Many small market classic hit stations I've heard, meet my expectations. It's the larger markets, like Los Angeles, that do not. I rarely, if ever, complain about the small markets, they mostly do the job. But 400 repeated songs on KRTH and the like....well, that's another story.
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Beatles - 50th Anniversary
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Many small market classic hit stations I've heard, meet my expectations. It's the larger markets, like Los Angeles, that do not. I rarely, if ever, complain about the small markets, they mostly do the job. But 400 repeated songs on KRTH and the like....well, that's another story.
Are they locally programmed, or programmed by some national syndication or barter service?
And KRTH has a bigger library than 400 songs.
While KRTH plays about 450 different titles in the course of a week, when you look at the last 4 week period, you see around 800 total titles.
The consensus is that Rick Thomas, reduced the playlist from a Jhani Kaye high at around 800 to approx. 400 titles being rotated today. Check out Superhits 106....(Queen B Radio....Dubuque, Iowa) as an example of a smaller market radio station that plays a nice selection of 70's and 80's. Also check out KFEZ (101.3...Soco Radio) out of southeastern Colorado. WLNG is also good, from Long Island, NY
http://superhits106.com/
http://easy1013.com/
http://www.wlng.com/
It's just what I prefer for classic hits, vs. the redundancies of big city radio.
Including "Hotel California", played about 112 times in four weeks (at 4 plays a day)....YIKES!
At 6 1/2 minutes a spin....that's a ton of Eagles exposure and some overkill. Oh well.......
Keep in mind that the daily time spent listening of KRTH is around an hour. Stations like KBIG and KOST get an hour and about 55 minutes per day respectively. They don't hear the repetition.
And KRTH is looking to be going into what could be its best month in over a year.
Big A is r....t about it being about listeners and advertisers. Firepoint - since you live in Nashville. First, one of the biggest guys in county radio told me this past week that he loves (and I know he listens to) Hippie Radio 94.5 (an oldies/classic blend in Music City.) He is constantly on the look out for new talent and has found and manages the best and biggest names. His words of inspiration: "Play the Hits." From a guy who tries to create the next hit. My most enjoyable time spent in radio are the bonding moments with listeners and/or advertisers. You saw the lines at the Wannabeatles Show a few weeks ago. People waited for hours to get in. Listeners showed up. They love the music and the station. Most of the advertisers are local vs. Agency. Advertisers are usually amazed by the results, especially given the parameters of a little stand alone radio station. The weirdest thing of all is that literally every time you debate pulling a song, some nice person calls or comments that they "love that song." With a playlist of over 2,000 songs, and still growing, every song is still someone's treasure. And someone's trash. All the surveys, playlists and data aside, none of us would be on this board chatting if we never tuned back in the after we didn't like what someone else said. Same with our own playlists. I can never pick all the songs you will like. It can be pretty humbling to see the songs meant for the trash be THE most requested songs. Radio is a mass community. It's about sharing. Advertisers and listeners. Not individual playlists.
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Which would probably reflect the period when K-EARTH became K-EAGLES a while back. I agree, the repetition won't be heard initially. It will eventually be noticed, long term by frequent listeners. In the meantime, let's enjoy your stiffs on CBS-FM and the top 20 from March 1980 and 1970.
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Can't answer for him, but I once worked at a small station in rural northwest Tennessee. Our reel-to-reel tapes came from Broadcast Supply West out of Seattle. The station was automated, and this was in the early '90s.
They promoted the Wannabeatles show HEAVILY for about a month! How could they NOT have seen that coming? They should have held it in a larger venue. Hippie does indeed play songs that many of the others are just simply loath to play. 97.1 (when they were classic hits) had a frustratingly narrow playlist. Just to be sure, I DON'T think they sold to K-Love because of competition from Hippie, but because they had to divest themselves of a station or two when they (Cumulus) bought out Citadel. Cumulus always had (and maybe still have) job fairs to try to attract new account executives, but their airwaves are always dominated by NATIONAL (network) advertisers.
Some of the commercials themselves are annoying. Tibbs, I am referring to Soul Shine Pizza spots on Hippie!
Do you know if it is on youtube so I can check it out? Advertising (particularly annoying advertising) must not work for me either. I have never been to Soul Shine.
[Aaah.................but the advertiser is the customer, not the listener.]
There are plenty of "customers" who would like to hear Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, and the Everly Brothers on commercial radio. Why can't they?
There are plenty of "customers" who would like to hear Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, and the Everly Brothers on commercial radio. Why can't they?
Actually, the listener is the consumer, but their "consumption" is paid for by advertisers.
The listener understands that they "pay" for listening to free OTA radio by accepting to listen to commercials.
In the past, this was referred to as Bi-modal Marketing where the user of a product was not the one who paid for it.
Another, and very different, example of bimodality is life insurance. It is not customarily used by the person who pays for it, as that person is long departed when the benefits are distributed.
In theory, but really who listens to radio commercials, word by word? No one, they just want music or to hear the guest in a talk show....or to hear that touchdown in a football game. Commercial sets......a tune out to many music listeners.
Which, once again, is why we don't program to people like you. And why you may feel left out.
And again, listeners don't listen to commercial sets that last 12 minutes, from beginning to end, word for word. They want music, not seemingly endless chatter. And this goes for AVERAGE everyday listeners (not for myself) that enjoy music or whatever they tuned in for, it just goes over their heads. Really, who wants to hear service type spots that repeat their phone numbers four times in a row and especially if it does not pertain to them? or political ads that have nothing to do with their party?
The only time I truly listen to commercials is during the Superbowls.
In some PPM markets stations have cut the number of breaks to one or two per hour. One long one rather than a bunch of little ones.
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As with most things to do with radio, that's not necessarily so. Granted, a set filled with really bad commercials prompts people to hit the station changing buttons. But really well done, clever or entertaining commercials are not necessarily tune-outs. The crafting of good, effective commercials is as much an art as it is a science, just like programming the music for a station, or writing a hit song. Sadly, there is no place in this forum to actually discuss one of the most important parts of all broadcasting, the creation of really good commercials.
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