Honky Tonk Happy Hour: Let The Free Market Rule

I have to agree, I hate having my radio try to tell me what I should like by playing the same songs by the same artists all day. And I hate trying to request songs that either “aren’t on the playlist” or be told that “oh we already played them this hour” which really means “I have to play Taylor Swift or Rascall Flatts four more times before you can hear what you want. That’s why I almost never listen to the radio anymore, because I can’t hear the music I want even if I try to request it.

I figure this thread is the perfect place to share this short article from Country Standard Time:

“Amber Digby Makes Her Opry Debut This Saturday!

Wednesday, December 16, 2009 – Texas based singer Amber Digby will make her Grand Ole Opry debut Saturday night. She will sing “Silent Night (After the Fight)”, a song recorded by Ronnie Milsap many years ago. The song appears on Digby’s just released fourth album, “Another Way to Live.”

“I’m thrilled to death,” said Digby in a telephone interview Wednesday. “I’m excited. I’m not scared to death. I’ve got butterflies, but every human being gets that.”

“I’ve been spending a lot of time in Nashville writing. I’ve made several trips this year and made a lot of contacts there.”

Digby’s mother and aunt have worked with Milsap, leading to that connection. She will appear while he is hosting that particular segment of the Opry show.”

Darn, I was hoping that on Amber’s Opry debut she would get to share the stage with Loretta Lynn! Oh well…

PS – As for Miss Leslie’s article, I consider country music blogs like “The 9513″ to be about as “free market” as you can get these days since such a wide variety of artists are covered. It may not be “mass market” like Top 40 country radio stations in major markets, but at least quality is a major consideration unlike the commercial dreck radio programmers love these days.

Well said – Ms Leslie

I don’t despair of it ever turning around, but I am getting more discouraged

Here here Miss Lesley.

Just a level playing field. Country music belongs to the people. Let them decide what it should be, and what is best.

I long ago switched to satellite radio to get away from top 40 music, but even there corporate mergers have taken away the sole place I could find American, X Country on XM, away.

What we have in place is the direct result of a “free market economy.” The 1996 telecom act was a deregulatory measure that set the free market loose on radio in the form of companies like Clear Channel and Cumulus.

True. The other direct results of the free market economy is the tremendous decline in sales and the rise of the Americana movement. Susan Boyle’s succcess suggests that people will still go out and buy albums if the music appeals to them. If the mainstream ever gets its act together and starts listening to its audience, its fortunes will change. Until then, people will seek out alternative outlets.

What an awesome post! Its so good to read this and the replies and know you’re not out here alone in wondering why so many good artists are being ignored!!

I agree totally with Stephanie – and don’t like radio forcing artists on me that I’m supposed to like. The local country stations around here seem to play back to back Carrie, Taylor, Brad, Keith, Toby…oh lets throw in some Jason Aldean and then start it all over again in the next hour.

I’m going to use Jamey Johnson for an example — he’s an artist I can’t figure out why radio hasn’t embraced – he has put out an amazing album and some real, flat out country music (even if radio does consider “High Cost of Living” risque). His shows around here have been sell outs or pretty close to it – proving there are fans out here! “In Color” was played around here — but it was next to impossible to get his next two singles played at all. First calls to the stations (and our stations haven’t gone all automated, there are real DJs in the booth) were met with “Thats not on our playlist yet”. And when I asked why not, was informed Jamey wasn’t “popular” enough for airplay other than “In Color”. I was actually told by one DJ when I was calling to request “High Cost of Living” that “the people” (ie radio listeners) only knew him from “In Color” and thats all they “were allowed” to play. He couldn’t play “High Cost” because it wasn’t on the charts and people wouldn’t know the song. When Jamey released “My Way to You” – it was the same issues. (And I cannot believe country radio let this song die – I just believe its so well written and the delivery is amazing.) Well, hello — if you’re not playing the song, how are people (besides the Jamey Johnson fans) going to hear that song and know if its something they’d like to hear. I’ve asked them, take out one rotation of Carrie in the afternoon and add in the song I was requesting and then see what happened. Did it generate any calls/emails of interest – wondering who the artist was or asked to play or ditch the song — but to no avail. One station does a listener poll – 30 songs every two weeks voted on by their listener club…and every poll is the same 30 songs it seems like and nothing new is hardly added. Those are the core songs they’ll play because they’ve been “voted” upon by the fans as what “we” want to hear. Umm…no…I didn’t get to vote on the song I REALLY want to hear, because you didn’t put them on your stupid poll in the first place! I honestly don’t mind putting up with all the other artists they’re going to throw at us, if I knew there is a chance something I want to hear is going to be mixed in there! Just give a song or an artist a real chance before passing it over. I also agree with what Saving Country Music posted — let the people decide! Country Radio – please…listen to your listeners!!

I feel as Paul does.

There seems to be some vague idea that we should give power to decide what gets played to DJs. I’m just a fan – but, why? The musical taste of the DJs likely doesn’t correlate to the taste of the listener. I know one former DJ, who is now a sports talk host — he once was a DJ for a country station but he hates country music. He pretended to like it because that was his job. Would letting him and others like him pick the music be a good idea? Once i was listening to a radio station in 2004 and the DJ thought “Montgomery Gentry” was one person, even after playing the song. He also mis-pronounced “Gentry.”

I just am skeptical about giving power over song selection to DJs. They seem to be very low on the food chain: If I owned a TV station I wouldn’t give programing decisions to such a low level employee. I don’t know why radio stations should do so either.

Even if DJs like country music, and are informed, they may bave 4 hour shifts, wheras I may listen in the car for only 30 minutes. As a result, I may not want variety. i may want Taylor Swift played once an hour so I am very likely to hear her song on my drive to and from work. But DJs, working their shift, may tend to think differently, even if they aren’t listening to the music played.

It seems that if radio stations want to find out what music their listeners like best, the way to go about it is through well done research. That would be a lot more accurate than relying on requests or on DJ preferences.

JON – I was wondering when your sword would pierce one of my blogs. Took you long enough .

I think that the presence of monopolies suppresses the free market. But maybe I need to brush up on my economics.

SAM – you haven’t heard a good DJ in awhile. There was a time when DJs were allowed to talk about something other than advertisers on the radio. They knew artists, music and were all about sharing what they thought was hip and up-and-coming. They frequently broke new artists – sometimes just locally but sometimes nationally. I regret that I was not an adult during that time but occasionally I’ll be listening to a station and get to hear one of those old dogs.
You’re right – the modern DJ starts out at minimum wage and doesn’t have to have half the knowledge of either radio or music that DJs had to have 20 years ago.

It would be nice to have DJs that can hear and respond to the voice of the people. Currently, no one is listening – either the radio or (and this is the end result) the “radio” audience.

I think that the presence of monopolies suppresses the free market. But maybe I need to brush up on my economics.

Well, yeah, actually, I think you do. When markets are unregulated, there are winners and losers among the entrants, and eventually just a tiny handful of winners. Chris N.’s point is exactly right; the concentration in broadcast media ownership followed directly from deregulation, whereas it was the heavy hand of gummint regulation that tended to protect local ownership and some degree of diversity. Free markets breed diversity in the short term and the opposite in the long.

The other thing worth keeping in mind is that where competition is relatively unrestrained – like, for instance, webcasting, or online retail – the results aren’t as different from those in the monopolized media; indie and niche stuff may make a better showing in absolute terms, but they’re still dwarfed by the same stuff. At some point, it’s worth considering that one’s tastes are simply in the minority, and that while exposure of what one likes to tens of millions of people may result in a modest increase in support – which, don’t get me wrong, can mean the difference between making a living doing it or not, and is therefore not insignificant to the artists involved – it’s unlikely to result in a massive reorientation of people’s tastes. Thanks to its canary-in-the-coal-mine position, discerning fans of bluegrass figured this out a long time ago ;-).

Smith certainly considered monopolies to be opposed to the public good, but in what respect did he consider them to be a form of interference with the free market? I think it might be more accurate to say that Smith wasn’t in favor of wholly unrestrained markets.

If you look at the passage from which that quote is taken, it’s clear that Smith is talking about monopolies granted by government, not monopolies which occur as the natural result of competition. Monopolies occurring as the natural result of competition don’t need to, nor (in Smith’s theory, at least) can they in the long run resist the tendency for commodities to reach their natural price.

This has long been a dream of mine if one day I were to hit the lottery big time: I’d start an independent country station. Get a group of like-minded people who know how to put a good playlist of music together and put money into it until advertising could keep it afloat. And I’d do it simply because I love music and I get a real kick out of turning someone on to a new artist or band. I love all kinds, but primarily what I consider country music. Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Loretta Lynn, and others are still making music…why not play it on the radio? Hell, I’d even play Bruce Springsteen, John Fogerty, and Bob Dylan. I’d also try to have the station as listener-friendly as possible since real people instead of a computer program would be playing the music. I’d hope to have such on-air variety that playing a song twice in a week would be rare. I’ve worked in a blue collar environment for awhile and about the only thing that breaks up the monotony is my own music since to me, radio is a dead medium.

If this ever does happen, I might just start a station in Nashville. Man, what a hornet’s nest that would be…XD

Mojo Bone: Excellent points. There is a lot of truth in what you’ve written, and you are absolutely right — there is good and bad music in every era, and the best from each era is what tends to be remembered. That being said, I can remember a time when I could listen to the radio and like most of what I heard. I can remember when the Top 10 albums included at least 7 albums that I owned. Somewhere along the way things changed. Now I dislike the vast majority of what gets played on the radio and it’s only the occasional album that I like that has a shot of making the the Top 10. My own tastes have changed a bit over the years, but I still like most of what I listened to 10 or 20 years ago. But what I like to listen to is no longer considered mainstream.

Perhaps what you liked then, the mainstream, isn’t what is mainstream now.

Isn’t that what I said?

Should it ’stay the same’ just because it was more convenient for you or people who listened a lot back then?

No. Nobody said anything about staying the same.

Don’t tastes change?

Um, yeah. I said that too. Did you actually read what I wrote?

Maybe you were thrown off by the way he seemed to be complaining, but now says he wasn’t.