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Big 95.5
- Thread starter jasonharper2013
- Start date
Any radio format is built around a finite group of songs that they will play over and over. That's kind of how it works.
The goal of music scheduling is to vary the placement of those songs so they don't appear at the same time or in the same order every day.
I get scheduling, but there really isn't an finite amount of rock from the 80's and 90's.
There is more then "Enter Sandman" by Metallica. There is more than "Something to believe in" by Poison. I don't recall hearing that as much during Poison's heyday as I'm hearing it now. I heard it Monday night on my way home from work, then again Tuesday morning on my way back in... Seriously! There is more then Beverly Hills by Weezer. Those are just three off the top of my head...
Metallica has an infinite portfolio of popular radio played songs during the 90's. Poison has quite a few from the 80's/90's too. There is more than one or two Linkin Park hits...
I'm not asking to go in to deep, dark depths of some of these bands/groups, but good grief...
There is more then "Enter Sandman" by Metallica. There is more than "Something to believe in" by Poison. I don't recall hearing that as much during Poison's heyday as I'm hearing it now. I heard it Monday night on my way home from work, then again Tuesday morning on my way back in... Seriously! There is more then Beverly Hills by Weezer. Those are just three off the top of my head...
Metallica has an infinite portfolio of popular radio played songs during the 90's. Poison has quite a few from the 80's/90's too. There is more than one or two Linkin Park hits...
I'm not asking to go in to deep, dark depths of some of these bands/groups, but good grief...
That's not the point. Even in the 80s, there wasn't a finite amount of music being made, but radio only played a limited amount of it.
Those are names you know. What about all the groups who you don't know because they never got airplay?
None of that changes the fact that radio format play curated lists. They aren't going to play every song ever recorded.
Radio is the free sample. You want everything else? Buy the music. Support the artists who make it.
The playlist is absolute garbage. Not only are the category choices non-sensical, but the track selections / airplay frequency within certain categories is also non-sensical.
The (lack of) choice of Metallica songs in particular is pathetic.
All one needs to do is listen to just about any Active Rock station or most Mainstream Rock stations to realize that. Fellow iHM quasi-classic rock station 106.7 WLLZ in Detroit actually does a decent job with its Metallica selections.
95.5 sounds like an ill-conceived Variety Hits / Active Rock hybrid - two formats that definitely should not be blended together! Whoever is programming this trainwreck needs to be handed his walking papers.
The (lack of) choice of Metallica songs in particular is pathetic.
All one needs to do is listen to just about any Active Rock station or most Mainstream Rock stations to realize that. Fellow iHM quasi-classic rock station 106.7 WLLZ in Detroit actually does a decent job with its Metallica selections.
95.5 sounds like an ill-conceived Variety Hits / Active Rock hybrid - two formats that definitely should not be blended together! Whoever is programming this trainwreck needs to be handed his walking papers.
That explains why in its debut week it tied for 3rd in the market in 18-49 adults.
I still like it as a down-and-dirty listen when I want some familiar songs to which I can rock out. Otherwise, I'll just resort to my super-large collection of Rock music from the '60s to present when I really wanna go deep and listen for long periods of time.
Also, this station is a good way for someone getting into rock to get a taste of what's out there, then move ahead and evolve their tastes by buying the music and building their own super-big, deep collection.
Also, this station is a good way for someone getting into rock to get a taste of what's out there, then move ahead and evolve their tastes by buying the music and building their own super-big, deep collection.
The playlist itself is limited and at times awkward for what they’re pushing on the air (Matchbox 20 - Unwell, Goo Goo Dolls - Iris, Hoobastank - The Reason, etc) But I don’t for one second believe they didn’t research heavily when putting this together. It’s clear to me that they are not just going after the male audience the Active and Classic Rock formats target. They also want a female audience.
The above mentioned songs were heavily played on WKSC and other CHR stations back in the day. A lot of the songs they play were actually. In the Early 2000s, you could hear Headstrong by Trapt on WKSC. Same goes for any of the 3 Doors Down cuts they play (WKSC played a LOT of 3 Doors Down between 2001 and 2005 under Rod Phillips) Same goes for the Nickelback, Linkin Park, Creed, Fall Out Boy, Evanescence, Staind, Puddle Of Mudd, cuts. Under The Bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers was played on WKSC in those days. Females who might have listened to Top-40 radio in the early 2000s would be familiar with those songs.
The 80s songs are mass appeal. The 90s songs are mass appeal. They routinely refer to it as a “Rock Anthem” station. In other words, songs that are familiar with a mass appeal. You won’t hear anything new. Their format is very carefully put together to make it familiar enough for females while being a male dominated format. It’s basically a younger targeted and female-friendly Classic Rock station. Where Classic Rock stations would be if they evolved into the 90s and if they also tried to attract females.
The above mentioned songs were heavily played on WKSC and other CHR stations back in the day. A lot of the songs they play were actually. In the Early 2000s, you could hear Headstrong by Trapt on WKSC. Same goes for any of the 3 Doors Down cuts they play (WKSC played a LOT of 3 Doors Down between 2001 and 2005 under Rod Phillips) Same goes for the Nickelback, Linkin Park, Creed, Fall Out Boy, Evanescence, Staind, Puddle Of Mudd, cuts. Under The Bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers was played on WKSC in those days. Females who might have listened to Top-40 radio in the early 2000s would be familiar with those songs.
The 80s songs are mass appeal. The 90s songs are mass appeal. They routinely refer to it as a “Rock Anthem” station. In other words, songs that are familiar with a mass appeal. You won’t hear anything new. Their format is very carefully put together to make it familiar enough for females while being a male dominated format. It’s basically a younger targeted and female-friendly Classic Rock station. Where Classic Rock stations would be if they evolved into the 90s and if they also tried to attract females.
But there's no incentive for classic rock stations to do that. They manage to attract enough under-55 men to remain desirable to advertisers because the appeal of testosterone-fueled tracks like "Whole Lotta Love" and "Rock You Like a Hurricane" to male listeners is timeless. Now that country music has pretty much blown off its entire male fan base, joining AC and CHR, and with active rock being a dying sub-niche, classic rock and sports have the under-55 men (white men, anyway -- hip-hop and Latino CHR seem to appeal to both genders) pretty much to themselves. Why dilute the product with "Unwell" and "Iris"?
I agree. We keep talking about slicing the pie, and someone found a way to slice the pie a different way.
I still strongly suspect WCHI will evolve into a heavier Alternative (i.e. WBUZ and WXDX basically) over time - a format that definitely has cross-gender appeal in modern times even in heavier incarnations. But more to the point, Jeremy's got this nailed. The fact that the morning show is led by a woman, Angie Taylor (who primarily has a CHR background, not rock), gives the intention away. They do want the male audience - otherwise songs like "Bodies" and "My Own Prison" would not be present. But the addition of HAC crossover acts like Matchbox Twenty, Counting Crows, and Goo Goo Dolls shows an intention to capture the female audience as well.
The fact that the rest of the format talent primarily has Alternative backgrounds - again, a format with cross-gender appeal - further shows the desire to capture a female audience. Walt and Klinger are both talented at appealing to both men and women, and Palmer would sound just as home on a HAC as she does on a rocker.
This is perfectly fine. And honestly considering 97.1 The Drive is heavily male-skewed (and won't go past 1990), 93XRT is a hulking Goliath in the city right now, and WKQX has skewed heavily in a pop direction over the last couple of years (especially since Walt left the station), this was the only way it was gonna work.
I don't understand why a station would launch at this time, create an audience, and then alter it in a way that might defeat the position that brought them to life.
In 25-54, WCHI looks like it will be around 10th to 12th in the market (I'm guessing based on the first three weeks of October... although 10th may be a bit optimistic). We will know Monday when the book comes out. Remember, in that demo the were 27th in March!
Even though the Coronavirus has made research harder, I'll bet they did considerable work to find the proper mix and library for this to work. The idea of playing just a few songs in the first month or so and then expanding is very 80's. It's not the way I see launches done in the last couple of decades. A launch is make it or break it; "Hit me with your best shot" or never make it at all.
It is going to be, in all probability, in the top 10 25-54 when the book comes out on Monday. It is trending upwards as people find it.
There was no significant launch promotion, so inflated sampling is not likely. That is something that might have happened several decades ago.
I'm not suggesting anything more dramatic than them playing a current or two within pretty much the exact same playlist they have now (albeit probably at the cost of the little bit of 70's rock they play that has heavy overlap with 93XRT and The Drive). If it came off as otherwise, I apologize. If you did understand what I was getting at, could you explain why it would be such a major, audience-alienating shift to play, for example, Chris Cornell's cover of "Patience", a recurrent like "S.O.S. (Sawed Off Shotgun)" by The Glorious Sons or a 2010's hit like "Gold On The Ceiling" by The Black Keys, once or twice in an hour of pretty much the same music they're playing now?
I don't doubt that iHeart did an insane amount of research to make the playlist work for the Chicago market. They also probably spent a lot of time listening to their would-be competitors to know what the audience is listening to and what they are lacking. They are literally playing a huge plethora of songs that have been neglected (Nirvana, Soundgarden, Kings of Leon, blink-182) or completely absent (pretty much everything The Loop played) in the Chicago market. It's smartly programmed, but I have to wonder what happens when the "new station smell" wears off. Right now there's a gradual building of curious listeners, but what happens six months from now? I think the current playlist is extremely intelligent and should hook people, but eventually they'll have to start mixing it up. I am curious to see what they'll do when they have to start gently adjusting the formula.
The listeners they are getting, and I continue to believe that the full month, out Monday, will have them as high as within the top 10 stations in the sales demos, are there for the familiarity. There is no need to play currents until they are well aged. The issue, of course, is whether their listeners hear enough of current rock to even recognize those songs... and recognition, called "familiarity" in research, is key to this format. No surprises, just known favorites.
I doubt they listened much. They just pulled the playlists from BDS or MediaBase and analyzed by daypart, repetition patterns and the like.
The main research for a new station of this kind is an AMT. Auditorium Music Test. Not done in Auditoriums for decades, they are mostly done online now with listeners with specific ages and characteristics being asked to hear tidbits, called "hooks", of songs and to score each one as to how much they'd like to hear each one on the radio today.
The idea is to find a group that is OK but not satisfied with existing stations and finding the "hole" that can be filled that may pull from a number of stations, not just one. That is often done with an Awareness-Trial-Usage study before the AMT to determine the "like" of a variety of music blends and whether that niche is being satisfied. That reveals the possible openings in the format spectrum.
Such a procedure was used a number of years ago by Emmis in Argentina. We went in with a station but no idea of what format to employ. The ATU test found a huge hole for Spanish language rock just by Argentine artists. It was so big that the station jumped to #1 in 30 days and had the largest radio audience in the Western Hemisphere for a half a decade until Emmis pulled out due to the political situation.
In other words, this is a long-standing, trusted research methodology that adapts easily to new media or a new environment.
Why would they adjust. They just regularly test the library, and propose newer songs that may enter as the audience ages but the station target remains the same. Songs that get burnt are cut off, or rested, or put on light rotation. But the feel of the station stays stable.
Any idea how WKQX is doing in their target? They seem to have been hit the hardest by WCHI. At least in this most recent book
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