The Git Up
It’s not number one.
There’s all these hosannas about Blanco Brown’s “The Git Up” going #1 on the “Billboard” country chart…BUT THAT’S NOT THE CHART THAT MATTERS!
Country is driven by radio. And “The Git Up” is not in the Mediabase Top 30, which means at best it’s a footnote in Nashville.
In case you’ve been in a media blackout, the song of the summer, the song of the YEAR, is Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road.” At this late date, we can all agree that it was built by two things…TikTok and a false controversy. This is the kind of thing Shep Gordon did in the seventies, create a false press story around Alice Cooper. But you’d think in the internet era that would be impossible, but not only are there multiple fact lanes in the straight news business, but media too!
“Rolling Stone” launched its charts.
Right now, they’re meaningless, and will probably stay that way.
Why?
First and foremost because they blew the launch. They said it was gonna be one day, and then it was delayed over rights issues. To the point where when the charts finally went live, people had already moved on to other things. I was fascinated at first, because I thought “Rolling Stone” had a chance, after all, its charts were based on the best data in the business, provided by the company formerly known as BuzzAngle.
But NO! “Rolling Stone” launched with a weighted chart, eviscerating any credibility!
It’d be like counting discussion of Facebook on Twitter in addition to impressions on the Facebook app. Who can make sense of that? NOBODY!
That’s right, the internet is based on 0’s and 1’s, facts, and music is all about obfuscation.
Forget sales…STREAMING IS ALL THAT COUNTS!
Steve Jobs kills legacy ports back in the nineties, and the record companies are still counting physical and digital sales. The only people I know who watch DVDs are nonagenarians, literally. I’m tossing all mine. Why should I keep them? Oh, I’ve got a DVD player, but I haven’t turned it on in years. And neither of my computers have disc drives.
Computer software is a service, there is no physical product, but in the antiquated music industry?
So, “Billboard” endured a lot of heat, Nashville endured a lot of heat, as as a result of the pseudo-controversy over “Old Town Road.” Which, if you listen to it, is not country. That’d be like saying ZZ Top is country because they wear cowboy hats!
So now another track comes along by an African-American performer and “Billboard,” with a backbone of silly putty, caves.
And there’s a huge difference between “The Git Up” and “Old Town Road”… “The Git Up” SOUNDS country. It’s got the overused drum machine that somehow country has embraced even though it was last hip in the eighties, and Blanco sings in a twang.
But Nashville and country radio aren’t buying. So is it number one or not?
You can go on Spotify, and see that “The Git Up” has 28 million streams. Which isn’t even a hit in the pop world. Blake Shelton, whose “God’s Country” is #1 on the Mediabase chart only has 33 million streams. Meaning, your mainstream country fan…has not embraced streaming yet. It’s like saying you’re the best quarterback in Vince McMahon’s XFL… Maybe one day the XFL will rival the NFL, but it’s doubtful. But there will come a day when everybody is streaming and we’ll have better insight into what is truly popular, but now “The Git Up” is a niche product, driven by TikTok. Nothing wrong with that, just don’t tell me it’s #1.
P.S. Adobe switched from a sales model to rental. At first, revenue dipped, then it went through the roof, the customer was happy, being served updates regularly, not just once a year, and they had to pay every month, lining Adobe’s coffers. But music just can’t let go of that sales model…
