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erockster Changing the Face of Radio (Tech News)

erockster Breaks All the Rules; Coachella Pirate Radio Launches a Revolutionary Station with an Entirely New Approach
on-Air, Online, and on-Demand Signed and Unsigned Artists – 5000 Songs Strong

Creatively Produced by Eric Szmanda from 'CSI: Crime Scene Investigation'

Clear Channel Radio today officially launched erockster – a vast collection of on-air, online and on-demand content for music fans of all genres. The collection will reach some 5000 songs over the next month, adding 1000 songs per week. From music to blogs to a social network and user-created content, erockster is created for 13- to 34-year-olds with hopes of appealing to music lovers of all ages.

Helmed and produced/inspired by Eric Szmanda, along with his childhood friend and business partner Tyler Malin, erockster brings a remarkable level of listener involvement and interaction. Listeners can sign on to www.erockster.com, register their preferences, and influence the content that erockster features.

"Our main focus will be on quality and we're going to give a lot of bands that don't have a chance to be heard on the radio that opportunity," said Szmanda, best known to audiences as Greg Sanders on 'CSI: Crime Scene Investigation'. "We want to be playing everything from indie rock to hip-hop to classic rock to soul to dance rock."

The wildly diverse group of artists already being featured include Radiohead, the Ramones, My Morning Jacket, the Rolling Stones, Grandmaster Flash, Johnny Cash, Hot Chip, Prince, the Beatles, T Rex, Al Green, Jane's Addiction,, Daft Punk, Pink Floyd, the Kinks, Bjork, the Who, Arcade Fire, Ray Charles, the Verve, Air, Otis Redding, Pharcyde, Velvet Underground, the Clash, Pavement, the Roots, The Police, David Bowie, and Kraftwerk.

The erockster content streams online at www.erockster.com; and starting May 2nd, it will also stream from Los Angeles (KYSR-FM), Washington DC (WWDC-FM) and Philadelphia (WRFF-FM) as well as broadcast as an HD2 channel. As additional stations are added, the show will also be syndicated as a two-hour program on FM stations.

Coachella Pirate Radio

This past weekend, erockster previewed at the Coachella music festival, pirating independently-owned station KAJR FM 95.9 in Indio/Palm Springs and streaming online at erockster.com. The preview included more than 1000 songs over the three-day festival, with no repeats and no commercial interruptions, focusing on current and past Coachella artists. To add to the pirate theme, and to place the focus of the broadcast on music and the festival, Szmanda used a vocoder to disguise his voice and allowed exclusive artist and fan interviews to tell the story of the weekend.

Artists featured for the Coachella weekend were those currently or previously playing the festival, including Fatboy Slim, Raconteurs, LCD Soundsystem, the Breeders, Cut Copy, Tool, Chemical Brothers, Coldplay, NIN, the Pixies, Justice, Kanye West, Beck, Oasis, Portishead and MGMT.

"Eric has an unparalleled love and appreciation for a vast array of music," said Evan Harrison, executive vice president of Clear Channel Radio and head of the company's Online Music & Radio unit. "His talent will absolutely resonate with like-minded fans."

"Clear Channel came to me with the chance to be a kid in the candy store," added Szmanda. "Now, erockster is giving all fans an outlet to listen to a wide variety of music, discuss bands, concerts, and really anything that we have an opinion or comment on that's music-related."

Views: 10

Comment by Mumbo Sauce on April 30, 2008 at 11:16am
The world is changing right before our eyes - get down or lay down

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