Jaye Albright
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Country Music 2012 Year in Review Part One: Is Luke Bryan Worthy of All Those Awards and Kudos?
- 12/21/2012
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music
No CommentsOh yeah. No doubt. Fueled by Tailgates and Tanlines, 2012 was Luke Bryan’s year. This month alone, Luke racked up 9 awards including Male Artist of the year and Artist of the Year on the fan-voted American Country Awards December 10th on Fox (plus, earlier this year, an American Music Award). He also was singled out
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Listeners’ Picks for Top Country Songs of Summer: Want to Float a Guess at What’s Number 1?
- 09/08/2012
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, radio
Just for fun with absolutely no intention of being scientific, Albright & O’Malley invited our stations’ listeners to tell us their favorite songs of summer 2012 by ranking the most played songs from Memorial Day to Labor Day (U.S.). The hands down winner? Little Big Town’s “Pontoon.” Here are the top five songs as picked
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Does Asking, “Is That Country?” Matter?
- 06/30/2012
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music
I got in a discussion this week about Carrie Underwood’s “Blown Away” and was asked if I thought the song was “country” (my answer is at the bottom). “What’s the definition of a country song?” is an interesting question. Recently I watched the Garage Boys – a pretty good cover band by anyone’s definition – get
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Should Country Cut More Collaborations?
- 04/24/2012
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, country radio
Albright & O’Malley’s just-released second quarter gold sort included four collaborations among the top 25 testers (the Zac Brown Band/Jimmy Buffet “Knee Deep” was the top tester this quarter). Others in the top 25 were Zac Brown Band/Alan Jackson, “Walking Away,” Blake Shelton/Trace Adkins, “Hillbilly Bone,” and Brad Paisley/Carrie Underwood, “Remind Me.” Jason Aldean/Kelly Clarkson,
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2011: A Very Good Year for Country Music
- 12/22/2011
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, ratings
This was a good year for current country music. Actually, it was one of the best – at least when talking about year-end test scores. Across our metrics, nearly all scores were better than 2010’s and some were the best since Albright and O’Malley began year-end analyses in 1998. Songs in the top third of course score better
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Conversing With Listeners: Three Things to Talk Over Now
- 07/30/2011
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, country radio
Tastes, opinions and alternatives are anything but static. So if you haven’t had a conversation with your listeners recently, you should. Here are three fertile and actionable talking points for your next listener panel or focus group: Music Satisfaction. “Playing the best music” is always a top reason for picking one country station over another. How
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Alpha Boomers: What Their Country Station Might Sound Like
- 07/16/2011
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, country radio
With “Alpha Boomer” now one of Arbitron’s standard Tapscan demos, I revisited Albright & O’Malley’s Roadmap 2011 (our annual online perceptual of 10,000+ country listeners) to see how the appeal of the various Music Clusters broke out across 25-54 and the 55-64 leading edge Alpha Boomer demo. The bars below represent the percent of ‘Like
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Crossing Paths: Country’s Millennial vs. Boom Era Music
- 06/11/2011
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, country radio, radio programming
Albright & O’Malley‘s Roadmap 2011 (our 5th annual online perceptual) continues to provide valuable insights into where country radio is at the moment and where it is headed. One part of each study is devoted to music, more specifically, trending the listener appeal of various music clusters. At CRS 2011 we revealed some top line data* that showed
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WHY SO DOWN? 7 Tips for Scheduling Music in a Down Tempo Cycle
- 02/15/2011
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, country radio
Every year has music cycles where the currents are be too “something” – too fast/slow, male/female, poppy/twangy, etc. We’re now in a cycle of down-tempo current music. More than half our currents are down-tempo and we’ve been ballad-heavy since at least the first of the year. Still, there’s no reason for your station to take
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Gen Y’s Top Artsts
- 12/22/2010
- Posted by: Mike O'Malley
- Category: country music, country radio
The end of the year always brings lists and quizzes. Here’s one of interest: Gen-Y’s Top 77 singers/bands/musicians. Anderson Analytics polled 1000 college students (survey limits noted) asking, “Who is your favorite musician/band currently?” Want to guess how many country artists are on the list? How many are in the top 20? Who they might