Payola in today's radio? No!!!

[JFPO]

"Music sociologists have known anecdotally that record companies bribe radio stations to play specific songs so that listeners would buy more of them."

Even statisticians can hear it. Wasn't it more fun when they just slid baggies of cocaine into album jackets?

http://www.buffalo.edu/ubreporter/2009_12_16/payola

 

[DFW_Radio_2000]

Wasn't it more fun when they just slid baggies of cocaine into album jackets?

That line had me rolling! Love it!

 

[MikeShannon914]

Johnny Fever: "Ahhh, a little nose candy?" when he found a baggie of it in an album jacket, meant for a replacement jock.

From what I understand, as long as there's a middleman between the record company and the station, payola is perfectly legal. Then there was the recent case where a record company was leasing blocks of overnight time on major market Top 40 and country stations, providing a collection of their currents and up-and-comers to be played. Although the time was bought, playing the songs constituted a "spin," and helped drive their records up the charts.

 

[oldmanradio]

Johnny Fever: "Ahhh, a little nose candy?" when he found a baggie of it in an album jacket, meant for a replacement jock.

From what I understand, as long as there's a middleman between the record company and the station, payola is perfectly legal. Then there was the recent case where a record company was leasing blocks of overnight time on major market Top 40 and country stations, providing a collection of their currents and up-and-comers to be played. Although the time was bought, playing the songs constituted a "spin," and helped drive their records up the charts.

All I know is Dick Clark was lucky, had a good lawyer and listened to him.

Alan Freed had none of the above.

 

[TheBigA]

The thing about this that amazes me is that payola exists, and all the labels get for their money is spins.

Imagine how that will change if they get their royalty. The greatest argument against the RIAA proposed performance royalty is that it will increase payola. Once record labels make money from spins, the checkbooks will open. The big stations get rich, the small ones don't. Business as usual for record labels.

 

[Kent]

From what I understand, as long as there's a middleman between the record company and the station, payola is perfectly legal.

My understanding is that there still can't be a quid pro quo between the middleman and the radio station. The middleman basically sits down with the program director and/or music director and compensates the station for its time. So long as it's a fee for access instead of for spins, what you're describing is perfectly legal.

Then there was the recent case where a record company was leasing blocks of overnight time on major market Top 40 and country stations, providing a collection of their currents and up-and-comers to be played. Although the time was bought, playing the songs constituted a "spin," and helped drive their records up the charts.

There have been several cases of this. I seem to remember one specific Avril Lavigne song was played as much as four times an hour in the overnights on some stations with the proper disclosure announcement being made. That definitely helped the song go up the charts, though no one is sure exactly how much it helped. Keep in mind that there were also similar cases with record stores, where promoters would go to the record store and buy the entire stock of an artist's records. The Billboard chart used to use record sales in addition to airplay to determine chart position, and these buyouts had a similar affect. I was told that was one reason radio stations began dropping countdowns that used Billboard and replacing them with Radio and Records countdowns in the 80's.