The Ongoing History of New Music

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The Ongoing History of New Music is a Canadian radio program, produced by CFNY in Toronto. The program, hosted by Alan Cross, is also syndicated to several other radio stations across Canada.

The Ongoing History chronicles the history of alternative rock, from its roots in punk and new wave to the modern day. An episode of the show may profile an important musician or band (The Sex Pistols, The Smiths, R.E.M., The Cure, Nirvana, U2, Nine Inch Nails, The Velvet Underground, etc.), a significant musical trend (eg. grunge, Madchester, riot grrrl), or a theme such as payola, gay musicians or significant cult figures.

Some topics are covered in a single show, while more substantial topics may be presented over two, three or four episodes.

The program, which first aired in 1993, airs Sunday evenings at 7:00, and is repeated on Monday nights at 11:00 on CFNY (102.1 FM "The Edge"). Older archive episodes of the show also air on Sunday mornings from 10:00 a.m. until noon. It can also be found on the CJZN (91.3 FM "The Zone") Sundays at 9:00 am and 9:00 pm.

Shorter Ongoing History segments, about a minute long, air at various times throughout the day on CFNY and CJZN during commercial breaks. In 2005, Cross also began production of a daily podcast available freely from their website. The minute-long podcasts share a similar format to the weekly show and detail one interesting rock fact each day. Also available are previous episodes available for streaming from the online archive, with titles added every day.

Cross has also licensed the program's name to a number of Canadian compilation albums collecting classic alternative rock songs.