Comparison Of Coldplay And The Chainsmokers

Coldplay and The Chainsmokers are two of the most popular groups currently in the music industry. Though the two groups are very different in terms of styles and genre, they have both seen commercial success over the last few years. Coldplay, an established English alternative rock band signed by Parlophone Records in 1999 and The Chainsmokers, a DJ/EDM pop duo formed in 2012 after signing with Sony Music Entertainment. Described as electropop (McIntyre, 2017), “Something Just Like This” was released officially by The Chainsmokers on February 22, 2017, along with a lyric only music video currently holding over 695 million views on Youtube. The song entered the Billboard Hot 100 at position fifty-six, however, after gaining worldwide attention
Through the act of repetition, an artist is able to continually reinforce the song to the audience. He argues that an artist must do this with a piece of work in order to make up for the fact that the song has no real substance so instead, “Listeners become so accustomed to the recurrence of the same things that they react automatically” (Adorno, 27). According to Adorno the audience neither cares nor notices that fact that the music they are listening to does not actually have any depth or creativity, instead repeating itself over and over simply because the artist can get away with it. The recurrence of notes, lyrics or sounds can cause the song to have a better chance of being remembered and therefore a better chance of being purchased or viewed. The idea is that the more repetitious a song is, the more likely it is to be liked and the more likely an artist is able to make money. “Something Just Like This” would be, according to Adorno, a perfect example for plugging. Not only is “Something Just Like This” the title of the track but these words also appear in the song over ten times during the course of the four-minute tune. Not only do the words “I want something just like this” appear over and over in the song but the words “I’ve been reading books of old” occurs at the beginning of both verses’. Additionally, lead singer of Coldplay, Chris Martin, harmonizes the phrase “Do do do do
The Frankfurt School believes that the audience is not engaged with their popular culture and instead are mindless, passive listeners who take what they are given. Adorno’s idea behind the concept of popular music and leisure is “the frame of mind to which popular music originally appealed on… one of distraction and inattention. Listeners are distracted from the demands of reality by entertainment which does not demand attention either” (Adorno, 37). His idea that all the members of the audience wants out of their music is to relax, is one I disagree with. Though some audience members do listen to music to relax, many people listen to music to find more meaning to try and relate to another person’s experience. In the song “Something Just Like This”, the combination of styles, lyrics and vocal qualities, may leave the listener feeling nostalgic or understood. Though it is not the most unique song in the world and on many levels is structurally similar to most pop songs today, it certainly does not expect to serve as a distraction for the members of the audience. Adorno assumes that because he believes that the music industry is driven off the ideals of capitalism, that no one song can have more substance or meaning that an average pop song that has no depth when