• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Undercharting hits

I

ixnay

Everytime I hear the opening strains of the Rolling Stones' "Jumping Jack Flash", I think, "WTF didn't this song reach #1" (it peaked at #3).

I get the same feeling when I hear the intro to Free's "All Right Now" (peaked at #4).

And I don't understand why the Mamas and Papas' "Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming to the Canyon)" only got to #20 when it sounded like a top 10 hit.

(Above positions from my Whitburn Top 40 book, 1996 ed.)

And when I hear the intro to Bow Wow Wow's "I Want Candy", I wish it had reached what Casey called "the survey".

These are examples of what I call "undercharting" hits, songs that in the ears and mind of the listener should have charted higher than they did.

Feel free to post any songs that *you* think undercharted, and to speculate why they didn't go higher up (other than "well, such and such a song was right above them" 8)).

ixnay
 
ixnay said:
And when I hear the intro to Bow Wow Wow's "I Want Candy", I wish it had reached what Casey called "the survey".
Click to expand...

I remember reading an article in Billboard back in the early 80s when new wave was beginning to hit the charts. One PD being interviewed (from an AOR station I believe) said something to the effect of "no way, no how was he gonna play a song by a group called Bow Wow Wow". I wonder if that mentality was more widespread than just him.

Then again, it might just have been a song that didn't "connect" with very many people. I always liked their version of it myself.
 
The national charts have never been totally based on pure statistics. There is often politics involved. Which label bought alot of advertising from the magazine the chart appears in and which one did not? Which song's label worked the radio stations to continue with upward or #1 reports? Which group did the chart editor prefer? And that is just 3 out of at least one thousand examples.
 
Oldbones said:
I remember reading an article in Billboard back in the early 80s when new wave was beginning to hit the charts. One PD being interviewed (from an AOR station I believe) said something to the effect of "no way, no how was he gonna play a song by a group called Bow Wow Wow". I wonder if that mentality was more widespread than just him.
Click to expand...

In the late 80's, the legendary Cousin Brucie did a Wednesday night "Yesterday/Today" countdown on the venerable WCBS-FM. I remember one night he was going off about the name of an artist on the "Today" chart asking "whatever happened when artists had names like The Capris, The Penguins, The Belmonts, The Five Satins, etc....THOSE were great names!" The name of the artist that started his tirade? DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince! LOL!
 
A lot of Chart Position has to do with geography. Every one of those songs mentioned peaked at different times in different cities and regions. It may have alread been a regional Top 5 in Detroit before Philly or Dallas caught on. This was especially true of the Canadian groups. Being forced to play specific percentages of Canadian content, 50,000 watt night time clear stations like CHUM, CKLW, and others were weeks ahead on groups like the Guess Who and Bachman Turner Overdrive. Once the American teens, cruising at night and listening to those signals in PA, Jersey, and the Carolinas started asking the local staions to play them, the song had already peaked in other cities. Does that make any sense?
 
The Mamas & Papas have a wonderful version of "Dancin' in the Streets" with Cass Elliott singing lead. It was a big hit where I live and I understand it did very well on the rest of the west coast but apparently not well enough anywhere else to even make the top 40. The Topper: When the movie, "Ghost" hit the theaters and "Unchained Melody" became popular again, enough stations began playing the original version to easily top the Airplay chart but instead of re-releasing the original for sale, Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield re-recorded the song and that was the version that was sold. The result was that both versions stalled short of the top 10. If they had simply re-released the song, it would have been one of the biggest hits of all time!
 
semoochie said:
The Mamas & Papas have a wonderful version of "Dancin' in the Streets" with Cass Elliott singing lead. It was a big hit where I live and I understand it did very well on the rest of the west coast but apparently not well enough anywhere else to even make the top 40.
Click to expand...

Was it ever released as a single? Don't ever recall seeing it. Around here (Boston area) stations played "I Call Your Name" from their first album. Did that get any airplay where you live? Keep in mind that album cuts did not chart (aside from a few radio station surveys). "Michelle" by the Beatles was another example...lots of airplay, but it was never released as a single so it never charted.
 
Here's one that I find interesting...

John Fogerty's "Centerfield" never cracked the Top 40??? Unless there's a mistake in my Whitburn book (which I doubt).

But "The Old Man Down The Road" (the song that he got sued over for sounding too much like himself ???) made it to #10.

How is that possible?

And Creedence NEVER had a #1, but had 5 songs peak at #2.

Someone should do a "#2 Hits of the Top 40 Era" show.

I think the charts are a crap shoot. Kinda like the Grammy Awards. Like when Steely Dan won Album of the Year for "Two Against Nature." That was the Grammies saying, "Oops. Sorry we forgot you all those years boys!"
 
Oldbones said:
Was [the M's&P's "Dancin'..."] ever released as a single? Don't ever recall seeing it.
Click to expand...

Neither do I. I know it from my mom's copy (since donated to our church's yard sale :() of their greatest hits album, Farewell to the First Golden Era (ABC Dunhill, don't know the serial # :-[), with nice liner notes chronicling the group's history by Derek Taylor. The M's&P's "Dancin'..." is a semifunky version that IMO more than holds up to M&theV's version (even to the point of Elliot and Doherty trading off some disjointed conversation during the fadeout :)), as does Jagger and Bowie's version from 1985 (a Live Aid fundraising single, with an instrumental version on the B side). In fact I like those renditions better than Ms. Reeves's.

ixnay
 
Talk about a great song that never charted....Springfield Plane by Kenny O"Dell or how about Timothy Carr's A Step Along the Way. . Both are great tunes that never made it, except for about a one week play life on some Drake stations in 68
 
Another example:

The song was "Little Black Egg" by the Nightcrawler.

It was #1 in Dayton, Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland, Ohio (I've seen most of the old radio charts on this, too.)...but peaked nationally around #40.
 
Wow, someone else has heard of Kenny O'Dell. The only thing I know of him was "Beautiful People"
 
Charts are meaningless. Any radio station that bases what it plays on industry charts likely isn't much of a station.
 
Barry MGuire's "On A Cloudy Afternoon" was agreat song. It was the follow up to "Eve of Destruction". It made it on Billboards top 100 but in the top 40.
I heard it played on several stations including WKBW but not on WABC.
 
therealjm12 said:
Barry MGuire's "On A Cloudy Afternoon" was agreat song. It was the follow up to "Eve of Destruction". It made it on Billboards top 100 but in the top 40.
I heard it played on several stations including WKBW but not on WABC.
Click to expand...

Most of the time, there's a major distinction that could be made between "great song" and "hit song". Where it ended up on any "charts" had a great deal to do with the record company, their rep, incentives to push/promote the song, (yes) payola and whether a PD or jock simply loved the song.

Wilson Pickett's "Land Of 1,000 Dances" peaked at #21 on billboard, let is one of the great late sixties songs that continues to endure; "Honey" by Bobby Goldsboro was #1 for eight weeks in 1968 and there isn't an Oldies station worth a damn who ever plays it. "But It's Alright" by JJ Jackson never got higher than #22, yet continues to test very high today while a handful of Osmonds and J-5 songs hit #1 but you wouldn't be caught dead playing them today. There are hundreds of similar examples.

THAT, my friends, is how accurate the "charts" so many of you are so fond of quoting are. Radio geeks love the charts but your listeners couldn't care less because "the charts" were never an important part of their world. All they know is: "I like this song" or "I don't like this song", which is why those of us who want to win consistently do research.
 
If Honey was #1 for eight weeks, SOMONE loved it. But many novelty songs, of which I consider Honey one, soared with great sales and airplay. Let's face it, the lyrics of Honey are heart-wrenching. At the same time, Sugar Sugar was crap too, but it gets payed every hour on the hour. Go figure.
 
Here's another example: the "Bad" album by Michael Jackson. Does anybody really and truly believe that there were five #1 hits from that album? I remember the incredible pressure from the record reps for play on all those cuts because they were going for the record of #1 hits from a single album.

In 20 years, will "Dirty Diana" or " I Just Can't Stop Loving You" be considered legendary hits? Answer: of course not.

Kind of puts "Honey" in perspective, doesn't it?
 
amfmsw said:
If Honey was #1 for eight weeks, SOMONE loved it. But many novelty songs, of which I consider Honey one, soared with great sales and airplay. Let's face it, the lyrics of Honey are heart-wrenching. At the same time, Sugar Sugar was crap too, but it gets payed every hour on the hour. Go figure.
Click to expand...

The issue is that you are ignoring the "then" and "now" factor. Oldies stations, or, for that matter, any station that plays gold in its mix, play songs that are hits now... today... at this moment.

Many songs that were hits are no longer liked. Stations that don't play them do so for a reason: they have consulted with listeners and found that such tunes are not of interest on the radio today.

Even personally, I like hearing Sugar Sugar and Brown Eyed Girl, but do not enjoy hearing Honey. In fact, hearing Honey is enough to trigger a station change with me. Top me, the first two songs are still hits, but the Goldsboro song is definitely not.
 
"The issue is that you are ignoring the "then" and "now" factor. Oldies stations, or, for that matter, any station that plays gold in its mix, play songs that are hits now... today... at this moment.

Many songs that were hits are no longer liked. Stations that don't play them do so for a reason: they have consulted with listeners and found that such tunes are not of interest on the radio today.

Even personally, I like hearing Sugar Sugar and Brown Eyed Girl, but do not enjoy hearing Honey. In fact, hearing Honey is enough to trigger a station change with me. Top me, the first two songs are still hits, but the Goldsboro song is definitely not."

Exhibit A - "Seasons in the Sun" (Terry Jacks).
 
the only people who care about billboard or r&r are radio geeks
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.
Back
Top Bottom