Standing Out and Fitting In: An Analysis of Chart-Topping Songs

abstract: Since 1965, Billboard has been charting top songs to publicly inform music artists and consumers which music is most popular at a given time. Given the changes in culture, technology, and countless other factors over time, it seems as though there are very few consistencies across the board to answer the question of why a song makes it to the top of the charts. To analyze this issue, I look at both songwriting trends and consumer mentality as they relate to the following questions: 1. What does a consumer look for in the music they choose to listen to? 2. What do trends in songwriting show us? 3. How can artists make songs that stand out in an oversaturated market? In examining songwriting trends, I utilize both secondary research and Python code for a dataset from Kaggle that contains over 5,000 records of Top 100 songs since 1965. To understand the consumer, I observe psychological, sociological, and psychographic behaviors that contribute to their music consumption patterns. To take time factors into consideration, I also consider the implications of our technology-heavy modern world. Consumers seek male vocalists with noticeable effort exerted and seek to explore themes present in the Urban/Contemporary stage of their lives, which occurs around early adulthood and involves finding love and social acceptance. Consumers also seek familiarity within or immediately surrounding their music due to psychological factors pointed out by author Charles Duhigg. Popular structure has changed over time by becoming shortened due to a decrease in attention span, and lyrics have evolved to focus more on the self due to the increased presence of social media. My results give songwriters a short, broad reference with which to understand consumers and create music that has a better chance at success and popularity. Though tailored to music, the results can be applied to all art forms, as the end consumer is very similar and the same societal shifts have shaped art for the past five decades. My goal is to inspire the artist that there is room for them in the ever-growing world of music that craves individuality as much as it does familiarity