Decline Of Consensus Hits

Radio and the Top 40 format have lost the long time #1 position as the gatekeeper of the music discovery where the hits start, also radio has lost the large amount of listening from passionate music fans looking for music discovery. Now that's #1 position belongs to Streaming platforms and apps

The factor that has built hits in the past, a consensus of agreement on the most popular songs due to exposure by radio (and especially Top 40 radio). Radio has lost its gatekeeper crown and there are multiple streaming platforms (and their playlists ) and TikTok as well as radio to hear the songs. The challenge is that the star making platforms that expose music are no longer at ONE CONSENSUS destination. For 55 years Top 40 radio as a whole picked up on 90% of the same hit music - when a song reached CRITICAL MASS with a huge number of listeners after it was high on the Billboard Charts and in POWER ROTATION at the same time across the country by these Top 40 stations it became a massive hit almost automatically. Those days are gone.

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