A lot of people have some strong feelings (including me!) about @triple_j’s Hottest 100 & 200 this year when it comes to homegrown artists. If you look at the data though, it’s a much better story than you might think.
Take away the emotional reactions to the Hottest 100 or Hottest 200 (I’m still annoyed about The Buoys not making it), and there’s actually a lot of good news in the data for Australian music.
What I’ve done on the screenshot below is ignore the tracks and the positions and looked instead at how many spots each artist received. For me, this is a better directional sense of strength of local artists.
This is because it’s worth thinking about how this data is collected. When you vote in the Hottest100/200, you do it individually. You create a shortlist and you cull it and edit it until you create a list that best represents you. It’s incredibly personal, and the process requires you to put thought into it.
The positions that come out of that are fun, sure – but it also means you can (and IMO should) look at the “most added” artists too. These are the artists who managed to make the cut the most times for the most amount of people. That, again IMO, gives a better overall picture of who Australia thinks it is, musically.
When you cut the data like that, there’s a clear top 21 of artists who appeared three or more times.
So, looking at it like that, these bits jump out at me:
- 48% of artists (aka “half”) who had >=3 tracks in top 200 were homegrown
- Out of those ten artists, 7 (or 33% of top artists) were groups, not solo artists
- Out of those ten artists, 5 (or 24% of top artists) are what you could call “typical” JJJ-sounding bands
- Most of those top Australian artists were formed recently – only Lime Cordiale formed before 2010 (and that was in 2009), and the bulk of them have been most visible in the last five years.
Conclusions:
- Given the record number of votes, and the relative strength of global stars this year, having half the most-chosen artists in the top 200 be locals is pretty good going IMO. Those ten artists will represent a LOT of votes.
- There is still a decent hunger for bands among the solo artists, including newer bands. Younger bucks like Old Mervs and The Rions are exactly who “should” be there alongside more established bands like Hockey Dad and Lime Cordiale.
- Amyl & The Sniffers did *spectacularly* well, and their presence all over the top 200 should be taken as a sign that there is support for the genre as well as the act. They might have taken the votes here, but the wider ecosystem will benefit. A rising tide of Amyl floats all shouty boats.
You must be logged in to post a comment.