Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Songs

Question on origin of Glad All Over, I'm So Glad

Question: Were Dave Clark Five's "Glad All Over" and Cream's "I'm So Glad" intended as send-ups of Charles Hubert Parry's coronation hymn "I Was Glad?" This song is still used at Royal occasions and would have been well-known to these bands. This bears looking into. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.224.98.231 (talk) 17:49, September 21, 2019 (UTC)

Release history tables added to song articles

PPAACCMAN4 (talk · contribs) has been adding large "Release history" tables to Aerosmith song articles (click on contribs for which). These largely duplicate the existing infoboxes, with the addition of promo/radio/DJ copies. When they are referenced, they usually include a link to rateyourmusic.com and discogs.com for sources (both considered unreliable). It looks like they are working their way through Aerosmith's song catalogue, after doing much the same for the group's albums. These does not follow WP practices and much of it looks like what discogs has on its release pages – that is, it is details for details sake and not encyclopedic content. Since this may require reverts on dozens of articles, some level of concurrence would be beneficial. —Ojorojo (talk) 15:18, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

@PPAACCMAN4: You're adding unsourced content (RateYourMusic.com is not a reliable source as it's user-generated) so all what you're doing can be removed based on WP:RS.

Before I start reverting it all, I'd like to know why it's being added. What does this content add that can't be discovered at discogs.com? How is it encyclopedic rather than merely informative?

The fact that the entries are using quote marks to specify "inch" is also problematic. 7-inch or 12-inch not 7" or 12". Walter Görlitz (talk) 16:23, 16 January 2020 (UTC)

The point was to simply clarify release dates. As an example: Done With Mirrors has long been listed as Nov. 9, 1985. A Saturday. Most record releases are not on the weekend. The copyright office lists it as Nov. 4,1985. Similar problems existed with other Aerosmith albums listed as being released on the 1st of a given month. My goal was to improve upon the discography with regards to release dates. The reason for the release history table was to clarify information that exists on both Discogs and Allmusic. I would not call the USA copyright office, RIAA, Billboard, Record World and Cash Box unreliable. However I do see your point on Rate Your Music. Discogs was used as photographic evidence for the Aerosmith self-titled first album in regards to a more approximate date for the third album cover usually attributed to 1976. I apologize for the use of the quotation marks. After reading some guidelines I see the this style is not used in Wikipedia. I am still fairly new to this and learning as I go. Thanks for your time. PPAACCMAN4 (talk) 08:51, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

One problem is that the release dates you've added are not supported: the sources do not actually specify release date. Rather, it appears the dates used are taken from copyright registrations "publication date" (not necessarily the same), date first advertised, and date first entered the charts. The dates are often different and none actually say "released on". Please note that sites such as discogs.com, imdb, songfacts, amazon, itunes, forums and fan sites are never reliable sources and, except for reviews, AllMusic details for older releases are often wrong.

For example, you added to the lead for Get Your Wings: "Although the official website for Aerosmith lists the release date for Get Your Wings as March 1, 1974, the USA copyright office lists the album as being released on March 8, 1974.[1] The album was actually delayed one additional week from the copyright date and released on March 15, 1974[2]":

1) aerosmith.com doesn't appear to list official release dates (also not linked as a source);

2) the copyright office indicates the publishing date as March 8, which fixes the date for copyright purposes. This is not necessarily equivalent to release date: the record company may ship the album prior to its official release or "street date", but still have copyright protection;

3) Billboard has an advertisement for the album in its March 16 issue and makes no mention of a release date (where does March 15 come from?) Also, there is a lag between when magazine receives the ad copy from Columbia and when the issue is actually published – does the record company always time its releases to exactly coincide with the date of Billboard publishing its ad?

The lead is supposed to be a overview or summary of the most important points in the article. Judging from the amount of emphasis they receive in Get Your Wings (2 out of 6 sentences), the conflicting dates seem to be the most important thing about the album. However, they are not discussed in the rest of the article, except as a line item in the "Release history" table (without a citation). This type of info may be of interest to record collectors who obsess over errata and minor publishing variations. However, it is unnecessary for an encyclopedic article and is best for collector websites that specialize in pressing plant matrix numbers, run out markings ("Do what thou wilt"), etc.

—Ojorojo (talk) 15:49, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

I'd add that the official websites of artists are often incorrect regarding release dates for albums from the 70s and 80s... you have to bear in mind that the website was probably set up two decades or more after the album was released, and the person maintaining it very likely doesn't have access to information from the time, only what they have been told (heck, they might not even have been born when the album first came out). I'd never rely on official websites as a source for release dates, in the past I've found several that are demonstrably wrong. Richard3120 (talk) 16:03, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

yes sir i can boogie

what a load of crap that this song has sold 18 million copies barely a million in certs and somehow its sold another 17 million without a shred of proof you people ay wkikipedia are full of shit07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)07:54, 29 January 2020 (UTC)~ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.75.175.141 (talk)

Well, apart from the fact that you don't seem to understand the difference between sales and certifications, and the history of certifications and that they didn't exist in most countries in 1977, if you read the article properly you would see that Wikipedia isn't responsible for saying it has sold that much... the claim of 18 million sales was made by Joseph Murrell, Wikipedia is simply reporting his claim. Richard3120 (talk) 10:51, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

A single or a promotional one??

Hi Guys. I've been in Wikipedia for a while and I have realized I don't really know how to differ a single from a promotional single when it is only released digitally. There are songs that are shown in digital music platforms as "singles" but some of them are consider by wikipedists as "promotional singles". I don't if it has to be recognize by the artist as a single, or it has to be mentioned to be one on a music publication.

For example, a publication on NME [1] refers to "Leave It Alone" by Hayley Williams as a "new single" and the second to be released from her album Petals for Armor. The song has been released digitally (as "Simmer", the first album single and considered as a "single") in most of the digital well-known music platforms. So I don't know how to deem a song as a single or a promotional one. Thanks in advance!--Saviourofthe (talk) 01:56, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm foggy in this area too. Pinging Brandt Luke Zorn, who may have some useful insight. Popcornduff (talk) 02:13, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

The "promotional single" terminology is most useful when applied to the pre-mp3 era, but I suppose it could still be found today. A "promotional single" is released only to radio stations (or otherwise distributed in very limited copies "within the industry", not to the public). A "single" proper, on the other hand, is a retail single which is commercially available for purchase (or consumption) by the general public.

The division between mere "promotional" singles and real singles was a result of the pre-digital era, because in order to play a song at all you needed some physical copy of it. Labels wanted certain songs to get radio airplay without necessarily releasing them commercially to the public, but they couldn't just send radio stations an mp3 or a link, they still had to send an actual physical product. A telltale sign of a promotional CD single from the 90s is that the label wouldn't bother to provide unique cover artwork and would stick to generic, purely functional labeling or reused artwork. Compare Radiohead's retail CD single "Paranoid Android" with the generically labeled promo CD singles "Let Down" or "Airbag", or the retail CD "High & Dry" b/w "Planet Telex" with the promo CD "Bones", which just reuses a simplified version of the earlier artwork.

Of course, very few people purchase singles on physical media like vinyl or CD anymore. Today, I would say that something becomes a "true" single by having its own dedicated page on digital retailers and/or streaming platforms, most likely including its own unique cover artwork. "Leave It Alone" has both (here's its page on Spotify, and I just uploaded that cover art to Wikipedia). —BLZ · talk 19:49, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

@Brandt Luke Zorn: Promotional single still may be released digitally without releasing it to the public. If something was released on publicly avaiable online store like iTunes it can't be promotional release. Eurohunter (talk) 21:36, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

@Eurohunter: that is correct, and that's a good point of clarification. To be clear, promotional singles still exist; I hedged because I'm not personally aware of how prevalent they are currently, but nothing about the shift from physical media to digital means that promotional singles can't or don't still exist. The relevant difference remains distribution internal to the music industry (promotional) vs. distribution to the public (regular single). —BLZ · talk 22:17, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Village_pump_(policy)#Stop_putting_Roud_index_numbers_in_the_lede_of_folk_songs

For the interested. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:50, 18 February 2020 (UTC)

Genre based on charts

Current discussion re several R.E.M. songs regards whether charting on Billboards "alternative rock" chart is a reliable source for the genre being "alternative rock".

IMO, charting is not a reliable source for genre. From a pedantic point of view, it is not a reliable source stating, with editorial oversight, anything about the song other than that a radio stations previously classified as "modern rock" or "alternative rock" were playing it.

From a practical point of view, radio stations do not necessarily stick to a particular genre. Through the late 1980s and 1990s, R.E.M. was a staple on modern rock/alternative rock/college radio stations. When a new R.E.M. single was released, those stations played it, because their listeners wanted to hear it, whether it was "modern rock", "bubblegum pop" or something else altogether.

Similarly, using charting as a source for genre would give us multiple cases that I'm sure most of us would recognize as absurd. While I don't see the sources for saying "We Are the World" is pop and/or gospel, I can reasonably see strong arguments supporting that. Charts, however, would make the song dance/disco, country, R&B/hip-hop and mainstream rock. - SummerPhD^v2.0 14:00, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I also think this is a slippery slope to go down. Ed Sheeran's "Shape of You" charted on the Billboard Latin Pop chart, but I don't think many people would see this song as Latin pop. Whereas, say, Madonna's "La Isla Bonita" has far more obvious Latin music influences, but never charted on any Billboard Latin chart... but did reach number one on the Adult Contemporary chart instead. So is "La Isla Bonita" more an AOR song than a Latin pop one? I don't think many would agree. Richard3120 (talk) 14:12, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

A song not charting doesn't prove it wasn't a certain genre. Sometimes, there will be an anomaly but for the most part, if a song charts on a hip hop chart, it's hip hop and if it's on a country chart, it's country. Either way, the question is not if Billboard charts are definitive truth but if they are verifiable (they are) and reliable (they are) sources for these types of claims. ―Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 15:02, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Charting songs are not subject to editorial review. Songs clearly show up on charts for genres that no one would argue apply. I'm really having trouble hearing "We Are the World" as country, R&B, hip-hop and dance/disco... - SummerPhD^v2.0 16:09, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Speaking of We Are The World, what arguments do you have that suggest it's pop and gospel? Maybe we should find a source for that too? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jimwagoner (talk • contribs) 16:11, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't have sources for that and it's worth discussing. However, it is off-topic here. - SummerPhD^v2.0 16:44, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely not okay to source a song's genre from charts. The two don't align for example Rhythmic songs does not refer to a genre. Radio stations pick and choose what they play which is why on occasion R&B or other genre songs end up being played on Latin stations and therefore airplay drives their chart position. I think it would be best to avoid using a song's charting on a particular genre chart as an indication it is of that genre. → Lil-℧niquԐ1 - (Talk) - 15:07, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

There are anomalies: the Beach Boys decidedly not-R&B "Surfer Girl" and "Be True to Your School" showed up on the R&B charts. Genres should be taken from sources where there is some discussion of the musical style, rather than just a name dropped into a list or blurb. Otherwise, they are not useful nor encyclopedic. —Ojorojo (talk) 17:07, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely OK to source a song's genre from charts except when the song was remixed or remastered for that chart. Stations only play songs that fit into their format whether that song is R&B, pop, urban Uzbek, rock, hip-hop or anything else. If a song is played on a station that does not report for that charting (for instance an R&B track played on a Latin station as was the example above) the polling would only count toward the Latin charts, not the R&B charts. I think this misinformation needs to start and is a complete misunderstanding of what charting constitutes (the era of payola excepted). Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:37, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I do it sparingly, only as an absolute last resort for non-contentious stuff. (For example, adding Rock to a Foo Fighters song that charted on the Mainstream Rock chart. Anything else, I stay away from it. Sergecross73 msg me 18:19, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree that if there is push-back, a different source should be found, and if all you have is charting info, it shouldn't be an article anyhow. Walter Görlitz (talk) 18:23, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Agreed, though in creating lots of song articles, I have occasionally found rare circumstances of songs that receive plenty of coverage, but for whatever reason, none address genre. Saint Cecilia (song) is the only example that comes to mind. Lots of coverage, but not really on genre. But I added Rock mostly on the grounds of the chart, and that there really isn’t a good faith counter-argument to saying it’s not something as vague as rock music. But if one was brought up, or a better source was found, I’d defer to the new source over the chart in a second... Sergecross73 msg me 18:32, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

As the rock chart is a large, catch-all genre. Walter Görlitz (talk) 18:54, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

@Walter Görlitz: so you would agree that we could list "We Are the World" as adult contemporary, hip hop, country, and disco, based on the Billboard charts that it charted on, but remove "pop" and "gospel" from the infobox as there are no sources for those? Richard3120 (talk) 19:13, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Why are you pinging me? Do you think that I do not have this talk page on my watchlist and just stumbled across the current discussion?

I would try to source genres, but there are a lot of issues with the "We Are the World" article that need to be addressed. Walter Görlitz (talk) 19:16, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I know you have this page on your watchlist - so do I, but that doesn't mean I might not miss a question aimed directly at me unless I was pinged, so I was extending you the same courtesy. I agree with you that there are definitely problems with that article, considering it's an FA. Richard3120 (talk) 19:36, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

I’d say add it if there’s is a good-faith argument that it fits the song, and remove it should be removed the moment there’s a good-faith doubt about the genre or a better source. Sergecross73 msg me 20:50, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Guys, important notice: There are two versions of. You have to look at the genres for the 1985 version. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jimwagoner (talk • contribs) 19:30, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Template:Did you know nominations/Anyone (Demi Lovato song)

Can someone please give this a full review? SNUGGUMS (talk / edits) 21:57, 23 February 2020 (UTC)