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Cash Box was a weekly magazine dedicated to the
music and jukebox industries published from July
1942 to November 1996.
An alternative to Billboard Magazine, Cash Box
included regional chart data, hit songs by city,
radio station, and record sales, popularity by
jukebox, and charts by genre including country and
R&B music. Initially,
Cash Box listed songs with artist and label
information, alphabetized by label, making it easier
to track the impact of specific labels on the music
scene. It also featured news of tours, insider
gossip, album summaries, and photographs found
nowhere else, as well as stories on thousands of
singers, bands, and musicians, both famous and not
so famous, rising stars and fading meteors,
long-time stars and one-hit wonders. Later issues
included sections for Canada, Great Britain,
Belgium, Holland, Japan, Mexico, and other foreign
countries.
In addition to the information about music and
albums, the magazine also included information about
the jukebox industry and coin machines in general.
Some music industry analysts believed that,
because Cash Box based its charts and content on the
music played on jukeboxes, rather than radio, it
covered the music interests of a less affluent
clientele and a different demographic.
In the
magazine's early years, not everyone was able to
afford a radio. But many of them did frequent places
of entertainment and social interaction that had
jukeboxes. These places were located in inner
cities, rural communities, small towns, and ethnic
enclaves. Consequently, Cash Box is sometimes
considered to include information about
under-documented communities that are not available
in other, similar sources.But, by September 23,
1978, Cash Box had added radio airplay into its
charting calculations. From that date, a lightening
bolt symbol was used to indicate high radio airplay.
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