Hey everyone, hope this isn't beating a dead horse. I'd love to get the forum's take on radio's current influence, especially in an era where most artists seem to prioritize short-form social media content for promotion (unreasonably so in my humble opinion).
The way I see it, there are two distinct types of influence radio can have, and I think they're worth separating.
The obvious one: amplification. When a song is already gaining momentum, heavy rotation on high-reach stations exposes it to new ears. It also forces repeated listens on existing ones. That repetition is part of hooking people. Though, a station like KIIS 102.7 isn't going to touch a genuinely fresh, unproven record. By the time they add it, it's already somewhere. So radio may now function more as a scaling tool than a discovery one, at that level. That's my read, at least. But maybe that's pretty much always been the case with such big stations? It feels like they used to be more open to risk back then, putting up a record they believed in that had not yet proved itself enough, with less negative consequences if it didn't work out. Although I might be romanticizing that a bit.
The less obvious one: who's actually listening. This one might matter even more, and I think it's underappreciated. Radio audience isn't just any consumers, it's also industry professionals. Label executives, A&Rs, venue bookers (small local and big national), tastemaker DJs, music press, sync supervisors... these people have radio on. And when something catches their attention, they have direct leverage to act on it: booking the artist, playing the record to new large audiences, bringing it to an internal meeting, pitching a sync placement, doing a buyout, writing about it, or simply talking about it to the right people in their network.
That creates a virtuous circle and results in somewhat exponential momentum (granted the song itself is that great). It's different from a casual listener sharing a song with friends (which loops back to influence #1), because each of these "gatekeepers" can open a door that multiplies exposure in a structurally different way. One person of influence might pass it on or just play it in their own context, and in doing so, it ends up reaching other people in similar positions (without that necessarily being the intention). It kind of builds from there. Eventually it exposes it to larger audiences, maybe in a more spread-out and longer-lasting way. This feels to me like how ""virality"" actually worked before short-form content and heavily personalized algorithms were a thing. It feels more natural and probably created more sustained and culturally impactful exposure.
Nirvana breaking through college radio in the early 90s might be a rough example of "influence #2" in action. That's surely an oversimplification of a story that's much more complex than that though. MTV was also around at the time, so that's one thing to account. Marketing, sync placements... all play their part too.
Anyway, that's kind of a thought I had recently.
So, curious what people here think: does radio still carry either of these two types of influence in a meaningful way? And if so, to what degree? Has one held up better than the other?
The way I see it, there are two distinct types of influence radio can have, and I think they're worth separating.
The obvious one: amplification. When a song is already gaining momentum, heavy rotation on high-reach stations exposes it to new ears. It also forces repeated listens on existing ones. That repetition is part of hooking people. Though, a station like KIIS 102.7 isn't going to touch a genuinely fresh, unproven record. By the time they add it, it's already somewhere. So radio may now function more as a scaling tool than a discovery one, at that level. That's my read, at least. But maybe that's pretty much always been the case with such big stations? It feels like they used to be more open to risk back then, putting up a record they believed in that had not yet proved itself enough, with less negative consequences if it didn't work out. Although I might be romanticizing that a bit.
The less obvious one: who's actually listening. This one might matter even more, and I think it's underappreciated. Radio audience isn't just any consumers, it's also industry professionals. Label executives, A&Rs, venue bookers (small local and big national), tastemaker DJs, music press, sync supervisors... these people have radio on. And when something catches their attention, they have direct leverage to act on it: booking the artist, playing the record to new large audiences, bringing it to an internal meeting, pitching a sync placement, doing a buyout, writing about it, or simply talking about it to the right people in their network.
That creates a virtuous circle and results in somewhat exponential momentum (granted the song itself is that great). It's different from a casual listener sharing a song with friends (which loops back to influence #1), because each of these "gatekeepers" can open a door that multiplies exposure in a structurally different way. One person of influence might pass it on or just play it in their own context, and in doing so, it ends up reaching other people in similar positions (without that necessarily being the intention). It kind of builds from there. Eventually it exposes it to larger audiences, maybe in a more spread-out and longer-lasting way. This feels to me like how ""virality"" actually worked before short-form content and heavily personalized algorithms were a thing. It feels more natural and probably created more sustained and culturally impactful exposure.
Nirvana breaking through college radio in the early 90s might be a rough example of "influence #2" in action. That's surely an oversimplification of a story that's much more complex than that though. MTV was also around at the time, so that's one thing to account. Marketing, sync placements... all play their part too.
Anyway, that's kind of a thought I had recently.
So, curious what people here think: does radio still carry either of these two types of influence in a meaningful way? And if so, to what degree? Has one held up better than the other?