How often do djs hate what they play?

[Tibbs4]

BigA: Very good point. Something a lot of folks on this board may not consider.

Tempo/talk speed/yes. I guess after all these years “it just comes natural? LOL”

One of my friends in Chattanooga (still mostly live) has the most casual and real delivery. He is just himself and he talks right “with” his audience. It works no matter what he is playing and its all classic rock. Really interesting. And successful.

 

[Phil Harmonic]

I can remember hearing on WLS where they were playing Muskrat Love and the DJ said "I now declare muskrat season open" with guns going off.

Another most hated song by DJs of the 70s.... Bo Donaldson & The Heywoods Billy Don't Be A Hero, we always called it "Billy Don't Be A Zero" or "That The Night The Light Went Out In Georgia" or "Sylvia's Mother" by Dr Hook.

I used to like to hang in the studio during Dr Dave Dunaway doing nights on Y-100/Miami.... you almost never heard a song played on the speakers. He did the intro and that was it.

 

[tbolt909]

Maybe. Some VT programs play the start and end of each song so you can get the tempo. You don't want to yell coming out of a big ballad, or whisper coming out of a big rocker.

It's not that hard to become familiar with the music. A professional broadcaster should be able to adapt. Some of the "talents" on the air today are embarrassingly bad. Some in major markets sound like they have no experience at all.

Since the quality of the on air product no longer matters in Corporate Radio, it's irrelevant if jocks like the music they're back announcing. Non Commercial Radio provides some exceptions where the jocks actually care about the presentation...

 

[SomeRadioGuy]

Never.

Doesnt matter if i do or not, the listeners will never know.. ill make them think whatever im playing is the best damn music out there since sliced bread.

that being said.. the current jobs i hold (noted below) i happen to love, partly because of the music selections/format.. i picked them/got them, in part for that purpose

 

[Mikey Radio]

Some artists resisted recording what became their biggest hits. Junior Walker didn't like "What Does It Take" because it was a departure from songs like "I'm A Road Runner" or "Shotgun". George Jones so much hated "He Stopped Loving Her Today" he took forever to record the spoken word part. He said "ain't nobody going to buy this maudlin piece of s**t" or something like it. It became his biggest hit and he sang it for the rest of his life.

Mark Chesnutt confessed he was against recording a cover of the Aerosmith song "I Don't Want To Miss a Thing." His label pushed him to do it. It became a big hit for him, but he never sings it today in his shows:

While Billy Joel never publicly said he's tired of playing/singing his signature song "Piano Man", he has said he was embarrassed when it became a hit:

The success of 'Piano Man' embarrassed Joel
When “Piano Man” became an overnight success, Joel was very surprised at the way that people enjoyed it. , Joel could see all of the flaws in it: “The melody is not very good and very repetitious, while the lyrics are like limericks,” he said

 

[Larry]

Doing a four-hour shift in Top 40 meant you'd play your powers twice a day. There are songs from 1973-1975 that I burned on so throughly at the time that it's only been in the last couple of years that I've been able to listen to them all the way through again. And given that most of them were 3 and a half minutes or less, that's saying something.

I can somewhat relate as there were artists huge on top 40 radio in the mid 70s that I didn’t like (e.g. Elton John) because it seemed like I heard them on the radio every hour. Now that I’m not burnt out on hearing them I can appreciate their talent and enjoy their music.

 

[vchimpanzee]

When was the last time that was played anywhere but on a Casey Kasem rerun?

America's Best Music. But I don't know how long it's been because I got tired of the format.

 

[firepoint525]

Your job isn't playing your favorite songs. Your job is doing a show and executing a format. Of course, especially when we were playing music manually, jocks got tired of hearing current songs twice per shift. I don't like country that much but still played it.

Seems like the only time that I ever heard the same song(s) twice per shift was when I worked overnights. Then because of the lack of commercials during those hours, the currents came up in rotation more often. I tried to slow it down a bit by playing longer versions, dance mixes, etc., when and where we had them. It seemed to work, and because of the late hour, no one really cared.

 

[michael hagerty]

In the days when powers played every hour and 40 minutes (and some stations were turning them every hour and 10 minutes), you’d easily play most of your seven hottest records twice in a three-hour shift, and more if you were on for four, five or six hours.

 

[Tibbs4]

Phil Collins has apologized for a few songs and said on a TV interview that he hates “Groovy Kind of Love.” That interview is incredible and funny. I would say its tough for long haulers on air to not get tired of Fleetwood Mac, Elton John, Kansas, Styx and Billy Joel. But those artists and groups have paid lots of salaries. . As for fast rotations, back when Addicted to Love, West End Girls, What Have You Done for Me Lately were all fighting on the charts, we had them on 40 minute rotations. 40 minutes. And still got 100 calls from listeners wanting us to play those songs because we had not played them a long time ago. Ten minutes. This was a hot hit beach radio station along the Gulf Coast. Endless Spring Break back in those days.

 

[tall_guy1]

Never.

Doesnt matter if i do or not, the listeners will never know.. ill make them think whatever im playing is the best damn music out there since sliced bread.

that being said.. the current jobs i hold (noted below) i happen to love, partly because of the music selections/format.. i picked them/got them, in part for that purpose

I have heard djs comment on some individual songs though, like "this is my favorite song out right now." Or ive heard djs talk about artists that werent currently on the radio. Ive heard a morning drive dj say he doesnt like avril lavignes music as it hasnt evolved at all.

 

[michael hagerty]

I have heard djs comment on some individual songs though, like "this is my favorite song out right now." Or ive heard djs talk about artists that werent currently on the radio. Ive heard a morning drive dj say he doesnt like avril lavignes music as it hasnt evolved at all.

Generally, program directors (at least in the old days when jocks said stuff) were okay with enthusiasm over artists and songs. Going on the air and complaining about the records basically is like saying "our radio station's music sucks".

 

[TheBigA]

I have heard djs comment on some individual songs though, like "this is my favorite song out right now." Or ive heard djs talk about artists that werent currently on the radio. Ive heard a morning drive dj say he doesnt like avril lavignes music as it hasnt evolved at all.

It can be a function of age. Typically the older a DJ gets, the less filtered the presentation. Boston's Matty In The Morning was doing just fine until he tuned 70, and then he made comments about Demi Lovato.

Keep in mind that some of these DJs in some of these formats are older than their average listeners. They're also older than the artists they play.

 

[DelmarvaDX]

A personal regret: While I was still in school I had the chance to intern at a local AM/FM combo. The former was country, the latter AC. (This was 32 years ago.) I never pursued it because I was a country fan and was concerned they'd make me work FM! I never did get a radio job...

 

[seatownmedia]

Of course dj’s will dislike some songs that are programmed by the PD or MD. I remember some of these, so what did I do? Just turned down my studio monitor. Not a difficult thing to do. But you had to watch your digital clock!

 

[DavidEduardo]

A personal regret: While I was still in school I had the chance to intern at a local AM/FM combo. The former was country, the latter AC. (This was 32 years ago.) I never pursued it because I was a country fan and was concerned they'd make me work FM! I never did get a radio job...

I was a suburban white kid in Cleveland, but I was able to get a go-fer opportunity at an AM/FM that was R&B and Jazz and where I was their "token white" guy. In a short time, I moved to paid board op and other positions.

I had no experience with either format. I neither liked nor disliked the music, so as I worked and learned, I developed a real liking and ended up being smuggled into club shows by the staff to witness the repertoire live.

I would have preferred being in the same position at WHK or WERE, but I picked the station I could ride my bike to. They were initially amused by the white kid who hung around, and then they adopted me. I even went down to Mississippi to help voter registration with them and I stopped looking at people's color. Definitely, I was more welcome and got better experience there!

With today's labor laws, I could never do that again. I'd have ended up like my grand-kids, sitting at home playing video games and the like. Sometimes overly restrictive laws prevent people from having valuable experiences.

 

[DavidEduardo]

Of course dj’s will dislike some songs that are programmed by the PD or MD. I remember some of these, so what did I do? Just turned down my studio monitor. Not a difficult thing to do. But you had to watch your digital clock!

A lot of us did that. Once cart machines had secondary and tertiary tones, we'd set them up to flash lights 10 seconds or so before the end or fade point.

 

[tall_guy1]

It can be a function of age. Typically the older a DJ gets, the less filtered the presentation. Boston's Matty In The Morning was doing just fine until he tuned 70, and then he made comments about Demi Lovato.

Keep in mind that some of these DJs in some of these formats are older than their average listeners. They're also older than the artists they play.

She at the time didnt have any song out and it was a chr. He was probably middle aged. He said something along the lines of "the one I cant get into is avril lavigne. She started out making music for teenage girls and she still does!"

 

[michael hagerty]

She at the time didnt have any song out and it was a chr. He was probably middle aged. He said something along the lines of "the one I cant get into is avril lavigne. She started out making music for teenage girls and she still does!"

Tall:

By now, we should know that BigA rarely gets his facts wrong. If you're going to argue with him, you should use the same device you post with to look stuff up and be sure you're right and he's not first.

The issue was with Demi Lovato, who had just announced they were non-binary.

And unless he's living to 138, Matty wasn't middle-aged. He was 69 at the time of the incident, which you can read about here:

Kiss 108 host Matt Siegel storms off show claiming censorship over Demi Lovato comments

 

[Deleted User]

it is like a cook or Chef having to prepare a dish they are not fond of, they put out the best product they can and put their own opinions aside.

Turn the monitors down and move on