This Week's LDD

[BROWNJB1]

I was listening to American Top 10 earlier today, and in this week's Long Distance Dedication segment, Casey read a letter from a Vietnam War veteran and the man who wrote the letter stated that he was dedicating it to his 3 buddies who were killed in the Vietman War in 1969. The guy mentioned that he wanted Casey to read the letter on the weekend of April 16 to commemorate the 36th anniversary of the deaths of his buddies. The man said that not a day goes by that he doesn't think of those guy, even those it has been 36 years since they were killed. At one point, it looked like Casey was about to breakdown from reading the letter and I have to admit that I was about to breakdown myself. It was one of the most stirring LDD's I have ever heard. The guy request "Hey Jude" by the Beatles to be dedicated to those guys. He said that he didn't know what the song was about. Well, the song was about Julian Lennon, (John Lennon's son) and Paul McCartney wrote the song about Julian as John was splitting up from his first wife Cynthia. There is the story of "Hey Jude". To the guy out there, here is your Long Distance Dedication.

[Michael1973]

This dedication was not read on AT20. I guess too many HotAC listeners would be offended hearing an oldie on their station.

[Deleted]

no, as has been discussed somewhere on this board before, it would be a case where Premiere and/or the prgram directors THINKING the song offends the listening audience

[BrettVW]

Which may or may not be true. I'm sure average-Joe Hot AC listener may turn off their local "90's and Now" station if they tune in at 10:45 on a Sunday morning and hear a Beatles song.

But I also feel that since it is specialty programming with appointment tune-in, if a song, especially in the case of a Long Distance Dedication on a show as well known and respected as a Casey Kasem countdown, then it should slide. But what do I know? Read a story in the General Music boards about what happened to me on my radio show when I tweaked the format on a late-night show. PD's simply will not budge when it comes to the format. I fault the mindset of the PD's, not Premiere....because Premiere simply knows if they were to include certain songs on certain formats there would be negative response.

[Deleted]

more than likely the average Hot AC fan knows the song and would probably enjoy hearing it. It isn;t like they get to hear it everyday or anything. Most HAC fans are mid 20'2-mid 40's I would think, which is my generation. We know who the Beatles are and like a lot of their songs. As I mentioned before, all listeners are not as short in playlist requirements as PD's seem to think we are.

[Scott Lakefield]

Michael1973 said:

This dedication was not read on AT20. I guess too many HotAC listeners would be offended hearing an oldie on their station.

Was a different dedication used on AT20? I haven't listened to the shows for last weekend yet (I'm a couple of weeks behind).

[BrettVW]

AT20 just featured one LDD this week....the one dedicating "Iris." From a look at Rob's listings, AT10 had two LDD's, "Hey Jude" and "Iris"

[Jeffster]

I think that stinks. There's absolutely no reason they can't play "Hey Jude" on AT20.

[BrettVW]

Try and tell that to a Hot AC Program Director.

It's kind of funny to go back and look at the Long Distance Dedications from 1998-2002 when CHR/Pop music was, in many ways what it is now, yet the LDD's were still so diverse and able to be played on AT40 and both AT20's. If you look at some of the songs that were played on AT40 as LDD's just three or four years ago....if AT40 was still hosted by Casey and had LDD's, CHR/Pop PD's would have a fit. And now that trend is stretching to Hot AC PD's!