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Songs Which Peak High On The Charts, But Don't Get Airplay

J

js6592

I have a bit of rant and the title of this thread says it all. It seems that, in the St. Louis Market where I live, stations that brand themselves as playing current hits often omit certain current hits from the playlists, even when they score high on the chart. I don't really understand this. And since they aren't getting played, I am not even aware of their existence, unless I, by chance, run across a song's info by casually surfing Wikipedia and reading a particular artist's discography history.

Just yesterday, I ran across one. It's called When The Good Times Come Again, a song off one of Barry Manilow's albums from the late 1980's. According to Wikipedia, it was released as a single for the very first time in 2020 and reached number 12 on Billboard's AC chart, but our AC station here, KEZK, which brands itself as "Today's Hits & Yesterday's Favorites," never gave it one spin, to my knowledge. Obviously, I never even knew this had been released as a single until I read the Wikipedia article, yesterday. I'd like to know this station's criteria for determining what a "today's hit" is, since a song that ranks #12 would certainly qualify as one, in my opinion. Or maybe KEZK isn't using the AC chart for their current hits, but an adult Top-40 chart instead. If that's true, I don't know why they are being classified as Adult Contemporary, then. Anyway, does anyone know of any major market stations that DID play this Barry Manilow single when it first came out?

P.S. By the way, I'm not singling this station out for my complaint. It seems like our country stations here do the same thing at times with songs that are high on the country charts! (rolls eyes)
 
That's an interesting story. Billboard magazine thought so too. Here's their article about it:


js6592 said:
I'd like to know this station's criteria for determining what a "today's hit" is, since a song that ranks #12 would certainly qualify as one, in my opinion.
Click to expand...

Looking at their playlist, they only play six current songs. So #12 is six songs below what they play.
 
js6592 said:
P.S. By the way, I'm not singling this station out for my complaint. It seems like our country stations here do the same thing at times with songs that are high on the country charts! (rolls eyes)
Click to expand...
Part of the job of a Program Director is to decide what current or recent songs fit the station's playlist. Just because a song appears on the generic music industry (not "radio industry") chart does not mean that the downloads and purchases are being made by the listeners to their station.

In fact, the people streaming the song may be in a different demographic. By mentioning the name "Barry Manilow" you made me think of people over 65. Those are not the listeners the station wants.

Manilow had lots of hits nearly around 45 years ago. I'll bet the station does not play any of them, either.

The Billboard chart is not focused purely on radio station playlists. It is based on consumption, with an emphasis on what the record companies that support the magazine want to know. I'll betcha' $10 that KEZK does not even subscribe to Billboard or look at their charts.

In fact, I have not been in a station in the last 20 years or so that had Billboard issues lying around.

And, above all other things, if you have doubts about a song, "what you do not play will not hurt you".
 
DavidEduardo said:
The Billboard chart is not focused purely on radio station playlists.".
Click to expand...

It depends on the chart. They do Airplay only charts. But the Hot 100 is based on airplay, sales, and streaming.

There are four AC charts. KEZK reports to the Mainstream AC chart. My understanding is that chart is based on airplay only.

DavidEduardo said:
In fact, I have not been in a station in the last 20 years or so that had Billboard issues lying around.
Click to expand...

When I read that, I wondered if they still do print editions, and found out that yes they do. But I receive a free subscription to their online edition, which is fine by me. I haven't seen a print issue in a long time either.
 
TheBigA said:
There are four AC charts. KEZK reports to the Mainstream AC chart. My understanding is that chart is based on airplay only.
Click to expand...
But the Hot 100 is based on lots of factors that are only remotely related to radio, and can't be related to a station's demographic target.

Saying that a station "reports" makes it sound like they actively participated. In fact, the Billboard panels are determined by ratings and monitored electronically. The station does not "report" in the old traditional sense where we used to call or be called by one of the tip sheets to report adds, drops, moves and "hot" songs. Later, we'd fax our list. And then they'd just monitor us, like it or not.

The print issues are down to about 22 or so a year. They skip lots of weeks, and refer the online source as the way to keep up with the charts.
 
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DavidEduardo said:
But the Hot 100 is based on lots of factors that are only remotely related to radio, and can't be related to a station's demographic target.
Click to expand...

Yes I said that, but the OP was specifically referring to "Billboard's AC chart," and according to Billboard.com, that chart is based on airplay.
 
The AC station I listen to did play Bon Jovi's two new songs this past year, "Do What You Can" and "Story Of Love" (#11 and #17, respectively, on the AC chart), but mostly because they're a beloved local New Jersey band. Otherwise I doubt they play anything that didn't reach the Top 10. For example, they never played Weezer's version of "Africa" (#19 AC), even though the original has been an everlasting staple of the format.
 
TheBigA said:
Yes I said that, but the OP was specifically referring to "Billboard's AC chart," and according to Billboard.com, that chart is based on airplay.
Click to expand...
And again, the chart is based on lots of irrelevancies such as the type of AC station (Hot, "regular" or more gold based), the competition in that particular station's local market and even things like the ethnic composition of the station's market.

That's why, back in the days of R&R, Gavin, FMQB and all the others we looked at the reporting stations more than the actual chart; we knew the stations that were near-mirrors of our particular station and which ones had PDs we respected. The full chart was kind of a "view from the upper atmosphere" but not actionable without further inspection of what stations in which markets were playing the songs we were looking at.
 
kevtronics said:
For example, they never played Weezer's version of "Africa" (#19 AC), even though the original has been an everlasting staple of the format.
Click to expand...

I understand that. It's a discussion we have too: Why play a cover if you already play the original? Especially when the cover is so similar to the original. The cover only makes sense for Hot ACs or alternative stations. That's likely why it only charted to #19.
 
Some artists who had a LOTS of hits get written off by AC and Classic Hits stations for sounding too wimpy. We probably know who's on the list...

Barry Manilow
Barbra Streisand
Air Supply
Anne Murray
Neil Diamond
Dionne Warwick
Tony Orlando
Captain & Tennille
The Carpenters
Michael Bolton
Kenny Rogers
Celine Dion
Gloria Estefan

Need I go on? Some of these artists are more 1970s than 80s, so they'd be eliminated these days because their recordings pre-date today's playlists. But even 10-15 years ago, they were banned from most AC stations, fearful that playing them would make the station sound too old.

I think WLTW NYC was still playing some more upbeat Celine Dion and Gloria Estefan songs up until a few years ago. But the other artists on this list got the ax by 2000. Maybe these days, the "too wimpy" list needs to be updated. Do AC stations still play Norah Jones, Lionel Richie and Sade?
 
Gregg. said:
Some artists who had a LOTS of hits get written off by AC and Classic Hits stations for sounding too wimpy. We probably know who's on the list...

Barry Manilow
Barbra Streisand
Air Supply
Anne Murray
Neil Diamond
Dionne Warwick
Tony Orlando
Captain & Tennille
The Carpenters
Michael Bolton
Kenny Rogers
Celine Dion
Gloria Estefan

Need I go on? Some of these artists are more 1970s than 80s, so they'd be eliminated these days because their recordings pre-date today's playlists. But even 10-15 years ago, they were banned from most AC stations, fearful that playing them would make the station sound too old.

I think WLTW NYC was still playing some more upbeat Celine Dion and Gloria Estefan songs up until a few years ago. But the other artists on this list got the ax by 2000. Maybe these days, the "too wimpy" list needs to be updated. Do AC stations still play Norah Jones, Lionel Richie and Sade?
Click to expand...
Norah Jones her songs aired a lot on radio back in the 2000's when she was at her height but she is pushed out of the way for 2010's songs. She faded in the past decade.
 
If the audience says no, you don’t play the songs. It’s that simple. It doesn’t matter if you used to play them because the audience said yes back then.
 
Gregg. said:
Some artists who had a LOTS of hits get written off by AC and Classic Hits stations for sounding too wimpy. We probably know who's on the list...
Click to expand...
It's not about "wimpy". It's about listener research.
Gregg. said:
Barry Manilow
Barbra Streisand
Air Supply
Anne Murray
Neil Diamond
Dionne Warwick
Tony Orlando
Captain & Tennille
The Carpenters
Michael Bolton
Kenny Rogers
Celine Dion
Gloria Estefan
Click to expand...
Most of those artists are predominantly 70's and the appeal in AC's 25-54 target is limited: in the younger half of the target those artists are, for the most part, toxic.
Gregg. said:
Need I go on? Some of these artists are more 1970s than 80s, so they'd be eliminated these days because their recordings pre-date today's playlists. But even 10-15 years ago, they were banned from most AC stations, fearful that playing them would make the station sound too old.
Click to expand...
They did not test any longer.
Gregg. said:
I think WLTW NYC was still playing some more upbeat Celine Dion and Gloria Estefan songs up until a few years ago. But the other artists on this list got the ax by 2000. Maybe these days, the "too wimpy" list needs to be updated. Do AC stations still play Norah Jones, Lionel Richie and Sade?
Click to expand...
If they don't test, they don't get played.
 
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