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Showing posts with the label gen x

Things Past: In Praise Of AOR

Growing up in the 70s and 80s, radio was a constant companion in the Holder home. Even when it wasn't convenient - there was an AM station on the next street, and its signal was picked up by the family phone, so we often had to talk over the sound of the program. Sure, we watched too much TV back then, but radio was king. Rocky Face, GA is located between two large FM radio markets, so growing up I had a choice between Chattanooga and Atlanta stations. The Chattanooga stations came in more clearly, but Atlanta had more variety. Top 40 stations were most prevalent, but for me, there was only one kind of station: Album Oriented Radio. While Top 40 stations played just that, the most popular current singles, Album Oriented Radio (AOR) stations dug deeper, playing "deep cuts" from albums old and new. Atlanta's most popular AOR station was 96 Rock, where you could hear everything from the Eagles to Iron Maiden (often in the same hour). 96 Rock was THE station of the 80...