For many music and radio lovers, their geekdom started with American Top 40 or a local top 30, but there’s less satisfaction in hearing radio countdowns these days. “All-Time Top 300”-type countdowns generally provide few surprises and little localism. “The Top 100 of (Year)” is battered by the scarcity of hits in recent years, especially in 2020. They’re usually not so local either, partially because the local hit has been challenged since the advent of MTV, much less Spotify and centrally programmed radio.
But listeners still love countdowns under the right circumstances. When Triple-A WXPN Philadelphia came back after a six-year countdown hiatus with its Top 2020 of All-Time in December, it was a national news story. You can argue whether chart numbers mean anything after a certain point, but I’m sure there were a few listeners debating “how can ‘Magic Bus’ by the Who possibly be only No. 1432 when Vampire Weekend’s ‘Oxford Comma’ was No. 1413?”
Two Ross On Radio readers wanted to make sure I knew about the New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day countdowns at the stations they programmed. If you’ve read this far, you’ll want to know, too.
In the early ‘80s, even after the advent of MTV, WCCK (K104) Erie, Pa., was one of CHR’s most iconoclastic stations, with numerous local hits not heard on any other Top 40, except its Burbach Broadcasting sister stations. I drove through Erie in the early ‘80s and my chief memory is hearing “K104, You Got It!” (which is how it said the call letters and positioner at every break) playing “I’ll Find My Way Home” by Jon & Vangelis. But there were many others, as the station’s own Top 100 of 1987 affirms.
On New Year’s Day, Erie AC WXKC (Classy 100) played its Top 100 of the ‘80s. The song that began the countdown was a K104 hit that is obscure elsewhere. The song that topped the countdown was “One Simple Thing” by the Stabilizers, an Erie band whose song also became a secret weapon in Denver and Minneapolis for years.
Altogether, the Classy 100 countdown included a dozen-and-a-half “Erie Exclusives,” not all local hits but some recognizable national hits that were bigger yet in Erie. (There would have been an extra level of meta if “That Thing You Do” by Erie’s fake one-hit Wonders had been there, but unfortunately it was a ‘90s song meant to sound like a ‘60s song.)
WXKC PD Vinny Marino is a New Yorker, but he’s also a chart lover who used K104 and WJET surveys to educate himself when he came to the market. You can find Classy’s ‘80s countdown pinned to the top of its Facebook page.
Then there’s successful Country outlet KSUX (K-Sioux 105) Sioux City, Iowa. PD Tony Michaels grew up on the countdowns at CHR KQKQ (Sweet 98) Omaha, Neb. In a year when some stations found it easier to run a top 25, or no countdown at all, KSUX indeed found 105 songs, helped by a Friday-night new-music show that propelled a handful of album cuts and other songs that were not national hits to regular rotation.
There are songs on KSUX’s Top 105 that I thought should have been bigger nationally. There are some album cuts that haven’t become singles yet, and some that likely never will, because it takes some songs that are singles up to a year to climb the chart. There are some that will likely be on most other stations’ 2021 countdown. And the No. 1 song of the year is Luke Combs’ “Six Feet Apart,” perfect both as one of the year’s best COVID-19-themed songs and as exactly the sort of individual choice a chart lover looks for. In a year where people needed both relatability and diversion from their radio stations, the choice of something as arcane as a year-end countdown managed to be both.
