( please do not boost or follow here, this is only a long form reading and archive reference. Please follow and interact with us at @radiofreefedi@musician.social )

Music updates are weekly or fortnightly and based on flow of submissions and mostly IRL pressures and stresses. The whole midweek update post idea is often bleeding more toward weekend. We recognise there is a decided lull in fedi activity on the weekend, but it is what it is.

#StateOfTheStation

We've rebuilt the nowplaying interface on the website which expands the comfy channel recently played to the same depth as the main channel and moved a few things around and softened some of the pain hopefully. We literally hadn't looked at it or had time to think about it since launch in February. Doh!

We posted recently that we have cruised past 2000 friends and 200 contributors and climbing almost every day. Awesome!

We have seen a number of amazing collabs kick of from fedizens finding fedizens and some via radio free fedi. And even more rad, we are now getting to put into rotation on the station some of the outputs of the collabs. Totally awesome! The collab between Lehto and Socool we've been spinning in advance of their EP release this month is so so good. There is so much talent on the fediverse hiding in quiet corners. Let's shout it all a little louder eh?

The fediverse focused publication wedistribute is back and released a nice writeup on our little community project and some of the feels of listening to radio free fedi. https://wedistribute.org/2023/06/radio-free-fedi/

Thanks to the amazing group of patrons that have rallied to RFF and a few new friends joining that effort, our infrastructure is sustainable for months to come. While it is hard some weeks to donate the time we'd like for developing and keeping the station going, content gathering and review, community management, editing, data entry etc etc etc, when that monthly bill comes for the servers it is nice to report that we feel zero existential dread in that respect at least. So thank you to our patrons.

https://radiofreefedi.net/#shouts

It wouldn't be a thing without you as we would have pulled the plug for costs some time ago, and instead we are out here making amazing connections for and with artists and listeners. Awesome!

We've received multiple new station IDs and new spoken word micro fiction from a fedizen collab writer/reader team that organically formed around a fedi interaction. Awesome!

Artists you are doing pretty darn good at letting us know when you have a new release, single, EP, album, collab etc and often sending them our way for advance play which is so cool! Please keep that up. We see chatter out there that there are definitely regulars who notice and call out new stuff from artists they previously discovered on RFF which is guess what...AWESOME!

Everyone, if you want to hear more of something, send it in, or encourage artists you know and/or love to submit.

The response to the csv file for easy masto and derivative import of the RFF artists list was overwhelmingly positive. This is great for networking and promotion and is why we make sure you are ok with and give us a public fedi ID. it's a great way to catch up and add as the station adds, or pare down as you find artists that jam your way.

https://radiofreefedi.net/following_radioFreeFediContributors.csv

We update this file every single batch of station updates, as well as the txt list of every artist with their links and licences on the website, and we have started shouting out by tagging new artist adds and existing artists new song adds in the regular station update posts.

We were recently called corporate/commercial and anti diverse due to our rough time limit guideline? We hope anyone that tunes in for a few minutes or reads the website or a couple of posts will get that the entire mission is to promote going AWAY from RFF straight to the artists and supporting them. The intention of keeping things neighbourly in length is to provide more diversity for the drop-in and discover experience. As in previous state of the station reports, we cannot afford the time or infrastructure to provide hyper curated genre end points for dead-end consumption. That's antithetic to the weird, wild, fun and diverse discovery experience of your fediverse community radio. That being said if you have long form work or very experimental long loop or drone kinda stuff and don't mind providing an excerpt, the bottom of the hour theTrafficReport is an awesome place we'd like to highlight more sound collage and excerpts of other long form stuff.

If there is ever a lag in response time or we get a bit of data wrong, we apologise, please reach out via DM and we appreciate your love and patience as this thing grows and grows. We are a lone hamster in a wheel.

We have had quite a few folk reach out to do station IDs, station read, or reads of materials we have ready for TheTrafficReport and TheNews segments but not submit. We would love for a variety of fedi voices to be included in this way. Don't be shy, DM the station for info, we have script outlines and material ready to help you and some new writers have also appeared.

Reminder that our playlist bot @radiofreefedi@botsin.space account is unattended so try not to DM it on accident. It's name has BOT in the front of it. Please do use it as a reference if you were washing the dog and could not look at the screen 27 minutes ago to get links for an amazing artist you heard!

And you did it, it's the end of the message. Stay awesome out there!

how to listen/submit/contribute: https://radiofreefedi.net

KEEP SUPPORTING EACH OTHER AND FEDI ARTISTS

and keep fedi weird

this is your 24/7 fediverse #community #radio #radioFreeFedi

Heoi anō tāku mō nāianei Kia ora rawa atu

( please do not boost or follow here, this is only a long form reading and archive reference. Please follow and interact with us at @radiofreefedi@musician.social )

Ahoy fedi friends, thank you so much for your amazing community vibes, sharing your thoughts on what you are hearing and supporting fedi artists. And now some extremely fascinating.........housekeeping

Weekly updates Given the midweek surges in fedi activity and liveliness and the being a busy time for concurrent listeners we have shifted to a midweek weekly update on new tracks an artists. We work on this continuously following up with artists, reaching out to more, and constantly getting tracks ready behind the scenes in the station to then go live in groups around when we post that kind of update. Generally there is a late weekend to early week response to the weekend posts by submitting artists.

This week we had a second midweek surge so just kept on adding awesome new tracks. We hope you have a kick ass and/or comfy weekend hearing new things on both channels.

Interviews Have you enjoyed any of the artists spolight interview we have run? We haven't done an artist spotlight interview segment in a few weeks as IRL has been exceptionally heavy on your one hamster in a wheel RFF engine room. We may make these available from the website for streaming only and think they are a bit of fun to help introduce amazing fedi artists. Feedback was a bit sparse. They are labour intensive for comms and prep and edit so we are re-assessing.

If you have an upcoming release that is a great time to organise having a spotlight synced up so please DM the station account if you are keen.

Time and effort and ethos and thanks Full disclosure even when we skip some features, segments and have a “light” week it is still generally a half-time job to keep things ticking, growing and to maintain the vibe and hopefully diverse and/or comfy standards while making certain we are staying true to the ethos as a discovery layer that CELEBRATES sending you off to fedi interact with artists and hopefully even support them on their platforms of choice.

We are in a pretty good spot in terms having the core infrastructure funded for a few months thanks to some amazing artists and patrons. The other fuel that really keeps this going is when YOU, the community, support each other and hopefully we get looped in to see that kind of amazing collaborative and support spirit in practice. Quietly or openly hearing from artists on what this project means to them really solidifies why it is so important to celebrate artists, agency and consent, together. Keep it up team.

If there is ever a lag in response time or we get a bit of data wrong, we apologise, please reach out via DM and we appreciate your love and patience as this thing grows and grows.

Spoken word and writings We have had quite a few folk reach out to do station IDs, station read, or reads of materials we have ready for TheTrafficReport and TheNews segments but not submit. We would love for a variety of fedi voices to be included in this way. Don't be shy, DM the station for info, we have script outlines and material ready to help you.

Writers, do you have some poetry, micro fiction, or weird and wild possibly out of context sections of writing we can point voice readers to or in abscence of that our amazing announcer crew at.

New Releases Similar to the weekly update on new tracks added shifting to midweek, we will also do the announcement of recent/new/pending releases from artists on the station then and boost for the weekend

beware of the robots

be advised our playlist bot @radiofreefedi@botsin.space account is unattended so try not to DM it on accident. Please do use if you were washing the dog and could not look at the screen 27 minutes ago to get links for an amazing artist you heard!

Reviews We have a backlog of mini reviews and we will start trickling those out, again spoons and time. We reckon these are handy for artists to boost or quote in other formats so they feel they are tooting their own horn. We say TOOT TOOT!

404 not what now? Also weirdly various posts with both the bot and the station account mentioned have not shown up to to the station account and this week we've had a number of DMs and bookmarked posts vanish from our end so thanks for your patience.

Wow you made it to the end you legend. Stay awesome out there.

how to listen/submit/contribute: https://radiofreefedi.net

KEEP SUPPORTING EACH OTHER AND FEDI ARTISTS

and keep fedi weird

this is your 24/7 fediverse #community #radio #radioFreeFedi

Heoi anō tāku mō nāianei Kia ora rawa atu

( please do not boost or follow here, this is only a long form archive reference follow us at @radiofreefedi@musician.social )

Often times numbers are used to divide, conflate, obfuscate, other, and oppress. But we hope in this instance here are some numbers to celebrate your #radioFreeFedi community in reflection of 3 months 'on the air'!

#StateOfTheStation

192 the number of music, voice, writing, financial contributors in RFF to date. AWESOME, keep it growing and submit music, readings or other help.

41 hours of material in our main channel rotation pools

10 hours of content in the young and emerging comfy channel rotation

50% funding to offset the first year of back-end and infra fees for RFF. We are 3 months into being public and thanks to some amazing contributors (including artists) we had no hesitation to add the comfy channel and improve our permanence and stability.

1 hamster in a wheel volunteer operation so thank you for your support, patience and enthusiasm as this experiment has grown rapidly and organically

PRICELESS

The support you all are showing for one another as listeners and artists. The discovery and encouragement to artists are why this thing exists. Well done team!

Not wanting to being the end point of consumption or the focal point of attention, but rather a discovery layer to fuel interaction and support with artists may seem odd to some. The interaction we have seen, heard of and been in are a testament to YOUR awesomeness

( of course as soon as this was posted as it's original masto thread the numbers changed because you are all awesome )

how to listen/submit/contribute: https://radiofreefedi.net

KEEP SUPPORTING EACH OTHER AND FEDI ARTISTS

and keep fedi weird

this is your 24/7 fediverse #community #radio #radioFreeFedi

Heoi anō tāku mō nāianei Kia ora rawa atu

from the desk of radio free fedi . please do not follow or boost this blog account or post. it is only a reference to long form we can't smash or make into 1 of 12 threads in masto.

What we've learnt so far in our first 7 weeks and from putting it out there about possible growth.

#StateOfTheStation

There can be a response to jump on a wagon of cool, now “hey be all the stations/playlists/genre silos like spotify/soma/etc/etc.” We can't because we are:

• unapologetically niche. all fedi, wildly diverse. weird and wonderful.
• community driven, volunteer, will always avoid commercial or walled garden mechanisms in our sphere, and fedi presence for artists and highlighting consent and attribution are not negotiable!
• committed to ALL are welcome and we do mean ALL, all humans (and a few raccoons, possum, badgers, alien deities etc), all genres and genres busters! except nazis, and fascists, and racists, and anti trans, and anti queer. fuck them. we celebrate sound and each other, not otherism.
• because of the above item we will never automate nor payola submissions as a trust mechanism for the community we are a part of and want to celebrate. time sink yes, good for community also yes.
• weird wild and lavishly diverse to yes sometimes gently challenge, but mostly to spark adventure and discovery
• meant to be a transparent non-commercial non-corporate intermediary for discovery not an end point for consumption
• against highly siloed curation that shifts focus away from artists toward a platform. the main stream will always be weird and wonderful drop-in and explore as you wish
• most likely not be doing highly curated genre channels because that makes RFF more of an end point of consumption and not the discovery layer to get you to the artists which is the mission
• a jumping off point to go fedi interact with and to support fedi artists on their platforms of choice which we do not judge. SUPPORT FEDI ARTISTS
• the artists, connections between them and with listeners are the absolute focus, not any RFF layers hence no RFF specific “app” or distracting web stuff
• you will continue to hear electronic and metal, folk and classical, downtempo and bangers, sometimes you catch a wave, sometimes you catch a basket of wth. enjoy.

Trouble we are having:

• some days it feels like 1 in 3 fedizens are a soundscape, noise, drone, ambient, experimental artist with 17 minute compositions. we are trying to feature excerpts of things like sound collage into spots like theTrafficReport and be as inclusive as we can but without artists taking this onboard and providing us said excerpts or edits we can't always afford the editing time
• similar to that, we do our very best to get SOMETHING on from everyone who submits, but again long format, very long loops, poor sound quality or well outside of levels sounding balanced in broadcast we try but simply don't always have time to adjust submissions. these things are just not neighbourly to the other artists or the listeners in a diverse unscheduled drop-in discovery format
• expectations? we are the opposite of a paid genre curated artist obscuring service. we work very hard to balance artist rotation based on number of tracks by each to maximise variety. many people get it, it is 100% not demographic, algorithm, payola, ad driven. This IS 100% community driven. What is on the station, outside of the above issues, is exactly reflective to what is submitted. As previously stated going hard silo and making the THING an ultra curated endpoint you consume is not a goal. The THING is a little challenging sometimes, but it is celebrating diversity, each other and THE FEDI ARTISTS, not a curator or a website or a playlist. Want more of a certain genre? Then please help encourage more fedi artists to participate.
• there are many things we could do. technically and content driven. however, rule 1 is not to distract from core mission of interact with and support fedi artists!
• if not hyper curated “channels”, scheduled genre shows will take a MASSIVE chunk of programming time and could technically be on a side stream, but as it stands, we do not feel they should be on the main stream. “you” may like it, but it thwarts the drop-in anytime and catch some diverse discovery ethos.
• as a disabled person needing remote work, saying “I'd pay for a feed/show of xyz” would be exciting to me were it not antithetical to the station mission. I can't yet see a way to balance that up without becoming the things we are actively not.

Whats awesome:

• so so many stories of discovery, mutual artist support, listeners subscribing and buying and giving words of encouragement to artists!
• the overall support for things we recognise as being weird and different and the core tenets we are standing on
• have you heard “golf punk” by sockpuppet or everything by Helen Bell? I mean come on, we are so excited these amazing artists came into our feed.
• it's a lot of work but we are having fun with artist spotlight interviews and hope you are liking them
• your boosts and interactions tell us that you like or tolerate our nowPlaying mini reviews and we try to do an 8 or 12 hour boost on most station posts to catch you awake

**************************************************

where to then?

Therefore, given the poll direction, and more importantly some very constructive chats with listeners, and assuming continuing patron help with some infrastructure upgrades, we think the following is the least distracting most “on brand” for a RFF small growth step.

We are in the process of scaling up and developing a “comfy” station feed. This will be both a subset of contributing artists and a superset of tracks, being able to feature more material maybe not included on the main feed. This will not be a genre channel persay, rather a vibe.

NEW “CHANNEL” FACTS:

• this channel will not have spoken word bits and sound collage at top and bottom of hour
• there will be no jump out at you surprises in terms of drastic sonic clashes and we hope that helps some listeners
• sonic and vocal pallets of light beats and rhythms we hope most will agree are suitable for focused OR background discovery, chill out and enjoyment
• while we are shaving off some of the experimental, hard, rough, piercing, throbbing edges, this will still be wildly varied from as many artists as possible who ALL will still be on the main discovery feed with varying degrees of track overlap

radio free fedi comfy!

What we need:

• keep supporting fedi artists!
• continued celebration of our difference and of our community
• keep sending in original music, if you are already contributing to the station please let us know when you have new stuff we can consider and help hype
• keep putting hands up to do station reads
• if you have the means, help offsetting infra costs is how this thing is evolving from the initial smell of an oily rag operation and we have begun to separate out some tech for resilience going forward
• more understanding that there isn't always time to respond to queries that might be pretty clearly answered on the site, that we can't always find a way to include every submission nor have the time to adjust things to within parameters to do so. We can't always respond to every post about “why don't you use this platform?” or “I hate Martian Speed Casio Waltz, why is there not more Hungarian Death Lute Polka!?!?”. The station is and will as direct as we can hustle behind the scenes to make it be a direct reflection of who contributes material. Any compassion, help with care taken with quality submissions to minimise our workload, or maybe holding off on helpful demands that would obviously strain or distract from our core ethos is a massive help.
• Not my style but I have been told it is worth noting that a lone volunteer spent 60 hrs a week for a month getting this community experiment up and running if that helps with understanding that this is not spotify in resource, ethos, or hatred for artists.

phew, thanks if you made it this far. we hope it helps to have a place other than truncated threads to document more long form some of the behind the scenes in evolving a community driven artist discovery tool

KEEP SUPPORTING EACH OTHER AND FEDI ARTISTS

and keep fedi weird

this is your 24/7 fediverse #community #radio #radioFreeFedi

listen and contribute: [https://radiofreefedi.net]

Heoi anō tāku mō nāianei Kia ora rawa atu

#np #nowPlaying #review #radioFreeFedi

Helen Bell – all the songs!

It's fair to say there is a not a single folk leaning bone in my abrasive music body, yet every time a Helen Bell track comes on I am absolutely GLUED to the speakers.

We love “Broken Town” but cannot list favs or recommended tracks as every single one is a pure sonic delight and an absolute master class in lyrical storytelling. Every track is a wonderful journey.

show @helenbellmusic@sunny.garden some fedi love

[https://helenbell.bandcamp.com]

this is an archive post so it is not lost in the masto ether... listen and contribute to radio free fedi at: [https://radiofreefedi.net] and follow us for more amazing fedi artist discovery at @radiofreefedi@musician.social

#nowPlaying #review #radioFreeFedi

Circuit Static – Six

The 6th album in a Halloween series. You will get very competently arranged electro synthwave infectious head nodders like “Dark Alley”, with some light industrial flair and some epic haunting soundtrack tension as in “First to Fall” and “Night Stalker Returns”.

Dark enough if you want Halloween every day like we do this is a must have. Accessible enough for your neighbours?

go show @cosmality@dice.camp some fedi love

[https://circuitstatic.bandcamp.com]

this is an archive post so it is not lost in the masto ether... listen and contribute to radio free fedi at: [https://radiofreefedi.net] and follow us for more amazing fedi artist discovery at @radiofreefedi@musician.social

#np #nowPlaying #review #radioFreeFedi

Mykie Frankenstein – Spiders in my Eyes! (Dec 2022)

100% organic farm to plate western goth.

This end-to-end enjoyable EP starts with a pleasantly brooding invite to join us down in the “Pumpkin Patch”.

“Diggin'” vibe is squarly 80s layered vox and talking goth guitar and I demand jack skellington should put on a belt buckle and join in on this love diddy.

“Three Pots of Coffee” an instrumental with a great wobble esque bass lines

“Promised Land” could have been straight out of Floodland and it scoots very nicely.

now I work outside a lot and well dig holes, so all week I been signing diggin holes until we're together again, but even more so, every time any detritus blows in my face I sing I GOT SPIDERS IN MY EYES for at least 20 minutes... “I've got spiders Crawling Out From Behind My Eyes” is addictive...send help?

This is an easy 9.1/10. We talk a lot about ear worms, now we can say EYE SPIDERS.

Even if you are totally wrong and don't think Halloween is every day you are still gonna 'dig' this EP.

show @mykie@mastodon.social some fedi love

[https://mykiefrankenstein.bandcamp.com]

this is an archive post so it is not lost in the masto ether... listen and contribute to radio free fedi at: [https://radiofreefedi.net] and follow us for more amazing fedi artist discovery at @radiofreefedi@musician.social

#np #nowPlaying #review #radioFreeFedi

Romeo Rucha – Stay Calm (Jan 2023)

cerebral, irreverent, funky, and guaranteed to crack a few smiles

Imagine Autotune the News, Blue Man Group and Emergency Broadcast Network are fighting in a smallish box. Heaps of creative shifted, re-timed and glitched samples of spoken word and catchy underlying beats and sounds.

I don't want this played at my funeral because I won't hear it. Play it NOW!

show @romeorucha@mastodon.online some fedi love

[https://romeorucha.bandcamp.com]

this is an archive post so it is not lost in the masto ether... listen and contribute to radio free fedi at: [https://radiofreefedi.net] and follow us for more amazing fedi artist discovery at @radiofreefedi@musician.social

#np #nowPlaying #review #radioFreeFedi

Shannon Curtis – Good to Me

This release is simultaneously beautiful, vulnerable and uplifting AND aggressive and empowering in the most cohesive way. Get lost in the sound between punchy and floaty. You will cry, yell, sing sometimes all at the same time. Fantastic story telling lyrics of substance and resonance.

Superior 80's synth vibes but with much more sonic depth and layers to enjoy with brilliant production and modern sound. Since there is no weak track there are many standouts, but “I Am” is an absolute ripper.

you go ahead and try to resist the urge to lace up your roller skates

12/10 infinite replay value

show @shannoncurtis@mastodon.social and @hilljam@mastodon.social some fedi love

[https://shannoncurtis.net]

[https://deptofenergymgmt.com/]

this is an archive post so it is not lost in the masto ether... listen and contribute to radio free fedi at: [https://radiofreefedi.net] and follow us for more amazing fedi artist discovery at @radiofreefedi@musician.social

#np #review #archive #nowPlaying #radioFreeFedi

Allflowers – More or Less Forever

Did you and/or ahem your parents grow up listening to siouxsie and curve and the cure, and lush, belly and echo and everything delightfully “alt” cause it sure sounds like Allflowers out of France did. In the best possible way. They present an outstanding individual and modern sound with unmistakable nods to alternative's past.

Praising a ballad is NOT something in my wheelhouse and yet they have one of those too in the form of the orchestral rock ballad “Zagreb Song”. AND, the next track “Somewhere Between the Lines” is another down tempo ish track with to this listeners' ear awesome cure esque guitar work I though OH NOES I LIKE NAY LOVE TWO BALLAD OR BALLAD ADJACENT TRACKS ON ONE ALBUM, what?!

Effortlessly floating between a touch of dreamy shoe gaziness or even melancholy to more driving progressive and moving alt rock underpinnings, all with perfectly complimenting vocals. 11/10 listen all the way through, no brainer for easy repeat play.

They are new to the fedi, go and give @allflowers@musician.social some love.

[https://allflowers.bandcamp.com]

this is an archive post so it is not lost in the masto ether... listen and contribute to radio free fedi at: [https://radiofreefedi.net] and follow us for more amazing fedi artist discovery at @radiofreefedi@musician.social