DANCE 89.5: live radio from Seattle

Hooold...

Dusting off the needle…

Seattle, United States

DANCE 89.5

Homework, then peak time.

Mainstream EDM, programmed by high schoolers.

KNHC began in a building behind Nathan Hale High School in Seattle with an antenna made of copper magnet wire wound round a broomstick, reaching less than a mile. The teacher who ran it wrote the textbook himself, no such book being in print, and put glue on the grooves of records he did not want played. The first FM broadcast went out on 25 January 1971, ten watts from the roof of an elementary school. In 1983 the students pushed it into New Wave, and it has been dance radio ever since.

Seattle Public Schools still holds the licence, and more than a hundred students a semester still take live shifts, around forty of them credited as hosts. Daytime is unapologetically mainstream, the big-room and dance-pop end of the format played without a trace of irony, while the specialty hours reach the edges a commercial station never touches, from happy hardcore to italo disco.

More like this

GermanyBerlin

Evosonic Radio

Died in '99, refused to stay down.

electronic

IrelandDublin

PHEVER Radio

The afterparty never closes.

PolandElbląg

Radio Time Out

Hands up, all night, every night.

electronic

United KingdomLondon

Select Radio

Promos first, playlist never.

BelgiumAntwerp

Radio FG Antwerpen

Paris attitude, Antwerp postcode.

TurkeyIstanbul

Dinamo Locodyno

Someone else's hour, all day.

electronic

Malta

Pure Radio Malta

The island's dancefloor, on tap.

United StatesSan Francisco

The Trip

Built for the long drive home.

electronic

SpainOrihuela

Total Groove Radio

Costa Blanca, basement hours.

electronic

NamibiaWindhoek

Afrika-Boom

Everyone here is also a DJ.

electronic

VietnamHo Chi Minh City

Scientific Sound Asia

Nobody here is on a playlist.

electronic

United KingdomLondon

RadioActive FM

The transmitters went, they didn't.

electronic

FranceParis

Radio ABF

Fifty-one DJs, no ad breaks.

electronic

GermanyHamburg

Hirschmilch Hypnotic

Forward motion, no destination.

electronic

EstoniaTallinn

R2 Pop

Raadio 2 minus the radio.

Poland

Radio MRS

Everyone brings their own hour.

electronic

United KingdomLondon

We Get Lifted Radio

Built by a DJ, not a boardroom.

electronic

ColombiaBogotá

REC Radio Electrónica Colombiana

Nobody here is an import.

electronic

United StatesSan Francisco

program audio

Three days a week, doors open.

electronic

United KingdomLondon

Foundation FM

The gatekeeping stops here.

Seattle, United States

DANCE 89.5

Homework, then peak time.

Mainstream EDM, programmed by high schoolers.

KNHC began in a building behind Nathan Hale High School in Seattle with an antenna made of copper magnet wire wound round a broomstick, reaching less than a mile. The teacher who ran it wrote the textbook himself, no such book being in print, and put glue on the grooves of records he did not want played. The first FM broadcast went out on 25 January 1971, ten watts from the roof of an elementary school. In 1983 the students pushed it into New Wave, and it has been dance radio ever since.

Seattle Public Schools still holds the licence, and more than a hundred students a semester still take live shifts, around forty of them credited as hosts. Daytime is unapologetically mainstream, the big-room and dance-pop end of the format played without a trace of irony, while the specialty hours reach the edges a commercial station never touches, from happy hardcore to italo disco.