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WLS-FM made a mistake last night

radioman148 said:
K-Hits last time I checked played very little from the 60s and what they did play was mostly Motown. Have they changed that?
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No. I'd say that yours is a very accurate assessment of their playlist. If I hear a 60s song on K-Hits, it's invariably a (very) well-worn hit from The Temptations, Diana Ross and the Supremes or Marvin Gaye. Not that there's anything wrong with any of those groups, but come on - they all have more than 2 or 3 hits. And, there is a heck of a lot more 60s music to choose from than the very narrow band of songs that CBS airs on 104.3.

Frankly, WLS-FM could widen it up a bit too. Except on Friday nights, which are excellent.

I so wish that greatest hits stations would open up their playlists a bit. And no, they don't have to go so wide as to play "Mrs. Bluebird" from Eternity's Children. Add some of the other hits that well-known groups had. Just a few examples:

- Shoo-Be-Doo-Be-Doo-Da-Day by Stevie Wonder;
- Special Occasion, If You Can Want, Yester Love by Smoky Robinson and the Miracles;
- Some Things You Never Get Used To and The Composer by Diana Ross & the Supremes;
- Don't Take It So Hard and Him or Me by Paul Revere and the Raiders;
- Words by The Monkees;
- Ask The Lonely, Something About You, Shake Me Wake Me, You Keep Running Away from the Four Tops;
- I Get the Sweetest Feeling by Jackie Wilson [GREAT song that's never, ever, played anymore];
- Agent Double-O-Soul from Edwin Starr;
- Girl (Why You Wanna Make Me So Blue) by The Temptations; and
- She's My Girl and You Know What I Mean by the Turtles.

Just a few examples of songs that you could drop in once in a while to freshen up these stale playlists. There are literally hundreds of others and I could be here all day listing them. All had frequent airplay on the biggest Top 40 stations and charted surprisingly well when they came out.

And if I never heard Brown Eyed Girl and/or It's The Same Old Song again, it would be too soon!!!! Not to mention that Bryan Adams sends me for the presets in a nanosecond when his raspy voice appears on either WLS-FM or K-Hits (and it's does so often on the latter).
 
stale playlists on 60's & 70's stations...i couldn't agree more, if i hear American Pie, i can't run fast enough to change the channel. the deal is they're not making any NEW 60's & 70's Oldies, BUT there are alot of songs that would STILL be an "OH WOW" for the audience.. once you've gone through the 300-400 "Tested" songs they burn quickly. and lets face it, THAT is what a format like this is all about. i wouldn't put these in high rotation, but just enough for spice, it can sure break up the "Predictability" of this format. keep it fresh sounds wierd for an oldies/classic hits format, but it can be done. unlike a current based format where the audience is fickle, the audience for oldies is Loyal, to a point, but they're looking for MORE memories, if you serve them the SAME thing everyday they might go to XM, i know i did.
 
WhoDat! said:
stale playlists on 60's & 70's stations...i couldn't agree more, if i hear American Pie, i can't run fast enough to change the channel. the deal is they're not making any NEW 60's & 70's Oldies, BUT there are alot of songs that would STILL be an "OH WOW" for the audience.. once you've gone through the 300-400 "Tested" songs they burn quickly. and lets face it, THAT is what a format like this is all about. i wouldn't put these in high rotation, but just enough for spice, it can sure break up the "Predictability" of this format. keep it fresh sounds wierd for an oldies/classic hits format, but it can be done. unlike a current based format where the audience is fickle, the audience for oldies is Loyal, to a point, but they're looking for MORE memories, if you serve them the SAME thing everyday they might go to XM, i know i did.
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Speaking of XM, they are not too good anymore either. Since they bought out Sirius they have dumbed down their playlist as well to the same old songs on the 50s & 60s channel. The rumor is that Mel will raise prices on or around Jan 1. If he does I'm gone. It's ipod time.
 
WhoDat! said:
stale playlists on 60's & 70's stations...i couldn't agree more, if i hear American Pie, i can't run fast enough to change the channel. the deal is they're not making any NEW 60's & 70's Oldies, BUT there are alot of songs that would STILL be an "OH WOW" for the audience.. once you've gone through the 300-400 "Tested" songs they burn quickly. and lets face it, THAT is what a format like this is all about. i wouldn't put these in high rotation, but just enough for spice, it can sure break up the "Predictability" of this format. keep it fresh sounds wierd for an oldies/classic hits format, but it can be done. unlike a current based format where the audience is fickle, the audience for oldies is Loyal, to a point, but they're looking for MORE memories, if you serve them the SAME thing everyday they might go to XM, i know i did.
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I took it further than that, I use Slacker to create my "oldies" stations and get some really good variety! I had XM for a while, and finally dumped it last year after (as was previously mentioned) Sirius tightened up the playlists. IMO stations like WLS-FM and K-Hits are good for short time listening but tire quickly if listened to, say, for more than two hours a day.
 
scanman1 said:
WhoDat! said:
stale playlists on 60's & 70's stations...i couldn't agree more, if i hear American Pie, i can't run fast enough to change the channel. the deal is they're not making any NEW 60's & 70's Oldies, BUT there are alot of songs that would STILL be an "OH WOW" for the audience.. once you've gone through the 300-400 "Tested" songs they burn quickly. and lets face it, THAT is what a format like this is all about. i wouldn't put these in high rotation, but just enough for spice, it can sure break up the "Predictability" of this format. keep it fresh sounds wierd for an oldies/classic hits format, but it can be done. unlike a current based format where the audience is fickle, the audience for oldies is Loyal, to a point, but they're looking for MORE memories, if you serve them the SAME thing everyday they might go to XM, i know i did.
Click to expand...

I took it further than that, I use Slacker to create my "oldies" stations and get some really good variety! I had XM for a while, and finally dumped it last year after (as was previously mentioned) Sirius tightened up the playlists. IMO stations like WLS-FM and K-Hits are good for short time listening but tire quickly if listened to, say, for more than two hours a day.
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Not only that XM sometimes gets hung up on the same songs. Recently on the 60s channel it's "MacArthur Park".
 
radioman148 said:
Not only that XM sometimes gets hung up on the same songs. Recently on the 60s channel it's "MacArthur Park".
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XM / Sirius's gold channels have more of a problem with vertical and horizontal rotation than they do with the library depth. For some reason they seem to have decided to not spend either money or time on log editing and optimization, so that songs that only play every few days play in the same daypart if not the same hour as on their last spin. They could do a lot better.

They try to spread out the rotations by adding a lot of less-than-stellar songs, when they could simply do the scheduling better.
 
DavidEduardo said:
radioman148 said:
Not only that XM sometimes gets hung up on the same songs. Recently on the 60s channel it's "MacArthur Park".
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XM / Sirius's gold channels have more of a problem with vertical and horizontal rotation than they do with the library depth. For some reason they seem to have decided to not spend either money or time on log editing and optimization, so that songs that only play every few days play in the same daypart if not the same hour as on their last spin. They could do a lot better.

They try to spread out the rotations by adding a lot of less-than-stellar songs, when they could simply do the scheduling better.
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Your absolutely right. I've often noticed the same songs in almost the same time slots a few days apart. You'd think with the amount of music available to them for an entire decade that this wouldn't happen so frequently.
 
if you want variety with your Oldies/Classic Hits, there are many Internet ONLY stations out there that i like,(Richbro Radio is one) but i can't get it in the car yet, so XM is the alternative now, and it isn't bad, i switch through the channels according to years, if i hear a burned out song... you can't do that when in most areas there is only ONE station playing that kind of music. from what i hear on-line at home WLS-FM and JMK are tweedle dee and tweedle dum, BOTH limited playlists. and if you want to hear Elvis or the 50's there's a channel on XM for that, even Cousin Brucie.
 
RayInChicago said:
They used the word "oldies" on the air.
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Strange how Terrestrial radio dismisses people over 50, when most people 40 & under are NOT listening to terrestrial radio anymore.

The stations tell us that oldies will now be late 70s-90s whether we like it or not. How many times a day do we have to hear "Rock this town" "Wang Chung" "Superfreak" or "Billie Jean"?
It's no wonder that folks that want to hear 50s-70s and a variety, are switching to Satellite radio or creating their own stations on I-heart, etc.
Terrestrial radio has no one to blame but themselves for their demise. "Greatest hits of all time"? Maybe it should be "The greatest hits of 2 decades that we want to play"
 
Billkex said:
Strange how Terrestrial radio dismisses people over 50, when most people 40 & under are NOT listening to terrestrial radio anymore.
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Actually you'd be surprised how many people under 40 listen to radio. They may not listen a lot, but they listen. That's why there are all those stations that target them.

And it's not that OTA radio that dismisses people over 50, but radio advertisers. If people over 50 would pay for OTA as they pay for satellite, you'd have OTA oldies. But they want it for free.
 
Billkex said:
Strange how Terrestrial radio dismisses people over 50, when most people 40 & under are NOT listening to terrestrial radio anymore.
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The average 18-34 listens to radio 11 hours a week. The average person over 55 listens 13.5 hours a week.

And, to keep the facts straight, radio does not dismiss persons over 55. Advertisers do. If a station programs to persons 55+, they find that there are few if any advertisers who want to reach those audiences.
 
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syndication sales

Tom kent, Dick Bartley, the re-runs of dick clark, machine gun kelly mike harvey, ALL rely on National ad buys for their syndication.... sounds like they're getting them.
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Yes, and they sell for 10 cents on the dollar (syndication truism with a few exceptons), and they only have to fill a couple dozen slots, usually with a dozen advertisers or fewer. A radio station, by contrast, has to fill 800 slots q week, usually with 100 or more advertisers.

I've done 40 years in broadcasting and several years in syndication. Trust me "old" is a death word at the agency level, and not just because the buyers are all 23 years of age. Agencies want people in "acquisition mode" meaning new furniture, cars, houses, mortgages, etc. Once people hit "old" they buy drugs, doctor visits, and cruises (exaggeration, but the meme is largely true.)
 
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