Flipping through the radio the other day, my scanning landed on a top 40 station. I decided to leave it there for a while to check out today’s hot hits. Without sounding like Grampa Simpson, I found the exercise disheartening. Was it my imagination, or did almost every song have a sameness to it in terms of production, tempo, timbre and vocal performance?
I decided to listen a little longer. Sadly, the more I listened, the stronger my initial impression.
This wasn’t the top 40 of my youth, a time when all sorts of different music made the charts. I randomly went back through the years and ended up with a list of the biggest singles in May 1985. The number one song that month was Don’t You (Forget About Me) by Simple Minds, followed by Everything She Wants by Wham! and Madonna’s Crazy for You. Also getting substantial airplay that month were Walkin’ On Sunshine from Katrina and the Waves, Smooth Operator from Sade, and Don’t Come Around Here No More by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.
I tried again with May 1980 and found even more variety and sonic textures. The biggest hits that month were Call Me by Blondie, Funkytown by Lipps Inc., and Ride Like the Wind by Christopher Cross. A little further down the chart, we had Another Brick in the Wall (Part II) from Pink Floyd, Workin’ My Way Back to You Girl from The Spinners and The Seduction, the sax-heavy James Last instrumental from the American Gigolo soundtrack.
By comparison, today’s big pop hits are simplistic and unoriginal. What’s behind the obvious homogeneity of today’s pop songs? I gave it a good think and here’s what I came up with.
Songwriting by committee
Record labels are risk-averse. No one wants to invest money in a song that’s going to be a stiff. To reduce that, multiple writers are brought in, each with their own specialty: beats, lyrics, topline melodies, instrumentation, programming and arrangement. Drake’s new Iceman album features dozens of writers and producers for its 18 tracks. When you have that many people working on a musical project, individuality goes out the window.
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Insistence on perfection with the recording process
Artists and producers are obsessed with making sure each record is perfect in every single way. Tempo is quantized to the nanosecond with no variation in speed whatsoever, meaning there is zero swing in the beat. Everything sounds robotic. With no live musicians jamming together in the studio, there’s no hope of locking into a groove. Compare any of today’s hits with the Motown classics of the ’60s and ’70s and you’ll hear it instantly.
Vocals are pitch corrected so that each note is unnaturally bang on. Many instrumental arrangements are electronically generated, devoid of the feel that comes with playing a real instrument. The result is something so polished as to sound unreal.
Where are all the bands?
A spin through this week’s Billboard Top 100 reveals exactly two hits from groups: Swim from BTS and Freakin’ Out from Dexter and the Moonrocks. The other 98 songs are from solo singers, although some feature guest vocals from another solo singer. Rock and pop groups, which once dominated top 40 radio, have been banished. In the first half of the 2020s, there were only three weeks on the British charts when a band held the number one spot. Why? Several reasons.
Streaming royalties are meagre. With multiple songwriters already taking their cut, it’s easier to just have only one principal artist. Home recording technology has advanced so much that it’s possible to create a hit record by yourself in your bedroom. A single person is easier to promote on social media, especially with TikTok and Instagram. Meanwhile, fewer bands are chasing corporate mainstream top 40 glory. Most pursue careers in their own niches, such as alternative, metal, hip-hop, and so on.
Singers are designed to be stars first, artists second
I blame TV talent shows like American Idol. The overriding goal for many of those pursuing a top 40 hit is fame, not being recognized as a musician and artist. They follow the method laid down by super-producer hit machines such as Sweden’s Max Martin. He literally has a mathematical formula for writing and producing songs and it has resulted in hits for everyone from Backstreet Boys, Britney Spears, The Weeknd, Lizzo, Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber, NSYNC and, yes, Taylor Swift. Who’s going to argue with that kind of success?
Songs are written to game streaming rules and technology
No one gets paid for a stream unless someone listens to a song for at least 30 seconds. Every song is now written with that in mind. That means shorter intros, putting the choruses up front and jamming as many sugary hooks into that first 30 seconds as possible to bring a listener over that finish line.
Everyone is using the same plug-ins for songwriting and production
In the olden days, an artist would set up in a recording studio and spend days, weeks, months experimenting with getting the right sounds. Bruce Springsteen spent days just trying to get the right snare drum sound from Max Weinberg’s kit during the sessions for Born to Run. The Beatles’ catalogue is loaded with happy accidents discovered while messing around in Studio 2 at Abbey Road. The feedback that leads off I Feel Fine is just one example. It happened when John Lennon absent-mindedly leaned his guitar against an amp. This was probably the first use of controlled feedback on a recording.
Today, artists and producers rely on plug-ins for digital audio programs like Pro Tools and Logic. Need a guitar sound like it’s coming from a Marshall stack? Get the plug-in. Looking to emulate a snare drum sound? Get a plug-in. Can’t afford a real Bösendorfer grand piano? Get a plug-in. No need to go messing about in a studio for hundreds of dollars a day. Just buy the sound you want off the shelf and mess with it a little. And don’t get me started on overuse of samples.
So, yes, top 40 isn’t what it used to be and it’s unlikely to return to the old days when it was supposed to be an across-the-board survey of all the hit songs in all the popular genres. Is it any wonder that people are gravitating toward older songs?
Of all the music streamed in the U.S. and Canada, 50 per cent are older than five years. It also explains why your 14-year-old is spending time with Nirvana and The Cure.
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