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International South Carolina: Getting Blasted by Idaho's Translators: 15 local watts for Christian rock 'Effect'
International South Carolina: Getting Blasted by Idaho's Translators: 15 local watts for Christian rock 'Effect' 
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| South Carolina: Getting Blasted by Idaho's Translators: 15 local watts for Christian rock 'Effect' |
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The Post and Courier (Charleston, SC) October 13, 2005 Thursday FINAL Edition SECTION: PREVIEW; Pg. 9F LENGTH: 496 words HEADLINE: 15 local watts for Christian rock's 'Effect' BYLINE: PRENTISS FINDLAY Of The Post and Courier Staff BODY: Chances are you haven't heard of KEFX-FM in Twin Falls, Idaho. It's a 100,000-watt station that has listeners all over southern Idaho. To my surprise, though, you can hear it in Charleston, too, where it broadcasts at a whopping 15 watts from a tower in Mount Pleasant. It can be found at 88.1-FM. A fellow reporter at The Post and Courier asked me recently what was going on at 88.1-FM, so I checked it out. At first, I thought I was listening to some sort of pirate radio. You know, the kind of broadcast where a bunch of college kids get together on somebody's roof and spin some tunes broadcast on an unlicensed milliwatt transmitter heard for a few blocks. The music I heard at 88.1-FM was very electric and very loud, like at a heavy metal concert. Turns out 88.1-FM is part of The Effect Radio Network, which plays Christian rock out of Twin Falls. They don't sell advertising and have no money for promotion. Word of mouth is how people learn about the station, which is exactly how I found out about it. "It is basically some equipment on a tower that is picking up our satellite signal from Twin Falls, Idaho. There is no one local to Charleston," said Brian Harman, station manager. In terms of what's actually here in the Lowcountry, 88.1-FM is nothing more than a "translator," radio jargon for a satellite dish hung on an antennae tower in Mount Pleasant that pulls in the satellite signal from KEFX-FM and routes it to a low-power transmitter and antennae that broadcasts the signal to area listeners. It's hard to say how many people listen to the station locally, but Harman said he regularly hears from Lowcountry listeners. "We do know it's a pretty good number because I get a lot of response from there. I consistently see e-mails coming in, calls coming in from that location, song requests," Harman said. The KEFX playlist includes artists such as Relient K, Switchfoot, Seventh Day Slumber and Thousand Foot Krutch. The music block I heard was heavy metal with a religious message. The station is part of the Calvary Satellite Network of Twin Falls, which has about 400 Christian stations, most of them satellite signal translators like 88.1-FM. KEFX is a 24-hour station heard from Hawaii to Virginia. The Charleston transmitter for KEFX is the only one in South Carolina. KEFX sponsors include Abide Clothing, Christian Concerts, U.S.A., Groundwire, Joshua Fest, King of Kings Skate Ministry, Landspeed Racing and Youth With A Mission. Most of the funds for the station's budget come from "teachers" who pay to be on the air to deliver their message like a preacher. I listened to KEFX early in the evening. My head was ringing with amped-up power chords and growling vocals. I'm told that's not even the heavy stuff, known as "Extreme Effect," which broadcasts from 11 p.m. to 2 a.m. "It's what's considered Christian rock. We're blasting southern Idaho with that," Harman said. And he's blasting the Lowcountry, too. LOAD-DATE: October 18, 2005 |
