(no subject)

[cheekbones3]

After observing the generally dismal performance in quiz music rounds of younger participants, I'm wondering if they are just struggling due to a lack of general musical knowledge (as I did on occasion at that age, although nowhere near that much), or whether the explosion in sources of musical broadcasts, and the one-dimensional nature of many of these sources is meaning that a lot of people are now illiterate to most music outside their own sphere of interest. Conversely, this may always have been the case, but I point to such programmes as "Pick of the Pops" which used to expose me to a lot of older music when I listened to Radio 1 constantly during the eighties, which now has fallen victim to an almost exclusively contemporary playlist, and resides on Radio 2.

(Please bear in mind, this is my usual back-of-envelope thinking, and coherence may only come after I see some results coming in, or at least how uninformative my options are)

And so, a poll!:


[Poll #598249]

Comments

[xquiq.livejournal.com]

It's definitely true that music used to linger in the charts for longer: singles would appear, move up the chart and then slowly make their way back down the chart in the 1980s. Nowadays one would generally expect a single to peak at whatever number it enters the chart at.

I also believe that there was less repitition on the radio, as DJs had more freedom with their playlists than they have nowadays.

[cheekbones3.livejournal.com]

From what I can tell, singles in the last few years have had a much shorter time at the top of the charts, but they linger in the lower numbers, so while they peak immediately usually, (James Blunt a notable exception this year), the overall chart record often remains similar for the biggest hits. Basically, most songs get four weeks of airplay before they are released, whereas this would be their chart-climbing period in the past, so that month of sales is condensed into the first week of sales, so there are a lot of spectacularly high entries with virtually no follow-up sales.

The introduction of the download charts into sales totals has partially restored the charts in some ways - the biggest hits and most popular songs are lingering for a long time in the charts now, more like they used to do (Bodyrockers have now clocked up something like twenty weeks at least for example), and there are a few songs climbing again. Lets hope this trend continues. I think it may well do while the current fashion for singer/songwriters continues, attracting a maturer set of single-buyers.