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The solution for smooth jazz

I

Interstate 78

was surfing the dish network muzak channels last night and stumbled upon a song called "Angel Love" by Samantha James. never had heard of her before but was totally enthralled by the tune. here's a little homework assignment for everyone here. go to her page here and listen to the sample song "Angel Love" below the bio and then come back here:

http://www.om-records.com/artists/samantha_james

below the biography, a media player with the song comes up where you can play "Angel Love" free. Go listen and then come back here.

now tell me, is that not the answer for smooth jazz stations?? if we have to endure 1 vocal per 1 jazz instrumental, why can't the vocals be like that instead of phil collins or whitney houston??

i'm not sure what to classify the genre as. most of my research on her comes up downbeat dance, electronic.

this takes me back to about a year ago when my wife was shopping in a hip female clothing store. i went in with her. this kind of music was playing in the background. i knew no artists, but it was all a hip kind of downbeat dance, electronic. i am a 30-something year old male and i was totally enraptured. then i heard this song the other night and it reminded me.

would songs like this not work PERFECTLY between brian culbertson and george benson? fresh. vibrant. fun. yet relaxing. vocal chill so to speak. instrumental chill didn't work in NYC, but this is more downbeat dance. thoughts??

sorry for the rambling post but that song totally blew me away. i keep playing it over and over today and pulling out my hair watching smooth jazz radio destroy itself when i think if they played vocals like this, it'd be the answer.

thoughts?
 
Interstate 78 said:
was surfing the dish network muzak channels last night and stumbled upon a song called "Angel Love" by Samantha James. never had heard of her before but was totally enthralled by the tune. here's a little homework assignment for everyone here. go to her page here and listen to the sample song "Angel Love" below the bio and then come back here:

http://www.om-records.com/artists/samantha_james

below the biography, a media player with the song comes up where you can play "Angel Love" free. Go listen and then come back here.

now tell me, is that not the answer for smooth jazz stations?? if we have to endure 1 vocal per 1 jazz instrumental, why can't the vocals be like that instead of phil collins or whitney houston??

i'm not sure what to classify the genre as. most of my research on her comes up downbeat dance, electronic.

this takes me back to about a year ago when my wife was shopping in a hip female clothing store. i went in with her. this kind of music was playing in the background. i knew no artists, but it was all a hip kind of downbeat dance, electronic. i am a 30-something year old male and i was totally enraptured. then i heard this song the other night and it reminded me.

would songs like this not work PERFECTLY between brian culbertson and george benson? fresh. vibrant. fun. yet relaxing. vocal chill so to speak. instrumental chill didn't work in NYC, but this is more downbeat dance. thoughts??

sorry for the rambling post but that song totally blew me away. i keep playing it over and over today and pulling out my hair watching smooth jazz radio destroy itself when i think if they played vocals like this, it'd be the answer.

thoughts?
Click to expand...

I like it.
VERY cool! 8)
Definitely something I wouldn't mind hearing mixed in with smooth jazz tracks.


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Angel Eyes definitely fits the vocal style I like in Smooth Jazz. That is close to what was originally included before the format went Motown.
 
This is the kind of music that started the format and it continues today on specialty shows (Chill with Mindi Abair among others) for the most part. The label is OM Records and they have a ton of tasty offerings including their "Chilled" 1 and 2 series. Check out the Techno Squirrels and Stolen Identity on those CD's. This music came out of the clubs and lounges in Europe originally and can be found around the country at various establishments. You can also hear it on TV in shows like CSI, etc. Everything But The Girl has worked in this vein for some time along with many others. Also try the Jody Whatley tune "Skin Deep" off her Shanachie release "Midnight Lounge" which came out in 2003. Always got huge response when we played it on my station. I would like to think the format will head back to this kind of music. I've said all along that the BA vision is Smooth AC and that is moving along nicely according to Arbitron. Now if Alan, Rad and the rest of their ilk can get on with it then the talented can get back to doing great things with music that deserves to be heard.
 
Very nice. There is a lot of singer/songwriter material that would be tasty in an NAC music mix, especially with pop/rock oriented instrumentals like the ones Steve Cole did on "True" , Mindi, Steve Oliver, Acoustic Alchemy, Ripps, Andy Snitzer, and such. Who said it had to be all about melisma-drenched R&B? Speaking of which did y'all see that they took the original vocal off Boney's "Gonna Get It" and mixed in the girl who came in 3rd on Idol, who sounds like watered down Whitney and released it to A/C. Carly was my favorite female and second favorite behind David Cook overall. Carly can sing!!

I just finished doing the music test for Keplers show..they've even got that slide thing for you to use and those 10 sec clips are waaay too short but 75% of the songs on the test were vocals, almost all of them were lite R&B covers and sounded like songs that were dumped into the SJ pool when labels couldn't get action on any other format.

This music came out of the clubs and lounges in Europe originally and can be found around the country at various establishments
Click to expand...
Chill and downtempo nights in clubs never went over where I live. Guess we aren't very Euro here. (which could reflect most non-metropolitan markets..this format tends to be LA-centric but LA isn't the real world.) I don't hear the above mentioned song as being chill anyway..it is structured, has a strong melody and there is beauty and warmth in her voice. Chill is more groove and effects driven and voices tend to be used as another effect..looped/processed/whatever. This is a human being singing a real song, kinda trancy but not chill.
 
The Chill/Electronic is where I connect with my 15 and 17 year old. My daughter searches the internet for music she hears on TV whether in movies or programs and alot of it is in the chill vein. How about the Apple song that they made a huge hit for an unknown. Been to Abercrombie and checked out what is blasting through the sound system? As I have been saying, the chill/electronic is where we pick up the younger audience to jump the format.

Nock
 
glad my post got so many people talking. that really is a great song, isn't it? in response to the post that said this is the type of vocals that started the format, my question is why then did they stop airing these kind of vocals on smooth jazz stations in the first place. to me, it seems that smooth jazz lost its excitement (and ratings) when phil collins, whitney houston, madonna, etc. were added and artists like basia and this samantha james were taken off. so why are the consultants being so brain dead and staying on course with this same watered down format while they watch the ratings go down down down and the number of smooth jazz stations go down down down. wouldn't it be common sense to go back to the style of format the way it was when smooth jazz was the big thing in radio? am i not seeing things right here? i'm sure listener's tastes haven't changed that much in 10 to 15 years.
 
Check out an artist named AYA. Couple years back they were pitching her as the new SADE. Strange Flower is a great cd.

Nock
 
This music came out of the clubs and lounges in Europe originally and can be found around the country at various establishments
Click to expand...
 

Cat said...

Chill and downtempo nights in clubs never went over where I live. Guess we aren't very Euro here. (which could reflect most non-metropolitan markets..this format tends to be LA-centric but LA isn't the real world.) I don't hear the above mentioned song as being chill anyway..it is structured, has a strong melody and there is beauty and warmth in her voice. Chill is more groove and effects driven and voices tend to be used as another effect..looped/processed/whatever. This is a human being singing a real song, kinda trancy but not chill.

Hey Cat...

Every once and a while you need to refer to the experience of others instead of riffing on subjects your not real sure of. I know that Jacksonville is not the most cosmo city on the planet (I lived in Florida for 10 years) but there's a lot more to chill than how you describe it. I've had the opportunity to travel and I've been to the clubs in Ibiza, the French Riviera and London and there are many facets to the music we describe as chill. It can be groove jazz, classic lounge, or even smoothed out dance mixes to even try to describe it. Chill has tons of structure, melody and hooks. It can be very down tempo and dance crazy. It has real humans singing real songs and some of it is trancy but not a lot. And one last thing, it has nothing to do with an LA sterotype at all. There are chill clubs in a lot of the larger cities and you'd probably be surprised at some of the towns you can find it being played including my cowtown of a berg. It does exist in college towns quite nicely. This woman has a good thing and it can fit the chill mode. The important thing and I believe that we agree is that it would fit our format to a tee and the question becomes why it's not getting airplay. We know why but hopefully that will go away when BA does.
 
Nice track, I wouldn't mind it in a Smooth Jazz mix....

The Phil Collins and Eric Clapton tunes are an effort to hook a mass audience....at least that's what I assume.
 
I've been to the clubs in Ibiza, the French Riviera and London and there are many facets to the music we describe as chill
Click to expand...

But is everyone on this side of the pond really that excited about clubbing in Ibiza? It's kind of like going to Cannes. You're supposed to want to because it has this status image but theres a big difference between supposed to want to and actually wanting to. I'll still hold that the format elite, or what was the format elite when this trend was planted, are more into upscale European culture than most average people. When it comes to vocals I'd rather hear something like Jason Mraz "Bella Luna" or Raul Midon than a chill track, although neither need to exclude the other. There are just so many non-chill vocals that would work but everyone has tunnelvisioned onto Chill to the exclusion of everything else.
 
Mike Sheridan said:
Nice track, I wouldn't mind it in a Smooth Jazz mix....

The Phil Collins and Eric Clapton tunes are an effort to hook a mass audience....at least that's what I assume.
Click to expand...
Mike Sheridan is right on that regarding the Phil Collins and Eric Clapton music on Smooth Jazz stations. Those stations want to get a much (bigger) audience. In a way, I think that's a good look, regarding for the person who like Classic Rock, when they hear Eric Clapton on a Smooth Jazz station, they might listen more and lock in that Preset on their radios at home, office and car. Hey, the more listeners, the better.
Personally when I hear Eric Clapton on a Smooth Jazz station, I will change the station, or if I'm listenning online, I lower the volume for a quick minute.
I guess these are the reasons of the Format Name Change
 
If they grew up with classic rock why would they listen to a station that doesn't allow electric guitar solos on the instrumentals? First time a string synth laden snoozer comes up they would hit the button and never come back.
 
AnotherCat said:
If they grew up with classic rock why would they listen to a station that doesn't allow electric guitar solos on the instrumentals? First time a string synth laden snoozer comes up they would hit the button and never come back.
Click to expand...

I don't know about that, Quintana & Spear regularly used electric guitar for solos on their 'Shades for Shadow' album which got a lot of airplay on KTWV when it debuted several years ago and was very popular.

But to go along with what Josh stated, most of SJ affectionados have the mainstay artists (like Kenny G or Najee) in their CD collection anyway and usually every album they recorded. So it seems pointless to keep these guys in such heavy rotation unless they have something new out. "Winelight" by Grover Washington Jr. is a great song, but how many times can it be played before it becomes a listener turn off? And who doesn't have the album, or at least the song, in their collection? So I think the core audience of Smooth Jazz loyalists is getting bored and straying away.

What's sad is that there are both new artists and seldom heard artists who are recording this kind of music but are not getting the exposure on radio. If I were programming Smooth Jazz I wouldn't hesitate to introduce new SJ artists, including some new vocalists, maybe a little Chill and Acid Jazz, to shake it up and keep it interesting. I wouldn't totally retire the tried and true artists but play them less frequently.

Above all, I would NOT put A/C into the mix. Big mistake. It becomes a 'neither fish nor foul' question after that.

But something needs to be done to take Smooth Jazz out of the moribund funk it currently is in and make it sail once more.

C5
 
OK, took the bait, doing homework...30 seconds into this Samantha Jones cut and I'm hooked big time! Yep, more diversity in the artists, especially infusing NuJazz (with the Brazilian, world jazz mix influences) are what will surge the SJ brand. I listen more these days to NuJazz channels on satellite or cable TV or 'net for that reason.

Of course the big solution for this format is buyouts. Literally fans and the financially adept buying stations and starting new internet radio facilities. The business has no head for long term anything; that's why I did not get the cash in an attempt to start multiplying this format (with some other good music infusions) 15 years ago. I had plans being reviewed by the old Coopers & Lybrand who were considering big bucks to get me started, but I decided to unplug from them because they were looking for quick trends and quick cash - the 'on now, gone in a flash' flipping of properties for quick profit.

How did we all forget that ownership is the best way to ensure you get something? Yeah, it costs money, all good things do.

-Bill Alley
WINY'S Juke Box Gold
Putnam CT
[email protected]
 
There is a guy in Melbourne Fl who has done just that. He has covered the area with a group of low power FM stations. There is some money down there and he's apparently gotten some investors to put in more than a few bucks for the cause. He's still kind of stuck in the relaxation and "smoothing out your day" presentation but the music is infinitely better than corporate radio and the guy really cares about radio and the music. And this is a true endorsement. Kepler called him a "know nothing" at R&R a few years ago.

www.thegroove.org
 
AnotherCat said:
Kepler called him a "know nothing" at R&R a few years ago.

www.thegroove.org
Click to expand...

Boy, the more stories I hear about this Kepler character, the more obvious it seems to be that he is very arrogant, condescending, and perhaps a bit egomaniacal?

For someone who claims to be the self-anointed salvation of terrestrial SJ, what fine set of personality traits to possess!! :-[ :mad:

DD©
 
Yeah, well...his career started to ascend under the Clear Channel Umbrella during the Randy Michaels era so one could assume thats where he learned how to do business.
 
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