Deeper Issues?

[davideduardo]

Radio has already done this to an extent. I remember the days where a single station would play both Country and MOR music and also have non-music features in between. Now every station seems to belong to a single genre and even uses that branding in its advertising.

You are remembering the pre-FM days of the 50's and 60's.

When FM started to become viable in the very late 60's and early 70's, most markets found themselves with triple the number of truly competitive stations. And if you write off the AM daytimers, in some markets the viable stations quadrupled.

So stations specialized. And record labels found profitable niche markets.

Harder rock found a home with "progressive rock" formats. Then that split with Album Oriented Rock popping out in the earlier 70's. And "chicken rock" which was later named AC came out in that early 70's period. Those are just a couple of examples.

All kinds of splits happened, and we ended up with boutique formats instead of department store formats.

 

[CTListener]

Radio has already done this to an extent. I remember the days where a single station would play both Country and MOR music and also have non-music features in between. Now every station seems to belong to a single genre and even uses that branding in its advertising.

WJMJ Hartford CT. Of course it's a noncomm and has three breaks an hour for Catholic dogma and teachings:

10:44	Fleetwood Mac - Think About Me
10:40	Elton John - Candle in the Wind (Princess Diana version - 1997)
10:36	Orleans - Dance With Me
10:26	Chicago - Make Me Smile
10:24	Scott McKenzie - San Francisco (Wear Flowers In Your Hair)
10:20	Brooks & Dunn - My Maria
10:17	Commodores - Oh No
10:14	Julian Lennon - Too Late For Goodbyes
10:11	Loggins and Messina - My Music
10:07	Procol Harum - Conquistador
09:56	Mariah Carey - Fantasy
09:51	Phil Collins - Do You Remember ?
09:48	Four Seasons - Stay

 

[seatownmedia]

Back in the day (60’s/70’s) WABC NYC played everything on the national charts despite wildly different genres. Few big AM’s did this. IMO, this helped make WABC the success it was.

 

[davideduardo]

Back in the day (60’s/70’s) WABC NYC played everything on the national charts despite wildly different genres. Few big AM’s did this. IMO, this helped make WABC the success it was.

WABC was about the slowest station in the US in going on songs. They were very conservative, and for much of its earlier history they let other Top 40's like WMCA, WMGM and WINS "test out" the songs before they added them.

In the earlier 60's, WMCA often beat WABC in the ratings, despite a lesser signal.

In the mid and late 60's when I owned a Top 40 station, I could have picked WABC to emulate as I even had, most of the time, the latest jingle package that had been created for them. But, instead, I used WQAM as my model to emulate. Less non-pop junk, a more active playlist and better balance of the subgenres in Top 40.