NPR Article: How The Hot 100 Became America's Hit Barometer

[JMW]

Most of what's talked about is nothing new to most people on here, but it's an interesting read nonetheless.

100 and Single

[Deleted]

Lol @ this paragraph! For more than 20 years (1970–91), the national syndicated program American Top 40 with Casey Kasem did actually count down the Top 40 of the Hot 100 (for Boomers and Gen-X pop nerds, it was paradise). But after a 1991 host change, and in response to longtime station complaints about the edgier hits making the chart (e.g., "Me So Horny"), AT40 switched to other, more radio-centric charts for its data. The current edition of AT40, hosted by Ryan Seacrest, uses an unpublished chart with no direct relationship to Billboard.

[bottlerocket]

Interesting article even if the writing is a bit glib. He mentions that the Hot 100 was sales plus airplay since 1958. However, I seem to remember someone posting an article from a 70s Billboard issue that the Hot 100 was only using sales data from that point forward. i'm not sure how long that lasted but it would be a departure from that stance.

[doofus67]

Aug 3, 2013 20:17:49 GMT -5 JMW said:

Most of what's talked about is nothing new to most people on here, but it's an interesting read nonetheless.

100 and Single

Still extremely informative and all-encompassing, even five years later!

[slf]

Very interesting article.  One minor issue I'd like to take is with the author's comment on Ricky Nelson.  He claimed that Ricky Nelson had to have been unfamiliar with the concept of music videos.  Actually, from what I've read, Ricky's father Ozzie was one of the early unsung pioneers of music videos.  I have read that Ozzie frequently produced short video clips to accompany many of his son's big pop hits back in the day, and those clips would be tacked on to the last few minutes of some episodes of his "Ozzie And Harriet" TV show.

[mrjukebox]

You're right-I remember seeing a clip of Ricky performing "Travelin'Man" many years ago.