morning for Texas radio billionaire L. Lowry Mays, who owned Clear Channel Communications as well as 36 radio stations at the time. Mays went on a shopping spree. Today, Clear Channel is the largest owner of radio in the United States, owning 1,200 stations in all 50 states and stations in 247 of the largest 250 markets. However, Clear Channel doesn't just limit their ownership to radio, they're also responsible for owning, operating and booking 135 amphitheatres, arenas, theatres and clubs nationwide, as well as controlling promoters and buying entire tours. Clear Channel out-bid its competitors and bought the tours of superstars like Madonna, 'N Sync and U2. Every door an artist must pass through on the way to success is guarded by some aspect of Clear Channel. According to Clear Channel Bites, just one of the many anti-Clear Channel sites on the internet, the media giant owns and operates “more than 250 radio stations in Mexico, Australia, New Zealand and Europe.” They also own 770,000 billboards, meaning that every day, they reach more than half of the adults in the US and six out of ten travelers. This is why many people in the industry refer to Clear Channel as the “800-pound gorilla.”

Now it's clear who's in charge of the public airwaves. Many have argued that this isn't a free market and Clear Channel is operating outside of the boundaries. Stop Clear Channel, another anti-Clear Channel Web site, racks up all of Clear Channel's sins, accusing them of “ruthlessly dominating the billboards and concert promotions … Using these properties together in an anti-competitive way drives up concert prices, busts unions…shuts out local artists and diverse voices, and destroys our media.”

Clear Channel means the death of the local DJ. The ratio of radio station to DJ in some areas is 6:1. This means the death knell for the DJ, who's slowly becoming an endangered species in the habitat of radio. Through voice tracking and a program called Prophet, one DJ can record a day's worth of programs for radio stations across the country in a matter of a few hours. Through online local news, the DJ knows what headlines to mention in his or her broadcast and what weather reports to read. Then, each sound byte is entered into a computer and mixed with pre-chosen songs that are beamed “live” all across the country and into your home while the DJ isn't even in the studio.

With voice tracking, the only thing that's ever live is the listener at the other end. But Clear Channel is slow to reveal its business tactics, tricking its listeners into thinking the DJ is local and cares about their area. In the past, the company has also left listeners in the dark concerning on-air contests. When a contest is announced on the air, it suddenly becomes the local listener competing against the entire nation.

However, Clear Channel sees nothing wrong with its business practices and believes that this is enabling the company to produce the highest quality of radio because there's no room for error, except, of course when a DJ confuses one city for another or accidentally mispronounces a name or two. This was the case for Cincinnati DJ Jay Gilbert when he confused San Diego's Oceanside (a city with a military base) and Ocean Beach (a home to retired hippies).

When any American opens up the warm cardboard box at a McDonald's, they know what they're going to find inside. Clear Channel is serving up the same lukewarm Big Mac everyday to an audience who thinks they're eating a meal unique to their area, one that reflects local recipes and spices. We know that McDonalds tastes the same everywhere, but most of us don't know that our radio does as well. The harm is that Clear Channel is deceiving the general public, spoon-feeding a false reality. All the while, Clear Channel is raising tour prices and forcing artists to play along.

In an interview with Bill Moyers, Barry Fey, who's been a concert promoter since the sixties, explained that Clear Channel is actually driving concert prices up for consumers and is trying to bid other promoters out of the market. Fey recently bid against Clear Channel in Denver for a Bonnie Raitt concert. He offered $100,000 and a set ticket price of thirty dollars. It was a strong bid that could have pulled Raitt in if Clear Channel hadn't dominated the bidding war, offering a quarter of a million dollars and doubling ticket prices as well as tacking on additional service fees. In the end, “[Consumers] didn't know they're paying 50% more,” said Fey. “They don't know I was going to charge them thirty and [now] they're going to have to pay forty-five.”

Not only is the listener given a raw deal, but so are local artists who can never seem to secure a spot on Clear Channel's playlists. How does an artist make his or her way into the golden computer? First of all, it always helps to support Clear Channel. The rules are rather clear-cut: The artist must “pay to play.” If artists want to secure their song on national play lists, then they usually must also book their tour with Clear Channel. The company owns so many mediums that they often use one to promote another. If an artist signs to tour with Clear Channel, that artist will no doubt receive countless amounts of nation-wide air-play as well as a spot on billboards across the country. However, the rules work both ways. If an artist somehow gets on Clear Channel's bad side, it's likely that he or she will practically drop off the face of the earth unless another means of promotion can be found.

Talent doesn't hold much merit in the world of Clear Channel. A prime example of this is the soundtrack to “O Brother Where Art Thou.” According to a report by Rick Karr for NPR, the record, which sold five million copies and won five Grammy awards, failed to find a spot on the radio. The reality behind this is the songs didn't test well in listener focus groups.

For artists to gain radio airplay, they must first win by popular vote and must fit the Clear Channel mold perfectly or the song will never even be considered for airplay. Program directors review Billboard charts and CD sales each week, then focus groups are created and telephone polls are taken and each song is assigned a “burn score” based on how sick of hearing the song the target audience is. When this burn score becomes high enough, the song disappears.

Even though this mathematical formula theoretically knocks a song off the radio before people will be tempted to turn the dial, it seems as though we're only hearing the same few songs over and over again. Clear Channel only represents the very tip of the iceberg and only plays music that fits into a distinct genre, which often forces artists to change their musical direction in an attempt to fit this corporate mold.

People are finally listening and many more have publicly labeled Clear Channel as a monopoly. Recently, Congressman Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., requested an investigation of Clear Channel; he is the second congressman to do so. According to the website Clear Channel Bites, Weiner insists that Clear Channel's business is “harmful to consumers, venue owners and artists” and charges that Clear Channel's anti-trust behaviors are increasing. The Dept. of Justice has begun an investigation, but many of the stations Clear Channel operates manage to drop below the radar of investigators because the corporation “warehouses” some of its stations to appear as though they are being run privately and not by the media giant. But why, with so many anti-Clear Channel websites and more and more press coverage, is Clear Channel still able to operate its business as usual?

For starters, L. Lowry Mays and George W. Bush are Texas buddies, as their sticky fingers are deep into the oil industry. Also, Colin Powell's son, Michael, is the Commissioner of the FCC. The first big issue he had to face was the merger of AOL-Time Warner. All this time, his father was on AOL's board of directors. He was also a major stockholder of both companies before the merger. The idea of synergy never seemed to bother the Republicans and when campaign time rolls around, they have come to expect a hefty check from Clear Channel.

Clear Channel denies any illegal business practice, declaring that the company is merely pioneering the future of radio. At a press conference in 1999, Clear Channel's Randy Michaels proclaimed: “Wake up-Wal-Mart is open people!” As we turn on any radio station in any state, we realize the absolute truth in his statement. Welcome to America where what you see is what you get, and what you get is packaged the same and available everywhere. In a country where we are prompted to “watch for falling prices,” it is more realistic, however, to watch for falling musicians.

In the meantime, Clear Channel is free to sit back, their fingers poised on the “play” button, carefully controlling what music we hear and what talk we are all subjected to. There is no escaping the voice of Clear Channel. It's everywhere.

Elizabeth Trickett is a junior writing major. Email her at etricke1@ithaca.edu.