Number of Top 40 Songs by Year (1989-2004)

[Dan G.]

147 songs debuted in the top 40 in 2004.

Of the past ten years, 2004 ranks second behind only 2002 for most top-40 debuts. Could pop radio be headed in the right direction?

On the other hand, we're nowhere near the late '80s and early '90s, when it was routine for more than 200 songs to debut every year.

1989: 205 songs
1990: 207 songs
1991: 209 songs
1992: 209 songs
1993: 199 songs
1994: 162 songs
1995: 139 songs
1996: 140 songs
1997: 133 songs
1998: 127 songs
1999: 132 songs
2000: 145 songs
2001: 144 songs
2002: 150 songs
2003: 142 songs
2004: 147 songs

--DanG

[Slinky]

We'll never go back to the days of the early 90's. That was before Mediabase monitoring and plays-per-week being counted. Back then, it was the radio stations decision what to count as current and recurrent, and radio stations did their best to move new songs up on the charts, even if they were only getting a few spins a week.

The charts nowadays are less interesting, but much more accurate.

[DuckHead]

Those are interesting statistics. Thanks for posting them!

[sandrose]

DanG82 said:

147 songs debuted in the top 40 in 2004.

Of the past ten years, 2004 ranks second behind only 2002 for most top-40 debuts.  Could pop radio be headed in the right direction?

On the other hand, we're nowhere near the late '80s and early '90s, when it was routine for more than 200 songs to debut every year.

1989: 205 songs
1990: 207 songs
1991: 209 songs
1992: 209 songs
1993: 199 songs
1994: 162 songs
1995: 139 songs
1996: 140 songs
1997: 133 songs
1998: 127 songs
1999: 132 songs
2000: 145 songs
2001: 144 songs
2002: 150 songs
2003: 142 songs
2004: 147 songs

--DanG

Wow. That is a revealing chart. Making the top 40 is a hell of a feat - much harder than I realized. There are obviously hundreds of thousands - maybe millions of new songs every year and for less than 200 of them to make it to the top 40 is a sobering reminder of how hard it is to make it as a pop star.

[Dan G.]

DuckHead said:

Those are interesting statistics. Thanks for posting them!

Sure thing!

[JCMF3]

I wonder what these numbers would look like for the AC chart!

[Slinky]

JCMF3 said:

I wonder what these numbers would look like for the AC chart! 

Haha... let me simulate:

1999: 2
2000: 0
2001: 1
2002: 0
2003: 0
2004: 2

As you can see, 2004 was a big year for the AC chart, with 2 debuts, tying a record, and an infinity percent increase from the previous year. :)

[Dan G.]

LOL!

[Hervard]

LOL! And so true. That's one of the reason that AT20 (now AT10) has foregone doing a full Top 60 of the year chart, since there haven't been enough songs making the Top 20 (in 2001, the last year they did a full chart, there were two "bubbling under" songs, but as I recall, they were both songs that were "familiar" enough, since they both did well at Pop and Hot AC). The main reason they only do a Top 30 is, of course, because of the Christmas sweep run by half of the AC reporting stations, but they could always start the year-end shows the week after. Seeing as the format is now slower than ever, as well as the fact that there are now only ten countdown songs, the Top 60 countdown is most unlikely to return.

[j]

I'm interested to know how many (lead) artists hit the pop chart each year. We had 127 Top 40 songs in 1998 but they probably came from less than 100 artists.