Why are big hits "lost?"

[michael hagerty]

Of the 30 songs on the WRKO survey, none had been there for as much as 10 weeks, and only one had been on it for nine! I bet "Soul Man" was played very little that week and disappeared the next. It's amazing to look at this and compare it to today's playlists, on which change is glacial and even midchart peakers hang around for at least four months.

There were a few things at work here:

One, songs like "Next Plane to London", which were either overhyped not-really-hits, turntable hits (driven by requests but not sales), or songs that were popular, but burned out really fast.

Two, there was SO much new product and two, three or more Top 40 stations in a market at a time where "hear the hits first" was a selling point, that records needed to hit their peak and get out of the way.

We learned, over time, that we were rushing true hits off the chart and off the air too early---which led to recurrents.

 

[michael hagerty]

Just looked at the KHJ charts on Ray Randolph's fabulous site 93khj.blogspot.com. Ten-week chart runs were very rare.

"Hey Jude" stayed on the KHJ chart for 11 weeks in 1968.

The record up to that point---Paul Mauriat's "Love Is Blue". It did 12.

That got broken in 1970 by the Supremes' "Someday We'll Be Together". 13 weeks. There were several after that ("Joy to the World", "Imagine", "American Pie"), but 13 was the absolute limit.

It was two years before a record ran longer on the KHJ chart---Harry Nilsson's "Without You" did 15.

I'm just enough of the right kind of geek to keep going, but it'll have to be later.

 

[CTListener]

There were a few things at work here:

One, songs like "Next Plane to London", which were either overhyped not-really-hits, turntable hits (driven by requests but not sales), or songs that were popular, but burned out really fast.

Two, there was SO much new product and two, three or more Top 40 stations in a market at a time where "hear the hits first" was a selling point, that records needed to hit their peak and get out of the way.

We learned, over time, that we were rushing true hits off the chart and off the air too early---which led to recurrents.

I'm seeing different approaches to add/drop at my three local country stations, all owned by small regional chains. WJEN (Pamal) throws practically everything at the wall and hopes something sticks. If a song by a known artist is coming out one week, WJEN will often add it either that week or within a month; songs by new names take longer but still get added quite early compared to the other stations in the market. WZLF (Binnie) is more conservative, being first or second on superstar product but waiting several months to add slow burners or unfamiliar artists. WXXK (Great Eastern) generally waits until a song is making an impact nationally to add it.

Example: Hailey Whitters' "Everything She Ain't" -- WJEN was on it in October, WZLF just added it a few weeks ago, WXXK hasn't played it yet. Back in Connecticut, where WWYZ (iHeart) has no in-market competition, "Everything She Ain't" probably won't be played until other major national chains are on it and it's adding lots of spins every week -- if that ever happens. The song sounds like nothing else on the chart and could conceivably never move the needle at influential major-market stations.

 

[Don CT]

Too bad that didn't happen to the entire soundtrack of Saturday Night Fever and all other disco.

Same goes for Bieber, although he's still too current. By the time he's long-forgotten, I'll be long-gone.

I would argue that Saturday Night Fever is still a great album.

 

[michael hagerty]

I would argue that Saturday Night Fever is still a great album.

Five Bee Gees hits---including "Jive Talkin'" and "How Deep Is Your Love".

I prefer The Bee Gees' version of "More Than A Woman" to Tavares', but it's still a great song.

And the LONG version of the Trammps' "Disco Inferno"? Sold.

 

[Don CT]

Five Bee Gees hits---including "Jive Talkin'" and "How Deep Is Your Love".

I prefer The Bee Gees' version of "More Than A Woman" to Tavares', but it's still a great song.

And the LONG version of the Trammps' "Disco Inferno"? Sold.

The Bee Gees get sucked into disco but I would not call them a disco act.

Even Donna Summer I think gets sucked in.

 

[michael hagerty]

The Bee Gees get sucked into disco but I would not call them a disco act.

Even Donna Summer I think gets sucked in.

I think the thing with Donna is disco is kinda where she started. She grew out of it.

The Bee Gees, in search of hits in a dry spell, wound up making dance records that actually popularized disco, and rode that train to the end of its line.

They re-invented, too, but not as quickly as Donna and not with the same degree of success.

 

[davideduardo]

Didn't realize we were that close in age, CT. I was 11.

I was 21 that year, and the first Top 40 station I built and owned was 4 years old then. We never played Next Plane to London, because we seldom touched any English language songs unless they were Top 15 or so...

And that is another reason those songs don't have an afterlife: in much of the world where English and US Top 40 hits were played, the ones that did not reach the Top 10 never got airplay. So the labels, which even then were becoming quite international, dropped the titles and the albums, often everywhere.

 

[CTListener]

I was 21 that year, and the first Top 40 station I built and owned was 4 years old then. We never played Next Plane to London, because we seldom touched any English language songs unless they were Top 15 or so...

Top 15 according to whom? Billboard? Cash Box? Radio & Records? I thought programming songs "by the charts" was something you were against.

 

[davideduardo]

Just looked at the KHJ charts on Ray Randolph's fabulous site 93khj.blogspot.com. Ten-week chart runs were very rare.

"Hey Jude" stayed on the KHJ chart for 11 weeks in 1968.

The record up to that point---Paul Mauriat's "Love Is Blue". It did 12.

That got broken in 1970 by the Supremes' "Someday We'll Be Together". 13 weeks. There were several after that ("Joy to the World", "Imagine", "American Pie"), but 13 was the absolute limit.

Much of that was the 12 to 13 week cycle of the record companies. They'd demand that we drop a song so that we'd consider the next release. With so many markets having two or even three top 40 stations, none could afford to annoy a major label.

The unfortunate thing is that we had not figured out recurrents yet... we thought a hit had to be rested quite a while before it even came back as "golden". So many songs after 10-12 weeks were dead for a year...

 

[davideduardo]

Top 15 according to whom? Billboard? Cash Box? Radio & Records? I thought programming songs "by the charts" was something you were against.

In the 60's there was no R&R.

Those who could afford it used Gavin and, later FMQB and Hamilton.

I used the WIXY, WQAM and WFUN charts as guidance. I had them airmailed. And the songs that hit the top 20 at WIXY got airmailed to me too... about $150 a month to buy them and mail them. That was more than my top rated DJ made!

Billboard would have been something like $300 a year for airmail service. And even airmail took a week to 10 days.

There was no local Top 40 record sales. So we went on requests alone.

 

[Kent]

I've read Ross on Radio and its column about "lost" songs which were big hits that aren't played on stations anymore. How do songs that become big hits and people really want to hear them suddenly fall on deaf ears and do not test well anymore? That is something that is surprising to me. I know people will comment that this is similar to other threads, but I'm wondering how some of those hits don't at least receive light rotation amongst some stations. They're definitely songs people who were around would remember (as opposed to songs which charted as #38 for instance.)

Most of the others have already said what I'm about to say, but I'd like to ask if you really want to hear "Honey" by Bobby Goldsboro? Do you know anyone who wants to hear it? It hit #1 in 1968 and stayed there for roughly a month, but the people I know who were around when it was a hit don't like it. Most of them say they didn't like it when it was new either. Enough people, of course, liked it at the time to keep it at #1 for several weeks, but they don't like it today.

Something else to keep in mind is that having a #1 hit doesn't mean your song is popular or that you're going to endure as an act. Approximately 1 in 7 artists who hit #1 never have another hit, and they're not always flash in the pan acts either. Sammy Davis, Jr. hit #1 with "Candy Man" in 1972. He never hit the charts again, and you never heard much of "Candy Man" either after it worked its way back down.

The reasons hits become lost are probably about as many as there are lost hits. I can tell you my 18 year old niece thinks my music sucks. She might grudingly admit a handful of songs I like aren't bad, but she's never going to willingly listen to them. Each generation has its own sound, and most of those sounds don't even last the full generation. As some of the others mention, disco was extremely popular in the mid-to-late 70's, but only a handful of those records endure today. Keep in mind also that popular songs are relative. A bad song can be a hit when its competition is weak. When it's competing with decades worth of other songs, that it was a bad song becomes more obvious. Go back and look at the year "Honey" spent a handful of weeks at #1. Take a look at the competition it had in 1968. It outperformed songs that are considered better today, but it was, overall, a fairly weak year in music. The Beatles only had two songs that made the Top-100 for the year, and, of the songs I recognize on that list, I'd only willingly listen to about half of them.

 

[MrJohn]

I heard the Rick Dees Top 40 play "Play That Song" by Train as a countdown extra though on CHR.

It's just that - an "extra" aka time filler. Ryan Seacrest does this too; I heard BTS's "Butter" the other day unannounced.

 

[Kelly A]

Those who could afford it used Gavin and, later FMQB and Hamilton.

I suggest the name of my first born son to be Gavin. My wife really liked it, until she found out later it was a radio music publication. Then she wasn't so amused. Next born I suggested Hamilton. She checked that time and said no.

 

[michael hagerty]

I suggest the name of my first born son to be Gavin. My wife really liked it, until she found out later it was a radio music publication. Then she wasn't so amused. Next born I suggested Hamilton. She checked that time and said no.

Tell me you went for a third and suggested "Cashbox" and I'll buy you a beer.

 

[michael hagerty]

Something else to keep in mind is that having a #1 hit doesn't mean your song is popular or that you're going to endure as an act. Approximately 1 in 7 artists who hit #1 never have another hit, and they're not always flash in the pan acts either. Sammy Davis, Jr. hit #1 with "Candy Man" in 1972. He never hit the charts again, and you never heard much of "Candy Man" either after it worked its way back down.

"The Candy Man" had more to do with "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory" than with Sammy (who hated it). And Sammy's career was independent of any success on the record chart. His only other Top Ten was in 1955.

 

[gr8oldies]

Most of the others have already said what I'm about to say, but I'd like to ask if you really want to hear "Honey" by Bobby Goldsboro? Do you know anyone who wants to hear it? It hit #1 in 1968 and stayed there for roughly a month, but the people I know who were around when it was a hit don't like it. Most of them say they didn't like it when it was new either. Enough people, of course, liked it at the time to keep it at #1 for several weeks, but they don't like it today.

Something else to keep in mind is that having a #1 hit doesn't mean your song is popular or that you're going to endure as an act. Approximately 1 in 7 artists who hit #1 never have another hit, and they're not always flash in the pan acts either. Sammy Davis, Jr. hit #1 with "Candy Man" in 1972. He never hit the charts again, and you never heard much of "Candy Man" either after it worked its way back down.

The reasons hits become lost are probably about as many as there are lost hits. I can tell you my 18 year old niece thinks my music sucks. She might grudingly admit a handful of songs I like aren't bad, but she's never going to willingly listen to them. Each generation has its own sound, and most of those sounds don't even last the full generation. As some of the others mention, disco was extremely popular in the mid-to-late 70's, but only a handful of those records endure today. Keep in mind also that popular songs are relative. A bad song can be a hit when its competition is weak. When it's competing with decades worth of other songs, that it was a bad song becomes more obvious. Go back and look at the year "Honey" spent a handful of weeks at #1. Take a look at the competition it had in 1968. It outperformed songs that are considered better today, but it was, overall, a fairly weak year in music. The Beatles only had two songs that made the Top-100 for the year, and, of the songs I recognize on that list, I'd only willingly listen to about half of them.

I've got to think it was our parents' who bought "Honey". It likely fit well mid-days for "housewife time" on top 40 and of course MOR stations.

I think the thing with Donna is disco is kinda where she started. She grew out of it.

The Bee Gees, in search of hits in a dry spell, wound up making dance records that actually popularized disco, and rode that train to the end of its line.

They re-invented, too, but not as quickly as Donna and not with the same degree of success.

Donna could rock when she wanted to. The Bee Gees spent the 80s writing and producing hits for other artists.

 

[Wimmmex]

How do songs that become big hits and people really want to hear them suddenly fall on deaf ears and do not test well anymore?

Relevancy. The "Ballad of the Green Beret" was a song that everyone liked, went to number one and was relevant at the time.

Does anyone want to hear it now?

Times change, and the environment surrounding that song changes over time.

 

[Daryl Lynn L.A.]

Most of the others have already said what I'm about to say, but I'd like to ask if you really want to hear "Honey" by Bobby Goldsboro? Do you know anyone who wants to hear it? It hit #1 in 1968 and stayed there for roughly a month, but the people I know who were around when it was a hit don't like it. Most of them say they didn't like it when it was new either. Enough people, of course, liked it at the time to keep it at #1 for several weeks, but they don't like it today.

Ummmm, No. No, I don't. That is probably my least favorite song of 50 years of listening to Top 40 or CHR formats. I have no idea how that song ever received airplay. And "Next Plane to London", ( which did receive airplay in L.A.), along with anything by the Captain & Tenille ( who were nice people) is right up there with "Honey." I never understood how that went to Number 1.
"Ballad of the Green Beret" was popular, but topical songs about specific events of the time will quickly become very dated. Same thing with "Eve of Destruction". Same thing with some early hits of Bob Dylan. JMO --- Daryl

 

[michael hagerty]

Death songs have a long history---"Tell Laura I Love Her"(1960), "Last Kiss"(1961 and again in 1999 from Pearl Jam)---I don't know why, but there was an audience for them in the 60s. "Honey" was just an update on the form. And 12 years later, in Country, George Jones made it work again with "He Stopped Loving Her Today."