"Urban AC" no longer called "AC"?

[vithor]

This came to me while collecting data for my updates this morning on AllAccess that the format "Urban AC" wasn't showing on their format lists, but there was a Urban/R&B format. I remember back in June/July last year (I can't quite pinpoint when), back when BLM protests started to go nationwide then worldwide, lots were reported about both Urban formats would get the 'urban' dropped from their names(but, not surprisingly, nothing happened), and then this morning, AllAccess was showing me this:



I don't know what this is, whether it's a bug on the website or the change is actually happening, which makes me worried R&B is gonna get even more cut from mainstream Urban in favor of Hip-hip (which is already happening in a way)

[Deleted]

Jan 26, 2021 10:32:04 GMT -5 vithor said:

This came to me while collecting data for my updates this morning on AllAccess that the format "Urban AC" wasn't showing on their format lists, but there was a Urban/R&B format. I remember back in June/July last year (I can't quite pinpoint when), back when BLM protests started to go nationwide then worldwide, lots were reported about both Urban formats would get the 'urban' dropped from their names(but, not surprisingly, nothing happened), and then this morning, AllAccess was showing me this:



I don't know what this is, whether it's a bug on the website or the change is actually happening, which makes me worried R&B is gonna get even more cut from mainstream Urban in favor of Hip-hip (which is already happening in a way)

I believe Mediabase is changing it to the "R&B" format. I'm thinking they left "Urban" in the format name for now so people don't get confused.

[bat1990]

This doesn't surprise me. The format plays more current music than AC anyway (though I wish AC would and distinguish itself again as more than "hits of yester-year")

[Ty]

I always prefer the name "Adult R&B" that Billboard uses. Yeah, I agree that they're very different from AC now and it makes sense to remove that unnecessary label.

[Deleted]

On the topic of this further segregating more traditional R&B and hip-hop at radio, I see this more as a reaction to what's already happening (for the last several years) than something that will serve as a driving force behind that divide. It may actually help to rebrand "Urban AC" as a relevant format for R&B acts rather than it being seen as an adult contemporary format where R&B artist's careers go to die. There's still a significant following for R&B.. look at Jazmine Sullivan's album, R&B acts still get a lot of attention on social media, etc. I don't think R&B is dying as a genre.. rather I think rap and R&B have diverged so much at this point that many R&B fans don't want to hear a lot of the rap hits on the radio and vice versa.

[bat1990]

Jan 26, 2021 11:57:16 GMT -5 @jazzysoul47 said:

On the topic of this further segregating more traditional R&B and hip-hop at radio, I see this more as a reaction to what's already happening (for the last several years) than something that will serve as a driving force behind that divide. It may actually help to rebrand "Urban AC" as a relevant format for R&B acts rather than it being seen as an adult contemporary format where R&B artist's careers go to die. There's still a significant following for R&B.. look at Jazmine Sullivan's album, R&B acts still get a lot of attention on social media, etc. I don't think R&B is dying as a genre.. rather I think rap and R&B have diverged so much at this point that many R&B fans don't want to hear a lot of the rap hits on the radio and vice versa.

I would love to live in a market with an R&B station. This makes me think of this series by Calvin Michaels where he postulates that R&B and Rap converged in the mid 00s instead of R&B being in its own lane and breaking ground like in the 80s and 90s. Now it seems they are separating again, which I personally would like to see because Rap doesn't appeal to me much.

[vithor]

Jan 26, 2021 11:57:16 GMT -5 @jazzysoul47 said:

On the topic of this further segregating more traditional R&B and hip-hop at radio, I see this more as a reaction to what's already happening (for the last several years) than something that will serve as a driving force behind that divide. It may actually help to rebrand "Urban AC" as a relevant format for R&B acts rather than it being seen as an adult contemporary format where R&B artist's careers go to die. There's still a significant following for R&B.. look at Jazmine Sullivan's album, R&B acts still get a lot of attention on social media, etc. I don't think R&B is dying as a genre.. rather I think rap and R&B have diverged so much at this point that many R&B fans don't want to hear a lot of the rap hits on the radio and vice versa.

What concerns me most about it is that the UAC format as we have today is considerably smaller than mainstream Urban, a #1 at UAC has basically half the spins and audience than a #1 at mainstream Urban, so that could mean R&B might lose a lot of space on radio if less and less R&B acts and labels promoted to Urban their music because it's not "THE R&B format" anymore. I think that with time being, there should be some kind of rebranding to all 3 formats, cause to me it makes no sense to have Rhythmic and Urban as 2 different formats cause they have been playing more and more essentially the same stuff, with the exception of maybe half a dozen songs

[bat1990]

^THIS

What's the point of Rhythmic other than playing things that are big at Urban and Pop together without any rock or AC leaning records?

The only formats that seem healthy to me at the moment are Hot AC, Dance, and the Rock/Alt/AAA (though the last grouping could do with playing more women).

[Deleted]

Few thoughts - the hottest, critically acclaimed and still selling LP-s for around 600-1000 dollars is Urban AC or neoneosoul or alternative urban act Frank Ocean. So people are really hyngry for this kind of music. Although no single from "Blond" ever charted on radio. So the problem must be on part of radio, not the artist. Another thought - yes dividing Urban and Urban AC might not have been such a great idea as in the 90ies Urban radio played as well as Sade along with Dr Dre and Whitehead Brothers. Right now the highest non Urban chart act Kem would be by spins around top 20 on combined chart. I wish they would recategorize the whole black music as R&B and Hip-Hop, because rap or hiphop has basically killed R&B or soul music(which was the worst nightmare for Walt Baby Love). But of course these Urban radio stations would never have to choose between RnB and rap, so it will not happen. But R&B needs something to be done and people really want to hear more positive and sweet vocal Urban music which requires a lil bit more talent than all these one hit Lil dudes provide right now. American society needs more stability through great seductive R&B music and this will eventually make much more money than these dirty rappers.

[Rican@]

Sales were much better when R&B was succeeding; however, labels don’t want to push for R&B anymore.

[Deleted]

Jan 26, 2021 12:39:13 GMT -5 vithor said:

Jan 26, 2021 11:57:16 GMT -5 @jazzysoul47 said:

On the topic of this further segregating more traditional R&B and hip-hop at radio, I see this more as a reaction to what's already happening (for the last several years) than something that will serve as a driving force behind that divide. It may actually help to rebrand "Urban AC" as a relevant format for R&B acts rather than it being seen as an adult contemporary format where R&B artist's careers go to die. There's still a significant following for R&B.. look at Jazmine Sullivan's album, R&B acts still get a lot of attention on social media, etc. I don't think R&B is dying as a genre.. rather I think rap and R&B have diverged so much at this point that many R&B fans don't want to hear a lot of the rap hits on the radio and vice versa.

What concerns me most about it is that the UAC format as we have today is considerably smaller than mainstream Urban, a #1 at UAC has basically half the spins and audience than a #1 at mainstream Urban, so that could mean R&B might lose a lot of space on radio if less and less R&B acts and labels promoted to Urban their music because it's not "THE R&B format" anymore. I think that with time being, there should be some kind of rebranding to all 3 formats, cause to me it makes no sense to have Rhythmic and Urban as 2 different formats cause they have been playing more and more essentially the same stuff, with the exception of maybe half a dozen songs

R&B already has a smaller audience than rap though. It's evidenced in streaming for example. So I don't view it as R&B losing anything by rebranding the formats. I feel like labels are sometimes hesitant to push new singles by younger acts to Urban AC right away because of the perception that it's where careers go to die and not a format for newer/younger acts. Look how long it took Ella Mai's label to finally push her new single there despite it being a perfect fit for the format.

Rhythmic has also evolved so many times over the past 30 years too.. I remember people arguing about 15 years ago that Urban and Rhythmic should just be combined since they had very similar playlists (despite the format heaving playing acts like Britney, NSYNC, etc. just 5 years earlier), and then by early the next decade, Rhythmic was playing a lot of pop acts again.. it goes through cycles. 

I agree with bat1990 too that the audiences and sounds of R&B and rap largely converged for the 00s but that that may have been something that was largely limited to that decade despite radio continuing to view them as overlapping genres/formats. "Black radio" (as it was called at the time) in the 80s wasn't playing a lot of rap.. there was the occasional crossover like LL Cool J's "I Need Love," but it was mostly R&B music. Then around 1992 probably fueled by the success of albums like The Chronic and Doggystyle and rap acts incorporating more elements from R&B music (samples built around more than just drum breaks, R&B hooks, etc.) rap started taking up an increasing percentage of Urban radio playlists. This likely led to the advent of Urban AC in the mid-90s because rap was still a relatively new genre and there were many Boomers and older Gen Xers who didn't want to hear any rap with their R&B. By the 00s, R&B-leaning rap was all over Urban radio and many Urban radio listeners at that point grew up with that style of music on the radio so they weren't turned off by it. In the early 10s, R&B and rap started diverging in styles and now many Gen Zers grew up with not much R&B on the radio at all. So ultimately I think while there's some overall between R&B and rap audiences at this point, they don't overlap nearly as much as they used to and it no longer makes sense to have one Contemporary Urban music format and then another for oldies/AC-leaning Urban music. That setup doesn't make it clear where younger/newer R&B acts should be focusing their efforts at radio, which I think also makes it less likely labels will invest in younger/newer R&B acts. Don't get me wrong... having a separate Rap and R&B formats won't change things overnight but I can see the popularity of the R&B format (and with it, R&B acts) over time.

[vithor]

Jan 26, 2021 13:24:50 GMT -5 @jazzysoul47 said:

R&B already has a smaller audience than rap though. It's evidenced in streaming for example. So I don't view it as R&B losing anything by rebranding the formats. I feel like labels are sometimes hesitant to push new singles by younger acts to Urban AC right away because of the perception that it's where careers go to die and not a format for newer/younger acts. Look how long it took Ella Mai's label to finally push her new single there despite it being a perfect fit for the format.

Rhythmic has also evolved so many times over the past 30 years too.. I remember people arguing about 15 years ago that Urban and Rhythmic should just be combined since they had very similar playlists (despite the format heaving playing acts like Britney, NSYNC, etc. just 5 years earlier), and then by early the next decade, Rhythmic was playing a lot of pop acts again.. it goes through cycles. 

I agree with bat1990 too that the audiences and sounds of R&B and rap largely converged for the 00s but that that may have been something that was largely limited to that decade despite radio continuing to view them as overlapping genres/formats. "Black radio" (as it was called at the time) in the 80s wasn't playing a lot of rap.. there was the occasional crossover like LL Cool J's "I Need Love," but it was mostly R&B music. Then around 1992 probably fueled by the success of albums like The Chronic and Doggystyle and rap acts incorporating more elements from R&B music (samples built around more than just drum breaks, R&B hooks, etc.) rap started taking up an increasing percentage of Urban radio playlists. This likely led to the advent of Urban AC in the mid-90s because rap was still a relatively new genre and there were many Boomers and older Gen Xers who didn't want to hear any rap with their R&B. By the 00s, R&B-leaning rap was all over Urban radio and many Urban radio listeners at that point grew up with that style of music on the radio so they weren't turned off by it. In the early 00s, R&B and rap started diverging in styles and now many Gen Zers grew up with not much R&B on the radio at all. So ultimately I think while there's some overall between R&B and rap audiences at this point, they don't overlap nearly as much as they used to and it no longer makes sense to have one Contemporary Urban music format and then another for oldies/AC-leaning Urban music. That setup doesn't make it clear where younger/newer R&B acts should be focusing their efforts at radio, which I think also makes it less likely labels will invest in younger/newer R&B acts. Don't get me wrong... having a separate Rap and R&B formats won't change things overnight but I can see the popularity of the R&B format (and with it, R&B acts) over time.

Well, on that note, I don't think only dropping AC from the format name will change much. The format will continue to operate on the same note as always, with same long ass chart runs, bipolarisms and especially target audience. I think an actual rebranding would require a lot more than just a name change, like broadening the format target audience, radio picking up more songs every week and consequently having more playlists variations than what we currently have. This way the stigma of "format for R&B legacy acts' dying airplay careers" can fade, but that still isn't gonna go away overnight.
What I think is likely to happen is having less and less of what now should be considered R&B crossovers to hip-hop/rap radio (Urban + Rhythmic).

[Deleted]

Jan 26, 2021 14:21:39 GMT -5 vithor said:

Jan 26, 2021 13:24:50 GMT -5 @jazzysoul47 said:

R&B already has a smaller audience than rap though. It's evidenced in streaming for example. So I don't view it as R&B losing anything by rebranding the formats. I feel like labels are sometimes hesitant to push new singles by younger acts to Urban AC right away because of the perception that it's where careers go to die and not a format for newer/younger acts. Look how long it took Ella Mai's label to finally push her new single there despite it being a perfect fit for the format.

Rhythmic has also evolved so many times over the past 30 years too.. I remember people arguing about 15 years ago that Urban and Rhythmic should just be combined since they had very similar playlists (despite the format heaving playing acts like Britney, NSYNC, etc. just 5 years earlier), and then by early the next decade, Rhythmic was playing a lot of pop acts again.. it goes through cycles. 

I agree with bat1990 too that the audiences and sounds of R&B and rap largely converged for the 00s but that that may have been something that was largely limited to that decade despite radio continuing to view them as overlapping genres/formats. "Black radio" (as it was called at the time) in the 80s wasn't playing a lot of rap.. there was the occasional crossover like LL Cool J's "I Need Love," but it was mostly R&B music. Then around 1992 probably fueled by the success of albums like The Chronic and Doggystyle and rap acts incorporating more elements from R&B music (samples built around more than just drum breaks, R&B hooks, etc.) rap started taking up an increasing percentage of Urban radio playlists. This likely led to the advent of Urban AC in the mid-90s because rap was still a relatively new genre and there were many Boomers and older Gen Xers who didn't want to hear any rap with their R&B. By the 00s, R&B-leaning rap was all over Urban radio and many Urban radio listeners at that point grew up with that style of music on the radio so they weren't turned off by it. In the early 00s, R&B and rap started diverging in styles and now many Gen Zers grew up with not much R&B on the radio at all. So ultimately I think while there's some overall between R&B and rap audiences at this point, they don't overlap nearly as much as they used to and it no longer makes sense to have one Contemporary Urban music format and then another for oldies/AC-leaning Urban music. That setup doesn't make it clear where younger/newer R&B acts should be focusing their efforts at radio, which I think also makes it less likely labels will invest in younger/newer R&B acts. Don't get me wrong... having a separate Rap and R&B formats won't change things overnight but I can see the popularity of the R&B format (and with it, R&B acts) over time.

Well, on that note, I don't think only dropping AC from the format name will change much. The format will continue to operate on the same note as always, with same long ass chart runs, bipolarisms and especially target audience. I think an actual rebranding would require a lot more than just a name change, like broadening the format target audience, radio picking up more songs every week and consequently having more playlists variations than what we currently have. This way the stigma of "format for R&B legacy acts' dying airplay careers" can fade, but that still isn't gonna go away overnight.
What I think is likely to happen is having less and less of what now should be considered R&B crossovers to hip-hop/rap radio (Urban + Rhythmic).

Yes. Everything I'm saying is based on the assumption that this will require more rebranding than just a name change.. and that it would take time before the impact of those changes would become apparent. It's not like they'll just flip a switch and call the format something else and suddenly the industry's approach to R&B would change. Those changes would happen little by little and if it proves itself successful, we may may see labels approach R&B acts/music differently than they have in the past several years.

[jenglisbe]

So, will the "Urban" format still exist and this will be called R&B?

[bat1990]

I'm not sure who best to tag, but I want to hear an in-depth read of and analysis on all the radio formats from Pulse. I wish this weren't buried in a sub-board and I wish we had an @everyone feature like Discord for this.

Who besides us, outside of the industry, can provide honest assessments of where each format is, where it's going, and if we're reaching the end of the road of splitting radio into so many formats.

[Deleted]

Jan 26, 2021 13:22:29 GMT -5 @sigur said:

these dirty rappers.

Nothing else you said registered after this for me. Its the arrogance of that for me.

[Deleted]

Jan 26, 2021 23:21:07 GMT -5 @pma2015 said:

Jan 26, 2021 13:22:29 GMT -5 @sigur said:

these dirty rappers.

Nothing else you said registered after this for me. Its the arrogance of that for me.

Dirty vs clean, I guess there are loads of people who have been turned off Urban radio last 20 years, because it is too dirty in every way and even all these New Jack Swing groups in the 90ies mostly had the church background, I guess the influence of church has also been reduced as well on Urban radio and this does not mean to listen to gospel station every day. 

[bjordan]

I think that mediabase has changed the name from Urban AC to urban/R&B to roll with the times because the adult R&B or Urban/R&B are including more 90’s and early 2000’s hip hop/R&B hits along with their R&B/Soul hits in heavy rotation. For example, longtime Urban/R&B station KJLH is more current than ever before and more adult friendly hip hop from the 1990’s until now gets airplay often on that station. This format was once home to Luther Vandross, Anita Baker and Gerald Levert during the 90’s and 2000’s the good old days.