I should note that personalities like Ron Bennington have gone on the record you used to be able to promote bands even up until the early 2000s and so on as long as you were *ahem* given incentive to play those albums and songs on the air among other things...until one little goody two shoes by the name of Eliot Spitzer put an end to that while he was New York's Attorney General saying that "the radio industry was misappropriating funds" and that "everything must be accounted for" especially when it came to the prizes and such that the radio industry gave out. Which of course meant that other states and the radio stations across the country had to follow suit. So bye bye under the table cash payments to play music. Enjoy listening to Panama by Van Halen for the umpteenth time as the record industry wonders why none of their new artists are making them any money.
In the universe finding a hilarious way for karmic justice to do its job, Spitzer got his comeuppance in the end when he was busted for being part of the Emperor's Club sting in 2008.
