Satellite Radio: XM vs. Sirius

By Scott Memmer Email

Date posted: 11-30-2004

We have been writing for several years about satellite radio. We began way back in 2000 when the technology was barely a blip on the automotive radar screen. Although satellite radio had been talked about for close to a decade, when it came to actually putting birds in space and generating a signal, things hit a snag.

It took approximately 18 months longer than expected to bring satellite radio to the general public. That's not so bad, actually, considering the complexity of the technology.

But that is all behind us. What we have now are two fully operational satellite radio services, both broadcasting music and talk shows from coast to coast.

And yet something is missing in our reportage. While we have reported diligently on the ups and downs of the satellite radio industry, we have neglected to discuss the actual content of the two services. Specifically, what is the difference between XM Radio and Sirius Radio? Are they clones of one another, or do they broadcast different content?

To that end we conducted a 60-day listening test between the two services. Here's what we discovered….

	XM	Sirius	Summary
Sports		√	For breadth of coverage, the nod goes to Sirius.
News	√		With a strong lineup of brand-name news providers, XM gets the edge.
Talk Radio and Entertainment		√	Because of its bold and brave content choices, Sirius beats out XM in the talk segment. For comedy, Sirius has more eclectic offerings while XM veers toward the mainstream.
Music
Country	√	√	For traditional artists, XM is the way to go. But for more contemporary folk and bluegrass, it's Sirius.
Pop	√		XM's eclectic mix puts it over Sirius.
Hip-Hop/R&B	√	√	Both services have similar offerings.
Rock		√	Providing the biggest surprises, Sirius wins the all-important category.
Result		√	The overall win goes to Sirius for its edgier and more surprising content, and its better choices in sports and talk.

Sports
Since we're in a competitive frame of mind, let's start with sports first. In this area, we give Sirius the clear edge. However, this may be by design. After all, marketing a brand-new technology to a previously nonexistent market segment is a bit like shooting fish in a barrel. In earlier discussions with our contacts at XM Radio, they had expressed reservations about Sirius' bold move into sports programming, suggesting that the listenership might be lighter than expected (meaning fewer advertising dollars). Does this explain XM's reluctance to jump into the sports fray? Perhaps. While XM sat on the sidelines, Sirius became the official satellite radio partner of the NFL, and also nailed down major deals with the NHL and the NBA. But XM may be changing its tune. In the midst of the recently concluded baseball playoffs, XM Radio announced a deal with Major League Baseball that will have it broadcasting hundreds of games per season. Still for breadth of coverage, the nod goes to Sirius, which currently boasts an exclusive deal with NASCAR.

News
In news, the edge goes to XM Radio, though not by much. The company has assembled a strong lineup of brand-name news providers, including ABC, Bloomberg Radio, CNBC, CNN, CNN Headline News, Fox News, MSNBC, Newstalk, The Weather Channel and BBC World. Sirius, in turn, counters with many duplications, including Bloomberg, CNBC, CNN and Fox. Sirius also offers two channels of NPR, as well as PRI and BBC channels. It was pretty clear to us that either service would keep you well-informed on current events, but we give the nod to XM.

Talk Radio and Entertainment
Moving on to talk radio and entertainment, both services do a similar job. At first glance, Sirius appears to offer a wider variety of choices. While this may be true, XM also has some clever surprises up its sleeve, with unique programming that does not duplicate Sirius' choices. We especially liked listening to the comedy offerings from both providers. Sirius has two comedy channels, Cracked Up Comedy (146) and Raw Dog (147). As the names imply, Cracked Up offers older, safer fare (Bill Cosby, Bob Newhart, etc.), while Raw Dog has a sharper, more contemporary focus (Chris Rock, Richard Pryor and the like). Not to be outdone, XM Radio offers XM Comedy (150), Laugh USA (151) and Extreme FM (152). Between the two services, we found the Sirius offerings to be a little more eclectic and the XM offerings more mainstream, so you may have to make up your own mind on that.

In other talk formats, XM Radio offers 11 other channels, running the gamut from MTV and VH-1 Radio (155 and 156) to Books & Drama (163). We enjoyed XM's more unusual offerings, finding them unique and idiosyncratic. For instance, the service boasts a Trucker's Channel (171), an Advice Station (165) and all African-American Talk (The Power, 169). Still, Sirius outdoes them, with more offerings segmented into more specific demographics. For example, in addition to the duplicated channels (E! Entertainment Radio and Discovery Channel Radio), Sirius boasts Radio Disney (130), Our Time, Talk for Women (131), a new-agey channel called Wisdom Radio (132), Court TV (134), a gay and lesbian channel (149), three channels of political talk — right, left and center (142, 143 and 144) — not to mention two Catholic channels, one in Spanish and one in English. It was clear to us in doing this review that, at least in the talk and entertainment arena, Sirius had chosen to cast its net wide and include marginalized groups that some radio programming professionals might consider negligible. We disagree, commending Sirius on its bold and brave content choices, and giving it the edge in the talk segment.

Music
This leads us to music. Let's start at the beginning. At the top of the dial, both services use channels five through nine to correspond to decades in the 20th century. Thus, 5 equals the '50s, 6 the '60s and so forth, up through nine. We found the services very similar in their offerings on these channels, with one notable exception. As a blast from the past (we can think of no other reason for it), XM's '60s channel boasts a team of motor-mouthed, slick-talking jocks reminiscent of the earlier years of that decade. We wonder why. Does it think we actually miss those annoying DJs? Does anyone? Please, XM, give us disc jockeys who talk like normal human beings and address their audience at something higher than a 12 IQ level. Edge to Sirius.

Let's talk about country. It's a big segment. For the most part we found the offerings here similar. Both services offer country hits, classic country, alternative country and contemporary country sounds. Most of these offerings are similar to what you would find on traditional radio, but as with the other channels, without the commercials. We found the difference in this segment mainly in the bluegrass and folk categories, which both services offer. In general, the guideline here is that XM plays more of the traditional artists mixed in with current players, while Sirius leans more heavily to the current scene. For example, in folk, XM plays a lot of old Dylan; Peter, Paul & Mary; even John Denver; whereas Sirius goes with Ron Sexsmith, Nancy Griffith and other contemporary artists. In bluegrass, we found a similar pattern. XM plays a lot of old Bill Monroe, Louvin Brothers and Ralph Stanley, while Sirius leans toward Tony Rice, Ricky Skaggs, Alison Krauss and the like. It's all good, but we're suckers for the old stuff, so this category goes to XM. If you're more into contemporary folk and bluegrass, though, you may prefer Sirius.

In the pop category, the services have several channels which are virtually identical to what you'd hear on commercial radio, minus the advertising of course. We would assume these stations are not the reason one would subscribe to satellite radio, but we've been wrong before. For example, both Sirius 01 and XM 20 play Top-40 hits, and there we found the obligatory Britney Spears, Ashlee Simpson, etc. Likewise, both services offer a channel for "love songs" (Kenny Loggins, Whitney Houston, etc.). At this point, though, there is a split, with the clear edge going to XM. Both services offer a channel of Broadway show tunes and one for standards from the Great American Songbook; however, XM goes one step further, throwing into the mix such unusual offerings as U-Pop (29, Euro and global chart hits), Cinemagic (27, movie soundtracks), and XMLive (26, rebroadcasts of live concerts). An eclectic mix, indeed, and one that we enjoy.

In hip-hop and R&B, both services have ample representation. Both XM and Sirius wisely offer a classic soul channel, filled mainly with Motown tracks from the '60s and '70s (Marvin Gaye; Four Tops; Earth, Wind and Fire). Likewise, each service broadcasts a contemporary version of the same type of material (Prince, Beyoncé, Michael Jackson). Additionally, both XM and Sirius give the listener several different angles on rap and hip-hop. For instance, both offer a classic hip-hop/rap channel (L.L. Cool J, Public Enemy, Run-DMC, etc.) and at least one channel of current hip-hop and rap hits. Both services seem to more or less duplicate one another in the dance category, too, except that Sirius adds a disco channel for those who still have sideburns and bell bottoms hanging in their closets. We judge these categories a tie.

And of course we can't forget rock. With both services, the rock category features the largest number of channels, the most selection, and, we're happy to say, some of the biggest surprises.

For starters, both services offer an early classic rock channel (Sirius 14, XM 46). However, when listening, we found the XM programming more adventurous, including early Genesis and Humble Pie and a Who cut we'd never heard before. Sirius countered with The Stones, Led Zep, Steve Miller and Steppenwolf — exactly the kind of content you'd hear on your local classic rock station. (We must say, though, that Sirius wisely divides the mammoth classic rock segment into two separate channels, early and late, while XM runs with one channel. Still, we give the edge to XM here.)

The services also pay homage to hard rock, each in a slightly different manner, Sirius going with a channel it calls Hair Nation (Sirius 23), which pays tribute to '80s hair bands (when we listened, it played Van Halen, Scorpions and Def Leppard), XM opting for the Boneyard (XM 41), which again played a more eclectic mix (Black Label Society, Queensryche, Metal Church). Again, we give the nod to XM here.

As for the rest, there are really too many rock channels to discuss here, so let us just touch upon the high points. XM offers a very fine acoustic rock channel (XM 50) called The Loft which, when we listened, played such artists as Ricky Lee Jones, David Bromberg and John Wesley Hardin. Quite a breath of fresh air. Sirius has a new channel called Underground Garage (Sirius 25), which plays some of the most delightfully weird and obscure cuts we've ever heard. During our listening test it played The Nazz, Quicksilver Messenger Service and a totally bizarre live version of Buddy Holly's "Heartbeat" done by none other than Humble Pie.

For those with darker tastes, XM offers Liquid Metal (XM 41). In the time we listened, the three bands in succession were Cradle of Filth, Three Inches of Blood and Watch Them Die. Whenever you're feeling too optimistic, we suggest you listen to this channel.

Finally, delight of delights, Sirius offers Sirius Disorder (Sirius 24), a grab bag of different tunes and artists which is beyond eclectic. When we listened to it, there seemed to be absolutely no logic to the programming, and for that reason we loved it. In succession we heard Manhattan Transfer, Steve Earle, Elvis Costello and, from the new Warren Zevon tribute album, Adam Sandler's spot-on cover of Zevon's signature tune, "Werewolves of London." It was a lot of fun. That such a loony mix of tunes could strike our ears in this day and age caused us to raise our glasses high and toast the free enterprise system.

In the all-important rock category, the nod goes to Sirius.

In the interest of brevity, we could not cover the whole spectrum of these two fine content providers. In addition to the aforementioned, both XM and Sirius offer a generous helping of jazz, classical, Christian and world music. You won't be disappointed with any of these channels.

So who's the winner?

First, let us say that even the most discriminating listener will be happy with either XM Radio or Sirius Radio. It is obvious that both companies have put together a crack team of researchers and programmers, and the variety of content offered by both services is truly staggering and impressive. In fact, we could easily call this test a tie, since both XM and Sirius provide excellent content.

That being said, we're going to give Sirius the nod. It strikes us that XM Radio takes fewer chances with its content, sticking to the tried and true, while Sirius takes a riskier path. As a result, the Sirius content is a little edgier and more surprising, plus the company has better choices in sports and talk.