CBS ever so slowly scaling back on the 60s

[lalumia]

In the year 2525..
I'll still be doing the hully gully and the boo ga loo to The Supremes...
and posting on this here message board to the delight of the masses

 

[oldies76]

Select stations playing 50s & 60s music in 2020-2030? 60 to 80 year old records? Notgonnahappen.com. You'll be lucky to hear 1969 by 2015.

Sure it will, even if it's just AM radio. Rock and roll has and will have a much different and favorable appeal to one's ears, than the music of the 1920's through the 40's, did since the 70's.

 

[michael hagerty]

We'll be able to hear anything from any era, thanks to Pandora and iTunes and whoever comes along to challenge them. But radio stations that sell advertising need 37 year old listeners, not 60 year old records.

I programmed Adult Contemporary stations from 1973-1980, and at the time, I was pushing the envelope of AC. Steely Dan, Pretenders, Nick Lowe. We were 60 percent current music and only played one pre-Beatles track per hour and two from 1964-1970. It worked. We were big 25-54. But even if you take the most recent year of that, those people are now 56-85...the median 68. Not a sales demo now...surely not in 2020-2030.

 

[davideduardo]

Sure it will, even if it's just AM radio. Rock and roll has and will have a much different and favorable appeal to one's ears, than the music of the 1920's through the 40's, did since the 70's.

I don't recall that much, if any, 20's or 30's music was played on the radio from the 70's onwards. And even the 40's was limited to "Music for What's Left of Your Life" and Al Ham-like formats that had real issues attracting advertisers.

 

[michael hagerty]

Sure it will, even if it's just AM radio. Rock and roll has and will have a much different and favorable appeal to one's ears, than the music of the 1920's through the 40's, did since the 70's.

I don't recall that much, if any, 20's or 30's music was played on the radio from the 70's onwards. And even the 40's was limited to "Music for What's Left of Your Life" and Al Ham-like formats that had real issues attracting advertisers.

Some 30s stuff....huge Bing Crosby hits, mainly...showed up on MOYL in the 70s and KMPC in Los Angeles when it first launched its nostalgia format in '82. But it was gone by '85, and the station focused on 40s and 50s music.

Even XM and Sirius, which don't have the agency demo pressure, have never had a "30s on 3" channel. They've been around about 10 years and the 40s is as far back as the decades channels go.

But I think Oldies76's point was that rock and roll will have better staying power on air than music from the 20s or 30s did. And I have to disagree. Radio is an advertising medium. Any format that delivers an audience outside the 25-54 bracket has a very hard time attracting advertising.

I've done this on the L.A. board, but I don't believe I've done it here. When I was programming, a popular theory at the time was Peak Musical Awareness (PMA). Basically, it says that you are most tuned in to current music from the ages of 16-22. Secondarily, from 23-29, and third comes ages 9-15. Older than thirty, there's a sharp drop-off and even sharper younger than 9.

You don't win 25-54 by aiming at 54. Like archery, you aim for the center of the target. That's 39 and a half. And the songs for today's 39 and a half year old's PMA would be from 1988-1994. Those are their oldies.

Dial the wayback machine any farther and you end up with some startling numbers. Take the center of PMA, 19, and work from there:

1956's 19 year old is 74 now.

1966's 19 year old is 64.

1976's 19 year old is 54...and in the last year of desirability when it comes to sales demos.

1986's 19 year old is 44, and while still in the demo, he or she is five years older than the center of the demo.

So we're talking about the viability of Elvis, Buddy Holly, The Beach Boys, The Beatles and Motown when in fact, New Wave is to today as Big Bands were to New Wave.

Tempus has done fugited, my friends.

 

[landtuna]

Radio is an advertising medium.

And there you have music radio's major problem! People today are bombarded with ads to the point they either do not listen or change the channel. Ads are invasive, distracting and offensive the majority of the time. That's why most younger folks (and a good many older ones, including this one) have virtually abandoned music radio for personal listening devices or ad-free services.

I am a long-time radio listener and would still listen if commercial blocks were quieter, shorter and if radio had better personalities than my mp3 player.

Radio will only succeed long-term if it has content that cannot be found anywhere else. Just like the old days. Music is not in that category.

 

[davideduardo]

Tempus has done fugited, my friends.

I didn't think it was legal to do that, except some places in Nevada.

While the "awareness" terminology is not much used today, the math matches the demos of stations along the spectrum between current music and that of 30 or 40 years ago.

Beyond that, our Spirit of '76 poster is probably just having fun with all of us with a well-used toolbox of devices which include, in no special order,

... overemphasizing the potential audience for pop / CHR gold.
... assuming that "everyone" listened to that music and not other genres.
... not factoring in those of us who have "moved on" and are just tired of the whole concept.
... not understanding that those who do like the music listen to other things, too.
... not taking into account the unappealing nature of bad AM signals or marginal FMs.
... believing that anyone who like the music likes the minor hits as well.
... not realizing that a huge percentage of the music that was big is dated or unappealing now.

There are some very interesting things in the industry newsletters about country radio, where it appears that 85% or so of airplay now is made up of "millenium songs" or ones no more than 10 to 11 years old. Even though country has traditionally had a broad and older leaning demo, the music that is working today is very, very recent. Makes you wonder!

 

[lalumia]

the young people of today are American Idol and The Voice fans,and guess what they're hearing, learning and loving?
Beatles week on Idol and Blake Shelton on The Voice having people compete with "You Can't Hurry Love"
by The Supremes; it's a different media world these days,kids, wake up and taste the tv audience and
what they're being exposed to..

 

[hubcity]

Radio will only succeed long-term if it has content that cannot be found anywhere else. Just like the old days. Music is not in that category.

I'm not quite ready to write off music. I think it's presentation, with music as one of many facets. (Which is to say, I think, that I'm in violent agreement.)

 

[davideduardo]

it's a different media world these days,kids, wake up and taste the tv audience and
what they're being exposed to..

What is being exposed is a very narrow subset of good, melodic, hooky songs that can be adapted to the Idol et. al. environment of today.

What is not being exposed is the actual sound and feel of a pure 60's environment.

What you are saying is comparable to suggesting that Americans like French music based on the fact that most have heard "My Way."

 

[michael hagerty]

And, without putting too fine a point on it, "Idol" only has to hold those young viewers for an hour a week a few weeks a year. To survive, a radio station needs them 24/7/365.

 

[lalumia]

once you know and like the song, you know and like the song..

 

[lalumia]

what i'm saying is that Blake shelton didn't say "You Can"t Hurry Love' by phil collins;
the french/my way analogy is beyond outer space,stretching beyond the outer limits

 

[michael hagerty]

once you know and like the song, you know and like the song..

And how long do you expect young people outside a station's demo to listen waiting for that song or three they know and like from American Idol when another station down the dial is playing their 50 favorite songs? 99 cents puts the song on their iPod and they don't have to listen to the oldies station to hear it.

 

[adma]

There are some very interesting things in the industry newsletters about country radio, where it appears that 85% or so of airplay now is made up of "millenium songs" or ones no more than 10 to 11 years old. Even though country has traditionally had a broad and older leaning demo, the music that is working today is very, very recent. Makes you wonder!

Though it may also paradoxically say something about what's often said to be the Red-America-cultural-conservative nature of the country demo--i.e. they're so "conservative", they'd rather opt to "churn" their music the way that pop radio did several decades ago! Whereas the pop/rock/etc realm has come to be defined through (or weighed down by?) its rich history and "historicity", as is even borne out through Idol, Glee, Jimi's various comments etc. (Maybe it's a little how Red America's come to be defined through inexorable 50s-style suburbanity and exurbanity, while Blue America's come to be defined through retro fashion and rediscovered/gentrified old urban cores.)

Needless to say, it's Red America that's more within the "marketable/targetable" comfort zone for many an old, experienced radio type. (Thus the dominance of conservative talk.)

 

[Silkie]

Interesting that you say "rediscovered/gentrified", given that gentrification is the urban systematic use of taxation to remove a demographic, usually the aged who cannot afford the taxes. The rediscovery rarely takes place, except as a new drug haunt, because they are at the same time turned into garbage. Just saying, as one who watched it in action for years.

 

[oldies76]

I don't recall that much, if any, 20's or 30's music was played on the radio from the 70's onwards. And even the 40's was limited to "Music for What's Left of Your Life" and Al Ham-like formats that had real issues attracting advertisers.

You're right, but the point is that in the 70's, music that was 30-50+ years old was rarely heard on the radio, unlike today, where we still hear rock and roll music of the 50's and 60's on certain stations, today in 2011. The appeal and appreciation is much different today for rock and roll, than it was in the 70's for those older songs.

 

[oldies76]

Dial the wayback machine any farther and you end up with some startling numbers. Take the center of PMA, 19, and work from there:

1956's 19 year old is 74 now.

1966's 19 year old is 64.

1976's 19 year old is 54...and in the last year of desirability when it comes to sales demos.

1986's 19 year old is 44, and while still in the demo, he or she is five years older than the center of the demo.

Very startling for sure. Scary in a way!

 

[davideduardo]

You're right, but the point is that in the 70's, music that was 30-50+ years old was rarely heard on the radio, unlike today, where we still hear rock and roll music of the 50's and 60's on certain stations, today in 2011. The appeal and appreciation is much different today for rock and roll, than it was in the 70's for those older songs.

What makes the two generations of music different enough to defy comparison is the nature of radio before the late 40's. During most of the first 25 to 30 years of radio, there was far less music on the radio. So if there were hits, there were hit titles, not hit songs. Through the combination of ASCAP and Petrillo of the AFM, recorded music was very limited and stations in markets as small as Chattanooga had to have house bands in order to be able to play any recorded music. The weakening of the AFM and the creation of BMI gradually allowed folks like Storz and McLendon to create hit song stations.

So there was nowhere near the "burning in" of a huge number of specific songs by specific artist that there was once what the Brits call "needle time" was increased and the playing of generic or multiple versions of songs, often by house bands or hotel orchestras was decreased.

Also keep in mind that radio on the go, as in portables and car radios, was immensely limited. Radio's prime time was night time, and the stars were not tunes and DJs but Edger Bergen and Fibber McGee and the Lone Ranger and Jack Benny and the daytime soaps. Radio in until the transition to TV served the purpose that TV came to fill in following decades, particularly after the Freeze was lifted.

 

[michael hagerty]

I don't recall that much, if any, 20's or 30's music was played on the radio from the 70's onwards. And even the 40's was limited to "Music for What's Left of Your Life" and Al Ham-like formats that had real issues attracting advertisers.

You're right, but the point is that in the 70's, music that was 30-50+ years old was rarely heard on the radio, unlike today, where we still hear rock and roll music of the 50's and 60's on certain stations, today in 2011. The appeal and appreciation is much different today for rock and roll, than it was in the 70's for those older songs.

Well, in the market I know best, Los Angeles, there was a guy named Chuck Cecil. He did a thing called "The Swinging Years" on KFI. All 30s and 40s music. That was his entire 3 hour show. He did it in afternoon drive from 1956 to 1969, when they moved him to early evenings, where he did it for four hours until 1973, when they moved it to weekends only and made Chuck play Adult Contemporary weeknights. After about six months, it was off to a small station, followed by a college station, where, pushing 90, Chuck continues to do it.

38 years later, we're starting to see the same trajectory for the first decade of rock and roll. And the second decade is right on its heels.