Killing Beyond Jazz = Killing The Whole Concept of SATRAD!!!

[xmcor]

I've been so disgusted as a long time XM sub and fan of Beyond Jazz to hear it's been killed. I wrote the company and got no reply. How stupid can they be to actually foster their rapidly growing competion in internet radio by canning an entire huge broad genre channel and have Russ Davis starting his own internet radio station with the same format? Seems that more of us audiophile's will abandon SatRad in favor of Slacker, and other internet radio formats. I am sickened beyond belief that SATRAD is going so mainstream; to think that we can't have just ONE station to appeal to REAL musicians making REAL music, but instead we need 12 urban channels, 12 country hits, and 20 FM pop channels etc? Might as well listen to FM. So XM is basically now FM without commercials. Is XM Chill going to be next? Are they going to kill Fine Tuning? Where can I hear real fusion and all the many styles XM USED to have???? SICKENING.

[xmcor]

Does anyone have the email address for the Jon Zellnor? Demian- did you write him about your Beyond Jazz outrage? Did you get a response?

[tdevine]

[xmcor]

Well, using your reference to the fact that both services currently have a Chill channel, the same can't be said for a modern jazz channel. Now both services (or the merged one) will have NO modern jazz channel. Even if they throw in the oocasional fusion tune on Real Jazz it won't flow right. The Sirius chill channel is not nearly as ethereal and deep and XM Chill- kind of like all their channels. Since they essentially bought XM's library, why would they water everything down instead of combining for deeper playlists on the channels that matter? I know I should wait and see what the new line-up will bring, but they continue to show signs of mainstreaming the whole service. Music Lab, Special X, Beyond Jazz, On the Rocks, Village, what's next? I forgot the name of the latin jazz channel a few years back, but when they killed that- they put some of that on Real Jazz for a while. Now it's gone completely.

[tdevine]

I remember Sirius Chill use to mix in random soft rock songs (think Coldplay) into their sets, don't think they do that anymore. But still XM Chill is the superior Chill. The XM dance programmers have been pretty untouched since the merger hoopla began so that gives me hope that XM influences Chill in the future.

I too felt it was unnessesary to delete the online-only channels, but for the most part they were dead anyways and were hardly ever updated. I'm hoping when XM Sirius gets their shit together some niche programs can at least return to the music channels. Or maybe when those minority/educational channels debut they'll offer something more niche. Will they ever replace what XM use to offer? Hell no, but would make XM more appealing to at least keep in the car. At home and at work internet radio has taken over much of my listening.

So Real Jazz got rid of Manteca ? I use to enjoy that

[Brian202]

[xmcor]

While this title of this post may sound extreme, I was trying to illustrate the point that one of the biggest draws to having SatRad in the first place was to be able to hear and discover many different forms of music not CURRENTLY found on terrestrial radio, of which Beyond Jazz was a huge factor because they dug deeply into no less than 5 decades worth of many forms of jazz that you will NEVER hear on regular radio. Jazz is real music, made by real musicians, not the endless repetitive pop synth artists found on many of the other xm stations. It's a well known FACT that even all of these stations are already getting watered down, sounding more and more like terrestrial commercial BS radio. If killing Beyond Jazz leaves NO place on a PAY radio service where I can hear the thousands of artists that have been formerly heard, then YES it is equal to killing the original concept of hearing great real music you never would on regular radio. The same could be said for even the 70's channel as another good example. Prior to the merger, you could hear thousands of songs that haven't aired since the 70's, although they were hits back then. Now, they play ONLY the same hits (Black Water, More Than A Feeling etc) that we've heard ad nauseum on regular radio for years. That is precisely what I liked about SATRAD. But no more. Appeal to the masses and the lowest common denominator and screw guys like me who want to pay for something different and interesting.

[Demian]

I totally agree with you. This is a travesty!

They are killing POTUS too....

What are they thinking?

Scott Walterman is what great radio is all about...

This is just a crying shame...

Raise some hell people!

[SuperH]

QQ



There is far more to satellite radio than Beyond Jazz.

[dalej42]

I like a lot of type of music, but a station like Beyond Jazz is one of the reasons I got satellite radio. There are genres of music I like, but I don't really want to build a collection of music in that genre.

[Andrew-NYC]

This is truly sickening. It appears they are realigning satradio to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Niche channels are what many people subscribe for. I happen to like the "shit" that a previous poster referred to. While I would never call the endless rock, rap, & country "shit", it does appear ridiculous that there isn't room for modern jazz anywhere on the spectrum. This is extremely short-sighted, and will lead to many defections to internet radio. (and loss of subscriptions). If they get rid of Audio Visions or Spa 73, or Watercolors, I'm gone!

[CTGuy]

If satellite radio could make a go of it as a niche medium, we wouldn't be having this discussion. Unfortunately, we are a nation of mainstream tastes. and that is the listener who must be catered to as the company tries to attain the pie-in-the-sky numbers it told Wall Street it would achieve seven years ago -- 40 million subscribers by 2010.

[syphix]

Once the REAL benefit of the merger is realized (owning both spectrums of satellite bandwidth..not expected for 10-15 years), perhaps SIRIUS XM can create TONS of "niche" channels.

[SuperH]

[jkb246]

They haven't advertised on tv in a year. They have no game plan whatsoever. I agree that will the loss of all of the niche channels that new Ipod is looking nicer and nicer and since this is Xmas There will be sales. I don't need CNN/POTUS,etc since the election is over.

They are about to lose customers if they mess this up