Hip-Hop Radio Has Failed the Genre Overall
So why do people still think of hip-hop as a young genre? Because so many entities refuse to let the music grow up. Consider this: by the time rock and R&B reached the late 1980s, the variety of the audience was being acknowledged. There were different age groups who’d grown up with rock and R&B, and as a result, radio recognized the need for various platforms. So older fans got “oldies” radio stations and “classic rock” radio stations, while younger people were listening to Top 40 and “modern rock” stations. Almost every major city had an “old school R&B” station and a “smooth R&B” station, in addition to the typical Top 40 “urban” station.
That hasn’t happened with hip-hop.
Most cities never launched a “classic hip-hop” or “adult contemporary” hip-hop FM platform. So what has happened? We permanently think of hip-hop as only the music being marketed to people 25 and under.
Age aside, mainstream radio has failed to acknowledge the diversity within hip-hop. There are countless “alternative rock” and “heavy metal” radio stations, alongside the regular Top 40 pop/rock stations. Why has this not happened with hip-hop? “Alternative hip-hop” is a viable subgenre unto itself, but it doesn’t get treated as such. Once again, the fans get shorted.
