Yeah, a DJ I know told me that oldies stations used to play '50s thru the poppier side of 60s, maybe bubblegum early '70s. Now oldies stations are late 60s - early '80s (what people my age (52) would've known as classic rock. Now classic rock is more hard rock '80s - late '90s, maybe a couple early '00s thrown in. Lots of great artists have slipped through the cracks so the great unwashed can hear "Hotel California", "Don't Stop Believin'", and "Piano Man" at least once a day.
I do NOT work for them but love any legit chance to hype Lancaster cA KFXM-FM 98, the most miraculous oldies overair FM station I've ever heard, nearly all pop hits late fifties-mid-70s with a small handful of inexplicable 80s outliers, almost never the obvious stuff..... they promise and deliver likelihood to play ANY pop charting single of their era, regularly coming up with things that never exceeded 70 or so on the charts. especially good on instrumentals, novelty, and the forgotten early pre-Beatles 60s. No artist you "won't hear anymore" on that station.... i had been a lifelong listener of conventional american fm oldies since early 80s and when I discovered this station in 2013 it played things I never knew about on an at least hourly basis.
Radio stations must make money to operate, and the music played is merely a tool to keep listeners tuned in long enough to hear sponsors’ advertisements. The vast majority of the general radio listening public tune in to hear what they remember from their youth. If the music is unfamiliar, they will not listen. Radio stations always follow the money trail and therefore will play only what is assured to garner listeners and advertisers.
I grew up listening to WMTR when they were hyper-easy listening (Fifties/Sixties). A lot of Jerry Vale and the like, but no hits at all, not even Adult Contemporary ones. I was an adult before they started acting like a normal radio station.
I lived in Victorville CA from 1966 to 1971 and KFXM was the main AM station in our area back then...it was terrific, the gold standard as far as I'm concerned. Even then they played both new and older material from practically every musical genre.
I still like most of it, especially "Mr. Businessman", which makes more sense now than ever! I also love the clearly dated "The Earl Of Stilton Square", which was arranged by Tupper Saussey, of which you are probably saying WHO??? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2g9qYaoIfo Maybe you'll remember this TOP 40 hit that Tupper wrote ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Lan8zQL52Y
Don K Reed’s Doo Wop Shop I used to like when they would play the top 20 e.g. the week of June 5, 1963
I have both Neon Philarmonic Lps , but not his solo album. I used to watch the Ray Stevens show (summer replacement for Andy Williams) on TV, but his music doesn't do anything for me anymore . PS sadly his records aren't worth much anymore.
I think the Searchers are rarely played, same with Manfred Mann , with the exception of "Doo Wah Diddy Diddy", for some reason !!
Just mentioning it again, but if you’re willing to listen online, this is what we do - all the 50s/60s hits, tons of misses, vintage jingles and commercials, etc. This isn’t the usual random-play jukebox online station so give it a listen if you like all these kinds of artists. We knew this world needed a home are trying to give it one! Www.wiwsradio.com https://streaming.live365.com/a02808
Shades of Blue (Oh How Happy), and Barbara Lynn (You’ll Lose a Good Thing). For the brief time that a CBS FM affiliate in Los Angeles was still doing actual programming in the 90s, they played both of these one hit wonders, and I loved them. Then of course, they went all robot, and I never heard anything like that again. But those two stuck with me!
We listen to Sirius in our cars. Mine has alerts available. Bread, The Carpenters, Helen Reddy, ONJ, C&T get a lot of airplay on the 70's station, and on various Love-song music stations. Bread is regularly played on the Bridge, which is heavy on early-mid 70's album artists. I really believe it depends on if you are listening to broadcast stations or stations heavy on specific playlists geared towards the user.
Independent freeform WFMU here in NJ is listener supported, no commercials. They get donations from all over the world, like Germany and Poland, when they do their fundraisers. Probably due to their live streaming, anyone can listen to them at any time
Ray politics led me away from him afew years ago and i always wondered what ever happened to his old philosophy of "everything is beautiful in it's own way", because now he is a right leaning nut job who loves to make fun of anybody who isn't on the right side of the damn fence! I do however still enjoy his older Monument and early Barnaby material, especially the song "Sunset Strip", which is as good as anything The Beach Boys ever cut with Ray doing about 25 Brian Wilson's all by himself on that track!
WAKY in Louisville is pretty good at still trying to keep it "deep" although it does play a lot of 80s as well, but on the weekends they usually try to keep their "way back weekends" in the 50s, 60s and early 70s and many times playing far lesser heard songs than the norm.
SXM has added deep cuts stations for First Wave and a couple of other genres to their streaming platform. Not sure of the cost to curate and run that type of channel, but that would be the place for it.
