TikTok is Dictating Your Music Taste

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I swear to God, if I hear the same TikTok trap-beat song on my feed one more damn time… 

Songs that go viral on TikTok are nearly inescapable anywhere else. The power TikTok has over the industry is undeniable. Whenever a song blows up on the app, it seems to shoot up the charts too. 

TikTok has 1 Billion monthly active users spending an average of over 6 hours a week on the app. And I know there’s a lot of us that spend way more time than that. That's a huge reach. You could hear the same song multiple times in different videos all within a few minutes. That’s the exposure marketers have wet dreams about. 

Halsey, singer of the national tragedy of a hit song “Closer” with the Chainsmokers, went off on TikTok about their record label restricting them. "I've been in this industry for eight years and I've sold over 165 million records and my record company is saying I can't release it unless they can fake a viral moment on TikTok," Halsey said. 

A lot of artists have been vocal about their label restricting them because of TikTok. Florence Welch of Florence + the Machine posted a TikTok saying “the label is begging me for ‘low fi tok toks’ so here you go.” Charli XCX and FKA Twigs have also posted videos about their label not releasing music because they didn't think it would do well enough on the app. If we miss out on some good FKA Twigs because the label didn’t think it was going to do well on TikTok, we’re gonna have a real problem. 

The music industry is all about marketing. Record labels and scouts used to find artists to make stars. Now it’s the algorithms making stars, which is good in a way since more power is in the hands of the fans. On the other hand, behind a song and artist blowing up on the app is likely a marketing team using the algorithm to their advantage. 

These are no longer the days of going to record stores or watching music videos on MTV to find new music. 

Look at Nicki Minaj. Her latest single “Super Freaky Girl” became her first number 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 after blowing up on TikTok. The (screamed) Queen of Rap started posting videos using snippets of the song on the app weeks before it was released. By the time it was put out, the Barbs were already familiar and waiting for its release.

The corny ass song “abcdefu” by GAYLE is another prime example of TikTok marketing ploys. The song was allegedly inspired by a comment left on GAYLE’s video asking her to write a breakup song based on the alphabet. Well, apparently the person who left the comment on the video works as a marketing manager at Atlantic Records… awkward. 

It’s like artists are releasing music only for it to blow up on TikTok. Take the all-powerful Beyonce, for example. The lead single off her last album, “Break My Soul,” is a great song. But you can't tell me that the catchy five-word chorus repeated over and over again with a groovy sampled beat wasn't designed to become a trendy sound on TikTok. And boom: number one hit. 

A large chunk of people’s music taste is almost entirely from TikTok. A video of Steve Lacy performing his song “Bad Habit” went viral when the crowd singing alone goes silent after the TikTok verse ends. Y’all are really out here buying concert tickets to hear one verse? In this economy? 

“Bad Habit” went number one after blowing up on TikTok too, in case you were wondering. 

So the impact of the app is tremendous; it makes stars. We probably wouldn't have Lil Nas X out here twerking on Satan's junk without “Only Town Road” blowing up on TikTok first. It also brings back old classics like “Promiscuous” by Timbaland and Nelly Furtado and makes them relevant again. 

So let's buckle in. Because it doesn't look like TikTok is leaving the music industry alone anytime soon. 

Sources:

https://www.newsweek.com/halsey-complains-about-record-label-tiktok-demands-cha rli-xcx-fka-twigs-florence-welch-1709195 

https://www.newsweek.com/tiktok-gayle-song-abcdefu-marketing-video-atlantic-records-1678323