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Do "funny" songs run thin on the radio?

Marcos_C said:
You have to go across the Atlantic to find novelty songs making appearances on a popular music chart. The United Kingdom has had a number of novelty songs that have become hits. A character named Mr. Blobby has a self-titled song that became the Christmas number one song of 1993 according to the Official Singles Chart. "Mr. Blobby" spent a total of three weeks at the top spot. In 2018, YouTube personality LadBaby began his reign as Christmas number one champion with "We Built This City," a song parody of the Starship single of the same name. However, instead of building the city on rock and roll, he built it on sausage rolls! Since then, LadBaby has released four more novelty songs, all of which became Christmas number ones. Proceeds from all of LadBaby's singles went to The Trussell Trust, a charity that is working to stop hunger and poverty in the UK.
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Perhaps it's my personal difficulty understanding British humor but I didn't find either of these listenable much less funny.
 
What is that show that has an intro with guys running around and wonky music playing? I can’t remember right now. Isn’t that a British show?
 
landtuna said:
Perhaps it's my personal difficulty understanding British humor but I didn't find either of these listenable much less funny.
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I agree that the listener has to be familiar with the United Kingdom and British colloquialisms to understand and to appreciate LadBaby's songs. Also, I totally understand that Mr. Blobby is not funny to everyone.
 
landtuna said:
Perhaps it's my personal difficulty understanding British humor but I didn't find either of these listenable much less funny.
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Neither do I, and I'm British. "Mr. Blobby" is widely considered awful; "LadBaby" is politically controversial for a number of reasons that are too esoteric (and political) to go into here. Neither are wildly popular.
 
Miss Tuned said:
Neither do I, and I'm British. "Mr. Blobby" is widely considered awful; "LadBaby" is politically controversial for a number of reasons that are too esoteric (and political) to go into here. Neither are wildly popular.
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I agree that LadBaby, as someone who basically sings karaoke to a soundtrack and changes the lyrics to fit his objective, does not have the ability to maintain a level of musical success for very long. Notice that I'm not calling him a musician; he is a YouTube personality who saw an opportunity in the world of music and took it. None of LadBaby's songs lasted more than one week at number one. In fact, each song dropped many places the week after its entry at the top spot.

So yes, tall_guy1, even in a country where it is relatively easy for novelty songs to become hits, such songs run thin on the radio really quickly.
 
The last novelty record I played was probably in the early 90’s. But I couldn’t tell you what it was. But again our changing access to almost anything online has reduced this radio sub-format.
 
seatownmedia said:
The last novelty record I played was probably in the early 90’s. But I couldn’t tell you what it was. But again our changing access to almost anything online has reduced this radio sub-format.
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Joe Lacina was playing novelty records at some point during the midday show on the Stardust satellite standards format. It had to be more recent than that because the station where I heard him didn't sign on until the mid 90s.
 
Daryl Lynn L.A. said:
Several months ago in October 2022, the "Victoria's Secret" single by Jax, charted at #35 on Billboard. That's as close to a novelty song as I've heard in a couple of years. It might have been more of a hit due to social media exposure than due to any exposure by a radio station. ( Just my opinion).

Jax-Victoria's Secret

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That song peaked at number 2 on the Hot AC airplay charts. And I just looked on All Access Music Group and see that it has 1843 plays for the last seven days, which is enough to put it in ninth place on the Hot AC recurrents list. So based on that, I'd say that the Hot AC format is not treating it as a novelty record.
 
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