A fascinating TEDx talk on pop music (not what you think!)

[fazool]

Scientifically arguing about the musical merits of pop music - really well-presented.

Using foundational computer science theories, Colin Morris focuses on understanding trends in popular music. Borrowing from the areas of bioinformatics and compression algorithms, he shows that the lyrics of pop songs have become substantially more repetitive over the decades. Having established that, Morris tries to convince listeners that this is actually a good thing. He traces repetition in pop lyrics back to its poetic roots, and shows that, rather than being formulaic and recycled, repetitive songs show fascinating diversity. He suggests listeners stop thinking about repetitive earworms as guilty pleasures, and instead think of them as virtuous ones. Colin Morris is a data scientist and educator based in Toronto with a Master's in Computational Linguistics. His work often involves applying computational techniques to the analysis and appreciation of popular music. Most recently, he has analyzed trends in lyrical repetition of hit songs.

[frankmcr]

Yup. The future's so bright I gotta wear shades.

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by fazool

Scientifically arguing about the musical merits of pop music - really well-presented.

That was really interesting thanks for posting....
I'm speculating Ravel understood this can also apply to instrumental music, even if only only at a instinctual gut level

[Jaden]

The Rolling Stones really brought repetition to the fore in pop music, employing this in their rhythm and blues style to increase intensity and to make up for their lack of song writing sophistication of Lennon/McCartney, in my view.

I’m very much a victim of it. Heck, just purchased Hot Rocks 1964-1971 because I had ‘19th Nervous Breakdown’ running around in my head even after all these years ...

Interesting study.