Modern Rock Tracks

Modern Rock Tracks is a music chart that has appeared in Billboard magazine since September 10 1988. It lists the forty most-played songs on modern rock radio, most of which are alternative rock songs. The chart was introduced as a companion to the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart and its creation was prompted by the explosion of alternative music on American radio in the late 1980s.

Modern Rock Tracks is solely based on radio airplay and it is a component chart of the Hot 100. As of 2006, approximately eighty radio stations are electronically monitored 24 hours a day, seven days a week by Nielsen Broadcast Data Systems. Songs are ranked by a calculation of the total number of spins per week with its "audience impression," which is based upon exact times of airplay and each station's Arbitron listener data.

Many rock artists do not release commercial singles in the U.S. Several popular songs which were not released as commercial singles did not qualify for the Hot 100 before December 1998, but performed very well on the Modern Rock Tracks chart.

During the first several years of Modern Rock Tracks, the chart featured music that did not receive commercial radio airplay anywhere but on Modern Rock radio stations. This included many electronic and post-punk artists. Gradually, as alternative rock became more "mainstream" (particularly spearheaded by the grunge rock explosion in the early 1990s), the Modern Rock Tracks and Mainstream Rock Tracks charts became more and more similar, both featuring a lot of the same songs.

The current number one song on Modern Rock Tracks (for the week ending July 22 2006) is "Dani California" by Red Hot Chili Peppers.

Chart trivia

The first number one song on the Modern Rock Tracks chart was "Peek-A-Boo" by Siouxsie and the Banshees.
Red Hot Chili Peppers are the act with the most number-one songs on this chart, with nine. Green Day and U2 are tied in second place with eight number-ones each.
Artists with the most cumulative weeks at number one:

Red Hot Chili Peppers (72)

Green Day (39)

Linkin Park (35)

R.E.M. (31) (tie)

U2 (31) (tie)

"What's the Frequency, Kenneth?" by R.E.M. (1994) and "Dani California" by Red Hot Chili Peppers (2006) are the only two songs to debut at number one on this chart.
No specific act has replaced themselves at number one on Modern Rock Tracks, although when "All My Life" by Foo Fighters replaced "You Know You're Right" by Nirvana on November 23 2002, this gave back-to-back chart-toppers to musician Dave Grohl.
Linkin Park's 2003 album Meteora has generated the most number-one Modern Rock hits (five), totalling thirty cumulative weeks.