The Shortening of Long Songs
Image Courtesy: Magnetic Magazine
The thing about the art of music is that it can serve many different purposes. It can be used as a rhythm to dance to, motivation while exercising, a form of art to be analyzed and appreciated, or the background noise to which I’m writing this article. However, despite its many uses, it’s incredibly difficult to play music for several people that is going to please everyone. This can be said for all art, but what contrasts music to other art forms is the dichotomy between its universality and the odds that the people in the car want you to pass the aux chord to someone with better taste.
When considering the factors of what makes some songs more appealing than others, the most common ones you’re likely to hear are discernible rhythm, harmony, catchiness, etc., but rarely do you hear the length of songs discussed. And why would you? Look at anyone’s Spotify playlist or Apple Music library; you likely won’t find a song longer than six minutes.
Despite its lack of prevalence in the general consciousness, long songs are out there, usually finding their audience among the aforementioned aficionados who analyze and criticize music as an art form. But this isn’t to say that popular artists have not dabbled in songs whose runtimes are longer than average. English band Led Zeppelin’s 1971 rock ballad “Stairway to Heaven” is seven minutes and fifteen seconds, and fellow English rockers Pink Floyd go even further on their albums Animals and Meddle with songs that stretch past the twenty-minute mark.
More modern popular artists have made long songs as well. On what could arguably be called his magnum opus, Kendrick Lamar closes out his acclaimed 2015 album To Pimp a Butterfly with the twelve-minute-long song, “Mortal Man”, which contains an “interview” with the deceased rapper Tupac Shakur. A common criticism leveled at beloved French electronic music duo Daft Punk is that their songs are too long, so much so, that Daft Punk closed out their second album, Discovery, with a ten-minute-long song aptly named “Too Long”. These artists’ songs remain popular but are not likely to be heard on the radio or seen on a casual fan’s playlist. It’s hard to give a concrete answer as to why this is, beyond the need for variety in the daily routine that music would normally accompany.
Generally, the longer you can hold a consumer’s attention, the more successful your product is going to be, but as the amount of time that you have a person’s attention increases, so does your likelihood of losing it. This has always been the case, even before streaming became possible, with most radio stations refusing to play songs that were over a certain length. But now, in the age of TikTok, where you can put licensed songs to your videos that can only be under two minutes, keeping your songs short and sweet is more important than ever. Songs can now become worldwide hits with only a snippet being known to its listeners.
Perhaps the most prominent and honestly, comedic, result of this is the viral video of psychedelic R&B artist Steve Lacy, performing his mega-hit song, “Bad Habit” at a concert, stopping singing so that the crowd could sing along. Everyone in the crowd seemed to know the words, but once the hook stopped, the crowd went completely silent. Fortunately, Lacy seemed to find the whole thing humorous, laughing as the clip ended, but it goes to show how music is consumed now. At the time of the release of “Bad Habit”, you could make a convincing argument that Steve Lacy was the most famous musician in the world, with the single reaching number two on the Billboard Hot 100, and yet, it seemed like the entire crowd only knew a few lines to his most famous song.
Image Courtesy: Popdust
Despite my opinions on the concept from an artistic point of view, it would seem like a missed opportunity for professional songwriters not to be tailored for the thirty-second format of TikTok, with all the focus on the chorus and nothing else. To me, a prime example of this is American singer-songwriter Olivia Rodrigo’s new single, “Vampire”, with a catchy chorus that starts quiet and whispery but suddenly transforms into a fast-paced barrage of guitar chords that seem prime for making a TikTok montage or transition to.
Making a hit song is very difficult, and it is not unique to this era that professional songwriters are following a specific formula to reach and grab the attention of the most amount of people possible. However, it seems unprecedented that music now be specifically tailored to a medium that doesn’t even allow for the playing of the entire song, just the catchiest part of it.
Strike Out,
Matias Civita
Editor: Cristina Angee
Tallahassee