Radio
Today on the road, I happened to be listening to the radio when the DJ came on to do his spiel. He introduced the song that was about to play as “brand new music” — and then proceeded to play “Knights of Cydonia,” a song that was “brand new” in July of 2006. July. July of last year.
After that song, he introduced another song, this time “Pain” by Three Days Grace. Guess what? He said that song was “brand new” too. “New music now from Three Days Grace, this is ‘Pain.’” That album came out in June of 2006.
Now, at what point do songs cease to be labeled as “brand new” by radio disc jockeys? I would think that a song over six months old should cease to qualify as “new” material, no? Am I missing some law of radio, that says you can tell your listeners that songs are new even if they’ve been out for a year or more?
Wendy said,
March 3, 2007, 11:24 pm
During my travels between Nebraska and Wisconsin, I would often hear 'brand new songs' in Nebraksa that had been on the radio for months in Wisconsin (at least the Milwaukee area stations). I think DJs label something as 'brand new' if it is brand new to their particular station. This makes sense with labeling 'Knights of Cydonia' as new becasue Muse is an Indie band and it sometimes takes a while for them to get noticed. However, Three Days Grace isn't Indie so this reasoning wont work there. But just because the album came out doesn't mean the song came out as a single, which is almost the only songs radios will play now-a-days. Therefore, a song on an album that came out last year could still be considered fairly new if the single only recently came out. ('Pain' has been around for a while though on 102.1, so even as a single I wouldn't consider it 'brand new'. )
P.S. Which radio station were you listening to?
Tigerblade said,
March 3, 2007, 11:29 pm
Hey there Wendy… long time no see.
Funny you mention 102.1, because that's exactly the station it was on. I don't usually listen to it, since I'm usually outside their range, but I happened to be in Milwaukee this weekend and caught a few minutes of it.
Yeah… I hadn't thought of the singles thing. I suppose that makes sense, but still. 'Knights of Cydonia' was getting major airplay (even on 102.1) last summer, which is why I don't get how they can still call it 'new' — if they hadn't played it last summer, then maybe. But not with the kind of airplay they gave it. It was like James Blunt; you couldn't go more than ten songs without hearing it.