Music Genre and Instrument Trends by Rick Beato

striker

Well-known Member
Rick Beato Has posted a very interesting clip about trends in music genres and instruments.
According to the data that he is using, Country and Rock are rising.
Use of Drums as an instrument in music is holding steady. Guitars are rising in usage.





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This is really cool. Thanks for posting it! I have a few thoughts:

- It's good to see country music on the upswing (even though what's considered "country" anymore is really a big debate).

- I can't really speak to trends right now. I just looked at Spotify top 50 for today, and I only recognized 10 of the artists and absolutely none of the songs.

- I'd bet that foul language decline is a direct result of the decline in hip hop music (but I could be very wrong about my assumption.)

- In any case, I love the fact that people are starting to pick up real instruments again.
 
This is really cool. Thanks for posting it! I have a few thoughts:

- It's good to see country music on the upswing (even though what's considered "country" anymore is really a big debate).

- I can't really speak to trends right now. I just looked at Spotify top 50 for today, and I only recognized 10 of the artists and absolutely none of the songs.

- I'd bet that foul language decline is a direct result of the decline in hip hop music (but I could be very wrong about my assumption.)

- In any case, I love the fact that people are starting to pick up real instruments again.
What's considered "foul language" is really a big debate too. It's been in rock, jazz, blues, etc. since the beginning...
 
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What's considered "foul language" is really a big debate too. It's been in rock, jazz, blues, etc. since the beginning...

While this is true, I'm talking about the foul language that Rick is talking about in the video that would influence that stats. I agree with what you are saying though.
 
I'll have to check it out.

I have two teenage boys, and the music they listen to is all computer generated with an occasional guitar. It's weird to me that they don't have any favorite bands. They just mostly listen to video game soundtracks and music inspired by video game soundtracks.

But I guess that is their music "rebellion" against Dad and all his listening to real bands.
 
watched this earlier as well. While thoroughly enjoy all the different takes Rick beings to viewers, I did find this one interesting data wise.
 
I don't think drums will ever go out of style. Personally I gravitated towards the drums because of the physicality of the instrument. I played sports and drums just seemed kinda natural. I once read that George Thorogood said the first time he held a guitar it felt so natural it scared him. Kinda how I felt... without the fear. And I think young guys are naturally aggressive so many will continue to select drums as their instrument of choice.
 
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I think this analysis just mirrors the issues that Billboards have. A few years ago, when streaming came out, it turned out that people were listening to country all along.

EG the popularity of guitars or drums hasn't really changed all that much. Just the push marketing hype is less believable than it used to be.

Personally, I've tried to acquire a taste for hiphop/rap and outside of a few songs, its just poetry. Meh. I highly doubt it was all that popular to begin with. Even now the results are likely skewed by some inner-city crowd, that consumes a large amount of music.
 
Personally, I've tried to acquire a taste for hiphop/rap and outside of a few songs, its just poetry. Meh. I highly doubt it was all that popular to begin with. Even now the results are likely skewed by some inner-city crowd, that consumes a large amount of music.
Meaning no offense, but rap and hip hop are two of the most popular styles around the globe. I mean literally everywhere—China, Japan, Brazil, England, the entire continent of Africa, etc. Kpop is heavily rap/hiphop based and its global fans are in the multi millions and very enthusiastic. Billboard says BTS alone has 300 million fans, and they have rap in most of their tunes. It's likely that you interact with a very small bubble of people that are the exception (and that bubble includes the DW demographic).
 
He says 90's music was longer because there was no internet to distract everyone. Then how can he explain musics' under 3 minute averages in the 50's? Sorry, I'm a slight, under-appreciator of Beato. No hate. Just a small critic. ☮️
 
The source of all this data is from a company called Chartcipher. If I am reading this correctly, I think this data only covers trends in USA since he says Country music is on the rise.
 
He says 90's music was longer because there was no internet to distract everyone. Then how can he explain musics' under 3 minute averages in the 50's?
Capitalism. Radio stations were unlikely to play a song longer than 3:30, and if you could keep it to around 2:45, they'd give you even more spins. And unlike the payola scandals, I don't think they even tried to hide that policy. That's why "Like a Rolling Stone" and "Hey Jude" were such big deals at the time.
 
Capitalism. Radio stations were unlikely to play a song longer than 3:30, and if you could keep it to around 2:45, they'd give you even more spins. And unlike the payola scandals, I don't think they even tried to hide that policy. That's why "Like a Rolling Stone" and "Hey Jude" were such big deals at the time.
That still doesn't explain the discrepancy between 50's music's top 40's song's lengths and the 90's equivalents. There was capitalism in both decades. And btw, payola has NEVER ceased to exist. We even talked about it in my music business school back around 2008. I just think it's a stupid thing for Beato to blame "the internet" for something that happened in the 2010's that ALSO happened in the 50's. That's all. 🤷‍♂️
 
Meaning no offense, but rap and hip hop are two of the most popular styles around the globe. I mean literally everywhere—China, Japan, Brazil, England, the entire continent of Africa, etc. Kpop is heavily rap/hiphop based and its global fans are in the multi millions and very enthusiastic. Billboard says BTS alone has 300 million fans, and they have rap in most of their tunes. It's likely that you interact with a very small bubble of people that are the exception (and that bubble includes the DW demographic).
Just saying, the results were skewed by billboard marketing before. I doubt they are close to accurate now. My points of observation A) MC'ing on a mic isn't all that entertaining("I'm here to rap at ya, check out the rhyme of the words I wrote") B) I don't see MC performances in my neighborhood.

A suburb of DC should have plenty of access to hiphop.
 
Then how can he explain musics' under 3 minute averages in the 50's? ☮️
Wasn't that also due to the very limited duration of the recording medium - 45 rpm singles? I wasn't alive, but I believe the 33 1/3 rpm long-playing album didn't come out until the early 1960s, right? Stereo around 1970? (Apologies if I've got my facts wrong.)
 
Wasn't that also due to the very limited duration of the recording medium - 45 rpm singles? I wasn't alive, but I believe the 33 1/3 rpm long-playing album didn't come out until the early 1960s, right? Stereo around 1970? (Apologies if I've got my facts wrong.)
 

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Beyonce just did a country song. Dolly Parton just did a rock record. Attention spans are shorter now, but on the opposite of that ironically is that people are also sticking around longer on YT vids they find interesting..like this one. I think the early thoughts when youtube started was that your vid couldn't be over 5 min since no one cared that much. Turns out they care if you have something to say, or it's educational etc. Light My Fire had an a.m. radio edit that took out the solos to get it shorter.

And recently I found out My Sharona had a version with a really long guitar solo, but that version tends not to get played. It's a minute longer I think. And ironically I heard the long version in a supermarket which is where you'd think only the short one would get played. Here's the long version. It goes on and on. It's like "wow! they're goin around again"

 
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