Proof that hearing Hotel California repeatedly will drive you crazy

[Thomps2525]

Sweet Dreams from the '80s, a few from the '90s...and mostly 2000s and 2010s. Wow. The format has indeed changed. I'm checking to see if any AC station still plays Barry Manilow, Anne Murray, Neil Diamond, Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie, Phil Collins and Barbra Streisand.....but I think I already know the answer. I wonder if a station in 2014 would be successful by playing all those artists. Such a station would have no competition and might garner a high percentage of the 35-49 female audience.

 

[michael hagerty]

Sweet Dreams from the '80s, a few from the '90s...and mostly 2000s and 2010s. Wow. The format has indeed changed. I'm checking to see if any AC station still plays Barry Manilow, Anne Murray, Neil Diamond, Kenny Rogers, Lionel Richie, Phil Collins and Barbra Streisand.....but I think I already know the answer. I wonder if a station in 2014 would be successful by playing all those artists. Such a station would have no competition and might garner a high percentage of the 35-49 female audience.

Steve, if such a format attracted a high percentage of the 35-49 female audience, it would not have been abandoned in the first place.

What you're describing is an AC playlist from 30 years ago. At that time, it attracted a high percentage of the 35-49 female audience, which today is the 65-79 female audience.

 

[ChannelFlipper]

Steve, if such a format attracted a high percentage of the 35-49 female audience, it would not have been abandoned in the first place.

What you're describing is an AC playlist from 30 years ago. At that time, it attracted a high percentage of the 35-49 female audience, which today is the 65-79 female audience.

Old ladies need radio they can listen to too.

 

[crainbebo]

"Dark Horse," "Rolling in the Deep" and "Just the Way You Are"! Barf. Where's Joe Cocker when we need him? Can a 34-year-old even stand something different from 1982 once in a while? 70s were common on AC just 4-5 years ago as well. I haven't heard Bee Gees or Orleans in a long time on a major-market AC station - oh but a couple of their songs are part of the 300 "Greatest Hits" on KRTH, WCBS, WJMK and other major market stations. There have been more than 300 greatest hits songs in the 1960-1990 period.

For example, here's all the #1s on the Billboard AC charts in 1989.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_number-one_adult_contemporary_singles_of_1989_(U.S.)

Almost every song on that list, with the exception of "The Living Years" and maybe "Right Here Waiting" or "If I Could Turn Back Time" are NOT on ANY major market ACs anymore. That's more than enough songs these so called "Lite," "Soft," "Warm," "Classy" and "Easy" stations could add to their playlist.
'
-crainbebo

 

[michael hagerty]

Old ladies need radio they can listen to too.

Radio stations need an audience they can sell to advertisers.

 

[michael hagerty]

"Dark Horse," "Rolling in the Deep" and "Just the Way You Are"! Barf. Where's Joe Cocker when we need him? Can a 34-year-old even stand something different from 1982 once in a while?

-crainbebo

Looking at KOST, Los Angeles' playlist, it appears they can and do, Crainbebo. KOST is playing "Hard To Say I'm Sorry" by Chicago, "Turn Your Love Around" by George Benson, "Private Eyes" by Hall & Oates, "Rosanna" by Toto, Lionel Richie and Diana Ross' "Endless Love", Phil Collins' "One More Night" and a few dozen other late 70s/early-mid 80s songs along with their currents.

 

[BOZ Profit]

Pure or Faulty Logic...

Pure or Faulty Logic​

Radio is in the middle of a conundrum. Read on and tell me if you agree.

Won't the day be wonderful when every radio station in every market is playing the exact same 300 songs because those are the ones that test well among the market's audience? I mean, it stands to reason that since profit is the sole motive for any corporation, that every radio corporation choose to pander to the largest audience possible. And to reach the largest audience every station should be playing the exact same songs. That way there is no "hit or miss". When someone changes the dial, they get the exact same station.. just different commercials, different liners, different jingles... It's like radio stations can just be a music industry affiliate, get the same songs as everyone else but sell their own spots. He who sells the most spots wins! yay!

There need not be formats... there need be only one format because the masses are not interested in variety, correct?

If wrong, please explain the fault in this logic?

[Yes, I am being sarcastic, yet hopefully can drive home a point... I'll let the more intelligent members figure out what the point is. Discuss...]

 

[Robert Bass]

...Lionel Richie and Diana Ross' "Endless Love"

I once heard someone say this song is the 80s version of Debbie Boone's song from the 70s...

R

 

[TheBigA]

If wrong, please explain the fault in this logic?

Where do I begin?

How about the fact that at least 20% of the radio stations in any given market don't play music at all? Can't play the same songs if you don't play songs at all.

This discussion of the most researched songs only really applies to classics-based formats. Any currents-based station has a different problem, which is deciding which new songs to add to the rotation every week. Quite often, PDs have to act on songs before the research is completed.

But my favorite memory has to do with Garth Brooks. Here's a guy who was selling 10 million copies of his records. As many copies as any pop star. By any standard, he should be getting pop radio airplay. But the pop PDs didn't want to add his records because he wore a cowboy hat. For that reason, Garth never had the pop radio success he was entitled to, and that similar country stars, like Kenny Rogers or Shania Twain, achieved.

So yes, the masses are not interested in variety, which is why we have formats in the first place. It allows for musical segregation.

 

[ChannelFlipper]

Pure or Faulty Logic​

Radio is in the middle of a conundrum. Read on and tell me if you agree.

Won't the day be wonderful when every radio station in every market is playing the exact same 300 songs because those are the ones that test well among the market's audience? I mean, it stands to reason that since profit is the sole motive for any corporation, that every radio corporation choose to pander to the largest audience possible. And to reach the largest audience every station should be playing the exact same songs. That way there is no "hit or miss". When someone changes the dial, they get the exact same station.. just different commercials, different liners, different jingles... It's like radio stations can just be a music industry affiliate, get the same songs as everyone else but sell their own spots. He who sells the most spots wins! yay!

There need not be formats... there need be only one format because the masses are not interested in variety, correct?

If wrong, please explain the fault in this logic?

[Yes, I am being sarcastic, yet hopefully can drive home a point... I'll let the more intelligent members figure out what the point is. Discuss...]

I am sure a lot of readers agreed with your post right up until you mentioned the obvious sarcasm.

 

[crainbebo]

Country music has the same "300-song" problem. I am SICK and tired of hearing Florida Georgia Line every 3 hours. Enough is enough. Country has fell down the drain in the past few years. Here we have more than a couple acts introducing "country rap," songs with no fiddles or steel guitars at all and just sounds like "active rock" with southern twang, and a LOT of country songs sounding like KIIS music. Where is Trisha Yearwood, Alan Jackson and Alabama when we need them? I hardly ever hear Alan Jackson anymore on the radio - it used to be 7-8 songs each day, five years ago. Now maybe 1 or 2 if that. "Remember When" and sometimes "Where I Come From" or "Chattahooche".

I'm shocked about KOST however... Lionel Richie and Diana Ross' "Endless Love", WOW!! That's a rarity in AC nowadays. I know for a fact KRWM wouldn't TRY to play this song in Seattle. They would rather play "Rolling in the Deep" for the 1,934th time. "Turn Your Love Around" George Benson is also a plus in my opinion. CC's AC playlists are pretty much the only thing I like about that company. They have gotten better lately. I've heard some Premium Choice CC's HAVE even spun Joe Cocker/Jennifer Warnes "Up Where We Belong". Any AC station airing that gets cheers from me. Easy is supposed to be "Easy", KOST is supposed to be KOST, Classy is supposed to be Classy, not "Kiss-FM Lite".

-crainbebo

 

[michael hagerty]

I am sure a lot of readers agreed with your post right up until you mentioned the obvious sarcasm.

Tragic if true.

Because, as stated and proven time and time again on this site, research and music are local...tailored to a specific audience. It's why WOGL, Philadelphia and KRTH, Los Angeles are so different, yet both so successful (and owned by the same company, so there goes the monolithic, robotic corporation argument)...because they're responding and appealing to their local audiences. And it's why stations in the same market aiming at the same demographic play different music to attract that listener.

And because, as stated and proven time and time again on this site, the typical 25-54 year old adult listener has between six and nine radio stations (s)he listens to over the course of a week or two, the variety comes from their own choices. KRTH brings them one type of their favorite music, KBIG another, KIIS-FM, The Sound and KROQ still more. And so on (some will flesh out that list with KKGO for country music, others KHHT for rhythmic oldies, still others KKJZ for jazz).

 

[michael hagerty]

Country music has the same "300-song" problem. I am SICK and tired of hearing Florida Georgia Line every 3 hours. Enough is enough. Country has fell down the drain in the past few years. Here we have more than a couple acts introducing "country rap," songs with no fiddles or steel guitars at all and just sounds like "active rock" with southern twang, and a LOT of country songs sounding like KIIS music. Where is Trisha Yearwood, Alan Jackson and Alabama when we need them? I hardly ever hear Alan Jackson anymore on the radio - it used to be 7-8 songs each day, five years ago. Now maybe 1 or 2 if that. "Remember When" and sometimes "Where I Come From" or "Chattahooche".

I'm shocked about KOST however... Lionel Richie and Diana Ross' "Endless Love", WOW!! That's a rarity in AC nowadays. I know for a fact KRWM wouldn't TRY to play this song in Seattle. They would rather play "Rolling in the Deep" for the 1,934th time. "Turn Your Love Around" George Benson is also a plus in my opinion. CC's AC playlists are pretty much the only thing I like about that company. They have gotten better lately. I've heard some Premium Choice CC's HAVE even spun Joe Cocker/Jennifer Warnes "Up Where We Belong". Any AC station airing that gets cheers from me. Easy is supposed to be "Easy", KOST is supposed to be KOST, Classy is supposed to be Classy, not "Kiss-FM Lite".

-crainbebo

As was explained to me many years ago, Country is Top 40....the guitars just sound different. That means tight rotations of current hits and not terribly deep gold. When Top 40 stations were still reaching back 10-15 years for their gold in the 1970s and early 80s, country stations were throwing songs out of the library at 5-7. It is, and has been for many years, a very contemporary format.

As for "Easy is supposed to be Easy"....I said this about a year ago on this site and it probably bears repeating. It's a lesson I learned as one of the first programmers of AC 40 years ago:

Adult Contemporary is whatever 40-year-old women like at that moment.

That summer of 1973, when I got my first PD gig and took KIBS Adult Contemporary, was a lot like now in terms of the sea change in adult music. "Live and Let Die" by Paul McCartney and Wings was a Top 10 Easy Listening record in Billboard (that chart did factor in airplay in those days)?? People who weren't 40-year-old women called to complain. "Where's Andy Williams? Where's Perry Como?" But it worked with the audience it was intended to work with...to the point that we were eating Top 40's shares of adult women for most of the 70s, forcing them to either go very teen or soften up a bit to compete with us.

Today's center of the target was born in that year. Graduated high school in 1991...college in 1994. If any of those stats seem alien to you (not you, Crainbebo, the larger "you" of anyone reading this), it shouldn't be a surprise that AC doesn't appeal to you much.

 

[michael hagerty]

The above should read "....college in 1995."

 

[TheBigA]

Country music has the same "300-song" problem. I am SICK and tired of hearing Florida Georgia Line every 3 hours. Enough is enough. Country has fell down the drain in the past few years.

And yet country radio is far more popular now than it was ten or twenty years ago. Whatever it's doing, it's working.

 

[firepoint525]

And yet country radio is far more popular now than it was ten or twenty years ago. Whatever it's doing, it's working.

"It's okay if it sucks, as long as it makes bucks."

 

[TheBigA]

"It's okay if it sucks, as long as it makes bucks."

I didn't say anything about the money. Millions of people love country radio. The format is top rated in lots of big urban cities like Philly, Boston, Detroit, and Cleveland, home of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. If you don't like it, blame it on all the fans who listen. You say it sucks, but the masses disagree.

 

[firepoint525]

I didn't say anything about the money. Millions of people love country radio. The format is top rated in lots of big urban cities like Philly, Boston, Detroit, and Cleveland, home of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. If you don't like it, blame it on all the fans who listen. You say it sucks, but the masses disagree.

Not THIS time, you didn't.

I wasn't referring to any specific genre, I am referring to the attitude of ALL the "suits" who shovel it out there, regardless of genre. I like SOME country music, but I don't listen to much.

You corporate guys like to position yourselves as the "caretakers" of the format (ANY format), when the reality is more like you are the "gatekeepers" of the format, keeping talented folks out. We hear more than we ever want to about American Idol, now every Idol winner expects to be the next Kelly Clarkson or Carrie Underwood.

 

[TheBigA]

You corporate guys like to position yourselves as the "caretakers" of the format (ANY format), when the reality is more like you are the "gatekeepers" of the format, keeping talented folks out.

I hate to break it to you, but that's the role radio has played since it was invented. Someone has to decide who's on the list and who's off. There's nothing personal about it. It's all based on popularity. Every baby is born with a voice and the ability to sing. The talent it turning something you're born with into something that's popular. Our job is to recognize it and play it. The public has many options for music. We give them a reason to choose OTA radio. And as I said, in terms of country radio, it's working.

This thread is 18 pages of people complaining about the most popular formats in radio. It proves that people will complain about anything, even when it's good. Instead of complaining about the formats that are working, why not address the ones that aren't?

 

[firepoint525]

I hate to break it to you, but that's the role radio has played since it was invented. Someone has to decide who's on the list and who's off. There's nothing personal about it. It's all based on popularity. Every baby is born with a voice and the ability to sing. The talent it turning something you're born with into something that's popular. Our job is to recognize it and play it. The public has many options for music. We give them a reason to choose OTA radio. And as I said, in terms of country radio, it's working.

Okay, but let's get serious for a moment. Are you there to deliver music for the listener, or advertising for the advertiser? So many radio insiders out there see music as "what gets played between commercials." I always bristle at terms like "masses," because we are talking about folks who have obsession with shiny objects. I don't even want to be associated with such folks. Too much of radio is "build it up just to tear it down." Don't believe me? When is the last time you played "Achy Breaky Heart" over country radio?