RadioActive wrote:

It's called PopRadio 77 and it's a pretty ambitious effort - an attempt to recreate the glory days of WABC's Top 40 era online. Their website promises live announcers, "no voice tracks ever," a playlist of typical 60s and 70s hits, newscasts, even contests and requests. It boasts a playlist of over 4,000 songs from 1965-1989. (Why they leave out 1964, the year the Beatles arrived, is baffling.)

The site outlines the basic concept:

"PopRadio 77 builds its playlists and music charts around the greatest songs that were the biggest on MusicRadio WABC until its end in 1982.  Many of the great traditions that were common on WABC have been incorporated into the PopRadio 77 routine.  Traditions such as call-in contests, nonstop music periods, great radio personalities and summer chime-times are all a part of PopRadio 77."

There's a lot of interesting stuff on the site, including a list of the Top 100 songs of the 60s, 70s & 80s, which you can see here. 

So far, so good.

But then they do something so bizarre for an online-only station, I can't quite figure it out. They restrict their stream. Not geoblocked to Canada, although it is.  But it's even geoblocked to other parts of the U.S. Here's their explanation:

"PopRadio 77 consistently broadcasts its internet stream to all listeners within a 300 mile radius.  At certain times, the internet stream will be extended to up to a 500 mile radius from South Jersey.  Listening to PopRadio 77 beyond these zones can be facilitated by using a VPN with an IP Address that is based within a 500 mile radius."

Huh? Perhaps they're trying to recreate the WABC signal range itself. But this is pretty strange and I've never heard of anything like it. Why go to all this trouble if you don't want the entire country to hear you? And then they openly invite you to defeat the restriction using a VPN? Why not just get rid of it altogether? Very strange.

Anyway, if you have a VPN, and can set it to a place in the U.S. close enough, you can hear PopRadio 77 here and judge for yourself. If nothing else, the site itself is worth a look.

The weird thing about the 500 mile radius is that it includes all of Southern Ontario, as well as Montreal. So if it's blocked in Canada they're not even allowing it in the entirety of that radius.