Transcript

AM Radio: Solid Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW

From Stuff You Should Know · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 49 min · 8,997 words · 193 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "AM Radio: Solid Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW", an episode of Stuff You Should Know published November 19, 2025 (49 min, about 8,997 words). It mentions 139 people, works and ideas, including AM radio, Exploring with Josh, Stuff You Should Know, The Golden Age of Radio, KDKA Pittsburgh.

What this episode is about

The announcement highlights an upcoming tour starting January 27, 2026, with performances scheduled in cities such as Denver, Seattle, and San Francisco, followed by Midwest stops in Madison, Chicago, and Akron in April. Pre-sale tickets are available, emphasizing excitement for reconnecting with fans across multiple locations.

Key takeaways

  • Skipping 2025: The band took a year off, not laziness - a cunning strategy for renewed fan excitement.
  • Midwest Magic: Tour heads to new cities, proving wanderlust isn't just for vacationers anymore.
  • Vinyl Vibes: Limited edition records back, sweet nostalgia wrapped in red and black marble.
  • AM Radio Redux: Once top-spot, now a quirky relic - a parallel tale of tech evolution.
  • Record Store Day Reissue: Dive into nostalgia, the holiday must-have spinning its own tale.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 5:00: AM radio, Exploring with Josh, Born Losers Records, Born Losers Records
  2. – 10:00: AM radio, Gilmo Maronei, KDKA Pittsburgh, KDKA Pittsburgh
  3. – 15:00: AM radio, FM drift, FM radio, Georgia Bulldogs
  4. – 20:00: AM radio, public good, The Golden Age of Radio, Guiding Light
  5. – 25:00: AM radio, The Fairness Doctrine, Fairness Doctrine, public good
  6. – 30:00: AM radio, Clear Channel, echo chamber, Stuff You Should Know
  7. – 35:00: AM radio, Top 40, The Golden Age of Radio, Raul Julia
  8. – 40:00: AM radio, DMT, Pina Colada, album-oriented rock
  9. – 45:00: AM radio, AM radio for every vehicle act, Jaguar, Emergency Alert System
  10. – 48:37: AM radio, Stuff You Should Know, iHeart Radio, ZZ Top

Notable quotes from "AM Radio: Solid Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"

  • Everybody, we have a big announcement, but Josh, I think you need to do your traditional tour announcement.
    about Exploring with Josh · at
  • Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.
    about Stuff You Should Know · at
  • Julia helped us with this one and I didn't realize before that AM broadcasting basically set the standards Yeah.
    about AM radio · at
  • We need to kind of lock this down for now. But starting in about 1920, in fact, exactly 1920 was when commercial broadcast AM radio started with KDKA Pittsburgh.
    about KDKA Pittsburgh · at
  • For sure. But he managed to make it like super radio friendly and it was super popular. you said that the golden age of radio ended around the 1962 and we should say this was…
    about The Golden Age of Radio · at
  • At the time you couldn't to just put out one say specific political viewpoint. So the fairness doctrine said you have to have equal time when you're talking about political matters you have to give equal time to both opposing viewpoints.
    about The Fairness Doctrine · at
  • Emergency alert system now. It used to be the EBS, the emergency broadcast system. And if you're thinking man, I get my Amber Alerts, like all that stuff comes through my phone now.
    about Emergency Alert System · at
  • Actually have come up with a law called the AM radio for every vehicle act that basically says if you sell a car in the United States, it has to have AM radio as a feature. not…
    about The AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Exploring with Josh — Person · Host / main speaker · 2 mentions · first at
    Co-host of Stuff You Should Know; leads the tour announcement and co-narrates the AM radio history discussion.
  • Raul Julia — Person · Researcher / contributor · 2 mentions · first at
    Credited with helping prepare the episode and providing framing/terminology (e.g., 'jukebox driven media') for AM radio’s role in shaping formats.
    Julia helped us with this one and I didn't realize before that AM broadcasting basically set the standards Yeah.
  • Gilmo Maronei — Person · Referenced historical figure (mis-transcribed name) · 2 mentions · first at
    Cited as the 'father of radio' who helped spread radio globally via companies; the transcript spelling appears to refer to Guglielmo Marconi.
    The world. And one reason why it exploded all over the world is because the person who's considered the father of radio, Gilmo Maronei, he set up companies everywhere. So very…
  • Father Charles Coughlin — Person · Referenced historical figure (example in free-speech/regulation discussion) · 1 mention · first at
    Raised as an early, controversial radio personality used to illustrate how AM radio prompted debates about regulation and speech.
    Yeah. One of the first people that the question of freedom of speech was raised around was Father Charles Coughlin who was a bigoted hate speech Catholic priest who really kind of pushed the envelope you could say. I.
  • Warren Harding — Person · referenced historical figure · 2 mentions · first at
    Referenced as the presidential election result read on KDKA's first commercial broadcast (1920).
    Yeah, that was the very first one. I think that they read the results of the Warren Harding election. I can't remember the other guy's name. Somebody Cox Warren Harding obviously won. But.
  • Jeffrey – Merrit, Jerry — Person · Producer / in-studio participant · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as present with the hosts ('Jerry's here, too'); functions as a supporting on-mic presence rather than a topic driver in this excerpt.
    That's right. And pay attention the great white north because there is more to come this summer.
  • Edgar Bergen — Person · referenced entertainer · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as the star of the popular radio ventriloquist show featuring Charlie McCarthy.
    Which was a ventriloquist act on the radio.
  • ZZ Top — Person · Referenced musical act (mis-typed as person) · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced for a lyric/joke ('got legs') during a humorous aside; not central to the AM radio topic.
    It was Don't forget the ZZ top eliminator video trilogy were feminist.
  • Calvin Coolidge — Person · referenced historical figure · 2 mentions
    Mentioned in passing as a president in the episode's historical discussion (confidence of detection in input was 0).
  • Little Chuck — Person · 6 mentions
  • Edgar Bergen — Person · 1 mention · first at
    During this time. on the lighter side, one of the most popular longrunning shows was the Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy show.
  • Charlie McCarthy — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Side, one of the most popular longrunning shows was the Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy show.
  • Alfred Hitchcock — Person · 1 mention · first at
    And then suspense was another one. It sounds like it was a little bit of a predecessor to like Alfred Hitchcock Presents and maybe The Twilight Zone here or there.
  • Big Bopper — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. like each station had to have their own personality. like the big bopper, one of the most famous of all time.
  • Dr. Crant — Person · 1 mention · first at
    This is not what you said during our therapy session last week. Well, Dr. Crant said that Dr. Cats, that's who we should have gotten.
  • Big Cat — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah, Dr. Cat said that I needed to make more stuff up. So, we're not in therapy together, by the way, everybody. That was a joke.
  • Rupert Holmes — Person · 1 mention · first at
    That's what he's upset about. It's a nutso song. Go listen to it. But yeah, Rupert Holmes, I don't think he like embodies the seven like the worst part of men in the 70s, I think.
  • Christopher Cross — Person · 1 mention · first at
    Well, well, you know what's funny? I think Christopher Cross wrote Ride Like the Wind when he was on LSD.
  • Cara — Person · 1 mention
  • David Lee Roth — Person · 1 mention
  • Guglielmo Marconi — Person · 1 mention
  • Larry Munson — Person · 1 mention
  • Rush Limbaugh — Person · 1 mention
  • Todd Storz — Person · 1 mention
  • Wolfman Jack — Person · 1 mention
  • Yumi — Person · 1 mention

Books & papers

  • Guiding Light — Book · Historical reference · 1 mention · first at
    Long-running soap opera that transitioned from radio to TV, mentioned in the context of AM radio's influence.
    And one of the longerlasting soap operas of all time actually made the jump successfully from radio to TV. That was Guiding Light.

Companies & orgs

  • Stuff You Should Know — Company · Host · 3 mentions · first at
    The podcast hosting the discussion, providing insights and banter on AM radio.
  • KDKA Pittsburgh — Company · Historical reference · 1 mention · first at
    First commercial AM radio station, marking the beginning of AM broadcasting.
  • Born Losers Records — Company · Product owner · 2 mentions · first at
    Company responsible for releasing the podcast's vinyl record, mentioned in the context of Record Store Day.
    Awesome. And thanks again to our friends at Born Losers. You guys are great.
  • CBS — Company · historical broadcaster/network · 9 mentions
    Mentioned as one of the major radio networks that launched by the late 1920s.
    The major networks had launched and you know these were radio networks NBC and CBS. these were international broadcasts from the United States all over the world.
  • AT&T — Company · historical infrastructure provider · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced for creating the first radio network in 1922 by linking stations via phone lines.
    1920s, everybody was on board. In 1922, in fact, AT&T had the first radio network built when they linked 38 radio stations by phone lines and could broadcast, WAF out of New…
  • BBC — Company · historical broadcaster · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as beginning broadcasts in 1922 as part of global AM radio expansion.
    Stations by phone lines and could broadcast, WAF out of New York all around the country. So like people it was literally like you said like the internet was it was American life before and life after as far as AM radio goes.
  • iHeart Radio — Company · Sponsor · 2 mentions · first at
    Production company of the podcast, mentioned in the closing credits.
    Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio.
  • Sketchfest — Company · 2 mentions · first at
    Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • Clear Channel — Company · 2 mentions · first at
    Essentially. We'll talk a little more about that later, but that's why the Clear Channel thing is a thing, right? And to be clear, I didn't even mean that. Not to be confused with former iHeart Media company Clear Channel.
  • Jaguar — Company · 2 mentions · first at
    Option. and a lot of car makers are Sure, fine. We're we're on board with that. Honda, Hyundai, Jaguar, Kia, Mitsubishi Nissan Salantis Subaru Toyota, all said, We're keeping…
  • Paramount Theater — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Yes. Get this. So, we're going to start hitting the road in January. Starting January 27th at the Paramount Theater in Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater…
  • Record Store Day — Company · 1 mention · first at
    It's coming out on Black Friday, November 28th this year, which also happens to be Record Store Day from what I understand. And our friends at Born Losers Records put this out again.
  • W Street — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah, maybe I could work something out with W Street here in town. I can go There you go.
  • ABC Sydney — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Australia's first radio station 2SB which is now ABC Sydney. That's they started in 1923.
  • Georgia Bulldogs — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Oh wow. And a lot of that was spent with me listening to Georgia Bulldogs on the radio.
  • Guiding Light — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Of all time actually made the jump successfully from radio to TV. That was Guiding Light.
  • General Hospital — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Switch channels during ads and what see what was on other soap operas. And on General Hospital once there was a scene where this couple was in bed and they did such a poor job…
  • US Bureau of Home Economics — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Is the way to do it. So the USDA radio service began talking to farmers in 1926. the US Bureau of Home Economics had a chat program they launched I believe in the same year…
  • Time Life — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Spoofing the genre made up the name yacht rock. Before that, I think like Time Life put out those the AM Gold series of CDs. I think AM Gold or mellow or easy listening.
  • Van Halen — Company · 1 mention · first at
    That's kind of like those videos of Van Halen with nothing but David Lee Ross vocals. Have you heard those?
  • Mitsubishi — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Sure, fine. We're we're on board with that. Honda, Hyundai, Jaguar, Kia, Mitsubishi Nissan Salantis Subaru Toyota, all said, We're keeping AM radio. Ford had said they weren't.…
  • Subaru — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Sure, fine. We're we're on board with that. Honda, Hyundai, Jaguar, Kia, Mitsubishi Nissan Salantis Subaru Toyota, all said, We're keeping AM radio. Ford had said they weren't.…
  • Polestar — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Well Tesla Rivian Polestar BMW Volkswagen, and Volvo dispensed with AM radio and some of their new car models. I don't think completely across the board for each of those.
  • Rivian — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Well Tesla Rivian Polestar BMW Volkswagen, and Volvo dispensed with AM radio and some of their new car models. I don't think completely across the board for each of those.
  • 119th Congress — Company · 1 mention · first at
    Support like on, both sides of the aisle. so but if the 119th Congress ever decides to do anything at all, perhaps that will be reconsidered.
  • ZZ Top — Company · 1 mention · first at
    That's good. That was the original ZZ top line, but it was a little baggy.
  • 2SB — Company · 1 mention
  • Honda — Company · 1 mention
  • Kia — Company · 1 mention
  • Stellantis — Company · 1 mention
  • Volvo — Company · 1 mention
  • WAF — Company · 1 mention
  • XWA — Company · 1 mention

Products & tech

  • sykvvinyl.com — Product · purchase_url / sales channel for vinyl · 1 mention · first at
    URL given as place to buy the reprinted vinyl release of an episode; used in call-to-action directing listeners to purchase.
    Released on vinyl is being reprinted because that thing sold out. And I think people would love to have one of these things for Christmas.
  • stuffyounow.com — Product · 1 mention · first at
  • syskvvinyl.com — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Records that are just beautiful. those are available online at syskvvinyl.com.
  • transistor radio — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Not even have AM radio or a radio in their house like a transistor radio or something or receiver but they may think AM radio is as like you know news talk, sports talk, maybe some foreign language stations maybe some if they're driving.
  • vacuum tubes — Product · 1 mention · first at
    And you know they worked by you know you had to have a receiver. So early on you know vacuum tubes worked with radio receivers connected to loudspeakers and that's how you…
  • loudspeakers — Product · 1 mention · first at
    You know vacuum tubes worked with radio receivers connected to loudspeakers and that's how you could hear things. Later on transistor radios came along and that's what really…
  • cassette player — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Back when I was taking my big out west trips when all I had was like a cassette player and the radio. once the sun went down, sometimes you could get an AM station on your…
  • water bed — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Furniture store in North Georgia called Gallery Furniture. If you wanted a water bed, you would go ask for the Wolf Man. Boy, that's a niche joke. should we even explain it or not?
  • crystal receiver radio — Product · 1 mention · first at
    It's everybody is reached by AM one way or another and I didn't know this but you can make a type of radio a crystal receiver radio that can play AM radio broadcasts without…
  • iHeart Radio app — Product · 1 mention · first at
    Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts of iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
  • AM receiver — Product · 1 mention
  • EV — Product · 1 mention
  • TV — Product · 1 mention
  • vinyl record (SYSK episode on how vinyl works) — Product · 1 mention

Concepts & topics

  • AM radio — Concept · Core topic · 33 mentions · first at
    Central theme of the episode, discussing the history, impact, and current state of AM radio broadcasting.
  • The Golden Age of Radio — Concept · Framework · 3 mentions · first at
    Described as a period when AM radio was the dominant form of entertainment and information.
  • Top 40 — Concept · Historical reference · 4 mentions · first at
    Music format that originated on AM radio, discussed in the context of AM radio's evolution.
    Yeah. top 40 radio started on AM which is I mean I think these days the kids if they hear of AM radio probably either don't know what it is or may not if they have as we'll see a.
  • Emergency Alert System — Concept · Related topic · 1 mention · first at
    Highlighted as a critical function of AM radio for public safety.
  • The AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act — Concept · Key argument · 1 mention · first at
    Discussed as a legislative effort to mandate AM radio in all new vehicles, emphasizing its importance.
  • The Fairness Doctrine — Concept · Key argument · 3 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as a policy that regulated AM radio to ensure balanced political coverage.
  • Mellow Gold — Concept · Related topic · 3 mentions · first at
    Described as a genre of music popular on AM radio in the 1970s.
    About usually like conquering women. most of them were about getting dumped by women. A lot of sad sack music coming out.
  • The Electric Pulpit — Concept · Key argument · 1 mention · first at
    Described as a platform for evangelists to reach wide audiences via AM radio.
    Religion was also a big deal early on AM radio. all of a sudden evangelists could broadcast far and wide from what they called the electric pull pit. and they became like you know big-time personalities and stars during the.
  • The USDA Radio Service — Concept · Framework · 1 mention · first at
    Noted as an early example of AM radio serving public information needs.
    Information because we got to get the word out about stuff sometimes and this is the way to do it. So the USDA radio service began talking to farmers in 1926. the US Bureau of…
  • Pina Colada — Concept · Referenced entity · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned in the context of yacht rock music.
    Girls. I'm gonna sing about things I like pia coladas and getting caught in the rain. Man, that guy. I think he's one of the most reprehensible songwriters of all time. Not just I hate that song.
  • DMT — Concept · Referenced entity · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned humorously in the context of interpreting yacht rock lyrics.
    Like for example, Love Grows Where My Rosemary Goes is code for Let's Smoke Some DMT.
  • public good — Concept · 6 mentions · first at
    One of the other things that we'll see about AM radio too, Chuck, is that it's it was long considered a public good. so that the government had like a little more willingness…
  • Fairness Doctrine — Concept · 3 mentions · first at
    Know no particular message gets out more than any other and that's where the fairness doctrine came about right yeah we talked about that in the presidential debates episode…
  • AM broadcasting — Concept · 2 mentions · first at
    Julia helped us with this one and I didn't realize before that AM broadcasting basically set the standards Yeah.
  • radio network — Concept · 2 mentions · first at
    But like you said, by the early 1920s, everybody was on board. In 1922, in fact, AT&T had the first radio network built when they linked 38 radio stations by phone lines and…
  • echo chamber — Concept · 2 mentions · first at
    So then, that's where that's really literally where the echo chamber of politics started, where you could turn into just your person who only talked about things that you agreed with.
  • mass communication — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Decades that all started with AM radio because ultimately it was the very first form of mass communication that was not printed.
  • FM radio — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Sticking with the AM. One of the big reasons is because the FM receiver needs more power because of the way FM radio is pumped out. That was a big thing for a long time. And…
  • FM drift — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. there's also something called FM drift. like you know if you're driving around listening to an FM station. it can kind of go in and out.
  • vaudeville — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Long time of all over the map variety style stuff kind of reminiscent of vaudeville.
  • freedom of speech — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. One of the first people that the question of freedom of speech was raised around was Father Charles Coughlin who was a bigoted hate speech Catholic priest who really kind of pushed the envelope you could say. I.
  • ionosphere — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Like four states away because of those air waves bouncing off the ionosphere and saying, We'll take it from here.
  • national security alert system — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Is kind of overlooked a lot here in the United States which is it is like a national security alert system essentially. We'll talk a little more about that later, but that's…
  • jukebox-driven media — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    But he said, Hey, let's let's start playing this music. let's create a what Julia calls a jukebox driven media and you know play people stuff. It you know DJs became a thing.…
  • album-oriented rock — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    You put on the radio because FM was playing you know they were playing the AO album oriented rock stuff that had a little more mechismo and testosterone fueled like you know rock bands big hair.
  • easy listening — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Time Life put out those the AM Gold series of CDs. I think AM Gold or mellow or easy listening.
  • electrical interference — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Short, AM waves are much more susceptible to noise because of electrical interference. Well, an electrical vehicle is lousy with electrical interference. And so the whole car industry is we're going to have to spend a bunch of money just.
  • AM Radio for Every Vehicle Act — Concept · 1 mention · first at
    Congress says no, we're we actually have come up with a law called the AM radio for every vehicle act that basically says if you sell a car in the United States, it has to have…
  • clear-channel station — Concept · 1 mention
  • Crystal Night (Kristallnacht) — Concept · 1 mention
  • DJ — Concept · 1 mention
  • Emergency Broadcast System (EBS) — Concept · 1 mention
  • radio drama — Concept · 1 mention
  • soap opera — Concept · 1 mention
  • vacuum tube radio — Concept · 1 mention

Places & events

  • KDKA Pittsburgh — Place · historical station (origin) · 1 mention · first at
    Referenced as the first commercial AM broadcast station (1920) that announced election results.
    We need to kind of lock this down for now. But starting in about 1920, in fact, exactly 1920 was when commercial broadcast AM radio started with KDKA Pittsburgh.
  • Sketchfest — Event · event_experience · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as a stop on the January run — returning to Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco.
    Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • AM radio for every vehicle act — Event · Key argument · 2 mentions · first at
    Discussed as a legislative effort to mandate AM radio in all vehicles.
    Congress says no, we're we actually have come up with a law called the AM radio for every vehicle act that basically says if you sell a car in the United States, it has to have…
  • Paramount Theater — Place · venue · 1 mention · first at
    Listed as the location of the tour's January 27 (Denver) and January 28 (Seattle) kickoff shows.
    Hitting the road in January. Starting January 27th at the Paramount Theater in Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be…
  • San Francisco — Place · city (event location) · 1 mention · first at
    City where Sketchfest and the Sydney Goldstein Theater appearance takes place.
    Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • Sydney Goldstein Theater — Place · venue · 1 mention · first at
    Venue for the Sketchfest stop in San Francisco on January 29.
    Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • KDKA Pittsburgh — Place · Historical reference · 2 mentions · first at
    Mentioned as the first commercial broadcast AM radio station.
    Now. But starting in about 1920, in fact, exactly 1920 was when commercial broadcast AM radio started with KDKA Pittsburgh.
  • Denver — Place · city (tour stop) · 1 mention · first at
    City hosting the January 27 tour kickoff at the Paramount Theater.
    Yes. Get this. So, we're going to start hitting the road in January. Starting January 27th at the Paramount Theater in Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on.
  • Seattle — Place · city (tour stop) · 1 mention · first at
    City hosting the January 28 tour show at the Paramount Theater.
    Yes. Get this. So, we're going to start hitting the road in January. Starting January 27th at the Paramount Theater in Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our.
  • Madison, Wisconsin — Place · city (tour stop) · 1 mention · first at
    Listed as the April 16 Midwest tour date at the Oreium Theater.
    And then in April, we're going to hit the Midwest and we're going to some cities we haven't been to yet. And I'm super excited because on April 16th, we'll be in Madison, Wisconsin at.
  • Oreium Theater — Place · venue · 1 mention · first at
    Venue named for the Madison, Wisconsin April 16 show (likely transcript spelling variant of Orpheum/Oreium).
    Cities we haven't been to yet. And I'm super excited because on April 16th, we'll be in Madison, Wisconsin at the Oreium Theater. On the 17th, we'll be back in Chicago at the…
  • Akran, Ohio — Place · city (tour stop) · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as April 18 tour stop described as the host's wife's hometown — at the Goodyear Theater. (Note: likely intended to be 'Akron, Ohio' in transcript.)
    The Oreium Theater. On the 17th, we'll be back in Chicago at the Chicago Auditorium, a city we love. and then to my wife's hometown finally April 18th in Akran, Ohio at the Goodyear Theater.
  • Record Store Day — Event · Event experience · 1 mention · first at
    Annual event celebrating independent record stores, mentioned in the context of the podcast's vinyl release.
    For the holidays. As a matter of fact, it's coming out on Black Friday, November 28th this year, which also happens to be Record Store Day from what I understand. And our friends at Born Losers Records put this out again.
  • San Francisco, CA — Place · Setting · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a tour location for Sketchfest.
    Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • Chicago Auditorium — Place · Setting · 1 mention · first at
    Venue mentioned in the context of the podcast's upcoming tour dates.
    Super excited because on April 16th, we'll be in Madison, Wisconsin at the Oreium Theater. On the 17th, we'll be back in Chicago at the Chicago Auditorium, a city we love. and…
  • Goodyear Theater — Place · Setting · 1 mention · first at
    Venue mentioned in the context of the podcast's upcoming tour dates.
    Be back in Chicago at the Chicago Auditorium, a city we love. and then to my wife's hometown finally April 18th in Akran, Ohio at the Goodyear Theater.
  • Paramount Theater in Seattle — Place · 1 mention · first at
    January 27th at the Paramount Theater in Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • Sydney Goldstein Theater — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.
  • great white north — Place · 1 mention · first at
    That's right. And pay attention the great white north because there is more to come this summer.
  • Montreal — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Canada got its first one in 1932. XWA out of Montreal. it was just like the internet. It's not like it was just one country. It was everybody who got in involved because it was a humanity altering invention.
  • Jersey City, New Jersey — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Speaking of sports, in 1921, over about 125,000 square miles from where it broadcast out of Jersey City, New Jersey, people listen to the heavyweight boxing championship. And I…
  • North Georgia — Place · 1 mention · first at
    Yeah. Like the Wolfman went on to own a furniture store in North Georgia called Gallery Furniture. If you wanted a water bed, you would go ask for the Wolf Man. Boy, that's a niche joke. should we even explain.
  • Beaumont, Texas — Place · 1 mention
  • Orpheum Theater (Madison) — Place · 1 mention

Media & podcasts

  • Guiding Light — Media · Historical reference · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a long-running soap opera that transitioned from radio to TV.
    And one of the longerlasting soap operas of all time actually made the jump successfully from radio to TV. That was Guiding Light.
  • Charlie McCarthy — Character · referenced character/entertainment · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as Edgar Bergen's ventriloquist puppet and part of a popular radio program.
    Which was a ventriloquist act on the radio.

Sponsors

  • Born Losers Records — Sponsor · sponsor · 2 mentions · first at
    Record label that released/reprinted the podcast's vinyl edition; acknowledged and thanked in the episode.
    November 28th this year, which also happens to be Record Store Day from what I understand. And our friends at Born Losers Records put this out again.
  • syskive — Sponsor · 1 mention · first at
    And we're actually running a pre-sale today, November 18th. You can use our code syskive to get tickets early. Go to stuffyounow.com. It'll have all the tickets and info that you need. And you can buy Sketchfest tickets right now as well.
  • stuffyounow.com — Sponsor · 1 mention · first at
    Today, November 18th. You can use our code syskive to get tickets early. Go to stuffyounow.com. It'll have all the tickets and info that you need. And you can buy Sketchfest tickets right now as well.
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    Records that are just beautiful. those are available online at syskvvinyl.com.

Full transcript with timestamps

Uh, everybody, we have a big announcement, but Josh, I think you need to do your traditional tour announcement.

There we go. That means it's tour time, everybody. We took off 2025 cuz it just felt like the right thing to do. But we are hitting the road again next year. Yeah.

And we are super excited. Yes. Get this. So, we're going to start hitting the road in January. Starting January 27th at the Paramount Theater in Denver. The next day, we'll be at the Paramount Theater in Seattle. And on January 29th, we'll be back to our beloved Sketchfest at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco, CA.

That's right. That's our January run. And then in April, we're going to hit the Midwest and we're going to some cities we haven't been to yet. And I'm super excited because on April 16th, we'll be in Madison, Wisconsin at the Oreium Theater. On the 17th, we'll be back in Chicago at the Chicago Auditorium, a city we love. and then to my wife's hometown finally April 18th in Akran, Ohio at the Goodyear Theater.

That's right. And get this, for the January leg, tickets are on sale now. And we're actually running a pre-sale today, November 18th. You can use our code syskive to get tickets early. Go to stuffyounow.com. It'll have all the tickets and info that you need. And you can buy Sketchfest tickets right now as well.

That's right. Sketchfest uh on sale the 16th of November. There's no pre-sale on that one. General on sale is happening as we speak.

That's right. So, we'll see you guys in 2026. We're really excited to get back out there. We hope you're excited, too. If you're not, just fake it when you see us.

That's right. And pay attention the great white north because there is more to come this summer.

That's right. So, we'll see you soon. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's Chuck and Jerry's here, too. And we're just kicking it old school, real mellow style, which is what I understand all the kids say today.

That's right. And hey, uh, before we get going, this is probably the perfect episode to mention that our, uh, episode on how vinyl works that was released on vinyl

is being reprinted because that thing sold out. And I think people would love to have one of these things for Christmas.

Yeah, we're releasing it just in time for the holidays. As a matter of fact, it's coming out on Black Friday, November 28th this year, which uh, also happens to be Record Store Day from what I understand. And our friends at Born Losers Records um put this out again. They did the first one. Did a magnificent job, of course. Um and they printed 300 red and black marble um records that are just beautiful. Uh those are available online at um syskvvinyl.com.

Yeah. And then for the actual record store where you have to leave your home, probably put on a cap because it's late November, maybe a coat, go down to your local indie record store. Yeah, they um they there might be a chance that they have one of the 300 gold royalty records. Those are exclusives for record stores.

Well, you can bet your Bippy I'll be going to my local record store and supporting ourselves by buying one.

That's awesome. You should draw more people by just spending like a full day there and telling everyone.

Yeah, maybe I could work something out with W Street here in town. I can go There you go.

sit up there and those guys can not talk to me. We'll see if we can get a cutout of you too um to for to stand behind you while you sit there.

That's great. I'm really excited this is back out though because people really seem to enjoy it and um what is it again? Syskinyl.com.

That's right. Awesome. And thanks again to our friends at Born Losers. You guys are great.

Yeah, they're the best. Yeah, they are. Okay, Chuck. So, yeah, this is a really good episode to shout out Records because we're talking about AM radio and um we talked a little bit about it in our beautiful music short stuff aka BM

which I'll never get over. Um, but there's a lot more to AM um radio. And in fact, I didn't realize this. Julia helped us with this one and um I didn't realize before that AM broadcasting basically set the standards Yeah.

for all sorts of different things like um how news is presented um soap operas all sorts of different stuff

that lasted for decades and decades and decades that all started with AM radio because ultimately it was the very first form of mass communication that was not printed.

Yeah. I mean, top 40 radio started on AM uh which is I mean I think these days uh the kids if they hear of AM radio probably either don't know what it is or uh may not if they have as we'll see a new a newer model car especially EV may not even have AM radio

uh or a radio in their house like a transistor radio or something or receiver but they may think AM radio is uh as like you know news talk, sports talk, maybe some foreign language stations maybe some if they're driving through a rural community, some like weird farm report or something that they've never heard.

I remember this. And that's that's kind of what AM radio became. But it it launched top 40. It was the up until like 1978. It beat FM. And FM had been around since what, like the 30s?

Yeah, it had. And everybody said, "Nope, we're really happy with AM." And stuck with it even after FM came around for quite a while.

Um, but let's talk about this. um because you like you hit on some really good points and we're going to touch on all of those but let's start at the very very beginning um when AM radio really started to come around because people had been messing with um AM broadcasting since the very early 1900s. Um, there were some inventions that all kind of came together around the same time.

And I I do not understand how this could possibly happen. But putting these disperate inventions together and figuring out how to broadcast radio waves that in have encoded sound in them is just I mean hats off. That's like mad genius stuff. But that's what happened in the very early 1900s.

Yeah. Yeah, there were there were people broadcasting AM signals uh at the time and you know the only people that had these AM receivers that could listen were uh like soldiers at sea or something like that.

Uh this before they made it into the homes of Americans. Um that paused during World War I because they said, "Hey, we can't have you broadcasting your your daughter playing violin, even though our soldiers love it that are out out at sea, right?

Uh we need to kind of lock this down for now." But starting in about 1920, in fact, exactly 1920

was when commercial broadcast AM radio started with KDKA Pittsburgh. Yeah, that was the very first one. I think that they read the results of the Warren Harding election. I can't remember the other guy's name. Somebody Cox Warren Harding obviously won. But right after that, I mean, like this was so clearly a groundbreaking medium. Um, it was basically for the people in the 1920s, it was what the what people in the early 90s experienced with internet.

It was almost like like, holy cow, I can't like you can't even begin to imagine all the different ways that this thing is going to change the world. You just know it's going to change the world. That's kind of what happened. And so, right after that first broadcast, um, it just exploded all over the world. And one reason why it exploded all over the world is because the person who's considered the father of radio, uh, Gilmo Maronei, he set up companies everywhere. So very quickly, radio stations started to develop and just a year or two after um, KDKA went on the air.

I'm, by the way, a little mad at you because ever since you sent me the Maronei tidbit this morning, I cannot get we built the city on rock and roll out of my head. How? Why? That's That's odd.

Marone played the mamba. Oh, I never knew that. Radio. I got you. Yeah. And I I mean, I hate that song so much

and I can't get it out of my head all because I just saw the word maronei typed in an email.

I always thought seriously there it was some gibberish I had in my head. I knew it wasn't right, but it was like and says Leamba, something like that.

I had no idea Maronei was name checked, but that's appropriate. Yeah, I'm not really mad at you, but uh it boy, that thing really gets rooted in your head pretty well.

Um but uh like you said, by uh the early 1920s, everybody was on board. In 1922, in fact, um AT&T had the first radio network built when they linked 38 radio stations by phone lines and could broadcast, you know, WAF out of New York all around the country. So like people it was it was literally like you said like the internet was it was American life before and life after as far as AM radio goes.

Well put well put and not just American life too like this like I said it spread around the world very quickly. The BBC started broadcasting in 1922. Um Australia's first um radio station 2SB which is now ABC Sydney. That's they started in 1923. Canada got its first one in 1932. XWA out of Montreal. Um it it was just just like the internet. It's not like it was just one country. It was everybody who got in involved because it was a humanity altering invention.

Yeah, for sure. Uh by the late 1920s um the major networks had launched uh and you know these were radio networks NBC and CBS. Um these were international broadcasts from the United States all over the world.

And you know they worked by you know you had to have a receiver. So early on uh you know vacuum tubes um worked with radio receivers connected to loudspeakers and that's how you could hear things. Later on transistor radios came along and that's what really changed the game because that's when it was like TVs for the olds uh the young people were had these little radios in their pocket and then they started you know uh putting radios in cars. But it's funny to think about a time when like, yeah, TV's out outdated, right?

And we want AM radio in our pocket and then it came roaring back eventually thanks to LA law. Um the you mentioned something that I think is worth calling out too. You mentioned that there's a speaker that converts that um that sound signal back into actual acoustic sound. They weren't headphones, they were speakers. So that meant that early radio was a thing that the family gathered around. It was a social activity listening to all the stuff that was on the radio which is really important because um

I mean that's definitely become fragmented and fractured today as it you know personal

media has become like more and more available but that was like whatever was on the radio right then probably whatever your parents wanted to listen to that's what the family was listening to.

Yeah. For better or worse. Uh I think by 1930 there were 40% of US homes had AM receivers. Uh hopefully most of them had speakers otherwise they just sit there and look at it. Uh there were more than 600 radio stations in 1930. Uh obviously all of them AM but um like we mentioned FM came along pretty quickly in the 1930s and had a better sound but um you know it just didn't um take over until 1978. I think um by 1940 even 83% of the households in America I mean that's really massive coverage

uh had AM radio signals like you know being broadcast through their homes. Yeah. And you said I mean like FM was around but people said no we're we're sticking with the AM. One of the big reasons is because the FM receiver needs more power because of the way FM radio is pumped out. That was a big thing for a long time. And that was one reason people stuck around with AM. But um there's definitely an affection that developed for AM radio over the years.

Yeah. Uh there's also something called FM drift. Um like you know if you're driving around listening to an FM station. Uh it can kind of go in and out.

Um uh you know to the left or to the right. I guess you could kind of turn your dial a little bit and try try and dial it back in. But that was an issue. And we'll talk about some of the AM radio issues, but uh if you're looking at the dial, uh AM according to the FCC, AM waves have to be broadcast on frequencies between 535 megahertz and 1.7. And FM is from 88 to 108.

Yeah, sounds legit. Those check out based on the radio call signs I'm familiar with.

Do you ever listen to AM radio anymore? Yeah, I listened to the Bulldogs game on the way home from Yumi's parents house on Saturday.

Wasn't that nice? The ball game or listening to the radio? Listening to a sports broadcast on the radio?

Yes. I used to do that in college. Um I can't remember the sports cer's name. The legendary one for Georgia with the hobnail boot.

Yeah. Yeah. Uh Larry Mson. Larry Mson. Um yeah. Back in college, I would listen to him and watch the game. Um

yeah, like on mute and hopefully they would sync up. Yeah, that was the preferred method. But um I still love and it doesn't happen a lot because you know I watch the game on TV generally, but if I'm traveling like you were just talking about or I remember when I built uh we couldn't afford to build like uh to get a fence company to build our fence 20 years ago.

So I built our privacy fence like pick it by picket over the course of two months.

Oh wow. And a lot of that was spent with me listening to Georgia Bulldogs on the radio.

Uh I mean it was pre-podcast even and it's just it's still to me a great way to to catch a game

for sure. Not even nostalgia wise. Like it really is a great way to listen to catch a game.

Oh yeah. The play calling is like you have to be really good. There's no assist there. You're telling everybody what's going on, you know?

Yeah. Um I say we take a break because we're getting nostalgic already. What do you think?

Yeah. I'm going to park that and we'll stick to the facts. Okay, baby. We're taking a break, everybody. We'll be right back.

So if we're talking uh the golden age of radio as a whole, that was a about a three to four and four decade period from the 20s through the mid-50s or so. That was when AM radio starred. Uh we'll also talk a little bit later about sort of the 70s period when AM radio music was like you know the mellow gold stuff was a big deal but that um you know that first decade of radio ushered in you know it was blowing people's minds like they had never heard sometimes any of this stuff

or certainly had not heard any of this stuff live like a live broadcast. And speaking of sports, in in 1921, uh, over about 125,000 square miles from where it broadcast out of Jersey City, New Jersey, people listen to the heavyweight boxing championship. And I can't imagine what that was like to hear a sports broadcast like that for the first time as it happened.

Well, hopefully the commentator knew what he was doing, too. And there weren't like like long pauses like the boom goes the dynamite guy. One of them's punching another one repeatedly.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention Carpente just went down. That's right. Uh, one of the other things that we'll see about AM radio too, Chuck, is that uh it's it was long considered a public good. Um, so that the government had like a little more willingness to be like, "No, you can say this and you can't say that and you have to do this." One of the reasons why is because it was very quickly used to kind of spread public information. Like presidents took to it very quickly. Remember I said that KDKA announced the um results of the Harding election. Within just a couple years, Warren Harding was using it to to talk to America and FDR was probably the most famous president who used the radio to talk to America. He had a series of um like just informal speeches basically called fireside chats. Yeah. that really made a lot of the country just fall in love with them. Um, but it was very it was it was very clear early on just how

much influence it could have on people's political opinions. Well, and it was a lot of people the first time they ever heard the president's voice speak, you know.

Is that what he sounds like? Yeah. It wasn't around during Lincoln because everyone would have been like, really? Uh, but yeah, you know, there was definitely public good and we'll dive into that a little bit. um along with tons of entertainment. Uh you know it was basically like 15inute chunks for a long long time of all over the map variety style stuff kind of uh reminiscent of vaudeville.

Um like there were hosts of shows but the DJ thing didn't come along till much later. So you had you like advice shows and news shows and obviously comedy stuff, game shows, uh you know radio dramas were a big big deal.

Yeah, that's where soap opers came from too. Um they were broadcast almost exclusively with women as their target audience. Um and at the time this is just post World War I uh where women had helped the war effort in the factories. Uh the men came back and they were like get back in the house and women were stuck in the house all day. So these radio dramas were broadcast to them and they were almost exclusively um sponsored by cleaning product companies.

That's right. So they became known as um soap operas. And one of the longerlasting soap operas of all time actually made the jump successfully from radio to TV. That was Guiding Light.

No way. Yeah. It started in 1937 on the radio and was finally cancelled in 2009 on TV. It was 72 years of Guiding Light. Every weekday too.

I had a very very brief foray into soap operas. I I guess it was in college or something. I don't know why, but I got hooked for

I mean, not too long, but I was I was hooked. I was like, "These things are stupid." I was like, "Yeah, but what happens?"

Yeah. The same thing happened to me again in college, too. Um, and I cannot remember the name of it, but it was just off the chain. I know there was a main character named Marina and she was possessed by the devil at one point.

Someone will remember and let Yeah, certainly. That's like a very famous plotline. Um, that was going on when I was hooked on them. And then I got hooked on them enough that I would switch channels during ads and what see what was on other soap operas. And on General Hospital once there was a scene where this couple was in bed

and they did such a poor job of editing that they left in the director saying cut and the two actors roll out of bed. I'll never forget it. It was one of the greatest things I've ever seen on television. They're like the the sheets are pulled up, you know, to their their bare skin and then they roll out of bed and they have on like blue jeans.

Yeah. I don't remember what they were wearing or anything, but yeah, I'm sure it was just like that.

That's really funny. Uh oh god, to have that time again where you could just like maybe sort of get hooked on a soap for no reason.

Yeah, for sure. Uh religion was also a big deal early on AM radio. Um all of a sudden evangelists could broadcast far and wide from what they called the electric pull pit. uh and they became like you know big-time personalities and stars during the depression era.

Yeah. One of the first people that um the question of freedom of speech um was raised around was Father Charles Coughlin who was a bigoted hate speech um Catholic priest who uh really kind of pushed the envelope you could say. I think he said the Nazis didn't go far enough during Crystal Knocked. Like he was that kind of guy.

Wow. So he definitely rose to prominence during this time. Uh, on the lighter side, one of the most popular longrunning um, shows was the Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy show.

Yeah. Which was a ventriloquist act on the radio. Yeah. I mean, the jokes still worked, but it's definitely a visual medium

for sure. But he managed to to make it like super radio friendly and it was super popular. Um, you said that the golden age of radio ended around the 1962 and we should say this was um it this depends on your perspective because a lot of people say no golden age of radio went all the way to the 70s.

This would be like the first wave of golden age radio where it wasn't music, it was like dramas, scripted um comedies, uh like sports, all this stuff like what TV is today,

right? This was the first iteration of radio and it was all AM radio. But there was a year 1962 when two shows were cancelled. Two longunning shows and people point to their cancellation as essentially the end of that era.

What were those? Uh yours truly Johnny Dollar. Okay. It was about an insurance fraud investigator.

Sounds like true crime. It is. It sounds interesting. Each episode was a flashback of him going over the line items for his expense report for that particular case and then each line item would kind of bring up like a new scene. Pretty interesting.

The radio network guys like can he kill his lover. Um and then suspense was another one. It sounds like it was a little bit of a predecessor to like Alfred Hitchcock Presents and maybe The Twilight Zone here or there.

And both of those were really well produced shows and they got cancelled the same year and everybody said that's it. That's the end of the golden age and they spat on the floor.

Well, you mentioned the public good. Um, starting in the 1920s to jump back a little bit. um you know like you mentioned presidents speaking inaugural addresses were being broadcast and the government really realized hey like we have a um sort of a public service we need to enact when we're sharing information uh because we got to get the word out about stuff sometimes and this is the way to do it. So the USDA radio service began talking to farmers in 1926. Uh the US Bureau of Home Economics um had a chat program they launched I believe in the same year

uh where they could talk about like you know any emergencies happening uh in regards to kids like uh health and safety stuff like a new disease going around that your kid maybe should get vaccinated against stuff like that.

New fangled polio. Um but by the end of the 1920s they were like hey there's a limited bandwidth and people are getting political messages out and we need to make sure that everyone in America is getting sort of uh equal access to these messages so you know no particular message gets out more than any other and that's where the fairness doctrine came about right

yeah we talked about that in the presidential debates episode but I think it deserves its own episode it's so controversial But basically the fairness doctrine is what I was talking about earlier when I said the government wasn't shy about getting involved in regulating radio because of what you just said like you can't just use radio at the time you couldn't to just put out one say specific political viewpoint. So the fairness doctrine said you have to have equal time when you're talking about political matters you have to give equal time to both opposing viewpoints.

It also said some other stuff too that I thought was pretty cool. It um made sure that commercial concerns did not eclipse social ones, so you couldn't screw over the public for your own bottom line, which is just refreshing these days.

Um the radio serve the public good. Um, and that you have like a kind of public programming that's um, essentially like in addition to all of the, you know, ventriloquist acts and soap operas and all that, you have like stuff that makes people helps people be more informed citizens. Like that was what the government was getting involved in radio for.

Yeah. Maybe perhaps if we would have been around at the time it might have been stuff you should know. Oh, I could see that.

I I could see that. Yeah, we would have been great for AM radio. I think as a matter of fact, we should probably just stop podcasting and start broadcasting on AM radio.

Yeah, we got to get the message of jackhammers out far and wide. That's right. Uh, you know, the fairness doctrine went away. Um, and you know, like you said, we should do a whole episode on that. But one of the things that happened was, you know, the FM becoming a dominant force and just way more choices and way more bandwidth for radio, so they didn't need it anymore, right?

Um, so then, you know, that's where that's really literally where the echo chamber of politics started, where you could turn into just your person who only talked about things that you agreed with.

Yep. Absolutely. Yeah. Not coincidentally, 1980s is when talk radio like really started to become a thing with like people like Rush Limbbo. um that did not exist before that kind of thing.

Yeah. Um and you know FM when that came around uh it it did create that echo chamber but uh it was mostly like a wealthy educated crowd that could afford FM receivers. They were more expensive like you were talking about.

Um I think there were more than 2,000 AM stations on the air in the 1950s. Some of them would broadcast on both. I definitely remember you know both AM FM stations. Mhm.

Um but FM did have some uh and and still do have some sort of things that um weren't in their favor like uh if if you were inside a building sometime the AM signal could get blocked and get a little more difficult to get.

Yeah. Uh a lot of AM stations I think most of them in fact have to either reduce their power or just go off the air at night. So, you know, back in the day and maybe still you hear those signoffs at the end of the night, which is kind of fun where they play like the Star Spangle Banner or something and it just goes dead.

Yeah, like in Poltergeist. That's right. Uh, but another cool thing about AM is if you've ever been like driving around out west or something and you know, probably not these days, but uh, back when I was taking my big out west trips when all I had was like a a cassette player and the radio. Um, once the sun went down, sometimes you could get an AM station on your radio that's like four states away

because of those air waves bouncing off the ionosphere and saying, "We'll take it from here."

Yeah. During the day, the ionosphere is super ionized. That's where it gets its name. Uh, at night, it's less ionized, so there's um it, for some reason, AM radio signals can bounce off of it easier and like you said, end up down in Mexico for goodness sake.

Yeah. Which is pretty cool. Um, for that reason though, the that's why they stop transmitting at night. A lot of them, like I'm with you. I don't know if they still do or not. seems like the kind of thing that maybe was licked, but it also seems so fundamental that maybe it's still a problem. But there were some some stations that were designated clear channels. Um they were uh allowed to broadcast 24 hours a day and they were spread out both physically around the country and in Canada and Mexico and also um spread out on the dial so that their their signals wouldn't interfere with one another when they traveled really far distances. And one of the reasons why um they they had AM stations designated to operate 24 hours a day is again part of that public good um which was a service that AM radio offers that is kind of overlooked a lot here in the United States which is it is like a national security alert system

essentially. We'll talk a little more about that later, but that's why um the Clear Channel thing is a thing,

right? And to be clear, I didn't even mean that. Not to be confused with uh former iHeart Media um company Clear Channel.

No, but I bet that's where they get their name, man. That'd be a real coincidence, huh?

Wasn't that the name of the city that was built on rock and roll? Clear Channel.

Yeah, Clear Channel City. I'm not falling for anything you ever say anymore, so don't even try.

Should we take another break? Yes. All right, we'll take another break. Talk about the rise of TV and um you know, music on AM radio right after this.

Okay, Chuck, we're back and we're we talked about how the golden age of radio ended, but that was what the oldsters considered the golden age. If you were young and hip, the golden age was still yet to come.

That's right. Uh I mentioned Top 40 was invented on AM and it was specifically developed by a a station owner named Todd Stores in Nebraska

uh at the beginning of the 1950s, I guess. And he said, "Hey, you know, radio has all these great shows. I love those puppets. that ventriloquism is great,

but we've got rock and roll now and R&B and uh soon, you know, pop music coming our way.

Pop and pop music. Who was that? Is that Falco? No, I shouldn't have opened my big mouth because I don't remember. I even have that on my phone, so maybe I'll look sometime soon.

Uh, but he said, "Hey, let's let's start playing this music. let's create a um what Julia calls a jukebox driven media and you know play people stuff. It you know DJs became a thing. That's when they became personalities. Uh each station started having you know these sort of wacky that's where those first you know like the Wolfman and all those sort of wacky early DJs came from that were like real personalities people would tune into just to listen to their specific show.

Yeah. Um like each station had to have their own personality. like the big bopper, one of the most famous of all time.

Yeah. He he was um DJing for a station in Bumont, Texas. Like it had like if you had a station, you had to have a personality. And some of them just happened to be so popular that they became international icons essentially.

Yeah. It's amazing. Yeah. Like the Wolfman went on to own a um furniture store in North Georgia called Gallery Furniture.

If you wanted a water bed, you would go ask for the Wolf Man. Boy, that's a niche joke. Uh, should we even explain it or not?

Nah. Okay, good. I think if you go on to YouTube and you look up Gallery Furniture and The Wolf Man, there'll be something on there.

Oh, sure. But that wasn't Wolf Man, Jack. Are you sure? You didn't really think it was the same guy, did you?

Uh, no. Okay. See, I I don't know what to believe anymore. I'm not trying. I You know, I just wanted to come clean about this.

Okay. I've never tried to fool you. That was a thing that just kind of evolved. I've just been making dry random jokes all this time, but it's never been to fool you. You took that and ran with it. I've never done it directly to fool you.

This is not what you said during our therapy session last week. Well, Dr. Crant said that um

Dr. Cats, that's who we should have gotten. Yeah, Dr. Cat said that I needed to make more stuff up. So,

we're not in therapy together, by the way, everybody. That was a joke. But if we did, we'd get the guy who therapied Metallica, right?

Oh, I forgot that they were in therapy together. Yeah, I guess it worked. That's a That's not I'm not knocking it at all. I mean, we haven't had to do it, but I think that's a great idea for any kind of partnership, you know.

Agreed. Um Okay, good. Was that the uh therapist that talked Metallica out of their emo phase?

Right. Because hats off to that that therapist, maybe. Um Oh, we were talking Oh, yeah. We're talking about what was going on with this transition to uh music.

Yeah. Uh one of the reasons why AM radio transitioned to music and away from things like ro soap operas and all that stuff was because those things ended up on TV.

Yeah. The older people followed those. Remember they're like radios the pits now because the golden era is over. And then they turn on their TVs and they're like, "Oh, the golden era is over here now. Let's just keep going and and watching now instead of just listening." And that left the kids um to fill this vacuum which was AM radio. And like you said, the top 40 format started there. The like big internationally known DJs started there. And um it just kind of took off little by little. Uh but really picked up steam when a few things kind of came together and one of them you already mentioned which was transistor radios. So now you didn't just have to sit at home with the oldsters to listen to your favorite hits. And then also AM radio started to show up in cars essentially as um not even an option after a while. Like you got the AM radio whether you wanted it or not.

Yeah. I think uh more than half of American cars had AM radio receivers factory installed uh by the 1950s and that was a huge huge deal obviously. Um and you know it was it was the the dominant paradigm for music until 78. And there was that period from uh kind of the the early 70s to the early 80s uh little under 10 years where that you know sort of uh yacht rocky am mellow gold stuff really really took over.

Yeah. um you had to kind of watch what you put on the radio because FM was playing um you know they were playing the the AO album oriented rock stuff that had a little more mechismo and um testosterone fueled like you know rock bands

big hair yeah exactly big hair long hair um not a mustache in sight unless it was part of a beard probably but

sure wasn't the case on AM uh with yacht rock they were mustachioed dudes generally um sensitive guys. Uh, the songs weren't about usually like conquering women. Um, most of them were about getting dumped by women. A lot of sad sack music coming out.

Yeah. Um, on AM radio in the 1970s. I I I still listen to a lot of that stuff. Yeah. And a lot of the the constraints I found this to be true throughout my life that when you put constraints on something, it automatically fuels creativity because it doesn't mean you don't still want to get across um, you know, subversive ideas. is you just have to cloak them within the confines of these constraints and it makes you more creative than just saying the idea out loud. Right. Which is why um album rockers are um typically dumb compared to yacht rockers as far as the artists go.

Yeah. So like if you're a songwriter and you're like I'm a yacht rocker. I'm not going to sing about uh you know teenage girls. I'm gonna sing about things I like like pia coladas and getting caught in the rain. Man, that guy. I think he's one of the most reprehensible songwriters of all time. Not just I hate that song.

Not just that song, the Pina Colada song. Have you ever heard the song him? His song him?

I don't know. I don't know it by name. Would I recognize it, you think? I don't know. It's a It's considered yacht rock, but it's it's a really despicable song about this this guy whose girlfriend is sleeping around on him. So, he's got to teach her a lesson to basically bring her back to heal and how he's not heartbroken or hurt. He's just mad that this guy, he says like nobody should get it for free.

Yeah, that's what he's upset about. It's a nutso song. Go listen to it. But yeah, uh Rupert Holmes, I don't think he like embodies the the seven like the worst part of men in the 70s, I think.

Yeah. I mean, I I really don't like that song at all, but I do love most yacht rock. And I know we've probably talked about it briefly at some point as a recommendation, but the yacht rock documentary that came out last year is really really good.

Yeah. Uh and we do definitely want to say that uh that term was not coined until the 2000s uh when a comedy web series spoofing the genre uh made up the name yacht rock. Before that, I think like

you know, Time Life put out those the AM Gold series of CDs. I think AM Gold or mellow or easy listening.

That that sort of uh is what we called it, right? Isn't that what you called it?

Easy listening. Yeah, that's what I was first introduced to it as. My our mutual friend uh Allison, who we used to work with, um my friend Eddie's wife uh calls it uh car sick music because it just brings back days of like riding backwards in a station wagon and being car sick and that stuff just droning on and on.

That's a perfect name for it. Yeah, it's good. But when you know when you're familiar with the idea that they had to kind of cloak subversive ideas in like a nonobvious terms and you go back and listen to some of this Melo Gold stuff, it's like whoa, they were really

It's a little crazier than you thought. Like for example, um, Love Grows Where My Rosemary Goes is code for um, Let's Smoke Some DMT. [gasps]

Yeah, that was the only one I turned up. I mean, what do you think Ride Like the Wind is about? Come on.

Right. That's about DMT as well. Oh, wow. All right. But he's talking about what it's like to be on DMT, not just inviting you to smoke DMT.

Well, well, you know what's funny? I think Christopher Cross wrote Ride Like the Wind when he was on LSD.

I believe that. I think he said that in that yacht rock, doc. Did he really? Yeah.

It's a great song. It's a great song and has one of the like most uh one of the greatest guitar solos because he's a killer guitar player, but it's so buried in the mix.

And there's all kinds of YouTube videos now where they're like, "Yeah, let's bring it up in the mix and talk about this solo and like how amazing it is."

That's kind of like those um videos of Van Halen with nothing but David Lee Ross vocals. Have you heard those?

Yeah, those are those are very funny. Uh and and to be clear, it's a ripin solo um for yacht rock. It's no. So, it's not like the solo for My Shirona or anything, but it's still good.

I don't Yeah, neither of those solos stand out to me. I can't bring either one to mind.

Oh, man. The My Shirona solo is a top five guitar solo of all time for me. Huh.

And you got to listen to the the radio version cut out a full minute. It's like 90 plus seconds, the full version. Wow.

And they cut out twothirds of it for the radio version. So, you got to listen to the real full version. It's like it's way better than it should be for that song. That would be the album edit, right?

Uh, yeah, I guess so. It's killer. Or the 12-in version. I don't know about the 12 inch.

Okay. Well, regardless, go listen to some mellow gold. It'll make you happy, for sure. Uh, but where are we these days with AM radio?

Well, um, there's this battle over it. Just like absolutely every single other thing that people more than one person talks about in America, AM radios actually managed to become politicized. Um, a bunch of car makers from what I can tell led by Tesla. I think they were the first ones to announce this back in 2020 that they were going to discontinue AM radios in their cars.

Boo. Yeah. Um, and now I think now you can kind of imagine why it's a politicized idea. Um but the the the ostensible reason is that the AM stereo is interfered with by the EV. Um long story short, uh AM waves are much more susceptible to noise because of electrical interference. Well, an electrical vehicle is lousy with electrical interference. And so the whole car industry is like, we're going to have to spend a bunch of money just to keep this AM radio in there. And the US government is pretty adamant that AM radio needs to stick around again, not just for the public good thing, the nostalgia factor, but also because if you are going to get an alert that you know the Cubans have invaded,

you're going to probably get that alert over an AM radio station because that's what the whole system is set up to do. Not because it's antiquated, but because AM radio does all sorts of things. those um they could the waves can travel very far so it reaches a lot of people rural um people listen to AM radio still today like it's just part of rural life um so it's everybody is reached by AM one way or another and I didn't know this but you can make a type of radio a crystal receiver radio that um can play uh AM radio broadcasts without any battery or power source the it the crystal manages to take the energy in the radio carrier wave and and use that alone to basically reproduce the sound. So for all those reasons, AM like radio really makes a lot of sense to put all of your eggs in that basket as far as getting like emergency broadcasts out. So the government said, long story short, um

you need to keep AM radios in cars and they're trying to figure out how to get that mandated.

Yeah. I mean, the it's called the emergency alert system now. It used to be the EBS, the emergency broadcast system. And if you're thinking like, man, I get my Amber Alerts, like all that stuff comes through my phone now. Um, and and this isn't like Gen Xer saying like, "Oh, you're too relying on your phones, but like if if you expect that phone to always work in all cases for the rest of time,

um, you're sorely mistaken because if that system is taken out, then you're going to rely on something like AM radio to to get important information out." You know, I mean, that's why it's still there. Uh that's why they're, you know, going to the the car makers and saying like, "Hey, like you may not listen to it. You may think it's oldfashioned, but there are still 4,000 AM stations and 80 million listeners a month that some of them rely on this stuff to get information." And you can't just say like, "Well, it seems old timey, so we don't interferes with our stuff, so we don't want it anymore."

Yeah. I do kind of have the feeling that there is like a certain um scorn toward the nostalgic factor of AM radio.

Um and that that's part of maybe what's driving it, which really ticks me off because who are car makers to decide whether AM radio sticks around or not? Uh Congress says um no, we're we actually have come up with a a law called the AM radio for every vehicle act that basically says if you sell a car in the United States, it has to have AM radio as a feature. not even an option. Um, and a lot of car makers are like, "Sure, fine. We're we're on board with that." Honda, Hyundai, Jaguar, Kia, Mitsubishi Nissan Salantis Subaru Toyota, all said, "We're keeping AM radio." Ford had said they weren't. And they said, "Okay, we didn't realize AM radio was so popular. We're going to keep it, too." So, I guess if you want to show your support for AM radio, everybody should just go out and buy a Jaguar.

Well Tesla Rivian Polestar BMW Volkswagen, and Volvo uh dispensed with AM radio and some of their new car models. I don't think completely across the board for each of those manufacturers. Uh but that that every uh AM for every vehicle act failed in 2024, unfortunately. Uh it was um reintroduced uh this year in 2025, just I think recently in September, and has a lot of support like on, you know, both sides of the aisle. Um, so but you know, if the 119th Congress ever decides to do anything at all, perhaps that will be reconsidered.

Yeah, it's got legs like a intern carrying coffee back to the office is how they put it in Washington.

That's good. That was the original ZZ top line, but it was a little baggy. It was Don't forget the ZZ top uh eliminator video trilogy were feminist.

That's right. Uh, you got anything else, man? No, I think that was that was good. Support support AM radio. It's not a relic. It's still important.

Yeah, well put, dude. Uh, if you want to uh know more about AM radio, start listening to AM radio. And since I started to sign off this episode like it was one of the OG episodes, that means it's time for listener mail.

Uh, this is from Cara. Just kind of a thank you. Um, Cara started listening in 2008, uh, when she was sick at home from high school with pneumonia. Uh, yours was the very f first podcast I ever listened to back when hardly anyone knew what a podcast was. Uh, I've been an avid listener to a lot of shows since, but you have been a constant in my life uh, through the end of high school, college, grad school, and beyond. Your voices have always been a sense of comfort and familiarity when things in life got really difficult. Uh, I went to see you live in Boston three times.

Nice. uh always on my own and each show felt like a small celebration for myself of something that had carried me through so many years.

I wonder if that's the the person who had the laugh that we called out in Boston every time.

Oh, I don't know. Maybe I think Carol would have mentioned that probably. Probably.

Uh one rule with stuff you should know for me though is I could not listen to a new episode until I could really pay attention. Um like other shows were background

um podcasts for me but not yours. Uh the only downside was that I fell further and further behind uh unless I had the focus to listen. Um this year I've had to do a lot of driving though and things have settled down some. So I made it a goal to catch up in time to listen to the 2025 Halloween special on Halloween.

Oh me. Uh also told myself if I did it could finally write in and tell you how much I appreciate the information, banter, humor, and uh movie wrecks and stuff like that. So, uh, this is a a h day before Halloween, uh, email coming from Cara or Cara, K A R A.

That's awesome. Thanks, Cara. Cara. Um, you're obviously very goal motivated and I appreciate that. Um, and thank you for listening to all of our shows for so long. That means a lot that we have uh friends who are travelers like you, you know.

Yeah. I mean, we've said it before, if there weren't the Kakaras, then we would not exist as a show anymore.

Absolutely. That's That sounds like a t-shirt if you ask me. Yeah. And Kakara sounds like I don't know, like a a food.

Uh yeah, like Pata. Okay. Uh if you want to get in touch with us like Kakara did and let us know what we meant to you, we love those emails. Uh you can wrap it up, spank it on the bottom, and send it off to stuffodcast.com.

Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts of iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "AM Radio: Solid Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

Josh Clark (Host), Charles "Chuck" Bryant (Host), Jerry (unknown full name) (Guest), Cara (listener email author; last name not provided) (Guest).

What is "AM Radio: Solid Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW" about?

The announcement highlights an upcoming tour starting January 27, 2026, with performances scheduled in cities such as Denver, Seattle, and San Francisco, followed by Midwest stops in Madison, Chicago, and Akron in April. Pre-sale tickets are available, emphasizing excitement for reconnecting with fans across multiple locations.

What is mentioned in this Stuff You Should Know episode?

139 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including AM radio, Exploring with Josh, Stuff You Should Know, The Golden Age of Radio, KDKA Pittsburgh, Top 40. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "AM Radio: Solid Gold | STUFF YOU SHOULD KNOW"?

The episode runs 49 min; the transcript is about 8,997 words in 193 timestamped sections.

More from Stuff You Should Know

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated February 9, 2026.