Males simply don't care to hear the soft country sound of artists like Shania Twain, said Larry Rosin, president of Edison Media Research, which surveyed 601 country listeners in six markets around the country. But as men have been listening less, women have been listening more because of soft country songs like Lonestar's crossover hit Amazed , according to Rosin's survey. Rosin's research showed men like to hear country music with a slight rock sound, like Dwight Yoakam's Guitars, Cadillacs from his 1986 album of the same name.
Record labels consider radio the chief tool for selling records.
If men aren't listening to country radio, they may not be buying country music as much, either. This has left stations scrambling to figure out how to get listeners back. Rosin's research presented at the seminar last year helped persuade radio to play hit songs more frequently over a longer period of time. Dene Hallam, program director for 93.3 KYCY-FM in San Francisco, said Rosin's research overgeneralized what listeners desired. But, he noted, the findings should push stations to ask different questions when they poll local audiences.