History Main / RadioFriendliness

* Music/SonicYouth's ''Washing Machine'' closes with "The Diamond Sea", an alternative rock ballad that ''would'' be one of the most melodic and radio friendly tracks on the album if not for the significant obstacle of being [[EpicRocking almost 20 minutes long]]: despite this, it was still the first single from the album, with an edit that cut it down to a slightly less-than-ideal for radio 5 minutes and change by shortening one instrumental section and fading out prematurely just before a second one starts up. Interestingly, the album version of "The Diamond Sea" was ''already'' edited for length - one of the {{B Side}}s of the radio edit is a version that's over 25 minutes long.

* Music/SonicYouth's ''Washing Machine'' closes with "The Diamond Sea", an alternative rock ballad that ''would'' be one of the most melodic and radio friendly tracks on the album if not for the significant obstacle of being [[EpicRocking almost 20 minutes long]]: despite this, it was still the first single from the album, with an edit that cut it down to a slightly less-than-ideal for radio 5 minutes and change by shortening one instrumental section and fading out prematurely just before a second one starts up. Interestingly, the album version of "The Diamond Sea" was ''already'' edited for length - one of the BSides of the radio edit is a version that's over 25 minutes long.

* Music/SonicYouth's ''Washing Machine'' closes with "The Diamond Sea", an alternative rock ballad that ''would'' be one of the most melodic and radio friendly tracks on the album if not for the significant obstacle of being [[EpicRocking almost 20 minutes long]]: despite this, it was still the first single from the album, with an edit that cut it down to a still less-than-ideal for radio 5 and a half minutes by shortening one instrumental section and fading out prematurely just before a second one. Interestingly, the "maxi-single" for "The Diamond Sea" consists of the radio edit of the title song, a short BSide called "My Arena", and an alternate edit of "The Diamond Sea" that's actually five minutes ''longer'' than the album version.

** One radio station got fined by the FCC for playing ''the Clean radio edit'' of "The Real Slim Shady", as the song was considered to be too filthy for broadcast. (Modern listeners, not [[TheNewRockAndRoll living in the peak of the Eminem moral panic]], [[SeinfeldIsUnfunny might not understand what the fuss is about]].) Eminem grouched about this particular incident on two later singles - "The Way I Am" ("''radio won't even play my jam!''") and "Without Me" ("''the FCC won't let me be, or let me be me...''").

** You might also hear the seven-plus-minute version of "[[Music/TheBeatles Hey Jude]]" from time to time, or the similarly-lengthy "Macarthur Park".'

* {{Lampshaded}} by Music/{{Nirvana}}'s "Radio Friendly Unit Shifter" from ''Music/InUtero''. Ironically it was neither Radio Friendly nor a Unit Shifter[[note]]Unit Shifter is a music industry term for a song that sells albums[[/note]]. The song was originally titled "Four Month Media Blackout" to mockingly reflect the amount of time "Smells Like Teen Spirit" would play on the radio and MTV. When "Teen Spirit" lingered on for longer, the song was retitled "Nine Month Media Blackout." When it became clear the song would become a permanent fixture, the newer song would be retitled "Radio Friendly Unit Shifter."

* The Music/{{Carpenters}} version of "I Just Fall in Love Again" was thought to have hit single potential, but was too long for Top 40 airplay at the time (the late 1970s) and couldn't be edited without butchering the song. A few years later, a considerably shorter version of the song did become a hit for Music/AnneMurray.

** While Eminem stopped doing significant lyric rewrites for his singles after ''Music/TheSlimShadyLP'' (apart from a video version of "Without Me" which softens the homophobic slur to "you 36-year-old bald-headed ''[[LoonyFan Stan]]'', blow me"), his songs usually still faced heavy edits due to the intensity of the language and violence. One significant exception is "We Made You", the lead single from ''Relapse'' and one of the only Eminem songs with no swear words in it. However, the content of the song is still utterly foul, containing references to adult breastfeeding fetish, premature ejeculation and plenty of lesbians-only homophobia, with an lurching, swung burlesque beat which Eminem raps across in an absurd, heavily-accented machine-gun rattle. For this reason, it did not get a lot of radio play. Eminem switched to a much more radio-friendly, straight-laced pop-hip-hop crossover sound after ''Relapse'', with a lot of inspirational ballads that went into heavy rotation, and noted on "Guts Over Fear", a song in which he debates the future of his career, that he'd "rather make "Not Afraid 2" than release another "We Made You"."

* Music/DavidBowie saw little U.S. airplay after he moved on from the pop-rock stylings of ''Music/LetsDance'' and its two successor albums at the end of TheEighties. He moved on to [[Main/NewSoundAlbum usually harder sounds]], and given his lyrical tendency towards dark and/or difficult subject matter rather than SillyLoveSongs, he wasn't welcome in the adult contemporary radio format that usually adopts older rockers' new material (Sting, Elton John, The Eagles, etc.). Modern rock radio wouldn't play him either, possibly due to his age. In TheNewTens, ClassicRock radio largely neglects him because so little of his work "rocks" in the conventional sense; tellingly the song that gets the most play is his collaboration with Music/{{Queen}}, "Under Pressure". (Stations that do "flashback" weekends featuring blocks of 1970s/'80s tunes might throw in "Changes", "Young Americans", "Modern Love", and other numbers that charted.)

* [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] in the case of Music/{{Queen}}'s "Bohemian Rhapsody" from ''Music/ANightAtTheOpera'', a mini-RockOpera released as a single uncut at 5:55, which the band knew would be a hard sell. It became a hit when Freddie Mercury gave his friend, DJ Kenny Everett a copy, telling him not to play it [[ReversePsychology knowing full well Kenny (who loved the song) would do so anyway]]. Kenny would always "excuse" his plays of the song by muttering, "[[BlatantLies Oops, hand slipped]]!" and the like.

** While Eminem stopped doing significant lyric rewrites after ''Music/TheSlimShadyLP'', his songs usually still faced heavy edits due to the intensity of the language and violence. One significant exception is "We Made You", the lead single from ''Relapse'' and one of the only Eminem songs with no swear words in it. However, the content of the song is still utterly foul, containing references to adult breastfeeding fetish, premature ejeculation and plenty of lesbians-only homophobia, with an lurching, swung burlesque beat which Eminem raps across in an absurd, heavily-accented machine-gun rattle. For this reason, it did not get a lot of radio play. Eminem switched to a much more radio-friendly, straight-laced pop-hip-hop crossover sound after ''Relapse'', with a lot of inspirational ballads that went into heavy rotation, and noted on one of his later songs that he'd "rather make "Not Afraid 2" than release another "We Made You"."

** "My Name Is" had a radio edit which replaced some of the more extreme violence, drug references and suicide jokes with more harmless antics (example: "Well, since age twelve, I've felt like I'm someone else/ 'cause I hung my original self from the top bunk with a belt" becomes "Well, since age twelve, I've felt like a caged elf, who stayed to himself in one place, chasing his tail"), though even this edit was considered far too rough for radio play and was often censored further. The line "I just drank a fifth of vodka - dare me to drive?" was especially controversial, and the whole line is usually played backmasked on radio.

* Many of Music/Taylor Swift's early songs, when played on pop radio stations, had overdubbed electric guitars to make them seem like pop songs as opposed to crossovers from country music. The pop version of "Teardrops on My Guitar" has a single acoustic guitar strum in the intro as opposed to a longer mandolin intro, and it has a cello instead of a steel guitar after the chorus.

* This trope sparked the development of the Progressive Rock radio format in the mid- and late 1960s, which featured music from across - and beyond - the spectrum of rock and roll regardless of radio friendliness. The owners of such stations believed that Top 40 radio stations had become too concerned about ratings and making money to take chances on playing anything that didn't fit the typical pop-song template, and that there was a need for a format that played rock music from albums the way people were listening to them at home (including, since most of these new stations were on the FM band, in stereo). As such stations grew in popularity, Top 40 stations began incorporating more album versions of hit songs into their playlists to various degrees. Eventually even the Progressive Rock format became commercialized and evolved into Album Oriented Rock, and today most of the stations that epitomize the traditional Progressive spirit are non-commercial broadcasters, particularly college- or university-owned stations.

** "Boy With Luv" (which debuted at #8) stands out as a song that by any other criteria would be considered BTS' radio-friendliest single, but got heavily edited for radio and only managed to stay on Top 40 stations during a few weeks.

* [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] in the case of Music/{{Queen}}'s "Bohemian Rhapsody" from ''Music/ANightAtTheOpera'', a mini-RockOpera released as a single uncut at 5:55, which the band knew would be a hard sell. It became a hit when Freddie Mercury gave his friend, DJ Kenny Everett a copy, telling him not to play it [[ReversePsychology]] knowing full well Kenny (who loved the song) would do so anyway]]. Kenny would always "excuse" his plays of the song by muttering, "[[BlatantLies Oops, hand slipped]]!" and the like.

* [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] in the case of Music/{{Queen}}'s "Bohemian Rhapsody" from ''Music/ANightAtTheOpera'', a mini-RockOpera released as a single uncut at 5:55, which the band knew would be a hard sell. It became a hit when Freddie Mercury gave his friend, DJ KennyEverett a copy, telling him not to play it [[TemptingFate knowing full well Kenny (who loved the song) would do so anyway]]. Kenny would always "excuse" his plays of the song by muttering, "[[BlatantLies Oops, hand slipped]]!" and the like.

* Of course the length rule isn't always true; if a DJ at a rock station needs to buy some time for other matters (such as taking a rest, grabbing some food, or [[PottyEmergency doing some business]]), they'll often put on "[[Music/LedZeppelin Stairway to Heaven]]" (7:55), "[[Creator/DonMcLean American Pie]]" (8:33; also the longest single to ever be a number-one hit in the U.S.), or "[[Music/LynyrdSkynyrd Free Bird]]" (9:08). "Free Bird", however, sometimes gets cut short just as the singing stops, and the [[EpicRocking guitar solo that comprises the last third of the song]] starts.

* Muisc/ToadTheWetSprocket "Walk On The Ocean" suffered from this due to formatting - it lacked the usual instrumental "intro" and "outro" with the singing starting ''immediately'' at the start of the track, and the track ending ''immediately'' when the lyrics stopped meaning the DJ would have to time the transitions carefully to avoid either talking/playing another song over the lyrics, or DeadAir.

* Music/{{BTS}}'s music has had a history of getting little to no airplay in US radio stations regardless of requests, with several reports of radio stations ignoring requests or asking for ridiculous amounts of Twitter interactions just for a play in the middle of the night, even after they were getting top 10 singles on Billboard [=Hot100=], to the point that "ON" managed to get to #4 despite minimal radio play. Main causes? [[https://nowthisnews.com/pop/radio-why-wont-you-play-bts Reluctance to play non-English songs, as well as songs by acts perceived as "teen pop"]] (nevermind the many journalistic pieces dedicated to the diversity of the fandom or the adult themes in BTS' music). The songs that got the most airplay were "Mic Drop" (the remix featuring Desiigner), "Waste it on Me" (where BTS is a featured artist, and mostly in dance music stations), "Boy With Luv" (feat. Music/{{Halsey}}), and "Make It Right" (feat. Lauv). It was only with "Dynamite", BTS' first fully English single, that BTS finally got noticeable radio support.

* As fans have found and some radio [=DJs=] have outright stated, Music/{{BTS}}'s music gets little to no airplay in US radio stations regardless of requests or chart placement due to the lyrics being in Korean, with several reports of radio stations ignoring requests or asking for ridiculous amounts of Twitter interactions just for a play in the middle of the night, even after "Fake Love" or "IDOL" charted at #10 and #11 on [=Hot100=], respectively. The songs that got the most airplay were "Mic Drop" (the remix featuring Desiigner), "Waste it on Me" (mostly in dance music stations), and "Boy With Luv" (feat. Music/{{Halsey}}).
** "Boy With Luv" (which debuted at #8) stands out as a song that by any other criteria would be considered BTS' radio-friendliest single, but got heavily edited for radio and only managed to stay on Top 40 stations during the weeks Columbia spent actively promoting it.

* Music/DavidBowie suffered the same fate in the U.S. after he moved on from the pop-rock stylings of ''Music/LetsDance'' and its two successor albums at the end of TheEighties. He moved on to [[Main/NewSoundAlbum usually harder sounds]], and combined with his lyrical tendency towards dark and/or difficult subject matter rather than SillyLoveSongs, he's not welcome in the adult contemporary radio format that usually adopts older rockers and their new material (Sting, Elton John, The Eagles, etc.). Yet he's not embraced by modern rock radio either, possibly due to his age. In TheNewTens, ClassicRock radio largely neglects his work because so little of it "rocks" in the conventional sense; it's telling that the song of his that gets the most play is his collaboration with Music/{{Queen}}, "Under Pressure". (Stations that do "flashback" weekends featuring blocks of 1970s/80s tunes might throw in "Changes", "Young Americans", "Modern Love", and a few other numbers that charted when new.)

** "Boy With Luv" stands out as a song that by any other criteria would be considered BTS' radio-friendliest single, but got heavily edited for radio and only managed to stay on Top 40 stations during the weeks Columbia spent actively promoting it.

* As fans have found and some radio DJs have outright stated, Music/{{BTS}}'s music gets little to no airplay in US radio stations regardless of requests or chart placement due to the lyrics being in Korean, with several reports of radio stations ignoring requests or asking for ridiculous amounts of Twitter interactions just for a play in the middle of the night, even after "Fake Love" or "IDOL" charted at #10 and #11 on [=Hot100=], respectively. The songs that got the most airplay were "Mic Drop" (the remix featuring Desiigner), "Waste it on Me" (mostly in dance music stations), and "Boy With Luv" (feat. Music/{{Halsey}}).

Is that half my songs are five minutes and [[PainfulRhyme over]]\\

* Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty, better known as Music/TheKLF, had a Number One hit in the UK as [[Series/DoctorWho The Timelords]] with a novelty record called "Doctorin' the Tardis", and were inspired to write a book about it, ''The Manual (How to Have a Number One the Easy Way)'', "a step by step guide to achieving a No.1 single with no money or musical skills". One part of the advice is listen to other tunes, and the one you're making, on the most basic equipment available. If it's [[EarWorm memorable]] on the crappiest car radio, you're onto a winner. The book was also prescient enough to anticipate home recording, saying "It's obvious that in a very short space of time [[JapanTakesOverTheWorld the Japanese]] will have delivered the technology and then brought the price of it down so that you can do the whole thing at home. Then you will be able to sod off all that crap about going into studios."

* [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] in the case of Music/{{Queen}}'s "Bohemian Rhapsody" from ''Music/ANightAtTheOpera'', a mini-RockOpera released as a single uncut at 5:55, which the band knew would be a hard sell. It became a hit when Freddie Mercury ''begged'' his friend, DJ KennyEverett not to play it, [[TemptingFate knowing full well Kenny (who loved the song) would do so anyway]]. Kenny would always "excuse" his plays of the song by muttering, "[[BlatantLies Oops, hand slipped]]!" and the like.