Explore Payola through 10+ example sentences from English, with an explanation of the meaning and related words like bribe or payoff. Ideal for language learners, writers and word enthusiasts.
Payola in a sentence
Payola meaning
A bribe given in exchange for a favor, such as one given in exchange for the promotion of goods or services (originally one given to a disk jockey to play a record).
Using Payola
- The main meaning on this page is: A bribe given in exchange for a favor, such as one given in exchange for the promotion of goods or services (originally one given to a disk jockey to play a record).
- Useful related words include: bribe, payoff.
- In the example corpus, payola often appears in combinations such as: payola to, of payola, the payola.
Context around Payola
- Average sentence length in these examples: 26.6 words
- Position in the sentence: 4 start, 10 middle, 6 end
- Sentence types: 20 statements, 0 questions, 0 exclamations
Corpus analysis for Payola
- In this selection, "payola" usually appears in the middle of the sentence. The average example has 26.6 words, and this corpus slice is mostly made up of statements.
- Around the word, congressional, cash, main, investigations, system and became stand out and add context to how "payola" is used.
- Recognizable usage signals include allegations of payola and amount of payola to play. That gives this page its own corpus information beyond isolated example sentences.
- By corpus frequency, "payola" sits close to words such as aaj, aal and aalto, which helps place it inside the broader word index.
Example types with payola
The same corpus examples are grouped by length and sentence type, making it easier to see the contexts in which the word appears:
This is the example of the payola system of government. (10 words)
Labels turned to independent promoters to circumvent allegations of payola. (10 words)
This newer type of payola was an attempt to sidestep FCC regulations. (12 words)
It opens by saying "This one's for you, Alan Freed" and then states "'Cause the things they're doing today would make a saint out of you," implying that Payola corruption is bigger now (or was bigger in the 1980s) than it was in the '50s. (47 words)
If the song is identified before being played as being done because the talent or station is being paid to do so, the playing of the song and acceptance of money to do so is perfectly legal, and does not constitute payola. (42 words)
On a Washington, D.C. radio station in 1999, the disc jockeys announced that they were debuting the Lou Bega song " Mambo Number 5 ", by saying that they had accepted a large amount of payola to play the song. (39 words)
Example sentences (20)
The term Congressional Payola Investigations refers to investigations by the House Subcommittee on Legislative Oversight into payola, the practice of record promoters paying DJs or radio programmers to play their labels' songs.
Aubrey claims UMG used bots and payola to make the five-time Grammy-nominated diss song bigger than it actually is.
This is the example of the payola system of government.
Hamas has been given so many hundreds of millions from the suckers and chumps in Europe and elsewhere, not to mention via the Obama-Kerry Cash Payola to Iran.
In a recent interview he shared experiences of his journey and how payola has penetrated deep in the music industry.
After the initial investigation, radio DJs were stripped of the authority to make programming decisions, and payola became a misdemeanor offense.
Dick Clark 's early career was nearly derailed by a payola scandal, but he avoided trouble by selling his stake in a record company and cooperating with authorities.
EMI remains under investigation. citation citation Concern about contemporary forms of payola prompted an investigation during which the FCC established firmly that the "loophole" was still a violation of the law.
History main "Payola, in one form or another, is as old as the music business." citation In earlier eras there was not much public scrutiny of the reasons songs became hits.
If the song is identified before being played as being done because the talent or station is being paid to do so, the playing of the song and acceptance of money to do so is perfectly legal, and does not constitute payola.
It opens by saying "This one's for you, Alan Freed" and then states "'Cause the things they're doing today would make a saint out of you," implying that Payola corruption is bigger now (or was bigger in the 1980s) than it was in the '50s.
Labels turned to independent promoters to circumvent allegations of payola.
Much early commercial radio was completely freeform; this changed drastically with the payola scandals of the 1950s.
On a Washington, D.C. radio station in 1999, the disc jockeys announced that they were debuting the Lou Bega song " Mambo Number 5 ", by saying that they had accepted a large amount of payola to play the song.
Payola can refer to monetary rewards or other types of reimbursement, and is a tool record labels use to promote certain artists.
Payola was eventually ruled out as a cause of increased sales of particular songs at a company.
Richard Campbell et al, Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication, 2004 Payola to DJs is less of a concern today, as they are rarely involved in choosing the songs.
Since the independent intermediaries were the ones actually paying the stations, it was thought that their inducements did not fall under the "payola" rules, so a radio station need not report them as paid promotions.
The practice is criticized in the chorus of the Dead Kennedys song " Pull My Strings ", a parody of the song "My Sharona" ("My Payola") sung to a crowd of music industry leaders during a music award ceremony.
This newer type of payola was an attempt to sidestep FCC regulations.
Common combinations with payola
These word pairs occur most frequently in English texts:
- payola to 4×
- of payola 4×
- the payola 3×
- and payola 2×
- payola was 2×