It's odd how putting a number on a song sometimes increases its allure. I think back to my radio countdown listening habits in the '80s and early '90s. In the early '80s, I would listen to all four hours of "American Top 40," jotting down the name, artist, and ranking of each song. In later years, I latched onto year-end radio station countdowns and top-rock-songs-of-all-time surveys. Songs that I would have flipped past or turned off under any other conditions had to be endured, at least fleetingly, or my listening experience would have felt incomplete. I kept wanting to find out, "What song is next? Is it a song I like? Will its ranking be higher or lower than I would have guessed?"
Admittedly, a "my world is the world" bias would sometimes creep in as I listened. As a kid, I would sometimes think, "That song is number one this week? More people bought and/or listened to that song than any other? How is that possible? The vocals are grating, and there are so many better songs in the countdown and others that didn't even make the countdown. Besides, none of my friends or family members like that song." A few seconds later, I would concede, "Then again, we're one small sample of listeners in just one of the many cities surveyed."
Looking back, I had no idea how those rankings were tabulated. In some cases, I knew, in general terms, but I didn't know the specifics. If the countdown was based on sales, how many record stores were contacted? Did the record store workers providing the data provide exact sales figures or approximations based on memory? When the rankings also factored in how often songs were played on the radio, how was that tracked? Did the number of times listeners requested a song factor into the rankings? For local radio station countdowns, was it strictly a matter of ranking songs based on how many listeners listed them as favorites? How were ties handled? One station, for instance, would have an annual top 500 rock songs countdown. Many years, the top-ranked song was Led Zeppelin's "Stairway To Heaven" or The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again." Was that top ranking based on a survey of local listeners or national listeners, or was it simply the collective opinion of station staffers? One local station in the mid '80s put a refreshing disclaimer on the jazz albums countdown it sent to record stores. The fine print said that the rankings were based on sales and the station "music staff's judgment of each album's appeal." Another radio station that provided weekly countdowns to record stores then printed on each survey, "Rankings are based on sales and requests only, not rotation." In other words, the rankings didn't necessarily reflect how often the station played each song.
The lesson here? Perhaps it's best to just sit back and enjoy the music, without getting too caught up in the methodology.
