The new krth

[hm insulators]

Guys, enjoy. I'm done. Life is too short to spend trying to explain to grown men why it's a bad idea to stick their fingers into light sockets.

Funny post!

I've been having fun reading this thread; it sounds like Republicans vs. Democrats. I have to say I'm on the side of LARadioRewind on this issue; I myself get tired of the likes of "Hotel California," "Satisfaction" and yes "Brown Eyed Girl" over and over again and wish the stations would expand their playlists.

Now where did I put that aluminum ladder?

 

[Unregistered]

I've checked out KRTH a bit this weekend, mostly out of curiosity.

Wow, talk about redundant adds to the playlist.

Here's some of the 80s tunes now heard on KRTH. (Mostly 80s, some 70s)

Holiday by Madonna (can be heard on JACK, 92.3, probably somewhere else)
Misunderstanding by Genesis (JACK, Sound, KLOS)
Let's Go by the Cars (JACK, Sound, KLOS)
Just What I Needed by the Cars (Jack, Sound, KLOS)
Dirty Laundry by Don Henley (Jack, KLOS, Sound)
One Thing Leads to Another by The Fixx (JACK, KLOS, Sound)
Take On Me by Aha (JACK)
Call Me by Blondie (JACK, KLOS, Sound)
We Will Rock You/We Are The Champions by Queen (JACK, KLOS, Sound
Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen (JACK, KLOS, Sound)
Beast of Burden by The Stones (JACK, KLOS, Sound)
You Aint Seen Nothin' Yet by BTO (JACK, KLOS, Sound)
Always Something There To Remind Me by Naked Eyes (JACK)
Faith - George Michael (JACK, probably other stations)
Sweet Dreams by Eurythmics (JACK)
Carry On My Wayward Son by Kansas (JACK, KLOS, and Sound)
Don't Bring Me Down by ELO (JACK, KLOS, and Sound)
Free Fallin' by Tom Petty (JACK, KLOS, and Sound)
Come On Eileen by Dexy's Midnight Runners (JACK)
Jack and Diane - John Cougar (JACK, KLOS, Sound, and probably 1000 others...)

These songs are not just songs you can hear all over the dial, they are among the most burned out classic rock and 80s pop tunes out there.

They've also bumped up the already overplayed Fleetwood Mac, Eagles, and Doors tunes.

Really, really boring. At least prior to this, KRTH burned out its own list of 60s and early 70s tunes, but they were at least unique and largely unheard elsewhere. And their late 70s adds were also fairly unique (Abba, Bee Gees...) As someone smack dab in their "target demo," and a longtime KRTH fan to boot, I'm seriously unimpressed. Kaye was better at adding a "dab" of 80s and keeping the KRTH sound.

This is frankly a waste of radio dial space - to basically compile a bunch of tunes already being aired elsewhere. Sad.

How is it a waste of space to play what the audience, in aggregate--not isolated anomalies--tell you they want, time and time again? Seems like if there's to be any "blame," it rests with the audience. The customer--the advertisers--tell the stations what product they want. It's up to the stations to deliver that, is it not?

 

[oldies76]

Just curious, because no non-poster I've ever met has had that negative opinion of the song or ever mentioned how sick he/she is of hearing it.

I personally don't mind it, every now and then, but for gosh sakes there has to be more to 1967 or the late 60's, than just Van Morrison. Radio Rewind, seems to really dislike it more than myself.

 

[Thomps2525]

Mister Bass and Mister oldies76, if you'll spend some time on that other site, you'll see that I've posted at least 50 playlists for various radio stations and satellite radio channels. For each song, I include the peak position and the year that it debuted on the appropriate Billboard chart, e.g., Hot 100, r&b singles or country singles. Thus, Show & Tell is from 1973. David often points out that classic-hits stations do not add songs based solely on chart position...and yet almost every song KRTH plays was a top-ten hit. Go figure!

 

[Thomps2525]

Today I added one whole song to the KRTH list: Madonna's Dress You Up.
http://xmfan.com/viewtopic.php?t=120994&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=105

Certain songs, such as Grease, Lights, Night Moves, What's Love Got To Do With It, You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet, Dance With Me (Orleans---you'll never again hear the one by the Drifters), Living On A Prayer and several others, seem to play every few hours. Fewer songs and more repetition. This is how Rick Thomas makes KRTH a better station?

 

[benale]

Steve,Thomps, LA Radio Rewind..I feel your pain. I enjoy your posts here and on the XM board,but face it..it's a losing battle. If I had an Internet radio five,ten,fifteen years ago,I would be very excited to listen to KRTH,CBS-FM and countless other oldies/classic hits stations. These days I'll tune in KRTH to hear the personalities. The once unique KRTH now sounds like KSWD and KLOS. Same with CBSFM sounding like WAXQ. The line between "classic hits" and "classic rock" is getting blurrier and blurrier.

I am thankful there are Internet stations that play 50's and 60's music. It's also nice there a handful of stations that still play "oldies" Try WROW in Albany,NY and KRUZ in Denver. Two examples of AM stations appealing to over 55's. It's 2013. That's the way of the world. Think I'll go over to Reel Radio and listen to The Real Don Steele on KHJ from 1967.

 

[Robert Bass]

Mister Bass and Mister oldies76, if you'll spend some time on that other site, you'll see that I've posted at least 50 playlists for various radio stations and satellite radio channels. For each song, I include the peak position and the year that it debuted on the appropriate Billboard chart, e.g., Hot 100, r&b singles or country singles. Thus, Show & Tell is from 1973. David often points out that classic-hits stations do not add songs based solely on chart position...and yet almost every song KRTH plays was a top-ten hit. Go figure!

According to the Billboard Book of Top 40 Hits, Show & Tell entered the charts in 1973. There is a + sign next to the date, which means it peaked to its highest chart position in 1974. Therefor the "hit year" of the song on the Top 40 Charts is 1974.

R

 

[Thomps2525]

KRTH has a 1950s-60s HD2 channel, KRTH Classiscs. You can listen at http://betaplayer.radio.com/player/k-earth-classics but don't expect any surprises. They could do so much with an HD channel but they chose to play only the biggest hits and the playlist is smaller than that of KRTH in the 1970s. Yeah, you're better off going to Reel Radio and listening to airchecks of Steele. "It's a fractious Friday! What do we know and believe?" Tina Delgado is alive, alive!

 

[Thomps2525]

Robert, Show & Tell reached number one on January 13, 1974 (Hot 100 for the week ending January 19), and perhaps my many lists should show the year of each song's peak position instead of the year the song first charted...but after a dozen years and 50 or 60 lists, I ain't gonna change 'em now! I show the year of debut and I tell you that that's what I do, so now you won't be confused. (I'm so clever!)

 

[oldies76]

Robert, Show & Tell reached number one on January 13, 1974 (Hot 100 for the week ending January 19), and perhaps my many lists should show the year of each song's peak position instead of the year the song first charted...but after a dozen years and 50 or 60 lists, I ain't gonna change 'em now! I show the year of debut and I tell you that that's what I do, so now you won't be confused. (I'm so clever!)

Released in late 1973, made #1 in early '74....simple as that. It's a 1974 hit according to Billboard and Joel Whitburn. And that would go for all the songs that were released late in the previous year and making #1 (or any position) early the next year.

 

[oldies76]

I enjoy your posts here and on the XM board,but face it..it's a losing battle. If I had an Internet radio five,ten,fifteen years ago,I would be very excited to listen to KRTH,CBS-FM and countless other oldies/classic hits stations. These days I'll tune in KRTH to hear the personalities. The once unique KRTH now sounds like KSWD and KLOS. Same with CBSFM sounding like WAXQ. The line between "classic hits" and "classic rock" is getting blurrier and blurrier.

The very first post on the XM site "show and tells" (lol) what KRTH did way back in the mid 80's as a true oldies / classic hits station and frankly and sadly, those days will probably never return (on KRTH anyways). Maybe some other station, somewhere in the USA is providing similar specialties (but we are highly unaware of it). Radio will never be the same!

http://xmfan.com/viewtopic.php?t=120994&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

 

[oldies76]

David often points out that classic-hits stations do not add songs based solely on chart position...and yet almost every song KRTH plays was a top-ten hit. Go figure!

It's because most songs that play on any CH station are top 10's anyways. I've always believed charts and positions should still be referenced during some specialty weekends or during some countdowns highlighting a specific week or year. Is it wrong to tell your listeners that xx song was #1 for xx weeks, back in 19xx??

It's a tribute to that song and artist / group success and it should be mentioned.

 

[davideduardo]

Released in late 1973, made #1 in early '74....simple as that. It's a 1974 hit according to Billboard and Joel Whitburn. And that would go for all the songs that were released late in the previous year and making #1 (or any position) early the next year.

I'd remind you that Billboard was not the chart source for radio stations in th 70's.

Whether they followed Gavin, Hamilton, FMQB, R&R or whatever, the preferred charts were the radio-based ones in the programming trades, not the music industry charts.

 

[oldies76]

I'd remind you that Billboard was not the chart source for radio stations in th 70's.

Whether they followed Gavin, Hamilton, FMQB, R&R or whatever, the preferred charts were the radio-based ones in the programming trades, not the music industry charts.

Even KRTH had it's own radio charts or surveys back in the 80's. Very interesting.

http://las-solanas.com/arsa/surveys.php?vqry=KRTH

 

[davideduardo]

Even KRTH had it's own radio charts or surveys back in the 80's. Very interesting.

http://las-solanas.com/arsa/surveys.php?vqry=KRTH

I hate to burst your bubble (not really) but most of those station charts were made up. They were representations of the image the station wanted to put forth, and were more of a promotional vehicle than anything else.

I did charts, either published in the local paper, or hand-outs at record shops, in the 60's and 70's and they were, at best, only remotely connected with any facts.

 

[oldies76]

I hate to burst your bubble (not really) but most of those station charts were made up. They were representations of the image the station wanted to put forth, and were more of a promotional vehicle than anything else.

I did charts, either published in the local paper, or hand-outs at record shops, in the 60's and 70's and they were, at best, only remotely connected with any facts.

So, how do songs like "Freak A Zoid" in 1983 make #1 in L.A. on an AC / Top 40 station like KRTH at the time. It also hit #2 on KIIS-FM that same week (10/25/83). It was a song that was big in L.A. but stunk nationally at #66. Looking at the other dates on Solanas, the number one songs tend to match national trends, for the most part. I would have to assume that station requests would have something to do with this. And you know, the older special I always reference over Labor Day (the number one weekend), used those same KRTH surveys for the 1977 to 1985 portion. I just don't get how those charts could be "made up", if those chart toppers actually aired on that specialty weekend back then.

What's your take then on the KHJ radio surveys (1965 to 1980)?

 

[davideduardo]

So, how do songs like "Freak A Zoid" in 1983 make #1 in L.A. on an AC / Top 40 station like KRTH at the time. It also hit #2 on KIIS-FM that same week (10/25/83).

You are missing the point.

Radio station "charts" were a reflection of what the station played. What the station played was determined by the station, with many factors beyond sales taken into account.

But for starters, back when stations did store surveys, they did not get data on number of units sold... they just asked about each song and got a read if it was moving up, down, or staying the same... and if there were any new songs getting sales.

So there was really no #1. Or, better said, there was really little difference between the first 8 to 10 songs. The order in a station chart was not totally arbitrary, but it was not a measure of anything real.

 

[Thomps2525]

David, from 1967 through 1980 I typed the weekly list of top 30 singles and top 20 albums for a local record store. (That was back when there were such things as records.) Every Friday, someone from KHJ would call and ask for the entire list of singles. Our store was one of many that were called each week. As you pointed out, our list was just a ranking and did not include sales figures. In the latter half of the '60s, KHJ moved songs up and down their Top 30 very quickly. It was rare for a song to be on for more than eight weeks. During any given week, songs that were still among our top ten biggest sellers would already be off KHJ's list. For three weeks in April-May 1976, Jimmy Dean's IOU was, by far, our biggest seller. I imagine it sold well at all the other stores too. Of course KHJ never played it. Why?, you ask. Let's read the "small print" on the old Boss 30 surveys, shall we?

"The listing of records herein is the opinion of KHJ based on its survey of record sales, listener requests, and KHJ's judgment of the record's appeal."

Obviously IOU had appeal to record buyers...but not to Bill Drake and Ron Jacobs.

Here are two more "small print" disclaimers:

"This list is selected on the basis of combined sales and KRLA's opinion of its entertainment valuie."

"This survey is compiled each week by radio station KFWB, Los Angeles, California, from reports of sales of recorded sound gathered from all leading retail outlets in the Los Angeles area. This survey is a true, accurate and unbiased account."

In other words, if KFWB still played top 40 in 1976, ol' Jimmy would have been on the Fabulous Forty survey.

 

[Thomps2525]

Today I added a few more songs that weren't on my KLOS list, including these three:

Free Fallin' - Tom Petty (7/1989)
Let’s Dance - David Bowie (1/1983)
Goodbye Stranger - Supertramp (15/1979)

I'm sorry---did I say KLOS? I meant to say KRTH. I wonder why I got confused.

 

[semoochie]

Something from another thread got me to thinking. If rankings on the Billboard chart before 1980 didn't really mean anything, does that mean that the Beatles, holding down the top four spots in April 1964, didn't mean anything either?