The Biggest Radio Station on the 'Net

by Holly Henry

On the tip of Fredericksburg, nestled in a residential area lies Texas Rebel Radio Network.  The small building has a couple of studios and some offices.  The desks overflow with papers, a sign of busy workers.  

Amid the KFAN 107.9 T-shirts and the piles of work are relics of the past -- old record players and typewriters.  Vinyl records hang on the walls alongside black and white photos.  Plenty of old radios stand in the corners or sit on tables.  

For a moment, it's a step back 50 years.  But look beneath the antique novelties and there's something else -- a very real look at the future of radio.

According to a recent Arbitron survey, Texas Rebel Radio is the most listened to radio station in the United States, even though it is based in a small Texas tourist town.

How does that happen? The answer is easy -- the internet.  

Last fall, information services company Arbitron measured Webcasting in the United States and found almost 10 percent of all computers tuned to the radio on the Web in October were logged onto texasrebelradio.com.

When General Manager Jayson Fritz heard the news, he was relieved.  

"It validates what we're doing.  I felt like we were on the right track, but we didn't have anything concrete (to prove it)," he said.

Jayson and his wife, Jan, own Texas Rebel Radio through Fritz Broadcasting.  

They simulcast KFAN 107.9 and KEEP 98.3 through the radio waves and on the Internet.  

The Fritzes first bought out an AM station, KNAF 910, that had been in Jayson's family for years.

About 10 years ago, they started KFAN and, with it, a whole new concept of radio.

The Texas Rebel Radio format blends a variety of music -- country, rock, blues, -- with one overlaying theme -- Texas.  More than half of the music played on Texas Rebel Radio has a Texas connection, meaning the artists is from Texas, the song is about Texas, the artists lives in Texas or the music is produced in Texas.

"By blending music, we're giving people a wider variety than they might have in their music collection," Jan said.

Willie Nelson, Robert Earl Keen, Lyle Lovett, Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Jerry Jeff Walker are all Rebel regulars, mixed in with Stone Temple Pilots and Matchbox 20.

With one of the largest music libraries, Jan said Texas Rebel Radio doesn't follow a play list, but a formula.  Certain styles of music are played at certain times.  For example, at a specific time, the deejay plays blues, but what particular blues song he plays is up to him, Jan said.

The deejay has more freedom and can work requests right in, instead of following a strict play list, she added.  He also can take requests from the Internet.

"It's not just the Hill Country anymore.  Friends and family in Dallas call and ask me about songs," said KFAN deejay Tim Steele.

"How many stations in the world can you work where the stuff in rotation all of the time is what you want to listen to," Steele said while spinning tunes for his afternoon show from a studio whose walls are lined with autographed photos.

"The music is foremost in our program," Jayson said.  "Our philosophy is there's a lot of good music out there that blends together.  We give people the familiarity and then they can hear something they hadn't heard before."

Maybe someone loves .38 Special but they've never heard Stevie Ray Vaughn, Jayson said.  On Texas Rebel Radio, they can hear both.

"You can't listen to us for 15 minutes and decide if you like us," Jayson said.

According to Arbitron's survey, plenty of people are listening to the FAN all over the world, which could leave some people wondering how a station playing predominantly Texas music could have such international appeal.

"When we were developing Rebel Radio, there was discussion of the appeal of anything Texas," Jayson said.

Plenty of Texas artists, many from the Hill Country, are big hits in Europe and tour there at least once a year, he said.

"For (people in other countries), it's a wonderful way to hear all these people who are touring but are not being played on the radio," he added.

Jan noted the number of Texans scattered around the world, and their desire to find ties to home.

"If you're a native Texan, you're a Texan first and then an American," Jayson said.

With listeners in the Middle East, Russia, Germany, Italy and beyond, Texas Rebel Radio is truly an international phenomenon that has developed, Jan said, almost a kind of cult following.

One couple moved to Fredericksburg just so they could tune into Rebel Radio, Jayson said.

Texas Rebel Radio fan Lynda Obst produced the movie "Hope Floats."  She's such a fan of the FAN, she put Harry Connick Jr. in a KFAN T-shirt for one scene.

"She just wanted to do something nice for us," Jayson and Jan said.

The Fritzes see Texas music as truly unique -- a marriage of blues and country that forms Texas roadhouse music.  And it's music that can't be found outside Texas.

"It's singer/songwriter music," Jan said.  "The person wrote the song and has a message to get out.  It's one reason people are more emotionally attached to the music they play. It resonates a cord in them."

But with the Internet and the wonders of technology, that Texas roadhouse flair can reach far beyond the Lone Star state.

Even in the early stages of the Internet, Jayson said he recognized what was happening and wanted to get in on the ground floor.  The Texas Rebel Radio Website launched about seven years ago, but at that time, Webcasting was just too costly.

In August 1998, Rebel Radio signed on with Internet affiliate Magnitude Network as the company's seventh radio station customer.  Magnitude streams the audio to the Web site.

The early investment paid off for Rebel Radio with more than 100,000 people logging on to listen each month.

But Rebel Radio was lucky.  It started Webcasting early and it's a niche program, which is where Jayson says the success of radio Webcasting lies.

"I don't think we're seeing the number of (Webcasting sites) growing as much as the founders of Webcasting thought it would," Jayson said.  "It probably has to do with the quality.  We're not quite there yet, but it's getting better every month.  As the technology improves, we'll see it grow by leaps and bounds."

Jayson said he foresees more Webcasting from niche stations and more Webcasting-only sites.

Unique stations on the Web - niche music, sports, talk or news formats - are those that will prosper the most," Jayson said.

"There's no reason for a country station to stream audio because there's a country station in every town.  I wish they'd stop trying and get off my bandwidth," he said with a laugh.