Pop radio stations under review after claims they don’t play enough Australian music

AFTER six months of industry debate about whether Australia’s commercial stations are failing to meet their local content quotas, the matter will be subject to an independent analysis.

COMMERCIAL radio stations are under review for how much Australian music they play after claims they are falling below the local content quotas.

Industry insiders raised suspicions stations weren’t meeting the regulated 25 per cent targets for homegrown music at the BigSound conference in September last year.

Tina Arena addressed it in her keynote speech and said they should want to support Australian songs and artists.

“Radio is still an important media and it’s not too much to think commercial radio could do more,” she said.

“Music directors are in a position of power and with that power comes responsibility.”

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Tina Arena believes commercial radio should do more to support local artists. Picture: Supplied.

Since then, Commercial Radio Australia and industry bodies APRA and ARIA have been trying to establish whether “non compliance is a real problem”.

Music industry veteran and academic Chrissie Vincent found it was a real problem in her thesis titled “Is commercial radio in Australia meeting their minimum requirements for local content?”

She examined every single song played over the week from June 5 to 11 last year and found Nova 100 played just seven per cent Australian content over 24 hours, Fox FM played 11 per cent, KIIS FM in Melbourne played 13 per cent while Triple M met the 25 per cent target.

Independent research obtained by News Corp Australia which monitored Sydney stations during the week of August 1 to 7 found similar results.

Considering the time between 6am and midnight — which is when the stations are supposed to meet their 25 per cent quota — Nova played eight per cent, 2DAY 13 per cent, KIIS 14 per cent and Triple M exceeded the quota with 32 per cent.

Blackchords were good enough for TV syncs around the world but not commercial radio in Australia. Picture: Supplied.

Vincent said she started to look at quotas after struggling to get support for local bands.

One of her bands Blackchords had their songs used on TV shows including Orange Is The New Black, Suits, Underbelly and Offspring but could not get on the playlists of commercial stations.

The lack of Australian artists in the ARIA top 50 in the past year as streaming overtakes downloads has also spotlighted the lack of support for local artists unless they are radio-friendly such as Jessica Mauboy, Peking Duk, Guy Sebastian, PNAU, Vance Joy and Dean Lewis.

“It looked like no-one was checking the quotas and I thought it was time to get that conversation started,” Vincent said.

“The music is out there for them to play even if radio stations claim they don’t have same the production values as overseas songs, or don’t fit their formats.”

Vance Joy is a pop radio favourite. Picture: Supplied.

Jessica Mauboy gets radio love. Picture: Supplied.

Commercial Radio Australia alerted the stations on Monday they will be monitored independently for the next year over how much Australian music they play between 6am and midnight to meet the quotas.

While CRA said they believe the stations are meeting their Australian content quotas, in an email to their member stations they acknowledged there may have be some “misunderstanding of the code definition”.

CRA CEO Joan Warner said some stations and monitoring services were including songs which had Australian writers and producers but weren’t actually by Australian artists.

“We have some anecdotal evidence they were tagging New Zealand artists as Australian artists,” Warner said.

“And some of the record label pluggers were telling radio programmers that they could report songs which were produced by an Australian or written by an Australian which is completely wrong according to the code definition.”

Warner also said the record labels weren’t targeting radio station programmers with homegrown music which suited their formats.

“Some years there isn’t a lot of new Australian music on offer, some years there is, maybe when The Voice is on,” she said.

“If they are saying ‘Here’s Troye Sivan, play this’ and this new music fits with the station’s audience, they will put it into rotation.”
APRA and ARIA released a joint statement yesterday saying all parties were working together on the issue.

“The three organisations will now work together to obtain and review relevant data. While any stations that are not compliant will be contacted and requested to address the issue, it should be noted that CRA expects that the majority of Australian commercial radio stations will be found to meet their quotas and, as in the past, in some cases exceed them,” the statement read.

ARIA CEO Dan Rosen said independent monitoring was a “collaborative effort.”

“Millions of Australians listen to radio and it’s a really powerful medium where a lot of people listen to music and find music; it’s a very important part of the music ecosystem,” he said.

“We want Australian voices to be heard and we are working with radio to find ways to do that better.”