USRN To Re-Launch Scott Shannon's True Oldies Channel

United Stations Radio Networks (USRN) is expanding its association with legendary programmer Scott Shannon by offering his 24-hour-a-day True Oldies Channel to radio stations.

USRN has been the distributor of Shannon's weekend program "America's Greatest Hits" in co-production with CBS Radio since November, 2014. Now, as an independent producer, Shannon signs with USRN to re-launch his fulltime oldies network for the first time since 2014. The True Oldies Channel is currently on the air again in four test markets using a new cloud-based distribution technology developed by Synchronicity.

The True Oldies Channel began as the brainchild of Shannon in 2004, after he noticed that as Classic Hits radio stations were evolving their demographic target and moving their music focus toward more recent decades, there was an opening for programming that featured an entire library of hit music that was starting to be overlooked. Shannon is not only the namesake of the channel but is its Program Director and on-air host.

The network was originally distributed by ABC Radio Networks. In 2007, ABC Radio was purchased by Citadel Media, who then took over distribution of True Oldies Channel. In September 2011, Cumulus Media obtained Citadel Media, merging the two media companies and their assets together. Cumulus Media Networks, and later, the Cumulus-owned Westwood One took over distribution of Shannon's radio network. At the start of 2014, Cumulus ended the True Oldies Channel and parted ways with Shannon.

In July 2014, Shannon began an online-only version of his True Oldies Channel for fans to stream. In October 2014, Shannon began working with USRN (United Stations Radio Networks) on a new weekend show called "America's Greatest Hits," a Classic Hits program.

Shannon is now working with USRN to get the True Oldies Channel back on radio stations across the country. USRN's new cloud-based distribution technology for the True Oldies Channel has been successfully beta tested in four different markets, and is now ready for a national rollout.

Noticing that Oldies radio has all but disappeared, replaced by Classic Hits formats that are heavily 1980s, and in some cases even 1990s-based, Shannon felt the time was right to re-introduce his network, which is made up primarily of a deep library of songs from the 1960s and 1970s.