Average word count of top-ten songs during the 1960s: 176
Average last year: 436
That is from Harper’s Index, August issue. I don’t think it can be a pure length of song effect.
Hit songs are getting wordier
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Rap pushing the word count?
The tempo of music has certainly soared.
Does “Fergalicious” count as a word?
The influence of rap, undoubtedly.
Do backing vocals get included here?
As other commenters have said – have you heard of this thing called “rap music”? You see, it’s quicker to speak words than it is to sing them…
Do they give a breakdown by genre? Or is it all songs against all songs, do synthesized vocals count? Could musicians be saying more and meaning less?
Clearly rap.
There are a variety of interesting analyses of pop songs over time that can be done, but it will take more time than I have to do them.
Top-ten just doesn’t mean what it used to, you’d be hard pressed to name any of the songs in it. Music is too fragmented now, too many niches, it’s almost as fragmented as the book bestseller list. There’s no longer any “song of the summer” that dominates radio airplay (does radio even play music anymore?) and takes you back when you hear it again years later, unlike hit summer movies which still have that effect.
It’s not just the rappers though; angsty female singers have high word counts too. What hath Alanis wrought?
Re: Hey Jude. The “na na na na” part at the end is actually longer chronologically than the first part of the song; try timing it if you don’t believe it. I wonder if each “na” counts as a word.
On the other hand, I heard somewhere that contempo movies have about 1/3 fewer dialogue words in them than movies of the past did. More action accounts for some of this, of course. But it’s apparently also a function of the fact that contempo actors generally can’t read dialogue as fast as actors used to be able to.
Songs are getting longer, now that they’re not defined by the 3-minute length of recording media. The hit songs of the 1960s were all 2:xx long–nowadays the hits are 4:xx long.
I wouldn’t underestimate the song length effect.
Has to be the rap/hip-hop factor.
Not to mention that Dream Theater songs don’t have that many words. A ten minute Dream Theater song is half instrumental. This goes for other progressive bands that tend to have long songs. How many words does an Opeth song have?
Bob Dylan certainly upped the wordiness of songs. Writers all of a sudden felt ok with long strings of words put to music. Was communication of feeling enhanced? Don’t think so…
Bye bye love
Bye bye happiness
Hello lonliness
Think I’m gonna die….
Pretty much sums up every heartbreak I’ve been through…
I think this is due to the changes in recording media. CD´s, MP3, AAC and other eletronic formats are much better storage media than LP´s. So, music evolves to fill the extra room.
The comment about instrumental pieces is correct. But even more important is that older songs had guitar solos. Why are there fewer today? Because there are fewer guitar virtuosos today. Duane, Jimi, Eric, Ray, Dave, Stevie Ray, BB, Johnny, Roy and, of course, Jerry are not spicing up bands anymore. The rockers of today use short rhythm riffs instead of blues jams. Have they substituted harmonies? NO. Have they added thoughtful lyrics? NO. All I hear is yadda, yadda, yadda.
this is assuming rap counts as MUSIC in the first place…
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