Suddenly my dad has started complaining that he does not get to hear the music of 3 Idiots on FM. "It has such great tracks! Jab dekho koi purana gaana sunaate rehte hain!"
Well, I had to explain it to him technically. And there is a history to it too.
When RadioCity* started playing music from the 90s around 9-10 months back, everyone was laughing at them. The music sounded out of place and the station started sounding dated. But then suddenly, RadioCity started picking up numbers (in the RAM* Reports)
The 'strategy' City had, was not to turn into a Retro station, but play music that is melodious and creates a soothing and relaxed environment. They had conducted research and figured out that people listened to music mainly because they wanted to relax. (So their reaction to the same was to get rid of 'Dhinchak' music) I assume.
Red* and Mirchi* were not bothered. They were still holding strong positions but City's upward travel was too fast to go unnoticed for too long. MANY made the mistake of attributing the success in numbers to the late night show hosted by Manish Valecha as THE reason of City gaining numbers. It was an adult show and to top it -it played ONLY English Retro. Suddenly, (supposedly) according to RAM, everyone was listening to City at nights. Listenership also looked good in the afternoons when their mix of music had more of 90s and other mellow numbers.
Now, the station looking down in the dumps at that point was Fever 104. They were still giving Format Radio to Mumbai. Same product 24x7. The one thing that was their advantage was 40 Mins of Non-Stop Music route (brought to you by Virgin) - which gave them the advantage of playing maximum music in one hour and also maximum music without an ad-break. Great product. Not working.
They had a close look at their competition. And like an intelligent opponent.. imbibed what was good in their competition and only did it better. They had dropped English music long time back. Now came a point when they started playing music of the 90s AND Retro as well. The placement, repetition etc can be explored in some other post, cause that is another chapter to study altogether.
Now Fever started looking upward. Specially after the line-up changed and emphasis was given to the Afternoon and Night shows. (again, something important to learn and study) People sampled the new (but previously famous) jocks and ofcourse, the music, that was more (as compared to other stations) and the right mix. It provided variety and (according to some) - a surprise element for listeners.
The only question on EVERY one's mind was, what the f&$# is Fever upto? How is the TSL so high? How is it suddenly Number 3-2-huh!!almost 1!? Now competition started keeping an eye out or lets just assume glued their ears to Fever. And what did they discover? AH! Old music?! Why not? We can do it too. And yes, we will do it MORE if not better than them! And yes, also, people were slowly realizing that Music indeed is the king.
So eventually, Mirchi worked out 'Dheemi Local' - where they would play music from the 90s for straight 4-5 hours in the afternoon and bring in a Retro show with a bang! You all know it - Purani Jeans- the number 1 show in Mumbai as of today. Incidentally, Mirchi is No.1 (RAM stats) in Mumbai now. (with Afternoon and Night shows doing very well and better than the rest of the day-parts)
There was a time in between (specially when no new movie, and so, no new music was getting released) when even Red tried their hands at 90s. One per hour. Big* did some experiments too. And Radio One has NOW launched something whereby every alternate song or so is a Retro number!
A lot of time has passed since RadioCity made a change in their music and since then, they have rolled in and out of the top 5 in Mumbai. But, every station has experimented with their music and programming since then. So you hear songs ranging from 10-40 years old music more than you would get to hear a latest song. One should not forget that this is also a result of a complete lull in the music scene for quite a long time and listeners needed to be provided with SOME music. On an average, most stations have decreased the number of new songs played every hour / in a day. There are smart programmers like Mirchi and Big who have a good mix and somehow manage to escape the loop. But then others are being caught sleeping over their database!
Because of older songs being heard more often, the recent songs (5-10 years old) are also sounding older than they used to. Databases are not being refreshed. (specially the libraries) However, NOW - new and fresh music is being churned out of Bollywood at a better pace and better quality. No one knows how long this happy season will last, but while its here, the listeners are not being allowed to enjoy it as much as they want to!
Ajab, 3 Idiots, Chance Pe Dance, Ishqiya, Veer, are flooding the market and sitting their like sweets at a shop, getting wasted, since the shopkeeper is not displaying it to the shopper enough!
"Behti Hawa sa tha woh" from 3 Idiots has not got any rotation in radio stations! Can you believe it?! People are dying to listen to it people!!
Anyway, so to address my dad's grievance, I would like to state that as long as RAM doesnt show that X radiostation is doing well because they are playing NEW songs at some arbid time. And more importantly, unless some OTHER station does not try it out and become successful as well, there is a dim chance that music policies would change in the coming days.
Bhaiyya, sab hai RAM bharose!
*
Red = Red fm 93.5
Big = Big fm 92.7
City = RadioCity 91.1
One = Radio One 94.3
Mirchi = Radio Mirchi 98.3
Fever = Fever 104 fm
RAM = Radio Audience Measurement
