Stats: Janet Jackson's Biggest Billboard Hits - Page 3

umich

Quote:

Originally posted by Cap10Planet

How were R&B and Country songs able to be big hits before 1998? Granted that R&B singles used to sell like hotcakes, most of their airplay had to come from urban formats. Something like "Freak Like Me" by Adina Howard (or just just R&B songs in general) had to be a huge Rhythmic hit.

Yea; I think that most of the big R&B hits were huge on rhythmic and got consderable pop airplay. Boyz II Men would be a great example - I think all of their big hits went #1 (or at least top 5) on pop radio. Not to mention, R&B music was also popular on adult contemporary.

As far as Country, I'm assuming that some of those were pop crossovers as well (Shania Twain, You're Still The One for example) and received AC airplay.

Dingdong123

Together Again is a BOP.

brianc33616

Quote:

Originally posted by Cap10Planet

How were R&B and Country songs able to be big hits before 1998? Granted that R&B singles used to sell like hotcakes, most of their airplay had to come from urban formats. Something like "Freak Like Me" by Adina Howard (or just just R&B songs in general) had to be a huge Rhythmic hit.

If the singles sold strongly enough from the other formats, they could reach the Hot 100 on sales points alone. The best example is Tim McGraw/Faith Hill's "It's Your Love," which climbed to #7 in 1997 with only very minimal airplay support from AC. Over 99.5% of its points on the Hot 100 were from sales.

Also, "Achy Breaky Heart" reached #4 in 1992 almost entirely on sales points, but mainstream radio began spinning the track once they saw how strongly the song was selling.

Still, probably 95%+ of Achy Breaky Heart's points while it was in the Top 5 came from sales, since mainstream radio didn't really start playing the song until the single began dropping in sales.