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CHR/Top 40
This essay, Coast To Coast With Canadian Top 40 – Part II: Toronto to Winnipeg, was written by Sean Ross for Radio-Info.com's CHR/Top 40 column.
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Coast To Coast With Canadian Top 40 – Part II: Toronto to Winnipeg
Read Part I: St. John’s, Newfoundland to Ottawa
If you just go by the chart reporting panel, Toronto has four Top 40 stations: CIDC (Z103.5), CKFM (9-9-9 Virgin Radio), the new CKIS (Kiss 92.5), and CFXJ (the Flow). The latter is actually the market’s Hip-Hop/R&B station, but doesn’t have a chart of its own to report to. Then there’s CHUM-FM, nominally an Adult Top 40, but effectively the format leader. However you look at it, it’s North America’s most crowded market for the hits. And a place where you can say that competition really did make the market sound great. And, as the host city to Canadian Music Week, it’s the second stop on our Canadian CHR virtual road trip.
It’s the second time around on this frequency, with this handle, for Rogers’ Kiss 92.5—one of the most intriguing (and unabashedly young leaning) Top 40s of the late ’90s/early ’00s. Today, it’s the station most obviously in the Amp/Now model of American CHR insurgents, running Commercial Free Mondays (a tradition that actually started in the market 30 years ago with CFTR’s Commercial Free Sundays). But there are also some unique, non-CHR like touches such as a “vacation a day giveaway.” There’s also a lot of emphasis on-air on how the station actually answers the phone. (“You guys are so nice,” says one listener in a promo that you wouldn’t hear in the States.) Here’s Kiss at 9:10 a.m. on Monday (8):
Down With Webster, “Rich Girl$”
Young Money, “Bedrock”
Dragonette, “I Get Around” (Canadian rhythmic pop act that falls somewhere between Metric and Lady Gaga, whom it preceded by several years)
Pitbull, “Hotel Room Service”
Jaiko, “Oh Yeah”
Nelly Furtado, “Do It”
Adam Lambert, “Whatya Want From Me”
Kardinal Offishall, “We Go Go” (Americans discovered him with “Dangerous,” but he’s an elder statesman of Canadian Hip-Hop)
Taylor Swift, “Fifteen”
Stereos, “Turn It Up”
Sean Paul, “Temperature”
Timbaland & Justin Timberlake, “Carry Out”
K’naan, “Waving Flag”
Even as rhythmic pop becomes the flavor of mainstream radio everywhere, CHUM-FM sounds like no other station. The station hasn’t completely ankled its ’80s product, particularly since former PD Rob Farina signed on ’80s-based Greatest Hits rival CHBM (Boom FM). But it was the first Adult Top 40 in North America to come to grips with Hip-Hop and R&B, well before its U.S. counterparts were forced to acknowledge the Black Eyed Peas. Now under PD David Corey, here’s the station at 9:45 on Monday (8):
UB40, “Red Red Wine”
David Guetta, “Sexy Chick”
Nikki Yanofsky, “I Believe” (the Canadian Olympics TV theme)
Destiny’s Child, “Lose My Breath” (not heard on CHR here, but sounded great)
Lady Gaga, “Just Dance”
K’naan, “Waving Flag”
Toni Braxton, “Yesterday”
Usher, “Yeah”
Hedley, “For The Nights” (teen punk outfit with one of the biggest Canadian ballads of recent years)
Jason DeRulo, “In My Head”
Mobile, “Out Of My Head” (Montreal synth-pop outlet that sounded like New Order long before the Killers, to the point where it actually titled a follow up single, “The Killer”)
Kanye West, “Heartless”
Karl Wolf, “Hurtin’” (the artist who gave us the Hip-Hop remake of “Africa,” a huge Canadian hit in 2009)
For more than a decade, Evanov’s Z103.5 has been North America’s most aggressive Mainstream Top 40 when it comes to dance product—even as dance languished here in the States. It’s not quite as noticeable a difference at this moment when all the format operates on the cusp of rhythmic and dnace, but you can still hear Z103.5 playing a dance record and announcing that it will be on the station’s next compilation CD. Z103.5 is also doing its version of commercial-free Mondays, positioned here as “The Zone.” And for those Canadians not quite done with Olympic fever yet, Z103.5 is qualifying listeners for a trip to the 2012 Russian Olympics. Here’s Z103.5 at 10:45 a.m. on Monday (8):
Adam Lambert, “Whatya Want From Me”
Inna, “Hot”
Stabilo, “Flawed Design” (dance remix of the quirky Canadian rock hit)
Lady Gaga f/Beyoncé, “Telephone”
Mariana’s Trench, “Beside You”
Selena Gomez, “Naturally”
LaBouche, “Sweet Dreams” (like sister Z103.5 Halifax, staged as a “wayback playback”)
Tiesto vs. Tegan & Sara, “Feel It In My Bones”
Justin Bieber, “Baby” (a Canadian, but not, to the disappointment of Canadian PDs, a Cancon record)
Sean Desman, “Shiver”
Ke$ha f/3Oh!3, “Blah Blah Blah”
In the early ’00s, Canada got a wave of stations that were licensed as Rhythmic Top 40 or Hip-Hop. Most evolved to Top 40 (particularly in the mid-’00s when a wave of incumbent Top 40s got out of the format). And CFXJ (The Flow) had moved in that direction at various points as well. These days, however, it’s a very listenable, accessible station, billed as “hits that move you,” but still identifiably R&B/Hip-Hop. And it’s the best sounding iteration of the station in years. Here’s The Flow at 11:20 a.m. on Monday (8):
Rihanna, “Rude Boy”
Art Of Fresh f/King Reign, “Lemonade Stand”
Kanye West, “Flashing Lights”
Melanie Fiona, “It Kills Me” (fortunately, this is Cancon)
Gucci Mane, “Lemonade”
Quanteisha Benjamin, “D N G”
Tag Team, “Whoomp! There It Is” (a “Flowback” cut)
Alicia Keys, “Try Sleeping With A Broken Heart”
Addictiv, “Tonight”
Slakah the Beatchild, “The Answer”
CKFM (9-9-9 Virgin Radio) Toronto
Like CHUM-FM, the former Mix 99.9 evolved from a more traditional Hot AC. It has more of a full-service personality/entertainment angle than its rivals, with Ryan Seacrest in early afternoons. And Virgin has also had its best ratings in recent memory since the advent of PPM. As heard during CMW week, the station was giving away concert trips as part of its Virgin World Tour. Here’s Virgin Radio at 1:40 p.m. on Wednesday (10):
Taio Cruz, “Break Your Heart”
T.I. f/Justin Timberlake, “Dead And Gone”
Adam Lambert, “Whatya Want From Me”
Midway State, “Never Again”
Madonna, “Celebration”
Down With Webster, “Your Man”
Daft Punk, “One More Time”
Lady Gaga f/Beyonce, “Telephone”
Rihanna, “Rude Boy”
Danny Fernandes, “Never Again”
Di’ja, “Rock Steady”
Jay Sean f/Sean Paul, “Do You Remember”
CKMM (Hot 103) Winnipeg, Manitoba
Hot 103 was one of the few Canadian CHRs to weather the format’s early-’00s doldrums (prompted, in part, by a wave of Jack-mania that caused format flips coast-to-coast). It remains a great sounding radio station with the same focus on female relatability that you hear on, say, WKSE (Kiss 98.5) Buffalo, N.Y. Here’s the station at 12:55 on Monday (5) as it emerges from its lunchtime “Totally Random All Request Dance Party.”
Timbaland f/Justin Timberlake, “Carry Out”
Kings Of Leon, “Use Somebody”
Stereos, “Throw Ya Hands Up”
Lady Gaga, “Just Dance”
Classified, “Anybody Listening”
Boys Like Girls f/Taylor Swift, “Two Are Better Than One”
Girlicious, “Over You”
Read Part III: Saskatoon & Calgary and Part IV: Edmonton to Vancouver.
About the Writer
Sean Ross, one of the radio and music industry’s most widely respected writers and programming analysts, is the author of the newsletter Ross On Radio, an extension of his long-running column of the same name.
