Heck. We hope you have, but if you’ve never given this excellent mix of genres and smooth transitions a listen, you definitely should. It’s not in iTunes. Rather, you have to go to their website and open up a stream. At our Charlotte ad agency, we spend a LOT of time sitting quietly in front of a computers either designing or researching, and a mellow, aurally interesting flow of tunes is indispensable to the quality of our office life (a couple of Rocketfish wireless speakers help ensure high fidelity).

Plus, the DJ’s speak French and have a sugary, über-cool tone of voice and style.

FIP (originally France Inter Paris) is a French radio network, founded in 1971 as part of the Radio France group. The concept behind FIP has scarcely changed since its founding: continuous music interrupted only for traffic updates, occasional announcements about forthcoming events, and a short news broadcast at 10 minutes before the hour, but no advertising.

FIP’s programming is an eclectic mix of musical genres: chanson, classical, film music, jazz, rock, world music and more, but with careful attention paid to smooth and unobtrusive transition from item to item. FIP is one of the few stations in the world to transmit this type of programming around the clock. The broadcasts are presented live from 7 am to 11 pm, after which a computer replays a selection of the music broadcast earlier in the day.

The station was founded in 1971 by Jean Garetto and Pierre Codou, both week-end presenters at France Inter. It was broadcast from Paris on 514 m (585 kHz) medium wave, hence its original name of France Inter Paris 514.