College radio recap week 2. CMJ ISSUE 1423

We saw a nice uptick this week in the number of stations reporting with almost double the number of ADDS reporters and a nice uptick for top 200. I think we are still a few weeks away from normalcy though. Right now the charts are a weird mix of leftovers from last year that won't go away and new stuff that people sort of care about but not really.  Over the next few weeks we should see bigger name records come and take over.  

The first of those came this week with David Bowie.  It was amazing to see so many of you show love and support for Bowie. I have spent the whole week just listening to his records as I am sure many of you have.  Before his death I talked to some other promoters about what we thought would happen with the record on the charts. No one I talked to really thought it would have a shot at #1. But now, it seems like it would be a major shock if it did not hit #1. Perhaps as soon as next week. 

Over the years there have been many posthumously released records. The last Elliott Smith record comes to mind. That went #1 but it also came a good amount of time( i.e. not the week of release) after his death.  Joe Strummer had a record shortly after his death, it peaked at #2 though.  

As far as i can tell this is a pretty unique occurrence, it's actually surprising it hasn't happened before. 

While the charts and Adds warm up for the year I thought it would be fun to look forward to big records in 2016. It's hard to know what might come out so I checked out the Most Anticipated lists on Consequence of sound and Pitchfork guide to winter 2016 as my guide.  So Lets look at some of the big records coming out this year that we know of. 

Animal Collective

Crystal Castles

Grandaddy

PJ Harvey

Tegan and Sara

The Strokes

The Shins

Blood Orange

Yeasayer 

Bon Iver

Band of Horses

James Blake

Phoenix

Spiritualized

Nine Inch Nails

M83

Dr. Dog 

Savages

Ty Segall

Sia

Ra Ra Riot 

M. Ward

Haim

Beck

I am sure I left some off that you think might have a shot at #1, if so let me know and I will add them. 

Now some of those won't come out this year and it is hard to know what ones will and some unexpected records will show up also.   Looking at the last five years we know the average number of #'1's in a year is 21 ( rounded up from 20.8) 

So we already have 1 down with Grimes taking the first 2 weeks of the year.  I anticipate David Bowie taking over next... so we have 19 more to go. 

Animal Collective seems like a no brainer as does M83 and Ty Segall. Everyone else really depends on what else is out there. 

Can you pick what 21 records will be #'1s this year. Would love to see if anyone could get even 70%. 

I am stuck at 16 for now.  

Thank you for reading. 

Lets talk more on twitter.