Definitely a preposterous claim; we're talking about people who don't even OWN an AM radio. What they do have is every audio source in the world in their pockets 24/7.

RadioActive wrote:

Agreed. It's hard to listen to something if you don't know it exists. Although I suppose it could be argued they could stream an AM-er online in stereo and perfect quality. But that's not enough to sustain a full radio station. 

The AM would be redundant at that point, except to give the programmer a break on royalties.

I'm not sure there's even much demand for linear, programmed audio at all amongst Gen Z, regardless of how it's delivered.

If you can find the space on an increasingly crowded FM dial. 

I’m not sure about now, but I remember a decade ago when I was about 30, I had colleagues younger than me listening to AM radio. Why? Sports talk and the Blue Jays. I had one colleague who was maybe 25 at the time who told me that 590 was the “only” radio he listened to. I also knew a guy my age who often listened to Leafs Lunch when it was on 640.

Podcasts these days play a bigger role than they did back then, but in a time that was already heavily dominated by FM and some level of streaming, sports talk got young people interested in AM radio.

Indeed, podcasting is not radio.
If young people are to be attracted to AM radio it is if there can be a way to create an AM radio station that has an overall culture or theme to it.
It's the characters on the station, or the style of music mixed with the presenters.
Growing up in Vancouver CKLG AM and CFUN (the CHUM station) had their own separate vibes.
even though they were playing the same top 40 music, the personalities were unique.
CFUN had true stars like Fred Latremouille or Red Robinson.
LG had "the boss jocks" like Michael W Morgan and Little Stevie Wonder, a lineup of clever smooth and appealing anchors who enhanced the music, not appeared as secondary.
As far as talk AM radio went, there was a lineup of hosts, all with compelling viewpoints and real credibility, like Jack Webster, Pat Burns, John McComb, etc
To appeal to young people AM radio has to find their generation's version of all that.
In other words the AM station overall has to be a brand, not just one segment (like a podcast).





 

AM HD signals impress me from what I've listened to here on 530 AM and away at 1230 AM New York.

Fidelity is  close to an FM HD sub-channel. (I work on a non-hd station, sure wish we could do hybrid analog/HD like 530 Toronto/Brampton)

Johnny B wrote:

it's primarily the bastion of news/sports talk, right wing propaganda, MAGA and the F Trudeau crowd, conspiracy theories and religious nonsense...the band as we've known it will eventually die when the majority of the 'oldies' that still cling to it die off with any programming that remains viable to continue to migrate to the FM.

We found our answer as to why younger people are not listening to AM. 

Here's an old example of an AM station that tried something different. I'm not entirely sure when this was, but I think it was sometime in the 1980s. WKWF in Key West, Florida tried to do an album rock format at 1600 on the dial. Needless to say, it did not last long. For one thing, it was only 500 watts. For another, the sound quality wasn't the best for a one lung radio station at the very bottom of the dial. And there was a lot of choice on the FM dial, playing the same thing. 

But at least someone tried it. I can't find much about them online (they're apparently a classic jazz station now) but the T-shirt below that I got somewhere I've long forgotten shows they did exist at one point. 

Didn't CKFH experiment with an AOR format on the Open Lid from 10pm-1am back in 1967/68? I think Terry David Mulligan was one of the hosts. There may or may not be some truth to this. FH was starting to get noticed with this programming and this was the reason CHUM FM dumped their Classical format in favour of Progressive Rock.

RadioActive wrote:

Speaking of FM-type rock on AM, does anybody remember this? How long did it last? I suspect it was quick, because they went to a music-talk hybrid soon after and I have no memory of this happening at all.

I was listening to them at the time, and I think that what you're recalling is actually what they were doing right from the start when they became Metro 1430 -- and that the problem is that the article doesn't do a great job of describing it. And although I've never worked in radio, I developed an interest in how stations were formatted starting in the early 1970s, and I remember thinking at the time of their change that what they were doing was different from anything that I'd ever heard before. And this makes me think that part of the problem is that the format they adopted wasn't that easy to describe. I did a search and found the advertising brochure that they put out at the time of their format change, which might help clarify things.
https://www.worldradiohistory.com/CANADA/Canada-Miscellaneous/CJCL%20Toronto%20-%20Metro%201430%20Brochure.pdf
 

RadioAaron wrote:

tdotwriter wrote:

Done right, an AM station running such a format might be quite successful as a terrestrial outlet accompanied by a live web stream and maybe an HD FM simulcast.

Virtually nobody would be listening to the AM or the HD. Young people aren't going to buy a separate device just to listen to a single station. 
 

That's very true. That's what makes streaming apps so important, but HD Radio is very common and in fact a standard feature in many if not most new vehicles. Therefore, a simulcast on an HD subchannel is a very convenient way for people in vehicles to get a high-quality simulcast of an AM radio station, if it's provided by a broadcaster.