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RADIO AIRPLAY 101 - Commercial Radio Charts |
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Saturday, 12 June 2004 |
We've talked a lot so far about CMJ magazine/charts for college radio, since CMJ is a good starting place for most bands (and should be included even if you attempt commercial campaigns.) We now progress on to the commercial radio charts. (Billboard is best not attempted at this point in your career, for reasons covered before. And Gavin, unfortunately, does not publish a magazine with charts anymore.) There are other charts/magazines besides the ones listed below, but they are more non-commercial, and will be covered later.
If you are just moving into commercial radio for the first time (and all you've done so far is non-commercial radio,) then you need to start off with the specialty/mixshow charts first. Then if successful, you can proceed to the regular rotation charts (at a much higher cost.) You do not need to subscribe to these magazines, since we give you the pertinent information you need each week. You WILL need a promoter, however, since charting in these magazines (regular rotation) is beyond the scope of the do-it-yourself artist/label.
FMQB: The name stands for Friday Morning Quarter Back. The FMQB company puts out two weekly magazines: FMQB, and FMQB-Rock. The regular FMQB (or FMQB-Pop as some call it) contains charts for pop, AC, and urban. FMQB Rock contains rock, alternative, and AAA. FMQB is available by subscription only.
FMQB is a nice starting point for commercial radio, since the specialty/mixshow charts and regular rotation charts use stations which, on the average, are smaller than those the other magazines use (but by smaller, don't think they'll be easy.) Advertising in FMQB is reasonably priced and not over crowded. If all you do is chart in FMQB, then you have accomplished more than 99.9 percent of all artists out there.
ALBUM NETWORK: The Album Network company has six radio trades, many of them weekly: Album Network (abbreviated AN) (and it covers mostly rock), Network 40 (abbreviated Net40 or N40) (covers pop), Urban Network (abbreviated UN) (covers Hip Hop, Rap, R&B), Virtually Alternative (abbreviated VA) (covers alternative), Aggro (covers metal), and Totally Adult (abbreviated TA) (covers AC and AAA). None of these magazines are available on the newsstand; they are all subscription only. Although the AN specialty/mixshow charts are not THAT much more difficult than FMQB's, the regular rotation charts ARE (since they use larger stations.)
HITS: Whereas the AN company divides music genres into six separate mags, and the FMQB company divides genres into two mags, Hits magazine combines all genres into one mag. This makes it more limited (per genre), but since it is available on many newsstands, and since it sometimes includes specialty charts for alt, rock and urban, it is kind of a good all-in-one. The charting difficulty is somewhere between AN and R&R: Hits includes some of the larger stations that R&R includes (which makes it more difficult), along with some of the smaller stations that AN and FMQB include (which makes it easier.) But make no mistake: It is difficult and very expensive to chart regular rotation in Hits.
RADIO & RECORDS: This is the biggie for commercial radio. This magazine does not include small stations in their charts; Therefore, you will have charted in all the other charts before you get into R&R. (This makes R&R almost as difficult and expensive to work as Billboard.) R&R is available at bigger newsstands in NY and LA, and of course by subscription. While it is possible to chart in R&R's specialty/mixshow charts, an indie band has very little chance of charting regular rotation in R&R without spending enough to buy an new house or two; competition is too fierce, and you are battling all the major labels.
The one exception that you may have to use R&R for, however, is smooth jazz. R&R has the only smooth jazz magazine chart.
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 12 June 2004 )
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