Ah, the golden age of the radio! So will exclaim, shall we say, more mature music fans who got weaned to rock (or any other music form) before streaming started to dominate.
Most of the classic (and not so classic) rock bands got the chance to present their music and be known by wider audiences through radio waves, the most far-reaching method for a number of decades for wider audiences to get to know first-hand what good (or not so good) rock music sounds like.
But not all the greats or should-be-greats got much of a chance through radio waves, as they should have. Radio was surely the cheapest way to learn about some great music, but if some music didn’t get played, you either had to rely on music critics, word of mouth, or cough up cash and satisfy your curiosity. Many greats had to rely on the latter three at their time, with varied luck.
Very little radio play for these bands, can streaming vindicate this?
These days, it should be easy with cheap (?) streaming and availability to get to know music you might have missed, but that can be a curse too; there's too much stuff available, whether it is brand spanking new or not so new. Yet, those below 15 didn’t get much of a chance to be widely played through the radio waves at their time, but surely should have.
Frank Zappa & The Mothers of Invention
When Frank Zappa started in the mid-sixties, he and his Mothers of Invention were a seriously rebellious bunch, covering both lyrically and musically such a variety and often touchy ground that many, even more forward-looking radio stations had a hard time finding pieces of their music they would play.
Even later on, when Zappa, as a solo artist, came up with music that radio saw fit for airplay, a big chunk of his music was seen (and heard) as not suitable for airplay.
Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band
Even when Captain Beefheart, aka Don Van Vliet came up with experimental rock masterpieces that were Trout Mask Replica and Lick My Decals Off Baby, something radio stations never wanted to touch, his early left-field take on the blues variations and one of the most unique vocals in rock to this date were never considered as radio friendly, nor was his later, more melodic (so to say) material.
Still, he got a solid, well-deserved fan base through the word of critics and devoted fans.
The Velvet Underground
These days, the Velvet Underground are considered one of the most influential bands in rock music, with so many other bands and artists taking cues from Lou Reed and co., but in their own time, they never got much radio play, very often because radio editors considered Reed’s lyrics too risky and dark.
The fact that their initial record label (Verve) didn’t care to promote their first album, one of true rock classics, didn’t help much either.
Can
While all forms of more complex rock music were not exactly suited, or often not wanted, on commercial radio stations, there were specialized ones that were mostly present on FM radio waves that played prog rock and its related genres or sub-genres like krautrock.
Yet, Can, one of the progenitors of krautrock, never truly got their time of the day on the radio. Was it their forward-sounding music that leaves ripples to this day, invented the English language of the band’s most prominent vocalist, Damo Suzuki, or something else, who knows?
Big Star
Ok, maybe the band’s third album that goes by that name or as Sister Lovers, who is dubbed as the saddest album in rock, might not have been the fare for quite a few radio stations, but Alex Chilton and co.’s first two albums were key in development of power pop and songs like “September Gurls” were picture perfect for radio.
Yet it didn’t work for Big Star, but did for quite a few other artist that covered their songs.
Thin Lizzy
Late Phil Lynott and his crew did start out with a European hit with ‘Whiskey In A Jar,” but when the band introduced their hard dual lead guitar attack, loved by so many critics and hardcore fans, the radio seemed to have forgotten to play them, even though their concept was followed by many others that did get extensive radio play.
Television
When Television released their seminal debut album Marquee Moon, radio editors were quite devoted to clean labels with which they could sort artists and their music.
Yet, Television was one of these bands that really defied labels in use at the time, as their music could not be classified either as punk, new wave, or prog rock, as it was all of those rolled into one. By the time alternative and indie came into use, the time to play Television was forgotten by most radio DJs.
Devo
Presenting your music as conceptual art was not something many radio presenters in the late seventies or early 1980s wanted to know about (many probably had problems with what conceptual art is), and coming up with risky lyrics like the ones in “Whip It” didn’t do Devo any favours with radio, no matter how well the band did over at MTV.
Pere Ubu
Some critics think that Pere Ubu didn’t sit well with radio presenters and editors due to not so usual vocals by band’s leader David Thomas, but Pere Ubu, another proponents of conceptual art were also a band that created music that was difficult to categorize, as if prog rock musicians were attempting to play punk, or vice versa, something radio people were definitely not to keen on.
The Replacements
When the Replacements started, they might have created one of the greatest ramshackle sounds in modern rock, and any form of ramshackle was not something that radio people wanted to know about, great or not. That just might have carried on when the band’s sound got more polished and melodic, remaining great, but radio play was as rare as a good rare steak.
Hüsker Dü
Loud, brash, and fast with great melodies sifting through even in the band’s early days, but even when the melody lines became more prominent, Hüsker Dü were never seen or heard as the commercial radio material, mostly getting airplay on not-so-far-reaching local FM stations with a more refined taste.
The Minutemen
Putting prog rock moves through a hardcore blender and adding some politically and socially infused lyrics to the mix was never something commercial radio stations considered as something they would play, but even the more specialized FM stations often shied away from the trio of D. Boon, Mike Watt, and George Hurley.
The premature death of D. Boon in a road accident didn’t help the band’s cause.
The Fall
Late Mark E. Smith was a mercurial figure who led the Fall, was always considered one of the big collectors of any kind of music, which he incorporated in any shape and form in the band’s sound, and too much variety was not something many radio stations in the late seventies and on wanted to hear about. Smith’s quite off-kilter vocal delivery didn’t help much either.
Talk Talk
When Talk Talk first appeared in the early eighties, they were taken as another propulsive electro band, scoring big with songs like “Talk, Talk” and “It’s My Life,” getting hefty radio play along the way. Yet when the band went quite experimental under the guidance of late songwriter/singer Mark Hollis, that hefty radio play practically disappeared, quite unjustly.
Stereolab
Retro-futuristic lounge pop and avant-pop were terms the critics applied to Stereolab’s sound when the band appeared in the early 1990s.
Radio was still dominant at the time in its old form, and anything that had avant-garde in its description, or combined too many different sounds, as Stereolab always didn’t sit well with standard radio stations, whether they were on their way out or not.