It's 2015! Time to get rid of the '70s.

[CurtisNEPA]

Two things here.

First, there's a small top 40 station calling themselves T-102 about 50 miles south of my location that not only plays CHR, but it mixes in with 80s, and yes, even 70's disco stuff thrown in. That is because it's located in Schuylkill County, about 50 miles NW of the Philadelphia region. And that small coal mining region has only two stations to choose from. Last month, I even hear them playing X-Mas tunes during the month of December, something you don't get to hear on any other CHR outlets in the market.

Lastly, the Cumulus owned station I have mentioned called KMGA out of New Mexico has no reason of putting Barry White stuff in their playlist. He does not belong to this type of format anymore! I couldn't tolerate his sleepy tunes, particularly Never, Never Gonna Give You Up, which the station has not played as of yet as part of their aggressive tweaking. Except for his well-known hit Can't Get Enough of Your Love, Babe, I personally don't like his music. It's not my taste. On the other hand, our local AC outlet, Magic 93(WMGS) has very limited 70's playlist, but most of their stuff is just 80s-current product. It's also owned by Cumulus.

If I'm a PD of a small county top-40 station with no competitors, I'm free to include any type of music dating up to even 40 years ago. That will target both the 18-34 and the adult audiences. However, if I'm a PD of a medium or a major market AC or hot AC station whose competitor runs the classic hits format, then I'll never include any sleepy oldies music from 35 years ago, this includes Barry White. That, itself will drive listeners away.

 

[Music Lover]

As this station's Linkedin page explains, while the soft, Adult Contemporary format is slowly leaving the traditional broadcast medium, it is having a second life on the web. These web-only stations have been put on the air in response to the growing number of broadcast Adult Contemporary stations that are, sadly, but naturally moving away from the 70s and 80s hits. These stations are designed for listeners (like me) who may enjoy some new artists but love hearing the older songs in a soft rock setting (as opposed to Classic Hits or Oldies or Standards.) https://www.linkedin.com/company/k-lite-online

If it weren't for such stations, I would give up on radio.

 

[Music Lover]

The web-only soft Adult Contemporary stations have revealed to me an issue on the other end of the spectrum.

The few soft AC's that are out there on FM radio, such as WDUV in Florida or WEZW in New Jersey could use updates to their playlists. There are plenty of soft songs that have been on the AC charts between 2000 and 2014 that those stations are ignoring.

Songs such as:

Say Something - A Great Big World/Christina Aguilera
Brave - Josh Groban
Incredible - Celine Dion/Ne-Yo
All Of Me - John Legend
Just Friends - Vanessa Williams
I Hope You Find It - Cher
Going Back - Phil Collins
Story Of My Life - One Direction
Close Your Eyes - Michael Buble
Good Morning Beautiful - Jim Brickman/Luke McMasters
Marry Me - Train
When I Was Your Man - Bruno Mars
Let It Go - Idina Menzel
A Thousand Years - Christina Perri

 

[oldies76]

I didn't know stations met with listeners. I always thought it was the "suits", like in this Yahoo discussion: https://nz.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070506175501AAqK4qq

Yes, they do research, but interestingly, the results are usually the same, month after month and year after year. Why? Because those testing companies always present the same music already heard on classic hits stations to retest to their audiences over and over again. So since the songs are already familiar, the audience will favor those heavily aired songs again and again and........again. And since these are basically the same songs being aired repeatedly, any "new" classics that get presented, will usually get the negative response because of unfamiliarity, even though many of these lost songs were huge and ranked very high in their debut time.

I believe radio's testing methods are somewhat to blame for the selections of music being aired today. Out of all the songs that charted just top 10 from the late 60's through the 80's, barely 10% of all those timeless classics are being aired today on classic hits stations, with many of them aired up to 5 times a day. You'd expect tighter rotations on AC stations, since their rotational libraries are much smaller. Most songs are playable today and nearly all of them were minor or incredible hits on top 40 radio in their heydays, despite these "suits" telling music and radio fans, that they were not.

Music and radio fans (such as myself) and our so-called "peculiar" and "outlier" tastes for recent and older classics whether on AC or CH stations, would certainly enjoy more songs than what is offered today, but fortunately there are other smaller terrestrial stations out there that do offer them, but you'll never hear them in big cities since they program only to the "common mass" and their limited expectations.

As for AC eliminating the 70's, I think selective power and catchy songs should remain, mixed well with the 80's and some 90's, the rest should go to classic hits, I agree.

 

[oldies76]

There are plenty of soft songs that have been on the AC charts between 2000 and 2014 that those stations are ignoring.

The libraries for AC stations are much smaller than classic hits, since only a certain sound is expected from AC stations and many deserving songs will be left off the plate. The big difference between CH and AC, is that with CH, a goldmine of songs are available from nearly five decades of hits, where as with AC, it's usually two decades of just the biggest hits and a distinctive sound and presentation is expected.

 

[TheBigA]

I believe radio's testing methods are somewhat to blame for the selections of music being aired today.

So because you don't like the results, you blame the methodology?

You're welcome to come up with a methodology that suits your taste, and show us the results you get. There is no law that reserves the music testing business to "suits."

 

[Music Lover]

The thing I like about a station like this one is that they can play album cuts and one-hit-wonders I haven't heard in years: http://www.radionomy.com/en/radio/soft-hits-and-lost-hits. I've heard songs I haven't heard since I was a kid, such as "Never Ending Story" by Limahl and "Thinking Of You" by Sa-Fire and "Toy Soldiers" by Martika. It's like Pannoni1 mentioned in the Chat box on this station's website (http://www.softrockradio.net/softrockradiolove.html): Those song selections remind me of the innocence growing up.

I also like a station like this one that plays some European pop artists that I very rarely hear on US stations: http://www.heartbeatfm.net. An example of such an artist would be Boyzone, an Irish "boy band" that I liked in the 90s.

 

[oldies76]

"Never Ending Story" by Limahl

Great song from 30 years ago!! The eighties never sounded better!

 

[oldies76]

So because you don't like the results, you blame the methodology?

You're welcome to come up with a methodology that suits your taste, and show us the results you get. There is no law that reserves the music testing business to "suits."

And to avoid expense, I'll just avoid the music tests altogether. As they say.....just play the music.

I would simply do research by comparing playlists from major classic hits stations and incorporating lost songs to create a diverse station that pleases everyone, music fans alike. A station that solely rotates 400 songs is not representative of classic hits. The CH era has a GOLDMINE of potential, to pick just 2 or 3 nuggets from a mound of hundreds in front of you is wasteful. Or play Pac-Man and chomp one 200 point ghost when all four are right in front of you....2800 points wasted.

 

[Music Lover]

That station that plays "Never Ending Story" has nearly 3000 songs on the playlist. As they say on their Facebook page, probably the only radio station in the world that has that many charted US AC hits. https://www.facebook.com/SoftHitsAndLostHits

 

[TheBigA]

I would simply do research by comparing playlists from major classic hits stations and incorporating lost songs to create a diverse station that pleases everyone, music fans alike.

You missed my point. Radio stations want to see results. Right now, what they're doing is getting great results. You need to prove that changing what they're doing, and doing things YOUR way will get them the same or better results than they're currently getting. None of your posts prove to me that doing radio for you and a handful of other music lovers will appeal to the masses. It'll just make you and your friends happy. For that, you can continue to listen to the stations you already enjoy.

 

[Music Lover]

The libraries for AC stations are much smaller than classic hits, since only a certain sound is expected from AC stations and many deserving songs will be left off the plate. The big difference between CH and AC, is that with CH, a goldmine of songs are available from nearly five decades of hits, where as with AC, it's usually two decades of just the biggest hits and a distinctive sound and presentation is expected.

The thing is, since the few soft AC's that are out there on FM are playing the usual tired oldies by their core artists (Celine Dion, Josh Groban, Jim Brickman, Vanessa Williams, Phil Collins, Michael Buble), you would think that new soft songs by those core artists would fit in too.

Example: This soft AC will go by sound but also by core artists: http://www.softneasy.com/. Michael Buble is a core artist. But he's had more hits besides "Home". So, they've added those newer hits.

Seems to me, the soft AC's on FM would be doing the same, yet they act as if Michael Buble hasn't had anything new.

 

[oldies76]

You missed my point. Radio stations want to see results. Right now, what they're doing is getting great results. You need to prove that changing what they're doing, and doing things YOUR way will get them the same or better results than they're currently getting .

With a system that you embrace already in place on a national scale, that would be difficult to overcome. But there are plenty of other stations that do not participate in your ways of research that have lasted for many years. Mine would be of similar nature. Anything is possible.

Why spend the money on tests, if you can just incorporate samples of other stations playlists and do some shuffling with other big hits?? Obviously my station would play "Hotel California", "Brown Eyed Girl" and "Billie Jean", mixed with "Fire Lake" by Seger, "Send One You Love" by Stevie and "Back in Love Again" by LTD.

 

[TheBigA]

With a system that you embrace already in place on a national scale, that would be difficult to overcome.

There's nothing like to success. The minute any of those "other stations" have the kind of success that's worth emulating, you'll see everyone rush to embrace what they do. It's not like we've never thought about mixing in other songs. Just that every time we do, it leads to tune-out, and that's not very encouraging.

 

[oldies76]

The thing is, since the few soft AC's that are out there on FM are playing the usual tired oldies by their core artists (Celine Dion, Josh Groban, Jim Brickman, Vanessa Williams, Phil Collins, Michael Buble), you would think that new soft songs by those core artists would fit in too.

Same thing happens on CH's. Some play their core songs up to 5 times a day, everyday. The problem with soft AC, is just that, most songs are soft and sleepy. They have to be mixed with more lively currents and classics. To be just soft and easy, is like the 70's versions of "Music of your life" stations or standards. They have not lasted too well over the years.

 

[oldies76]

It's not like we've never thought about mixing in other songs. Just that every time we do, it leads to tune-out, and that's not very encouraging.

It's because your audience has not heard those songs in years. Many big city stations have been in a long-lasting rut of simply playing the same 400 songs that supposedly they all agree on, so they are used to them after years of repeated exposure. If the other songs would have been played in the first place, then maybe the tune-out factor would not be so high today. Your audience is familiar with the familiars and have forgotten the others.

But on the other hand, people always complain about limited and repeated playlists, but yet somehow, you guys never hear that. The public does though.

 

[TheBigA]

But on the other hand, people always complain about limited and repeated playlists, but yet somehow, you guys never hear that. The public does though.

People always complain about a lot of things. We care about what they DO, and we see how they behave every time we check the ratings.

Also, stations cycle in new songs all the time. There is no "long-lasting rut." There are some songs that are always there, and some different songs all the time.

 

[Music Lover]

Same thing happens on CH's. Some play their core songs up to 5 times a day, everyday. The problem with soft AC, is just that, most songs are soft and sleepy. They have to be mixed with more lively currents and classics. To be just soft and easy, is like the 70's versions of "Music of your life" stations or standards. They have not lasted too well over the years.

This is WDUV's (one of the few soft AC's still on FM) hour by hour playlist: http://www.wduv.com/lsp/

This is a non-FM soft AC playlist: http://www.softneasy.com/

Both stations are soft and easy in sound, nothing very lively, yet the non-FM soft AC is more up-to-date with playing soft currents from the charts than the FM soft AC is.

 

[Avid Listener]

So because you don't like the results, you blame the methodology?

You're welcome to come up with a methodology that suits your taste, and show us the results you get. There is no law that reserves the music testing business to "suits."

I know more than a few musicians who play many live gigs. They all say that the sequence in which songs are played have a huge impact on how well an audience likes them. All of the external factors in the listening venue make a big, big difference. Sticking a bunch of people in an auditorium and playing little snippets of songs to gauge their reactions is an extremely easy deck to stack. So are most other methods of song testing. I've never heard of a method of song testing that wasn't easy to manipulate.

There's nothing like to success. The minute any of those "other stations" have the kind of success that's worth emulating, you'll see everyone rush to embrace what they do. It's not like we've never thought about mixing in other songs. Just that every time we do, it leads to tune-out, and that's not very encouraging.

The few times I've heard a station that I actually liked, it was something I stumbled on by accident when traveling outside the range of the preset buttons on my car radio, or something a friend told me about. For those local stations that I could tune in any time I wanted, I only learned of them by accident. Many people I know would have probably liked them had they known they were on the air, but they got no publicity and no promotion. So, they failed. But they didn't fail because of the product they put on the air. They failed because no one who would have liked them knew they were there to listen to.

 

[TheBigA]

I've never heard of a method of song testing that wasn't easy to manipulate.

We also can simply play them on the radio and watch as listeners tune out. I've seen that happen. I've also been to concerts where artists try to work in unfamiliar stuff, and watched as people left the room. The goal in radio programming is to keep people in the room, not give them a reason to leave. If listeners are interested in hearing album cuts, we encourage them to buy the album, and listen on their own personal music device. As I said yesterday, we're not a replacement for personal music devices.

And once again, radio stations have no reason to manipulate the audience with regards to music. It costs us exactly the same amount of money to play a hit as it does an album cut. It's up to the audience. Time and time again, they're the ones who manipulate us to play the familiar favorites.