The Next Oldies Format Is CHR

When I first heard the “Feel Good Weekend” on WKCI (KC101) New Haven, Conn., my immediate thought was “this is a format.” But on that Memorial Day, it didn’t seem like we needed a “gold-based CHR” station full-time. After the first few weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, the new-music pipeline was starting to flow again. Americans seemed determined to have a summer, and it was possible to choose “Stuck With You” over “Watermelon Sugar,” if you needed something topical.

Then commenced a new summer of rage, and relapse. The song that speaks to us now is likely still being written, although for a week or so, a handful of stations in various formats were reaching for “This Is America” by Childish Gambino. With each new month’s ratings, CHR clearly didn’t have enough of the audience’s attention to break new music or set an agenda, although the first June PPM figures are showing some signs of a rebound.

Fourth of July weekend was always a time of special programming and “Firecracker 300” countdowns. But in the late ‘90s, when CHR rebounded, I remember then-WHYI (Y100) Miami PD Rob Roberts saying that we’d reached a turning point where the current hits were more compelling than any gold (and that was on a station that had returned from Hot AC to CHR more gradually than most). Oldies weekends faded for a while. Even in the early ‘00s, when CHR music was considered weaker, reaching for the most recent available “oh wow” oldies would have meant going back to the Modern AC mid-‘90s, and there wouldn’t have been much surprise and delight in hearing Jewel in between Trapt and “Tipsy.” 

But with the passage of another 15 years, the late ‘90s and early ‘00s are ready to surprise and delight. In previous decades, teen pop was the thing that never came back, but PDs are now used to seeing “Wannabe” and “Oops … I Did It Again!” as surprisingly playable songs. In Pittsburgh, where WKST (Kiss 96.1) set the agenda for several years, some of the Hip-Hop reaction records that were its signature songs in the early ‘00s have been back on rival WBZZ (Star 100.7) for several years now, even before that station’s recent segue from Adult to Mainstream Top 40.

I first covered KC101’s “Feel Good Weekends” as part of a Memorial Day “virtual road trip.” On July 4 weekend, I did a real driving trip, at least for a few hours, and heard multiple throwback weekends, all enjoyable in their own way. There was WFLY Albany, N.Y.’s “OMG Weekend” — all retro, unlike KC101, which played a few powers and power recurrents each hour, and heavier into early ‘00s Hip-Hop. Mainstream AC WRNQ (Q92.1) Poughkeepsie, N.Y., was doing a “Studio ‘92” weekend, going back to the ‘80s, but with more of the late ‘80s/early ‘90s rhythmic pop titles that have generally fallen through the cracks (e.g., Pretty Poison, “Catch Me, I’m Falling” and New Kids on the Block, “Step By Step”).

Separately, I heard both Adult Top 40 KZPT (99.7 The Point) Kansas City and CHR WZPL Indianapolis doing “Red, White, and Boy Band” weekends. (Twitter shows that WRVW [The River] Nashville was using the name at least as far back as 2015.) With a more limited pool of songs to choose from, those throwbacks were fewer per hour, interspersed between a more typical hour of the hits.

Besides the increased demand for musical comfort food and the rebounding appeal of the late ‘90s/early ‘00s, there’s also the smaller number of legitimate currents in play at CHR, and the glacial pace at which they’re replenished. “Say So,” “Don’t Start Now,” and “Adore You” were already mature records in May, but they’re still the songs you hear monitoring any random hour on Mainstream and Adult CHR. There aren’t that many legitimate secondaries, and CHR isn’t in a position to help develop them. Reaching for gold gives the format the tempo that much of the current product does not.

For the last few years, it’s been clear that the ‘90s and early ‘00s titles are coming back. It was just a matter of where. Traditional ’80s-based Classic Hits stations have a hard time negotiating “In The Air Tonight” into “Ice Ice Baby,” especially given the generational split in the middle. Mainstream AC can play “No Scrubs,” but has been afraid to delve further into the R&B/Hip-Hop sound of the mid-’90s, Few stations have been willing to go all-’90s, at least until KC101’s sister, WMIA (Totally 93.9) Miami flipped today (July 9). (We’ve already taken a “First Listen.”)

It will be interesting to see what WMIA spurs. But with CHR and Hot AC product suffering now, the idea of gold-based CHR suddenly makes sense. A station could easily just go into a “feel good weekend”and not come out. And even before WMIA’s change, some Mainstream and Adult CHRs have probably been thinking about just that, given the possibility of somebody else beating them to the ’90s franchise.

To be clear, I am not enthusiastically suggesting the abandonment of Mainstream CHR. I want to hear the all- or mostly current station that finds a way to update the all-current “Hot Hits” formula of the ‘80s for an era when streaming creates more stories than ever, then embellish those songs with even more hits found through radio’s own enterprise. But most of our present CHRs seem not to be moving in that direction, or equipped to do so. Many of them are on a template developed more than 20 years ago. It may take a next wave of stations to help lead CHR forward again, just as the late ‘90s depended on a mix of new and revitalized brands.

I like KC101 a lot during the week, too. It does fall in that category of stations that can still be heard working hard to “do radio” in tough times. But those weekends sound really good. Also, the station is in a unique position with co-owned, similarly formatted WKSS (Kiss 95.7) covering much of the same geography. It also happens that KC101 has a particular heritage for oldies weekends, going back to the launch of the station in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s, back when oldies were Four Seasons, not Flo Rida.

Here’s KC101 at 4:30 p.m., July 5:

• ‘N Sync, “Pop”
• Justin Bieber f/Quavo, “Intentions”
• Blessid Union of Souls, “Hey Leonardo (She Likes Me for Me)”
• Dua Lipa, “Break My Heart”
• Nelly, “Hot in Herre”
• Lizzo, “Good as Hell”
• Backstreet Boys, “Quit Playing Games (With My Heart)”
• Flo Rida, “Good Feeling”
• Justin Timberlake f/T.I., “My Love”
• Harry Styles, “Adore You”
• 702, “Where My Girls At?”
• Aqua, “Barbie Girl”
• Surfaces, “Sunday Best”
• Carly Rae Jepsen, “Call Me Maybe”
• 3 Doors Down, “Kryptonite”
• Next, “Too Close”

Here’s WFLY’s OMG Weekend at 4:30 p.m., July 5

• All-American Rejects, “Move Along”
• Rihanna, “S&M”
• Lauryn Hill, “Doo Wop (That Thing)”
• Nelly, “Grillz”
• Justin Timberlake, “Mirrors”
• MKTO, “Classic”
• Juvenile, “Back That Azz Up”
• Meghan Trainor, “All About That Bass”
• Ludacris f/Mary J. Blige, “Runaway Love”
• Kevin Rudolph, “Let It Rock”
• P. Diddy, “I Need a Girl, Pt. 1”
• Pitbull, “Hotel Room Service”
• Destiny’s Child, “Lose My Breath”
• Katy Perry, “I Kissed a Girl”
• Jojo, “Too Little, Too Late”

This is WRNQ’s “Studio 92 Summer Weekend” at 4:30

• Paul McCartney & Michael Jackson, “Say Say Say”
• Maroon 5, “Memories”
• Black Box, “Everybody Everybody”
• Whispers, “And the Beat Goes On”
• Lauv, “I Like Me Better”
• Karyn White, “The Way You Love Me”
• Rick Astley, “Together Forever”
• Village People, “YMCA”
• Rihanna, “We Found Love”
• Lionel Richie, “Say You Say Me”
• Stereo MCs, “Connected”
• Toni Basil, “Mickey”
• Usher, “DJ Got Us Falling in Love”

Finally, here’s WZPL on its “Red, White & Boy Band Weekend” at 2 p.m., July 5:

• Backstreet Boys, “Larger Than Life”
• JP Saxe & Julia Michaels, “If the World Was Ending”
• Dua Lipa, “Don’t Start Now”
• Trevor Daniel, “Falling”
• Benee f/Gus Dapperton, “Supalonely”
• Harry Styles, “Adore You”
• The Weeknd, “Blinding Lights”
• One Direction, “What Makes You Beautiful”
• Blackbear, “Hot Girl Bummer”
• AJR, “Bang!”
• Saint Jhn, “Roses”
• Justin Bieber f/Quavo, “Intentions”
• Gabby Barrett f/Charlie Puth, “I Hope”
• Doja Cat, “Say So”