Increasingly radio fails to mention titles or artistes after playing tracks, often because, these days, DJ's appear to be automated tape operators. I think this has been a part of the collapse of sales - I recently spent some time online trying to find out the name of the song about loving someone when they were 70, discovering it is Ed Sheeran clearly singing about me.

JK2006 wrote:
Increasingly radio fails to mention titles or artistes after playing tracks, often because, these days, DJ's appear to be automated tape operators. I think this has been a part of the collapse of sales - I recently spent some time online trying to find out the name of the song about loving someone when they were 70, discovering it is Ed Sheeran clearly singing about me.Doesn't matter, kids use Shazam to find out.

Ah - one there are no "kids" and individuals work in different ways and two - that's the precise problem, by assuming the listeners will be bothered to check is what's killing music. If instantly told, even though they only mildly liked it, they may well buy. Very few are interested enough to log on to Shazam or anywhere else to get details. I'd say 99% of potential buyers who decide "that's pleasant; I'll buy it for 79p or whatever" and listen again at a more convenient time, then again and again and bang, they are hooked. We are wiping out that massive real marketplace.

Yes. There are of course quite a few options now for checking titles/artists if one has a digital radio or access to websites, but, as you say, there's more to it than that. Most disc jockeys, like many others in the music biz these days, don't really have any passion for the music as such. It's not a vocation, just a profession. So the DJs barely seem to notice the music, they're too eager to start talking again. Steve Wright is the granddaddy of such an attitude, but even he used to care a tiny bit, a long time ago. The best presenters really WANT you to know abut songs and singers - they want to share an enthusiasm. That would be the case no matter what other sources of info there were.

This illustrates the current problem of superficial thinking; it is increasingly hard to move beyond "well they can find out the artiste and title by accessing Shazam" to "ah but do those merely pleased by a sound bother to do that?". Which I think is the essential problem. By only programming to those instantly hooked so much that they access Shazam to find it and then access iTunes to buy it, Radio now only caters to a tiny tiny percentage of potential music lovers with each play. So the 95% on whom it may grow and who may be inspired after a few plays to buy it and listen much more at home never do buy it. Likewise, the lifeblood of music (one offs) have instant appeal not backed up by strong desire to purchase ("oh that's great fun; I look forward to hearing it next time") and, since it doesn't sell, then disappears before the majority hear it. Self fulfilling failure.