"D Peter Maus" wrote in message
...
David Eduardo wrote:

But none breaking new ground. Far be it from me to agree with Rickets,
but he makes the same point I do. Breaking new ground, taking risks is not
even on the radar, today. So, what the listeners pick is what they hear,
what sounds familiar, and with very few exceptions, what they've come to
expect from contemporary music. More of the same. Different names.
Different performers. Same clothes, same sounds, same haircuts.
Interchangeably, more of the same.

Most stations that play currents add new songs with a certain regularity.
These are always songs listeners have never heard, since promo copies, even
with the internet, get to radio before anyone else.

Stations try to find songs that will sount right for the format but will
also give variety. Very often on the three separate times I have filled in
as acting PD of an LA AC, I have looked at what we are playing as currents
and then looked at potential adds for songs that do not sound too much like
the bulk of the list. That means looking for songs that add variety and
differentiation.

Obviously, the songs picked have to satisfy the PDs perception of what the
listener wants.

Of course, after a hundred or so plays, we let the listener tell us if they
are starting to like the song.

Most stations do the same thing. The reason is that the last 50 years of top
40 and contemporary formats ranging from alternative to country have shown
us that doing it any other way does not work. Some of us have tried it
themselves and learned a lessorn... or been fired... or we have watched
others do it..

Occasionally, PD's I've worked for have taken a chance, and added 'out
of the box.' In one case, a test pressing, hand delivered from the record
label on the next block. And more often than not, these wild card tunes
blew holes in the dial. Such was the result with a PD who knew his
audience better than B-A, Lund, or even, dare I say it...you.

Adding a song does one thing, as we have seen in 6 years of PPM.. it drives
listeners away. So we add songs because we know the list needs refreshing,
but we place the songs in between very high scoreing songs... and we stll
see listener loss on every new song.

BA is a Smooth Jazz consultant / syndicator, but mostly a research company.
I don't even know of any stations Lund has consulted. You have not even come
close to the major consultants in the US.

We've all played test pressings and been first on something... I was the
first to play Julio Iglesias outside Spain, for example. But when I did it,
I knew our main job was to play the listeners' favorite songs and have
entertaining jocks and good newscasts because I am not in the record
business and my job has always been to help sell spots, not records.

What wears so thin, now, is that I can turn on the radio and hear hot,
new tunes that don't sound any different than anything else that's been on
the air in the last 18 months.

I could say the same for almost all top 40 music from about 1956 to 1964. It
sounded the same, and the "innovations" were redocoration, not innovation.

So, you're making your numbers. Wonderful. Spend it wisely. But what I
have been asking, what Telamon, Rickets, RHF and the rest of us have been
wondering is, when do are you going to do something for the listeners?

In my case, we are providing more than just juke boxes with antennas....
live talent 24/7, training talent daily, morning shows that interview Obama
as well as recording artists. Innovative new formats on occasion.

Jeff Davis used to tell me that all program directors share the same
brain cell. Nowhere is that more apparent than on the radio, today. And
nowhere is it more apparent that it's going to exact a terrible price in
the years to come as more and more young people abandon radio, entirely.

Our strongest cell in 18-34. We aren't losing listeners because we are more
than, as I said, a jukebox.

Who's showing them the potential of Radio. The theatre of the mind. The
ability to bring new sound. New ideas. New blood.

Look at who is not declining in revenue. The answer is there... where
listenership is not off, and there is lots of innovation.

Instead, we get overresearched playlists. Overresearched personality
types. Overresearched formatics. All homogenized into 5 radio stations
cloned across the nation.

You can not talk too much to the listener. Talking to the listener is the
definition of research. So what you are saying is not to listen to the
listener and make decisions unilaterally... which is the height of
arrogance.