The Payola scandal involved (as this cover implies) the effort by record companies to bribe deejays to play their records. It hit the newspapers in November 1959; this is the April 1960 issue of Archie. In something of a rarity for Archie at the time, the cover actually refers to a story inside, where the kids at Riverdale High pay Archie to spin their records.
I don't see anything wrong with payola. Playing a song on the radio is little more than an advertisement for the album, so why shouldn't an ad be paid for?
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