How do radio stations decide what music to play?!
Question:
How do radio stations decide what music to play?
Do the record companies pay them, or do they get to choose independently?
Answers:
More and more, the people who decide what gets played on a radio station aren't the station DJs. Only a few large companies own the majority of radio stations across the country. The decision about what gets played on a radio station is increasingly made at the national headquarters of one of these companies, instead of at the radio station.
Over the past five years, this has really affected the choice of music on the radio. If you drove across the country in the 1950s and '60s, you would hear different music for every new area you drove through. You would hear music that you might never hear in your hometown. It made travelling by car very educational and entertaining.
Today, if you travel across the United States, you will hear the same small number of songs over and over again, because the same big company picks the songs for all of the stations. That's a very bad thing for musicians and music fans. It means that many musicians can't get their music heard by the public. It also means that music fans don't have an opportunity to hear new music.