Kennedy: Shawn Ryan is bringing you the 'Greatest Hits You've Never Heard'

When it comes to radio, this isn't Shawn Ryan's first rodeo.

Ryan, a former newspaper music writer and editor, has a new show on WUTC-FM (88.1) Fridays at 2 p.m. called "Greatest Hits You've Never Heard."

The hour-long show highlights singles by known artists that flopped on the radio, as well as promising tunes that were simply never released as singles by the record companies.

Curated from his iTunes library of more than 9,000 recordings, Ryan's show features songs that prove that picking hits is an imperfect science. He said he hosted a similar show at Jacksonville State University years ago while working at the nearby Anniston (Ala.) Star.

Staff Photo by Mark Kennedy/ UTCճ Shawn Ryan hosts a weekly radio show on WUTC about good songs that never became hits.

The aim of the WUTC show is to steer listeners to good music they've never heard, Ryan said. Feedback, so far, has been positive, he noted.

As a former music critic at the Birmingham News, Ryan said he would receive as many as 50 CDs a week from the music labels. An opinionated, self-described "music geek," he would try to guess which singles from those CDs would go on to become hits.

"I'd think, 'This is a great single. It's going to hit big.' And it would flop like a fish on a dock," said a laughing Ryan, a former Chattanooga Times Free Press features editor who now works as an executive writer in the communications and marketing department at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, which operates WUTC-FM.

"I've always loved music. Always," said Ryan, who notes he bought his first stereo at age 12 with savings from a newspaper delivery route. His first LPs were the Beatles' "White Album" and Three Dog Night's "Live at the Forum," he recalled.

In 13 years as a music writer at the Birmingham News, Ryan said, his job included writing CD reviews, covering concerts and interviewing recording artists, including Alabama natives such as Lionel Richie and members of the Temptations soul super group.

He also spent three years operating a music store in Birmingham, before peer-to-peer file-sharing on Napster gutted the record store industry in the 2000s.

Mark Kennedy

One of the joys of selling CDs, Ryan said, was the ability to introduce customers to music unfamiliar to them. It's a mission that still resonates today, he said, as he has mental lists of great songs that never became hits.

"It occurred to me there's a lot of great music out there and only 14 people in the world have heard it," he said. "I thought it deserved to be played."

Ryan said he likes to diversify his weekly radio show with different musical genres, aiming each week for a mix of R&B, rock and Americana songs.

An example of a song that has made the show is "Some Might Say" by the English rock band Oasis. The cut was a No. 1 hit in the United Kingdom but never became popular in the United States despite being released here as a single, Ryan said.

Another Ryan favorite, "Phases of the Moon" by Sonia Dada, was never released in the U.S. as a single, but deserves a shot on any R&B lover's playlist because of its infectious groove, he said.

He says his template for "Greatest Hits You've Never Heard" is: "A good tune, with a good hook, [and] good lyrics." Or, more simply, a song that would make him turn up the volume on his car radio.

The show skews toward baby boomer musical tastes. Ryan said he finds little inspiration in most of today's popular music.

"Stuff that gets played on the radio these days, it doesn't do anything for me. It's technology," Ryan said. "I don't know if there's anybody in the studio instrumentally when people make these records. Today, it's almost the producer of the record that is is the star."

Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645.