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Best and worst AC songs of this decade?

A/C has been traditionally a "gold based" format. A couple of currents and recurrents an hour and the rest made up of gold. A couple of things happened in the 00s that greatly affected the format.

1. Classic Hits format. A/C's were now sharing many of their 70s titlles with another format. All the Billy Joel/Elton John/James Taylor material was now being played on a format that was based on what "AOR" stations played in the 70s. The format just plucked off the "hit singles" from
the big albums from the 70s and 80s and built a whole new format around it. One that had enough of a "soft" texture that it was very safe for listening at work.

2. Oldies stations evolving into another version of "Classic Hits." A more "pop" version ala CBS-FM that is pulling in huge adult numbers. These stations also tend to have talented personalities who were big in the heyday of AM Top 40 radio. These stations have added more 80s tunes as well.

3. As A/C is trying to evolve to be more acceptable to younger listeners, in some cases, the stations have become TOO edgy and has begun not to meet listener expectations. You can be "Soft" and "Contemporary" without being wimpy.

4. The 90s--A PD friend of mine told me that finding "90s" material in the format has been a real challenge. You would think that the demo that grew up listening to that music would have a fondness for it. But as it has been always believed that your musical passion is influenced by what was popular during your high school and college days, that is not holding true with this generation. You can only go so far with Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and Bonnie Raitt.

But back to the subject of this thread...this decade. Frankly, I believe the material has been more friendly to A/C than the 90s. And the big songs have primarily crossed over from other formats. A/C only hits have a hard time standing up because this is the only format they're played and they don't get the amount of spins per week (ala CHR & Country), to become big hits, unless they're on the chart for a long time.
 
Very good insight! I'm always interested in hearing insight and/or philosophy on the AC format.

Actually, in markets without oldies/classic hits (such as mine, Greenville-Spartanburg), AC's are usually the preferred alternative - the AC stations around here are generous with the 70s and 80s material, maybe because of that reason -- but then again, so are B101 and Lite 106.7, both of which are in markets with strong classic hits stations.
I love 70s and 80s music (60s also), but don't really care to hear nothing but that most of the time. That is why I enjoy the AC format - I can enjoy new pop/rock hits, favorites from recent years, plus the older ones. However, I can't think of many 90s songs (the era I grew up in, mainly) I care to hear on an AC station.

Agreed that there have been good songs from the previous decade. IMO, some of the best stuff came from ~2004-2008. AC crammed too much Taylor and Miley down my throat in 2009. Very early 2000s still had that crossover country-craze (Lonestar, Leeann Womack, Diamond Rio, etc...bleck) going on.
 
Carolinaradio, a major word that A/C's have used in their positioning for years is variety.

It's very difficult to call yourself the "variety" station if the only decades you pull music from is primarily the 90s and 00s with a little 80s sprinkled in.

Here's the secret that many programmers have a hard time grasping-------the thinking is..."If we want to attract a younger audience, then we have to dump the 70s and...in some cases 80s music." Logically, it might make sense but younger folks "expect" their A/C to play some older tunes from the 70s and 80s. And welcome it as a change from the current Top 40 fare. THe answer is not to be a watered down version of their CHR. That's what many Hot A/C's are today.

WLTW plays a minimum of 3 70s songs an hour. That's about right.
 
Seltzer said:
4. The 90s--A PD friend of mine told me that finding "90s" material in the format has been a real challenge. You would think that the demo that grew up listening to that music would have a fondness for it. But as it has been always believed that your musical passion is influenced by what was popular during your high school and college days, that is not holding true with this generation. You can only go so far with Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and Bonnie Raitt.
Click to expand...

A big problem with 90s music is that audiences were quite fragmented by then. The audience that is now in AC's demo was split between altrock, mainstream CHR, urban/hip-hop CHR and what remained of mainstream AOR. The trouble is, very little music from any of these formats is particularly compatible with AC. The acts you mentioned, as well as Elton John, Celine Dion, Mariah, etc. got played on mainstream CHR somewhat, but were seen as AC-ish acts even at the time...certainly not anything someone who was then in their teens or early 20s would have been interested in. 90s music has not aged well.
 
Oldbones said:
Seltzer said:
4. The 90s--A PD friend of mine told me that finding "90s" material in the format has been a real challenge. You would think that the demo that grew up listening to that music would have a fondness for it. But as it has been always believed that your musical passion is influenced by what was popular during your high school and college days, that is not holding true with this generation. You can only go so far with Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and Bonnie Raitt.
Click to expand...

A big problem with 90s music is that audiences were quite fragmented by then. The audience that is now in AC's demo was split between altrock, mainstream CHR, urban/hip-hop CHR and what remained of mainstream AOR. The trouble is, very little music from any of these formats is particularly compatible with AC. The acts you mentioned, as well as Elton John, Celine Dion, Mariah, etc. got played on mainstream CHR somewhat, but were seen as AC-ish acts even at the time...certainly not anything someone who was then in their teens or early 20s would have been interested in. 90s music has not aged well.
Click to expand...
Exactly. Fragmentation was, and still is, a pretty big deal. Michael Bolton and Phil Collins had some AC hits in the 90s also. But those weren't exactly CHR acts/songs at that point. Some CHR-types get played ("Iris" comes to mind) but not many. Maybe I am a special case, but like I said I grew up in the 90s listening to current hits, and, frankly, don't care to hear most of that music anymore. Most of the 90s stuff is dated. Disco is dated, but has...."character." 90s is just....dated.

While the thought of WLTW is in my head, they play very little 90s. I checked the 1pm hour Sunday on yes.com - they played 5 (yes) 70s songs in that hour but none from the 90s. That's probably an exception, but was interesting. Many inexperienced AC PD's would have it the other way around. They have it down.
 
It can technically be considered 2000s - I've gotta say, Mariah Carey's remake of "I Want to Know What Love Is" is pretty bad. Will be interesting to see if it has legs and can make it past 10th. That song, IMO, needs to be left to Foreigner. Hers is just missing something and sounds whimpy.

I think if stations do add it, they'll be playing Foreigner's version long after Mariah's. It is classic.
 
Oldbones said:
Seltzer said:
The 90s--A PD friend of mine told me that finding "90s" material in the format has been a real challenge. You would think that the demo that grew up listening to that music would have a fondness for it. But as it has been always believed that your musical passion is influenced by what was popular during your high school and college days, that is not holding true with this generation. You can only go so far with Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and Bonnie Raitt.
Click to expand...
A big problem with 90s music is that audiences were quite fragmented by then. The audience that is now in AC's demo was split between altrock, mainstream CHR, urban/hip-hop CHR and what remained of mainstream AOR. The trouble is, very little music from any of these formats is particularly compatible with AC. The acts you mentioned, as well as Elton John, Celine Dion, Mariah, etc. got played on mainstream CHR somewhat, but were seen as AC-ish acts even at the time...certainly not anything someone who was then in their teens or early 20s would have been interested in. 90s music has not aged well.
Click to expand...
CHR in the '90s had to rely heavily on AC-ish acts and artists by then, because CHR was being overrun with gangsta-rap artists who did not need airplay in order to sell records (as the charts showed), but radio couldn't have played them anyway, because many of them were too obscenity-laden to be played over the air anyhow.
 
PM Dawn sampled parts of "True" in 91' sounded ok. I think anything by Taylor Swift sucks. Can't tell whether she's pop or country. I've noticed people on allaccess .com and FMQB.com don't like Taylor Swift .Thank God I'm not the only one.
 
kd4rnc1964 said:
PM Dawn sampled parts of "True" in 91' sounded ok. I think anything by Taylor Swift sucks. Can't tell whether she's pop or country. I've noticed people on allaccess .com and FMQB.com don't like Taylor Swift .Thank God I'm not the only one.
Click to expand...

And to think she's a top-seller? Whew! Where's the talent? Perhaps she is indicative of just how bad music sucks these days, or how crazy consumers are.
 
Actually, with the realization I may take a beating for what I'm about to say, I think Taylor is pretty talented. I went to one of her concerts last year and was pretty amazed. Another artist who I like an awful lot is Carrie Underwood. She hasn't had the crossover success of Taylor. Taylor is still growing as far as her on stage performance goes. I will agree it has been rough at times. But ticket sales don't lie and how quickly she sells out.

Are her songs overplayed? Any more than other big records? Probably not.

I think Michael Buble is very talented and would love to see his songs become "library material" for the format. But, again, because he generally only gets played at A/C, it's difficult for his songs to become library staples.
 
Seltzer said:
Actually, with the realization I may take a beating for what I'm about to say, I think Taylor is pretty talented. I went to one of her concerts last year and was pretty amazed. Another artist who I like an awful lot is Carrie Underwood. She hasn't had the crossover success of Taylor. Taylor is still growing as far as her on stage performance goes. I will agree it has been rough at times. But ticket sales don't lie and how quickly she sells out.
Click to expand...

Talented? Hearing the same chords over and over again is like begging for torture at Guantanamo!
 
I think Taylor is talented. The only thing that surprises me about all the AC airplay she get's (and country for that matter) is that the subject matter of most of her songs seems like it would be too young to appeal to an adult audience.
 
I don't mind Taylor as a singer, but she belongs on top 40 or maybe country. I don't care to hear her 3 ADULT Contemporary hits 10-12 times a day combined. I don't like her as much as, say, Faith or Shania. They seem more AC-ish.

I think she's getting so much airplay because 1) she's at #1 and 2) the format doesn't have a ton of great material right now on the chart.

Another horrid one was..."I Can Only Imagine." It's been burned to death. My radio is off when it starts.
 
Seltzer said:
I think Michael Buble is very talented and would love to see his songs become "library material" for the format. But, again, because he generally only gets played at A/C, it's difficult for his songs to become library staples.
Click to expand...
And standards. I heard one of his A/C songs this morning. Mostly I hear him sing standards on my standards station. Like last Friday I heard "You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You". And I heard another good standard on Saturday but can't remember what it was. But there was that name again.
 
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