As more 2023 airplay data continues to be analyzed across the industry, country music’s gender disparity is again being highlighted over which songs and artists ended up at number one (and which didn’t) on Country radio throughout the year.
The Women Of Country based their findings on data from Billboard’s 2023 Country Airplay Chart. The results showed 88.5% of the artists to top the chart were solo male artists, with only 5.75% being solo female acts. The remaining 5.75% is a gender split, with Kane and Katelyn Brown’s “Thank God.”
Lainey Wilson was the only solo female artist to achieve a number-one hit on Country radio last year.
In 2023, Wilson was the first female artist since 2016 to have multiple number-ones in a single year and the first solo female artist in two years to top the chart, thanks to her single “Watermelon Moonshine.” The Women of Country points out how Wilson was the only woman in the top 20 of the Country Airplay Chart for five consecutive weeks.
Jan Diehm and Dr. Jada Watson released a study last year that took a deeper dive into gender, race, and sexual orientation’s place in Country radio. The research analyzed programming from 29 major market country radio stations in 2022 and found that songs by female artists were played back-to-back 0.5% of the time, primarily during overnight hours, and primarily featured golds or recurrent songs rather than current singles.
Dr. Watson and Diehm found that despite broader data inclusion in the Hot Country Songs chart, female artists’ songs have averaged only about 15% of charting tracks in recent years.
What, no songs about climate change??
For some reason, these writers never look at rock or alternative music when they do these studies. Only country. Makes one wonder what their real purpose here is. The chart isn’t based on gender. There is no quota system. You can’t force people to like music based on the gender of the artist. But apparently that’s what these writers want.
Just play the hits. That’s all.