If you think about the premise of TikTok, it makes total sense. Albeit not an original idea (for those who remember Vine from the start of the last decade), people upload a short, funny video onto the internet, usually with a short clip of music attached in the background.
This sounds a rather arbitrary statement to make – but the fact that the app now has developed such an international and wide-ranging reach over the past twelve months, means that it is a platform you can no longer ignore.
From hugely catchy tunes such as ‘Think About Things’ by Daði Freyr to ‘Blinding Lights’ by The Weeknd, modern music charts, both in the UK and around the world, have all been subject to the influence of viral videos making waves on TikTok.
You might think, what does this mean for the music industry? Well, quite a lot, actually. Utilising a clever business model, the app pays artists royalties through lucrative deals with labels. They also utilise free music by providing up-and-coming artists the platform to spread their art to audiences they may have only ever dreamed of previously.
In jumping on the bandwagon in an attempt to become ‘TikTok famous’, we are increasingly being surrounded by content being created on the platform – especially as people have been finding things to do in lockdown. Consequently, music used on the site has had an influence on chart positions every week.
According to officialcharts.com, the official barometer for the music industry’s movers and shakers each week, Jawsh 685 & Jason Derulo’s latest single rocked-up a staggering 7.2 million streams to secure the Number 1 spot in the week leading up to 10th July.
Considering that many songs on the platform have the tendency to get stuck in your head, industry behemoths are seeing the music scene literally change in front of their eyes under the influence of TikTok. As people try to emulate attempts at the many viral ‘challenges’ on the site, it makes sense that the correlation between being a hit on TikTok and in the charts is only going to get stronger.
Away from recent noise around certain nations considering to ban the app , TikTok isn’t going away any time soon. This means, for better or worse, you will very likely see (and hear) its impact for a while – from stumbling across random videos when scrolling on the internet to a tracks position in the weekly charts.
But will the bubble ever burst? Music has always been a powerful force, but what is inevitable is that viral trends do come and go. As TikTok has not yet reached the top of the viral curve – not by a long shot – they will continue to “make every second count”, and could continue to be the place to find new music for a long time to come.
Image: by Kon Karampelas from Pixabay
Is TikTok the new frontier for music promotion?
