burn-outs come faster in the 90's than previous decades

["Tim Davisson" <timdav@bright.net>]

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> From: SteveOrdinetz <steveord@xtdl.com>

> Without a doubt.  Also keep in mind that prior to the past 10-12 years or
> so, stations were far less recurrent-heavy than they are today.  Back
then,
> when a song dropped off the chart, there was a pretty good chance that it
> would just go away, as opposed to hanging in forever in recurrent
rotation.
>  It increases the "ow wow" factor of a lot of these songs, but time will
> tell how well they wear after 6 months or so.


You're right Steve. Great comment.

Back in even the 70's, a typical Top 40/CHR station, like the ones I worked
at, played about 80% currents, and 20% oldies. Recurrents weren't really
around in most markets til the middle 70's. In fact, as a music director in
Akron and later in Tampa, I had to talk the PD into creating a category of
"recent oldies", as we called them back then.  He thought I was crazy
for that idea....but, it made sense. In Tampa we played one "recent" per
hour, and had about 24 to 30 cuts in the category.

Today, many stations play up to 80% NON-currents. Many classic rock
stations, for example, play about 10 or 15 currents....one current cut per
hour, and usually only 7pm-6am!  Even CHRs today play up to 40% or
so non-currents.

So, oldies today seem to burn out faster than they did in years past.

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