Year End Top of the Alt Rock Charts
Before I even looked to see how the Top 10 in the alt rock charts shook out, I guessed #1 would be Linkin Park. I was wrong, but not by much. This list is based on total radio spins.
2007 Top 10 in Alt Rock Radio (via All Access):
1. Finger Eleven - Paralyzer
Total spins: 65121
2. Linkin Park - What I’ve Done
Total spins: 62831
3. Papa Roach - Forever
Total spins: 58607
4. Breaking Benjamin - Breath
Total spins: 54876
5. White Stripes - Icky Thump
Total spins: 50223
6. Red Jumpsuit Apparatus - Face Down
Total spins: 49813
7. Incubus - Dig
Total spins: 47938
8. Foo Fighters - The Pretender
Total spins: 47215
9. Three Days Grace - Never Too Late
Total spins: 44519
10. Plain White T’s - Hey There Delilah
Total spins: 44318
What a horrible top 10. Just seeing the Papa Roach and Breaking Benjamin makes me cringe that those songs were so insidious* that I can still sing parts of them. I used to joke around that you could mix their choruses and not even realize it was two different songs...."You take the breath right out of me because days come and go but my feelings for you are forever....” Good Lord.
The best of the rest (songs that I tracked during the year):
13. Silversun Pickups - Lazy Eye
Total spins: 42613
It definitely was SSPU’s year. They were the top spun indie band.
16. Muse - Starlight
Total spins: 40981
I’m surprised this wasn’t higher. It seemed like I could be anywhere in the country and I could hear this on the radio. Not a bad thing and I never got sick of this song.
23. Paramore - Misery Business
Total spins: 30726
Sad to say, but this is the only song in the Top 50 with a female vocalist. Sigh. Not to take away from the great year that Hayley and the boys had though.
34. NIN - Capital G
Total spins: 24522
This never made it to #1 (though Survivalism did). I am actually surprised this got as much airplay as it did coming from a politically charged and somewhat controversial album. Also their label pretty much stopped promoting them after it was clear that Trent was done with them.
37. Jimmy Eat World - Big Casino
Total spins: 23457
Total respectable showing since the single didn’t come out until late summer. (I want to say August?)
Overall, by looking at the charts, you could lament that it was all business as usual on the radio. And while that is true for the most part, you gotta love that SSPU’s success was fueled by heavy radio play on the part of a few influential stations. In any case, I’m looking forward to another year of geeking out about the radio. Because it is what I do best.
* insidious - (via dictionary.com)
1. intended to entrap or beguile: an insidious plan.
2. stealthily treacherous or deceitful: an insidious enemy.
3. operating or proceeding in an inconspicuous or seemingly harmless way but actually with grave effect: an insidious disease.
