Mark Hamilton
After three years of sonic change and a newfound philosophical approach, KNRK/Portland not only sounds different than most Alternative stations… it feels different. An NPR style in an upper end Alt package, 94/7 has evolved on its own terms – or more succinctly on the terms of its listeners – and laid out and followed a long term vision that envisions long term results. We recently sat down with KNRK maestro Mark Hamilton for a progress report on one of the format’s most highly regarded outlets.
Up Close: KNRK/Portland PD Mark Hamilton
After three years of sonic change and a newfound philosophical approach, KNRK/Portland not only sounds different than most Alternative stations… it feels different. An NPR style in an upper end Alt package, 94/7 has evolved on its own terms – or more succinctly on the terms of its listeners – and laid out and followed a long term vision that envisions long term results. We recently sat down with KNRK maestro Mark Hamilton for a progress report on one of the format’s most highly regarded outlets.
eQB presents excerpts from the FMQB September Magazine Modern Rock Up Close featuring KNRK/Portland PD Mark Hamilton
On KNRK’s recent changes…
We’ve been through two really major changes. The most recent being almost exactly three years ago, after that whole Marconi incident. Looking back in hindsight, it was a cloud with a silver lining for us because we made our changes and the station has been more successful than it ever had been. You know, there’s always good things that come out of bad, as they say. In this case it’s been a really, really fun past three years, and the station has really grown and established itself as a market leading radio station in Portland.
On their music philosophy…
David Field was in Portland a couple of weeks ago, and we were talking about the station and he described it as looking at the Alternative format with a completely different philosophy. Whereas, for the majority of radio stations in the format, their idea of Alternative begins in 1992 and 1993 withNirvana. My philosophy really wants to appeal to Portland and a 25-44-year-old audience, as opposed to a 18–24-year old audience as my core. Our sort of presentation and philosophy is that Alternative begins in the ’70s – we even play some songs by the Velvet Underground. That’s the early days of real Alternative music, which is everything from the Sex Pistols, Talking Heads, The Ramones, The Clash, the list goes on and on. Playing those songs alongside the new music of today fits completely, in my opinion. Muse sounds fantastic next to a late ’70s, early ’80s band. It sounds right; it doesn’t sound unusual. You’ve got to remember a lot of those things really haven’t been played on the radio for a long, long time. Admittedly it’s not in heavy rotation here or anything, but there’s a lot of stuff we’re playing that I haven’t played or heard on the radio since my Live 105days, back in the late ’80s, early ’90s. So it’s fun! It really is fun. They’re flavor essentially. But the ’80s… the pre-’90s stuff does make up the bigger, more familiar songs. They make up a third of what we play.
On programming to the Portland market…
It’s very much programmed for Portland. As for the whole philosophy and presentation and the sound of the station, that’s very important that we stick with that feel. For example, I’ll pull up BDS and half the stuff we’re not playing but there’s a reason for that because there’s a sound and a feel that we want. We’re not playing Finger Eleven, yet we’re playing The Kooks. We’re not playing a lot of the Mid West Rock we call it. We play MuteMath and at the same time cement that by playing big Alternative hits like Smashing Pumpkins, Foo Fighters, The Killers, The White Stripes, Modest Mouse and The Shins. Geographically and regionally the Pacific Northwest right now is a hot bed for new bands and artists, many of whom are moving here from other parts of the country.
On their HD-2 Station…
We launched it a couple of months ago. We play nothing but Northwest bands on 94.7 Too. We presented the idea to our VP of Programming, Pat Paxton, back in January, and originally I just wanted it to be Portland bands or Oregon bands, and he said “This is a great idea but expand it to include The End so you guys can both play it, but make it Northwest Bands,” which is what we’ve done. So 50% of the music comes from the Seattle region; 50% of the music comes from the Portland region. It’s simulcast on both HD2 channels with specific imaging to both markets. It’s streaming 24-hours-a-day because we want to turn people onto it. The response has been phenomenal.
On the station’s Bootleg Videos…
It was written up in the New York Times recently. It is essentially where your band comes in town for either a concert or a recording studio session for us, we mine the database to find a list of the people who list said band as their favorite, and call one of them and say: “We noticed when you joined the 94.7 Nation, you made a note that [band] were one of your favorites. We have a pair of tickets here to go to the show this coming Saturday. We’re also going to give you a video camera. The band have let us film some of their stuff and we want you to be our cameraman.” Then that person comes back with footage of four or five songs. We take a couple of those songs and then push them out as videos to the database. Those have been really successful.
His thoughts on Alternative music right now as a whole…
It’s in a really, really good spot. There’s a lot of great new music. I’m also really pleased that female artists are coming back, or at least starting to get played.
His thoughts on the younger end of Alternative music…
There was a time, and I would still say that right now, Alternative was being driven by the younger and emo type bands like Panic! At The Disco, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance. It was really driving the format. We did an 18-49-year-old study that showed the perception of those bands is that they are the boy bands of today. So, I’m glad we don’t go there.
**QB Content by Mike Bacon**
| Also in the September Issue: |
|
Rising From The Underclass: Sum 41’s Derryck Whibley |
