Pop music has led us to believe that unless an artist has albums with multiple hits (i.e., singles), that they are not actually successful.
Popular music gains its place on our radio dial by three means:
- Record companies send singles from albums that they think are probably the catchiest. For each time that a radio station plays this song, the record label will pay them a fee.
- As the populace hears this song, they run out and buy the album. As purchases occur, figures are aquired by both the record company and groups such as the Billboard Music association. Based on the figures generated, the song is played even more.
- As the song finds favor with the audience, they call in to request that it be played more, thus generating more advertising.
Thus, an artist whose music is different or original enough to actually be creative is almost guaranteed to disappear immediately upon hitting the charts, whereas repetitive, crowd pleasing pop is quite likely to gain a long life and be judged as successful.