Radio
Radio broadcaster Cumulus Media was notified by the Nasdaq Composite on Wednesday (April 23) that its shares will be de-listed from the exchange on May 2, according to a Cumulus regulatory filing. The stock will transition the same day to trading on the over-the-counter (OTC) market and will retain the CMLS ticker. Shares of Cumulus […]
Earlier this year, Univision Networks Group president Ignacio Meyer‘s role was expanded to include oversight of the Hispanic media giant’s portfolio of 35 owned-and-operated radio stations, nearly 300 affiliates, its Uforia streaming app, live-events business and networks group. The promotion empowered Meyer to fully execute his longheld vision for a streaming-era business strategy. In the wake of Univision’s $4.8 billion 2022 merger with Televisa, his division would operate as part of a global, vertically integrated multimedia company where content created by different units can move freely between countries and platforms, including VIX, the company’s growing streaming enterprise.
That content includes music, and Meyer says he’s focused on fortifying its strength as one of the “pillars”— in addition to drama and sports — of the TelevisaUnivision brand.
For the company’s consumers, “Calling music a passion point is an understatement,” the dapper, Madrid-born executive says. As a result, “The entire company is behind it.”
Meyer, who is known for booking music artists himself on Univision shows and sending personal thank-you notes afterward, is well-loved by the industry, and his office is decked out with signed gold records, awards and other memorabilia. His walls will inevitably become more crowded, given his plans to return Univision to the music business. In the early 2000s, Univision Music Group operated as a label, which was sold to Universal in 2008 (before Meyer joined the company). And in 2016, Univision’s Fusion Media Group division signed a multiyear, multiplatform deal with former Calle 13 member Residente, which is no longer active.
Meyer spoke to Billboard about those plans, as well as his strategy for harnessing the power of music to Univision’s advantage.
How has your job changed since your promotion?
The big difference is we’ve become a platform-agnostic, content- and audience-first company. We’re fortunate enough that, over the years, our ownership has invested in all the platforms. We have TV stations, local and national networks, radio stations, top digital destinations — whether it’s web- or social media-based — and now we have a dedicated streaming platform, VIX. This year, for the first time, we deployed a global content investment strategy and looked at every content investment for profitability and distribution purposes, regardless of platform or country. That’s new and different because we realize that the strategy of having the consumer at the forefront is not about pulling them to a particular platform. It’s about making sure we are everywhere they are and that they can flow freely.
How does music play into that?
Music is a passion point for U.S. Hispanics. We feel strongly that Latin music is mainstream today, and we need to follow that mainstream consumer everywhere they are. So we’ve made structural changes to allow music to travel more seamlessly throughout our ecosystem.
If you look at the history of Univision, there are isolated pockets of success with music. What was missing is the connective tissue. We’re eliminating the barriers between calling something a “radio product” or an “audio product” or a “national” product or a “local” product. It’s intellectual property. It’s music, it’s a song, it’s a brand, it’s an artist.
Can you give me an example?
This year, we treated Premio Lo Nuestro [an annual awards ceremony that recognizes achievements in Latin music] as a platform-agnostic event. It was simulcast on streaming and we had events [tied to] fashion and social with some brands. We decided to light up YouTube and social media before we aired the show, so we did our version of off-air awards and the pretelecast on digital networks. And it was all supported by audio-first talent that represented different genres. For example, we featured talent from our [Mexican musicfocused] radio show, El Bueno, la Mala y el Feo. Just as we lean into our [TV] consumer brands, we’re going to lean into our radio show brands and elevate those shows. And we’re crosspollinating. TV host Alejandra Espinoza, for example, is now also part of our Los Angeles morning radio show.
Awards show viewership in general has declined. How do you make yours profitable?
We found a way to make money because we studied the ecosystem. It’s not just a TV show. We’re communicating, we’re editorializing, we’re telling a story, and we’re using music to do so — across all of our platforms. It creates more inventory for brands to get more deeply involved. Ratings define and validate the commercial side of ad sales, but it’s not the only measure of success. Total impressions, total reach, influence — that is success.
How else are you expanding Univision’s music presence?
We are looking at entering the music business again through strategic alliances. That is new. I don’t have the format a hundred percent. I don’t know if it’s a record label, but by virtue of this vertical, content-first approach, I am going to be getting back in touch with the industry. We want to be a more regular part of the music ecosystem. It could be a strategic alliance with a particular artist, a distribution deal with an artist, a management company, a publishing company or the distribution and promotion of music. I will generate content with you. I will generate social currency. We will make money by participating in a revenue share or license fee of the actual revenue streams we generate.
Some companies are not as convinced about the viability of music as a revenue driver.
We are. We demonstrate it day in and day out with our properties, and we know we could do more with it. So that’s where the investment comes in. Could we have done it as a company 10 years ago? I think the answer is no. Structurally, we probably weren’t set up for it. The power of music is it travels with no borders. Now we have the platforms. You can consume via audio, video, streaming.
Does Univision have any music-driven shows in the pipeline?
There will be announcements made, likely at the upfronts [in May]. But our approach is holistic. For example, you’re going to see a lot more radio shows like El Flow and El Bueno, la Mala y el Feo — which are also podcasts — on TV or on VIX. We are no longer taking a TV-centric approach to business. We will have music properties, but it’s not going be a one-show-fixes-all. Scripted is still a huge vehicle for music, for example. And we have a publishing business with over 100,000 copyrights here that I’m also managing.
What really drives fans to tune in to music-adjacent programming?
Storytelling and pop culture. Music has become a synonym for lifestyle. And it has a lot to do with social media and the way artists interact with their fans. Permanence in any kind of show all year is the most important. Also, there is a lot more being done in scripted than we are getting credit for as a music industry. There are so many storylines, documentaries, entertainment shows that are in and around music. How do we get people to engage? The most successful reality shows on television today have more hours of digital content than they do of [regularly scheduled] linear content. Because there are multiple platforms, they are “always on.” The Latin market is diverse, and we are more than a media company. We are a cultural representation of the Latins who live in the U.S. and of the way we live in the U.S.
This story appears in the April 19, 2025, issue of Billboard.
The Academy of Country Music revealed the winners of the ACM Radio Awards bright and early on Thursday (April 17). Ella Langley, this year’s top nominee at the upcoming 60th ACM Awards with eight nominations, called the radio on-air personalities and radio stations to surprise them with the news of their ACM Awards.
Winners announced include multiple first-time honorees. In the On-Air categories, first-time winners include: Lorianne Crook and Charlie Chase of Crook & Chase Countdown for National Weekly On-Air Personality of the Year; Josh Holleman, Rachael Hunter, and Steve Grunwald of Josh, Rachael and Grunwald in the Morning for Major Market On-Air Personality of the Year; Joey Tack and Nancy Barger of Joey & Nancy for Medium Market On-Air Personality of the Year; and Mel McCrae of The Cat Pak Morning Show for Small Market On-Air Personality of the Year.
Among radio stations, WIVK in Knoxville, Tenn. won Radio Station of the Year, Medium Market for the ninth time, a longer winning streak than any of this year’s other winners.
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The 60th ACM Awards are set to take place on Thursday, May 8 at Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas and streaming exclusively on Amazon’s Prime Video. Reba McEntire is set to host the show, which will feature performances by Blake Shelton, Eric Church, and Lainey Wilson, with more to be named. A limited number of tickets to the 60th ACM Awards are available now at SeatGeek.
The 60th Academy of Country Music Awards is produced by Dick Clark Productions (DCP). Raj Kapoor is executive producer and showrunner, with Patrick Menton as co-executive producer. Damon Whiteside serves as executive producer for the Academy of Country Music, and Jay Penske and Barry Adelman serve as executive producers for DCP. John Saade will also continue to serve as consulting producer for Amazon MGM Studios.
Here’s a complete list of the 2025 ACM Radio Award winners, with a notation indicating how many times each has won in this category.
On-Air Personality of the Year Winners
National Daily: Big D, Bubba | Big D & Bubba (fourth wins)
National Weekly: Lorianne Crook, Charlie Chase | Crook & Chase Countdown (first wins)
Major Market: Josh Holleman, Rachael Hunter, Steve Grunwald | Josh, Rachael and Grunwald in the Morning – WYCD – Detroit, Mich. (first wins)
Large Market: Big Dave, Stattman | The Big Dave Show – WUBE – Cincinnati, Ohio (fourth win, third win, respectively)
Medium Market: Joey Tack, Nancy Barger | Joey & Nancy – WIVK – Knoxville, Tenn. (first wins)
Small Market: Brent Lane, Mel McCrae | The Cat Pak Morning Show – WYCT – Pensacola, Fla. (third win, first win, respectively).
Radio Station of the Year Winners
Major Market: KYGO – Denver, Colo. (second win)
Large Market: WQDR – Raleigh, N.C. (fourth win)
Medium Market: WIVK – Knoxville, Tenn. (ninth win)
Small Market: WXBQ – Bristol, Va. (second win)
The ACM Awards are produced by Dick Clark Productions, which is owned by Penske Media Eldridge, a joint venture between Eldridge Industries and Billboard parent company Penske Media.
SoundExchange and the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) have reached a broad rate settlement that includes per performance rates rising from $0.0025 this year to $0.0032 in 2030 for non-subscription digital audio transmissions.
The expansive settlement, which covers the period of 2026-2030, allows SoundExchange and the NAB to forego the usually expensive Copyright Royalty Board rate trials, but the settlement still needs formal approval by the CRB.
Other aspects of the settlement involve gradually raising the current annual minimum fee of $1,000 per station by $50 each year, reaching $1,250 for 2029 and 2030. Additionally, the annual minimum fees will be capped at 100 stations, which means that the large radio networks will have annual minimum fees grow from $100,000 currently to $125,000 in the last two years of the settlement.
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“This settlement with broadcasters provides needed increases for the creative community we represent, and allows us to forego the costs, uncertainties, and distraction connected with any litigation,” SoundExchange president and CEO Michael Huppe said in a statement. “Striking a business solution that both parties can accept has many benefits over battling it out in court and allows us to focus resources on other efforts and services benefiting our creator community.”
Additionally, the settlement mandates shorter reporting and payment deadlines, requiring radio stations to submit data and payments within 30 days after the end of the month, down from the current 45-day timeframe. Furthermore, radio stations also must provide contractual access to performance data held by third-party vendors, which should enhance SoundExchange’s auditing capabilities.
On the positive side for radio stations, late fees for underpayments are reduced from 1.5% to 1% per month. This change, along with the predictability of incremental costs and the capping of minimum payments, offers additional financial relief.
In noting that the NAB is “extremely pleased” to reach the settlement with SoundExchange for the CRB Web VI rate setting period of 2026-2030, NAB president and CEO Curtis LeGety said in a statement that “this settlement provides critical certainty around streaming rates in a way that is sustainable for broadcasters large and small, ensuring that local stations can continue to deliver the experiences and connection that millions of listeners depend on every day.”
Furthermore, he said, “It also includes meaningful improvements in areas like audit late fees and minimum payments, helping broadcasters focus their resources on serving fans and supporting the artists who make broadcast radio so impactful, all while avoiding the high costs of litigation.”
The specifics of the incremental rate increases show that after rising from $0.0025 in 2025 to $0.0028 in 2026, the per performance rate will increase by 1/100th of a penny each subsequent year, culminating in $0.0032 in 2030.
The settlement will be published in the Federal Register so it’s available for public comment, although that doesn’t appear to have happened as of yet, at least according to a Billboard search of the Federal Register and the Copyright Royalty Board websites.
Wink Martindale, who had success as a DJ, radio personality, game show host and TV producer, died in Rancho Mirage, California, on Tuesday (April 15). He was 91.
Martindale was best-known for hosting Gambit from 1972 to 1976 (and again from 1980 to 1981), Tic-Tac-Dough from 1978 to 1985, High Rollers from 1987 to 1988 and Debt from 1996 to 1998.
He also had a short-lived career as a recording artist. His spoken-word hit “Deck of Cards” reached No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1959. The song had been a No. 2 hit for “T” Texas Tyler in 1948 on Billboard’s Best-Selling Retail Folk Records chart, a forerunner to Hot Country Songs.
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Martindale landed just one other Hot 100 hit, “Black Land Farmer,” which reached No. 85 in 1961.
The future broadcaster was born Winston Conrad Martindale in Jackson, Tennessee. He began his career as a DJ at age 17 at WPLI in Jackson, earning $25 a week. After moving to WTJS, he was hired away for double the salary by Jackson’s only other station, WDXI. He next hosted mornings at WHBQ in Memphis while attending college at Memphis State University.
In 1959, he became morning man at KHJ in Los Angeles, moving a year later to the morning show at KRLA and finally to KFWB in 1962. He was a regular presence on Los Angeles radio into the 1990s. He had lengthy stays at KGIL (AM) from 1968 to 1971, KKGO-FM/KJQI and Gene Autry‘s KMPC (now KSPN-AM) from 1971 to 1979 and again from 1983 to 1987, a brief stint on KABC during 1989, and KJQI from 1993 to 1994.
Martindale’s first break into television was at WHBQ-TV in Memphis, as the host of Mars Patrol, a children’s series. While at that station, Martindale became the host of the TV show Teenage Dance Party, where Elvis Presley (who would become a friend) made an appearance in June 1956.
Martindale’s first game-show hosting job was What’s This Song?, which he hosted for NBC (credited as “Win Martindale”) in 1964-65. In 1970-71, he hosted a similar song-recognition game show, Words and Music, again on NBC.
While Martindale’s greatest claim to fame is as a game-show host, he periodically returned to music programming. Martin filled in as guest host for Casey Kasem on American Top 40 in October 1975.
In the 2000s, Martindale had a daily three-hour show on the syndicated Music of Your Life format. In 2012, Martindale hosted the nationally-syndicated The 100 Greatest Christmas Hits of All Time.
On June 6, 2021, Martindale began hosting the syndicated The History of Rock ‘n’ Roll, a two-hour weekend review of music from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. The production was created by Martindale, producer/engineer Peter Jay Gould of The Intervale Group, and writer/producer Gary Theroux.
Martindale was one of the hosts featured in the 2002 NBC special Most Outrageous Game Show Moments, alongside four other game show mainstays – Bob Eubanks, Jim Lange, Ben Stein, and Peter Marshall.
Martindale’s last program was the GSN original series Instant Recall, which premiered on March 4, 2010.
On June 2, 2006, Martindale received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. It is located at 7018 Hollywood Boulevard, adjacent to the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel – site of the first Academy Awards ceremony. On Oct. 13, 2007, Martindale was one of the first inductees into the American TV Game Show Hall of Fame in Las Vegas.
Martindale married Madelyn Leech in 1954, with whom he had four children; the couple divorced in 1972. He married his second wife, Sandy (née Ferra), on Aug. 2, 1975.
Back before satellite radio launched at the turn of the millennium, the best an artist could hope for was that their label’s radio team could help get their songs on playlists at as many terrestrial stations as possible, as often as possible.
But following the launch of the XM and Sirius satellite radio services in 2001 and 2002, respectively, a new paradigm emerged that allowed artists the possibility of hosting their own bespoke channels — on which they could play their hits and deep cuts, as well as songs by their influences, while chatting up their latest releases.
The new format kicked off, naturally, with Elvis Radio in 2004 on Sirius. That was followed by Sirius’ first artist pop-up channel, the Bruce Springsteen-focused E Street Radio, in November 2005, which ultimately went full-time in 2007 and continues to this day.
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The trend continued following the 2008 merger of the Sirius and XM satellite services. Since then, SiriusXM has hosted full-time channels by big-name artists including Kenny Chesney, Willie Nelson, Kelly Clarkson, Taylor Swift, Pitbull, Eminem, Bob Marley, Diplo, The Beatles, Jimmy Buffett, Grateful Dead, Phish, Frank Sinatra and dozens of others. The service has also collaborated with artists including Green Day, Beastie Boys, Jonas Brothers, Metallica, Linkin Park, Luke Bryan, Coldplay, Usher and Billie Eilish on shorter-run pop-up stations.
So why have artists flocked to the service to claim their own spots on the satellite dial?
For some, having their own SiriusXM channel can serve as a valuable promotional vehicle for a forthcoming release. Lady Gaga, who had a short-run “Gaga Radio” channel in February ahead of her blockbuster Mayhem album, tells Billboard it was “a reflection of the sounds that shaped Mayhem, the artists who move and inspire me, and the emotional connection I share with my fans,” adding that “every song you hear was handpicked — not by an algorithm, but by me.”
Marcus Mumford — whose band Mumford & Sons is the newest act to have a short-run channel, tied to the release of its new album Rushmere — says his group “leapt” at the chance to celebrate their music and look back at their catalog, live performances and collaborations over the years. “As artists now we can’t show up expecting to get people’s attention… there’s less gatekeeping, which is a good thing, so you really have to put in the work,” he tells Billboard. While taking extra time to sit with SiriusXM staffers to record the stories behind the band’s songs and curate the channel during the rush of Rushmere promotional duties, was, in his words, “not ideal,” he says the group was up for the hard work it takes. “We love going where people are,” he says.
“The feedback we get labels or artists when they do these pop-up channels has been really outstanding, so I think there are other aspects beyond increasing consumption numbers,” says SiriusXM head of music Steve Blatter when asked if there’s specific market data he can point to that illustrates a Colbert-like “SiriusXM bump” for either the long-running or time-limited channels (he notes that the company does not share any details on the financial arrangements for its artist channels).
For other artists, particularly those who have year-round stations on the satellite service, it’s less about promoting a project than about promoting a catalog, or even a culture. When LL Cool J launched his year-round Rock the Bells Radio channel in 2018, he wasn’t interested in just putting his name on a channel — he wanted to preserve and elevate timeless hip-hop. “[I] personally went through thousands of tracks to shape something real for the culture,” he says. “Every song, every interview, every moment you hear is chosen with intention.”
Tom Petty‘s daughter, Adria Petty, says that when her dad heard Bob Dylan doing his “Theme Time Radio Hour” shows on SiriusXM’s Deep Tracks channel from 2006 to 2009 — on which the rock bard told rambling stories and played songs around a particular theme — it led him to approach SiriusXM about starting his own channel, realizing the free format would allow him to do something other than talk about his music and lyrics, which “he found to be a hassle,” she says.
While Petty was alive, the channel also gave Petty’s fellow Heartbreakers band members the chance to come on and do their own shows and play deep cuts, live tracks and rarities. “It was that idea that DJs are people who create and curate culture and have fun in communion with people,” says Adria, adding that before her father died in 2017 at age 66, he told her the channel was a crucial part of his legacy.
Today, Adria says the channel not only heightens her dad’s catalog consumption but functions as the “heart and soul” of the estate. The 24-hour channel’s constant presence on the virtual dial impacts the catalog “in a big way,” she says, because there’s a whole team dedicated to programming it, which can help promote re-issues and archival releases.
“When you have an artist produce their channel in the manner we do, it’s not just about spinning their music, but about shaping a culture and cultivating the artist’s fan community and really presenting their legacy in a way that’s very authentic and credible to that artist,” says Blatter. Since Carrie Underwood’s year-round Carrie’s Country channel launched in 2023, it’s been an “amazing avenue” for the country star to connect with her fans, says her manager, The HQ’s Ann Edelblute, who adds that connection “is extremely important to her and the reason she signed on.” Since the launch of Carrie’s Country, the superstar has launched two additional streaming-only channels: Carr-dio by Carrie, featuring the country star’s workout picks; and Savior Sunday Daily, which has a mix of uplifting faith-based country and gospel.
“Both [of the additional channels] allow her to go deeper into areas that she and the fans love,” says Edelblute. “The three channels are a great creative outlet for her as well, as she regularly curates new playlists and loves being able to create new content and special programming year-round.”
Not everyone can have a year-round channel, however. Satellite-distributed services such as SiriusXM have a limited bandwidth to work with, says Blatter, so there’s a fixed number of channels they can offer; any time they add a new channel, they have to drop something else. “I’d love to offer a lot more artists their own year-round channels, but it’s challenging to do so…so the bar to get your own year-round channel becomes fairly high,” he says. Another key factor in who gets a spot is whether an artist’s body of work can hold up to being a year-round draw, according to Blatter. This can include legacy acts like the Dave Matthews Band, Pearl Jam, Springsteen, Grateful Dead and Phish as well as contemporary artists such as Eilish and Lizzo.
As for audience size, Blatter says even the artist channels with the smallest audiences are well-trafficked, though he declined to provide any hard numbers. (A spokesperson for SiriusXM says the company does not publicly share listenership data.)
At this point, SiriusXM has 46 year-round artist partner channels, though a few legendary acts with deep catalogs such as Michael Jackson, Prince, Dolly Parton and Beyoncé are noticeably absent from the permanent lineup (though all except Beyoncé have had limited-run channels in the past). Blatter says he’d love to expand the company’s relationship with any of those artists (or artist estates) into something bigger, noting that sometimes it’s the talent’s choice to only commit to a short-run channel to promote an album release or documentary.
Sometimes it comes down to resources and the artist only wanting to have a presence during a specific promotional window. Or, in the case of a somewhat niche act like Trans-Siberian Orchestra, realizing that interest will peak during the Christmas holiday and then likely drop off shortly after, making a quick hit channel more realistic.
For Mumford, having a SiriusXM channel is a way to engage with fans on a deeper level amid a surge in short-form content that perhaps underestimates audiences’ attention spans. “A lot of your publicity has to be shortened into snippets… yet people’s capacity and attention is greater than ever — they’ll sit and watch 10 hours of a Netflix show,” he says. “I think people want to hear stories in whatever form they come… it felt like a wider palette to paint with.”
Audacy has announced a slate of executive changes, with Kelli Turner appointed as president and CEO, while Chris Oliviero has been named chief business officer, and Bob Philips named as chief revenue officer.
Turner had been serving as interim president and CEO since January, after former Audacy chief David Field stepped down, and has served on the Audacy board since September 2024. Turner most recently served as managing director and CFO for Sun Capital Partners, and previously served as president and COO for Blackstone-owned music licensing and rights management SESAC Holdings. She has also served in various executive and leadership roles in the investment and media industries, including RSL Group, Martha Stewart Living, Time Warner, Allen & Company and Citigroup.
Oliviero was most recently market president for Audacy New York, and Philips was president of Audacy Networks and multi-market sales.
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“On behalf of the Audacy board, we are delighted that Kelli Turner has agreed to take on the permanent President and CEO role and lead Audacy through its next phase of reinvention and growth,” Michael Del Nin, chairman of Audacy, said in a statement. “She is an exceptional media executive who, along with Chris Oliviero and the rest of the Audacy team, will ensure we continue to invest in high-quality content to engage our audiences and provide best-in-class solutions to our partners.”
“It’s a privilege to lead Audacy at this exciting moment in its impressive history and the evolution of audio,” Turner added. “This is one of the most dynamic businesses in media and entertainment, and I am looking forward to partnering with Chris Oliviero and all of our teams to build on our momentum with audiences, creators and advertisers. I’m especially excited by the appointments of Chris and Bob, who know Audacy’s businesses inside out and whose track records in management, programming and sales are second to none.”
Oliviero has served as market president in New York since 2020 and previously spent over 23 years at CBS Radio (which became part of Audacy in 2017). Philips joined CBS Radio in 1996 and later took on the role of CRO for CBS Radio and Entercom. After Entercom’s rebranded as Audacy in 2021, Philips transitioned into his most recent role.
Audacy has also announced several departures, including COO Susan Larkin, chief digital officer J.D. Crowley, chief marketing officer Paul Suchman and executive vp and general counsel Andrew Sutor.
Mike Dash, who has been with Audacy’s companies for nearly 20 years, has been named executive vp and general counsel, and will succeed Sutor, who will stay on for a transition period.
When Island/Republic/MCA Nashville released Chappell Roan’s “The Giver” on March 12, the move extended a pop/country crossover trend that has seen the likes of Shaboozey, Beyoncè and Post Malone successfully hop genre fences.
As current as the development may be, it’s also a case of history repeating. The release comes 50 years after Freddy Fender’s “Before the Next Teardrop Falls” reigned on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart dated March 15. “Teardrop” went on to top the Billboard Hot 100 on May 31, 1975, in the midst of a crossover wave.
“That song just caught fire,” says Country Music Hall of Fame member Joe Galante, who handled marketing for RCA Nashville at the time. “It sold, and that was one thing that made it difficult for people to walk away from, was the sales numbers. Even as a competitor, I was sitting there going, ‘How the hell is this happening?’ And you start looking at the numbers and you went, ‘Well, that’s how it’s happening.’ ”
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Fender’s success was not an isolated example in 1975. From March 8 through June 7 that year, four different singles reached the Hot 100 summit while simultaneously becoming country hits: Fender’s “Teardrop,” Olivia Newton-John’s “Have You Never Been Mellow,” B.J. Thomas’ “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song” and John Denver’s“Thank God I’m a Country Boy.”
When Fender was at No. 1, at least seven more titles on that same country chart made significant inroads on the Hot 100 and/or the Easy Listening chart (a predecessor of adult contemporary), including Jessi Colter’s “I’m Not Lisa,” Elvis Presley’s “My Boy” and Charlie Rich’s “My Elusive Dreams.” Additionally, Linda Ronstadt peaked at No. 2 on country with the Hank Williams song “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still in Love With You),” weeks ahead of the crossover follow-up “When Will I Be Loved.”
Throughout the rest of 1975, the country crossover trend continued with Newton-John’s “Please Mister Please,” Fender’s “Wasted Days and Wasted Nights,” Glen Campbell’s “Rhinestone Cowboy,” The Eagles’ “Lyin’ Eyes,” Tanya Tucker’s “Lizzie and the Rainman” and C.W. McCall’s “Convoy.”
Then, as now, plenty of fans and critics debated if some of those titles belonged on the country station.
“For me, the answer to ‘What is country?’ is: the records that the country audience, at that time, thinks belong on a country radio station,” says Ed Salamon, a Country Radio Hall of Fame member who became PD in 1975 of WHN New York.
Salamon programmed plenty of crossover music, sometimes incorporating songs that weren’t being promoted to the station, in an effort to appeal to a metro audience that didn’t have much history with the genre.
WHN became a major success story — just five years later, the Big Apple got a second country radio station — but its crossover mix yielded as much hostility from Nashville as praise. Part of that was directly related to the corporate source of some of the records on the playlist: Denver, Newton-John and The Eagles were all signed out of New York or Los Angeles.
“There was such a pushback about what I did that I didn’t fully comprehend it at that time,” Salamon reflects. “I was taking the space that the Nashville label thought should go to one of their records on a country radio station, and I was giving it to the pop division.”
Exactly one year after Fender topped the country chart, crossover material in 1976 had subsided. The number of crossover singles was the same, but none of them had the same level of impact.
“It’s the luck of the draw,” says Country Radio Hall of Fame member Joel Raab, a consultant and former programmer for WHK Cleveland.
Two of those 1976 crossovers, Cledus Maggard’s “The White Knight” and Larry Groce’s “Junk Food Junkie,” were novelty records, distinguishing them from the 1975 batch.
“We’d seen success in the crossover the year before,” recalls Country Radio Hall of Fame member Barry Mardit, whose programming history included WEEP Pittsburgh and WWWW Detroit. “If those songs weren’t consistently coming, we were therefore looking for something else that would grab the ear, that would grab the attention of the listener, like a novelty song does.”
Crossover records would continue through the rest of the ’70s, with Crystal Gayle, Dolly Parton, Ronnie Milsap, Kenny Rogers, Eddie Rabbitt and a couple of Waylon Jennings & Willie Nelson duets benefiting. In most cases, those happened when one or more label executives were enthusiastic enough to take a risk. Record companies had to be judicious since radio stations relied heavily on local sales reports for research.
“You had to have product in stores in order for people to do sales checks,” Galante notes. “So it wasn’t as simple as just saying, ‘Oh, I think I’ll go do this.’ You’ve got to get the goods in stores, and if it didn’t move and they [were returned], you got a double whammy. And you’d spent the money. So you were careful about your shots, and you didn’t go willy-nilly trying to cross over a record.”
Similarly, artists often err when they purposely attempt to cross over. It’s an issue that country learned the hard way in the aftermath of the 1980 Urban Cowboy soundtrack.
“The Urban Cowboy sound was a moment,” Raab says. “It wasn’t a trend. It was just a bunch of really good hit songs that went with a movie — and those songs, by the way, were all pretty country: [Johnny Lee’s] ‘Looking for Love’ and [Mickey Gilley’s]‘Stand by Me.’ These were just really good country records. And because the movie was so popular, [some artists] said, ‘Oh, you know, I’ll be more pop.’ And they made these really bad pop-sounding records in the early to mid-’80s.”
The 2025 version of crossover is a little different — streaming data has helped identify the songs that work across formats, influencing the trajectory for music by Morgan Wallen, Ella Langley & Riley Green, Marshmello & Kane Brown, HARDY, Jelly Roll and Dasha.
Artists are interacting more freely across genre, with pairings of Kelsea Ballerini & Noah Kahan, Thomas Rhett & Teddy Swims and Post Malone & Wallen all on the current Hot Country Songs chart. And, Galante points out, country acts are playing stadiums and arenas in major markets, unlike in the ’70s, when they were mostly in small theaters in midsize metros.
As a result, there’s less incentive for country artists to refashion their music in a play for pop success.
“Country is just so big in its own right,” Mardit says, “that they don’t need to do that.”
Three months after SiriusXM pivoted away from its streaming app in favor of its core in-car satellite listeners, the company further thinned its ranks on Monday (March 10) with a new round of layoffs. The cuts came primarily in the company’s product and technology group and were part of the strategic shift announced in December, according to a company spokesperson. The company did not specify the number of employees affected.
Monday’s layoffs mark the third time in as many years that SiriusXM has cut its workforce. The company also laid off 3% of its employees in February 2024 and 8% of its employees in March 2023. The company described the previous two rounds of layoffs as necessary to build its platform and invest in technology to generate growth. Satellite subscription growth has stalled in recent years, though, and the company’s effort to attract new subscribers with a lower-priced streaming app brought disappointing results.
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In December, the company returned its emphasis to satellite listening, planning to “tak[e] steps to drive profitability and cash flow as we face marketplace headwinds impacting the company’s growth trajectory,” CEO Jennifer Witz said in December. At the same time, SiriusXM named former Google and Viacom executive Wayne Thorsen as COO in charge of the company’s product and technology, corporate strategy and parts of the commercial business. Thorsen’s arrival coincided with the departure of chief product and technology officer Joseph Inzerillo.
One of the products SiriusXM is using to bring in new subscribers is a lower-cost, ad-supported satellite service that had a limited launch in 2024. “In having an ad-supported tier, it gives us a place where we can market to these individuals,” CFO Tom Barry said Tuesday (March 11) during the Deutsche Bank Media, Internet & Telecom Conference. “We can bring them up to a higher price point as they appreciate and they increase their engagement in the product.” The full roll-out is expected to happen at some point in 2025, “but it could slip,” he added.
Advertising continues to be a problem, however. As concerns build over the Trump administration’s tariffs on China, Mexico and Canada, SiriusXM started “to see a drop-off” in advertising in the last “couple of weeks,” particularly in consumer-packaged goods brands, said Barry, adding, “I would say we’re cautious about where the ad industry is going right now.”
More subscriber losses are expected in 2025. SiriusXM is reducing its marketing spending on the streaming app and will “tighten” the terms of promotional plans, Barry said, which should result in the loss of approximately 200,000 subscribers this year. That drop would follow a 4% decline in subscribers in 2024, when SiriusXM revenue fell 3% to $8.7 billion.
Audacy, the second-biggest broadcast company after iHeartMedia, laid off 200 employees this week, according to a radio business source. “Audacy has made workforce reductions to ensure a strong and resilient future for the business,” added a company spokesperson, who wouldn’t confirm or elaborate on the layoffs. “We are streamlining resources to stay competitive in a rapidly […]