Is the Music Industry Changing for the Better?
Isabella C. 12, Island School
The music industry used to be dictated by
music executives, but now with more singers taking their images and shows intotheir own hands, they can also have a voice and opinion on what they do.
Back before YouTube existed, the only
possible ways of accessing music would be to listen to mix tapes and the radio.
Thanks to the invention of YouTube, you can now find singers with talent just
by clicking on a video. Of the many people who were discovered on YouTube, the
most famous ones would be Justin Bieber and Rebecca Black. Not only does Justin
Bieber have six million fans, he has also sold 15 million albums and has earned
more than 55 million USD in the past year. Rebecca Black was an overnight
success as she sang her song “Friday.” This song got over 157 million views onYouTube, and she now has an independent record label, “RB Records.”
With the development of the individuality
of artists, you can now discover more styles of music that are different from
what you would expect, but are still very popular. The most popular ‘recent’
genres of music are pop, pop rock, rock, contemporary R&B, Hip Hop,
Electronic, Country, Soul, Folk and some Korean Pop and Japanese pop. The most
popular song from an unusual genre is Gangnam Style (Korean Pop), which
received over 1,000,000,000 views on YouTube. Gangnam Style also is a good
example of how the music industry is improving. It is now welcoming much more
unique songs. This song was popular not only because of its catchy music, but
the dance and the music video.
Now with Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook,
Instagram and other social networking applications, you can follow your
favorite artists anywhere they go, and if you are lucky, you can also
communicate with your favorite artists. Using Twitter, you can send/read the
text based messages of your favorite artists. Tumblr is a very blog based
social networking website. You can see what pictures, videos and other news
your favorite artists posts. With Facebook you can make fan pages for an
artist/band, see what your favorite artists are up to, check for show dates and
even see some moments of your artist which you may not have seen before. You
can follow your artists on Twitter, so now you can feel closer to the artists
that you like.
Although many people may think that the new
development of the music industry exposes vulgarity and only cares about the
looks of the artists, the ‘vulgar’ artists are just trying to show their
individuality and there are certain settings in which you could block vulgar
content. For some artists such as Adele and Kelly Clarkson, they don’t care if
they aren’t a size 2, 5’11”, skinny singer, they have a powerful voice which
they can showcase instead.
To conclude, the music industry is rapidly
changing for the better. Now the music executives do not run the music
industry. You can have a voice which will be heard. If you discover a great
singer, you can post it somewhere and people will see the artist. The change in
the music industry now helps a lot of people find good music and lets people
with talent shine.