Podcast #43: the art of the transition

The best feedback we ever got was a single line: "you made my deploy go faster". Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording. We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit.

Small details

A good transition is invisible: you only notice it when it goes wrong, like a page that flashes white between clicks. Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording. Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am.

We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. If you have ever wondered why a song sounds warmer on air, the answer is a ridiculous amount of compression. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation.

• Late-night mixes with no talking
• Live sessions from Studio [0] every Saturday
• Weekend throwbacks from 08:00
• Podcast feed updated nightly

We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it. We believe the music should never stop just because you clicked a link. Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes.

A short history

Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. Our favourite metric is the number of listeners who stay through the ad break. Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording.

We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. Morning shows are for energy, weather, traffic and the one story everyone at work will talk about.

The music never stops. That is not a slogan, it is a technical requirement.

Some weeks the playlist is meticulously planned; other weeks it is a group chat argument that somehow turns into a show. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping. We believe the music should never stop just because you clicked a link.

Questions we keep getting

We keep the site lightweight on purpose, so it loads fast on a train, a tired laptop or a phone at 5% battery. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. A radio station is really a promise: that there will be something good playing whenever you tune in.

Our schedule is built in blocks, with softer sounds in the morning and heavier beats after dark. The chat is moderated by humans, which keeps it friendly, weird and welcoming. Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone. Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes.

const res = await fetch("/api/now-playing")
const { artist, title } = await res.json()
console.log(`${artist} — ${title}`)

Our engineers obsess over latency because a stream that stutters is a stream people switch off. Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes. A good transition is invisible: you only notice it when it goes wrong, like a page that flashes white between clicks. The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”. We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters.

Lessons from the studio

Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping. The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”. We keep the stream running around the clock, which means someone is always awake, caffeinated and slightly too excited about a B-side. Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes.

A radio station is really a promise: that there will be something good playing whenever you tune in. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. We measure success in hours listened, not clicks, which keeps us honest about what actually matters. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning.

We believe the music should never stop just because you clicked a link. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red. We test new segments live, keep what works and quietly retire what does not. The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air.

Behind the scenes

Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it. The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor.

Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it. Listeners tell us they tune in while they code, study, drive, cook and occasionally while they should be sleeping. Our engineers obsess over latency because a stream that stutters is a stream people switch off. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. Some weeks the playlist is meticulously planned; other weeks it is a group chat argument that somehow turns into a show.

• Transcripts for every talk segment
• Weekend throwbacks from 08:00
• Podcast feed updated nightly
• Low-data mode for mobile

If you have ever wondered why a song sounds warmer on air, the answer is a ridiculous amount of compression. We keep a strict no-autoplay policy on the site: you press play, and then we never interrupt you. The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation.

On air and off

Nothing beats the feeling of a track dropping at exactly the right moment and the chat exploding with fire emojis. We keep a strict no-autoplay policy on the site: you press play, and then we never interrupt you. Every show on ArrayFM starts with a simple rule: play the track you would send to a friend at 2am. Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it.

Our community Discord is where most show ideas start and where most bad puns go to live forever. Local artists make up almost a third of what we play, and that number keeps going up. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone.

We do not do playlists. We do conversations that happen to have a beat.

We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning. Nothing beats the feeling of a track dropping at exactly the right moment and the chat exploding with fire emojis. Some of our most-loved segments started as a joke in the green room.

The numbers

Some of our most-loved segments started as a joke in the green room. When a listener sends a track we have never heard, it goes straight into the next hour. Most of our DJs have day jobs in software, design or support, which explains the jokes. The best feedback we ever got was a single line: “you made my deploy go faster”.

Some of our most-loved segments started as a joke in the green room. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone. Radio has always been about company, and that has not changed just because the transmitter is now a rack of servers. When a listener sends a track we have never heard, it goes straight into the next hour.

# stream health check
while true; do
  curl -sI $STREAM | head -1
  sleep 30
done

Late nights are for experiments: long mixes, ambient sets and the occasional field recording. We run on a tiny budget, a lot of goodwill and a very generous hosting sponsor. We learned early that a stable stream matters more than a fancy one. Good radio sounds effortless, but every minute on air has at least ten minutes of prep behind it. We record every show, trim the talk, and publish it as a podcast by the next morning.

The tech stack

Accessibility matters to us, so every show gets a transcript and every page works with a keyboard. A radio station is really a promise: that there will be something good playing whenever you tune in. Guests are always surprised by how relaxed the studio is, until the ON AIR light turns red. Every Friday we look at the numbers, and every Friday the numbers say people want more synthwave. The archive now holds more than two thousand hours of shows, all searchable by track and guest.

The station started as a side project in a spare room and a borrowed microphone. Some weeks the playlist is meticulously planned; other weeks it is a group chat argument that somehow turns into a show. The request line gets more messages than ever, and our DJs read every single one on air. Our favourite metric is the number of listeners who stay through the ad break.

The studio is small, the monitors are loud and the coffee machine has its own on-call rotation. Behind the scenes, the playout system is a small pile of open source tools glued together with very careful shell scripts. We still print the weekly playlist and pin it on the studio wall, mostly out of habit. A good transition is invisible: you only notice it when it goes wrong, like a page that flashes white between clicks. Our favourite metric is the number of listeners who stay through the ad break.