Welcome
About
On May 27, 2016 I started this little show called “Smooth, Relaxing & Easy on WMCK.fm” and had no idea where it would lead! I have always loved “easy listening” and knew that I would want to do a program with the music… especially as my library expands with a lot of the custom material recorded for radio way back when, much of which has been made available for purchase at various “stores” (Amazon, etc.) on the Internet.
Over 300 weekly programs later, SRE is going strong. In late November 2020 when WMCK.fm took on the “Tube City Online Radio” moniker, SRE added Shaky Radio as an affiliate. The affiliation with Shaky ended in 2023 when the station signed off. In late 2021, Vulcan Sound Radio took the show on. And after the untimely death of my dear friend, Doug Goffus who hosted “Goffus Golden Oldies”, SRE filled his Saturday void in 2022 on both Tube City Online Radio and WRCT (88.3 Pittsburgh) giving the show a terrestrial home!
The music on SRE was once dominant on FM stations around the U.S. Many associated the music with riding in an elevator or having a root canal and in the late 1980s and early 1990s the music all but disappeared to the delight of advertisers who found buying time on stations with the format wasn’t all that lucrative. In the early 2000s, a small number of stations in small markets were barely keeping the music alive. Then satellite radio brought it back – even tapping the resources of the man considered the creator of the format, Marlin Taylor.
Since then, the music has made somewhat of a comeback in large part thanks to the internet. An example of this is JIB on the Web, a 24-hour station maintained by Warren Shroeger and other former employees of the former WJIB-FM (96.9 FM Boston, Massachusetts). It is probably the best depiction of the format when it was on the air.
While SRE doesn’t exactly imitate the precise sound of the stations of yore, it includes many of the instrumental artists and a lot of softer and classic vocals that you will know and love. Enjoy music from Ronnie Aldrich, Frank Chacksfield, Andy Williams, Anita Kerr, Lex DeAzevedo and more! Mix that with some “friendly talk” and you have Smooth, Relaxing and Easy.
Recording the program for you is my favorite two hours of my week. While health prevents me from maintaining a full-time radio job, these two hours give me the opportunity to do something I enjoy. AND I get to do it MY WAY!
See the showtimes below! I look forward to our time together.
Eric O’Brien
Creator/Host of Smooth, Relaxing and Easy
Show Times
Join creator/host Eric O’Brien at these times:
- Tube City Online Radio (McKeesport, PA)– Fridays: 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. Eastern; Saturdays: 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. Eastern; Tuesdays: 8:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. Eastern
- WRCT-FM (88.3 Pittsburgh, PA) – Saturdays: 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. Eastern
- Vulcan Sound Radio (Bournemouth, UK) – Wednesdays: 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. British