The differences between Mainstream AC, Hot AC and CHR today are fewer than 10 years ago. It's because of the current crop of hit music. In the past, it was generally accepted that women began to lose interest in the current hits after age 25, losing interest almost completely by age 30. That created a nice niche for Mainstream AC, a format which is mostly "library" based by design. Successful Mainstream stations tend to play only current per hour and they wait forever before adding new songs, to ensure familiarity. So those that are "currents" at the format might seem like recurrents to many. Then they'll play one recurrent per hour, which may go back as far as 2 to 3 years. The hour will then be fleshed out with a mix of songs of past 25 -30 years. Hot AC was more current based playing 3- 4 currents per hour, 2-3 recurrents and the rest gold from the past 15 years.
Now with this generation being more in touch and plugged in, Many of today's currents are appealing to women as old as 44. That has been making CHR #1 25-54 persons in many markets. Also, Mainstream AC has a big doughnut hole of music: the 90s. While the 80s have been and continue to be a big source of appeal, the 90s are a wasteland. If you recall, CHR went off a musical cliff from 1990-94. Plus, beginning around 1995, stations starting getting more conservative, adding fewer songs and keeping the hits longer. The net result is a very limited number of good testing songs to choose from. So as the 80s get older and older in demographic appeal, there will be little to keep the library up to date. And although some Mainstreams are still playing a few 70s titles, those songs are appealing mostly to 50 + persons. This may be why Mainstream AC wasn't missed in York these past 2 years.
