MUSICAL MUSINGS
April 16, 2001
TOO MUCH NEW MUSIC? A GUIDE TO THE CHARTS AND THEIR EFFECT ON YOUR PROGRAMMING DECISIONS
We all use the charts listed in trade magazines to help us make our programming decisions. But music charts, like anything else based on math, can be misleading. Are you using the charts correctly?
Open up a copy of Radio & Records and find the Country chart. Read the small print at the bottom of the page. Let’s look at two notable items from that box.
“BREAKER status is assigned to songs achieving airplay at 60% of reporter base for the first time.”
Many people see the large word “BREAKER” attached to a charted song and assume it means that song is rocketing up the chart. But the impressive graphics are playing a trick on you. BREAKER is merely an indication that a certain percentage of reporting stations played the song at least once this week. It could have been played by 59% of those stations last week; in fact, it could even be losing spins in a BREAKER week as long as one more station is playing it this week than last.
“Songs that are down in points/plays for three consecutive weeks and below No. 1 are moved to recurrent.”
Did you read that carefully? A song could literally be at #2 but no longer appear on the chart, provided it has lost points in each of the last three weeks. On the Country chart in particular, you’ll notice that most of the songs are moving up. This is because the majority of the downward-moving songs have been deleted. The upshot of this is that, in reality, the song listed at #50 is far, far below that ranking. R&R prints a “Most Played Recurrents” chart for each format, but you’ll notice they don’t list the number of spins each of those songs received. Every one of those songs, and many more to boot, would still have a respectable showing on the Top 50 if they hadn’t been manually removed.
The rules governing recurrent status vary from chart to chart and from one trade magazine to another. Billboard charts usually have a literal chunk at the top of the chart in which songs are allowed to stay as long as they are able, but below that point (#20, for instance, on their AC chart), you start seeing the dregs appear pretty quickly. Record labels can push a song pretty high on the chart, with nothing but marketing dollars, long before anyone has a clue how the actual audience feels about it.
For another example, let’s look at a literal AC chart from Broadcast Data Systems, the company that provides Billboard with its raw chart data. I’ve chosen 25 top-rated AC stations in medium to large markets. The song at #26 this week is “Truly Madly Deeply” by Savage Garden, a three-year-old song and a great recurrent. #32 is “Something To Talk About” by Bonnie Raitt (1991), and #38 is “Every Breath You Take” by The Police (1983). In fact, of the literal Top 100 songs, 79 of them are more than a year old, and 17 were hits prior to 1990. And where’s the song that Billboard listed at #30 this week? Well, I won’t name the title and artist because I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, but the song is at #779. That’s right: #779, with 7 of those 25 stations playing it an average of 1.29 times each.
Now let’s look at a literal Heritage Rock chart, also from Broadcast Data Systems. “Sweet Child O’ Mine” by Guns N’ Roses (1988) sits at #29, “Tom Sawyer” by Rush (1981) at #30, and “All Along The Watchtower” by Jimi Hendrix (1968) at #53! These aren’t bad rotations; they’re the result of smart programming on very successful radio stations.
Yes, Rock stations tend to be very gold-based, as do AC stations. So lest you feel this doesn’t apply to current-based formats, look at a literal Country chart, where Trisha Yearwood’s “She’s In Love With The Boy” (1991) is perched respectably at #71. Every station on this panel played it last week, at an average of five spins per station. Even on a literal Rhythmic CHR chart, Jay-Z’s “Can I Get A…” is at #80, and that song is more than two years old.
The point of all this analysis is that it’s crucial to remember one thing about trade magazine charts: They are promotional tools designed to coax programmers into adding new music. They are not journalism. A journalistic chart would report a literal Top 50, chock full of proven hits. Would you add a song that you knew was only #115? Of course not. But when it shows up on the chart at #36, just a few slots below those BREAKER songs, it starts to look like a hit, doesn’t it?
Do you ever dig down to the bottom of the chart, or even into New & Active, to find an add? Be careful! Unless that song is the first single from a new album by a core artist (and it probably isn’t), you’re probably wasting a number of perfectly good spins per week. You may feel that a song on your playlist has stiffed, but it’s better to play a semi-familiar song for another week, knowing full well that you intend to drop it, than to rush an unproven song onto your airwaves.
Are you constantly adding stiffs in order to replace other stiffs? Well, how many currents are you playing? For a Country station, any more than 30 is too many. For a CHR, 35 is about all you can get away with, including your night currents. And if you’re playing an AC format, don’t go over 20.
Are you in a small market? Don’t think your situation is any different from the markets with all the research resources. People use the radio the same way no matter where they live, and most of your listeners would much rather turn the radio off completely than sit through an unfamiliar song. That’s why new music needs to be handled wisely. It’s the weakest link on your station, but you still need it.
Most listeners will tell you they enjoy hearing new music, but unannounced new music is just unfamiliar music, and it leads directly to button-pushing. Every time you play a new song, tell the audience it’s new, and be excited about it. How long does a song stay “new”? One recent study shows that you have to play a song 17 times, in a variety of dayparts, to get your average listener to hear it just once. Furthermore, don’t even think of gathering callout research on a new song until you’ve played it at least 100 times. Your jocks should be sick of hearing a song before they stop announcing its artist and title at every play. And again, this is a truism that runs from the largest market to the smallest market.
So next time you sit down to preview the labels’ latest offerings, ask yourself this: Are you absolutely certain this untried song will be a hit? Or is it just the latest item on your record rep’s agenda?