When the music’s over…

The Beatles had The Cavern in which to learn their craft.

It was once said that we measure out our lives in pop singles, but will we still be humming the songs of Pop Idol graduates 20 years from now?

The pop charts may be over 50, but with singles sales at their lowest level for over 25 years there is a big question mark over the pop 45. And if further evidence were needed of how much singles have fallen in our affections, a recent survey to find the all-time favourite Number One single did not include one record from the last 20 years.

Could it be that pop is simply going through one of its periodic lulls, or, with global CD sales sinking, and so many more demands on teenage attention and money, such as computer games and the internet, is pop in terminal decline?

Much the same question was asked in the early Sixties, between the first flush of rock and roll and the emergence of the Beatles, and again the pre-punk mid-Seventies. Late critic George Melly, in his book of the same name, called it ‘revolt into style’. A musical movement springs up from the grass roots, dominates the charts for perhaps 18 months, and is then seized on by the music industry, which proceeds to smooth down its rough edges, manufacture third-rate clones of its leaders and generally kill off the goose laying the golden records.

It happened with Elvis Presley, The Beatles, punk and Britpop – you’d think record companies would learn. What makes the current crisis in pop music so acute, however, is that there is no arena for new talent to learn its craft. The Beatles had the Cavern, The Sex Pistols a thriving circuit of pubs and small clubs, while Blur, Oasis, Pulp and other Britpop bands emerged from a thriving ‘indie’ scene of small record labels.

Many of today’s pop idols, however, are manufactured and, as a result, have a shorter shelf life. Six months is considered a career in today’s terms – even though the number of CDs needed to secure a Top Ten slot has never been lower. Sales of 100,000 should be enough to secure a Number One slot, 25,000 a Top Ten placing and as few as 5,000 a Top 40 hit. Thirty years ago 20,000 sales in one week might just have earned you a Top 30 placing, and 200,000 copies a Number One record. With single sales down, the charts have never been easier to enter – or to rig.