Christian Radio Then & Now
Remember back in the 90's when Steven Curtis Chapman, Michael W. Smith and Point of Grace were the stars? They had 4-6 singles released PER album and a new album every 18 months. Today the big named- stars like Casting Crowns, MercyMe, and Mandisa only get 2-3 singles per album which are released every 8-12 months and an album every 24-30 months! Basically, today we hear an overload of the same songs for years.
In the 90's when CCM was a growing and thriving genre, even lesser known artists were given a chance to have multiple radio single releases in hopes of gaining a top 10 single (or four). Artists like Cheri Keaggy, Lisa Bevill or Sierra, who were not major stars in CCM, had multiple #1 and top 10 hits and sold a decent amount of records (approx. 100,000 units each). There was just a wider span of artists to listen to back then. Today a mid-pack artist may get 2-3 top 10 singles in their whole career!
In the 90's, and even up to the mid-2000's, Christian CHR (Pop) radio played COMPLETELY different music than Adult Contemporary (AC) or Inspirational (Soft AC/INSPO) radio stations. In fact, some artists would release 2 radio singles at a time, an upbeat one to CHR radio and a ballad to AC and INSPO or a mid-tempo/upbeat to CHR/AC and a really slow ballad to INSPO (sometimes a hymn cover or album closer). Today INSPO, AC and CHR radio are all encouraged to play Chris Tomlin's very slow ballad "Jesus Loves Me", Jeremy Camp's mid-tempo "He Knows" and Moriah Peters' very upbeat "Brave" without considering the audience's actual tastes.
Sure most Christians like all of these songs but if I'm listening to POP radio I want something that sounds CURRENT not a hymn-like ballad. Conversely, if I'm listening to a conservative INSPO station, I want to hear hymns and ballads and other contemplative songs that deepen my spiritual knowledge, not a soulful dance song about being "BRAVE".
The large number of radio single releases per album is what made Steven Curtis Chapman, Michael W. Smith, Jaci Velasquez, Point of Grace, Avalon and others so big in the 90's and early 00's. Because we knew so many songs from these artists' albums due to the variety of radio play, it made buying a whole album ($18.99 a CD in the late 90's) worth it and it made the concert experience so much more fun as we could sing along loud and proud to almost every song. There's no reason why Mandisa's Overcomer shouldn't have had 4-5 singles out by now. The same can be said for Casting Crowns' Thrive, Matthew West's Into the Light, Tenth Avenue North's The Struggle and MercyMe's Welcome to the New or any of these artists' previous albums which have only received 2-3 single releases per album. Today single releases are so slow and spaced out that people tire of the songs and even when they are preformed in concert there is a slight sigh of boredom due to overplay.
I get the value of a major "I Can Only Imagine"-sized hit that finds its way into every playlist across the country over a series of 12 to 24 months (ballads can be CHR appropriate and upbeat tunes can make it to Inspo every now and again) but not every song can be that kind of hit nor should it be. A great album would have 1-2 major hits and 3-4 other successful but not career defining hits (see all of Steven Curtis Chapman's 90's releases for a great example of how this worked for him or even Chris Tomlin's breakthrough record Arriving which had 3 major #1 hits and 1-2 minor radio singles).
We need to get back to releasing more radio singles. In the digital age, people tire of the same songs over and over again. They can go on Pandora and just try something new at any time. Radio needs to keep up. Of course there are 5-10 songs per year that just BLOW UP and everyone wants to hear them ALL THE TIME.... think about those 90's CCM songs that never went away: "The Great Adventure", "God is in Control", "Place in This World", "On My Knees", "People Get Ready", "Go Light Your World"- some of these songs still show up on radio and that's completely fine. But radio cannot keep playing the SAME 20-30 songs for a year and a half straight! There HAS to be a higher turnover or a larger playlist of songs or people are simply going to turn off the radio!
I understand this is not a problem unique to CCM. Actually mainstream AC and Black Gospel radio are far worse and even mainstream CHR radio has slowed their turnover as well. Every song on Country radio does sound the same today but at least there are 50+ different artists getting played every day. It may take about 6 months for a single to peak on the Country chart but at least the second it peaks, it gets sent to the recurrent chart and a new single is immediately sent to radio for airplay. None of this lasting a year past its peak nonsense that we see on the Christian AC chart today. Seriously, I loved "Redeemed" ,"Where I Belong" and "10,000 Reasons" but they all lasted WAAAAY too long on the charts to the point where I really don't want to hear them again for a while. What's worse is now I also have to hear these same songs in church every other Sunday which is a story for another day....
The bottom line is radio is broken and needs fixed- especially Christian radio. I shouldn't be a able to turn to 3 different Christian radio station in the same market and hear the same songs on all 3 stations at the same time. When this happens, and it happens regularly, it is clear that the radio singles pool is far too small for the industry. Record labels needs to get their act together and release more songs to radio. PLEASE?
Thanks for listening to the rant of a long-time CCM fan :)
In the 90's when CCM was a growing and thriving genre, even lesser known artists were given a chance to have multiple radio single releases in hopes of gaining a top 10 single (or four). Artists like Cheri Keaggy, Lisa Bevill or Sierra, who were not major stars in CCM, had multiple #1 and top 10 hits and sold a decent amount of records (approx. 100,000 units each). There was just a wider span of artists to listen to back then. Today a mid-pack artist may get 2-3 top 10 singles in their whole career!
In the 90's, and even up to the mid-2000's, Christian CHR (Pop) radio played COMPLETELY different music than Adult Contemporary (AC) or Inspirational (Soft AC/INSPO) radio stations. In fact, some artists would release 2 radio singles at a time, an upbeat one to CHR radio and a ballad to AC and INSPO or a mid-tempo/upbeat to CHR/AC and a really slow ballad to INSPO (sometimes a hymn cover or album closer). Today INSPO, AC and CHR radio are all encouraged to play Chris Tomlin's very slow ballad "Jesus Loves Me", Jeremy Camp's mid-tempo "He Knows" and Moriah Peters' very upbeat "Brave" without considering the audience's actual tastes.
Sure most Christians like all of these songs but if I'm listening to POP radio I want something that sounds CURRENT not a hymn-like ballad. Conversely, if I'm listening to a conservative INSPO station, I want to hear hymns and ballads and other contemplative songs that deepen my spiritual knowledge, not a soulful dance song about being "BRAVE".
The large number of radio single releases per album is what made Steven Curtis Chapman, Michael W. Smith, Jaci Velasquez, Point of Grace, Avalon and others so big in the 90's and early 00's. Because we knew so many songs from these artists' albums due to the variety of radio play, it made buying a whole album ($18.99 a CD in the late 90's) worth it and it made the concert experience so much more fun as we could sing along loud and proud to almost every song. There's no reason why Mandisa's Overcomer shouldn't have had 4-5 singles out by now. The same can be said for Casting Crowns' Thrive, Matthew West's Into the Light, Tenth Avenue North's The Struggle and MercyMe's Welcome to the New or any of these artists' previous albums which have only received 2-3 single releases per album. Today single releases are so slow and spaced out that people tire of the songs and even when they are preformed in concert there is a slight sigh of boredom due to overplay.
I get the value of a major "I Can Only Imagine"-sized hit that finds its way into every playlist across the country over a series of 12 to 24 months (ballads can be CHR appropriate and upbeat tunes can make it to Inspo every now and again) but not every song can be that kind of hit nor should it be. A great album would have 1-2 major hits and 3-4 other successful but not career defining hits (see all of Steven Curtis Chapman's 90's releases for a great example of how this worked for him or even Chris Tomlin's breakthrough record Arriving which had 3 major #1 hits and 1-2 minor radio singles).
We need to get back to releasing more radio singles. In the digital age, people tire of the same songs over and over again. They can go on Pandora and just try something new at any time. Radio needs to keep up. Of course there are 5-10 songs per year that just BLOW UP and everyone wants to hear them ALL THE TIME.... think about those 90's CCM songs that never went away: "The Great Adventure", "God is in Control", "Place in This World", "On My Knees", "People Get Ready", "Go Light Your World"- some of these songs still show up on radio and that's completely fine. But radio cannot keep playing the SAME 20-30 songs for a year and a half straight! There HAS to be a higher turnover or a larger playlist of songs or people are simply going to turn off the radio!
I understand this is not a problem unique to CCM. Actually mainstream AC and Black Gospel radio are far worse and even mainstream CHR radio has slowed their turnover as well. Every song on Country radio does sound the same today but at least there are 50+ different artists getting played every day. It may take about 6 months for a single to peak on the Country chart but at least the second it peaks, it gets sent to the recurrent chart and a new single is immediately sent to radio for airplay. None of this lasting a year past its peak nonsense that we see on the Christian AC chart today. Seriously, I loved "Redeemed" ,"Where I Belong" and "10,000 Reasons" but they all lasted WAAAAY too long on the charts to the point where I really don't want to hear them again for a while. What's worse is now I also have to hear these same songs in church every other Sunday which is a story for another day....
The bottom line is radio is broken and needs fixed- especially Christian radio. I shouldn't be a able to turn to 3 different Christian radio station in the same market and hear the same songs on all 3 stations at the same time. When this happens, and it happens regularly, it is clear that the radio singles pool is far too small for the industry. Record labels needs to get their act together and release more songs to radio. PLEASE?
Thanks for listening to the rant of a long-time CCM fan :)
I agree with all of these points! Unfortunately I'm a teenager and have only been into CCM for a few years, but a lot of the time I actually prefer the older stuff to the new songs, mostly just because today's songs are ridiculously overplayed.
ReplyDelete*Sunny
P.S. Just found your blog tonight (while looking up Avalon pictures) and LOVE it!
Its amazing how overplayed everything is now :( I'm not quite sure how radio can even fix themselves at this point.
ReplyDeleteI know, right? Where I live we have two Christian stations, and the worst thing is (I think you mentioned this) when they're both playing THE SAME SONG AT THE EXACT SAME TIME! That's just ridiculous...
ReplyDelete*Sunny