Just my two cents... Most of the male artists mentioned here have the urban/rhythmic backing them too. For instance Drake (33 years old) will most likely soon hit the point when pop radio is more reluctant to play his music but urban/rhythmic will continue supporting him for at least a decade no matter what he puts out. Chris Brown seems to be in that phase now.
For pop artists like Gaga, Taylor, Maroon 5 etc, once they lose the "top ten on pop support" the only way to find broader audience is to become AC staples and even then the airplay numbers are smaller than with urban backing. I think it's fair to say that urban-esque male artists are the ones that benefit the current airplay system the most.
the same holds true for Beyonce. That ho can't get a Top 10 on Pop, either, or really even close to it anymore. Not that she tries, but she isn't an automatic crossover anymore.
Post by Devil Marlena Nylund on Apr 28, 2020 14:45:47 GMT -5
Interestingly with Beyonce, her untouchable status as the queen of everything really kicked into high gear after she stopped being able to get top 10 pop hits. She’s thrived even without pop radio.
Interestingly with Beyonce, her untouchable status as the queen of everything really kicked into high gear after she stopped being able to get top 10 pop hits. She’s thrived even without pop radio.
Beyonce can get a top 10 pop hit if she really wants too, but shes choosing to sell albums instead. Lady Gaga is still trying to get pop hits, because Stupid Love had a radio deal on its opening day and got great updates during its first 3 weeks. It hit a brick wall when it got to the top 15.
Isn't that mostly an issue with stans and not the general public though? Female popstar stans are the ones pushing the narrative of "comeback, reinvent, promote," male popstar stans generally don't care. Maroon 5 doesn't have to reinvent themselves because their general audience doesn't give a s**t, on the other side of the coin if Gaga is making the same thing she did before then the stans talk about it "flopping" because it was the same s**t as always and nothing different. Then when she does something different a la Joanne the stans blame it on being too different.
I'm not saying there isn't sexism in the music industry, because there is, but I think the big argument on female artists having to reinvent themselves and have huge comebacks mostly falls on the stans for pushing that narrative. Look at Dua Lipa, stans made fun of her dancing and stage presence and once she "improved" that and came back and reinvented herself it was highly praised by them. I assure you Post Malone doesn't have the same issue, but that's not societies fault that's the fault of the fan.
EDIT: Also Justin Bieber has been around almost as long as Gaga and he isn't doing that well either FYI, Timberlake is flopping and Bruno has been away for a while so we'll have to see where his next era takes him, but that's about it for the male popstars. Women basically dominated the charts back in the late 00's and early 10's so there's not a lot of male popstars to compare to. Artists like Post Malone and The Weeknd have only been on Pop radio for a few years now.
You are right that male artists didn't have much space in the pop landscape until recently (or they only got 1-2 hits and disappeared). So we don't exactly have a comparison right now besides Maroon 5, who have been around for a very long time, get terrible reviews, yet are always propelled by radio to get gigantic hits no one cares about a year later.
The "reinventing" narrative isn't just because of the fanbases, though. Because pop music doesn't have anything to do with fanbases -- it's about the crossover impact, the mass of people you are able to lure into your music. Radio puts a different type of pressure on women -- they have to be nicer in their interviews, they have to share some of their private life, they have to reinvent their sound. I don't even know if Adam Levine ever does radio shows at this point, and if he did, no one would ask him invasive questions. Fanbases, believe it or not, are very small in comparison to the general public. You, I, and everyone on this forum reading this post will be very passionate about music, but most music consumers couldn't give a single f**k about what stans on twitter say about Dua Lipa or Lana Del Rey.
I do agree with a great lot of what you wrote, but at the same time Maroon 5 is a complete anomaly of music, other bands that came after like OneRepublic and Imagine Dragons aren't doing numbers like Maroon 5. I think it's unfair to compare any flopping artist to them because success for that long and consistent is unheard of in this era, male and female artists from that era (early 00s) are flopping but Maroon 5 are okay. It's stranger than fiction.
Interestingly with Beyonce, her untouchable status as the queen of everything really kicked into high gear after she stopped being able to get top 10 pop hits. She’s thrived even without pop radio.
Beyonce can get a top 10 pop hit if she really wants too, but shes choosing to sell albums instead. Lady Gaga is still trying to get pop hits, because Stupid Love had a radio deal on its opening day and got great updates during its first 3 weeks. It hit a brick wall when it got to the top 15.
If it was that easy, she would have done it. There’s more to it than simply the charts and Beyonce doesn’t even sell that many albums. But she has a brand that’s beyond nearly anyone else in the world right now. But I don’t expect you to understand that, especially since you continue to diminish Gaga’s current stature as “chasing pop hits” just because she got a radio deal. I’ll once again repeat: you = cement wall.
the same holds true for Beyonce. That ho can't get a Top 10 on Pop, either, or really even close to it anymore. Not that she tries, but she isn't an automatic crossover anymore.
The idea that Pop radio drops female artists when they’re over 30 is ridiculous, it’s the 40s where it becomes a problem.
As already mentioned Madonna and Mariah had multiple hits in their 30s but also Gwen and Fergie smashed with their first solo eras when they were 31/35 and P!nk had multiple Top 10 hits.
When it comes to ageism Pop males have it just as bad. How many successful eras this millennium by male artists over 40 with Top 10 hits as a lead at Pop radio can you name?
Pharrell - GRL Eminem - Marshall Mathers LP 2 Jay Z - Magna Carta Holy Grail Maroon 5 - Memories
Are the only 4 that come to mind and Eminem and Jay Z needed younger artists like Rihanna and JT for a pop hit. Eminem’s last solo Top 10 hit on Pop radio was like 15 years ago.
While Females over 40: Madonna - Music + Die Another Day Madonna - Hard Candy JLO - Love? Sia - This Is Acting
So it’s pretty even.
Gaga isn’t flopping because of ageism she’s flopping because Stupid Love is a terrible dated song. The fact that it even made #11 proves that Pop radio is/was still here for Gaga. If it was better and more current it would’ve gone Top 10 easily.
Regarding female artists, the most recent example you have given is Sia, and that's apples and oranges. Radio is not the same as it was with the other rare exceptions you have given which happened 20, 12, and 9 years ago.
So Donna Summer hitting num.7 in 1989 when she was 40 with "This Time I Know It's For Real" isn't a good example.. lol
"Stupid Love" hit #11 which is better than just about all of us expected but could've done better and the reason it didn't is because of ageism. You're right, it's not an excuse. It's a fact.
"Stupid Love" hit #11 which is better than just about all of us expected but could've done better and the reason it didn't is because of ageism. You're right, it's not an excuse. It's a fact.
Realistically it should have gone top 10. It is a better song than the Black Eyed Peas song and Post Malone was in the top 10 longer than it should have been.
This argument has been made so many times. Welcome to the over 30 crowd Gaga! It's being simplified yes Gaga is no longer the pop girl of the moment (we can argue if the girl who is deserves it or not) but yes sexism exists, ageism is real,music is driven by youth blah blah
However Gaga can only control what she controls. So at some point fans have to reconcile with the fact do you want success chasing or do you want her to build a legacy. She isnt even mostly the same Gaga who debuted with hit after hit. The songs were incredible and deserving but her entire visual was gimmicky and not built to last. It was built to get her attention then. She smartly pivoted and is now finding her footing. She been stumbling around and trying different things and sometimes it sounds great and sometimes it sounds bad. Her music to some has gotten boring and her personality without the gimmick exposed as bland pretty much. However what its not in dispute is her talent and artistry. I still think her best album is yet to come. I just think her last couple projects cost her fans and hype but its partly her own doing and not all external factors.
Rambling but whatever that's my perspective on her. Get mad or argue but it's what it is for me. You cant change your whole look and sound overnight and expect pop music radio or fans to just play you cause you're Gaga or anyone else
And no to beat a dead horse but I'm kind of surprised the song is out of top 200 global spotify, it fell really fast! oh and ms. Shallow #86
Most played songs of 2020 so far (Last.fm):
1. Don't Start Now - Dua Lipa 2. Blinding Lights - The Weeknd 3. Say So - Doja Cat 4. Lose You To Love Me - Selena Gomez 5. Break My Heart - Dua Lipa 6. The Bones - Maren Morris 7. Intentions - Justin Bieber feat. Quavo 8. Sunday Best - Surfaces 9. Stupid Love - Lady Gaga 10. Rain On Me - Lady Gaga & Ariana Grande
Henry Suárez Its beginning to stabilize. The negative & burn rate still increased, but the positive did too. No major losses this week
Now: what do we think should be the next single? should there be a next single? tagging leonagwen because duh. My heart says "Used to This" (i'd kinda love a shawn mendes remix of this actually wait) but my head says "Should've Said it"/"first man" or nothing
Top 10 songs (9/11): 1. Liu Yifei - Reflection (debut) 2. Jackson Wang - 100 Ways (-1) 3. Drake Bell - Diosa (-1) 4. Poppin'Party - Breakthrough (=) 5. Taylor Swift - Cardigan (-2) 6. Agust D - Daechwita (+1) 7. Thomas Rhett & Kane Brown - On Me (-1) 8. Chris Brown & Young Thug - Go Crazy (-3) 9. ARASHI - In The Summer (+4) 10. mxmtoon - ok on your own (debut)
Not in POP!! It barely made the top 20. And in the Hot 100 it reached the top thanks to her Oscar performance going viral. Further, not even that achievement or having one of the top streamed and sold singles last year convinced pop radio to take Shallow higher than freaking #18 in the second run. Not the best example at all.
Stream the original version of Levitating!!! And let’s remove homophobe DaBaby from the credit of Levitating in the charts!! images.app.goo.gl/jEtzWpwhFo5KhZMg7
Boston Radio played "Shallow" like it was the only song out there for awhile. I'm still surprised it only hit num.18 at pop. What was it's peak at other formats because at the time I was flipping the stations a lot and it felt like it was on every one of them. I actually started to dislike it for a bit. It so burned on me.
Not in POP!! It barely made the top 20. And in the Hot 100 it reached the top thanks to her Oscar performance going viral. Further, not even that achievement or having one of the top streamed and sold singles last year convinced pop radio to take Shallow higher than freaking #18 in the second run. Not the best example at all.
Yeah, 1.12 billion Spotify streams and 1.15 billion Youtube views (combined for the Oscars video and official video), double platinum soundtrack with 3 weeks at #1 and STILL pop radio treated it like a lead single by Meghan Trainor in 2018.
Some of the icons seen in this theme are being used pursuant to a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The copyright owners of these icons are Webdesigner Depot (the announcement icon) and Iconshock (the microphone icons on the forum pages, star icon, and poll icon). The microphone icons seen on the home page are being used pursuant to a Freeware Non-Commercial License with McDo Design (Susumu Yoshida). In accordance with these licenses, redistribution of the icons is not permitted. Please visit the owners' respective sites, linked above, if you wish to use these images.