Does anyone else look up music popularity charts?

[Music Chart Fan 818]

As you might be able to tell from my user name and avatar, my biggest hobby is looking up Billboard music singles popularity charts from the last 50 years or so (i.e. 1960s-present). I am in the process of making Excel spreadsheets for the following weekly charts for the last 50 years:

 

Hot 100

Hot 100 Airplay

Hot 100 Singles Sales

Hot Digital Songs

Adult Contemporary

Adult Top 40

Mainstream Rock

Modern Rock

Dance/Disco

R&B/Hip-Hop/Soul

Country

 

I have spent countless hours copying and formatting charts from Billboard's online archives, and for the older charts (i.e. any charts before the 1980s), going to the public library, printing the charts from microfilm, and typing the charts into Excel manually. I have a file box full of hundreds of old weekly charts to manually enter into the proper Excel spreadsheets, although I have completed or nearly completed the spreadsheets for the first eight charts in the list above..

 

I love being able to see how well the songs of my favorite artists have performed on the charts, and especially seeing how well songs cross over among the different charts. Also, from looking at these charts develop and change over time, I can see the general trends in popular music and in specific genres over the years.

 

I was wondering if anyone else here has any interest in music singles popularity charts like I do. I would be happy to discuss these charts or any artists' performance on these charts (particularly the first eight charts for which I have nearly complete spreadsheets) if you're interested.

[MVC NVMXD JVRXD 2,406]

Eh, most of the music I listen to isn't mainstream at all... It's almost never on the charts. And I don't judge the bands I like by their position on the charts, so yeah, I don't really care about Billboard and all that stuff.

Though I must say, you really must be dedicated to put all that work into something

[Phaeston-e12 173]

I don't really bother about how popular the music is, if the music is pleasing to my ears then that's good enough reason to spend money to buy the music; unless it's some foreign music that's impossible to purchase because of cross-national restriction or lack of international support.

[OptimisticNeighsayer 471]

Interesting hobby you got there. Planning on being a music historian, or is this really just for fun?

 

For that matter, are there any jazz/classical singles charts out there? Ever thought about expanding to albums?

[Twiliscael 3,960]

Sorry bud, but this is the internet. People generally don't listen to mainstream stuff and don't care about the popularity of a song...

 

Things like metal, dubstep, trance, aren't usually accepted by all of the public

[Bohtty 1,775]

I don't care what the band is called because often bands don't make consistant songs that I like. I don't care if it's Justing Beiber, Deadmau5, Skrillex, Caravan Palace or Lapfox. If I like the song, I'm going to listen to it, no exceptions.

[Music Chart Fan 818]

I guess I should give a little more information about my music philosophy. My interest in singles popularity charts grew out of my desire to build a digital collection of songs that I know and like. I have spent a lot of time listening to the radio (oldies, classic pop/rock, and adult top 40). Therefore, my interests in music lie mostly in pop, rock and adult hits from the 1960s-present. Since I am most interested in these genres, I started looking up the singles charts for them to find songs which I had heard before and like.

 

Since there is so much music out there, I felt I had to restrict myself somewhat, and I did so by concentrating on hit singles, which I like the best and am most familiar with. I don't deny that there are probably album tracks and non-mainstream songs which I would like, but I had to narrow my focus in order to stay sane! I happen to discover music through listening to the radio and looking up singles charts, but others may discover music in other ways.

 

Planning on being a music historian, or is this really just for fun?

I don't have any plans on being a music historian as a career. I recently finished my master's degree in chemical engineering, and in the fall, I will be starting a doctorate program in polymer engineering. I will have to see what I do, if anything, with these chart databases when I finish them.

 

For that matter, are there any jazz/classical singles charts out there?

There is a Billboard Smooth Jazz Songs chart (which I have not really looked at at all), but that is the only jazz/classical singles chart that I know of. There are separate Billboard jazz and classical albums charts which have been published for at least a few decades.

 

Ever thought about expanding to albums?

As a consequence of my tastes and my self-restrictions above, I don't have much of an interest in album charts, because I basically never listen to albums in their entirety. I just look up and listen to singles (although I do like to look up which albums certain singles came from). Also, albums charts are even larger than singles charts (usually 100-200 positions as opposed to 10-100 positions) so that would be an even larger investment of time, money and energy to get those.

[Le Kvlt Dawn 2,364]

I hate to brake to you but, not much of the stuff I listen to is on the chart's. The Foo Fighters and Radiohead are exceptions of course. But ya know I would much rather listen to Sonic Youth, Hüsker Dü and Black Flag than any number one hit pop single whatever. And of course I'm not alone so would a lot of people. Maybe not the majority but, a lot. There some pretty good stuff currently in the underground like this band called Japandroids.

 

Some bands I like have charted in the past though but, popular doesn't equal good.

Edited August 13, 2012 by Neighvana666

[Dusty Soul 2,611]

I don't really listen to music on the charts, but I do listen to music that had charted in the past, like Chuck Berry for example.

popular doesn't equal good

I couldn't have said it better myself.

[Treeboy 418]

I don't personally pay attention to them because releases I'm interested in rarely make it on the charts. EXAMPLE: If I see the new Behold... the Arctopus album on there in December, I'll flip.

[Music Chart Fan 818]

Some bands I like have charted in the past though but, popular doesn't equal good.

I agree, and there is a lot of popular music which I do not like. For example, I don't care for the vast majority of mainstream pop from the last 20 years or so. Even among pop music from the 1960s-1980s, I certainly don't like all of it. If I happen to catch some of Casey Kasem's American Top 40 from the 1970s or 1980s on the radio, I find that many of the songs that made the Top 40 reflect passing fads and/or have not aged well at all.

 

I pick and choose pop/rock/adult artists to listen to based on whether I like any of their hit songs that I have heard on the radio or looked up on the charts.

[Satsuki Kiryuin 1,154]

I don't really check out the charts, I check out the Beatport Top 10 every once in a while though, I love Zedd dominating first place, or Porter Robinson slowly getting up there! But I usually listen to Electronic Music, so it doesn't really hit the charts xD

Zedd Represent!

[SonOfTheNorthe 412]

Nope. I stay away from the charts. I don't like today's popular music.

I'll stick to my folk metal, thank you very much.

[XUNUSEDXXX 3,459]

Not really. Sometimes if I'm really desperate to listen to a new song I will, but not very often does that happen.

[Music Chart Fan 818]

I don't like today's popular music.

I don't really like today's mainstream pop music, either. When it comes to recently released music (from the past 10-15 years), I find that most of the artists that I like appear on Adult Top 40 (i.e. adult pop/rock), Adult Contemporary, and occasionally Mainstream Rock or Modern Rock.

 

I do like a fair bit of mainstream pop/rock from 1960s-1980s, and that time period is where the Hot 100 (i.e. the pop chart) is really useful to me for finding out what hits artists that I like had.

[Kodan 25]

I wish the charts reflected on the quality of the music instead of how much is sold. That would be cool.

[XUNUSEDXXX 3,459]

Not sure if everyone on this forum is a hipster or a person who follows most of the mainstream, but I never look up the number ones.

[Music Chart Fan 818]

I wish the charts reflected on the quality of the music instead of how much is sold. That would be cool.

The problem with that premise is that "quality music" probably means something different to every music listener. By using music popularity charts to determine music to look up, I am assuming that people buy music and radio stations play music that generally sounds good, but I still pick and choose songs based on my personal taste in music.

 

Also, FYI, singles charts are based on more than just sales. The Billboard Hot 100 incorporates radio play across all genres, digital downloads, physical singles sales, and live streaming (to the best of my knowledge). Most of the charts I look up are based solely on radio play by stations of whichever specific genre the chart represents.

[Dr. Nefarious 195]

Nah, not really. Since most of the music that is popular is usually complete shit. The only reason why all the shitty pop music is popular on the charts is because teenage girls are the only ones who buy music anymore.

[Kodan 25]

I tend to prefer Last.fm charts more than anything. They help out a lot with recommending new artists.

[Music Chart Fan 818]

Nah, not really. Since most of the music that is popular is usually complete shit. The only reason why all the shitty pop music is popular on the charts is because teenage girls are the only ones who buy music anymore.

That's why I look up more than just the Hot 100 (a.k.a. the "pop" chart). I myself like more of the songs that appear on the Adult Top 40, Adult Contemporary, and Rock charts these days.The various genre-specific charts for the most part are calculated solely by radio play, not sales. Of course, one could make the argument that radio these days is highly homogenized, corporate-controlled, and unadventurous, and so the genre-specific charts merely reflect the artists that record labels and radio conglomerates push. I personally have to pick and choose only certain artists from today to listen to; I mostly listen to popular artists from previous decades.

[Jibus 192]

I listen to mostly Dubstep, Electro, and All that....

And Everyone knows if you want to find good stuff you gotta look for the least mainstream to find some really good dubstep

[Away 2,077]

Every now and then, I'll glance over the charts on iTunes, but's that's really it. I have other ways of finding new music I like.

[Ribbonfree 2,383]

Not especially, but I do like tuning into Top 40 radio stations in the car so I can get a sense for what the masses of my generation is listening to nowadays... Too much Martin Garrix, but other than that I'm not complaining.

[Scootalove 10,685]

Not really, I prefer to search on Google to see which song is the #1 song without using the music popularity chart.