You are reacting as if Alt listeners were a monolithic group. They are not. If you go to an Alt music test (or watch the results pour in online) you will see that there is no unity, just very differentiated sub groups that only have a few songs in common.
Yeah, but I know some of the people in real life who make up the alternative listener base and have a pretty good idea of a common profile. I'm guessing these people like adult swim, ifc, amc, coffee shops, among others and probably don't like reality tv, mtv, tiktok, celebrity culture, and justin bieber.
I would say that KPNT and 91X (XTRA) probably have the best fingers on the pulse on what alternative listeners like right now - or at least appeal to the broadest range of them. Both KPNT and XTRA touch alternative metal veterans like Chevelle, Deftones, and Tool (KPNT also likes to pick up newer acts that fit that label, and they give the red carpet to post-grunge legends Shinedown still) - but their bread and butter are a wide variety of indie rock. They do add some pop-punk revival artists without going overkill on the movement like Audacy does. They also pick up a smidgen of indie pop, but indie pop tends to be used like parsley on a really elaborate dish on both stations I would say.
That's interesting and a good representation of how alternative should move.
It's probably because they tap into what the audience actually wants to hear. An active rock/indie combination is what they need right now. Pop punk isn't doing anybody any good right now. Every alternative station, even in Denver, is down because of the music being played on the format. I think moving away from the pop and pop punk sound as soon as possible is what's necessary for the format to survive.
Or is it simply too late for alternative to be a viable commercial format in Denver or most other cities because the demos that used to be into rock and melodic pop have drifted into less complex, more rhythmic genres with greater street cred and "keeping it real" hipness?
In Denver, the alternative station used to be #1. It might be so that they drift into other genres, but there's always a profile for the listener that they need to tap into and tailor to. Right now, I think there is a hole in a lot of markets for the kinds of rock that made early '10s alternative thrive.
Pop yes. I think pop on the format has run its course. Pop-punk I'm not so sure. All Time Low had the rock hit of 2020 and it had some success on pop and active rock radio. Machine Gun Kelly is a top 10 hit on pop radio with his new sound and he also crossed to Active.
Not as simple as that. In one test I watched, there was a group of songs that were universally well scoring, but they were very few in number. After that, one could see using factor analysis that, when you divided the total into three groups each one came out with about the same number of respondents (recruit was based on passing scores on 3 out of 5 pods of Alt "hits" and use of radio) but group A tolerated group B songs and disliked group C... and so on for each group.
You're correct, and the fragmentation has gotten worse this year. Checking spin counts; nobody can agree on anything right now. Audacy is in their own world, iHeart is being even more conservative than usual (just staples and megahits), the Active-leaners are, well, running Active songs (watch out for The Pretty Reckless to make Billboard Alt tomorrow due to them), and everyone else is throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. Twenty One Pilots will be sitting pretty at #1 for the entire spring because nothing has any chance of catching "Shy Away" other than maybe All Time Low yet again.
Nothing drove listeners away. The music fragmented into a number of distinct flavors, with only a few big hits crossing over to all groups. So radio stations found that they could not play many / most of the new songs because each one was polarized and would turn off a major portion of listeners.
The reduction of the 50's "Top 40" concept has affected nearly all formats.
That wasn't my point. I talking about how the smaller market stations seem to be coalescing behind a general indie/alternative rock sound (with varying degrees of heaviness) while Audacy is pushing something completely out of left field. That's the disconnect I was talking about. The two visions are at total odds with each other to the point where they're almost different formats.
