How does college radio work? The Chart | Not The Chart

There is often a lot of uncertainty and argument about the use and effectiveness of college radio. There seems to be one school of thought that states that college radio cannot sell records, that nobody listens to it and that its sole purpose is to create a "buzz" for new, upcoming, developing bands. That "buzz" means, basically, charting on the college charts and a general acceptance and approval of the artist by the current regime of college radio music directors.

There is a good basis for this argument. The most powerful one are the charts themselves. If one compares the college charts with the record sales charts, there is hardly ever any signs of cause and effect. Often times the artists on the trade magazine charts are nowhere on the sales charts, and visa verse. Even locally, records on the college radio stations chart doesn't sync up with what the local store is selling.

The reasons for this are obvious, yet seldom even considered. For one thing, much of what get's played on most college radio stations are records that are not being tracked for the stations chart. They are records that are no longer considered "new" (which tend to be those less than 2 months old for most stations). Also, a lot of eclectic stations play records that stores don't know about, can't order, or can't keep in stock. And, of course, when a station over-interprets when making their chart, skewing the order and misrepresenting what actually got played most, it adds to the distortion of reality. So because the #1 record didn't get as much play as the #25 record, it looks baffling when the local store is actually selling the #25 record but not the #1 record.

But no radio station is "just a chart" - not even a carrier current (non-broadcast) station. In fact, even college radio, with its oft low wattage and unorganized form, has real-world viability and meaning. College radio and community radio sell records. Period. And given the choice on which two things to focus - the whipped cream or the pie - the smart people will take the pie. Record sales. (With whipped cream on top, naturally, not on bottom.) How does college radio do it, though?

First of all, college and community radio do broadcast to a population. Some broadcast a long range to a large population (WRAS in Atlanta & KUT in Austin both have 100,000-watts and are in large cities), some broadcast a shorter range to a large population (WFMU with 1,400-watts in the New York market, KXLU with 3,000-watts in L.A.), and hundreds of other variations of market size and wattage all across the country. But all of those stations tend to specialize on music, news, features, etc. which are not represented anywhere else in their market. And because of their unique services, they attain a loyal, unique following.

And secondly, even if they didn't broadcast to anyone, radio stations have their own built-in market of music fanatics who buy records, go to shows and are involved in music much more than the average person. Consider just 300 stations at which there are d.j.s filling 3 hour slots for 18 hours a day. That would give you 6 d.j.s per day. Multiply that by just 5 days and you have 30 d.j.s. Without factoring in extra d.j.s or extra hours and days of programming that would give you 9,000 d.j.s working at just 300 stations. That's 9,000 music fanatics who are potential buyers of any given record, or supporters of any given band, label or scene.

On top of that, people involved with college and community radio are often also involved with other aspects of their local music scene. They may volunteer for 3-5 hours a week at the radio station, but they may also work at the local record store, write for the local entertainment paper or school paper doing reviews, publish their own zine, host a music webpage, book bands at the local club, etc. The radio station acts as a hub for a network of people involved with all kinds of music on all kinds of levels. Reaching them through the radio station is an end in itself. And being exposed to music is the one of the main reasons they are at the radio station in the first place.