Country Music and Publishing, Different industries, same issues.

Sometime in the past couple of weeks, some radio marketing consultant made the statement that reducing the number of female country music vocalists on a typical country music radio station will normally substantially improve the station’s competitive position and number of listeners, thus increasing their ad revenue. I have absolutely no knowledge about the veracity of that claim. However, it caused quite a furor, leading to Country Air Check to convene a discussion panel about gender disparity in Country Music.

I have no connection to country music (other than one of my sons being a fan) and little knowledge of the ins-and-outs of the music industry in general (other than through a few friends), either as an art form or as an industry. I was struck, though, by the commonality of the issues between book publishing and country music radio. The lingo differs but the issues are the same. There are some obvious differences: Radio has much faster feedback from listeners than does publishing and apparently that feedback is much more accurate and detailed. The production pace is far faster: Radio stations have to play more than a hundred songs a day, thousands in a week. A song writer can write dozens of songs in a year and a singer can record many dozens. Music requires a much lower time investment from the customer than reading. The average song is less than five minutes. An average novel might take 5-10 hours (average reading speed of 250 words per minute).

While the discussion is about gender there is, in this panel, no discussion of other forms of diversity. Perhaps that is because they have already solved the problem of diversity. Per The Blues Brothers “Oh, we got both kinds. Country and Western.”

The issues in common between the two industries include:

In any given year, female country vocalists are only 15-35% of the top performers in terms of air-time, awards, record sales, etc. The same as in virtually all industries.

While some of the greatest performers (in terms of sales) are female, there are simply fewer of them.

Aversion to female vocalists is directly measurable in radio feedback systems and is shaped substantially by the female listener base.

There are innumerable song writers and vocalists and there are virtually no barriers to entry (though, as with publishing, immense barriers to breaking through).

The Country Music people seem to have a vernacular that differs from publishing regarding commercial success. They refer to breaking an artist, i.e. finding that first couple of songs in the right channels which lead to momentum and a fan base that can then make the artist a commercial success. (As opposed to the best seller terminology in publishing.)

The gender gaps have been known of and discussed for decades.

There have been multiple efforts in one form or another, on individual programs, by stations and at the industry level, to change the listener dynamic in order to create more female vocalist breakthroughs but without success.

In both industries, the after-release activities (promotion) have become critical elements for success.

While those who are most mindful of the gender gap seem hopeful that things will change in the future, those more on the commercial side of the business appear less sanguine.

Today’s disparities are seen by all the panel members, as a function of the customer demand, not record producers, program directors or radio stations.

The whole business is hard; production, distribution, marketing, promotion, etc. and with no confidence about what will gain traction and what won’t.

Long lead times between intent and success.

Tension between artists wanting to be true to their craft and producers wanting to customize it to the market as they understand it.
Success accrues primarily to those who persist over long periods with great focus.

There’s a lot more talent available than there is demand. Pareto Distribution functions in both industries.

Frequent mismatches between that which receives Awards and that which is commercially successful.

There is no correlation between number of female executives in the business and the number of female artists released (i.e. music production companies with a lot of women executives don’t produce any more female artists than other companies).

No answers here but it is interesting to see an industry that seems completely removed from publishing to have virtually identical issues. Just as with publishing, new mechanisms for obtaining fast, accurate commercial feedback are emerging all the time which shed more light on a confused demand side. Because there are so many publishers selling indirectly through so many channels, I think publishing has less clarity than radio stations. But technology offers all sorts of insights. For example, YouTube just released information about the number of listeners of musical artists by city and country: Ed Sheeran is huge in the Philippines, YouTube reveals by Mark Savage. Fascinating insights. Here is the YouTube site where you can enter your favorite musical artist and see where their fans are located and which of their songs are the most popular. Wish we had something like that for the book business.