Itunes, Billboard, and the marginalization of black music and black audiences in America

what is happening what is trap queen

we are all trap queen now

Basically my point is the idea of "earning" a "genuine" hit is rockist malarkey

― da croupier, Friday, April 3, 2015 9:24 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this would be relevant if i was trying to convince anyone that they should like or dislike the song, rather than just mocking the weeknd's lack of pop instincts

& yeah obv the arianna grande song is totally classic but w/e

"you're always worth it" is basically a disgusting line. "you earned it" also disgusting. he's either paying for sex with her, or he's in that more ambiguous zone of sugar daddy, and these compliments that he evidently thinks are profound and touching are like one more shitty necklace to her, she's like "whatever jack" in her mind but with her eyes and face she's like "ooh yes big stuff, i am here to please you always" and he's like "man i think this ho actually loves me"

Okayyyyy. We're interpreting this song completely differently cause I'm hearing it as him singing to a lover, not as part of a transactional dynamic, singing about intangible rather than material things. I get why people are ready to assume the worst of him but I feel like, with a few notable exceptions, if it were any other r&b singer with the exact same set of lyrics, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Like Miguel's sang way sketchier things ("How Many Drinks" anyone?) and I can't see anyone jumping down his throat if he sang this. But if that's how you want to read it, I can't stop you.

what is happening what is trap queen

#6 on the charts, #1 in our hearts

Btw I dropped both those songs at a club tonight and way more people danced to "Earned It" ¯\_o_O)_/¯

Earned It rules, tho looking into The Weeknd's catalogue after hearing it ws a v unpleasant experience (obv). Song reads as abt his first unmisogynistic to me and I kinda think that's part of its success (along w pretty arrangement/vocal etc). Tracer's reading just seems willfully weird

"earned it" and "you're worth it" are explicitly transactional phrases.. this isn't some kind of weird reach

and yes, i put it in the context of his previous creepy-ass songs, why wouldn't i?

Yeah that bit makes sense, bt those transactional phrases're v commonly used to describe relationships, bc capitalism, so that bit seemed a big stretch

the new #1 is wiz khalifa's pop-rap song from the furious 7 movie

"trap queen" rises to #4

"post to be" jumps to #16 and possibly headed for top 10. as w/ "trap queen" before it's getting streamed a ton and only has major airplay at urban radio for now (tho gaining at rhythmic).

big sean's "blessings" (don't really like the song but w/e) is also in a similar situation w/ very high streaming activity and major play only at urban, so it could be on its way too. (neither it nor "post to be" have been really big sellers like "trap queen" has become tho.)

i would say the streaming metric is (recently) serving a similar purpose as retail singles sales did in the 90s for r&b songs, i.e. to drive initial gains up the chart so non-urban stations will take notice and start giving them some play.

the hot 100's top positions look like they could end up being about as male-dominated as they were (white) female-dominated for some time last year. black women not named nicki minaj, rihanna or beyonce (or natalie la rose for 1 week) lose either way :(

to be fair black women besides those 3 artists aren't really on urban radio that much at the moment either. Ciara's latest peaked at #16 on R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay, Sevyn Streeter at #19, Mary J. Blige at #35...women besides Beyonce are having it rough in R&B.

i dunno if we have a "race in music" thread or if this is it, so
http://clandesteen.tumblr.com/post/107484511963/dont-cash-crop-my-cornrows-a-crash-discourse-on
sorta sarkeesian-y but you could do plenty worse for a sixteen year old's assessment of the landscape

point of order that the dude who sings the hook on that wiz song is charlie puth, whose terrible meghan trainor collab 'marvin gaye' has been covered in the worst songs thread

forks wtf

i'm really frightened that charlie puth might actually become a thing

are you offering some pushback

goddamit safari autocorrect ruined my brilliant pun

puthback

lol

deej wtf

i'm really frightened that charlie puth might actually become a thing

― dyl, Friday, April 17, 2015 11:59 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i've never known what "become a thing" really means, but especially now if singing a #1 pop hit doesn't count

"become a thing" = get his own thread on ilx

Macklemore & Ryan Lewis: a thing
Wanz: not a thing

another example - LMFAO vs "Lauren Bennett and Goonrock"

yeah i wouldn't worry too much about charlie pluth becoming a thing

i dunno Sam Smith primed America for more simpering cry-singing

charlie puth is way more marketable (and in more of a catbird seat, in that song) than lauren bennett or goonrock

also more punchable

oh i wasn't saying charlie puth is or isn't a potential thing (i think i'll let info about this guy come to me rather than seek it out), i was just trying to clarify how one could be "not a thing" and on a #1 hit

oh god i just looked up charlie puth on google

damn my curiosity

the lead singer from Magic! doesn't seem to have become a thing so lets not overestimate america's long term taste for punchable things

charlie bluth

i still haven't ruled out the possibility that Charlie Puth is just a hilarious Andy Samberg character

while i'm proud america has shunned at least three potential follow-up singles to rude i wouldn't count those dudes out until the follow-up album tanks

if they were just some lucky nudniks who stumbled onto a novelty hit i'd say they were toast, but the singer is a successful pro songwriter and pretty immersed in the biz. this feels like saying candyman in the mirror, but there's still the possibility of "featuring Nasri" becoming a thing.

aaaaaaaaaagh no no no no shut up shut up

*says it three times while looking at billboard on my computer, annoying lyrical hook comes out of screen and kills me*

it's such a truly unknowable crapshoot who survives and thrives and who doesn't in the music industry
talent, money, connections, looks, originality, experience, past performance; nothing is a tell-tale indicator of success
the only thing that ever seems to work is hitching a ride on the zeitgeist but how the fuck do you plan that

http://www.2kmusic.com/prev-yD5ZTbMD_xY.jpg

is recording vocals using an earbud as your monitor a "thing"?

30 years ago a child would kick a ball on the street.

he looks like if you took all the New Kids and morphed them into one face

and then punched him in the nose a whole lot.

there is one immediately telling difference between charlie and nasri though

(gestures to thread title)

(nasri is palestinian and not black, but the people choosing who gets to be the teen dream -- and the audiences who fall in line behind them, they're not off the hook -- are more likely to do so for someone who looks like charlie puth)

this week "earned it" becomes, with "happy" and "all of me", one of the three songs since 2010 to have gone #1 in all-format radio play (http://www.billboard.com/charts/radio-songs) that broke r&b radio before pop radio rather than the other way around. 2010 is the year when rihanna's "what's my name" was the only such song to do the same. (from 2009 going back to the first full year that billboard's hot 100 airplay chart was tracking an all-format panel [1999] several such songs would pull it off.)

*'several such songs would pull it off each year' i should say

*tears for Trap Queen*