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Do kids really like oldies?

vchimpanzee said:
Both oldies stations in my area have a kid doing liners.

In fact, one did the legal station ID at the top of the hour, along with the words "Magic One O Thwee Point Thwee."
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Depends on what you mean by kids. I'm 22 and dig pretty much any music pre-1980, whether golden oldies, folk, country, soul, etc.

I just had a 20 year old guy come over earlier this evening to ask for turntable advice. He brought along a couple of George Harrison LPs and some other stuff from that era. Pretty typical jock sports playing college student. This isn't unusual - I know a lot of people my age from a variety of walks of life and interests who enjoy older music.

Heck, I heard Engelbert Humperdinck blaring out of a bluetooth speaker on my college campus during the final weeks of class. Another day I heard the Carpenters.

That said... is there enough interest to make oldies a viable format aimed at "kids"? Probably not, sadly... They're interested in oldies along with a lot of other eras and genres.
 
People who like music outside their generation's scope may have grown up in a household where a parent listened a lot and the songs "stuck" forever. Or, they are what researchers call "outliers" who are people who do not have mainstream tastes.

In any case, they are a small minority and each one likes a different set of songs.
 
it de[pends on what their parents listen to. and oldies is a very very broad definition by the publics standards.. ive had some people call 80s bruce springteen an oldie.

Idsay the answer is./. some, but only some of the bigger more recognizeable hits.. and the more high energy upbeat ones... those wont sound "old"
 
At a young enough age, children didn't have much room for independent discovery, so they'll tell you they like whatever their parents expose them to.

If you had asked 8 year old me, I liked Elvis and Sammy Davis Jr., because those were the records my parents had, even though both of them were dead by that time. But as an adult, I have not listened to either on purpose.
 
The station in the small town where I grew played (at the time) a roughly 50-50 mix of oldies and current songs. Something for everyone. At least they didn't play much country (except for some of those dreaded "crossovers.") So a good mix for me to grow up on.
 
What @TheBigA said.

I mean, my four-year-old grandson and six-year-old granddaughter can sing along with every Creedence Clearwater Revival and Queen song ever recorded, because (improbably) my 25-year-old stepdaughter listens to them and listens to them more since the kids like them.

But neither know they're "oldies" (my granddaughter was crushed to learn that she's 33 years too late to meet Freddie Mercury), and for that matter, I seriously doubt either of them knows what a radio is for. Those songs come from Mommy's iPhone.
 
michael hagerty said:
What @TheBigA said.

I mean, my four-year-old grandson and six-year-old granddaughter can sing along with every Creedence Clearwater Revival and Queen song ever recorded, because (improbably) my 25-year-old stepdaughter listens to them and listens to them more since the kids like them.

But neither know they're "oldies" (my granddaughter was crushed to learn that she's 33 years too late to meet Freddie Mercury), and for that matter, I seriously doubt either of them knows what a radio is for. Those songs come from Mommy's iPhone.
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Is CCR “oldie” or “classic”.

I think of oldie as 50s teeny bop.
 
Don CT said:
Is CCR “oldie” or “classic”.

I think of oldie as 50s teeny bop.
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"Oldie" has been in use to describe non-current music since around 1910---and it was in wide use by the 1940s. In the 50s and early 60s, songs as little as five years old were called "Oldies but Goodies".

So "oldie" and "classic" in this case are more format descriptors than they are a descriptor of the music itself.

There's a type of music that we tend to associate with "oldies radio" because the format became stuck in a 1955-1972 time frame, thanks to the calcification of Boomer musical tastes.

The format evolved into "Classic Hits" almost 20 years ago because the format descriptor "oldies" had too much negative baggage.
 
michael hagerty said:
"Oldie" has been in use to describe non-current music since around 1910---and it was in wide use by the 1940s. In the 50s and early 60s, songs as little as five years old were called "Oldies but Goodies".

So "oldie" and "classic" in this case are more format descriptors than they are a descriptor of the music itself.

There's a type of music that we tend to associate with "oldies radio" because the format became stuck in a 1955-1972 time frame, thanks to the calcification of Boomer musical tastes.

The format evolved into "Classic Hits" almost 20 years ago because the format descriptor "oldies" had too much negative baggage.
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So how do we classify by era. Lumping 40s and 80s as oldie is a huge leap.
 


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