Short Stuff: BM Radio

Summary

Stuff You Should Know: Short Stuff - BM Radio

Release Date: July 2, 2025

Introduction

In this episode of Stuff You Should Know, hosts Chuck Bryant and Jerry delve into the intriguing history of BM (Beautiful Music) Radio—a genre that once dominated the airwaves but eventually faded into obscurity. Through engaging conversations and insightful anecdotes, they explore the evolution of radio formats, the impact of regulatory changes, and the cultural shifts that influenced listener preferences.

---

The Evolution of AM and FM Radio

Timestamp: [00:42]

The discussion begins with a nostalgic look at the AM and FM radio bands, particularly focusing on their status during the late 20th century. Jerry reminisces about how AM radio was once considered "as square as a Rubik's Cube," while FM was the upstart offering a different listening experience.

Jerry: "If you grew up in the late 70s, 80s, 90s, you knew that AM radio was as square as a Rubik's Cube. And the FM radio was where it was at." ([01:38])

Chuck clarifies that in the early days, specifically the 60s and 70s, AM radio was actually the cool medium, broadcasting popular hits and rock music, whereas FM initially catered to easy listening formats.

Chuck Bryant: "If you grew up like we did, they did a switcheroo. And early on, AM radio was the cool one and FM was the upstart trying to find its way." ([02:25])

---

Birth of Beautiful Music

Timestamp: [03:00]

The hosts transition to discussing the rise of the Beautiful Music format, also known as "elevator music." This genre focused on orchestrated versions of popular songs, often stripping away vocals in favor of instruments like flutes or clarinets.

Jerry: "Beautiful music as a whole, as a format on the radio, was actually mellowed out as far as advertising goes, and was very protective and defensive of the listener experience." ([07:37])

Chuck explains how Beautiful Music became a strategic response to FCC regulations in 1965, which mandated that companies owning both AM and FM stations diversify their content to avoid redundancy.

Chuck Bryant: "The FCC came around in '65 and said, you can't do this anymore. You got to play different stuff." ([05:33])

---

Commercialization and Syndication

Timestamp: [08:38]

A significant part of the conversation revolves around Schulke Radio Productions (SRP), a leading syndication company for BM Radio. Schulke provided pre-programmed tapes that stations could easily broadcast, ensuring a consistent and “perfect” listening experience.

Chuck Bryant: "Schulke said, 'This sounds great,' but they also required stations to upgrade equipment and adhere to strict advertising guidelines." ([08:38])

Jerry adds that Schulke’s approach included minimizing ad interruptions and maintaining a smooth musical backdrop, which was highly appreciated by listeners.

Jerry: "They could only do six minutes of ads an hour, and those ads had to be lower in volume than the music." ([08:38])

---

Challenges and Technological Advances

Timestamp: [12:38]

As BM Radio gained popularity, a new challenge emerged: the repetitiveness of playlists. To combat listener fatigue from hearing the same songs on a loop, companies like Bonneville introduced technology that randomized song selection, ensuring a fresh and varied listening experience.

Chuck Bryant: "Bonneville came along with a really unique idea of randomly selecting tapes to avoid repetitive playlists." ([13:21])

Jerry reflects on how Beautiful Music served as an incubator for radio standardization and automation, laying the groundwork for modern broadcasting techniques.

Jerry: "Beautiful Music itself was basically an incubator for figuring out how to standardize and automate radio." ([13:48])

---

Decline of BM Radio and Rise of Alternative Formats

Timestamp: [14:34]

Despite its initial success, BM Radio began to decline in the 1980s as musical tastes shifted towards rock and alternative genres. Younger audiences, who gravitated towards more dynamic and edgy music, led to a decline in BM Radio’s listener base.

Chuck Bryant: "Buying power shifted as rock and roll came along and younger listeners became the dominant sort of listener of radio." ([13:38])

The transition was often abrupt for established BM stations, resulting in significant format changes that alienated long-time listeners. The hosts cite the fictional TV show WKRP in Cincinnati as a dramatized reflection of these real-life industry shifts.

Jerry: "That's why they hired Andy as station manager, because they were converting from beautiful music to rock." ([17:10])

---

Cultural Impact and Legacy

Timestamp: [16:01]

Despite its decline, BM Radio left an indelible mark on broadcasting. The hosts reminisce about iconic shows and stations, such as Atlanta’s Album 88 and WFMU in New Jersey, highlighting the unique programming that characterized the BM era.

Jerry: "Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks—then look no further." ([Host Introduction])

These formats not only provided a soothing background for daily activities but also played a role in shaping the auditory landscape of their time.

---

Conclusion

Timestamp: [17:55]

As the episode wraps up, Chuck and Jerry acknowledge the lasting influence of BM Radio on the broadcasting industry. They express appreciation for the dedication of listeners and the innovative approaches that once made Beautiful Music a staple on the airwaves.

Chuck Bryant: "Stuff you should know is a production of iHeartRadio." ([17:55])

Through their detailed exploration, the hosts offer listeners a comprehensive understanding of BM Radio's rise and fall, underscoring its significance in the broader context of radio history.

---

Notable Quotes

• "Beautiful music as a whole, as a format on the radio, was actually mellowed out as far as advertising goes, and was very protective and defensive of the listener experience." — Jerry ([07:37])

• "Schulke said, 'This sounds great,' but they also required stations to upgrade equipment and adhere to strict advertising guidelines." — Chuck Bryant ([08:38])

• "That's why they hired Andy as station manager, because they were converting from beautiful music to rock." — Jerry ([17:10])

---

Acknowledgments

The hosts extend gratitude to their sources, including Chuck Tarver at the University of Delaware, Ken Mills at Radio World, and others who contributed valuable insights to the episode.

Jerry: "Let's thank our sources for this episode: Chuck Tarver at the University of Delaware, Go Blue Hens, Ken Mills at Radio World, diffin.com, Ken Siyapura @ Cradoville, and the Forum at Radio Discussions." ([17:28])

---

Final Thoughts

Stuff You Should Know effectively captures the essence of BM Radio's impact on the broadcasting world, blending historical facts with personal anecdotes to create an engaging narrative. Whether you're a radio enthusiast or simply curious about the evolution of media, this episode offers a thorough and entertaining exploration of a bygone era in radio history.

Transcript

[Chuck Bryant]

This is an Iheart podcast.

[Josh Clark]

Want to keep your personal number private but still stay connected? With line two, you can get a second phone line right on your device with a super simple app and no need for another phone. Whether it's for online shopping, dating, or shielding your main number from spam, line two is an easy way to manage it all. Ready for peace of mind without breaking the bank call, text block and more for only $9.99. Get started with line2.com audio or download line two in any app store today. Line two, your second line, simplified.

[Jerry]

Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh and there's Chuck. And Jerry's here too. And this is Short Stuff, the rootingest tootinist down home sarsaparilla drinking podcast on the planet.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. Welcome to wsysk. You your source of all the smooth podcasting sounds.

[Jerry]

That was great, Chuck. You have a future in radio, I think.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, great. I hear there's a bright future in radio.

[Jerry]

So we are talking radio. That's why you just did that. And we're talking about a specific kind of radio. But we should kind of go back a little bit to the beginning because. And I should. It occurred to me that there are people who listen to us. They won't even know what we're talking about with AM&FM. But if you know enough about radio, there were two bands, the AM band and the FM band. And when you, if you grew up in this late 70s, 80s, 90s, you knew that AM radio was as square as.

[Chuck Bryant]

A Rubik's Cube.

[Jerry]

Yes. And the FM radio was where it was at. But it turns out that when FM radio first came on the scene in the 60s and then early 70s, it was square. And AM radio is where it was at. That's where you'd hear hits and rock and stuff like that. FM was so super square that it actually gave birth to what we consider easy listening music today.

[Chuck Bryant]

By the way, I know this is going to be kind of a long one, but I still have to say this. When you were just stumped on trying to think of a square thing, all I could think of was the little Homer Simpson bubble above your head with just like a donut.

[Jerry]

Or that that bubble black and white donkey swatting flies with his tail. That one always gets me. No, I thought of a Citra Wilson quote that I just can't say, but it's hilarious.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, well, tell me later.

[Jerry]

Okay.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, so you left off that AM radio square. FM radio was where the rock hits Were.

[Jerry]

I think you said the opposite.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, if you grew up like we did, they did a switcheroo. And early on, AM radio was the cool one and FM was the upstart that was trying to find its way.

[Jerry]

Yeah. And so FM essentially gave birth to that easy listening music, which is also called elevator music. Some people call it good music. But the type of music format that we're going to talk about today is known as beautiful music. And it is a great name for a great kind of music, if you ask me.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And, you know, if you heard our Muzak episode, we talked a lot about this stuff. Muzak is, of course, a proprietary eponym or AKA a company.

[Jerry]

Right, right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Or did I use that right?

[Jerry]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay. But beautiful music is that it is like, let's take a pop hit of the day, like a Beatles song or something, and let's arrange it as a orchestral arrangement, a lot of strings. We'll either do pop hits or maybe we'll do old standards from like the Great American Songbook. And, you know, we're going to make it super polished, very easy on the ears. We're gonna remove the vocals almost always. And instead of like the singing, there's gonna be like a flute or a clarinet or something. Is the singing voice. Or if it does have human voices singing, it's probably gonna be like a chorus. Just singing a little bit of it here and there.

[Jerry]

Yeah. Or doing that kind of singing that the vocalist does on the Star Trek theme where she's just using her voice as an instrument.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't know the Star Trek theme.

[Jerry]

What?

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't. I've probably heard it, but I can't call up like, oh, yeah, that thing.

[Jerry]

It goes.

[Chuck Bryant]

It turns out I do know that, actually. Yeah.

[Jerry]

So like you said, the vocals were almost always removed, except when they were humming or that kind of thing. Sometimes they would include vocals, but they, like the Carpenters were a little too hard edged for beautiful Music. So they would have like the rayconiff singers sing the song and provide the vocals. Like, this is how softened they would take these songs and make them. And I mean, if it was done right, even like the hardest core punk, even the members of Crass would hear that song and be like, I'm not going to admit this out loud, but that is actually beautiful music.

[Chuck Bryant]

Are you going on a limb and saying that everybody likes this stuff?

[Jerry]

I. No, no, no. Not as a genre for sure. I'm just saying there were some. There's this one version of what's New Pussycat that is way better than any version. Tom Jones, Burt Bacharach. It's so good that I really think that basically anybody could hear it and be like, this is. This is a great song. It actually is great. But whether they'd admit it or not, but I don't think that that would automatically convert them to beautiful music. I'm just saying, in some instances, done perfectly, it really is beautiful music.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, well, pressing forward, the BM format really took off because of an FCC ruling in 1965 that said if you are a company that has AM stations and FM stations, you gotta play different stuff. Because at the time there were companies that are like, hey, this is great. We can just broadcast the same thing on AM and FM and get ads on AM and also get different ads on FM and essentially double down on our product. And that's like the opposite of what they were trying to do with FM to begin with. So the FCC came around in 65, said, you can't do this anymore. You got to play different stuff. And so beautiful music came along and said, hey, this is a pretty cheap solution. It's going to be sell a lot of ads because it's gonna be directly aimed at women, especially housewives. Cause you know what they're doing, they're at home all day doing that housework, listening to music. And this'll make them happy. While they're doing their housework, they're gonna have it on the background and we're gonna pump ads in there for all the stuff that they're making the buying decisions over, which is household stuff.

[Jerry]

Yeah, because they were the target demographic of advertisers at the time. They bought most of the stuff that advertisers were selling. They made those day to day decisions about purchases. So they were what teenagers are today as far as the target demo. Right. And it was just basically assumed and presumed that women would not want anything intrusive or jarring or something. They just wanted smooth, beautiful music. So much so that like a version of this was called Music Only for a Woman. That's what the industry called the mow. Right. The thing is, despite the fact that this was set up to advertise to women directly, beautiful music as a whole, as a format on the radio. Actually, I guess the best way to put is mellowed out as far as advertising goes, and was very protective and defensive of the listener experience, which meant cutting down on ads and doing all sorts of other interesting things to ads to.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, there was a company in particular that came along called Schulke Radio Productions srp. And they were a, they became like the biggest player in syndication, like being a syndication company for the BM format. Because they offered, they were like, here, we're going to send you these ready to play reel to reel tapes. It's all programmed. You just slap that sucker on there and push play and you're set. And they said, this sounds great. They said, oh, but wait a minute. If you want to use our stuff like we're audio files. So we want the listening experience to be great and we want it to be kind of perfect. So you've got to update your broadcasting equipment because we're sending you high quality tapes and they need to come across that way. You got to hire an engineer that really knows what they're doing and make sure this is all going to go as we say it goes. And Those ads, those 16 minutes of ads an hour that you're playing, you can only do six minutes of those an hour. And when you do, you gotta have those lower in volume than the music even. And all the stuff you should know. Listeners stood up and cheered.

[Jerry]

Yeah, it's true. Because they found that if you had the radio on a low enough volume, Those ads at 6 decibels less were like you couldn't even hear them sometimes at a certain volume threshold, even though you could still hear the music. And there was another thing about the ads too. They're like, you cannot use attention grabbing tactics to advertise. And in some cases, some of these local radio stations had to go back to their advertisers and be like, crazy Murray, we're gonna have to tone this down quite a bit. And like they had to re record, rewrite ads to follow these Shulkey standards. And the reason that Shulky could get away with this was because they were selling not just like pre recorded tapes that you could just put on and have your radio station, they were selling what Muzak did as well. That there was a scientific basis to this that like followed the rhythm of the day and like built up and crested and then waned. And then built up and crested and waned. Just like Muzak. The thing is just like Muzak that was essentially totally made up, but Shulkey still had the data to prove it. People who listened to beautiful music radio listened essentially all day.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, feels like a good time for a break.

[Jerry]

Agreed.

[Chuck Bryant]

And we'll be right back to finish up with BM radio right after this. Learning things with Chuck and Chuck churning on the.

[Annabe]

July 4th celebrate freedom from spills, stains and overpriced furniture with Annabe, the only machine washable sofa inside and out where design designer quality meets budget friendly pricing. Sofas start at just $699, making it the perfect time to upgrade your space. Annabe's pet friendly stain resistant and interchangeable slipcovers are made with high performance fabric that's built for real life. You'll love the cloud like comfort of hypoallergenic high resilience foam that never needs fluffing and a durable steel frame that stands the test of time with modular pieces you can rearrange anytime. It's a stick sofa that adapts to your Life. Now through July 4th, get up to 60% off site [e-mail] Every order comes with a 30 day satisfaction guarantee. If you're not in love, send it back for a full refund. No return shipping, no restocking fees. Every penny back. Declare independence from dirty outdated furniture. Shop [e-mail] Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.

[Unknown]

OpenAI is a financial abomination, a thing that should not be an aberration, a symbol of rot at the heart of Silicon Val. And I'm going to tell you why on my show Better Offline, the rudest show in the tech industry where we're breaking down why OpenAI, along with other AI companies, are dead set on lying to your boss that they can take your job. I'm also going to be talking with the greatest minds in the industry about all the other ways the rich and powerful are ruining the computer. Listen to Better offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you happen to get your podcasts.

[Jerry]

Oh, the stuff we learn from Josh and ch. Stuff you should know.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, we're back. I think where we left off, Schulke was doing pretty good business. Crazy Murray was reduced to slightly eccentric Murray. And they were selling like hotcakes. And they had the ratings to prove it, like you said, even though the science was not true. And they were listening for hours and hours and hours. But that posed a problem, or I guess presented a problem, which was, hey, they're listening for so many hours a day, they're just having to hear the same playlist in order, basically when it loops back around and we can't get these tapes out the door fast enough to you guys. So people have like a, you know. Cause they were concerned about the listener experience. And certainly listening to a playlist on a loop is not a good one.

[Jerry]

No.

[Chuck Bryant]

And so some Companies came along that said, all right, well, let's just start hiring conductors and arrangers and putting together our own stuff. Until a company called Bonneville came along with a really unique idea. Right?

[Jerry]

Yeah. Bonneville did what Schilke did. Like, you would get pre recorded tapes of beautiful music from them, but you also had to have essentially a random automatic tape player that would select a tape, a song from a tape at random. So even though you had like the same set of, say, 50 songs, there was never going to be a playlist over the course of like, say 12 hours that was the same as before. Same songs here or there, but never the same entire playlist starting over every 12 hours.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. So they'd send tapes and packages, tapes.

[Jerry]

And tapes, tapes and tapes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, man, miss those guys. And then. Yeah. I mean, pretty good technology at the time to randomly select and, you know, cue up different songs. So it was a pretty big leap forward.

[Jerry]

Well, beautiful Music itself was basically an incubator for figuring out how to standardize and automate radio. That's where. That's the cradle of. It is beautiful music, weirdly enough.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And it spread throughout the country as a format. Every city had at least one station. If you were a big city, you probably had a few. A lot of times it was like in Detroit, wjoy, like, very mellow call signs. They just wanted to really put out, like, brand themselves as BM radio. Cause it was such a big deal. But it wasn't a big deal for that long because, you know, buying power shifted as rock and roll came along and younger listeners became the dominant sort of listener of radio. And one by one, they kind of, you know, BM radio stations switched over, which is a very jarring thing for any radio station. Format change. I'm sure we've all suffered those where you're like, well, I can't listen to this station anymore because you're just not the same radio station.

[Jerry]

Do you remember the opposite happening when 99x came out in the early 90s? And they played like the Smiths and it was like, what are the Smiths doing on the radio? This is awesome.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Because 99 in Atlanta before that was sort of cheesy pop and all of a sudden it was alternative music, which was the first true alternative station in Atlanta.

[Jerry]

Yeah, like truly alternative too. Especially at first.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I was a 96 Rock kid. But then.

[Jerry]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

But when 99X came along, I was into that. But then 99X got really bad too.

[Jerry]

Right. But at first it was pretty great.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, I Agree. Because you couldn't hear the Smiths on the radio unless you went left of the dial, which I was doing with the great album 88.

[Jerry]

Oh, album 88. Guys, I'm so bad for anybody who didn't live in Atlanta while album 88 was on the air. It was so great. It had the best shows. They played the best, like, regular rotation music. Like, it was a great, great radio station, and you can't find it anywhere. Nobody's archived it, sadly enough.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think they still have it on the weekends.

[Jerry]

Do they?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, the weekday they switched over to npr, which is dumb because we already have an NPR station.

[Jerry]

Yeah, they play basically the same thing.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. But I'm still pretty sure that album 88 exists on the weekends. And if you haven't heard of it, you maybe have heard of the great WFMU out of New Jersey. It's our version of wfmu. But every. Most every city had a great left of the dial station.

[Jerry]

Well, this one was the best left of the dial station. I agree. Do you remember Atom Bomb? He had, like, a soul show.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, I don't remember that one.

[Jerry]

Soul Kitchen, I think it was called.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, okay, I remember Soul Kitchen.

[Jerry]

Yeah, that was Atom Bomb. And that's definitely not archived anywhere on the Internet. So if anybody has old tapes of Atom Bomb's Soul Kitchen, please post them.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that Reelin in the Ears was a good show. Their Sunday morning reggae show was amazing.

[Jerry]

Do you remember the Saturday morning cartoon theme show? That was a good one, too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Good stuff.

[Jerry]

I think we should just put one last thing. You said that a BM station started to drop like flies in the or 80s in particular. By 1990, they were basically gone. There was a fictionalized version of this event, and we like to call that fictionalized version WKRP in Cincinnati.

[Chuck Bryant]

You know what? I did not remember this, and I love that show until you included it in the article. And I was like, wait a minute. I do remember this pilot. Like, I remember that happening.

[Jerry]

That's what happened. That's why they hired Andy as station manager, because they were converting from beautiful music to rock. And that's exactly what was going on at the time around him.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And that's why Dr. Johnny fever and Venus Flytrap all were stoked about their job.

[Jerry]

Yeah. And Herb Tarlick had to go to Crazy Murray and be like, can we turn you upward now? Because we're a rock station.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. And Lonnie Anderson said, did I type this right? And leaned over the desk.

[Jerry]

That was a good show. Oh, let's thank our sources for this episode. Chuck Tarver at the University of Delaware, Go Blue Hens, Ken Mills at Radio World, diffin.com Ken Siyapura @ Cradoville, and the Forum at Radio Discussions. And since we have nothing more to say about beautiful music, Short Stuff is out.

[Chuck Bryant]

Stuff youf Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever.

[Annabe]

You listen to your favorite shows.