How is a hit single measured these days?

[MonkeyFunk]

Back in my day, we'd buy a 45, take it home and put it on the record player and tilt the bird over to play the song.




And somebody, somewhere, kept track of how many records we bought.

But how is a hit single measured today? Who buys singles? Who even listens to radio?

How do they determine what's a hit single nowadays?

[Left Is Write]

1. As far as I know, it's still measured by radio airplay by reporting radio stations.

[MonkeyFunk]

3. But they give

gold and platinum awards for sales. Who buys singles?

And compared to my youth, there doesn't seem to be many "new music" radio stations anymore. And who listens to them outside of the car? In the past, if you wanted to hear music, you turned on the radio. But now I NEVER listen to music on the radio. I have internet stations, cable TV music stations, my own CD's, iTunes....

The industry sure has changed.

[Left Is Write]

10. Nobody buys singles anymore. Singles are used to drive album sales.

At least they used to be, before the advent of music readily available online.

Of course, I have been out of full-time radio for over 11 years, so I'm considerably out of the loop. And yes, the radio industry has changed enormously since I was involved.

[Spider Jerusalem]

2. Airplay and online sales (iTunes, eMusic, Napster, etc)

[MonkeyFunk]

5. and is it different for hit albums?

because people still buy physical albums (by which I mean a collection of music, not a vinyl disc).

[Spider Jerusalem]

7. The album charts...

are based on physical sales and digital downloads (as long as the whole album is purchased, and not just one song) via iTunes/etc.

[Hugin]

4. I was recently thinking on that subject as well...

:shrug:

I guess they do it by which page of the tabloids the latest scandal lands on.

[Oeditpus Rex]

6. It's done the same way

Except now, there's a microchip in the bird's beak.

[Hugin]

9. I thought it had a glass eye...

and had to read braille.

Hmmmf.

Shows what I know about modern multiple media technologies and stuff.

[Left Is Write]

11. By "it's done the same way", I thought you meant....

Payola.

:D

[Oeditpus Rex]

13. Hey, as long as it doesn't say

"Booogarrrrrr!"

:7

[last_texas_dem]

8. The Billboard Hot 100 still exists, but

it's a different deal than it used to be. Until the late '90's a song had to be available as a single to chart on the "singles" chart. Gradually, the growth of "album rock", the shift away from the vinyl format, and other factors, made the singles chart wasn't as representative as it once was of what songs were the most popular. So Billboard started allowing songs that weren't released as singles to chart on the Hot 100, but gave more weight (at least IIRC) to songs released as commercial singles.

This did make the chart more reflective of what songs really were the most popular at the time, at least initially, but things have changed quite a bit even since then. I'm really not sure if there is any one chart that combines all the different ways people get music and would be a "definitive" sort of Hot 100. The "singles" chart is still a decent indicator, but as far as I know it doesn't track downloads, which is the way many get their music. (Billboard does have a separate chart that tracks the most downloaded tracks, though; at least, the most legally downloaded tracks.)

So I don't know what the definitive source for defining a hit single would be, or if there is one. With the single nearly dead as a format and radio hopelessly divided into narrow genres, having a hit "single" doesn't mean as much as it once did. Airplay charts can be interesting to look at, and checking download charts can give a good idea of what people would be buying if singles (technically) were still made available, but even combining those two charts wouldn't quite be the same as what it used to mean to have a #1 single on the Hot 100 when commercial singles were commonplace and sold heavily and radio wasn't so segregated by genre.

[MonkeyFunk]

12. Thank you

that was very informative.