Radio Waves

By Michelle Phillips

Radio. Everyone listens to it...in fact, 75% of people over the age of 12 listen to the radio every day. People also spend more of their time listening to the radio than they do with any other medium. Even though you may spend a chunk of your day listening to the radio, you may not know a lot about it. You may wonder why you hear certain songs on the radio, who or what determines the "top 40," how musicians get to be played on the radio, and what it takes to become a success in the music business. Radio stations play a key role in all of these factors and can make or break a musician.

Since I was very young, I've always been fascinated with radio and music although I couldn't sing a note or play any type of instrument. I couldn't even keep the beat with a song if I tried tapping my pencil while listening to the radio when I was supposed to be doing homework. Since I knew I'd never be able to become a musician, I decided that I could become a "DJ" and listen to music all day and actually get paid for it...the next best thing to being a rock star!

I would often call radio stations and beg for a song to be played and I'd always wonder why it would take so long for them to play my request. Have you ever called a radio station, for example, Mix 104.7 and asked them to play...hmmm, lets say Beethoven? No, of course not. Well, why not? It's because Beethoven does not fit into the format of Mix 104.7.

Mix 104.7 is considered Contemporary Hit Radio, which basically means that the format is what most people refer to as "Top 40." CHR is mostly a "melting pot" of other formats and pop. For example, you'd hear anything that has "made it big" on other types of radio stations. CHR stations play a wide variety of music including pop, dance, rock, light rock, rap, hip-hop, Latin pop, and even a little bit of country. And of course, (warning shameless plug) you can hear all of your favorite "top 40" hits from the 80's during the Old School Lunch on Mix 104.7 weekdays from noon to 1pm.

So how does an artist get to be played on a CHR station? Well, it's a little complicated but I'll try to explain it as simply as possible. To make it a little easier for you to understand, lets follow the path of a musician, and lets call this band The Javas. The Javas started out playing in small bars, clubs, and even coffeehouses...go figure. Some musicians (i.e."boy-bands") create their music primarily in a studio, but The Javas make and play all of their own music. One night while playing a gig at the House of Blues, a rep from Pride Records was scoping them out and decided that they were going to be the next big thing. Pride Records immediately signed them on and sent The Javas to the studio to record. After they completed their first single, Pride Records had it mass-produced and sent it off to as many radio stations as they could. Record labels usually target the larger cities first (i.e. New York, L.A., Chicago, etc.) because they have the most influence on smaller cities, which usually follow in their path. Z100, the biggest CHR station which is located in New York, received The Javas' first CD single. Pride Records contacted Z100 and set up some meetings to try to talk them into giving The Javas some airplay. Z100 listened to The Javas during one of the meetings and they absolutely loved their work so they started airing it immediately. They played The Javas new single mostly during the night time hours to make sure it would go over well with their audience. The reason for this is so they aren't playing a song a lot that may not ever become a big hit.

Radio audiences, or the "fans," play an important role in determining whether or not a musician or song will become a hit. Radio stations will factor into their decision the number of times a song is played by the number of requests a song gets. The Javas ended up getting a TON of requests and Z100 increased the number of times they played their song and started playing it throughout the day. The more popular a musician is with a radio audience, the more plays their song gets. When you hear the ever-popular saying "its all about the fans," it basically means that if it weren't for the fans requesting songs at radio stations and buying CD's, a musician wouldn't ever become successful.

Radio stations are size ranked by the amount of people who listen to them, the higher the population of the listening area, the more people a station has listening to it. For example, Z100 in New York has the largest listening audience; therefore, they're the biggest radio station in the U.S.

Each radio station has their own "play list," which is a list of all of the songs they play and the number of times each song is played, usually a list of their top 50 songs. Some radio stations submit their play lists weekly to a nationwide magazine called the R & R (Radio & Records). The R & R then ranks the songs, or puts them into a "Top 40" by averaging what songs they're playing. The top ranking song would be the song that is played the most number of times on the most number of stations. Back to the story...Z100 submits their play list to the R & R and The Javas were played the least number of times, so they ranked #50 on their play list. As the weeks progress, and The Javas are played more and more, at more stations around the country, they'll go up the chart. If their song happens to be the most played at the most radio stations, they'll have the number one rated song. The current number one CHR song in the country is Creed's "With Arms Wide Open".

And Last, the "Top 40" countdown shows you hear, Casey Kasem (Sunday mornings on Mix 104.7) for example, get their countdowns from the R & R or a similar publication, which essentially is a national average of songs that radio stations play the most. The R & R isn't the only publication that radio stations submit their play lists to, there are actually several, but R & R is definitely the most widely used.

Now when you call a CHR radio station to request "song number 3" from The Marshall Mathers LP, you'll understand why it sometimes seems like forever before its actually played. Save money and skip Radio 101, this is everything you ever needed to know about radio.