A Texas-based company, which owns and operates 1,170 radio stations in the United States and 22 in Maine, is denying reports that it banned 150 songs from airplay in the wake of last week’s terrorist attacks.

The list includes songs such as “Burning Down the House” by the Talking Heads, “Love Is a Battlefield” by Pat Benatar, “My City Was Gone” by The Pretenders, and “Crumblin’ Down” by John Mellencamp, which either by title or lyrics could be thematically linked to the attacks.

The list has been widely circulated by e-mail, often with criticism of Clear Channel Communications, suggesting the company was practicing censorship, overreacting, or just being silly. The connection of some of the songs on the list to the recent tragedies is so tenuous, critics have said, as to be laughable. For example, Simon and Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” The Beatles’ “A Day in the Life,” and “Walk Like An Egyptian” by the Bangles appear on the list beside more obvious titles including “Blow Up the Outside World” by Soundgarden and “Another One Bites the Dust” by Queen.

Based in San Antonio, Texas, Clear Channel Communications is saying the list of songs was circulated merely as an advisory to station managers to consider making music choices that would not offend listeners.

In a statement posted on its Web site Tuesday, Clear Channel said the company “has not banned any songs from any of its radio stations.” But the statement also notes that station program directors “must take the pulse of his or her market to determine if play lists should be altered, and if so, for how long.”

In Maine, Keryn Smith is vice president and general manager overseeing nine Bangor and Ellsworth area stations, including WABI, WWBX, WKSQ and WFCX.

“For our nine stations,” Smith said Thursday, “we never got the original list that they refer to. I never saw anything about a list,” he said, until hearing about it in news reports.

Smith suspects that a midlevel executive with Clear Channel probably generated a list of songs that might be deemed offensive to listeners as a proactive move after the terrorist attacks, but that the list was probably just advisory, not a mandated “ban.”

“We had a discussion here,” he said, after the attacks about what songs might be considered insensitive. “It’s common sense that you don’t play songs like [Steve Miller’s] ‘Jet Airliner’ and ‘You Dropped a Bomb on Me’ [by The Gap Band],” Smith said.

In addition to dropping songs that might seem insensitive, Smith said the group of stations has been playing patriotic songs at the top of each hour, like “God Bless America” by Ray Charles, and “God Bless the U.S.A.” by Lee Greenwood.