How to define adult top 40?

[tall_guy1]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat... Adult Top 40 (Adult,heard on Hot AC stations.
According to this Wikipedia article and posts about a decade ago, adult top 40 is a hybrid between mainstream top 40 and hot ac. I've seen the term diminish in recent years or refer to all hot acs as this term when they started becoming more rhythmic. It might be a meaningless term, but I've thought of it as more rhythmic leaning hot acs. Your thoughts?

 

[Kelly A]

Simple: Modern hits that don't contain profanity,

 

[101tm]

“Adult Top 40” stations may have moved more rhythmic, but you’re very hard pressed to find many that play hip hop hits on the CHR chart. Generally, BDS will move a Hot AC/Adult Top 40 to the CHR panel if it starts to get too rhythmic to the point of playing a lot of hip hop hits that are primarily charting on CHR, Rhythmic, or Urban.

 

[Gregg.]

The term "Adult Top 40" isn't usually used when discussing formats. When you see ratings listings, for instance, a station may be Hot AC or it may be Top 40. I guess as a rule of thumb, a Top 40/CHR station plays mostly current hits and maybe goes back ten years or so for occasional hits of the past. A Hot AC plays a mix of current and recent hits and goes back maybe 20 years for past hits, with a few more past hits per hour than a Top 40 station. A Hot AC also deletes some songs that hit the charts if they are too rhythmic and hip hop. I suppose in the past, they'd also delete a song that rocks too hard, although these days that is rare.

When you come down to it, aren't most Top 40/CHR stations technically Adult Top 40, at least when you look at the ratings? Z100 in NYC and KIIS-FM in Los Angeles do almost as well in the 25-54 demo as they do in the 18-34 and 18-49 demos. Very few stations aim so young that they're not getting some adults listening. They have morning shows that may talk and joke about youthful celebrities and topics. But just the fact that talk makes up a significant portion of the morning show means it is aimed at adults, rather than teens or early 20s.

Can we give some example of stations that would qualify as "Adult Top 40"?

 

[jt99]

“Adult Top 40” stations may have moved more rhythmic, but you’re very hard pressed to find many that play hip hop hits on the CHR chart. Generally, BDS will move a Hot AC/Adult Top 40 to the CHR panel if it starts to get too rhythmic to the point of playing a lot of hip hop hits that are primarily charting on CHR, Rhythmic, or Urban.

Even with the trap led resurgence that hip hop had in the late 2010s, the genre has just not had the same prominence on CHR/Pop in recent years compared to the early to mid 2000s. Ultimately, I think that makes it extremely difficult to differentiate Mainstream CHR from Adult Top 40 (a term some people used in the past to describe a hybrid of CHR/Pop and Hot AC, although I understand it's also often just used as a synonym for Hot AC).

 

[davideduardo]

The term "Adult Top 40" isn't usually used when discussing formats. When you see ratings listings, for instance, a station may be Hot AC or it may be Top 40.

And Nielsen does not accept that as a format name for their internal classification.

(Good points in your post, Gregg)

I guess as a rule of thumb, a Top 40/CHR station plays mostly current hits and maybe goes back ten years or so for occasional hits of the past. A Hot AC plays a mix of current and recent hits and goes back maybe 20 years for past hits, with a few more past hits per hour than a Top 40 station.

Exactly. It's about the percentage of gold and rotation speed.

When you come down to it, aren't most Top 40/CHR stations technically Adult Top 40, at least when you look at the ratings? Z100 in NYC and KIIS-FM in Los Angeles do almost as well in the 25-54 demo as they do in the 18-34 and 18-49 demos.

Yes, it has been about 4 decades since Top 40 paid attention to teens other than as trend-setters. There is essentially no teen advertising business, so Top 40 is a young adult women format.

Can we give some example of stations that would qualify as "Adult Top 40"?

The classic example over the years has been KRBE in Houston.

 

[jt99]

The classic example over the years has been KRBE in Houston.

Or WSTR in Atlanta back in the 1990s. As for KRBE, it's tough for me to call them Adult Top 40 these days as they're not quite the same station they were during the Jan Jeffries years (which dayaparted even rap songs like Love The Way You Lie which were #1 CHR/Pop hits), but they definitely sound like they're programmed for a more white market like Cincinnati. Why they do this in such a diverse market like Houston is baffling, to say the least!

 

[davideduardo]

Or WSTR in Atlanta back in the 1990s. As for KRBE, it's tough for me to call them Adult Top 40 these days as they're not quite the same station they were during the Jan Jeffries years (which dayaparted even rap songs like Love The Way You Lie which were #1 CHR/Pop hits), but they definitely sound like they're programmed for a more white market like Cincinnati. Why they do this in such a diverse market like Houston is baffling, to say the least!

You bring up a good point: Adult Top 40 is a station programmed by Jan Jeffries (and I'm the guy who brought Jan out of Pascagoula / Moss Point in 1972 to WERC in Birmingham).

 

[101tm]

Q100 in Atlanta also had a very “adult top 40” format but it was due to similar programming strategies as KRBE due to Jan Jeffries.

WZPL in Indianapolis was also an adult top 40 sounding station for many years, but has since transitioned fully in to CHR around 2012-2013.

 

[semoochie]

When Hot AC was the station that was not too hard and not too soft, there was somewhat of a hole for a station that appealed to adults but kept the general tempo of a Top 40 station. When Hot AC stopped doing that, the hole all but disappeared!

 

[victorres43]

I feel the likes of KZZO in Sacramento (which is more current-based) differentiate themselves from the likes of KIOI in San. Francisco (which is more gold-based). Both are classified as "Hot AC" in multiple trades, but KZZO is a great example of an "Adult CHR".

Or WSTR in Atlanta back in the 1990s. As for KRBE, it's tough for me to call them Adult Top 40 these days as they're not quite the same station they were during the Jan Jeffries years (which dayaparted even rap songs like Love The Way You Lie which were #1 CHR/Pop hits), but they definitely sound like they're programmed for a more white market like Cincinnati. Why they do this in such a diverse market like Houston is baffling, to say the least!

Could it be the reason why KRBE is trending down, albeit slowly, in the ratings, with not as much of a strong showing in 25-54, 18-34, or 18-49 to make up for it? Top 40 radio, mainstream or otherwise, is not faltering this much in, say, Orlando.

Then again, KRBE was known to have a "no rap" approach for some time in the 90s during their "Hits Without the Hype" phase. Plus, it's likely that the more conservative suburbs of Houston are less receptive towards rhythmic material, so KRBE has programmed accordingly.

 

[jt99]

Plus, it's likely that the more conservative suburbs of Houston are less receptive towards rhythmic material, so KRBE has programmed accordingly.

Perhaps this is why CBS Radio couldn't make rhythmic leaning CHR work with KKHH, even if the demographics may appear to be favoring to more rhythmic music. Houston just seems like a tough market to program CHR/Pop, although KRBE certainly made it look easy in the late 1990s and early 2000s under Susquehanna ownership, when they were certainly not Adult CHR.

 

[victorres43]

Perhaps this is why CBS Radio couldn't make rhythmic leaning CHR work with KKHH, even if the demographics may appear to be favoring to more rhythmic music.

Very true. Although, CBS Radio in general did not have CHRs that overtook their competitors.

Houston just seems like a tough market to program CHR/Pop, although KRBE certainly made it look easy in the late 1990s and early 2000s under Susquehanna ownership, when they were certainly not Adult CHR.

You would think that with KRBE alumni that includes Elvis Duran and Cubby, KRBE may have a little DNA to be the Z100 of Texas. But perhaps a conservative, subdued approach that aims for Houston suburbia has helped the station financially all these years. (Likewise, the heavy Hip-Hop/R&B-lean has helped Rhythmic KBXX target the more urbanized parts of the metro.)

One note, when I streamed KKHH back in 2009, I heard an ad for a local bail bonds company!

 

[TexasTom]

30 years ago or thereabouts, I remember KRBE positioning itself as "Hits without the hype", which seems like a classic "Adult Top 40" approach. Going back further in time, the old "TM Stereo Rock" automated format that was widely distributed in the seventies and early eighties was very much an "Adult Top 40" approach. They would play all styles of music that hit the Billboard Hot 100, but they definitely held off on the harder-edged stuff until it was fairly high on the chart, they played more older music than typical for Top 40 stations, and the formatting was definitely laid back, with no screaming DJs or zit cream commercials. Rotations were also lower than for typical Top 40 (I remember songs repeating after 5 hours, which would work out to 34 plays per week).

But this was before Top 40 splintered into "mainstream" and "rhythmic" variants, and before AC splintered into "Hot AC" and the various soft/gold-based "traditional AC" variants. Nowadays, what would have once been considered "Adult Top 40" might be classified as either an aggressive Hot AC station or a cautious Top 40/Mainstream station.

 

[davideduardo]

But this was before Top 40 splintered into "mainstream" and "rhythmic" variants, and before AC splintered into "Hot AC" and the various soft/gold-based "traditional AC" variants. Nowadays, what would have once been considered "Adult Top 40" might be classified as either an aggressive Hot AC station or a cautious Top 40/Mainstream station.

And, back when a few of us started doing Adult Top 40 or Hot AC, it was negatively called "chicken rock" in the trades and within the music industry.

Record promoters did not like it because the format would not accept many of the songs they were paid to "bring home". The trades did not like it because it played more recurrents and gold. Of course, we did not use the term "recurrent" as we just thought that our "hits" in the format lasted longer, so we slowly moved them downwards in rotations.

I was at WERC in Birmingham as PD in '72 when we did "chicken rock". It was a challenge as the record promoters did not like the format and the all-adult audience made promotions very different. What introduced us to a new audience was the weekly cume created by being the flagship station of the Crimson Tide.

 

[vchimpanzee]

I remember one station describing itself as no rap, no grunge, no teen idols. Whatever term they used for music that appealed to teens, they were referring to Britney and the boy bands.

 

[victorres43]

I remember one station describing itself as no rap, no grunge, no teen idols. Whatever term they used for music that appealed to teens, they were referring to Britney and the boy bands.

Ah, I bet that one station plays the most Kelly Clarkson and Nickelback in the area.