![]() ![]() The current digital music landscape seems more conducive to longer pop songs than anything that came before it. As Thomas Tierney, director of the Sony Music Archives Library, told Mashable, “it’s embedded in our DNA.” It’s also likely that pop music listeners just preferred concision after all, it’s what the last several decades had taught them to expect. Record labels may have favored shorter singles, too, since longer songs didn’t mean fatter royalty checks. According to Classic FM, this is partly because radio stations could fit more commercials into a program if the songs stayed relatively short. While 10-inch 78s had originated the three-minute trend, 45s really helped make it a necessity for radio singles throughout the mid-20th century.Īs music technology evolved over the years, from records to cassette tapes to CDs, three minutes didn’t fall out of fashion as the de facto estimate for pop songs. Long-playing records (LPs) were introduced around the same time, but it was much easier for radio stations to play single tracks from 45s-which hordes of listeners then went out and bought. ![]() The late 1940s saw the birth of the 45 RPM record: a smaller, cheaper disc made of vinyl that couldn’t manage much more than three minutes of music per side. To get radio stations to broadcast their music and get people to buy it, musicians pretty much had to accommodate those time limits. ![]() The most popular record sizes were 10 inches-which could hold about three minutes of music per side-and 12 inches, which held roughly four to five minutes per side. The rates at which these records spun varied, but 78 revolutions per minute (RPM) quickly became the norm. No matter where you usually hear today’s top hits-the radio, Spotify, a mixtape on your Sony Walkman-you’ve probably noticed that they tend to be around three minutes long.Īs Vox explains, the custom dates back to the early 20th century, when shellac records first appeared in the market. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |