Part 3: the potion for a hit single.
READING TIME: 20 MINUTES
INTRODUCTION
There are increasing pressures for artists nowadays who are signed to any major music label to guarantee the executives they will consistently make hit songs throughout their career. The more exposure and popularity a song has the more likely the song is to reign a top of the charts more. However, it makes one think 'are there any special ingredients which the longest number one songs of the year have in common which have led them to having a hit single?' This article will explore some of the most common factors which producers, artists and label executives trawl over when trying to formulate a hit song and release it to the public.
i. Song Tempo
Figure 1. A line chart showing the song tempo for the song which was the longest running number one single of that year. The red dotted line follows a trend using the moving average taking account of the last 3 years data points.
The general trend line for song tempo in the 1990s displays an oscillating relationship where the longest number one song’s tempo year by year would vary between very fast and very slow. Whereas if you take the main trend line into account, song tempo over time has in general increased since 1992-to-2014 from 64-to-154 beats per minute (bpm), which is a 140% increase. The rise in tempo (allegro) was likely due to the rise in dance-pop and/or incorporation of more accompaniments of electronica in music which has a faster rhythm than R&B. This is most notable using the moving-average trend line which shows a gradual incline in song tempo in the 1990s and then a slower and more unsteady rise until its peak in 2014-2015. Until 2017, most of the 2010s songs were all above the average tempo of 100 beats per minute. However, since 2014 there has been a dramatic fall in tempo for the longest number one for every consecutive year. This phenomenon is due to the symbiosis between the rise of streaming and the dominance of hip-hop genres which have a much slower rhythm. As the power and influence of streaming increased every year in the 2010s, Billboard kept changing their formula to prioritise the incorporation of streaming and with hip-hop dominating on this platform sonically the pop music landscape has slowed down. Also people may have been burned out by the previous dominance of up-tempo music (Bonnie McKee) [1]. With the rise of social media this decade too, music has become a platform for incorporating sociopolitical ideas to the forefront and a slower tempo reflects the mood of the times we are living in which is slower beats for more lyrical awareness.
ii. Song Dynamics
Figure 2. A line chart showing the decibel level of the song of the longest running number one single of that year. The red line follows a trend using the moving average taking account of the last 3 years data points. The purple circles mean the single that year remains an outlier in comparison to the rest of the data.
To create Figure 2 I used [chords.tv] to collect information on the decibel levels of each song. The figure uses the period where Nielson Soundscan began collecting more accurate data of information for Billboard to show what the most popular song in the United States was that week. The graph shows that since 1992 the ‘loudness' of music decreased during the 1990s reaching its 'quietest' period at the point of the millennium. This trend was probably to do with the rise in more upbeat genres such as latin rock or dance pop and a reduction in R&B ballads (a staple during the 1990s). However, during this decrease there was a year-by-year oscillation period where one year the longest number one would be an R&B ballad and the following year would be a dance-themed song. Then during the 2000s the song dynamics began to increase again. Using the data it suggests that the more vocal-dependent a song was the greater the song’s dynamics were and Mariah Carey’s We Belong Together in 2005 (and Drake’s God’s Plan in 2018) being indicative of this. Their commanding and unique voices and tones may be partly the reason their songs stayed atop for so long. As the 2000s progressed into the 2010s the rise of dance music and EDM contributed to a decrease in 'loudness' with its lowest recording was in 2010 (Ke$ha - Tik Tok) at -3dB. With time a song’s instrumental production took priority in its recording over the vocal performance, which contributed to the song dynamics decreasing. From 2014 to 2019 there was a significant oscillation period where the decibel level kept increasing and decreasing several decibel levels every year. During this 28 year period, only one song was found to be an outlier which was Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You which was recorded at -12dB. This is highlighted on the Figure as purple circles which is both the first data point on the main trend line and the moving-average trend line. To compare, its recording is nine-fold times greater than Tik Tok which highlights the strength and significance of Houston’s vocal prowess. A further investigation would involve looking at Billboard data since 1958, rather than just from 1992. This investigation could help highlight whether these present findings based on genre or vocal-dependence is similar or whether different music periods in time have different relationships with respect to the longest number one song that year’s song dynamics.
iii. Song Length
Figure 3. A line chart showing the length of the song of the longest running number one single of that year. The red dotted line follows a trend using the moving average taking account of the last 3 years data points. The orange circle in 2019 means the single that year remains an outlier in comparison to the rest of the data.
The relationship over time is that there is an oscillating period from 1992 to 2003 where the song length decreases and increases every few years until it reaches its peak length in 2003 at 5 minutes 40 seconds. While there is no obvious relationship until 2018, Figure 3 shows that after the slow increase in song length until 2003 there is a more noticeable relationship when looking at the moving-average trend line after this. It shows that every 4 years the longest number one of the year’s song length increases or decreases until it reaches its peak or trough and then abruptly changes in the opposite direction. This could be due to the change in genres every few years due to a changing pop music landscape and once a song genre gains popularity to capture the consumer’s attention other artists compete for their song to be the most popular which means the song (depending on the genre) gets even longer or even shorter. However, since 2015 the song length of the longest number one every year has been consistently decreasing. It reached its lowest point of 130 seconds in 2019 with Old Town Road and it an outlier compared to the rest of the data (this song length is the average of the Old Town Road original recording and Billy Ray Cyrus remix which both contributed to its charting). The reason why songs have been getting shorter is due to multiple reasons. Due to streaming optimisation, the contemporary instant gratification culture and more song choice availability there is more competition to fight for the shorter attention spans of today’s consumers. This means shorter songs gain more interest for consumers to listen to an artist’s song and maybe then their other works. Also streaming is 75% of the music industry’s overall revenue and because reports indicate that royalty rates given to artists are not as high as they had in the past shorter songs mean artists will get more replays on streaming platforms which increase their revenue. Overall this means that today an artistically-challenged 150 second song holds the same economic and charting value as a well-crafted but longer song. Furthermore if the artist has built up a big enough fan base by releasing short songs this can leave the fans craving for more songs to be created by this artist.
A further investigation would be by looking at individual charts such as rock, country, R&B, dance to see if the general trend applies to these individual genres. Or to even look at valence [positivity] and word length in title.
iv. Song Label
Figure 4. A pie chart showing which label the performer of the longest running number one single of the year was signed to.
Figure 4 shows a pie chart which shows the main record label and distributor the longest number one song of the year was released by. It must be stated that as time went by smaller labels were merged and/or acquired by other record labels until they were mostly absorbed into the Big 3 record labels: Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment and Warner Bros Records. These include Arista who released ‘I Will Always Love You’ (1992), Virgin who released ’That’s The Way Love Goes’ (1993) and Motown who released ‘I’ll Make Love To You’ (1994). This means that the chart is not entirely accurate but it only shows the strength of the top acquisition parent labels today. Figure 7 shows that since 1992 music released through labels in both Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment have shared the same number of longest number ones of the year. When looking at individual labels there is no specific relationship for dominance because for 2-to-3 years Sony Music reign atop and then the same happens to Universal Music Group some years later. The 6.7% of Warner Bros, under Atlantic Records, comes from ‘The Boy Is Mine’ (1998) and ‘Low’ (2008). On another note, Columbia Records, through Sony Music, has released 9 out of 28 songs for the longest running number one of the year which is the most successful label in this accolade. RCA, Arista and Interscope follow behind with 3 songs each. Taking the longest running number ones of all time (since Nielsen Soundscan), ‘One Sweet Day’ and its successor ‘Old Town Road (Remix)’ was released under Columbia Records too which showcases the labels strength and dominance to be willing to keep a song at the top for a long period of time. Meanwhile ‘Despacito’ was released under Universal Music Group (Latin). A further investigation could look at the longest number ones and see which labels the song’s main competitors were trying to get the top spot.
v. Artist Gender
Figure 5. A chart showing the gender of the artist who had the longest running number of the year. The top half which is pink represents female artists. A large pink circle represents the song was sung by a solo female, a small pink circle represents a female singing in a duet. A light pink circle represents an all-female group. A pink diamond represents a featured female artist. Lastly any black circle around a pink dot means that the song had a female as a lead artist. Similarly the bottom half of the chart represents male artists. A large dark blue circle represents that the song was performed by a solo male. A light blue circle represents an all-male group. A small blue circle represents a male singing in a duet or group performance. A black circle represents a male artist who had sung as a lead artist. A blue diamond represents a featured male artist. Lastly the yellow dots represent a male-female duet/group.
Figure 5 is a chart which shows the type of artist who has held the longest number one of the year and has been categorised by gender and whether the performer was a solo artist (entirely solo or a lead or featured artist) or as a group. Since the introduction of Nielsen Soundscan, females have appeared 16 times on the longest number ones of the year. 8 of these have been solo appearances, 3 of these have been as a lead artist with a male feature, 1 is in an appearance in a male-female duet, 1 is a female-female duet, 1 is an all-female group, 1 is in a male-female group and 1 appearance is as a featured artist with a male duo. In contrast males have appeared 32 times which is double the amount of appearances as females. They have appeared 5 times as solo appearances, 6 times as a lead artist (four times feature 1 male artist and 2 times feature 2 male artists), 1 is in an appearance in a male-female duet, 1 is a male-male duet with a male featured artist, 1 is a male-group featuring a female artist, 4 times as an all-male group and once in a male-female group. Three females make 2 appearances on this chart and they are Mariah Carey, Beyonce (3 if including Destiny’s Child) and Rihanna. Whereas there are only two male artists who make 2 appearances; they are Boyz II Men, as a group, and Pharrell Williams, as a solo artist. On a positive note all five artists are made up of people of colour.
Males have been dominating this decade’s longest number ones for almost every year because the ratio of male:female appearances in the 2010s is 15:4. In the 2000s this was 11:7 and in the 1990s this was 6:6. Numerically this means that female appearances have decreased from 50% to 39% to 21% with each passing decade. This decline might become even more apparent as we move into the 2020s. They reflect that gender diversity may not be as prominent (for the top spot at least) today as we might have thought despite hit makers like Cardi B, Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Katy Perry and Adele making big strides for female representation on the Hot 100 number one spot. This is probably due to the song genres which reign atop the longest tend to be in dance, rap or funk which is overwhelmingly male dominated. It’s also noticeable that while the 1990s most performers were credited as a solo artist or a group, whereas the 2010s is much more collaboration-driven with 60% of this decade’s longest number one’s of the year have been collaborations. Due to increased competition to breakout in the industry, collaborations with artists from different genres provide exposure to an artist to another consumer group who may not have discovered them based on their solo material alone.
A further investigation into this would be to look at the age of the artist (by gender) and the time the artist had been in the industry when releasing the single to see if this plays a part into their chart-reigning periods.
CONCLUSION
Overall it seems that keeping a song atop of the charts is a multifactorial process and the song has to adapt to or stay ahead of the curve of the evolving trends of its time. Also external factors come into play such as the musical and political scene in society at the song’s time of release which may play a part in having a single’s success for longevity, which is where meme hits have taken a priority for 2010 songs to hit big. Also we must take account of the artist’s career trajectory and musical evolution they embark upon and how this is, especially where the single sits in their career, marketed to the public. For example ‘One Sweet Day’ and ‘I Will Always Love You’ were released at the commercial peak of each respective singer’s careers. Other than that? - sometimes an artist is just lucky that the public has taken kindly to the song and are willing to embrace that song of that time, whether till it burns out or has everlasting longevity.
