JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum Pop: Sells Because of What?

Johnny,

Thanks for your input. I sent you a private message. I felt it would be better to continue our discussion privately.

G

If someone had the magic formula, every song would sell lots of records

ALL people can do is get behind a trend or into a genre, and compose something they THINK people want to hear.

IF it gains momentum, it is pushed and pushed and pushed some more, in various incarnations until things move on...all according to the old joke (thanks to our dear friend Bob Young)...who is Bob Young, get me Bob Young, get me someone who sounds like Bob Young, who was Bob Young...

So the answer to the question of why a particular piece of pop sells is because someone likes it, then more people like it, then the serious money backs it and pushes and spreads it and capitalizes on it (sometimes trying to imitate it) until no more money is being made.

YOU may not like it personally, but one person does not a market make.

We've been through this "argument" before and the same arguments go round and round...but the inescapable conclusion is that art is subjective.

Who knows why exactly a trend takes off? There is just a certain "je ne sais quoa" about it that captures people's attention.

We do know that when it does, money rushes in to exploit it as much as it can.

Record companies have been producing general pop songs since before the "chart" type songs began. Aside from obvious novelty songs like "Flying Purple People Eaters", which was by the way recorded by a well known folk musician of the time, Sheb Wooley, most of the junk records were contrived by the studios using studio singers and musicians.

Tony Orlando was a successful record producer in the 60's. He produced and sang a song called "Candida" under the pseudonym of "Dawn". The song became so popular that he later had to create the trio of Tony Orlando and Dawn. Terry Jacks, "Seasons In The Sun" was a studio creation from the 70's. "The Night Chicago Died", "Love grows Where My Rosemary Goes", "Hot Pants", made up bands like "The Grass Roots"..etc. I can go on forever.

The point is that they were all contrived songs, names, and bands, made up by record companies and recorded by "play for hire" musicians to stack the charts.

It's no different today. They use the same MO, only the music today sounds different (and crappier) because of the times.

Not to mess with your general point Ben, but Seasons In The Sun was actually an English translation of a Jacques Brel song...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Jl-R2NhUiI

And your general point is exactly what I am talking about. "Get me someone who sounds like Bob Young"

Yeah John, I heard that the song was offered to The Beach Boy's, but a little too sappy for them.

Still looking for Bob Young.

Cool, didn't know about the Beach Boys connection. Jacks was actually in an earlier band with his wife, Susan, and they had a monster hit, "Which Way You Going Billy" ..so he was "there" before.

To underscore your point, add "Quick Joey Small" by the Kasenetz-Katz Singing Orchestral Circus ...created by record producers Jerry Kasenetz and Jeff Katz...and as I understand it, the Ohio Express was actually their band as well.

I suppose examples could take on a thread of their own

I guess I jumped the gun on Jacks, but you know what my point was. Manufactured session player pop music was rampant in the 70's.

Absolutely. I just knew about Terry Jacks because he's Canadian, and I also knew about Jacques Brel ...

The rest I thought was dead on.

Look at the Archies and Sugar Sugar...you can add that to the list as well

Hey-Hey..there's The Monkeys...heh-heh!

"Pop" is Popular because of Big Exposure and Big SALES...(With Big LUCK, as-well.)

What's a bit sad is there aren't all that many NEW Trends seemingly on the Horizon. Lady Gaga, for all her talent, is JMO Warmed-Over Madonna. (No Biggie, I enjoy hearing/watching Both-of-'Em!) Marilyn Manson's an Alice Cooper Clone..& so-on.

But.."Each Generation sends a hero up the Pop Charts" (Paul Simon..in "Boy in the Bubble")..and..If it's NEW to The Kiddies, It's POPULAR...(Properly-Cloned and Marketed.)

Why bitch about Success?

I enjoy listening to those songs..very nostalgic and marked an era. I don't know if people will find today's manufactured music nostalgic forty years from now.

Ben,

They said the music of the 80's was vapid crap that would be totally forgotten in the future. In Europe, 80's music is the most popular genre format for radio in nearly every country. It is also reflected in a lot of pop music coming out today. As much as you may dislike what is popular today, folks will LOVE it who are 12-25 in 40 years just as people who are 50-70 love what came 40 years ago. You usually love what you grew up with, period. It was the soundtrack of your life, for better or worse. It has less to do with songwriting or production and more to do with nostalgia.

There are a lot of excellent young bands out there today and a lot of manufactured pre fab commercial stuff. But looking back you had the Monkees, a fake band and the Archies, a fake CARTOON band etc. The more things change the more they stay the same.

For me, the 80's had a signature sound because of the mass development of the Synthesizers. The 90's-00's used a lot of Sampler technology (actually I had several in the 80s) and the 00's-current use a lot of vocal technology along with a mixture of styles such as Rap, R&B and Pop which have produced plenty of songs which 50-60 year olds in the future will fondly remember.

We have a brand new phenomena going on which never existed in music before as well. Kids today will have ALL genres in much greater depth to choose their favorites because more than any other generation, kids mix extremely different genres from Death Metal to Country to Rap to Classical Guitar to Celtic to Techno to (name it). It won't just be "pop" music because that's only a tiny sliver of what they have to choose from and since they all have unlimited access to more music than any previous generation, they will more than fondly look back at today's music to mark the greatest times of their lives.

Brian

All recorded music since they went to LP records has been to some extent formula music. From Patti Page/Doris Day to Tony Martin/Tony Bennet, They followed what was selling at the time. If you stretch the point a bit, Mitch Miller was the first super producer, pre-dating Phil Spector.

Most of the early Do-Wop songs all used the same musicians. And as time passed the same could be said for the Philly Sound, The MoTown sound and the Stax sound. All used a core set of musicians. Out on the West Coast you had Carol Kay and Tommy Tedesco and in Nashville Jimmy Capps would be doing 500 sessions a year. You could say it was formula, or it was just a group of musicians that people at that time really enjoyed listening to. I tend to side with the fact that people really enjoyed that group of musician's playing style.

The other day I played my boyfriend a cut from an album I did 30 years ago and compared it to a White Stripes cut. His comment was that their music was danceable and mine wasn't. I was lucky enough to get put together with a well known drummer who wanted to create a Power Duo. I was the newbee and all the others were well seasoned studio people with a heck of a track record. But it just didn't work. It wasn't till I heard the White Stripes that the reason became clear why. Jack White distilled the music to it's most basic while we were to busy trying to show off our musical skills and forgot it's about the song stupid. So it wasn't about how skilled the musicians are or how many hits a producer has had. We weren't listenable and the White Stripes were.

Yeah well, pop was jazz in the 40'ies, rock'n roll in the 50ies, Beatles in the 60ies, Zep ect. in the 70ies, Van Halen in the 80ies, Grunge in the 90ies, electronic music since the 2000s, maybe now it's the DJ wave..

I think what sells depends on what's coming out fresh in a particular decade. It has to do with culture, technology, fashion, discourses ect. Pop is simply just in tune with the times, in sync, in harmony ect. If you get the vibe, you get to jive :-)

Stay tuned to whats happening in the world, pick up the young generations attitudes towards it, and emotional reactions to change.. and write, for it, against it, along with it, anyway you feel should turn out great music..