# What Do You Think Is "Oldies" Music? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 17, 2007, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005 "2007-10-17T05:42:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ceejaytee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ceejaytee/32/2956_2.png) [@Ceejaytee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ceejaytee)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/21 "2007-10-17T19:39:54Z")
The oldies are the 50s through the mid-60s. I’m happy that NYC got it’s oldies station CBS-FM back but unhappy that they play “oldies” from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. I want my doo wop, damn it. ---
**Author:** ![DSYoungEsq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c6cbf5/32.png) [@DSYoungEsq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSYoungEsq)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/22 "2007-10-17T20:27:56Z")
Madonna 😃 ---
**Author:** ![SmartAleq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smartaleq/32/163_2.png) [@SmartAleq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SmartAleq)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/23 "2007-10-17T20:53:49Z")
John Dowland 😉 ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/24 "2007-10-17T21:33:57Z")
[QUOTE=Jophiel] 50’s and 60’s here with some slight overlap into the 70’s for some acts such as the Beatles… [/QUOTE] The Beatles were a 60’s act. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@Johnny\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Angel)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/25 "2007-10-17T21:41:19Z")
When I was a kid, Oldies radio invariably included 50’s (generally late) to 70’s (early). At one point I found a station that played mostly 50’s and 60’s and included early 50’s and late 40’s R&B. But these days self-styled Oldies stations seem to start at the late 60’s and go into the 80’s. ---
**Author:** ![drm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e57/32.png) [@drm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drm)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/26 "2007-10-17T21:42:14Z")
I consider anything prior to 1962/3, _oldies_ and everything between 1962/3 and early 1980 as _classic_. I suppose it’s a matter of opinion, but for me, I used the Rolling Stones/Beatles and U2 as cutoff points. Anything after 1980 is what, new crap? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/27 "2007-10-17T21:57:41Z")
[QUOTE=Happy Lendervedder] 32 y.o. checking in. To me **Oldies** are from the 50s and 60s. **Classic Rock** is from the late 60s through the 70s. **Retro** is from the 80s and early- to mid-90s. [/QUOTE] I would _personally_ consider anything before 1990 to be an oldie. But if we’re talking about how _radio stations_ carve up the rock/pop universe, then it’s about style as well as year. Rock/pop before 1964 is all ‘oldies’, but over the next decade, it’s split into ‘classic rock’ which is (for the most part) the stuff that would have been played on FM radio during those years, and ‘oldies’ which is what would have been played (for the most part) strictly on AM stations during that period. The Doors are classic rock, and the Carpenters are oldies, despite having been on the airwaves at about the same time. What I’d call ‘lite’ soul - stuff like the Supremes - I think also gets played on ‘oldies’ stations. Again, the key is: was it played on (primarily white music) AM radio stations at the time? Does any black artist besides Jimi Hendrix get played on classic rock stations, or is he the genre’s token black? ---
**Author:** ![AuntiePam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f19dbf/32.png) [@AuntiePam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AuntiePam)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/28 "2007-10-17T22:21:53Z")
Personally, my oldies would be what **Sean Factotum** said, pre-Elvis. A local AM station used to play this stuff on Sunday nights, and I’d go to sleep with Guy Mitchell, Frankie Laine, Patti Page and Frank Sinatra. Radio station oldies, 50’s to the Beatles, is what I grew up with. I tuned an oldies station the other night and listened to songs that I’d never heard before – probably from the 80’s and 90’s, when I was listening to country. I didn’t recognize a single song in 30 minutes of listening. Damn. I’m hearing a mouse in the ceiling. Where’s my cat?! ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/29 "2007-10-17T22:29:30Z")
Yeah, you guys have to remember that “Oldies” and “Classic Rock” don’t mean times, they mean demographics. There’s a chronological overlap here. Although I notice lately that when I turn on the local “Oldies” station they occasionally play a disco song or other 70s music. 10 years ago it was strictly motown, Beach Boys, Chuck Berry, Beatles, Elvis, and suchlike. But no Rolling Stones…they’re classic rock, not oldies, despite being contemporaries of the Beatles. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/30 "2007-10-17T22:36:09Z")
I’m with those who think it’s a moving window. I’d say I have three guidelines: 1. “Oldies” starts roughly 20 to 30 years ago, depending on what specific type of music you’re talking about. 2. Music by an artist still producing relevant music is never an “oldie.” Madonna’s early material cannot be “oldies” as long as Madonna is still producing relevant, interesting music. (Which I would argue she is and I don’t even like it.) If she starts producing shit that’s a parody of herself, like the Rolling Stones, then her old stuff will become oldies. U2 is in the same category; their songs from 25 years ago are exempt from oldie status because they still produce relevant music. Bizarrely enough, another example is Weird Al Yankovic. 3. The extent to which music sounds dated moves it into the “oldie” category faster. Brit Synth-pop music from 1983 is already decidedly oldie. REM’s “Murmur,” sounding far less dated, is not “oldie” yet, even though it’s from 1983. ---
**Author:** ![denquixote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9bd4f/32.png) [@denquixote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/denquixote)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/31 "2007-10-17T23:35:16Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] What I’d call ‘lite’ soul - stuff like the Supremes - I think also gets played on ‘oldies’ stations. Again, the key is: was it played on (primarily white music) AM radio stations at the time? Does any black artist besides Jimi Hendrix get played on classic rock stations, or is he the genre’s token black? [/QUOTE] Well there was: The Crazy World of Arthur Brown The Chambers Brothers Billy Preston Love with Arthur Lee ---
**Author:** ![Governor\_Quinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@Governor\_Quinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Governor_Quinn)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2007, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/32 "2007-10-17T23:51:53Z")
First off, I might as well admit this: The definitions I’m using are the ones that radio programmers seem to use, not my own (I use technological changes as a dividing line), and I may not always be right with these. That said, the way I understand it: Recordings made prior to 1940, for the most part, are not acknowledged to exist by radio broadcasters. The popular music recorded from 1940 to 1955, and music recorded after that date but in a similar style, tended to be regarded as **Music of Your Life** or some such term. More or less all popular music from 1955 to around 1966 in any sort of rock form (no matter how tenuous at times) is classified under the term of **Oldies** , as are the lighter forms of popular music (still in nominally post-1955 styles) from the following decade. **Classic Rock** consists of the popular music post-1966 that is of a harder nature than the music played on Oldies stations, and which belongs to certain rock genres (no R&B, and many stations will not include developments in rock post-1975), as well as music of a similar nature that was not popular on AM radio but which was popular through albums and FM radio. The terminal date for this music ranges, but (in my experience) most broadcasters tend to stop at a date roughly twenty years before the current date. **Jammin’ Oldies** tend to play music that was popular with black audiences from roughly 1965 to 1985 or thereabouts. Most popular music not already mentioned from after 1980 tended to be grouped by decade by the radio programmers. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/33 "2007-10-18T00:06:07Z")
I got annoyed when my local oldies station played Harry Chapin, so I decided to craft a criterion for the end of the oldies period (the beginning, of course, is when _Rock Around the Clock_ was released). The oldies era was officially over when the boy dancers on _American Bandstand_ were no longer required to wear ties. I maintiain a conceit that _“oldies”_ was always the term for this music, even while it was being written, recorded, and released. It comforts me. ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/34 "2007-10-18T00:17:29Z")
[QUOTE=denquixote] “Oldies” to me begin with Chuck Berry and end with the Supremes. (Basically 1955-1965.) [/QUOTE] Same here. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/35 "2007-10-18T01:43:09Z")
[QUOTE=Ceejaytee] The oldies are the 50s through the mid-60s. I’m happy that NYC got it’s oldies station CBS-FM back but unhappy that they play “oldies” from the 60s, 70s, and 80s. I want my doo wop, damn it. [/QUOTE] See if you can pick up [WMTR 1250](http://www.wmtram.com/index2.htm). [“Doo Wop Drive”, Fridays 7 - 10PM](http://www.wmtram.com/programschedule.htm). ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/36 "2007-10-18T03:17:51Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] What I’d call ‘lite’ soul - stuff like the Supremes - I think also gets played on ‘oldies’ stations. Again, the key is: was it played on (primarily white music) AM radio stations at the time? Does any black artist besides Jimi Hendrix get played on classic rock stations, or is he the genre’s token black? [/QUOTE] [QUOTE=denquixote] Well there was: The Crazy World of Arthur Brown The Chambers Brothers Billy Preston Love with Arthur Lee [/QUOTE] [OT]I didn’t know Arthur Brown was black.[/OT] Anyway, as was mentioned earlier in Governor Quinn’s post, the definitions for what constitutes “classic rock” or “oldies” were pretty much set by radio programmers. As for Hendrix being the only black artist played on classic rock stations, I’ve heard Sly and the Family Stone (a racially mixed band with a black frontman) get some airplay on a few of these stations. Beyond that, I think the artist list is pretty white (and male with a few notable exceptions as Janis Joplin and the Pretenders). Oddly enough, the precursor to the classic rock format, album oriented rock, used to play Stevie Wonder, late 60’s and early 70’s Motown (e.g., Marvin Gaye during his “What’s Going On?” and the Temptations during their “Pappa Was a Rolling Stone” periods), Richie Havens, and Otis Redding but all those songs and artists got culled down around 1980 as programmers apparently felt the need to “whiten up” their playlists. ---
**Author:** ![berff](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/43a26b/32.png) [@berff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/berff)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/37 "2007-10-18T04:35:27Z")
I guess I would consider anything pre 2000 to be an oldie. It’s certainly not in the same class of oldies as 1950s and 1960s music, but most 90s music sounds very dated compared with modern music, so if it’s not an oldie, I don’t know what else I would call it. Not that there’s anything special about the year 2000 being the cutoff; I could probably say 2003 instead. But then again, I get nostalgic sometimes when I hear music from April 2007. ---
**Author:** ![denquixote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9bd4f/32.png) [@denquixote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/denquixote)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 7:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/38 "2007-10-18T07:48:12Z")
[QUOTE=NDP] [OT]I didn’t know Arthur Brown was black.[/OT] Anyway, as was mentioned earlier in Governor Quinn’s post, the definitions for what constitutes “classic rock” or “oldies” were pretty much set by radio programmers. As for Hendrix being the only black artist played on classic rock stations, I’ve heard Sly and the Family Stone (a racially mixed band with a black frontman) get some airplay on a few of these stations. Beyond that, I think the artist list is pretty white (and male with a few notable exceptions as Janis Joplin and the Pretenders). Oddly enough, the precursor to the classic rock format, album oriented rock, used to play Stevie Wonder, late 60’s and early 70’s Motown (e.g., Marvin Gaye during his “What’s Going On?” and the Temptations during their “Pappa Was a Rolling Stone” periods), Richie Havens, and Otis Redding but all those songs and artists got culled down around 1980 as programmers apparently felt the need to “whiten up” their playlists. [/QUOTE] How humiliatin’!! Apparently I misspoke. I, of course, meant to say that he wore black. (You would think that would teach me not to make assumptions, but I am sure it will not.) ---
**Author:** ![Sean\_Factotum](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/50afbb/32.png) [@Sean\_Factotum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sean_Factotum)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/39 "2007-10-18T12:21:24Z")
[QUOTE=denquixote] Well there was: The Crazy World of Arthur Brown The Chambers Brothers Billy Preston Love with Arthur Lee [/QUOTE] You can add Living Color (“Cult Of Personality”) to this list. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2007, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005/40 "2007-10-18T15:05:07Z")
[QUOTE=Governor Quinn] **Jammin’ Oldies** tend to play music that was popular with black audiences from roughly 1965 to 1985 or thereabouts. [/QUOTE] I pretty much agree with your analysis, however I thought black people music from 1965 to 1985 would be considered “old school” rap and R&B. **Alice The Goon** , tell your kids they don’t know what they are talking about and that their music is gay. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-you-think-is-oldies-music/423005.md?page=3)