Will CMT's Gender Pledge Influence Country Radio?

CMT last week pledged to establish a 50/50 programming policy for music videos from female artists on both its CMT and CMT Music channels.  CMT’s senior vice president of music strategy and talent Leslie Fram hopes that the gesture will be a motivator across the industry. “We’re not saying you have to play every song by every woman.”

“But what we will be doing is reaching out [to radio] saying, ‘What kind of pledge can you even make?’ It would be nice if radio could increase women’s spins even by 10 percent. It’s not that difficult, it’s not some scary thing.”

Rolling Stone Country reached out to more than 30 country radio PDs and asked if they would make a similar pledge and/or remove the “no women back-to-back” rule that has plagued the genre for decades. Last week, it became the subject of a viral tweet from WKCQ 98.5 FM in Saginaw, Michigan in which they stated “we cannot play two females back to back.”

“Smells like white male bullshit,” Kacey Musgraves tweeted in reply. Only a handful of PDs responded at press time, including Tom Poleman, chief programming officer and president of iHeartMedia.

“Not sure what station said they have a ‘no women back-to-back’ rule, but it’s definitely none of our stations,” Poleman told Rolling Stone Country. “iHeartCountry continues to recognize the pivotal role of women in country, and our top country on-air personality, Bobby Bones, and the entire iHeartCountry team have been strong supporters of women in country.”

Others, like David Corey, the program director of WKLB 102.5 FM in Boston, went further. “I am 100 percent in favor of supporting women in the format way more than we have been,” he said. “I think the goal for our industry [and] radio programmers in general is to increase adds and rotations of female artists over the next six months to a year so that the songs we are playing in that time frame can get to a point where they will be big hits several months after the airplay starts.

That’s a sharp contrast from programmers like Randy Brooks of KIXQ Kix 102.5 FM in Joplin, MO, who insists that all decisions are made simply on “the power of the song and the performance as a whole.”

MoJoe Roberts of KUPL 98.7 the Bull in Portland says the concern is fair and not simply “social issues,” whatever that may be. “I feel there is a lot of validity in the outcry for more airplay for women,” says Roberts, who is adding a woman-centric weekend show to his programming. “We stand with the movement and are showing our support.”

Nashville’s main leadership organizations, the CMA and CRS (Country Radio Seminar), offered gestures of support as well. “CMA is supportive of any music discovery program that helps give women artists and creators an equal opportunity,” said Sarah Trahern, CMA CEO in a statement to Rolling Stone Country.