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Posted by: popchartfreak May 15 2017, 06:19 PM

Music Week have a article stating simple facts: of the top 100 singles (as per official charts) last year, only FOUR tracks had the artist or band as the sole writers of the song (and two of them were one band).

The average for the entire top 100 is around 4 and a half writers, some as many as 8. What happens is record companies bring in professional songwriters with track records to "assist" their acts, be they Adele, Sheeran, X Factor acts, Chainsmokers, Katy Perry and so on.

We just had a Eurovision winner written by the sister of the winner. Are the comments of the winner fair?

Now, I love pop and all forms of music, and am aware the music biz runs in cycles, rocknroll followed by clean teen idols, British invasion/hippie/rock followed by mid-70's teeny pop, New Wave/Punk/New Romatics followed by late 80's SAW and teenpop, Britpop followed by late 90's teenpop/Max Martin-era. And so on. So are we actually living in the most-controlled era of music ever (given those stats above) or are the professionals giving the otherwise-less-impressive songwriting talents of popstars a much-needed sheen and professionalism?

Posted by: Suedehead2 May 16 2017, 05:26 PM

The BBC have produces their own version of the article (although they haven't added the original MW writer's name to the byline).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-39934986

It does sometimes seem that a passing office worker who suggests changing a word or adding a single ding on the triangle can end up being added to the credited writers

Posted by: popchartfreak May 17 2017, 12:59 PM

interesting that they went and got some new quotes from professionals - presumably why they can not credit the original writer.

My own take on it (since no-one is lining up to comment what with my sticking in the wrong Lounge thread by mistake! ) is that having "writing schools" and a pool of professional writers is that it begins to sound like a homogenous sound and individuality/innovation goes out the window as everyone chases that Spotify sound. Not too slow, not too loud, not too fast, just middling EDM beats on vaguely Tropical rhythms and annoying autotune or tiddly-bit noises. Anyone who manages to break the mould, like Rag'n'Bone Man, and grab a big hit is doing exceptionally well. The irony is... yes he uses co-writer professionals too. They all do.

Acts who manged to get a top 100 single without using other writers in 2016:

Mike Posner
Calvin Harris (and he often uses co-writers, or writes for others)
Twenty One Pilots (twice).

So, there you have it - only one against-the-odds did-it-alone dance act (Mike Posner) and only one traditional rockband act. Sounds like Record Companies sucking up to Spotify to me. Time for another music revolution to shake things up a bit?

Posted by: Suedehead2 May 17 2017, 02:00 PM

And Rag 'n' Bone Man then found himself plagiarised by a Eurovision entry

Posted by: Liаm May 17 2017, 02:49 PM

I did a sociology essay recently and one of the works I read for it was Adorno who said, paraphrasing, popular music was merely a product and basically wheeled out on a conveyor belt to please the masses. This was in the 50s iirc but I think it does somewhat ring true now. Well, if you read his stuff he's very dismissive and it's not ALL music, but it is interesting in the wake of this. There was something else I read about Berry Gord who said that Motown as a brand should be as clean and uniform in its production as cars coming off a conveyor belt. I don't think it's necessarily as negative as Adorno makes out because there's for example Julia Michael and Justin Tranter who are two of the go to pop songwriters and haven't put a foot wrong imo. But when it gets to the same old trends, lyrics and drops to get a hit, it does get frustrating. There is definitely a formula to getting a fairly easy hit nowadays, so a lot of people follow it. At the moment it's probably tropical and future bass

Posted by: Klaus May 17 2017, 03:15 PM

This is very much a big issue but its actually about the Top 100 biggest selling singles of last year rather than ANY single that reached the Top 100! I don't think things are that bad yet

Posted by: popchartfreak May 17 2017, 07:39 PM

Yes I meant "of the year" or else I would be able to single out regular top 100 hits like, ooh well, I'm SURE there MUST be others who just dont spring to mind

Posted by: fiesta May 18 2017, 12:27 PM

Surely in an era of Hip hop R&B and DJ 's -dance that dominate the charts. These genres rely heavily on samples, which in most cases end up with the writers of the sample being given a writers credit. Also for instance if Charlie Puth writes a song, and wants a rap included in it, he brings in say Jay-z who writes a rap to be included in it, he gets a writers credit, or if he wants it to have a club dance feel to it he brings in Calvin Harris who then has a writing credit for the new dance arrangement. I think its inevitable that they are going to be more than one or two songwriters involved in a hit in the modern era.

I think singer songwriters like Adele, Charlie Puth and Ed Sheeran are capable of writing a song by themselves or with one other person. I know Ed Sheeran did on his debut album but for subsequent albums when he has wanted to have a different feel other songwriters have been used, i.e second album Pharell Williams to give him an R&B feel, this current album Steve Mac for a more dance pop feel