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Programming & Music
This essay, 1981: The Year Top 40 Bottomed Out (Or Rebounded), was written by Sean Ross for Radio-Info.com's Programming & Music column.
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1981: The Year Top 40 Bottomed Out (Or Rebounded)
It was a year when the hits on Top 40 radio were at their mushiest—Air Supply, Dan Fogelberg, Kenny Rogers, and the “Theme From ‘The Greatest American Hero’” dominated while “Super Freak,” “The Stroke,” and “Under Pressure” mid-charted. 1981 was also a year when a lot of markets didn’t really have a Top 40, just a Hot AC or AOR station with CHR reporting status. But it was also the year that WCAU-FM Philadelphia and MTV launched, and with them came the beginnings of the Top 40 revival. And if you were discovering Top 40 that year, perhaps 1981 didn’t seem so bad.This article began as an e-mail exchange with WAKS (96.5 Kiss FM) Cleveland night jock Java Joel about, of all things, Adele’s “Rolling In The Deep” and the initial discomfort that some programmers had felt about crossing over what was, not so long ago, a primarily Triple-A song. But it quickly hooked left into a discussion about 1981, which was indeed the year that Java Joel started listening to Top 40 music. Here’s our dialogue, meant to prompt your comments on 1981, Hot Hits and more.
SR: I understand why some stations would have initially felt like “Rolling in the Deep” didn’t fit. I appreciate any Top 40 station that wants to stay young and reaction-record-driven. I just differed with some PDs on where this song fell in the spectrum. It’s kind of like the PD who told me he got out of Top 40 in 1981 because Rosanne Cash’s “Seven Year Ache” crossed over. To me, that was one of the few good records. But I could see how somebody would lump it with all the sappy stuff.
JJ: Ahhh. “Seven Year Ache,” summer of ’81, the first summer I was into music. I was six.
SR: And you doubtless remember everything as being great—the same way I remember the Engelbert Humperdinck songs that were hits during my first year of Top 40 (1967-68) being pretty good, too. Thus your willingness to cut Joey Scarbury a lot more slack [in some of our previous exchanges].
JJ: Exactly! Perhaps I romanticize the past a little too much as well! And don’t even get me started on Franke & The Knockouts, Ray Parker Jr. & Raydio, the Manhattan Transfer & Ronnie Milsap!
SR: I thought Franke & the Knockouts’ “Sweetheart” was terrible—generic and boring. I liked Ray Parker, Jr. & Raydio, so I cut him some slack on “A Woman Needs Love,” but I thought it was boring compared to some of the others of his that came before and after. The Manhattan Transfer’s version of “The Boy From New York City” was on the bubble. At least it was uptempo.
I think I liked Ronnie Milsap’s “(There’s) No Getting Over Me” the first few hundred times. But the follow-up, “I Wouldn’t Have Missed It For The World,” was unforgivable. (Now, I’d probably listen to it if it came on, say, WFEZ [Easy 93] Miami. But I’d feel bad if I missed a song I really liked.)
Worst of the Year: “Yesterday’s Songs” and especially “On The Way To The Sky” by Neil Diamond. Also, Barry Manilow’s “The Old Songs” and “Somewhere Down The Road.” Every Air Supply hit except “Sweet Dreams” (and that only by comparison).
Then again, I kinda liked Marty Balin’s “Hearts” when it came out and thought it would be a much bigger hit.
JJ: My Mom loved “Sweetheart” back in the spring of ’81. Even bought the 45! “A Woman Needs Love” was probably one of the first five 45s I bought (Hall & Oates’ “Kiss On My List” was the first, Grover Washington, Jr.’s “Just The Two Of Us,” my second. John Lennon’s “Watching The Wheels” and Phil Collins’ “I Missed Again” were in there too somewhere. And can you believe I had the 45 of “Yesterday’s Songs”? I can’t believe that song co-existed alongside “Super Freak” and “Under Pressure.” It has not dated well.
SR: It’s more like those other songs co-existed next to Neil Diamond. His was the one that got the out-of-the-box Top 40 airplay in that environment. It’s just that the other two seem much bigger now.
And bringing it back to Adele, I was afraid people would think I was belittling her with the comparison, but what “Rolling In The Deep” reminds me of, as far as its radio arc, is spring ’81 when Kim Carnes “Bette Davis Eyes” exploded. Both were female singer-songwriters who’d been around for a few years who suddenly walked in with the record that nobody expected from them. The industry reaction went from “this isn’t bad” to “going to be a hit” to “going to be a monstrous hit” within a few weeks’ time.
JJ: I remember hearing an aircheck of Terry Young on WCAU-FM saying something like, “This is going to make the competition very nervous,” and going into “Yesterday’s Songs,” since it was such a non-edgy/“Hot Hits” type of song.
SR: WCAU was very capable of that. I remember hearing them for the first time in November ’81 and they were playing Anne Murray’s “It’s All I Can Do.” Even the excitement of the station itself could only do so much for that one. (And there are other Anne Murray songs I like.)
JJ: One of the things I loved most about “Hot Hits” was they were all currents, or at least sounded like they were. And like you said, the energy brought up mellow tracks like Sneaker’s “More Than Just The Two Of Us” or “The Sweetest Thing” by Juice Newton (or any of the Air Supply songs… I have an aircheck of Terry absolutely slamming the post on “Even The Nights Are Better”).
For me at the time, the only way to really hear songs like “Super Freak” or “She’s A Bad Mama Jama” was by watching Solid Gold or America’s Top 10 (for some reason, the Syracuse ABC affiliate didn’t air “American Bandstand”). Although I was lucky because the PD of one of my local AM daytimers, (WPDM/Potsdam N.Y.,) loved R&B and wouldn’t hesitate to play “all the hits.” You could tell a lot of the lilywhite Top 40s in 1981 were still reluctant to play anything remotely rhythmic for fear of being labeled “disco”. There were exceptions: “Let’s Groove” by Earth Wind & Fire comes to mind.
SR: At the time, I was near Detroit, which also had a spotty history with Top 40 in 1981. WDRQ softened from Top 40 to what would now be called Rhythmic AC over the course of the year as a prelude to going Urban. CKLW was evolving back from their attempt at full-service AC. That summer, their playlist looked pretty great, but by the time I returned to school in the fall, they had softened again. And AOR WLLZ was so big that year that nobody really cared what the Top 40s were or weren’t doing. The songs any self-respecting Detroiter remembers from that year were all the Doubleday rock oddities—“I Could Be Good For You” by 707, “Don’t You Know What Love Is” by Touch, “Last Chance” by Shooting Star, etc.
Ironically, if it hadn’t been for WCAU, my favorite Top 40 of the year would have been WIFI Philadelphia, which was back from its own attempt at Rock 40. They had lots of library variety, good jingles, and played all the hits. Their numbers were on the upswing in summer ’81, shortly before WCAU debuted. In any other market, they would have been proof that the real Top 40 model still worked.
And yes, WCAU was all-currents, as were most of the Mike Joseph “Hot Hits” stations for their first year, until he left the building, at which point most of the PDs couldn’t wait to put some recurrents on, which meant, ironically, that they were putting back all the songs they were sick of.
JJ: You would think more stations in 2011 would try the “all currents” format. Is anyone currently doing something close to that? Even Dom Theodore’s “edgy” CHRs play at least four recurrents an hour.
SR: In 1981, even with the softness of the music (or so I thought), there were still 40-50 currents to choose from for a station doing Hot Hits. And needing those records meant that you didn’t just play the mediocre stuff that was dominating the charts, it meant that stations like WCAU-FM played the reaction records as well. In the PPM era, there are more like 15 consensus hits. Even though many stations are playing their powers in roughly the same 1:10-1:15 rotation that Joseph did, there’s much less depth at the other end.
One last question: what was the first sign of MTV’s influence in your world in 1981? I did see it as a college junior at a friend’s off-campus apartment. It wasn’t until a year later that it came to my own dorm. And what I remember of it on my first viewings was that it was pretty much Rock 40—even more REO Speedwagon than what was on the radio.
JJ: I first saw MTV in early October 1981 during a trip to visit my relatives in Syracuse. I remember lots of Pat Benatar, Hall & Oates, Cliff Richard, Phil Collins, the Producers (remember them?) and David Bowie’s “DJ”. Along w/ the REO/Billy Squier AOR stuff, I remember seeing Juice Newton’s “Queen Of Hearts” and the Charlie Daniels Band’s “The Devil Went Down To Georgia.” My parents didn’t get MTV until October ’82. But I remember spending much of the summer of ’82 at my grandparents’ house watching it. By this time, they were playing a ton of British music. In fact, I remember seeing “Hungry Like The Wolf” in August ’82. Song wouldn’t go top 40 until much later.
Other 45s I bought that spring/summer of ’81: “Stars On 45,” “The One That You Love,” “Elvira,” “The Stroke,” “Queen Of Hearts,” “Slow Hand,” “The Breakup Song,” “Everlasting Love” by Rex Smith/Rachel Sweet (ha!), and “The Beach Boys Medley,” among others.
COMMENTS
Smokey Rivers, Director of Programming/Operations, Clear Channel/Phoenix, writes, "I was fortunate to be programming one of America’s Top 40 format dominators in 1981 (WKXX Birmingham, Ala.). And while we didn’t shy away from playing the mega-hits from Rick Springfield, Hall and Oates, etc., we were a station that passionately embraced fun, uptempo songs from Loverboy, Billy Squier, EW&F, Blondie, The Police, U2, J Geils Band, Joan Jett, the Go-Go’s, Rick James, Journey, the Rolling Stones, the Cars, and Kool and the Gang. Sounds like a good year in music to me. Consider that there was a lot of energy being poured into saving music radio on AM from 1977-1983. “Longer” and “Waiting For A Girl Like You” were great AC hits, suited for keeping 40 year olds entertained. However, when music does its thing in the proper cycle, AC takes its cues from CHR, not the other way around.
Ed Brown, All Access Music Group, writes: "Great piece! I was just north of you in Flint, Mich., (okay, technically the towers were in Grand Blanc) at a heritage Top 40, WTAC. Our PD at the time was one of those anti-disco guys, too. But in Flint it didn’t really matter, since the local musical makeup of Top 40 through the years had a strong base built on good ol’ Rock n Roll. So in 1981, even though we had our fair share of ‘lightweight’ Pop on the radio, we also borrowed liberally from Detroit AOR (WRIF & WLLZ) and ‘new wave’ stuff from MTV. I loved to play 707, Touch, Billy Squier, and also Police, Squeeze, Elvis Costello, Cars (not that they were ‘new’ anymore – but you get the idea). We kept the softer poptitles on the chart to a minimum and would add those songs late in the game, not to mention we kept a healthy Gold library, which certainly helped. It truly was a weird time for Top 40, and ‘I Wouldn’t Have Missed It For The World.’ P.S. Not long after, I worked at WHYT Detroit when they were in the final throes of “Hot Hits” … talk about fast paced!"
Colby Colb, OM, Radio One/Cleveland, writes: "I grew up in Philly and I was in 8th grade when WCAU-FM launched and it was a historic moment in Philly radio history. That station had a huge, diverse audience and they definitely were in sync with MTV. The night jock “Terry Motormouth” Young captivated the city and was one of my inspirations to get into the business."
See more comments below from Frank Bell, J.J. Dulling, Scott Lowe, and others, and be sure to post yours.
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.
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You touched a nerve here, Sean. 1981 was the year two buddies and I bought our first radio station, WSQV, in north central PA. As a response to the musical blandness saturating the airwaves that year, we followed the lead of 96KX - Pittsburgh, which played "the top tracks from the top albums". 38 Special, Eddie Money, REO, Joan Jett and others, including regional act Donnie Iris helped to separate us from the rest of the pack and we were #1 18-34 and 18-49 within a year. Not bad for a little Class A FM with a signal so weak, we used to tell clients "You can urinate farther than our signal!". The signal strength didn't matter in the end, because the audience sought out the rock hits we played and patronized our advertisers, allowing us to sell the station for triple our investment three years later.
It sure did suck when "Steal Away" and Eddie Rabbitt crossover tunes were considered mainstream Top 40. And, what changed it all? The release of Journey's "Escape" album, with "Who's Cryin' Now" in late '81. Early '82 then brought a wave of great stuff, like John Mellencamp's "Hurt So Good" & Jack And Diane", the Go-Go's, Steve MIller Band's comeback with "Abracadabra" and a ton more really solid Top 40 hits with some meat on their bones. In addition, has anyone else noticed that the 'in between' periods of nearly every decade sees this? Though I wasn't necessarily around to see it, the late 50s saw the start of rock & roll soften with Elvis in the military, Buddy Holly's plane crash and the holes were filled with the likes of Fabian...pretty much still felt like the 50s (culturally, musically) until the Beatles hit in 1964. Same with the late 60s/early 70s when acts like the Cowsills, J-5, Partridge Family and Carpenters were big and ended when the 70s REALLY started (musically & culturally) with the Eagles, Chicago, Elton John and Fleetwood Mac were rockin' radio. And, so on with the late 80s dance/rap thing before the 90s and return of mainstream pop/rock hit with GooGoo Dolls, Alanis Morisette, Sheryl Crow, Dave Matthews band and our intro to Pearl Jam & Nirvana. Check it out-happens every few years and after the turn of each decade. Why? I'm not sure.
You have no idea how important and timely this conversation is for today's CHR programmer, Sean. I have been preaching for weeks that CHR radio today, if one were to tune in for 2 hours to a given big-market CHR, is in the same position Top 40 radio stations were in summer 1980. Sorry to being the bearer of bad news. In 1980 Top 40 was battered because it bought into the resurgence of Disco we can thank "Saturday Night Fever" for. A listen to American Top 40 from this week in 1977 over the weekend proved that Disco was still popular, but only three truly Disco songs were on AT40 that week. By March 1978 we were awash in boogie tunes. By 1980, after Disco Demolition and the backlash to Stop Disco (I remember the graffiti well), Top 40 was musically lost. Plus, it had to deal with the uncoolness of being on AM in markets where all the cool kids listened to FM. And unless you were in Miami or Pittsburgh, most Top 40s were on static-filled mono signals. I was 9 in fall 1981, and vividly recall listening to the automated Musicradio WBPM/Kingston, NY, an affiliate of NBC Radio's "The Source." John Leader voiced all of the song intros and time checks. The jingle package was the one KHJ had in 1976-77. I had an Air Supply album. I famously taped over a cassette featuring me as a two-year old, which my mom lynched me for, because I wanted to record Don Geronimo doing a high-speed intro and outro to "Every Woman In The World" on WLS. Chicago AMs boomed in at night and before school each morning, so I grew up on WLS and Larry Lujack along with Kevin Matthews and WLUP-AM 1000. CKLW also came in now and then, while the FMs of the area - K104, Fly 92, the old 99GFM and WTIC-FM - were just getting going. Top 40 was a mess. It had relied on a singular sound to power it. Disco. Fast-forward to today. Top 40 is relying on soundalike power-driven rhythmic records that utilize auto-tune techniques. If not for Adele, we'd be on the road to reliving 1981 all over again. Lady Gaga would be our generation's Donna Summer; Taio Cruz would be our Andy Gibb, perhaps. Of course, the ratings tell another story. CHR seems just fine in the PPM markets - it's the format of choice. But do the ratings tell the whole story of what people like? Music always evolves, and in 12 months listeners may be tired of the sounds that permeate CHR radio today. Where are we headed? It's unclear. But with Pandora and satellite radio and internet radio competing stronger than ever against over-the-air FM choices, Top 40 programmers better take a look at WCAU-FM circa fall 1981 and take a history lesson in how to survive the next three years. Top 40's resurgence came thanks to kids like me buying the 45s for "Kiss on My List" and "I Love Rock & Roll," and not any dance or disco records. But history will prove that MTV saved CHR. If not for MTV, Barry and Barbra and Neil would have had much longer chart runs into the 1980s. What's today's MTV? Whatever it is, watch out. It will directly effect your programming for the next 6-8 years.
As a baby DJ in 1981, there were two things that contributed to Top 40's state: #1, in 1981 there were a lot of heritage AM Top 40s who really were now AC, but were reluctant to give up their CHR reporterships. Radio & Records had not yet given the other formats "reporting parity "at that time . If memory serves, CHR was still the only chart featured on the back page up to that point. Plus, there were some FMs who mimicked the dying AMs, not understanding fully why the AMs had to go the AC route. #2, radio had recently embraced the 25-54 demographic as the prime purchasing demo. Through the 70s, 18-34 ruled. Many operators felt they had to soften to compete..
I lived in Houston at the time. In 1980 the last of the AM CHR's had changed formats (610/KILT went to AC for a year and then to country) while on FM KAUM had gone to a CHR/country hybrid in Summer, 1980, and then to AOR KSRR in Fall, 1981. The remaining CHR, KRBE, went to AC in late 81 leaving no CHR in Houston. (It converted back at some future date, probably late 1982 or 1983). That's when I began writing to stations and AM station KULF agreed with my arguments, and evolved into CHR in July, 1982, and was one station-and only CHR in town: KKBQ. Later the sister FM had to convert to CHR, too, to ward off competitors trying to get back in to CHR. However, I had left for Los Angeles in June, so I never actually heard the station that I helped shape :( The LA CHR scene was 180 degrees different from Houston and all these stations were good. On AM was KFI and gold based CHR KRLA and on FM were gold based KRTH, KIIS and my favorite CHR because of the large playlist and their embracing of new wave music: KIQQ. So, there you have night and day in the CHR arena in 1981/82: Houston and Los Angeles. John Kier
Living just outside of Philly in 1981, WIFI-92 was the usual Top 40 favorite, along with Trenton’s WPST . As my tastes were starting to embrace the likes of Elvis Costello, The Cars and Devo, I also listened to AOR outlets like WMMR, WIOQ and WYSP. In the process, I also learned about Led Zep, The Doors and Hendrix (my older brother also helped me in the Classic Rock department). Later that year when WCAU-FM launched Hot Hits, they became a station favorite. Although at the time, I took the jingles for granted, didn’t like the reverb and hated that the music was pitched up 2%. Today, my feelings are the exact opposite, WCAU-FM was brilliant and so is Mike Joseph. I still have a box of original Hot Hit surveys from the station.
As someone who lived in an area without an authentic Top 40 around 1981, this topic appeals to my interest. Much of the problem revolved around the concept that the lion share of Top 40's were on AM and when the core audience left for FM and formats other than Top 40. These AM's became desperate and decided to be "The station that you grew up with has grown up with you". What really made this annoying were these same heritage Top 40's were still reporting as a "Top 40" or what we now call CHR in the trades thus causing this stagnation of songs and explains why "Endless Love" and "Bettie Davis Eyes" remained number one for longer than they should along with music that was very boring. Another factor, beyond the bad economy of the time, was the backlash of disco as stations ran away from anything with a beat. If you remember MTV was originally avoided anything rhythmic going straight ahead rock. I always consider early 1982 as rock bottom for Top 40 but by the end of the year CHR was rebounding and a year later was back with a mass appeal format mostly on FM. On the bright side there were CHR/Top 40's that still rocked or got funky in 1981. Beyond WCAU-FM KFRC San Francisco under Gerry Cagel comes to mind with his rhythmic approach along with WPGC and Q107 Washington though PGC did go AC by the end of 1982. Another approach was used by stations like WLS Chicago that sailed into a rock leaning port avoiding anything rhythmic until 1983. I have always felt that CHR/Top 40 or whatever you want to call it is best when much of the music would fit other pop formats. Right now CHR doesn't have this appeal. The last time CHR had this ability was about five years ago. Hopefully CHR will cycle back to mass appeal again.
Sean: You can't talk about 1981 without understanding the role record promoters played in it. As documented in the book HITMEN--You Better You Better You Bet and Turn Me Loose were KILLED overnight when Warner Brothers and Columbia refused to play the game that was being played. (Great book, give it a read) At age 18 I was the PD at WXIZ/The Rock in Waverly, Ohio. I always laugh when people suggest this was a bad period. 1990-2011 has been a bad period for CHR. There were more "good" songs in any given week in 1981 as there have been collectively in the past 21 years:-) In fact, I'm writing a screenplay based in that period (1979-1982) at present and THE MUSIC is half the reason for doing it. What's not to like about: Bette Davis Eyes; Starting Over; Jessie's Girl; Celebration; Kiss on My List; Keep On Loving You; Rapture; The Tide is High; I Love You; The Best of Times; Take it On the Run; Urgent (This was the period where arena rock was at its zenith with Journey; Foreigner; REO; STYX and all those cool Canadian bands) Hearts; Lady (You Bring Me Up); The Break Up Song; Hit Me With Your Best Shot; Hungry Heart; Time; Too Much Time; Who's Crying Now; Stop Draggin' My Heart Around; Another One Bites the Dust; Games People Play; While You See A Chance; Master Blaster; Hey 19; The Stroke; Same Ole Lang Syne ; Whip It and I'm Coming Out. That's 29 songs from 1981 that are better than most anything of the last 21 years. Even the Urban Cowboy stuff was good/popular: Ronnie Milsap; Juice Newton; Eddie Rabbitt and the Kenny Rogers records were well produced. The Lionel Richie penned Lady from Kenny was one of the biggest records of the year. And what about the lower charting records? Boz Scaggs; Jacksons; Teena Marie; Teddy Pendergrass; Donnie Iris (Ah! Leah one of the Top 10 great 45s of all time!) AC/DC (Back in Black); Bob Seger; John Cougar; Lakeside; Whispers; (It's a Love Thing is Classic!) Loverboy (Turn Me Loose alone makes 1981 worthwhile!) the Police; April Wine (Just Between You and Me--another reason 1981 was AWESOME!) .38 Special (Hold On Loosely is another one of the Top records of all time) Gap Band; Rush (Limelight and Tom Sawyer) The Who (You Better You Better You Bet--another GREAT 1981 record) the two Phil Collins songs; In the Air Tonight and I Missed again are signature sounds; Starship; Santana; Quincy Jones (Ai No Corrina is a dance classic) Neil Diamond's America has held up well and will be all over the radio in the next few weeks 30 years later; Tom Petty-The Waiting makes 1981 great; George Harrison; Joe Walsh; Rick James (Give it to Me Baby is a dance classic) Moody Bles Gemini Drean and The Voice are special; the Tubes; Blackfoot and I am just up to July looking at the songs that didn't make the Top 100 for the year. Buddy Scott at 92X was playing the GREAT stuff while WNCI (in Colunbus) was emphasizing the Jesse Winchester and Jim Photoglo:-) Maybe you were just listening to at bad Top 40 station, after all, KIS in LA and Z100 in New York didn't bust out until later. Granted, 1982-1986 were much better than 1981--but 1981 was much better than 1987-1989 combined. As Jim Steinman sang in 1981--may all of your Rock N' Roll Dreams Come Through. ~Doug Daniels (Available to program your AC; Hot AC; Oldies or Classic or Variety Hits now)
Frank Bell helped me get my FCC license and it was because of WSQV I wanted to get into radio. I used to set a timer and make tapes of the overnight show just to hear gems like Nightshift by Quarterflash and Hold On by Santana. I later worked in the WSQV studios, but it was a soft AC where the summer of 87 was worse than the summer of 81 musically. Set The Night To Music and Luka were about the most uptempo songs we played. BTW - hey Frank - thanks again :)
Honestly Top 40 was dying in the late 70's, it started cheating towards Adult Contemporary in many instances as early as 1977. Who to blame: The Record Companies, they were releasing garbage to Top 40, while AOR received the smash albums. Also there were an awful lot of bad Top 40 programmers and consultants at the time who embraced the 25+ disaster formula. Quite frankly the first generation of FM Top 40's won simply because of technology, not talent or programming, add to that the safe-stale antics of heritage AM Top 40's and the format nearly died. The two exceptions were the Rockin' styled Top 40's which embraced the rock attitude & powered rock crossovers, as well as used image and power oldies with a rock mindset.There were few of these stations, but I worked for one, and we won. The other exception was Rhythmic Top 40, playing the Barkays, Shalamar & Sugarhill Gang, along with mainstream pop. No doubt about it Mike Joseph is the guy who got it going again, Spring 1982 was the start of the rebirth of the format. By the summer of 82 it was off to the races with excellent mix of rock, pop, R&B, New Wave, & dance. Although some Top 40's with very famous PD's and consultants continued to act like it was 1978. Of course to some of us, real Top 40 radio died when MG Kelly and Ten Q was sold and switched to Spanish in 1979. Remember this, for every killer Top 40 station, there were a dozen that had yucking, loud mouth jocks, second rate jingle packages, and lame rotations.
This story connects with me in so many ways: First off, I know Java Joel from my time in Upstate NY radio. Second, I LOVED Mike Joseph's Hot Hits format, having been exposed to it with Syracuse's WFBL, "Fire 14." That lasted until a format switch in December, 1980 (Java Jim juuuust missed it!). Then, while traveling south in the summer of '82, imagine my surprise to hear the same jingle package on an FM: WCAU in Philadelphia! I immediately airchecked and was psyched for weeks! I actually liked a lot of the songs criticized in Sean's highly insightful piece, including "Sweetheart" and all the Air Supply songs (I loathe "Yesterday's Songs," however, so I'm not totaly lost). Call me a sap if you like, but there's certainly a place in my soul for well-produced, melodic and yes, schmaltzy, pop. As much as I love "Rolling In The Deep," I find yesterday's songs (lower case, not Neil's wretched release) far more appealing to today's mass-produced, mindless, repetitive, derivative drivel. And thanks for calling out CKLW and the other Canadian stations, which played terrific, mostly unpopular tracks that seriously expanded my musical horizons as a youth.
It amazes me just how relevant our little Hot Hits group is today in 2011. Listening to todays PPM driven CHRs and hearing stations like Kiss 108 play songs like Extreme's "More than words" opens up opportunities to go Hot Hits and make an ...impact in big markets. These days where everyone is so worried about station's websites and their social media efforts, why not just play the hits, and be exciting. The New "Now", 30 years in the making. If its HOT, they will listen, and will have a reason to put their ipods and Pandora aside.
Another thought about Top 40 in 1981: What may have been hurting Top was the then-recently discovered tool of auditorium music tests. This made programmers realize how valuable certain gold titles were. Up to that point, the "oldie" or library song at Top 40 was just a condiment, something extra that could be dropped. Now seeing the "power of gold", some Top 40s were playing 50 percent of their mix gold. By doing that, in essence they became Hot ACs. Mike Joseph got the format back to Top 40.re
