Classic Hits: Evolution or Revolution?

[michael hagerty]

Oldies, in a market that size on up, if you simply throw everything on the air and wait for the audience to tell you what you're doing right and what you're doing wrong, a competitor will eat your lunch overnight as the 6% send you chasing your tail while the 94% find the station that is playing songs that are statistically proven to be favorites or at least not tune-outs to most people of their age. Ratings will be marginal to begin with and fall with each successive measurement. There will be minimal (at best) revenues and eventually you won't be able to continue. People will lose their jobs and you will lose either your position as PD or GM, or if you're an owner, your investment.

Sounds very brutal. I suppose Chris at KFXM does not have to worry too much about the consequences.

That's what I've been trying to get across the past couple of months. Millions of dollars and people's jobs are at stake. And it takes so little to put it sideways.

Chris has a wonderful luxury. Even if no one other than the people who donate listened, he's got his expenses covered.

 

[RIN3GUY]

Quote from: michael hagerty

Even reducing the number of spins on a record the 6% complain about could mean you've brought the record down to a level where the 94% who love it never hear it, or feel they don't hear it enough.

Michael,
I understand that you are an industry veteran, and I am on the outside looking in and for that I do respect your wisdom. However, you have contradicted yourself at every turn. You've previously declared that you can't be hurt by what you don't play, but totally contradicted that above.

You have also said that if it charted high then but doesn't test well today, it shouldn't be played at all because you claim that a song's chart performance from 30 or 40 years ago is irrelevant. I agree that certain songs and perhaps even artists DO need to be sifted out for various reasons. Yet I'm sure you will agree that at least 85-90% of songs played on CH stations are songs that actually charted quite well (typically Top 10, and usually Top 5).

You've asserted that if a song charted from #16 or lower that it was just a "stiff." Yet you've also said that if it tests well today that this so-called "stiff" should receive airplay. You can't have it both ways. Since not all Top 40 hits are tested, they cannot and should not all be considered "stiffs." And since testing is not infallible it should not be a license for running songs into the ground just because a small sample indicated they liked it, or totally ignoring a song on the same basis.

KJMK switched formats just last March. They had been "Lite Rock" format for years (with Deliliah), running the same few dozen songs and their station's rating (4.2) into the ground. Their excellent new rating represents not just a changed format but a greatly expanded library (500-600) and daily cash call-in giveaways of $1400 weekly. I appreciate them, but I still listen to "MIKE FM" half the time even though they play FEWER of my favorites simply because of more variety and less predictability. Their playlist is twice the size and I don't get bored.

IMHO, your attitude about variety and creativity represents all that is wrong today with lackluster, cookie-cutter "good enough" radio programming. It treats the majority of songs which charted respectably well ("middlin' hits," #15 to #30) no better than if they had reached only #75 to #100. I'm not saying they should be on equal footing as the higher-charting songs, but many if not most them should still receive at least limited rotation to break up the monotony of the Top 10 airplay monopoly.

 

[oldies76]

but many if not most them should still receive at least limited rotation to break up the monotony of the Top 10 airplay monopoly.

I really think this is possible. Many small market stations do this to some extent. This arguement has dragged on, on 3 or 4 different threads in the last few months and there has to be a good reason for it. Never has this been so important since classic hits are once again going through that shake up, where the 60's and 70's, will unfortunately be replaced with 80's and 90's, something most of us do not want to see.

More songs have got to be played.

 

[michael hagerty]

Quote from: michael hagerty

Even reducing the number of spins on a record the 6% complain about could mean you've brought the record down to a level where the 94% who love it never hear it, or feel they don't hear it enough.

Michael,
I understand that you are an industry veteran, and I am on the outside looking in and for that I do respect your wisdom. However, you have contradicted yourself at every turn. You've previously declared that you can't be hurt by what you don't play, but totally contradicted that above.

I see your point. Let me see if I can phrase the "can't hurt" a bit more clearly.

That was referring to trying records untested because they hit a certain chart position years or decades before. Testing allows you to define whether a record helps or hurts you, and to what degree (there is no such thing as a record with zero negatives). Once you know whether a record helps or hurts you, then absolutely not playing a valuable record (and not playing it often enough for your target audience to be aware you're playing it) is inhibiting your success.

You have also said that if it charted high then but doesn't test well today, it shouldn't be played at all because you claim that a song's chart performance from 30 or 40 years ago is irrelevant. I agree that certain songs and perhaps even artists DO need to be sifted out for various reasons. Yet I'm sure you will agree that at least 85-90% of songs played on CH stations are songs that actually charted quite well (typically Top 10, and usually Top 5).

I think the percentage is a bit lower than that. Looking at the KRTH playlist over the past few weeks (a lengthy work in progress), there are a surprising number of lower-charting songs and LP cuts that never charted. But they test well with audiences today for various reasons (TV, movie or commercial exposure, life or news events relating to the artist or genre, the fact that the artist sold more LPs than singles to begin with).

You've asserted that if a song charted from #16 or lower that it was just a "stiff." Yet you've also said that if it tests well today that this so-called "stiff" should receive airplay. You can't have it both ways. Since not all Top 40 hits are tested, they cannot and should not all be considered "stiffs." And since testing is not infallible it should not be a license for running songs into the ground just because a small sample indicated they liked it, or totally ignoring a song on the same basis.

Again, context. That was in reply to a suggestion that everything that ever hit #40 should simply be played today because it was a Top 40 record. What I said was there's a huge difference in sales as you work your way down the chart and the cliff comes rapidly (bigger difference between a #1 and a #10 record than between a #20 and a #40 or between a #40 and a #100)...with anything below #15 and probably #12 being a crapshoot. But there are factors (see the last paragraph) that overshadow the peak position in Billboard (as a programmer in the 70s, I was a big believer in folding in sales of the album the single was from. A #24 single from a #1 album is a lot different than a #24 single from a #83 album).

KJMK switched formats just last March. They had been on a "Lite Rock" format for years, running the same few dozen songs and their station's rating (4.2) into the ground. Their excellent new rating represents not just a changed format but a greatly expanded library (500-600) and daily cash call-in giveaways of $1400 weekly. I appreciate them, but I still listen to "MIKE FM" half the time even though they play FEWER of my favorites simply because of more variety and less predictability. Their playlist is twice the size and I don't get bored.

I'm going to assume "Mike FM" is KMXL. They've dropped from a 9.6 to an 8.1 since KJMK's change. It will bear watching over the next few books (Joplin only does Spring and Fall ratings, so it'll be six months before we see Spring '13), but if you're telling me that a station with 500-600 songs has an 11.0 while a station with twice as many songs lost a point and a half in the same time period (falling behind KJMK), I think that's an early indicator that, even in a small market, a tight list can be a winning strategy. The change happened 10 months ago. That's plenty of time for a market to burn on 500-600 songs. Doesn't seem to be happening, and the competitor with the looser list is losing altitude.

IMHO, your attitude about variety and creativity represents all that is wrong today with lackluster, cookie-cutter "good enough" radio programming. It treats the majority of songs which charted respectably well ("middlin' hits," #15 to #30) no better than if they had reached only #75 to #100. I'm not saying they should be on equal footing as the higher-charting songs, but many if not most them should still receive at least limited rotation to break up the monotony of the Top 10 airplay monopoly.

I would agree with that as long as the listeners want to hear them today. That's what testing determines. That attitude actually treats those songs just as well as it treats the former #1s (which I wouldn't play without them testing well, either). And it's why there are songs that peaked in the lower half of the chart that are getting play on KRTH and other Classic Hits stations that put a significant amount of time and money into statistically reliable testing of the target audience.

 

[michael hagerty]

but many if not most them should still receive at least limited rotation to break up the monotony of the Top 10 airplay monopoly.

I really think this is possible. Many small market stations do this to some extent. This arguement has dragged on, on 3 or 4 different threads in the last few months and there has to be a good reason for it. Never has this been so important since classic hits are once again going through that shake up, where the 60's and 70's, will unfortunately be replaced with 80's and 90's, something most of us do not want to see.

More songs have got to be played.

Well, Oldies, I at least had 2 hours and 33 minutes of thinking that you understood why you can't do that. Thanks for that!

 

[oldies76]

Well, Oldies, I at least had 2 hours and 33 minutes of thinking that you understood why you can't do that. Thanks for that!

Oh geez, I'll just logoff and let you & RIN3GUY go at it for a while.....watch out too, Biondi is lurking nearby!

 

[michael hagerty]

IMHO, your attitude about variety and creativity represents all that is wrong today with lackluster, cookie-cutter "good enough" radio programming.

I'm at a loss to see how dozens of radio stations around the country spending considerable time and money to determine what songs their target listeners have in common as favorites and then applying that information in the city in which they obtained it can be considered "cookie-cutter" or "good enough". Lackluster is simply subjective.

 

[RIN3GUY]

Thank you for the clarification, Michael. Perspective and context do make a difference. And album performance certainly is a legitimate factor to consider as well, but Classic Hits stations should not feel compelled to lean AOR. It would be quite nice to hear a Classic Hits station that leans A/C (or an A/C station that leans Classic Hits), and is not petrified to play a Manilow, Streisand, Warwick or Carpenters tune for fear that all the men will tune out. Those artists were an integral part of the Classic Hits era, and they are also part of what made WLS so great in its time. WLS leaned just a bit A/C during the day, and then seemed to get slightly rockier at night, when Landecker might play more Zeppelin.

KMXL (Mike-FM) has a different focus. They have some overlap but skew newer, rockier, with no Beatles, Motown, Monkees, Jackson 5, or disco, unlike KJMK.

I suppose that a tight playlist may be important at first in order to attract a solid listener base, however, that is a gimmick or tool, just like giving away cash. But once established, in order to maintain interest and retain an appreciative listenership it is equally important to expand the playlist to prevent listener burnout. When all songs in rotation are played equally often, there is an element of randomness that is lost and the finite nature of the playlist becomes painfully apparent.

There is no song that is so good that it needs to be played more than 2-3 times a week! Other songs should maybe be played only 2-3 times a month. But I am sure that systems are sophisticated enough to be programmed to do this. Oh, and songs that are punishingly long (e.g., Pie, Jude & Hotel!) how about playing them only half as often? A little bit of those goes a long way.

Either way, there is no excuse for KJMK or any Classic Hits station to not at least occasionally play such great Top 5 hits as:

"Whatever Gets You Through the Night" - John Lennon
"Bad Time" - Grand Funk
"Heatwave" - Linda Ronstadt
"Please Please Me" - Beatles
"She Loves You" - Beatles
"Incense & Peppermints" - Strawberry Alarm Clock
"Will It Go Round In Circles" - Billy Preston
"Fame" - Irene Cara
"Why Can't We Be Friends" - War
"Green Tambourine" - Lemon Pipers
"Games People Play" - Spinners
"Love Will Keep Us Together" - Captain & Tennille
"Feel Like Makin' Love" - Roberta Flack
"Don't Wanna Fall In Love" - Jane Child
"The Happening" - Supremes
"Love Rollercoaster" - Ohio Players
"Make a Move on Me" - Olivia Newton-John
"Hot Line" - Sylvers
"Self Control" - Laura Branigan
"Cruisin'" - Smokey Robinson
"Say It Isn't So" - Hall & Oates
"Part-Time Lover" - Stevie Wonder
"Make Me Lose Control" - Eric Carmen

 

[davideduardo]

I suppose that a tight playlist may be important at first in order to attract a solid listener base, however, that is a gimmick or tool, just like giving away cash. But once established, in order to maintain interest and retain an appreciative listenership it is equally important to expand the playlist to prevent listener burnout.

It's actually the opposite. When a station debuts or is new in the format, many songs that have not played together on a single station are welcomed. But as time goes by, the weaker songs become tiring as they don't hold the same passionate relationship with listeners as the truly big hits.

It's not unusual to have a debut library that is 30% to 50% larger than the permanent library.

When all songs in rotation are played equally often, there is an element of randomness that is lost and the finite nature of the playlist becomes painfully apparent.

Stations don't play all the songs in the same amount. Those that score very high get more plays than lesser scoring ones.

We can more easily look at a CHR station. The powers play 120 times a week, or about every 90 minutes. The next set of currents will likely play every 2.5 to 3 hours, and then there might be categories that turn every 4.5 hours, and then recurrents that might turn over two to three times a day, other recurrents one to two times, and some recent gold that plays once every 30 hours or so... and so on.

Those rotations are based on how often listeners want to hear those same songs over and over. If you don't play them that often, the station will fail.

Similarly with gold based stations, some songs may deserve to play several times a day, once a day, once every day and a half, etc.

In either case... gold or CHR... the fact that there are many songs in many rotations makes the music sets always different. It's like gears in a transmission, where the number of possible cog and groove combinations is almost infinite.

There is no song that is so good that it needs to be played more than 2-3 times a week!

Add to that "...needs to be played more than 2-3 times a week" for each individual listener. Since each listener spends, on average, perhaps 5 hours a week with a single station... maybe 8 hours if the station is their favorite... that means for every listener to hear each song once a week the song would have to be played about 25 times a week!

Other songs should maybe be played only 2-3 times a month.

The average listener would, then, hear them about once a year or less.

But I am sure that systems are sophisticated enough to be programmed to do this.

Music scheduling software can, of course, do this. But nobody would set up a system to intentionally cause the station to lose its audience.

Further, what you describe requires a library of somewhere around 3,000 songs if the rotations range from 8 times a month to 2 times a month. No variant of classic hits shows 3,000 playable songs.

Usually, listeners have strong commonalities on about 700 to 800 songs which are pretty uniformly liked and don't have huge corresponding negatives. Once you have the songs, you do the math on rotations. You can't pad the library to get what "you feel" is right.... you have to deal with the reality that there is a finite number of playable songs.

Either way, there is no excuse for KJMK or any Classic Hits station to not at least occasionally play such great Top 5 hits as:

If they are not played, it is because the audience indicated that they were not acceptable.

 

[michael hagerty]

Thank you for the clarification, Michael. Perspective and context do make a difference. And album performance certainly is a legitimate factor to consider as well, but Classic Hits stations should not feel compelled to lean AOR. It would be quite nice to hear a Classic Hits station that leans A/C (or an A/C station that leans Classic Hits), and is not petrified to play a Manilow, Streisand, Warwick or Carpenters tune for fear that all the men will tune out. Those artists were an integral part of the Classic Hits era, and they are also part of what made WLS so great in its time. WLS leaned just a bit A/C during the day, and then seemed to get slightly rockier at night, when Landecker might play more Zeppelin.

A couple of things to keep in mind:

45 sales peaked in 1974 and fell rapidly from then on. Album sales had already passed them, so factoring in album sales isn't so much skewing AOR as just determining what the natural progression of hit music was.

As for skewing A/C, it's less a gender issue than an age issue. Remember that AC stations were aiming 25-49 back then. Center of the target: 37. So a record by Manilow, Streisand, Carpenters or Dionne that WLS or any Top 40 was playing for adults while the kids were in school) appeals more to someone now in their 70s than to someone in their 40s.

It's why you don't hear those artists on AC anymore (a format that still is aiming for mid-late 30-somethings), and why, with Neil Diamond, you'll hear "Cherry, Cherry" on Classic Hits but not "You Don't Bring Me Flowers". There's only 11 years between those two records, but about 25 years' difference in appeal.

KMXL (Mike-FM) has a different focus. They have some overlap but skew newer, rockier, with no Beatles, Motown, Monkees, Jackson 5, or disco, unlike KJMK.

I suppose that a tight playlist may be important at first in order to attract a solid listener base, however, that is a gimmick or tool, just like giving away cash. But once established, in order to maintain interest and retain an appreciative listenership it is equally important to expand the playlist to prevent listener burnout. When all songs in rotation are played equally often, there is an element of randomness that is lost and the finite nature of the playlist becomes painfully apparent.

I see David beat me to a reply. He's right. I'd only add that in a small city with only 7 stations but with a viable competitor that plays more and different music, you'd be seeing burnout on the wrong 500-600 songs well before now. The fact that they're going up and Mike is going down suggests they're doing it right. Again, with only two ratings periods a year, we have to wait six months for the next snapshot, but if there's burn, we should certainly see it then.

There is no song that is so good that it needs to be played more than 2-3 times a week! Other songs should maybe be played only 2-3 times a month. But I am sure that systems are sophisticated enough to be programmed to do this. Oh, and songs that are punishingly long (e.g., Pie, Jude & Hotel!) how about playing them only half as often? A little bit of those goes a long way.

Again, David's right. The typical listener doesn't park on a Classic Hits station. It's one of several choices they listen to through the day. 2-3 times a week is the minimum it takes (scheduled properly) to register a presence with the typical listener, who will miss all but one of those plays over a three or four week period.

Either way, there is no excuse for KJMK or any Classic Hits station to not at least occasionally play such great Top 5 hits as:

"Whatever Gets You Through the Night" - John Lennon
"Bad Time" - Grand Funk
"Heatwave" - Linda Ronstadt
"Please Please Me" - Beatles
"She Loves You" - Beatles
"Incense & Peppermints" - Strawberry Alarm Clock
"Will It Go Round In Circles" - Billy Preston
"Fame" - Irene Cara
"Why Can't We Be Friends" - War
"Green Tambourine" - Lemon Pipers
"Games People Play" - Spinners
"Love Will Keep Us Together" - Captain & Tennille
"Feel Like Makin' Love" - Roberta Flack
"Don't Wanna Fall In Love" - Jane Child
"The Happening" - Supremes
"Love Rollercoaster" - Ohio Players
"Make a Move on Me" - Olivia Newton-John
"Hot Line" - Sylvers
"Self Control" - Laura Branigan
"Cruisin'" - Smokey Robinson
"Say It Isn't So" - Hall & Oates
"Part-Time Lover" - Stevie Wonder
"Make Me Lose Control" - Eric Carmen

And again, David's right. If the percentage of listeners in a test who say they'll tune out if you play...oh, let's go for the obvious one...Captain and Tenille...is higher than your threshold (What's an acceptable risk? 20%? 25? Certainly not a third of your audience at any given moment), that's the best reason in the world not to play it.

The wild card here is whether KJMK does auditorium testing. In a market that size, I'd usually guess no...but they've got cash for promotion, have a very tight list that isn't exhibiting burn in a market with only 7 signals and while some of the records you list aren't played on big Classic Hits stations, some are, which suggests they aren't just copying another Midwestern station's playlist and may very well have done local testing.

 

[oldies76]

It's not unusual to have a debut library that is 30% to 50% larger than the permanent library.

See, always thought that the "library" was the entire vault of charted hits for the format. The "playlist", on the other hand, would be the active or well-tested songs for daily rotation.

All the remaining music (lower charters, lower testing songs, so-called stiffs) would be "inactive" or just remain in the overall library, available just in case.

Library and Playlist, two different terms here.

 

[oldies76]

45 sales peaked in 1974 and fell rapidly from then on. Album sales had already passed them, so factoring in album sales isn't so much skewing AOR as just determining what the natural progression of hit music was.

Just curious, what were the actual sales of 45's in 1974 in the USA, compared to the years 1975, 1976, 1977...onward to the early 90's. Don't quite understand how singles could just "fall off rapidly" if that was generally the only format to buy singles for the remainder of the 70's (disco era) and all of the 80's. I believe CD singles were introduced in 1989 or so, maybe in the UK first. I know album sales rose in the late 70's and 80's, but many people still did not want to spend $9.99 on an album, when a single was selling for maybe $1.29 or less.

I'm not even counting the lesser-quality cassette singles here.

 

[michael hagerty]

45 sales peaked in 1974 and fell rapidly from then on. Album sales had already passed them, so factoring in album sales isn't so much skewing AOR as just determining what the natural progression of hit music was.

Just curious, what were the actual sales of 45's in 1974 in the USA, compared to the years 1975, 1976, 1977...onward to the early 90's. Don't quite understand how singles could just "fall off rapidly" if that was generally the only format to buy singles for the remainder of the 70's (disco era) and all of the 80's. I believe CD singles were introduced in 1989 or so, maybe in the UK first. I know album sales rose in the late 70's and 80's, but many people still did not want to spend $9.99 on an album, when a single was selling for maybe $1.29 or less.

I'm not even counting the lesser-quality cassette singles here.

I'll have to spend some time combing through back issues of Billboard to get you a year-by-year on that one, Oldies. But here are a couple of mileposts:


1974 (record year) 200 million singles sold.

1985: 90 million singles sold.


1973: Peak number of Gold Record Award singles for all time (70).

1985: 11 Gold Record Award singles.


By the way, in both cases, the 1985 figures are boosted by sales of 12-inch dance mixes, which the RIAA did not separate from 7-inch singles sales. So from 1976-ish on, disco singles added to those numbers.

It's not terribly surprising, really. Beginning in the late 60s, when albums became more than two singles and some filler, albums were percieved as a better buy. That only accelerated through the 1970s.

When the slide began, prices were lower than what you cited. If we're dealing with list prices, you're talking $1.00 to buy two songs or $4.98 to buy 12. Even when prices went up (after the 1973 energy crisis), you were still a lot more likely to find deeper discounts on LPs than singles, so that $8.98 or $9.98 album was probably going to be something like $6.49.

Singles had been selling mainly to teens all along...but as teens in the biggest cities started to transition to FM in general and album rock in particular (KHJ lost teens to KLOS in fall of 1972), the teen base began to erode.

 

[davideduardo]

Library and Playlist, two different terms here.

This is a word usage issue.

In broadcasting, it might be considered that the active library is the playlist.

The key is understanding that the "playlist" term comes from the era when stations might have a true "playlist" of songs that could be played; if it was not on the list, it could not be played.

The introduction of computerized music logs in the late 70's (yeah, using anything from S-100 machines to TRS-80's and Apple II's) made "playlist" and "active library" essentially the same... the DJ could not play anything but what was on the log.

Stations may have a music archive of some kind for songs that they don't have on in the active library. Some companies have centralized systems where nearly anything that might be played on the radio is kept; a station needing a song for a morning show bit or a special can pull them from the central server.

In any case, for most of the discussions here, we have several elements:

1. The active library that includes the songs that come up time and again in the 6 AM to 7 PM time where most listening and nearly all revenues come from.

2. Specialty show songs that play generally in hours that don't produce much revenue and listening, but which are an opportunity to enhance the brand in particular subsets of the audience.

3. Additional songs used to fill or pad overnights or even late nights. Often, these are songs that don't fit, based on score or style, the focus during the prime sales hours.

Here is the math of exposure based on 25-54 averaging at a certain classic hits station in New York (caveat: these are broad averages to not violate citing specific books):

Total people reached 6 AM to Midnight, all week: 1.8 million
Percent of all 25-54's reached in a week: 21%

Total people reached daily on average: 500,000
Percent of all 25-54's reached each day: 6%

Total people reached 5 AM-7 PM M-Sun: 1.6 million.

So you see that evenings are only a small contributor to the reach of the station, and weekend evenings are even less.

Overnights cumes 100,000 so that means that songs played in that daypart that are not otherwise played reach only a tiny group. Weekend evenings reach about 80,000 each... less even than overnights. So plays in weekend evenings reach to few people to matter.

All this is why many, if not most, of us look at M-F 6 AM to 7 PM or M-F 6 AM to Midnight for analyzing music plays; we don't look at weekend evening and we don't look at overnights as they don't represent many impressions, even if songs are played.

 

[oldies76]

Stations may have a music archive of some kind for songs that they don't have on in the active library. Some companies have centralized systems where nearly anything that might be played on the radio is kept; a station needing a song for a morning show bit or a special can pull them from the central server.

This is what I was looking for, thanks for all the information you provided.

 

[oldies76]

I'll have to spend some time combing through back issues of Billboard to get you a year-by-year on that one, Oldies.

Oh, you don't have to go through all the trouble. Thanks for the info, though.

 

[michael hagerty]

I'll have to spend some time combing through back issues of Billboard to get you a year-by-year on that one, Oldies.

Oh, you don't have to go through all the trouble. Thanks for the info, though.

Okay. A little added context, though:

Even though singles sales peaked in 1974 (and 1973 was close), the rate of growth began to slow from 1967 on and LP sales were increasing at such a rate that before the 60s were out, industry folks were predicting that LPs would outpace singles sales soon and singles would start to fall. One statistic I am still going to look for is the year in which LP sales beat 45s...it may have been while singles sales were still on the rise, but slowing.

 

[michael hagerty]

Sorry for multiple posts, but the information comes piecemeal.

LP sales eclipsed singles sales in the 60s.

In the peak year for singles of 1974 (200 million sold), 400 million albums were sold.

Singles dropped from there, albums climbed and by 1985, when singles were at 90 million (including 12 inch dance mixes), albums were at 675 million.

 

[oldies76]

Singles dropped from there, albums climbed and by 1985, when singles were at 90 million (including 12 inch dance mixes), albums were at 675 million.

According to Wikipedia, there's some amazing stats regarding the "We Are the World" #1 single:

"The single was also a commercial success; the initial shipment of 800,000 "We Are the World" records sold out within three days of release. The record became the fastest-selling American pop single in history. At one Tower Records store on Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood, 1,000 copies of the song were sold in two days."

Also the album site says that 3 million copies of the LP were sold in the US. Thought that would have been higher. Interesting

 

[michael hagerty]

Singles dropped from there, albums climbed and by 1985, when singles were at 90 million (including 12 inch dance mixes), albums were at 675 million.

According to Wikipedia, there's some amazing stats regarding the "We Are the World" #1 single:

"The single was also a commercial success; the initial shipment of 800,000 "We Are the World" records sold out within three days of release. The record became the fastest-selling American pop single in history. At one Tower Records store on Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood, 1,000 copies of the song were sold in two days."

Also the album site says that 3 million copies of the LP were sold in the US. Thought that would have been higher. Interesting

Not just another single...a piece of pop history and an opportunity for Americans to feel like they were helping conquer hunger by going to the record store. And there was urgency...people were starving. Buy the record quick and get the money to buy the food quicker.

The album? It was tied to an event that was only going to get media exposure for so long before attention turned elsewhere. Triple platinum's not bad, all things considered. Albums that did better than that were usually propelled by multiple hit songs and promotional campaigns that lasted a year or more.