Ignoring a #1 hit?

[davideduardo]

The English language is one of the hardest languages to learn. No wonder people struggle. I still have trouble with English lol and it's my first language! 😄 🤣

Funny!

I find that, without a spell checker, I can not write a couple of sentences without a spelling error in English. I can write a 20 page report in Spanish with no errors at all.

And because my English vocabulary has grown extensively through reading, I miss-pronounce many English words.

Other than tonal languages like the Chinese dialects, I can not think of a harder language to learn well.

 

[MVB13]

Funny!

I find that, without a spell checker, I can not write a couple of sentences without a spelling error in English. I can write a 20 page report in Spanish with no errors at all.

And because my English vocabulary has grown extensively through reading, I miss-pronounce many English words.

Other than tonal languages like the Chinese dialects, I can not think of a harder language to learn well.

Facinating!

 

[CTListener]

Facinating!

FaScinating. You've reinforced your point! I spent nearly 40 years as a copy editor and can also vouch for the difficulty native English speakers have with written English. It's full of exceptions to just about every rule that's ever been imposed on it, thanks to the wide array of languages whose words have been added to English over the centuries.

 

[firepoint525]

To take this topic back 45 years, the two Seattle top4o’s at the time KJR and KING didn’t play the number one hit “Disco Lady”. I guess they felt it was too urban for their listeners.

Never heard it while it was a hit (except for on countdowns) and I lived in a rural area only two hours from Memphis.

 

[CTListener]

This is bizarre. I wonder how many markets found Disco Lady "too black." Couldn't have been many if it hit No. 1 nationally. I was in Syracuse in winter 1975-76 and it was all over the radio there. In fact, I'm pretty sure it even got played on uptempo AC WHEN as well as the market's two Top 40s.

 

[davideduardo]

FaScinating. You've reinforced your point! I spent nearly 40 years as a copy editor and can also vouch for the difficulty native English speakers have with written English. It's full of exceptions to just about every rule that's ever been imposed on it, thanks to the wide array of languages whose words have been added to English over the centuries.

And English was not even standardized until relatively recently. For fun, look at how many published spelling variations there were for Shakespeare's name back in his time.

 

[MVB13]

FaScinating. You've reinforced your point! I spent nearly 40 years as a copy editor and can also vouch for the difficulty native English speakers have with written English. It's full of exceptions to just about every rule that's ever been imposed on it, thanks to the wide array of languages whose words have been added to English over the centuries.

As an educator I teach social studies and not Language Arts. Spelling is not my strong suit.

 

[seatownmedia]

There were definitely “white” markets in the 70’s. Portland and Seattle, perhaps Minneapolis. I don’t think they were doing anything wrong but just programming for the audience. This isn’t racial discrimination, it is just programming to the available audience. They needed to gain audience numbers within what the ratings were recording. Racial discrimination doesn’t really play into this.

 

[davideduardo]

There were definitely “white” markets in the 70’s. Portland and Seattle, perhaps Minneapolis. I don’t think they were doing anything wrong but just programming for the audience. This isn’t racial discrimination, it is just programming to the available audience. They needed to gain audience numbers within what the ratings were recording. Racial discrimination doesn’t really play into this.

I agree. When I programmed Top 40 in Quito, Ecuador in the later 60's, we'd have lots of hits by the Supremes, but none by James Brown. The market's heritage is Spanish and Indigenous, not African. So all we were doing is reflecting the influences of cultural heritage.

When I got to Puerto Rico, I found that the English language music was a lot less "The Sounds of Silence" and The Osmonds and a lot more Marvin Gaye and The Honey Cone.

As you say, not racial discrimination. Just "I like what sounds familiar".

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

All of this also explains the popularity of WLAC in many areas at Night. Many R & B stations were Daytimers, or Class IVs with 250 watt Night signals. In Michigan, many markets didn't have more than one full time Top 40 station, and that was often a Chicken Rocker. Rock stars like Bob Seger listened to CKLW Days along with WPAG and WAAM growing up in Ann Arbor, but as another radio archivist observed, WPAG and the others "ran down at Sundown". Detroit stations reduced power and or went to a different DA pattern, and they listened to WLAC, WLS, and WCFL. Flint had R & B WAMM, a Daytimer. Mark Farner and Don Brewer of Grand Funk Railroad listened to WAMM in the parking lot of the Musicians Local Union Office, waiting to line up gigs when they opened, where the signal from their towers overloaded their radios, the only station they could get there. It influenced them, but it was gone at Night, and it was WLAC to hear John R at Night. Howard Tate, James Brown, Clarence Reid, and the Soul Brothers Six were some artists that influenced them. In Grand Rapids, Lansing, and Kalamazoo it was also WLS, WCFL, and WLAC at Night for R & B. Then FM started to take over.

 

[CTListener]

I agree. When I programmed Top 40 in Quito, Ecuador in the later 60's, we'd have lots of hits by the Supremes, but none by James Brown. The market's heritage is Spanish and Indigenous, not African. So all we were doing is reflecting the influences of cultural heritage.

James Brown's funkier singles were ignored by Boston's Top 40 stations. I was always surprised to see them in the upper reaches of the Billboard Hot 100 as well as the Soul chart when the only station I was hearing them on was urban WILD. On Boston Top 40 radio, Brown was "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," "I Got You (I Feel Good)" and nothing else.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

Exhibit A, James Brown and John R/WLAC influence on Michigan Garage Band Rockers.

 

[Marcos_C]

To take this topic back 45 years, the two Seattle top 40’s at the time KJR and KING didn’t play the number one hit “Disco Lady”. I guess they felt it was too urban for their listeners.

I wonder how many markets found Disco Lady "too black." Couldn't have been many if it hit No. 1 nationally.

For the record, I heard "Disco Lady" played on top 40 radio in New York City during the mid-1970s.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

James Brown's funkier singles were ignored by Boston's Top 40 stations. I was always surprised to see them in the upper reaches of the Billboard Hot 100 as well as the Soul chart when the only station I was hearing them on was urban WILD. On Boston Top 40 radio, Brown was "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag," "I Got You (I Feel Good)" and nothing else.

Perhaps it was also because WMEX 1510 was in Boston, and WLAC 1510 had a deep hull toward Boston? WLAC played much deeper James Brown tracks than just about any Top 40. And WILD 1090 was Daytime only, within the protected skywave of WBAL 1090 Baltimore.

Zoom out to see the whole WLAC Skywave contour.

https://www.fccdata.org/?facid=&call=WLAC&ccode=1&city=&state=&country=US&zip=&arn=&party=&lmspf=&lmspl=&party_type=LICEN&latd=&lond=&lang=en

 

[CTListener]

Perhaps it was also because WMEX 1510 was in Boston, and WLAC 1510 had a deep hull toward Boston? WLAC played much deeper James Brown tracks than just about any Top 40. And WILD 1090 was Daytime only, within the protected skywave of WBAL 1090 Baltimore.

Zoom out to see the whole WLAC Skywave contour.

https://www.fccdata.org/?facid=&call=WLAC&ccode=1&city=&state=&country=US&zip=&arn=&party=&lmspf=&lmspl=&party_type=LICEN&latd=&lond=&lang=en

I doubt the absence of WLAC from the Boston airwaves at night influenced WMEX's musical programming one bit, nor the playlists of WBZ (mid-'60s) or WRKO (late '60s through '70s). AM DXing wasn't as much of a thing among teenage boys in those years as we radio geeks sometimes assume it was, so while there might have been a handful of white suburban kids discovering the Godfather of Soul late at night with John R on the transistor radio under their pillows in other cities, they weren't going to change the musical preferences of the 99+ percent who couldn't tell sky wave from permanent wave.

 

[landtuna]

Other than tonal languages like the Chinese dialects, I can not think of a harder language to learn well.

(American) English seems pretty easy to learn......until you try to teach it to someone who is fluent in another language. I warned my two adopted and foreign born daughters "you might just try to memorize spelling and context because we have all these rules which are broken constantly".

Which brings to mind a question......when British English made the trip across the pond to America what happened to the 'R' at the end of words? I submit it got lost somewhere along the way.

 

[Schroedingers Cat]

WBZ, WOWO, and WIND all were Chicken Rock LEANING Top 40s from my observation, and except for an occasional raucous track, I preferred it. The difference between Chicken Rock and full bore Top 40 may have only been two or three positions in a 30 or 40 position current playlist. You may be able to see it on ARSA. Almost all tracks for both a Chicken Rock and full bore Top 40 were on the top 60 Hot 100, except perhaps local "garage bands", who usually Bubbled Under or peaked in the 60s on the Hot 100, like The Cryan' Shames and the New Colony Six, but may have been #1 or #2 on WLS and WCFL, and Terry Knight and Bob Seger, which appeared as high as #1 or #2 on WKNR, and to a lesser degree, CKLW in the mid to late 1960s.

 

[gr8oldies]

I doubt the absence of WLAC from the Boston airwaves at night influenced WMEX's musical programming one bit, nor the playlists of WBZ (mid-'60s) or WRKO (late '60s through '70s). AM DXing wasn't as much of a thing among teenage boys in those years as we radio geeks sometimes assume it was, so while there might have been a handful of white suburban kids discovering the Godfather of Soul late at night with John R on the transistor radio under their pillows in other cities, they weren't going to change the musical preferences of the 99+ percent who couldn't tell sky wave from permanent wave.

We DXed because we couldn't play sports and we were awkward around the opposite sex

 

[vchimpanzee]

On Boston Top 40 radio, Brown was ... "I Got You (I Feel Good)" and nothing else.

Although it is oldies now, the America's Best Music affiliate played this on the local morning show.

I've heard it on one other standards station.

I can't speak for the other song the Boston station played.

 

[kevtronics]

Which brings to mind a question......when British English made the trip across the pond to America what happened to the 'R' at the end of words? I submit it got lost somewhere along the way.

You mean the other way around, don't you? American English is predominantly rhotic ("park the car") while British English is predominantly non-rhotic ("pahk the cah").