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Nashville's Jack!!

Re: 80s-80s-80s-80s-80s

> that's not what I said- the conversation was about Eighties
> stations.

I know its about 80s stations, but what did 90s have to do with anything? Were you using an example or something?

> > You mean oldies stations are adding 90s already? Not Jack
> > type, but regular oldies? Didn't know that, but I'm sure a
>
> > lot of oldies listeners don't want to here 90s music. Now
> is
> > the appropriate time to add select 80s, which some are
> > doing.
> >
> > > So, a 29 yr old who thinks it's the next oldies
> derivation
> >
> > > or focuses on dance club-type 80s hits will get killed
> > > (message to Cox 80s stations).
> >
> >
> >
> > > > Sounds boring. Even if a regular listener was
> listening
> > to
> > >
> > > > the whole show, they would probably notice.
> > > >
> > >
> >
>
<P ID="signature">______________
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80s post rerun

> I know its about 80s stations, but what did 90s have to do
> with anything? Were you using an example or something?

Read on, McDuff:

Problem with most 80s stations is (are) the people programming them. I'm betting by looking at their music monitors) most look at is a "retro" format and the Prince/Madonna station. That is a recipe for disaster.

The 80s was a great decade for pop music and there is a boatload of great music available that is definitely familiar. And, a lot of that music was pop/rock plus there's some great late 70s music (Cars, Clash, etc.) available along with a SELECT number of early 90s songs. Most oldies stations who are getting killed right now are, IMHO, adding TOO MUCH 90s music.

So, a 29 yr old who thinks it's the next oldies derivation or focuses on dance club-type 80s hits will get killed (message to Cox 80s stations).
 
80s

That could be, but it's up to the PD to include a wide, broad representative music list for the test PLUS the correct demo and lifegroup.

If their playlist (let's say) is currently 400 songs, they should test at least 700 or do a two night test and do 1200-- it can be done and is worth the time and money.

> Somewhere in this thread, I'd like to also point out that it
> may be the end result of a music test.
>
> One person, (depending on the market) may be representing up
> to 4,000 people.
> If the music tests say that those attending are NOT sick of
> the Prince/Madonna/eighties pop playlist, then the 80's
> station carries on playing the same songs over and over
> until that music test shows otherwise...or...until the
> ratings come in and show otherwise.
>
 
Re: 80s

I think the fact that these songs tested highly positive in six test groups
of over 100 people in two markets (including Nashville) and got minimal airplay
on Star 97 (If any) is a good example of how out of touch the station was:


Good 80's:

Annimotion - Obsession
West End Girls - Pet Shop Boys
OMD - If You Leave
Robert Palmer - Addicted to Love
Asia - Only Time Will Tell
Pat Benatar - Love Is A Battlefield (also We Live For Love)

vs. these songs that did not test worth a damn (over and over) and still have
been played well into the ground, but were on high rotation is just an
example of why Star sucked as an 80's station.


Bad 80's - mainly because they were so played into the ground originally:

Go-Go's - Our Lips Are Seal
C Lauper - Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
Frankie Goes to Hollywood - Relax
Madonna - Borderline
Prince - 1999
M. Jackson - Billy Jean
Pat Benatar - Heartbreaker
Toto - Rosanna
Loverboy - Working for the Weekend (actually played very little, to hard)

Thus, Star was a wimpy, non-emotional middle-of-the-road AC 80's station
with less than 80 songs in regular rotation and it drove people off the
deep end quickly. Plus, it was boring as hell.

I found that people liked the US/British/European sounds (Crowded House,
Cutting Crew, Roxy Music, INXS, Talk Talk, U-2, Peter Gabriel etc.) and got sick of Billy Joel, The Pointer Sisters and Night Ranger. Dep Leppard was
sort of a hot potato.

It really doesn't matter much now, does it?
 
Re: Star=80s=dog

Actually I did look at Media Base as I always do. I Wanna Dance With Somebody? The problem in Chicago (94.7's debacle, morph #4) was that it was all whitey all the time. No attention to heritage of this market and no dance. Nothing like injecting your own preferences into what you "THINK" works EX: "dance-club garbage". How silly and WRONG. I guess that throws the money spent on research out the window. Which leads me to this. How important is research, how WRONG is it when a station flips a format and falls apart even more. KNOW YOUR MARKET. Research can only show so much. Be intellectually honest about the MUSIC in the market. Not all white guys listen to just rock n' roll.

> Actually, if you look at the Media Base 24-7 monitors, most
> 80s stations lean TOO rhythmic and dance (because the often
> too young pds love that stuff). I'm not saying ignore the
> dance hits, but they better be huge, mass-appeal smashes
> (i.e.:
> My Prerogative, I Wanna Dance With Somebody, Vogue). No
> urban cross-over or dance-club garbage. Yecch!
>
> > The problem with 80s formats is that those programming
> > (programmed) them ignore URBAN and dance. It wasn't all
> Bon
> > Jovi, Prince and Madonna and bad punk bands. Granted it
> > depends market to market. There's well over 100 HITS that
> > were ignored by most 80s stations in favor of playing the
> > same old tired crap over and over again. Not to mention
> the
> > few spins those HITS of the DANCE and URBAN persuasion
> > receive(d) in both reality and perception due to how long
> it
> > took to come back to them in rotation.
> >
> > > Problem with most 80s stations is (are) the people
> > > programming them. I'm betting (by looking at their
> music
> > > monitors) most look at is a "retro" format and the
> > > Prince/Madonna station. That is a recipe for disaster.
>
 
Re: Star=80s=dog

MLII:

Why don't you give us a dozen or so of the songs you'd
put on your 80's station and let us see where you're
coming from? Especially list some of the club tunes.

I'll agree that I cannot understand why TODAY's music
doesn't reflect the international dance/techo European
beat/style of music, even if it's sprinkled in.
 
dog

> Actually I did look at Media Base as I always do. I Wanna
> Dance With Somebody? The problem in Chicago (94.7's debacle,
> morph #4) was that it was all whitey all the time. No
> attention to heritage of this market and no dance. Nothing
> like injecting your own preferences into what you "THINK"
> works EX: "dance-club garbage". How silly and WRONG.


Wow, I hadn't thought of just going along with what everybody else does and not have any personal vision for programming a station. There isn't anybody in radio that doesn't have personal preferences and the key for Programmers is balancing that "sound" or vision with specific market preferences.

All I know is that MOST 80's stations are ratings mutts and many of them are too stuck on 80s/dance/techno. I'm talking 80s overall, not in just one market or another (and, obviously, 80s approach you refer to DID NOT WORK IN NASHVILLE, otherwise the station would be still in the format).
>
 
Re: Star=80s=dog

Well, first off, techno and euro would not have a place in an 80s format seeing as though techno (other than Inner City) would not be part of the 80s scene. If you're of the school of thought that the European bands that used "technology" to create music, that's different (ala Naked Eyes, Depeche Mode etc)

Songs never played or not played nearly enough as the played out garbage on "80s" formats"

Party Train - Gap Band
You Dropped A Bomb On Me - Gap Band
Fascinated - Company B
Shake A Tailfeather - Ray Charles
Big Fun - Inner City
Good Life - Inner City
So Many Men, So Little Time - Miquel Brown
Let The Music Play - Shannon
I.O.U. - Freez
Bizarre Love Triangle - New Order (The Shep Pettibone Version is far more appealing for radio than the album version)
All Night Passion - Alisha
This Time I Know It's For Real - Donna Summer
Da Butt - EU
Come Go With Me - Expose
Point Of No Return - Expose
White Lines - Grandmaster Flash With Melle Mel
Jam On It - Newcleus
Jungle Love - The Time

For the sake of time:
Jane Child, Information Society, Fat Boys With Chubby Checker and Beach Boys
Miami Sound Machine

An 80s format should be a party, a bright uptempo good time with specialty and feature shows sprinkled in. Instead it's a lilly white presentation programmed by macho white guys who probably can't even admit that they watch the lifetime network.

If you want more males you program the way the 80s stations have been programmed, if you want more females then you sprinkle more bright uptempo dance hits as opposed to rock hits. You play it all and the perception will be that you're a brighter 80s format and that's what will lure the female numbers and that doesn't just mean Shalamar's Dancin' In The Sheets, Sheila E's Love Bizarre or Glamorous Life or Dead Or Alive's Greatest hits

When you play more of the danceable hits instead of Don Henley's garbage over and over again you get better numbers. How do I know this? Because the 80s stations that failed were humping Don Henley and all the other white portions of the 80s and very seldom played Jody Watley, The Jets, Cover Girls etc (including the small amount of titles I listed above) frequently enough.

Once again this is all based on markets here the above were played on those market's top 40 stations or high rated urban stations

> MLII:
>
> Why don't you give us a dozen or so of the songs you'd
> put on your 80's station and let us see where you're
> coming from? Especially list some of the club tunes.
>
> I'll agree that I cannot understand why TODAY's music
> doesn't reflect the international dance/techo European
> beat/style of music, even if it's sprinkled in.
>
 
Re: dog

You continually talk about these small little markets where whitey was spoon fed good ol' rock n' roll along with Air Supply throughout the 80s. I'm talking markets where people were EXPOSED to more than what was spoon fed to them by narrow minded programmer. I always talk about a format from a top 10 market application. I guess I should note that.

> > Actually I did look at Media Base as I always do. I Wanna
> > Dance With Somebody? The problem in Chicago (94.7's
> debacle,
> > morph #4) was that it was all whitey all the time. No
> > attention to heritage of this market and no dance. Nothing
>
> > like injecting your own preferences into what you "THINK"
> > works EX: "dance-club garbage". How silly and WRONG.
>
>
> Wow, I hadn't thought of just going along with what
> everybody else does and not have any personal vision for
> programming a station. There isn't anybody in radio that
> doesn't have personal preferences and the key for
> Programmers is balancing that "sound" or vision with
> specific market preferences.
>
> All I know is that MOST 80's stations are ratings mutts and
> many of them are too stuck on 80s/dance/techno. I'm talking
> 80s overall, not in just one market or another (and,
> obviously, 80s approach you refer to DID NOT WORK IN
> NASHVILLE, otherwise the station would be still in the
> format).
> >
>
 
U keep changing the topic

We were talking about the 80s format and specically how it applied to Nashville.

OK, great- you talk about an 80s format in a Top 10 market...



> You continually talk about these small little markets where
> whitey was spoon fed good ol' rock n' roll along with Air
> Supply throughout the 80s. I'm talking markets where people
> were EXPOSED to more than what was spoon fed to them by
> narrow minded programmer. I always talk about a format from
> a top 10 market application. I guess I should note that.
 
80s

Most of these songs you list were not major Top 40 radio hits in the 80s.
A few were, most were club hits.

>
> Songs never played or not played nearly enough as the played
> out garbage on "80s" formats"
>
> Party Train - Gap Band
> You Dropped A Bomb On Me - Gap Band
> Fascinated - Company B
> Shake A Tailfeather - Ray Charles
> Big Fun - Inner City
> Good Life - Inner City
> So Many Men, So Little Time - Miquel Brown
> Let The Music Play - Shannon
> I.O.U. - Freez
> Bizarre Love Triangle - New Order (The Shep Pettibone
> Version is far more appealing for radio than the album
> version)
> All Night Passion - Alisha
> This Time I Know It's For Real - Donna Summer
> Da Butt - EU
> Come Go With Me - Expose
> Point Of No Return - Expose
> White Lines - Grandmaster Flash With Melle Mel
> Jam On It - Newcleus
> Jungle Love - The Time
>
> For the sake of time:
> Jane Child, Information Society, Fat Boys With Chubby
> Checker and Beach Boys
> Miami Sound Machine
>
> An 80s format should be a party, a bright uptempo good time
> with specialty and feature shows sprinkled in. Instead it's
> a lilly white presentation programmed by macho white guys
> who probably can't even admit that they watch the lifetime
> network.
>
> If you want more males you program the way the 80s stations
> have been programmed, if you want more females then you
> sprinkle more bright uptempo dance hits as opposed to rock
> hits. You play it all and the perception will be that you're
> a brighter 80s format and that's what will lure the female
> numbers and that doesn't just mean Shalamar's Dancin' In The
> Sheets, Sheila E's Love Bizarre or Glamorous Life or Dead Or
> Alive's Greatest hits
>
> When you play more of the danceable hits instead of Don
> Henley's garbage over and over again you get better numbers.
> How do I know this? Because the 80s stations that failed
> were humping Don Henley and all the other white portions of
> the 80s and very seldom played Jody Watley, The Jets, Cover
> Girls etc (including the small amount of titles I listed
> above) frequently enough.
>
> Once again this is all based on markets here the above were
> played on those market's top 40 stations or high rated urban
> stations
>
> > MLII:
> >
> > Why don't you give us a dozen or so of the songs you'd
> > put on your 80's station and let us see where you're
> > coming from? Especially list some of the club tunes.
> >
> > I'll agree that I cannot understand why TODAY's music
> > doesn't reflect the international dance/techo European
> > beat/style of music, even if it's sprinkled in.
> >
>
 
Re: Star=80s=dog

> > MLII:
> >
> > Why don't you give us a dozen or so of the songs you'd
> > put on your 80's station and let us see where you're
> > coming from? Especially list some of the club tunes.
> >
> > I'll agree that I cannot understand why TODAY's music
> > doesn't reflect the international dance/techo European
> > beat/style of music, even if it's sprinkled in.
> >
>


MLII ---

Re-read my last paragraph and notice I mentioned TODAY's
music about international techno/dance, etc. As for your
misplaced interpretation of techno not being a part of
the 80's, while I was not referring specifically to the
80's, as I noted, I disagree --- Techno WAS a part
of that decade, as it was created in Europe as an offshoot
of something called Disco. True, in this country it was
not huge, there where some techno-based extended versions
of mainstream songs from Flock of Seagulls, Depeche, Pet Shop Boys,
that could have been sprinkled in (even if only at night
or on the weekends) to offer a brief respite from the exact
same version of songs played one billion times. But, Techno
was a part of that decade and is still huge overseas. It
is a shame that the US has not embraced this music and
has such stale sounding formats compared to the rest of
the world. We should be the leaders in freedom of music,
but we're not. Techno is relegated to the underground.
Include in that Electronic(a), etc. Also huge in the UK/Europe
and somewhat here in the US, like techno.

I agree in particular that 80's stations should have played
a lot more Gap Band. "Party Train" is one of the best songs
ever and it's probably only been played three times in this
country since 1990. I did hear/program a fair amount of Lisa Lisa
and the Cult Jam, Expose, Janet Jackson, Newcleus and
the Time (all are great artists) and I wish that music
had been embraced more on retro 80's stations. Nashville's
Star was so boringly AC 80's that it never had a chance.

REAL question is why hasn't radio embraced the fact that
people who listened to the 80's music and loved it (who
were in college or high school) think Adult Contemporary
sounds like a vast wasteland (or worse funeral music)
like we all hated elevator music in the day? 50 year
old's today are still rockin', dancin' or shakin'. But,
radio thinks they are in wheelchairs and discounts their
$$$. Totally a flawed, sheep herd, follower mentality
that has yet to be broken. This is why radio will continue
to be in decline.

This is not off-subject for Variety Hits, because, in a sense
grouping the techno music in with Dance, Urban, CHR, etc.
would be the ultimate Variety station. And, they certainly exist
and are incredible radio stations in Europe and Australia.
Maybe one day, someone will come up with the right formula
that will work on US radio stations.

Can't wait to hear responses to this one.

<P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by tibbs on 09/15/05 05:27 AM.</FONT></P>
 
Re: Jack

> Blow THIS.
>
> You hate the format, so why do you pour so much time and
> effort into arguing about it? You fail to acknowledge the
> realities, instead just throwing hot-headed B.S. up to see
> what'll stick.

OK, someone from this board wants requests. I agree, but not all the time.
Jack should really offer a Sat. Nite request show or something.
It would really be good.

Those who do make requests, are duely noted to also pay closer attention to the ads, and more often.
 
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