XRAY.FM Is Branching Into Television

The Portland community radio station will air a four-hour block of programming on public access TV on Saturday nights.

By Matthew Singer

The XRAY.FM brand is expanding into television.

Beginning March 12, the Portland community radio station is partnering with media arts nonprofit Open Signal to launch XRAY TV, a four-hour block of local music- and art-related programming that will air Saturday nights on Comcast channel 329.

According to Devin Febbroriello, the project's executive director, the programming will include a hodgepodge of original shows, curated collections of found footage and in-studio and live performances from the XRAY archives—a mix Febbroriello refers to as "desert island television."

"We don't want XRAY television to just be art- and music-based," she adds. "We're open to see how the community creates it. We're hoping it'll excite people and create wave of people who want to be involved."

Febbroriello says Open Signal approached XRAY with the idea as a spinoff of the station's film collective. Last year, the station also started a record label, releasing music from Sun Angle, Blesst Chest and others.

The TV block will air weekly from 10 pm-2 am on Saturdays through July, with the longterm goal being to expand into its own station at some point down the line.

XRAY TV celebrates its launch with a premier party—which also happens to coincide with the station's third anniversary—on March 12 at Mississippi Studios, with performances from Karl Blau and Chanti Darling. Get tickets here, and check out two teaser videos below:

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