There are only few mathematical formulae for a hit

[c s]

Software recognizes chart hits

Critical music listeners know it already: Many chart hits are alike the different one, because the record firms always simply vary well-known knitting patterns only newly. The Spanish software manufacturer Polyphonic HMI wants to systematize with a new software and make easier so fundamentally the search for successful music.


So-called hit song Science technology compares new songs with the data of successful hits and forecasts such possible chart successes. The software analyzes various parameters like speed, time, rhythm, pitch and harmoniums. "There are only few mathematical formulae for a hit", told head of the company Mike McCready Scientific opposite the science Journal New.

Already refers Polyphonic ahems to a success. So one has already classified songs of the Jazzsängerin Norah of Jone as hit suspicious months ago. The forecast was confirmed: Jones cleared eight away grief rottenly with her first album at once at the end of February. Five large record firms allegedly want to test the computer program after this successful forecast now.

Besides the chart hit reconnaissance orientated at the mass market the software can be used also quite individually. After a listener has entered approximately his favorite songs, these are analyzed and music recommendations then corresponding to exactly this profile given.


Software erkennt Charthits

Kritische Musikhörer wissen es längst: Viele Chart-Hits ähneln einander wie ein Ei dem anderen, weil die Plattenfirmen bekannte Strickmuster einfach immer nur neu variieren. Der spanische Softwarehersteller Polyphonic HMI will die Suche nach erfolgreicher Musik mit einer neuen Software systematisieren und so wesentlich erleichtern.


Die so genannte Hit-Song-Science-Technik vergleicht neue Songs mit den Daten erfolgreicher Hits und prognostiziert so mögliche Charterfolge. Die Software analysiert dabei diverse Parameter wie Tempo, Takt, Rhythmus, Tonhöhe und Harmonien. "Für einen Hit gibt es nur wenige mathematische Formeln," sagte Firmenchef Mike McCready gegenüber dem Wissenschaftsjournal New Scientific.
Auf einen Erfolg verweist Polyphonic HMS bereits. So habe man schon vor Monaten Songs der Jazzsängerin Norah Jones als Hit-verdächtig eingestuft. Die Vorhersage bestätigte sich: Ende Februar räumte Jones mit ihrem ersten Album gleich acht Grammies ab. Angeblich wollen nach dieser erfolgreichen Prognose nun fünf große Plattenfirmen das Computerprogramm testen.

Neben der am Massenmarkt orientierten Charthit-Erkennung kann die Software auch ganz individuell genutzt werden. Nachdem ein Hörer etwa seine Lieblingssongs eingegeben hat, werden diese analysiert und anschließend genau diesem Profil entsprechende Musikempfehlungen gegeben.

[zombie ritual]

Well, anyone remembers KLF and their book on how to make a no. one hit?

I once heard from two russian artists who made a worldwide internet interrogation about how people define the most appealing and the most annoying music they could imagine. The artists made sure answers were coming from all over the world in order to minimise any geographical bias. The interrogared collective, however, was found in young people below 30. Subsequently they composed two songs according to the answers, one "hit" song and one most annoying song. The hit song was a ballad with piano and thickly orchestrated, something that's likely to hear on the radio. The most annoying song had a really weird instrumentation (can't remember exactly what) and strongly reminded of modern classical music.

So this again is a hint that musical taste can quite easily be anticipated. There was one thing that made think, however: I liked the most annoying song more than the hit song. What's wrong with me?

[invisibleplanet]

zombie ritual - i also would like the 'annoying' song more than the hit song, so perhaps their theories are wrong, and a hit song is only a hit because it is what the masses have become used to being fed... a daily diet of pop means that anything outside the manufactured norm may have a difficult time of becoming a #1 hit.

But there are always exceptions to the rule - take Laurie Anderson's ' O Superman' for an example...

[CHIP TRONIC]

hmmmm i think it doesn´t matter if we don´t like it, for we are not ordinary people. We aren´t the group this records are made for.
the masses think different than we do. so they listen to a different kind of music.

[zombie ritual]

"Oh Superman"....love that song, too.

But I'm sceptical about this theory of mass media feeding it to the audiences. I rather believe that people get what they deserve....in the end they get what they want. Still they could turn off the radio or the TV if they absolutely couldn't stand what is being broadcasted, but they don't. So at least what they see or hear doesn't disturb them sufficiently. Now one might argue that this is the result of habituation. I don't believe that, cause people do react to things they don't like on the media, by writing emails, letters, phoning et al., so that means they don't get used to just everything they're exposed to. Also, this is not just a sign of our times. I once heard of one of the first comsumer questionnaires designed in the 1920ies for the austrian radio by a later famous sociologist whose name I can't recall now (he emigrated in the US in the 1930ies and influenced advertisement psychology there very much). Even then, the majority of people wanted more "entertaining music" instead of, e.g., classical chamber music and more programs featuring spectacular or somehow sensational incidents and happenings in general. I don't remember all the details, but I learned from that report that our behaviour as recipients hasn't changed very much.

[c s]

i think it's an interesting question: why do some people turn to 'alternative' stuff and some don't? you could guess they're perhaps 'more demanding', 'they look for something new' (although this is already very questionable - i always had the impression parts of 'alternative scenes' are just a micro version of mainstream), but i don't think this really covers it.

also i sometimes thought about hit melodies - i can't read/write notes but i thought i found some patterns in many hits, something like 'tension and release'. a hit refrain often consists of chords/notes that give this 'alternating feel' i guess, and that's what makes people remember.

btw i used to do bombastic pop stuff for a while, not aimed at the charts though... ;)

[marcel]

Originally posted by c s

also i sometimes thought about hit melodies

some time ago, i played around with the stepsequencer of my mc303 and i found out that these hookmelodies or hitmelodies can easily made (even without knowing anything about notes) when you know the general schemes i found out.
a easily remembered melodie contains of 4 or 6schemes, but i wont tell more... wanna earn some money..hehe;)

[c s]

well, my favourite method was chords (of 3 notes, 3 chords or so, in the abovementioned 'tension&release' manner). then simply create an appropriate hooky melody around the 'functioning' notes, i found it really easy and also the reason why i stopped it. :D

[marcel]

hehe, selber schuld. i dont stop doin it, want to get rich..;)

[zombie ritual]

Yeah it's quite interesting to think about why one likes the music he or she likes. I myself had no role models for my musical taste. My father is one of the few human beings who I can honestly say never gave a damn about music in general. My mother, if anything, listens to late 19th century classical music like Bruckner, Wagner, Mahler and so on... In school we basically never heard about contemporary music until I was about 16, and at that point, I was already into it so I wasn't told new things. The music teacher I had before was a disillusioned alcoholic who was getting on our nerves (as we got on his). So it was the radio that won me over. But you know how it is: you play around with the dialer, switching from one station to the next, and suddenly it strikes you and you say: "this is it!" But why this and not something else?

Maybe in the beginning one is flattered to see him or herself as something special, "more demanding", "looking for something new", but I have given up to see things like that. I rather wonder why I cannot bear "normal" music and consider the idea that this could be a sort of (social) defect.

[MUX]

oh yes...
as after a month or so of pure invisibilty.. the word POP rehits the board! as always in disguise!

interesting technology anyhow..
but slightly farfetched in my view