the consolations of oldies radio

I have a coworker that listens to it all day. They play the same songs at the same time in the same fucking order everyday. And they NEVER play the Who - but the Who didn't have many US hits.

the thing about oldies radio is that they have, you know.. 10-15 years of solid hits, and they reliably play the same 50-60 EVERY FUCKING DAY ALL DAY LONG.

(i see andy has beaten me to the punch. perhaps i should read more)

I feel almost exactly the opposite way.

French oldies radio is the greatest cause you've never heard any of the songs, but they SOUND like oldies. You'll hear a picture-perfect Nashville country song with all the words in French, and the whole car will fall about with laughter and start singing along. "EDDIE MEETCH-ELLE!!"

I agree with N.

However . . . there are certain artists and songs that drive me insane that just as predictably and dependably show up on every cotton-pickin' oldies station broadcasting. So for every "Tears of a Clown" I am blessed to hear (ha), I am punished by Gary Lewis and the Playboys' "This Diamond Ring" (a song I have NEVER heard anywhere else), or that "Never My Love" thing, or, worst of all, anything by the accursed Four Seasons.

I still listen, but with trepidation.

Tracer is sooooo GDOTMFM.

that and the would-be four seasons station ids, with all the computer-enhanced harmonies

see oldies stations are really different, or at least used to be; i've almost never heard "band of gold" on chicago oldies radio

oldies radio is like a soggy old apple that has one good part left, if you're desperately hungry you can try to go for that one part

is it time to rehash the "what is 'band of gold'" about debate???

"Who could have a problem," he says, "with hearing 'Baby Love' a little more often?"

nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo MAKE IT STOP

Can Pleasant Plains or any other past/present radio industry people point me to online info resources about companies that pump out formatted content via satellite?

bump

"Good Time Oldies" radio has crept forward to 1987 -- heard "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" today.

Once JackFM came around, I turned that shit off, and preserved what was.

I compiled what I believe is every song from the oldies station I heard growing up in the '80s/early '90s. Essentially, a '60s playlist, but I realized this morning, it had stretched to 1975 with:

(1975) Natalie Cole - This Will Be (An Everlasting Love)
(1975) Neil Sedaka - Laughter In the Rain

I also have a '50s oldies playlist from my '70s/early '80s childhood that stretched into 1965 with Elvis Presley's Crying In The Chapel.

Anything that was on the air when I was in high school is something I have no warm fuzzy feelings about.

Once JackFM came around, I turned that shit off, and preserved what was.

There was some anti-oldies thread a while back but I can't find it right now.

FM oldies radio has completely focus-grouped out almost all of the 50s and much of the 60s, and the off-the-wall novelty songs and the one-hit-wonders that make that era so fascinating to me. Satellite radio, on the other hand, recently introduced me to Jo-Ann Campbell.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFPak2lsrX0

The "oldies" format as it still exists over the airwaves fascinates me -- carefully avoiding some genres until finally embracing them (disco), pretending punk never happened but bringing a fair lot of New Wave into play (no surprise there), relegating pre-Beatles stuff to some prehistorical ur-rock status and trotting out a track every couple of hours with "did you know this existed? Hear what we found on our latest archaeological dig!" Who makes these decisions? I'd like to be a fly on the wall in whatever conference room it's being done in.

wcbs-fm in nyc will be playing the frankie valley & 4 seasons every hour until the end of time

the uncanny frankie valley

Who makes these decisions?

http://deadhomersociety.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/dj3000.png

the uncanny frankie valley

― mark s, Wednesday, November 2, 2011 5:57 PM (4 minutes ago)

thanking you

trotting out a track every couple of hours with "did you know this existed?

Really? I never hear this anymore. I used to work at a "Classic Hits" station in the late 80s that played mostly 60s/70s; they would pull out one obscurity each lunch hour, as voted by a listener. Once I pushed for "Precious Precious" by Jackie Moore, and was told it was too obscure. (#30, gold seller in 1971)

I haven't listened to oldies radio in a while, but last I checked there were no surprises whatsover. I used to hear a few oddities like "Hey Baby" by Bruce Channel and "Come On Down To My Boat" by Every Mother's Son in the rotation, but I think these have long since been eliminated.

I heard "Smokin in the Boys Room" (i think that was the track? was definitely crue) on the oldies station here, and that was the last straw.
Still, it has its charms -- there's nowhere else I could have heard "They're Coming to Take You Away" on the radio, and that song always amuses me.

yeah driving to work every day in a car with no way to hook up an ipod has led me to listen to a lot of oldies radio over the last few months, and i've decided that i'm really not ready to hear shit i heard on contemporary radio as a child (in the mid 80s) showing up on oldies stations, even though i've been expecting it for a while now.

in another 30 years, the "nuggets from the archeological dig" songs are gonna be like limahl solo tracks.

That's not as scary as thinking about what's going to be on the oldies stations in fifty years time. "One from the dig: it's LMFAO!"

45 at 5: i gotta feeling!

haha that wasn't so much a complaint about TODAY'S MUSIC as lamenting my inevitable and inexorable slide into decrepitude

wcbs-fm in nyc will be playing the frankie valley & 4 seasons every hour until the end of time

― chief rocker frankie crocker (m coleman), Wednesday, November 2, 2011 5:55 PM

Wiki on WCBS is fascinating--I remember that station being a weird 50s/early 60s holdout with very geriatric DJs a decade ago, apparently it had a failed Jack reboot a few years ago, and now does 50s all the way through the 80s.

"Hey Baby" by Bruce Channel

Now we can lock thread, as perfection has been posted.

i was really glad to hear "they're coming to take you away" tbh
ha ha hee hee

wcbs-fm in nyc will be playing the frankie valley & 4 seasons every hour until the end of time

― chief rocker frankie crocker (m coleman), Wednesday, November 2, 2011 5:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

This was the station my parents always had on in the car when I was a kid. So true. So much Valley. I can't even read WCBS without singing it the way the jingle does in my head.

DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAWN
GO AWAY I'M NO GOOOOOOD FOR YOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUU

i think it's Valli btw

sorry, that was annoying
but not as annoying as hearing 80s songs on the oldies station

lol it totally is oops

Not annoying - I actually love him and probably know the words to more 4 seasons songs than I should. My bff has two sisters one named Dawna and one named Sherry.

x-posts - I wonder if cousin brucie is still on WCBS

ha - Dawn not Dawna

Cousin Brucie is on satellite, on the Sirius XM 60s channel. I saw him on the subway a month or two ago. I said hello and he was pretty nice, don't think he thinks much of the current WCBS. I had actually seen him a few years ago on the subway, asking for directions. I asked him if he had ridden the subway before and he said yes, all the time, just not that particular line, so I guess this was a belated confirmation.