The Crossroads Are Coming Up Fast

“I went down to the crossroad, fell down on my knees.” -Robert Johnson, “Cross Road Blues”

We may be at the crossroads sooner than expected. On Memorial Day (5/30) this year, broadcast TV fell under nine million viewers.

A week before on Monday (5/23), there were 35-40 million. The audience was out at the pool or whatever on Memorial Day, but they weren’t watching broadcast TV, and there was nothing on worthwhile anyway … reruns and more reruns.

TV is in trouble. People have choices now more than ever. No fresh shows equals no audience, simple as that.

With these award shows and specials now on cable or streaming, the audience is so fragmented. No one ever said what the audience was for the ACM Awards on Amazon Prime Video. Maybe it was huge, who knows?

Radio better sit up straight and react. Who tunes in for 20 minutes or more of commercials when you get the same songs for free elsewhere? Like TV, the audience has loyalty to a program, not a network or station.

Programming a TV show based on Country is hard. Maybe there are a dozen headliners in the guest pool. Add a dozen more who used to be headliners. That’s 24 nights of programming. Maybe they come twice a year. You have a lot of months that are dry.

It’s why you have to get something else going, like sports stars or … something. The bean counters want you to be automated, voice track. With commercials, you better give something more.

It’s not like the old days when you had three channels of TV and your AM radio station had everything you needed.

We’re going backwards with no physical newspapers or magazines, Twitter and TikTok filled with bots and soft porn, and TV drowning in its on business plan from 1984.

Time is running out for get people interested in broadcasting, the best friend of Country music. The labels have seen the light and know where the audience is. The cow may be out of the barn, but a great cowboy should be able to get the cow back in … a little. Be unique.

Covid changed so many viewing habits and patterns. Physical sales of product were saved recently by a little bit of vinyl.

So much is different while so much is the same.

Elvis Presley changed the world. The Beatles changed it again. Now you have BTS having a private meeting in the White House with President Biden. Whew.

Radio and TV better get on the stick. Country artists are riding the social media wave. The media had better find that rope and get that cow at least near the barn.

And look at the headlines again this week: the Morgan Wallen beaters won’t let up. The Nashville Scene is going after the Academy of Country Music for giving Morgan an award at its ACM Honors show coming up in August. It just gets old. You really think anytime he gets a mention or an award you must bring up his indiscretion? He said he was sorry, and the fans seemed to have forgiven him.

“Top Gun” is a huge hit in Hollywood. The fans want to be happy and feel they way they do when you leave “Top Gun.”

We do so live in uncertain times! Remember that, songwriters: the folks want to be happy in a world that’s not so happy. As I write this, another mass shooting, this time in Tulsa. Whew.