THIS IS ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO: There's A Countdown A-Comin'

Our radio show This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl commemorates the end of each year and the beginning of the next with a countdown show, playing back what we played a lot over the course of the preceding twelve months. This year's countdown show is this Sunday, January 7th, from 9 to Midnight Eastern at sparksyracuse.org and on the air at Spark WSPJ-LP Syracuse 103.3 and 93.7 FM. If you've never checked out our weekly attempts at The Best Three Hours Of Radio On The Whole Friggin' Planet, there's no better place to start than the countdown show. If you know us already, you already know this is where you'll need to be on Sunday night.

The stats for our countdowns are compiled by the mighty Fritz Van Leaven, who keeps track of what we do better'n we ever could. For Countdown 2017, Fritz has given us a list of our [gulp] 92 most-played tracks, and our 125 most-played artists. Over the next day or two, Dana and I will decide how much of each countdown list we can fit into a three-hour show, while still leaving time for legal IDs, back-announcing tracks, station acknowledgements, and the odd attempt at performing sight gags on the radio. We may have to cut back on the latter. We'll likely dispense with our usual opening theme, The Ramones' "Do You Remember Rock 'n' Roll Radio?," and we'll probably skip our closing instrumental, too.

So how much countdown can we squeeze into a mere three-hour slot? We're currently weighing the folly-versus-audacity ratio of trying to play 57 tracks. That would be a countdown of our 16 most-played artists and our 41 most-played tracks, and I estimate the music alone for that would take up just over two hours and forty-five minutes. Doable? Maybe, though it's a little bit of a challenge. We'll decide within the next few days.

Whether we wind up playing 57 tracks or a couple less, the countdown show will offer an incredible collection of stellar rockin' pop music. We have stuff from the '50s, the '60s, the '70s, the '80s, the '90s, the '00s, and whatever this current decade is called. We have a lot of stuff from 2017, including a fistful of tracks from our recent compilation CD This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4. We don't care much about how old or new a record is; if it sounds great on the radio, we're achin' to play it.

The specifics of the countdown will, of course, not be revealed until the show itself. What fun would that be? But we are going to contact a few select artists to let 'em know their fans should tune in. Do you like pop music? You should tune in, too. The countdown commences Sunday night.

This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl, Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse on The Spark WSPJ-LP 103.3 and 93.7, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/

Spark Syracuse is supported by listeners like you. Tax-deductible donations are welcome at http://sparksyracuse.org/support/

You can follow Carl's daily blog Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) at 
https://carlcafarelli.blogspot.com/

Our new compilation CD This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 is now available from Kool Kat Musik! 29 tracks of irresistible rockin' pop, starring Pop Co-Op, Ray Paul, Circe Link & Christian Nesmith, Vegas With Randolph Featuring Lannie Flowers, The Slapbacks, P. Hux, Irene Peña, Michael Oliver & the Sacred Band Featuring Dave Merritt, The Rubinoos, Stepford Knives, The Grip Weeds, Popdudes, Ronnie Dark, The Flashcubes, Chris von Sneidern, The Bottle Kids, 1.4.5., The Smithereens, Paul Collins' Beat, The Hit Squad, The Rulers, The Legal Matters, Maura & the Bright Lights, Lisa Mychols, and Mr. Encrypto & the Cyphers. You gotta have it, so order it here.