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Stations that boast about not playing a particular artist or a genre, past and present
- Thread starter victorres43
- Start date
Nu-metal didn't kill the rock format. If anything, nu-metal and rap-rock extended its life a few years.
The greatest sales and revenues in the US music industry's history, when accounted for inflation, were during the nu-metal and rap-rock years -- 1998-2001, the peak year being 1999.
What killed rock's top popularity was changes in generational music tastes.
Agreed that by the mid 2000's, rock started its decline.
Sales and being good music are not mutually exclusive. Sure there were some good bands in that era but a lot of it faded.
I only personally know of one station that did this sort of thing. They were a classic rock station in a moderate sized city, that decided to announce that they would never touch music by Soundgarden, Alice In Chains, Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, or similar 90s-00s acts.
So, even though the older tracks by those grunge acts would definitely classify as 'classic rock', they were just not going there. In fact, they said "if you want to hear Soundgarden, there are other stations to listen to" (or something to that order).
Within 2-3 years, they flipped to some other, non-rock format. Apparently, enough listeners decided to follow their advice.
Kind of sad, really.
But the sales are an indicator of the popularity all those artists. Staind, for example, sold $100 million worth of CDs in just one year. That is not an easy feat to accomplish if your music isn't good.
Limp Bizkit and Britney Spears sold a lot in that time frame too.
Are you sure that's not Metallica or Megadeth?
In Greensboro NC Rock 92 seemed to be avoiding that kind of music. I think they did play it eventually.
But something which really surprised me was when someone said no one was playing "Blue on Black" by Kenny Wayne Shepherd. It seemed perfect for a classic rock station. Apparently the alternative station didn't play it.
Yes, that is very true. And those sales were an indication that they were producing some good music. Limp Bizkit had some good songs. Britney had one good song (in my opinion) in 2011 but earlier on she had a lot of hits that definitely were not my cup of tea, but if you were talking to a woman who bought those CDs in the late 90s / early 00s, you'd get a much different opinion.
In Puerto Rico we have WTOK-FM Hot 102, which has advertised itself as "the station that saved Puerto Rico from bachata and reggaetón". It is a strictly English-language CHR.
They had a promo, sadly deleted from Soundcloud, where they play a Carlos Vives song, a reggaetón song that I don't remember, and a Romeo Santos song, and say that it is not "Música HOT."
They had a promo, sadly deleted from Soundcloud, where they play a Carlos Vives song, a reggaetón song that I don't remember, and a Romeo Santos song, and say that it is not "Música HOT."
Not so much 'songs' or 'genres', but I have heard KYOY-92.3 in Cheyenne boast about the fact that they are the last remaining locally-owned station in town and put down Townsquare, iHeart, etc. without naming them. I have an aircheck from a few years ago where the v/o said:
"All the once-vibrant local voices are out of the can...with the same ole', same ole' syndicated cookie-cutter programming...from some GENIUS clear across the country!"
At least they have a much-better playlist of classic hits/classic rock than most of those major conglomerates. I spend a lot of time enjoying what's left of non-satellite, small-town radio for that reason.
"All the once-vibrant local voices are out of the can...with the same ole', same ole' syndicated cookie-cutter programming...from some GENIUS clear across the country!"
At least they have a much-better playlist of classic hits/classic rock than most of those major conglomerates. I spend a lot of time enjoying what's left of non-satellite, small-town radio for that reason.
There is an ultra-traditional Christian station in West TN that makes it known that they only play hymns and older Southern Gospel, but no CCM or even newer SG except for possibly some local groups that they consider "acceptable."
WKJV in Asheville NC uses designated King James Version, so any hymn that quotes from any other version would be verboten.
The station I was referring to is King James Only as well. It's actually a group of stations in West TN and KY operated by an Independent Baptist church, most of who are King James Only and anti-CCM.
I remember that, as well. It was pretty common for a while. The problem with that sort of positioning is what happens when a song with some rap elements crosses over with their audience?
But I'll also note that the idea of not playing a style of music that the programmers think is polarizing with their audience is nothing new. Then Top 40 KNBQ(FM) in Tacoma jumped onto the anti-disco backlash a little early by deleting all disco songs from their playlist in 1979 when it seemed liked disco was starting to oversaturate around the middle of the year. While they were right about the audience getting sick of disco, they were wrong in deleting all disco and their ratings tanked (down from a 2.0 share to a 1.2). In the spring of 1980 they realized their mistake, added a little bit of disco back in and saw their ratings jump (all the way up to a 2.7).
The lesson, I think, is that while a pop station's audience may not want to hear a lot of a particular genre, that doesn't mean they don't want to hear it at all.
^^^^^ The Disco Destruction thing only seemed to work well with rock stations. The backlash against disco was in some ways worse than the back;lash against rap, being that rock bands began to embrace the rap idea by the mid 1990s (Rage Against The Machine being a massive, early proponent) whereas fewer rock bands toyed with disco (The Stones being a notorious example of that), and their including disco beats in their rock music didn't last very long..
Some say the Disco Destruction thing -- especially the disco destruction event staged by Chicago's 'The Loop" -- literally killed Disco.
Some say the Disco Destruction thing -- especially the disco destruction event staged by Chicago's 'The Loop" -- literally killed Disco.
If you haven't read John "Records" Landecker's autobiography, he recounts how the disco backlash affected WLS, to the point station vans were being harassed. Their solution was to re-wrap the vans as "Animal Stories Mobile Units". Animal Stories, with Larry Lujack and Tommy Edwards, was very popular, but WLS had been re-positioned as "disco" in the public mind. It was so bad there was no mention of WLS or signage at concerts they sponsored.
It didn't help that WLS's FM station was "Disco 'DAI." 94.7 in Chicago seems like a jinxed frequency. I'm not sure that it's ever been that successful regardless of format or call letters.
Disco had been slowly fading out by 1978. Saturday Night Fever propped it back up for awhile, but Disco Demolition was the final nail in the coffin.
It indeed had a history of "format of the month" but has been mostly stable with some tweaks as Classic Hits for a number of years now.
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