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The Hermitage, TN outfit won the final competition event at the Wildhorse Saloon in Nashville. Radio Romance will receive national radio airplay on Cumulus Media radio stations, and a recording contract under the Big Machine Label Group umbrella.

Is this the start of the end for Cumulus or the first step to a refinance and manageable debt load? Cumulus was scheduled to make an interest payment of $23.6 million on 7.75% senior notes due 2019. In an SEC filing Wednesday, Cumulus' board of directors authorized the company to forgo that interest payment and a 30-day clock is ticking.

The radio landscape across the country will look a whole lot different when the Entercom/CBS merger closes in mid-November. On Wednesday, Entercom announced a series of deals to satisfy a civil antitrust lawsuit filed by The Department of Justice and move the CBS merger ball closer to crossing the goal line.

iHeartMedia already had six stations in Boston and six stations in Seattle before picking up four Boston stations (two from Entercom and two from CBS) and adding three CBS stations in Seattle in this massive transaction to help Entercom close its merger with CBS.

They're getting one of the top sports talk stations in the country, WBZ-FM. The station also carries the New England Patriots, the Boston Celtics, and Bruins Hockey. This means WBZ-FM and Entercom's WEEI-FM will continue to be fierce competitors in that sports-crazy city.

Before this deal was on the table, Bonneville only owned 14 stations in four markets: three in Seattle, three in Phoenix, four in Denver, and four in Salt Lake City. In this deal, Bonneville will add eight more stations: four in San Francisco and four in Sacramento, bulking up to 22.

Without a bundle of cash sitting on the sideline to purchase stations, in order for iHeartMedia to be in on any of these Entercom/CBS divestitures, it had to be willing to trade. And it was. So as iHeart expands in Boston and Seattle, it also exits Richmond and Chattanooga, where Entercom will enter for the first time.

Next week, Entercom CEO David Field is expected to announce all of his Market Managers, Regional VPs, and Format Captains. This week he announced some of the employees who would be playing a larger role, in senior positions, when the merger closes in mid-November. Here's who Field singled out...

This is something radio stations in Chicago have become known for...coming together to use the success of advertisers to promote the power of radio. It's still very surprising that more cities around the country do not follow their lead.

Despite a few big brand marketers stating they are reevaluating their digital ad spending, it doesn't seem to be stopping the flow of dollars to digital in any way. According to new data released by BIA/Kelsey, small and medium-sized businesses plan to spend 62.2% of their ad budget on some form of digital in 2018 -- that's up six percent over 2015.