How Much Larger (Than Life) Are The ‘90s Now?

By late 2016, it was clear that something was going on with ‘90s music. AC and Classic Hits stations were still dismissing it as a void between playable eras. Owners still didn’t regard it as a viable format. But there were early indicators in music testing that some of the most anthemic songs of the era were becoming playable again, if radio stations were inclined to test them.

That fall, I wrote two articles looking at how much airplay some iconic ‘90s titles were getting, according to BDSRadio. One looked at a cross-section of “the songs that saved the ‘90s.” One was specifically focused on teen acts, beginning in the late ‘80s with Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, and New Kids on the Block, and asked if any song could be rehabilitated, especially as the last two acts began popping up on Mainstream AC stations (at least with one song).

In 2016, the easiest ‘90s songs to find on the radio were Alternative titles. “Under the Bridge,” “Come as You Are,” “When I Come Around,” and “Santeria” all had more than 1,000 spins for the previous week measured. Next, in the 400-600 spin range, were the biggest R&B/Hip-Hop crossovers — “No Scrubs,” “This Is How We Do It,” “I’ll Be Missing You.” Backstreet Boys and ‘N Sync’s biggest songs were in the 200-250 spins range. They were songs that tested with audiences when they were included in research, but they weren’t songs that every station would test.

But in 2020, there are full-time stations devoted either entirely to the ‘90s “Totally 93.9” WMIA-FM Miami or the ‘90s and early 2000s “Play 107” Edmonton. In addition:

• Some of the throwback R&B stations of the mid-‘10s are gone, but others persevere and a few have joined the format since 2016.
• Hot AC stations and even some CHRs starved for new product are playing ‘90s/early ‘00s-based throwback weekends.
• A new generation of Soft ACs have launched, and although it’s Air Supply and Christopher Cross that get the attention, there’s also an increased profile for Mariah Carey and Toni Braxton as a result.
• Some stations that might have shoved their handful of ‘90s songs into a Millennial or ‘80s category now have enough songs for a separate category and a separate clock position.

Here’s what’s happened to some iconic titles since 2016. These were random samples of titles that fit either or both story themes. (I didn’t look at Britney Spears or Christina Aguilera four years ago because they hadn’t been banished from radio, unlike the Spice Girls, and they arrived when the format was already saved.) For any songs that made both articles, the 2016 number is the highest of the two). But directionally, the pattern is clear:

Teen Pop

Alternative

R&B/Hip Hop

Modern AC

Other

(Note, certain songs receiving more than 1,000 spins are now shown as rounded numbers by BDS.)

Some of the ‘90s rock titles that were already the most-played representation of the decade four years ago are even bigger now. We’ve seen the advent of library-driven Active Rock outlets like WBOS Boston. Classic Rock stations have ventured tentatively into ‘90s grunge, typically with the same handful of titles. By contrast, pure pop titles are living in the same sort of netherworld that we’ve seen for ‘70s and ‘80s songs in our recent “Lost Factor” calculations, although we looked at only a small sampling in 2016. Those songs are up, but not as dramatically as the others.

With all the publicity about the two-week-old Totally 93.9, detractors who don’t expect the format to get or keep traction have often pointed out the small number of songs available to a format, and the challenges of spanning an era where CHR changed directions every few years until finding its way around 1997. Those are definitely issues for a nascent format. But the cume-conscious ‘80s-based Classic Hits format doesn’t always play that many songs either. Miami played 216 songs at least twice last week. L.A.’s K-Earth 101, although tighter than many of its counterparts, played 218.

As the audience for all-‘90s stations becomes a measurable entity, those stations able to do music research in the future will almost undoubtedly uncover more songs, once there’s a discrete fan base to recruit and test against. If liking a montage that contains “Wannabe” is suddenly a requirement for participating in a music test, those are the listeners more likely to also like “Say You’ll Be There.”

Longevity is an issue too, as it has been for any decades format. Both all-‘70s and all-‘80s formats were short-lived in their earliest, purest form, but their hits landed elsewhere, while the Bob- and Jack-FM formats survived by playing both. But all-‘90s stations have gotten past one hurdle. When “Wannabe” started to test well several years ago, it was worth considering that listeners were responding to it in the abstract, in a way that might not live up to 3x a day rotation. But songs like “Everybody (Backstreet’s Back)” and “You Got It (The Right Stuff)” have been back on the radio for five years. Having the opportunity to hear them again has legitimized them, not worn off the novelty.