January 1st of 2026 marked the official relaunch of LTN Radio as a massive collection of hand curated Spotify playlists, eventually making their way to Apple Music as well. This article exists to share the story behind LTN Radio, highlight the playlists now available, guide you through using Spotify/Apple Music if you are new to the platforms, and answer any questions you may have.

Find the playlists here!

LTN Radio began its life in 2018 under a very different name. Alongside his ministry partner Mo and a small group of generous donors, Radio Matt launched Back Row Radio as an extension of the Back Row Baptist Podcast.

From the earliest episodes of that show, the team reached out to independent Christian artists to feature their music during segment breaks. What started as a simple idea quickly grew into something much bigger when hundreds of incredible submissions poured in from talented artists who were not being heard elsewhere.

After a couple of years, it became clear that these songs deserved more than short appearances between podcast segments. Radio Matt and his collaborators began exploring the idea of a full radio station that could highlight independent Christian artists alongside the best Christian rock, rap, and pop music that rarely finds space on mainstream Christian radio. Radio has always been part of Radio Matt’s story. Both his father and grandfather owned radio stations, and growing up he learned nearly every role in the business. The radio bug never truly left him.

As the vision expanded, the Back Row Baptist Podcast evolved into the Back Row Morning Show, shifting from a once a week format to four days a week. Fridays became a space to feature shows from friends, with the final addition being Church Nerds hosted by Bubba and Anna Stalclup. What many listeners did not realize at the time was that Church Nerds was created as a joint ministry effort between Back Row Radio and Love Thy Nerd, a connection that would grow over time.

In October of 2020, during the online LTN Con, Back Row Radio was officially folded into Love Thy Nerd and rebranded as LTN Radio. Radio Matt and Mo continued hosting the morning show, eventually producing well over 500 episodes. The LTN Podcast Network became a core part of the station, with episodes premiering on LTN Radio before being released to podcast platforms. At the same time, the station’s music library continued to grow, allowing even more independent artists to be featured.

As the station gained listeners, the team was able to launch the LTN Radio app and establish traditions that became listener favorites. One of the most beloved was the annual Christmas channel, launched every November and December, featuring Christian rock, rap, pop, and indie Christmas music that almost never receives mainstream airplay.

More than seven years have passed since the original launch of the station and over four years since it became part of Love Thy Nerd. In that time, a lot has changed. The Back Row Morning Show came to an end in 2023. The Love Thy Nerd podcasts transitioned from audio only formats to video first shows on YouTube. Independent Christian artists began finding much greater visibility on Spotify than they ever had before. At the same time, several radio stations similar to LTN Radio launched using the same platform the station had relied on from the beginning.

Eventually, it became clear that LTN Radio had accomplished what it set out to do in its original form. Rather than trying to compete directly with Spotify, Radio Matt and the Love Thy Nerd team recognized it was time to use the platform in a bigger and more intentional way.

That decision led to the relaunch of LTN Radio as a collection of massive, hand curated Spotify playlists. Between April and December of 2025, Radio Matt has painstakingly created dozens of Christian music playlists, one song at a time, to cover a wide range of tastes, making the new iteration of LTN Radio the largest one yet.

A soft-launch of the new Spotify playlists began in November with the Christmas playlists launching first, in place of the annual LTN Radio Christmas Channel that had been a special project available the last several years. The Christmas playlists were a bigger success than expected, leading to great excitement around the official New Year’s Day launch.

The LTN Radio Spotify Playlists launched with approximately 100 playlists. Over the first 6 months, a couple groups of playlists were removed, while a few new playlists were added. Due to popular demand, the playlists were also added to Apple Music, in two batches a few months apart.

That brings us to where we are today. What is coming next? We can’t wait to find out.

We have nearly 70 active playlists as of September 2026, separated into several categories. You can find each of them linked on our radio page, on our Spotify profile, or our Apple Music profile.

In addition to the main radio mix, LTN Radio has built 15 additional massive radio mixes focused on specific genres, including alternative, contemporary, country and southern gospel, EDM, hard rock and heavy metal, lofi, rock, rap and hip hop, praise and worship, and more.

As mentioned above, you can find links to our playlists as they release on our LTN Radio page. After a couple weeks, they should also show up on our Spotify profile.

1. Download Spotify. This is one of two music apps where you can find our playlists.
2. Create an account. You can opt for a free account or a Premium account. Both should allow you to listen to our playlists.
3. Visit the Love Thy Nerd profile page or our Radio website page. Linked above, these two options will provide you will every playlists that is live.
4. Find and save your favorite playlists. Once you find a playlist you are interested in, click the “+” to add it to your personal library, so you can find it easily.
5. Listen! Free users will only be allowed to listen on “shuffle” (which is more like a radio station, anyhow), will have occasional ads, and may have a limited number of “skips” per hour/day. Premium users will have no ads and can listen in whatever order they wish.

That’s it!

As mentioned above, you can find links to our playlists as they release on our LTN Radio page. After a couple weeks, they should also show up on our Apple Music profile.

1. Download Apple Music. This is one of two music apps where you can find our playlists.
2. Start a subscription. Apple Music has no free tier, unfortunately.
3. Visit the Love Thy Nerd profile page or our Radio website page. Linked above, these two options will provide you will every playlists that is live.
4. Find and save your favorite playlists. Once you find a playlist you are interested in, open it and click the “+ Add” to add it to your personal library, so you can find it easily.
5. Listen! Since Apple Music is subscription only, you won’t have to worry about ads. Play the playlists straight through or in shuffle mode.

That’s it!