The latest radio outrage...

Our local oldies station has begun an odious new practice: fading songs out well before they're supposed to.

Driving home last night, I heard Johnny Rivers's "Poor Side of Town" faded out right after the female chorus sings Come near to me, and say you need me now; the Beach Boys' "I Get Around" right in the middle of the final Round, round, get around, I get around; and--most egregious of all--an entire verse of Eddie Cochrane's "Summertime Blues" was cut out (they faded it out on the line Gonna take two weeks, gonna have a fine vacation...).

I know that at this late date I really shouldn't be shocked or offended by anything radio stations do, but WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON WITH THIS ********?!! Do they think people's attention spans are too short to hear the entire song? Is this a way to cram in even more commercials? What's the deal?

 

Several possible explanations that may be innocent or may be nefarious:

1. At what time were you hearing the songs? If it was close to the top or bottom of the hour, when many stations take a one-minute so-called "news break," then it might have been a miscalculation on the jock's or PD's part about the length of a song. Or they played a longer version of something before that song they had to cut off early.
2. Could someone have been playing the single version of "Poor Side of Town"? That's where the song starts fading on the original 45, after the last female chorus line and when Johnny sings "Oh with you by my side." I'm not sure if this version is on CD, though.
3. The music is being "piped in" via satellite, and the music track doesn't correspond to the local breaks, which can be programmed to air at a certain exact time.

 

I heard a premature fade out last night as well. It must be the new thing to keep listenership up.

 

What's worse is a DJ talking over the end of a song.

 

And that's been going on for generations. This is why I started buying (and eventually collecting) records in 1973.

 

Yes and yes.

I feel your pain, friend, but that's the truth. When you hear 5'o Clock World by the Vogues or maybe a Peggy Lee tune and they cut it right at the end, they're rushing the hour. If they're doing it ALL THE TIME, that's what they're doing. They can save 3-4 minutes an hour this way, and put more music in there...AFTER they spend their inventory (commercials).

There's research especially among females 18-25 that their TSL (Time Spent Listening) is about 4-7 minutes, depending on the market. Females are really HUGE even in the radio market.

If they ARE cutting tails ALL THE TIME, that's a station obeying some very tired research that they are driving to help them succeed. If you don't like the station, write them and their corporate entity, and play CDs in the car.

 

No Tim, it wasn't at either end of the hour and there was no newsbreak or commercial afterwards. Right after lopping off "Summertime Blues", they started playing a Billy Joel song, by which point I was home and out of the car.

I suppose it's possible that they used the single version of "Poor Side of Town" (or replicated it by fading out early). But that doesn't explain the other songs.

Looks like Sckott may have just confirmed my suspicions. Ah, well...as you say, that's the state of radio now and I can't pretend it really surprises me. You're right, it's probably long past time for me to replace my piece of junk factory in-dash with one that has a CD player.

 

Radio lost me about 6 years ago and I'm only 26.

 

The worst offender I've heard is WJMK, the big Infinity-owned oldies station here in Chicago. They routinely edit their songs--if anything is over 3-1/2 minutes or so, it is severely cut. I've literally heard "Someone Saved My Life Tonight", "Riders on the Storm", "Silly Love Songs" and even "Hey Jude" cut in half!

I've noticed that even some shorter songs, like "Drift Away" by Dobie Gray and "Lean on Me" by Bill Withers are edited. These may be 45 edits, but I've never heard them anywhere else.

 

Sheesh, don't they teach DJ's how to back-time anymore?

 

It was certainly rampant on top 40 stations in the early 80's when I was growing up. DJs yammer over intros and sometimes even over vocals (pausing and talking again when the singer takes a breath ). Songs were always faded out. I remember the first time I heard the entire fade out of "Every Breath You Take" after it had been on the radio for weeks.

At least the DJs were live back then, most everything is "voicetracked" now.

Dan C

 

Another real kicker is, most people who listen to the radio usually don't know the difference between the 5:23 LP version and a 3:12 edit. I know this is annoying, but research proves this.

Now, who's in this research? Usually audiences far away from where you listen. Many executives that have to do with cut-rate decisions are USUALLY in the west coast, but sadly this research proves itself over and over again.

Who's the feedback in this audience?? Arbitron. I've NEVER EVER been called for radio research, nor have I heard of anyone polled. I'm fairly sure it's not a bunch of bull, but I've not SEEN this happen to me.

Truthfully, if you want this to stop, write letters and tell your friends how much this station sucks. If you really want to get evil, write the local sponsors of the station, making example that you will never do business that give money to stations that believe in cheapening the respect of their listeners. Remember: LOCALS. Pepsi and Miller Beer could care less if three people a week complained.

Don't listen to radio if you don't like it. I know it's a necessary evil sometimes, but when you subscribe to something you don't like, you're encouraging more stuff like this to happen.

Radio is still a very powerful medium. Radio doesn't always suck. Radio hasn't been the way it used to, for years. It's one BIG reason I don't work "there" anymore, other than not being able to make any money at it.

If this station is new and has a big-throated jock in it, chances are the jock is satellite loaded. One doode does 3-4 hours of pre-recorded puking for up to 12 stations a week. Nice, huh? Community? Personal touch? Don't look behind the curtain. No one's there. Ha.

 

The Wizard of AAAAAGGGGHHHH?!?!

 

It seems radio has developed a case of "Music Interruptus" coupled with "Premature Fade-out". I wonder whether a large dose of "Sonic Viagra" would help.

Or maybe dee jays should just shut up and respect the music!

 

Considering that "Summertime Blues" is ALREADY under 2 minutes long, there's no excuse, ever, for editing that! That's the kind of song that a savvy DJ would use to lead to the next network break, the same way that in the 1990s, "Big Me" by Foo Fighters and "Roll to Me" by Del Amitri were used ... they're just barely over 2 minutes long and work great to fill a short gap. (One radio station near me uses "Holiday Road" by Lindsey Buckingham for the same purpose, but this station still plays vinyl records, or uses carts/dubs made from vinyl records, occasionally.)

 

Guys, THIS is closest to what it happening. The real truth is that everything is automated and the computers that turn down the sattelite signal and trigger the station ID tag, commercial, or whatever are out of sync. This happens all the time on our "Good times, great oldies" station run by Westwood One. It is much worse than the days when the fast-talking DJ used to blabber all opver a record's intro and end.

Just another reason I don't listen to radio anymore.

 

This often happens at the top of the hour, when stations are given the option of taking a local break here for news or whatever, usually two and a half minutes or so. For stations that don't take the break, the satellite feed will often play a record in this space, then fade it out abruptly, and you'll hear the station ID and the beginning of the next hour of programming. I always wondered why they didn't just play shorter records and back-time them, but the problem with modern Adult Contemporary stuff is, they seem to have forgotten how to produce a song that runs less than four or five minutes.

Here's one way to figure out if your local station is picking up a satellite feed. If when the DJ says the call letters of the local station, it sounds a little louder, softer, overlaps with the next word he says, or just has a different ambience for whatever reason, it's probably satellite. The station I worked for used to cover the night shift and weekends with a satellite service. They had a system set up where we'd wire up a cart machine (how's that for ancient history?) with various tape of the satellite DJ saying our call letters, and he somehow was able to trigger this cart from his location in Texas. Knowing how it worked, the difference seemed obvious to me, but you'd be amazed how many people this system fooled into thinking the guy was broadcasting locally. We still got a good number of request calls during satellite hours.

 

Yeah, but I think they're rolling the station without any respect for the music.

I was at a Texaco gas station a week ago. While you pump gas they play the "donut hole" of a lot of popular music and pelt you with advertisements.

What I mean is, they may play James Taylor "Shower The People" for the middle to right before the chorus ends, it fades down...
"Heyy! Have you stocked up on 1% milk today? Come in and find what you're looking for! We're always happy to help!"
The song changes, this time it's "California Dreamin'" by The Mams/Paps. JUST THE CHORUS plays.
"Did you know that we stock over 11 kinds of Pepsi products? It's just another way to say we've got you covered!"
Another song. "Doctor My Eyes" by Jackson Browne. Starts 2 minutes in until just the chorus is about to end.
Yep. Another "Heyyy!!"

I have a feeling Tim, they're rolling songs on hard drive that have no real timed or calculated song format. In otherwords, no one at the wheel, and the computer's not really running the show either...

Yeah, might as well fart through the songs then!

 

ROTFL at Sckott's comments about the gas stations...guess I have to laugh to keep from sobbing, or screaming.

 

But that is all music is to business, something to fill in the space between announcements or commercials. Business people aren't music people and don't care about music. Their only goal is to sell merchandise or services.

Frankly, to me, this practice cheapens the value of music and lessens it's importance in our society. It's no wonder most people don't get upset over rappers and hip-hoppers sampling songs, or commercials using oldies to sell burgers and cars, or even downloading music! It's just not important to them.

 

Another thing that bugs me are the stations that use extreme EQ/compression....there's a station here that has such massive bass boost (hit that "super bass" button for the feed!) that it just sounds ridiculous, even in the car...now I just take my iPod along and play it through the car stereo.

 

Heh. Just think! Thye're using a satelite transponder channel JUST for this crazy stuff! Either that or a intranet stream. They paid MONEY for this, and of course, paid BMI & ASCAP. Just for 6-seconds of music, 1 minute of promo, over and over. It's so you'll at least fill your tank 1/4-1/2 way, and that takes 3 minutes!!

Will TSL dictate how we hear music? How about the 45 second version of McArthur Park!!

"Devil Dogs! Beef Jerkey! It's all inside with the friendliest staff in town! Ask about our Gas Stations' Greatest Hits CD! 89 of your favorite songs on one CD! Only $8.99 at Participating Texaco stations!"