Yesterday, when working on this week's Music Biz Weekly podcast, Doc Kane, Justin Travis and myself discussed this article: Seven Trends Radio Missed. I won't spoil the podcast by telling you what we thought of the article, but it definitely got me thinking, just what IS wrong with US radio? Can the internet alone be to blame for why people are turning away from radio? What do you think? Share your thoughts by voting in the pool, and if you've got more to say, just leave a comment or get in touch!
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It’s kind of a mix, I think. I mean, the consolidation of stations (and the company wide playlists that came with it) pretty much closed off the possibility of local stations embracing anything different. Then there’s the quality factor; they really do play a lot of crap with some good music peppered in. Then there’s satellite, which I switched to seeing as how there’s typically more than one station for each genre of music, is commercial free and isn’t bound by region (it’s great on long car trips). finally there’s the iPod. Why would I want to listen to music that I’m not into, with commercials, when I could just make a playlist or hit shuffle and not have to do a thing after that.
Hell, I live in the New York radio market and we only have one rock station. What’s up with that?
I used to work in radio for over 20 years. The consolidation really killed radio. With all the cookie cutter formats our there now there is no creativity left. When I started it was 1 program director per station. Now a PD can oversee stations in NY and Detroit or LA and San Fran. Also overseeing various formats in each market. That can’t work and now Clear Channel is doing regional programming. Where someone in Dallas, let’s say, is doing the programming for a bunch of stations in Texas and the same music and DJ’s will be played at the same time all over the state. That is not GOOD for radio at all.
thanks.
Radio plays absolutely no variety or new music, which there happens to be. Everything on radio is either classic rock, which is going on 40 years stale now (think Zepplin, Stones, even Aerosmith). Or rap music, which is pretty stale at this point too. There is great new rock music out there but it never gets played on the radio. Arcade Fire’s new album “Suburbs” went gold in the first week. Do you ever here it on the radio? People who want to hear new music have no choice but to find it online. Radio killed itself by not staying relevant– not the internet.