Maybe it is different in other areas of the country, but even in the nearby metro area, there are at most two or three "indie" stations (that is being generous, since I can only think of one) not counting the university stations that have virtually zero physical reach.
Streaming might not pay much, but at least it is possible to be heard at all I suppose.
What do you mean by the term “indie” here? Are the stations themselves not affiliated with larger corporations? Or are they mainly playing independent artists? Or both?
I’m a professional musician and categorically reject the “but at least it is possible to be heard at all” angle. No. That is bullshit. Spotify is replacing BOTH album sales and radio play, and yet it pays multiple orders of magnitude worse than either.
That's fair; I am not a musician and have no thoughts on whether spotify or youtube or Amazon whatever or physical records are best.
As to your first question, I think in my area it is both, though I was mainly thinking in terms of "stations that dont play top 10 or 40 hip hop / pop / country / faux rock".
Streaming might not pay much, but at least it is possible to be heard at all I suppose.