How soon should you play an artist again?

[vchimpanzee]

Good Time Oldies played "Love the One you're With" by Stephen Stills. Two songs later, "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield.

 

[TheBigA]

Good Time Oldies played "Love the One you're With" by Stephen Stills. Two songs later, "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield.

Technically not the same artist, although the same vocalist.

 

[CTListener]

Technically not the same artist, although the same vocalist.

I'll bet those two are the only Stills solo and Buffalo Springfield songs on the playlist. Now, if the station were to play CS&N's "Woodstock" shortly afterward, that would certainly be an unusual concentration of one voice in a very short time.

 

[TheBigA]

Keep in mind these playlists are created by a computer based on a number of factors, such as tempo and popularity. All the programmer has to do is enter a line such as "Buffalo Springfield equals Stephen Stills" so the computer knows they're the same lead singer. when we're talking about 50-60 year old songs, there aren't a lot of people left who know all the details. We see the same issue in scheduling commercials. You don't want commercials for competing products back to back. That has to be entered in the scheduling program.

 

[davideduardo]

Good Time Oldies played "Love the One you're With" by Stephen Stills. Two songs later, "For What It's Worth" by Buffalo Springfield.

If this is a significant radio station (not an LPFM or an independent stream) they likely use RCS or MusicMaster software. Both have a way of giving artist codes to each song; the code for the main artist as well as other associated ones can be entered. An extreme might be Traveling Wilburys which would code for the group, the 5 artists and then the groups the five might have been with. That, of course, would be overkill but I mention it as an example of how deep one can protect.

I think BigA has a correct analysis in that many programmers today are dealing with multiple formats and may not have the time or knowledge to catch things like that.

 

[davideduardo]

Keep in mind these playlists are created by a computer based on a number of factors, such as tempo and popularity. All the programmer has to do is enter a line such as "Buffalo Springfield equals Stephen Stills" so the computer knows they're the same lead singer. when we're talking about 50-60 year old songs, there aren't a lot of people left who know all the details. We see the same issue in scheduling commercials. You don't want commercials for competing products back to back. That has to be entered in the scheduling program.

Competitive protection is a thing of the past now. Look at local TV news where a single break may have three different car or car dealer spots. Radio, where commercial logs are now centralized at the larger groups, does not do much to protect, either. Local, small group or single owner ones tend to do a better job as they use that quality as a sales tool.

 

[TheBigA]

Competitive protection is a thing of the past now.

The problem as I see it is the limited number of categories: Insurance, home improvement, auto, and drug/medical. If that's all you're dealing with, it's hard to split them up. What some people do is mix in a station promo or some imaging in a cluster to break it up.

 

[John Gallagher]

Years ago, I worked at stations that had an hour between the same artists. Even worked one or two stations in the same group that was no two female artists back to back or no two R&B artists back to back. But, that was then and this is now.

Today, in a number of current based format, those songs that are "This Artist" ft. "That One" & "The Other One" & "Still Another" sometimes means only a couple of songs of separation.

On one of the Spanish contemporary "Exitos Express" weekly new music discs from Radio Express, I had one week where half of the 20 songs had artists shared on at least one of the other ten. That was just about 12 months ago, in fact. That was an extreme, but having 5 or 6 cuts that had shared artists was not at all unusual.

 

[davideduardo]

Years ago, I worked at stations that had an hour between the same artists. Even worked one or two stations in the same group that was no two female artists back to back or no two R&B artists back to back. But, that was then and this is now.

Some of that is justifiable based on pure math. If you have an AC format and only 20% of your songs are by Black artists, you might want to insure that every sweep gets at least one, rather than having the hour's 20% back to back or close to each other.

Same with gender. If you have a music genre where the hits are predominantly by males, the female artists should be used to balance and to provide the relief to tedium that some formats otherwise can generate.

I see that as a good and positive step that highlights the kinds of artists that may not have a high representation in a particular format. Back in the 60's when there were some country crossovers in Top 40, we'd separate them. Same with novelty dance tunes... no "Locomotion" next to "Bristol Stomp" and "Peppermint Twist". The idea was to seed the novelty songs into more usual tunes for variety, change of pace and maximum entertainment value.

Today, there are some who would find that kind of practice to be discriminatory, biased, prejudiced or racist.

 

[vchimpanzee]

If this is a significant radio station (not an LPFM or an independent stream) they likely use RCS or MusicMaster software. Both have a way of giving artist codes to each song; the code for the main artist as well as other associated ones can be entered. An extreme might be Traveling Wilburys which would code for the group, the 5 artists and then the groups the five might have been with. That, of course, would be overkill but I mention it as an example of how deep one can protect.

I think BigA has a correct analysis in that many programmers today are dealing with multiple formats and may not have the time or knowledge to catch things like that.

Good Time Oldies is national. Lots of stations use the format. It comes with DJs.