[RadioInsight] Escape From Boyfriend Country: What Country Radio Must Do Now
 

RadioInsight

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Escape From Boyfriend Country: What Country Radio Must Do Now

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 01:32 PM PST
https://radioinsight.com/ross/184581...o-must-do-now/


If you’re already at Country Radio Seminar, you may be too busy in the
hallways to stop and read about Country radio. You may have already read
enough manifestos, even though we’re not yet 24-hours in to the convention
as I write this. But with the format discussion already highly charged, I’m
arriving in town on Wednesday morning with a lot of thoughts on “What
Country Radio Must Do Now” in its attempts to “Escape From Boyfriend
Country,” a place where listeners aren’t exactly happy, but largely
unchallenged. And that’s the first problem.
“Total Acceptance” Is The Enemy – Rival researchers are battling it out
this week on whether audiences are sincere in wanting to more
female-fronted hits, or agree only in theory. But the most reactionary
programmers aren’t even focused on that question. They’re looking at the
third or so of the CMT respondents that mostly like hearing men and afraid
to challenge them on even a single song.
It never defuses anything to bring up the Dixie Chicks, but their
banishment from most Country stations began in the same place: programmers
in format battles who felt the need to win every punch from a rival station
were not willing losing a single listener. And that was before PPM
measurement with its panicky directive to win the punch, win the
quarter-hour, win the hour, win the week, win the month. For those PDs, the
knowledge that some listener somewhere likes hearing male voices better is
enough. Now we need a survey to point out that they don’t necessarily sit
through anodyne back-to-back boyfriend country, either. But merely not
tuning people away is not a winning strategy now.
Equity Starts From The First Spin – Part of the reason there have been
fewer female hits is because the format’s most reliable female hitmakers
have been stuck on the 40 week path to No. 1, not the 24 week trip to the
top. Being throttled to one hit a year inherently meant that Kelsea
Ballerini and Maren Morris weren’t going to have the same depth of catalog.
Morris got around that, like Bebe Rexha before her, with a multi-format
hit. After two No. 1 songs, she will likely be on the fast track this time,
but also facing the callout research buzzsaw sooner. Whether fairness means
50/50 female/male to you, or just more diversity, it’s pretty obvious that
the female acts that Country commits to deserve enough support to have hits.
The “Fast Chart” Issue Is Realy Three Issues – Slowing down the charts in
this time of trouble is an understandable response, but Country had eight
fewer top 20 hits last year, it’s down almost 20 fewer top 20 hits from its
2013 peak. So after years of being told to slow down, why aren’t ratings
better if we’re finaly “playing the hits”? In part, because the issue of
Country allegedly burning through the hits is really three issues:

The Glacial Development of Hit Songs, including those neutral titles that
need 40 weeks to climb the charts and are given that by the labels;
The “No. 1” Game, in which a label takes a trade add saying “increase spins
now” and stations put at least one song in power, maybe two, that doesn’t
belong there;
No. 1 Songs Going To Recurrent Instantly – That doesn’t really happen to
every No. 1 song. It happens to the ones that got there through “increase
spins now.” As a listener, it never feels like there aren’t enough recent
hits still receiving significant rotation.

One Chart Is A Problem – Country radio stations are on three different
format templates. Some are comparable to CHRs. Some are more like
Mainstream ACs, which regularly take 40 weeks to incubate hit songs. Many
are like the Adult CHRs in the middle. Pop CHR isn’t so fast on music these
days, but imagine if Post Malone’s “Circles,” the current CHR leader, had
to wait another two months to close out the Mainstream AC panel as well,
including some stations that probably should never play it. Nashville
thinks that one chart is strength. But it throttles the number of stories,
and it limits the type of songs that can reasonably expect to be No. 1 at
Country. If we could allow our yesterday-and-today Country stations to play
records at their own speed, they could focus on making every immaculately
researched record broadly accepted, while other stations could focus on
those that generate passion.
“New Country” Is Not The Only Way – Our last two major station rebrandings
have been to “New Country.” Whether it’s the name of the station or just a
positioner, programmers are afraid to jeopardize that franchise. It seems
like an odd choice now—both because the yesterday-and-today position
languishes in many markets, but also because “new country” brings to mind
those faltering CHRs who used “today’s best music” both during the 1992
doldrums and the 1996 comeback. When the records were good, it was a great
position. When the songs weren’t as good, it raised the question “is that
all you’ve got?”
Why Don’t You Just Meet Me In The Middle: Country’s last three No. 1 songs
are telling—Dan + Shay & Justin Bieber’s “10,000 Hours”; Jon Pardi’s
“Heartache Medication”; Maren Morris’ “The Bones.” Two multi-format
pop-leaning songs that were undisputed testers flanking a traditional
throwback that eventually tested, according to PDs, but not on the same
level. For all the concerns about Country’s pop lean, which has often
prompted PDs to overreact by reaching for “I Met A Girl” or “Heartache
Medication,” it’s the pop songs with multi-format support that are
Country’s truest hits at the moment. We could defang the pop vs.
traditional issue by having more songs in the middle. When Country is at
its best, songs pretty much confound that issue anyway—what is “Big Green
Tractor?”; what is “Wagon Wheel”?
Is “Girlfriend Country” The Answer? In the past few weeks, I’ve heard more
languid mid-to-downtempo love songs from female artists that feel like a
determined attempt to offer “boyfriend country” with female leads. If we
suddenly have a glut of “girlfriend country” songs, it will be radio’s
fault, because we challenged artists to make the records radio wants. But
are those the records that listeners want.
What Is Missing From Country Isn’t Traditional, It’s Rap: In 2012-2013, the
format’s peak years. “bro country” gently brought a Hip-Hop presence into
the format that panicked many programmers. It was the easiest thing to
blame and it quickly steered us to “boyfriend country,” often the same
lyrical clichés, but delivered more reverently without the Hip-Hop beats.
With five years’ remove, it seems to me that Hip-Hop was a significant part
of Country’s calling card, both with younger listeners, but also with
32-year-old men for whom Hip-Hop serves the same purpose that Country would
have 30 years earlier. The Hip-Hop element was what most scared radio. But
the format hasn’t been the same without it.
Hunker Down For What? One of the most bewildering aspects of the female
artists discussion has been the industry’s willingness to double down at a
time when the format’s numbers are down sharply. The format sounds
claustrophobic in multiple ways. Are any of them worth defending?


The post Escape From Boyfriend Country: What Country Radio Must Do Now
appeared first on RadioInsight.


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Jason La Confora To Co-host Afternoons At 105.7 The Fan Baltimore

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 12:35 PM PST
https://radioinsight.com/headlines/1...fan-baltimore/



Entercom Sports 105.7 The Fan WJZ-FM Catonsville/Baltimore MD will debut
new afternoon and evening shows starting Monday, March 9.

CBS Sports NFL Insider Jason La Confora and current WJZ-FM evening host Ken
Weinman will be teamed in afternoons to host Inside Access. The new show
will succeed Scott Garceau and Jeremy Conn in the 2-6pm slot as Garceau
joins MASN-TV as a pre and postgame host and occasional play-by-play for
Baltimore Orioles baseball. Conn will move to 6-9pm at 105.7 where he will
also host the stations Orioles pregame show and take a lead role on the
stations digital content.

In addition to his role with CBS NFL Coverage, La Confora has served as a
regular contributor to Entercoms Sports stations around the country and the
Radio.com platform. Weinman has been with the station since its launch in
2008 and most recently served as pre and post-game host for the Orioles and
University of Maryland Terrapins as well as Baltimore Ravens beat reporter.

Entercom, a leading media and entertainment company and the unrivaled
leader in sports radio, announced a new afternoon drive show on 105.7 The
Fan (WJZ-FM), the flagship station of the Baltimore Orioles and Maryland
Terrapins. The station welcomes RADIO.COM SPORTS and CBS Sports Insider
Jason La Canfora to co-host “Inside Access” alongside longtime station
on-air personality Ken Weinman. “Inside Access” will air weekdays from 2:00
p.m. to 6:00 p.m. ET.

The station subsequently announces that on-air personality Jeremy Conn will
host the evening show, weekdays from 6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Conn will also
co-host “Orioles Baseball Tonight” and lead on content creation for the
station’s digital platforms. On-air personality Scott Garceau, who was
announced as the new play-by-play broadcaster and pregame and postgame host
for Orioles gameday broadcasts on MASN-TV, will contribute Orioles and
Baltimore Ravens coverage to 105.7 The Fan on a weekly basis. All changes
will be effective March 9.

“This revamped programming schedule will allow us to continue providing
around-the-clock content for Baltimore’s biggest sports fans,” said Tracy
Brandys, Senior Vice President and Market Manager, Entercom Baltimore.
“Adding Jason and Ken to our already successful lineup is a big win for our
market. We are also excited about Scott and Jeremy’s new roles. All are an
integral part of the success of 105.7 The Fan.”

“I am blessed to have this opportunity,” said La Canfora. “Hosting a sports
show in my hometown is a dream come true. Ken and I have been hoping for
this opportunity for a long time and cannot wait to get started.”

La Canfora is a RADIO.COM Sports Insider who regularly contributes to
sports talk shows around the country. He also serves as a fill-in host on
national radio shows for CBS Sports Radio. La Canfora joined CBS in 2009 as
an NFL Insider on the “The NFL Today” and also appears on additional shows
on The CBS Sports Network and CBS Sports HQ, the network’s 24/7 online
streaming service. He also writes three weekly columns for CBSSports.com.

“No one knows more insider information about sports than Jason La Canfora,”
said Weinman. “Baltimore sports fans won’t want to miss his daily insights
and I’m excited to team up with him to create an informative show for our
listeners to tune into.”

Weinman joined 105.7 The Fan as an on-air personality in 2008. He recently
served as the station’s Baltimore Ravens Insider, host of “Orioles Baseball
Tonight,” and pregame and postgame host on the Maryland Terrapins Radio
Network.

New weekday programming lineup is as follows.

6:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m.: “Big Bad Morning Show”

10:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m.: “Vinny Haynie”

2:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m.: “Inside Access”

6:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.: Jeremy Conn

9:00 p.m. – 12:00 a.m.: Terry Ford



The post Jason La Confora To Co-host Afternoons At 105.7 The Fan Baltimore
appeared first on RadioInsight.


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KUBC Flips To Classic Hits Ahead Of Translator Launch

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 10:52 AM PST
https://radioinsight.com/headlines/1...slator-launch/



Cherry Creek Media has flipped Conservative Talk 580 KUBC Montrose CO to
Classic Hits as KUBC Gold.

The station will retain its local morning show hosted by cluster Operations
Manager Dan Lynch with the change. The closest competitor to the new format
is Sunshine Broadcasting Variety Hits 104.9 Jack-FM KRYD Norwood.

The move comes ahead of the station launching its new FM translator on
104.5 K283CZ Montrose, which we are told should be live by the end of the
month.


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first on RadioInsight.


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Music On The 00s, Part V: Like A Melody On Replay

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 10:00 AM PST
https://radioinsight.com/ross/184316...ody-on-replay/







January 2, 2010

Iyaz, “Replay”
Ke$ha, “Tik Tok”
Owl City, “Fireflies”
Lady Gaga, “Bad Romance”
Jason Derulo, “Whatcha Say”

The turn of the decade is supposed to be a doldrum in pop music, and a
downturn in the fortunes of Top 40. That pattern holds up, more or less, in
most of the ’00 years we’ve been looking at since 1960, but the cycles
theory is severely challenged by pop music in 2010.
Pop music is awash in party-rock anthems, but still varied — below the top
five are Beyoncé, Taylor Swift, Kings of Leon, Kelly Clarkson, Jay-Z, David
Guetta, Rihanna, Onerepublic, and Black Eyed Peas. Justin Bieber and Miley
Cyrus are both represented — although Bieber is a few years from true pop
acceptance. American Idol still matters: Both Adam Lambert and Kris Allen
have chart songs.
Top 40 radio is on its biggest building boom of the last 15 years.
Arbitron’s PPM metered ratings methodology is being deployed and
cume-driven formats are thriving: A format with a mother/daughter coalition
like CHR that can be detected by multiple meters in a household is
particularly advantaged. For a decade, Top 40 has been largely the province
of Clear Channel/iHeart Media. Now both CBS and Cumulus are rapidly
deploying second and third CHRs in top 50 markets.
Pandora’s explosion has already started, the release of its iPhone app
making it the first serious online-only radio contender. But parents are
enjoying sharing music with their kids again, and continuing to model radio
usage for them. (And yet, music breaking online is now a decade old
phenomenon and Owl City is the latest example.) Parents are probably also
in a good mood because America isn’t experiencing a second Great Depression
— although pop music’s comeback was in process well before the downturn of
2008-09.
If you were looking for musical signs of trouble in January 2010, perhaps
you could look at two co-produced hits in the top five — “Replay” and
“Whatcha Say.” Other producers will go far further with this formula than
J.R. Rotem, but those songs herald pop music becoming more ethereal and
less energetic over the next decade. Imogen Heap was Jason DeRulo’s
inspired sample choice. Soon she was Taylor Swift’s collaborator and
chilled out pop was in “Style.” (“Replay” was also proof that lyrical
repetition—the cheesy, delicious secret weapon in an uptempo song—could be
far more unbearable with less tempo.)
The Top 40s that launched in 2009-10 often positioned themselves between
Mainstream and Rhythmic — that was a narrow place to begin with. Much of
the rhythmic pop that became their center lane sound was music not shared
with R&B radio, a precedent established by iHeart’s Kiss-FM stations of a
decade earlier. As with the ratings dominance and chart influence of those
stations in 2000, the format wars tended to make CHR music narrower, as
incumbent stations resolved not to be out-jammed by their new rivals.
Rock had experienced a relatively healthy representation at pop radio in
the ‘00s, because of pop/punk. By 2010, that genre was starting to be
affected by dance/pop — Cobra Starship, 3Oh!3. For its own part, dance/pop
was taking on a more aggressive EDM flavor. What began with “Boom Boom Pow”
the year before was becoming what this column dubbed “turbo-pop” and
becoming busier and less melodic. In a few years, the frothiness of “Tik
Tok” would give way to the joylessness of Ke$ha’s “Blow.” By then, EDM’s
superstar DJs were often the lead artists, rather than merely the
superstars’ producers.
The end of the late ‘00s/early ‘10s boom was neither on schedule—ending
usually about the time in the decade when the good times began—or
particularly symmetrical. There were the usual articles about the cycles
theory, but I remember thinking that rather than the format peak being
consumed in extremes, followed by a reactionary period that led to a
doldrums, what we had was an extreme doldrums—more aggressive EDM pop, but
also piano ballads and the brief period of Lumineers folksiness. Certainly,
the music of the late ‘10s—slow but sludgy and noisy—can be described as
“extreme doldrums.”
February 10, 2020

Post Malone, “Circles”
Maroon 5, “Memories”
Dua Lipa, “Don’t Stop Now”
Selena Gomez, “Lose You to Love Me”
Arizona Zervas, “Roxanne”

By mid-2019, pop music was again inspiring optimism, partially because it
had reached a place of such unlistenability over the previous few years
that the only way left was up. Toward the end of the year, I actually had a
medium-market PD tell me he was out of slots for new music, mind-boggling
because CHR had tightened to about 15 true currents in many places due to a
surfeit of product. But that was speeding up again in part because labels
were willing to work more than one song at a time from certain artists, and
because streaming services had so sped up the music discovery process that
it simply didn’t make sense to wait five months to decide if a song was a
hit.
Whether we are escaping the doldrums or mired in them will take a while to
play out, of course. Post Malone may feel a little more up-tempo thanks to
“Circles,” but Arizona Zervas is waiting to romance-the-drone in his place.
Billie Eilish and Tones and I are creating pop records that are cool to
younger listeners, but not yet entirely acceptable to their parents; they
may as well still be Roddy Ricch. And teens are hardly thinking out of “The
Box” yet.
One thing that became clear to me when looking at “Music on the ‘00s” is
the extent to which radio’s internal issues impact the musical landscape.
Radio’s internal issues now are being filtered through streaming. Going
forward, they will also certainly be shaped by iHeart’s announced intention
to rely more heavily on data mining. iHR is promising more local
differentiation as a result. Will that be offset by fewer decision makers?
There aren’t that many program and music directors practicing music
enterprise now.
The cycles theory is seen as a referendum on available product, but how
radio reacts has always determined what music is made available. The
question now is whether it’s radio or streaming that will shape what the
labels offer. After five decades, programmers decided not to participate in
a format downturn in 2010, at least for a few years. Now is that their
decision to make?
I hope you’ve enjoyed the “Music on the ‘00s” series. Be sure to check out
our earlier articles on:

1960 and 1970
1980
1990
2000



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on RadioInsight.


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La Invasora Doubles In Tyler/Longview

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 07:30 AM PST
https://radioinsight.com/headlines/1...yler-longview/



Alpha Media Regional Mexican La Invasora 96.7 KOYE Frankston/Tyler TX will
launch simulcaster 107.9 KTLH Hallsville/Longview at 5pm today.

Alpha acquired the 107.9 allocation in the 2015 FCC Auction 98 for $83,000.
The city-of-license was later changed from Longview to Hallsville in order
to move it into a county not technically included in the Tyler/Longview
market so that Alpha could fit the station under the ownership limits. The
new signal gives the format full-market coverage.

KOYE previously simulcasted on 92.3 KCUL-FM Marshall until Access.1, which
was leasing the station to Alpha, sold it last summer.


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RadioInsight.


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Final Listen: WAAF Boston

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 07:15 AM PST
https://radioinsight.com/ross/184569...n-waaf-boston/


A lot of people like to time major announcements to the Country Radio
Seminar, including, apparently, Christian broadcaster EMF. It was at CRS
last year that WPLJ New York, WRQX (Mix 107.3) Washington, D.C., and
several other Cumulus outlets were sold to the Christian AC K-Love owner.
This year, it was Entercom’s longtime Active Rock outlet WAAF Boston,
prompting the inevitable “from rock to rock of ages” headline in the local
press.
When I first became aware of WAAF growing up, it was “the Worcester rock
station” for those who went beyond the progressive WBCN and “kickass” rival
WCOZ. But WAAF outlasted both stations. In the early ‘90s, it went through
a brief stint as hair-band-driven “Rock 40” under consultant John Gorman.
In the late ‘90s, now unarguably a Boston outlet, it got into an extreme
rock battle with WBCN (then nominally still Alternative) over who was “the
Godsmack” station.
Like many Active Rock stations, WAAF expanded and became more reliant on
library. It never became Active Rock in name only. At the end, it was
dealing with former Alternative outlet WBOS Boston, which became the last
entrant in the trend toward “next generation Classic Rock stations,” which
is to say Active without those pesky currents. And I’ve felt more
enthusiastic about the currents in Active lately.
During these “Final Listens,” I’m always on the lookout for “were they
still trying to do radio?” and WAAF was. There was a new Pearl Jam song
that was both front and backsold. There was a crossover between veteran
middayer Mistress Carrie and the afternoon host about the Black Crowes, and
about the airline passenger who filmed her seatmate jostling her because
she was reclining. Here’s WAAF just before 2 p.m. on February 18, several
hours ahead of the sale announcement and during its second “Workday Blitz”
music bloc.

Metallica, “The Unforgiven”
Buckcherry, “Crazy Bitch”
Faith No More, “Epic (What Is It?)”
Black Crowes, “She Talks To Angels”
Volbeat f/Neil Fallon, “Die To Live”
Bush, “Machinehead”
Staind, “It’s Been Awhile”
Seven Mary Three, “Cumbersome”
Pearl Jam, “Superblood Wolfmoon”—Carrie mentions that the new Pearl Jam
album sounds a little like Talking Heads, before adding “not this one.”
Then she backsold it by mentioning that people were texting the station to
find out what it was
Black Sabbath, “Iron Man”
Red Hot Chili Peppers, “Dani California”
Offspring, “The Kids Aren’t Alright”
Shinedown, “Attention Attention”
Theory of a Deadman, “Bad Girlfriend”



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WKFY Completes Frequency Change

Posted: 19 Feb 2020 04:30 AM PST
https://radioinsight.com/headlines/1...quency-change/



CodComm Soft AC Koffee 98.7 WKFY East Harwich MA has completed its move to
a new tower site in Orleans and frequency change to 101.5.

The move allows WKFY to cover a larger part of eastern Cape Cod and follows
the upgrade of one of the stations two translators last month. 107.9 W300BE
Vineyard Haven moved to 103.5 to cover Falmouth and Marthas Vineyard. 100.5
W263BU Hyannis continues to serve the western cape and is now branded as
the primary frequency. Both translators are fed via 102.9 WPXC-HD3 Hyannis.


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