The Music & State of Alternative 2023

[davideduardo]

i dont know whats more offensive, my previous post here or the fact no one who follows alternative radio cares about alternative radio

The issue is not "how many here follow or care about alternative radio" but how many people today want to listen to alt rock on commercial radio. It is either a non-com or a stream type of format because the tastes in current music have fragged so much it is not mass appeal any more except as a gold-based format .

 

[JD36108]

The issue is not "how many here follow or care about alternative radio" but how many people today want to listen to alt rock on commercial radio. It is either a non-com or a stream type of format because the tastes in current music have fragged so much it is not mass appeal any more except as a gold-based format .

i think you're wrong, look at how many stations have flipped to Alt Rock in the past 6 months, if anything is losing mass appeal, it is CHR, with the exception being the 18 and under demo.

 

[davideduardo]

i think you're wrong, look at how many stations have flipped to Alt Rock in the past 6 months, if anything is losing mass appeal, it is CHR, with the exception being the 18 and under demo.

How many stations in total have gone to Alt Rock in the last year? Please name them.

CHR is off its peak, as has happened a number of times in the last 72 years since the format was created. But it is still a powerful, high billing format in nearly every market (and none of them target 12-17 anyway... the target is 18-34 and 25-44 women).

And CHR is off because the music industry is off in appealing product. Further, a huge portion of the loss is the defection of Hispanics now that they have their own version of Top 40, available on many major market stations and many streaming services.

 

[chrocket87]

How many stations in total have gone to Alt Rock in the last year? Please name them.

CHR is off its peak, as has happened a number of times in the last 72 years since the format was created. But it is still a powerful, high billing format in nearly every market (and none of them target 12-17 anyway... the target is 18-34 and 25-44 women).

And CHR is off because the music industry is off in appealing product. Further, a huge portion of the loss is the defection of Hispanics now that they have their own version of Top 40, available on many major market stations and many streaming services.

Outside of Live 105, I can’t think of any in top 100 markets.

 

[MVB13]

How many stations in total have gone to Alt Rock in the last year? Please name them.

CHR is off its peak, as has happened a number of times in the last 72 years since the format was created. But it is still a powerful, high billing format in nearly every market (and none of them target 12-17 anyway... the target is 18-34 and 25-44 women).

And CHR is off because the music industry is off in appealing product. Further, a huge portion of the loss is the defection of Hispanics now that they have their own version of Top 40, available on many major market stations and many streaming services.

CHR needs to embrace new artists and songs and sounds that are popular to be relevant. I'm tired of hearing 20+ year old songs on CHR.

 

[davideduardo]

CHR needs to embrace new artists and songs and sounds that are popular to be relevant. I'm tired of hearing 20+ year old songs on CHR.

CHR is doing what it always does when there is a shortage of good new releases: they reduce the current list and emphasize high testing recurrents and gold.

Top 40 discovered "gold" or "flashbacks" or "oldies" back in the very early 60's when the post-payola years produced fewer solid hits and stations began to fold in at least a couple of oldies an hour.

As research in thee 70s showed, there was lots of gold that listeners wanted to hear and those categories became a standard part of the format; when Top 40 was created and for its first decade, it was just those 40 songs and a few "hitbounds" that were played over and over.

As music went through cycles, programmers would adjust the clocks for more or less currents depending on the number of verified hits and, particularly, the presence or not of "powers". I've been through that and have had times when there were no powers, so the category was dropped for a while, supplementing with a bit faster rotation on the "regular hits" and one or two more recurrents an hour.

On the other hand, there were occasions when there were more powers than normal, and clocks were adjusted to play them all at the top rotation.

Radio does not produce songs. It can not "embrace" stuff that is obviously not going to be mass appeal. It is very rare that true hits don't get "discovered" and played. Today, radio has the advantage of instant play data on songs that emerge out of new media, and it is not hard to spot potential hits. The problem is, to repeat my point, that there is a dearth of good material at times and radio can't make up for it by playing stiffs.

 

[davideduardo]

Outside of Live 105, I can’t think of any in top 100 markets.

And Live is too new to evaluate yet. Obviously, SF has a historical heritage that would indicate the format might be viable there. But changes in the ethnic makeup of the market along with all the streaming options and the fragmentation in tastes for current releases all stack up against it working.

SF is now less than 39% non-Hispanic white. It is 29% Asian, 25% Hispanic and 6% Black and has around 6% first generation immigrants from areas like the Middle East, former Soviet Block nations, Armenia, Persia and other areas where there is little or no interest in Alternative. Those ethnic or new immigrant groups will get anywhere from zero interest to very limited interest in Alternative when compared to non-Hispanic whites... a declining group in the Bay Area.

 

[brokentuner]

You and I are not attractive to advertisers. (I’m 42). I have to basically settle for hoping enough women find a song good that I also like or that I’m in what amounts to a handful of our largest US radio markets.

Until we start consuming more than women in terms of commercial products, we are not the target of advertisers and thus our musical tastes are secondary when it comes to terrestrial radio.

I am assuming you are male?

You’re perfectly in the M25-54 Demo which is very very appealing to radio advertisers. Don’t sell yourself short!

 

[radiorobert]

You’re perfectly in the M25-54 Demo which is very very appealing to radio advertisers. Don’t sell yourself short!

Thanks! Hopefully someday there will be a format in my market that actually takes advantage of that and targets me. 😉

 

[radiorobert]

CHR needs to embrace new artists and songs and sounds that are popular to be relevant. I'm tired of hearing 20+ year old songs on CHR.

It isn’t so much the mix of gold versus not, it’s the Bizzare mix of pop rock and downtempo in with the higher energy token dance tunes and the hip hop. There’s something about it that doesn’t mesh well. Add to that we have lost a lot of mix shows and other specialties that CHR used to have an abundance of.

 

[davideduardo]

It isn’t so much the mix of gold versus not, it’s the Bizzare mix of pop rock and downtempo in with the higher energy token dance tunes and the hip hop. There’s something about it that doesn’t mesh well. Add to that we have lost a lot of mix shows and other specialties that CHR used to have an abundance of.

Remember, the primary target of CHR, Hot AC and AC is women. Many don't even research with men.

 

[TheBigA]

You’re perfectly in the M25-54 Demo which is very very appealing to radio advertisers. Don’t sell yourself short!

However, advertisers reach the demo more effectively in non-music formats, such as sports talk.

 

[Mark Roberts]

SF is now less than 39% non-Hispanic white. It is 29% Asian, 25% Hispanic and 6% Black and has around 6% first generation immigrants from areas like the Middle East, former Soviet Block nations, Armenia, Persia and other areas [....]

Does that 29% figure include those who identify as Asian or just those who immigrated from Asian countries?

I ask because a lot of complexity hides behind that number. First, you have to distinguish between South Asian and East Asian. Then there's the fact that many people of East Asian ancestry actually are from families that have been in the Bay Area for more than 100 years. They're thoroughly Americanized for the most part. And, already, there are more second-generation people of South Asian ancestry than someone from outside the area might realize. And there's intermarriage. It all adds up to a multi-ethnic population whose lifestyles and tastes have largely converged into the dominant white culture.

To me, the really astonishing thing about Bay Area demographic trends is the decline in the proportion of the Black population. This is happening even in Oakland, with consequential ripple effects on politics - and is notable in San Francisco, too.

So, anyway, the point that's relevant to this thread is that Bay Area 2nd+-generation "Asian" listeners may well have tastes that aren't so different from non-Hispanic whites.

 

[CentralFL]

CHR really seems to be in crisis. Many CHR's are playing so many golden oldies that the contemporary in CHR is an oxymoron. Hopefully this is just a blip like the early 80s and early 90s.

 

[radiorobert]

Remember, the primary target of CHR, Hot AC and AC is women. Many don't even research with men.

Yes, know that. It’s just interesting to see the shift in music cycles.

 

[TheBigA]

CHR really seems to be in crisis. Many CHR's are playing so many golden oldies that the contemporary in CHR is an oxymoron. Hopefully this is just a blip like the early 80s and early 90s.

The weakness of CHR has opened the door for those stations to start looking at high streaming country songs. The streaming data for them is much better than most of the pop stuff that's coming out. That's why they're now playing Kane Brown, Morgan Wallen, and Luke Combs. The question is will they play Jason Aldean. That song will get a lot of negativity in big cities.

The pop hole in the early 90s created an opening for alternative music to get CHR airplay. We definitely won't see that now.

 

[TheBigA]

I really think it's time for alternative program directors to look at country artists who fit their format. Country poached Jelly Roll from alternative. His latest song is #1 in the Billboard Rock & Alternative chart.

Hot Rock & Alternative Songs

THE WEEK’S MOST POPULAR CURRENT ROCK AND ALTERNATIVE SONGS, RANKED BY STREAMING ACTIVITY DATA BY ONLINE MUSIC SOURCES TRACKED BY LUMINATE, RADIO AIRPLAY AUDIENCE IMPRESSIONS AS MEASURED BY MEDIABASE AND PROVIDED BY LUMINATE AND SALES DATA AS COMPILED BY LUMINATE.

www.billboard.com

I think some rock stations could do well with the Aldean.

 

[davideduardo]

Does that 29% figure include those who identify as Asian or just those who immigrated from Asian countries?

People who indicated, under the "race" question on the Census and the annual update survey that they were "Asian" or one of the subcategories such as Chinese, Philippine, Indian, etc.

I ask because a lot of complexity hides behind that number. First, you have to distinguish between South Asian and East Asian. Then there's the fact that many people of East Asian ancestry actually are from families that have been in the Bay Area for more than 100 years.

The Census has it as a "race" option, and they define it with all the possible nationalities.

They're thoroughly Americanized for the most part. And, already, there are more second-generation people of South Asian ancestry than someone from outside the area might realize. And there's intermarriage. It all adds up to a multi-ethnic population whose lifestyles and tastes have largely converged into the dominant white culture.

But the huge percentage of more recent immigrants, including those who are on permanent work visas and not yet nationalized immigrants, makes this group significant under-perform with very "white" American formats like Alternative Rock and Country.

To me, the really astonishing thing about Bay Area demographic trends is the decline in the proportion of the Black population. This is happening even in Oakland, with consequential ripple effects on politics - and is notable in San Francisco, too.

Is this about cost of living? Or is it an indictment of the school system) Or?

So, anyway, the point that's relevant to this thread is that Bay Area 2nd+-generation "Asian" listeners may well have tastes that aren't so different from non-Hispanic whites.

But, as a group, they under-deliver listeners to many formats. Arbitron years ago did a study just of Asians and you could see the vast difference in listening, particularly to specific formats. Rhythmic and AC type formats did well, harder rock, country, and many formats that had lots of talk, such as morning shows, did not do as well. Not all in San Francisco are as big a part of the national culture as Ben Fong-Torres.

 

[JD36108]

I really think it's time for alternative program directors to look at country artists who fit their format. Country poached Jelly Roll from alternative. His latest song is #1 in the Billboard Rock & Alternative chart.

Hot Rock & Alternative Songs

THE WEEK’S MOST POPULAR CURRENT ROCK AND ALTERNATIVE SONGS, RANKED BY STREAMING ACTIVITY DATA BY ONLINE MUSIC SOURCES TRACKED BY LUMINATE, RADIO AIRPLAY AUDIENCE IMPRESSIONS AS MEASURED BY MEDIABASE AND PROVIDED BY LUMINATE AND SALES DATA AS COMPILED BY LUMINATE.

www.billboard.com

I think some rock stations could do well with the Aldean.

as an Alt rock PD, i have been playing Jelly Roll and Hardy for almost a year now...and recently i added Luke combs cover of "Fast Car" within the last month.

i agree with you, a lot of country artists can crossover with that "southern rock" appeal that has been missing since the days of bands like 38 special, molly hatchet and yes even lynyrd skynyrd.

 

[Mark Roberts]

People who indicated, under the "race" question on the Census and the annual update survey that they were "Asian" or one of the subcategories such as Chinese, Philippine, Indian, etc.

The Census has it as a "race" option, and they define it with all the possible nationalities.

All possible nationalities? You're talking about a category that, in the Bay Area, could include:

• People of Chinese ancestry whose families have been here more than 125 years. If a Chinese language is spoken at all in those households, it's Cantonese. Most likely to be found in San Francisco and the bayside East Bay.
• People of Japanese ancestry who already had been somewhat assimilated by World War II and then the horrible internment camps hastened that process.
• More recent Chinese immigrants, either from the PRC or Taiwan, largely in the South Bay. Mandarin is the likely primary language there.
• South Asian immigrants - Indian, Pakistani, Sri Lankan. Mostly Peninsula and South Bay, also around Fremont.
• Vietnamese immigrants - centered on San Jose.
• Second-generation children of the three previous categories.
• Others: Afghanis in Fremont, Hmong (including Oakland's current mayor who is second-generation), Thai, Korean.

Making generalizations about a category that encompasses so much seems problematic to me. With the way the census currently is structured, I really don't see a way around it.

[about the proportional reduction of Black populations in the Bay Area]

Is this about cost of living? Or is it an indictment of the school system) Or?

Cost of living and a feeling of a lost heritage as gentrification took over.

Not all in San Francisco are as big a part of the national culture as Ben Fong-Torres.

I have witnessed him sing karaoke. At my neighbor's house. I think he's more of a localized personality these days and I bet no one under the age of 55 knows who he is. Still has his newspaper column.