Define Pop
Printed From: Progarchives.com
Category: Other music related lounges
Forum Name: General Music Discussions
Forum Description: Discuss and create polls about all types of music
URL: http://www.progarchives.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=75555
Printed Date: August 10 2025 at 03:22
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Topic: Define Pop
Posted By: Icarium
Subject: Define Pop
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 17:41
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it is obvious that the term POP is confusing, and it is easly to label music POP, but what is pop to you, or how would you describe POP
POP/AOR/MOR/West Coast/David Foster is to many progers synonymos = bad,
what is pop is a diffucult question, with no clear answer, but it will be intersting to see if the big minds in the archive can give answers to this mystery
are POP = POOP or are POP = WOOP WOOP  -------------  
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Replies:
Posted By: TheGazzardian
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 17:59
| Pop: The sound a balloon makes when it explodes |
Posted By: The T
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 18:16
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Popular music, non-academic music; before rock and pop got "artsy", non-art music. But in the prog-fan world: every artist that sells more than 10 records, 9 of which are NOT bought by a converse-wearing prog geek...
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Posted By: Slartibartfast
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 18:30
Music that gets more attention than it warrants. 
------------- Released date are often when it it impacted you but recorded dates are when it really happened... 
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Posted By: clarke2001
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 18:36
Pop is one of the best thing that happened to contemporary music. Whoever disagrees shouldn't be on this forum.
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Posted By: zappaholic
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 19:51
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Music that sounds as if it were designed by committee. (And in most cases it has been.) ------------- "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." -- H.L. Mencken |
Posted By: SaltyJon
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 20:21
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According to Tim Smith, the Cardiacs are pop.
------------- http://www.last.fm/user/Salty_Jon" rel="nofollow"> 
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Posted By: paganinio
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 22:24
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Think about the difference between noise pop and noise rock, I suggest three characteristics of pop: 1. Pop is pretty, in a sweet, smooth way. Rock is beautiful in an edgy, harsh way. Rock is darker. 2. Pop has smooth vocals. Soul and R&B vocals are smooth, while blues vocals are not smooth. 3. Instrumentation: Pop features prominent use of synth, keyboards, electronic sounds etc.. Rock relies on guitars, bass and drums. When I feel like a sweet, lovely teenage girl (which I wanna be  ), I go for some pop. But more often I feel the darkness and grimness of living inside "The Wall", then it's time to rock hard.------------- 
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Posted By: Triceratopsoil
Date Posted: January 31 2011 at 22:26
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POP=POOP :D |
Posted By: overmatik
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 05:44
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To me this is no difficult at all. Pop music is non-complex music, with an easy and catchy melody or chorus. Once in a while a complex song will hit the charts, but this is very rare. ------------- "Wear the grudge like a crown of negativity. Calculate what we will or will not tolerate. Desperate to control all and everything. Unable to forgive your scarlet letterman." |
Posted By: Formentera Lady
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 08:30
In addition: The structure is mostly AABA. It has mostly a repetitive chorus. Length: it has mostly single record length (3-4 min.). No or very rare dynamic, rhythmic or harmonic change. The overall sound stays the same throughout song. Instrumentation: to achieve this specific sound any instrumentation is possible and is used: from orchestra to rock band, to computer generated sounds and sound effects. (As opposed to rock music, where the basic instrumentation is drums, bass, guitar and/or keyboards.) |
overmatik wrote:Posted By: dwill123
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 16:16
| Pop = Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga |
Posted By: CCVP
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 16:34
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there. -------------   
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Posted By: Angelo
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 17:08
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_music%20" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_music 
------------- http://www.iskcrocks.com" rel="nofollow - ISKC Rock Radio I stopped blogging and reviewing - so won't be handling requests. Promo's for ariplay can be sent to [email protected] |
Posted By: Man With Hat
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 20:41
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Like most things musical its hard to transcribe into words. But overmatik and Form. Lady seem to sum it up pretty well. Pop music, for me, doesn't focus on the music and really doesn't give the music room to breath. Its about the lyrics (or about forwarding an idea, using words with a musical backdrop), about being "catchy" and thus is generally simple, sparse in instrumentation, short, restrictive, uncessarily repeatitive, with little imagination, evolution, or room to do something different/musical. Obviously there are degrees to this, and pop music does change as time moves forward, but overall this box is generally stayed in.
(Pure pop I mean, pop-rock (and other such mixes) certainly allows more room for the music, but not much more.) ------------- Dig me...But don't...Bury me I'm running still, I shall until, one day, I hope that I'll arrive Warning: Listening to jazz excessively can cause a laxative effect. |
Posted By: PlumAplomb
Date Posted: February 01 2011 at 20:50
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damn you guys are haters:) ill have to link some 'pop' that's defies your logics' :) this song by florence and the machines is currently considered pop in that it is popular mainstream right now, having been featured in the trailer for eat, pray, love and an ep of glee and radio killed to death this song however is my favorite on her album, both are pretty layered musically imo ------------- la la la and a bottle of plum! 
and when it lands will my eyes be closed or open? |
Posted By: overmatik
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 06:26
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As I said before, once in a while a complex song will hit the charts, but only by accident. The difference is the fact that the song was not intended to hit the charts. To me the biggest example of this was Pink Floyd with Dark Side in America.
------------- "Wear the grudge like a crown of negativity. Calculate what we will or will not tolerate. Desperate to control all and everything. Unable to forgive your scarlet letterman." |
Posted By: Formentera Lady
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 06:28
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I don't know the song Dark Side in America...
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Posted By: hobocamp
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 09:07
| "Everybody talk about pop music" would have been a good title for this topic. |
Posted By: PlumAplomb
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 10:12
i love that song:) and it's not rare that that happens, it happens all the time in pop, everyday even, if we just take pop to mean popular. you said it yourself pink floyd has been pop, so has yes genesis zeppelin et cet. don't makem e bust out owner of a lonely heart:) i also follow all kinds of music and whats coming out et cet, i'm not saying you guys don't however, i might be more familiar with whats coming out and getting popular atm than some of you now the music genre defined as pop is a completely different thing, there we have the spice girls nkotb beiber britney gaga crap, i think thats the stuff you mean. i even ike some of that stuff though, some of it is good imo ------------- la la la and a bottle of plum!
and when it lands will my eyes be closed or open? |
Posted By: Icarium
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 10:58
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some of the most imaginative pop songs
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Posted By: PlumAplomb
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 11:57
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i love Sparks and Roxy Music :)
------------- la la la and a bottle of plum!
and when it lands will my eyes be closed or open? |
Posted By: TODDLER
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 12:07
| Pop music can be technical for a musician depending on what chord voicings you use. For example on guitar.....if you are playing with a unit of 4 or 5 players, instead of applying the basic fingering for chords, you can use 6 or 7 fret stretches across the fretboard, using beautiful melodic voicings that may take hours to master. The point? It sounds finer. Most people may not notice but you're having fun right? and at the same time you are not cluttering the music. It's almost like performing solo guitar like Chet Atkins or Pat Metheny would do but you are backing a singer instead. Some very corny Pop songs contain many inverted Jazz type chords. It's best to use finger style in this case and not a pick. When the piano takes a solo, you can switch to playing the piano part that backs the Pop singer throughout the song. So now you find yourself playing the bass line and chord changes as one. It's a lot of fun and more progressive in that sense. |
Posted By: overmatik
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 12:18
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A band who did record some amazing pop music with jazz and funk elements was Level 42: The Bolshoi also had great variety: The 80s were really the golden age of pop!  ------------- "Wear the grudge like a crown of negativity. Calculate what we will or will not tolerate. Desperate to control all and everything. Unable to forgive your scarlet letterman." |
Posted By: rogerthat
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 13:00
I am not completely convinced about this part. Dynamics is quite important in ABBA's music for instance. They may not be as dynamic as a Jethro Tull but still with their frequent acoustic-electric jumps, they have more dynamic range than run-of-the-mill hard rock, which usually sticks to one end of distortion. I would say songs like Mama Mia or SOS would lose their 'kicks' if all guitar parts were played in distorted electric and one level of attack. Stevie Wonder is even more dynamic(and also very interesting, harmonically) but I wouldn't even want to evaluate his work on pop terms in any case. I don't think dynamic, rhythmic (As Fast As You Can?) or harmonic changes impede the song remaining 'pop' in nature but not many songwriters usually have the skill to manage a lot of changes or intrigue in composition while still retaining pop catchiness and infectiousness. |
Posted By: ProgBob
Date Posted: February 02 2011 at 19:01
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^^ Good points here about run of the mill hard rock. I had been meaning to post something similar that some of the 'definitions' of pop that have been given would apply in large part to stuff like AC/DC. ------------- Bob |
Posted By: Formentera Lady
Date Posted: February 03 2011 at 15:22
With dynamic change I mean very loud and very quiet passages, like e.g. Hairless Heart (Genesis), which makes it difficult to play in a car with a lot of ambient noise, while I have no problems to listen to SOS or The Winner Takes It All in a car. With rhythmic change I mean for example a change from 4/4 to 3/4 like in Happiness Is A Warm Gun (Beatles). With harmonic change I mean something like chord progression and/or changes of key within a song. |
Posted By: Hanyou
Date Posted: February 03 2011 at 15:34
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I'm no musician, but here's my definition. It's music focused around simple hooks and easy to digest melodies. It often has a simple structure. Its main draw is being catchy. For example, They Might Be Giants is widely considered pop, but it was never all that popular outside of the internet and nerd circles: Yeah, I actually don't mind pop.
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Posted By: PlumAplomb
Date Posted: February 03 2011 at 15:44
i have to dispute that because i'm from NY lol, tmbg was huge there and spread, especially whne they wrote the theme song for malcolm in the middle. but yeah they arent too big, or else i wouldn ever have met and seen them a million times ------------- la la la and a bottle of plum!
and when it lands will my eyes be closed or open? |
Posted By: rogerthat
Date Posted: February 03 2011 at 19:43
But those levels of dynamic, rhythmic and harmonic change would not be commonly observed in hard rock/heavy metal either, that is the point I raised earlier too. And by the way, As Fast As You Can does have time sig changes. Raising a key is one of the most overused cliches in pop. Lots of Stevie Wonder songs from the 70s classic albums do have chord progressions ( I take it that you mean NOT playing the same chords over each line of verse?). |
Posted By: overmatik
Date Posted: February 04 2011 at 06:09
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Well, as far as Fiona Apple is concerned I don't think she might be labeled as a pop singer. To me she is more of a piano-rock singer. Even though Tidal was a hit the last two had only moderate airplay. And yes, Fas As You can is a great example of creativity on pop music. ------------- "Wear the grudge like a crown of negativity. Calculate what we will or will not tolerate. Desperate to control all and everything. Unable to forgive your scarlet letterman." |
Posted By: boo boo
Date Posted: February 04 2011 at 06:17
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According to this website pop is catchy and accessible therefore very bad, only sheeple with no taste like it. That's why the only artistically credible music is stuff like neo prog, which is just boring enough to insure that nobody can enjoy it, as enjoyment is the death of all art.------------- http://www.last.fm/user/kingboobs/?chartstyle=LastfmSuicjdeGirls" rel="nofollow"> 
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Posted By: overmatik
Date Posted: February 04 2011 at 06:30
What do you mean, Marillion achieved great success in the Fish era. ------------- "Wear the grudge like a crown of negativity. Calculate what we will or will not tolerate. Desperate to control all and everything. Unable to forgive your scarlet letterman." |
Posted By: boo boo
Date Posted: February 04 2011 at 06:39
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I like Fish era Marillion. I consider them the huge exception to the rule. My favorite song of theirs is Garden Party, a song I assume everyone hates because it's poppy and fun.------------- http://www.last.fm/user/kingboobs/?chartstyle=LastfmSuicjdeGirls" rel="nofollow">
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