R the oldies radio stations vanishing w/ their listeners?

Question

I ask this because I remember one radio station that used 2 play oldies, i.e. Beatles, Elvis, Motown artists, etc. That station changed 4mats a few years ago, & now in Bakersfield, there r no oldies stations. The only poplar music I hear on terrestrial radio that's old is either classic rock or old school. Thus, I presumed that the oldies listenership, perhaps older then the baby boomers, r dying off. Is that a valid hypothesis? Has a diminishing # of listeners killed off the oldies station here in a small-town market like Bakersfield, & is it doing the same in similar cities (e.g. Council Bluffs, Knoxville, Duluth, Las Cruces, etc.)? & r the large-market cities also vulnerable?

Answer 1

Well, if it's any indication, the oldies station in New York (WCBS-FM) just came back on the air in July after being gone for 2 years.

During the 2 year absence, the station was replaced with the mechanized "Jack-FM" format. New Yorkers didn't like the absence of local flavor, and missed their oldies radio. Jack bombed...

CBS updated their format a bit, calling it "Greatest Hits" instead of "oldies". The content now has more 80's and less 50's compared to the pre-Jack format.

So, it seems that the oldies format needs to follow the listeners to survive, rather than stick with a shrinking audience (as you say). They never used to play 80's, but now 80's songs are oldies too. I think there's still a market if they adapt a bit.

peace

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Answer 2

I think ( being an "oldie" myself) that a lot of "Baby Boomers" and those born in the '50s are switching to on-line sources of not just "Oldies but Goodies" music, but even old-time radio programs from the '40s and '50s like www.otr.net or Launchcast where we can listen to our favorite songs or shows while we work or just enjoy relaxing at home. An added advantage of on-line sources is that if you take out a membership ( really cheap!) there's no commercials to irritate you.

This even extends to old (and recent ) TV shows, movies etc.on sites like www.tv-links.co.uk where you can watch shows that go back as far as the '20s and '30s ( if you visit that site, click on "Shows", then "Flash Gordon-Vintage", then select the episode "The Electro Man" and tell me if you see anything ***VERY*** familiar, after the initial credits, from a recent series of blockbuster movies !?! And that was made in 1932 !?!).

I know that I spend at least 4-5 hours a day with those sources.

All the best! :-)

Answer 3

I work in talk radio and can tell you that the industry goes through a lot of trends.

Right now the emergence of satellite radio is probably taking some of the market for oldies radio, and you will still find a few oldies stations in large markets, but they generally don't survive particularly well in the smaller markets like the ones you cite.

Answer 4

Well I think is probably because they weren't making any money out of it because the ratings were too low. However, you can give them a call and get together with some friends to request the music back again. That way they will see that people acttually like oldies and put it back on. Good Luck!

Answer 5

I admit I've almost completely tuned ouf these stations. The reason is mainly because of the severely limited playlists and having to hear the same songs over and over again. For example, The Temptations were the top male vocal group at Motown. They had literally dozens of hit songs but you wouldn't know it if you listened to one of these stations. All they will play by this group is "My Girl" and occasionally " I Can't Get Next To You". They're basically reduced to one-hit wonders when in fact, they were far from it.