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Two Standards Stations Have Departed

I don't think you could have a #1 song if it only appealed to mothers and grandmothers. Younger people must have been buying the Carpenters and Barry Manilow records because they sold so well. Why would youth-oriented Top 40 stations play these artists if they were such a turn off?

I'll ask it again. We liked Barbra Streisand and Bread when we were young but we don't like them now that we're older? We listened to Top 40 stations that played Close To You and The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face every couple of hours. But now we want these songs banished from our radios?
 
michael hagerty said:
Plus, a lot of songs and artists that you mentioned were adult-appeal records that Top 40 played. Our moms liked them.
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That's an important point. Young adults and particularly young adult women have always been the bigger part of the Top 40 audience.

Those Top 40 stations that had 40 and 50 shares in the 50's and early 60's could not have done it with teens alone. And those adult listeners drove the adult sounding hits, whether they were by Perry Como, Dominico Modugno, Dean Martin or Barry Manilow.
 
Gregg. said:
But now we want these songs banished from our radios?
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I don't think anyone is saying that. People want what people want. But those songs today are the equivalent of Al Jolson in the 60s. And while there was an audience for that then, it wasn't a big audience.

As I often say, any format you want is available on Sirius for $14.95 a month. They're in that business of serving the niches.
 
Gregg. said:
I don't think you could have a #1 song if it only appealed to mothers and grandmothers. Younger people must have been buying the Carpenters and Barry Manilow records because they sold so well. Why would youth-oriented Top 40 stations play these artists if they were such a turn off?

I'll ask it again. We liked Barbra Streisand and Bread when we were young but we don't like them now that we're older? We listened to Top 40 stations that played Close To You and The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face every couple of hours. But now we want these songs banished from our radios?
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Gregg: Nobody said "only mothers and grandmothers". But these are records that skewed female and skewed adult. So did Top 40, and that's why album rock was able to steal teens and young adult males fairly quickly as the 70s went on.

Even if we were to pretend that every 14-year old loved "Close To You", every 15-year-old loved "Baby I'm A-Want You", every 16-year-old loved "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face", every 17-year-old loved "Touch Me In The Morning" and every 18-year-old loved "The Way We Were"----and still does, which would be another leap of logic--- we're still talking about somebody who turns 60 next year. Which leaves us exactly where we are now in terms of advertisers and the commercial viability of such a format.

Fact is, most of the teen and young adult males left top 40 radio just as soon as there was a decent album rock competitor in the market, and by the mid-late 70s, all but the youngest teen girls were going there, too. The guys put up with the Carpenters and Bread to hear the Stones and Led Zeppelin until they no longer had to do that. A lot of the girls simply outgrew soft rock as that phase ended (women tend to be more trend-driven musically) and went on to album rock themselves.

The "continuous soft hits" style of Adult Contemporary popular in the 80s and 90s and to a lesser extent the '00s was the logical extension of the Carpenters-Bread-Roberta Flack-Barbra Streisand-Barry Manilow appeal. But it was overwhelmingly female and 35+ in the beginning, which as the format was running out of gas, became 55+. It attracted moms born in 1936 in far greater numbers than it did Boomer daughters born in 1956....who, in the mid-80s, were listening to CHR with their tween-age daughters.
 
TheBigA said:
Some of this is a function of the number of radio stations in the 70s vs today, and the diversity of formats.

Take a look at the latest Top 40 chart. Not a lot of music that would fit with The Carpenters today. Maybe Adele.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2012/10/15/airplay-charts/1635101/
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Clearly, this is no longer a factor but ten years ago, I thought it would be. One of my all time favorite experiences was when I was 15 and sitting in the back seat with four 15 year-old girls, wearing bikinis that were all singing "Close To You" to me! The Carpenters were huge in the 70s and I can't think of anyone who didn't like them. By the way, there's nothing boring about somewhat softer music. It gives you a good excuse to embrace your partner on the dance floor and I can't believe that people no longer enjoy doing that!
 
Semoochie:

And seven years ago, you and a bunch of guys on this board were telling me that I was crazy and that there weren't enough 90s hits to support a format ("too much hip-hop...won't appeal to adults"). The hottest new format: Throwback hip-hop and R&B. The thirty-somethings love it. How'd I know? Human nature and a career of observing next steps. After us, they were pretty much raised on rhythm.

Your backseat experience (that sounds racier than I meant it) would make most guys like the Carpenters. But ten years later, those four 25-year olds would probably have picked a different song....or had trouble agreeing on one, as one was into album rock, one into disco, another had gone country and the fourth was still into soft rock, but was into Air Supply instead of the Carpenters. And all four of those women are out of the demo now.

As for embracing your partner on the dance floor, that's what slow jams are all about. But today's adult compartmentalizes better than we did. She/he wants uptempo feelgood to get through the day. The slow jam gets saved for the dance floor.
 
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michael hagerty said:
Semoochie:

And seven years ago, you and a bunch of guys on this board were telling me that I was crazy and that there weren't enough 90s hits to support a format ("too much hip-hop...won't appeal to adults"). The hottest new format: Throwback hip-hop and R&B. The thirty-somethings love it. How'd I know? Human nature and a career of observing next steps. After us, they were pretty much raised on rhythm.

Your backseat experience (that sounds racier than I meant it) would make most guys like the Carpenters. But ten years later, those four 25-year olds would probably have picked a different song....or had trouble agreeing on one, as one was into album rock, one into disco, another had gone country and the fourth was still into soft rock, but was into Air Supply instead of the Carpenters. And all four of those women are out of the demo now.

As for embracing your partner on the dance floor, that's what slow jams are all about. But today's adult compartmentalizes better than we did. She/he wants uptempo feelgood to get through the day. The slow jam gets saved for the dance floor.
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You are confusing me with someone else. I have the utmost respect for not only your knowledge but in your ability to explain things so the novice can understand and I certainly would not call anyone "crazy". At one time, it was explained by some of the pros that there weren't enough 90s hits with staying power to make up a format but it had nothing to do with genre'. It was just that there wasn't a consensus on enough songs. You referred to Throwback Hip-hop and R&B as the "hottest new format" but haven't most of those stations started fairly strong and dropped off quickly? I never said that anyone should play the Carpenters now or even then. I merely mentioned that I was surprised that they didn't get airplay a decade or so back when they were such a big act in the 70s and not necessarily just with older people.
 
Could you imagine this generation crankin' up "Close To You".

Michael Bolton and Celine Dion will suffer the same fate 20 years from now. It is a cycle

The verdict is still out on the throwback/Hip Hop format, it is starting to show some slow down/burn.

More 90's are starting to be added to playlists. We just added two 'N Sync songs, that wouldn't of happened 7 or 10 years ago.

For pop stations, many of the crossover Hip Hop songs usually sample a well know song, or it has to be something the is easily recognized such as the "Humpty Dance" or "California Love". That list might be around 40 or so songs.
 
She is the exception to the rule. Dion still sells out her Vegas shows.
 
semoochie said:
You are confusing me with someone else. I have the utmost respect for not only your knowledge but in your ability to explain things so the novice can understand and I certainly would not call anyone "crazy". At one time, it was explained by some of the pros that there weren't enough 90s hits with staying power to make up a format but it had nothing to do with genre'. It was just that there wasn't a consensus on enough songs. You referred to Throwback Hip-hop and R&B as the "hottest new format" but haven't most of those stations started fairly strong and dropped off quickly? I never said that anyone should play the Carpenters now or even then. I merely mentioned that I was surprised that they didn't get airplay a decade or so back when they were such a big act in the 70s and not necessarily just with older people.
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Semoochie: My mistake and my apologies.
 
Groove1670 said:
Could you imagine this generation crankin' up "Close To You".

Michael Bolton and Celine Dion will suffer the same fate 20 years from now. It is a cycle

.
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You mean they're still getting spins somewhere now? I haven't heard either of them on the radio in what seems like 7 or 8 years.
 
landtuna said:
Look how long Wayne Newton has been reeling them in and when was his last pop hit (and PLEASE don't play it)?
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But, as oldies76 would have said, it's someone's favorite song and should be played! :rolleyes:
 
CTListener said:
If we're talking about "Daddy, Don't You Walk So Fast," anyone who has that as a favorite song ought to be deported.
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We are, and I support deportation as well, especially if they take all of the "it was a hit so it should be played" proponents with them.
 
benale said:
You'll still hear that song on the few Standards stations that are left.
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Are Standards considered a genre now or, like the old days, does it mean songs by the 40's-60's mainstream crooners (Sinatra, Crosby, etc.)
 
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