Billboard: CD Singles vs. Maxi-Singles ?

I was always confused about this, too. I was under the
impression that a "Maxi-Single" was multiple versions of
the same song with another song occasionally thrown in.
But I think someone else told me back in the 90's that
any single with more than two songs is a Maxi-Single,
regardless of if it's multiple versions of the same song
or different songs. So I'm also not sure what the deal
was with them.

On Discogs, many years ago, we had these kind of discussions after it started becoming evident that we all had different impressions of what these terms mean, and that there was no rhyme or reason to what gets called a 12", a Single, a Maxi-Single, an EP, or a Mini-Album/Mini-LP. Even 'album' is hard to nail down a strict definition for.

If you look at charts, catalog numbers & price codes, official websites/discographies, text on the releases themselves, press kits... none of it is consistent. It's all just marketing. The same track selection will be called different things depending on where & when it was released, or who was saying it. So you may think you have some kind of rule worked out based on duration, content, or physical configuration, but then on Discogs you can look at gobs of releases, way more than most collectors have ever had physical access to, and you find there are counterexamples, tons of 'em.

This led to the creation of the infamous guideline 6.10, requiring many of those 'format tags' to have to be justified by text on the release... so if it calls itself Maxi something, then it's OK to use the Maxi-Single tag ... or the tag can be justified by the exact item being mentioned in a chart or official publication as such, arbitrary as that ultimately is.

As for the OP's question, I would assume either Billboard had their own definition, or they just relied on what they were told by the record companies.

Edited by mjb50

There were several songs marked with a (V) that doesn't actually exist...and there were quite a few with no (V) where one does exist. I'm sure the same is true with the other formats as well.

Probably the best example of that is the "Who Said I Would" Live Version by Phil Collins which Billboard listed with a (C) for its supposed availability
on Cassette Single. To date, I don't think anyone anywhere has ever actually seen a copy of it although it was issued on a Promo CD Single.

Which brings me to my next querie: did labels really make any profit releasing some songs on SIX formats? It just doesn't make sense to me that so many would be needed for ONE hit single.

I don't know about how they profited from it, but I would guess the multi-format thing happened at least in part because the labels figured there were
vinyl buyers, cassette buyers and CD buyers. I'll assume each configuration was targeted for specific buyers. I myself was a big buyer of Cassette
Singles from the late 80's to the mid-90's, and obviously I was slow to get on board with CD Singles as were many other people. From what I understand,
Cassette Singles were outselling Vinyl 45's by the early 90's, which might explain why some songs were available only in that format and not others. By
the late 90's it seemed to pretty much be CD Singles and not much else, as I noticed I was barely seeing Cassette Singles in stores anymore and Vinyl
had also seemed to disappear a few years earlier.

So in short, I'd guess that at the beginning of the decade, there was a market for the various formats because not everyone had made the transition from
Vinyl/Cassette to CD. By the end of it, it was obvious that the CD Single was the biggest seller, so much so to the point that labels were either
putting out limited pressings of them or in some cases none at all because of concern about them cannibalizing album sales.

2) Not letting "Into The Groove" chart. It WAS released commercially on the flip of the "Angel" 12". They suspiciously let it chart on the 'Hot Black Singles' chart which had the exact same charting rules at that time. It certainly was a large airplay hit, plus it propelled the "Angel" 12" to Gold (Million Seller) status at a time when her 12" singles were selling only moderately.

I always wondered why they didn't put ITG on the chart since it was still technically released on a commercial single. I don't know if it would have made
much of a difference as far as chart positions, though. I think in 1985, Billboard was still listing two-sided hits together as one listing, which
probably would have meant that it would have appeared on the chart as "Angel/Into The Groove". It had alot of airplay in my area as well, but does anyone
know how (or if?) it performed on the Airplay Chart? I ask because I think Bon Jovi's "Never Say Goodbye" was the first song to reach the Top 40 on the
Airplay chart a few years after ITG without being commercially released as a single. So obviously, "Into The Groove" must have peaked below #40 in
Airplay if that's true about the Bon Jovi song. That's why I sometimes wonder if a commercial single would have propelled it very high on the chart, if
it didn't have enough points to make the Airplay chart.

Dan, because it didn't qualify for the Hot 100, Billboard
didn't even allow "Into The Groove" on to their Top 40
Airplay chart at the time. If they had, it surely
would've charted fairly high. By the time that Bon Jovi
song came along, they had obviously changed their policy.