Things To Consider Before Calling Your Favorite Singer A Good Artist

Disclaimer: This isn’t a bash on pop music (although it kind of looks like one). I myself am a fan of some pop tunes. This is just an honest opinion about the difference between pop musicians and artists based on the things I’ve seen on TV and on music documentaries and on the things I’ve read on magazines, books, and the internet. Please don’t see this as a generalization. And lighten up, this is just a blog post, not the end of the world as you know it.

Lately, I’ve been obsessing on trying to stop people from calling any random “musician” as an artist without considering a couple of factors.
First of all, just what is an artist? You can Google it, look it up in a dictionary or whatever (but that wouldn’t be artistic). In my opinion, an artist is someone who creates something — a song, a painting, a sculpture, a poem, a story, a deep philosophical quote, anything — that comes from deep within his/her inner being, with the help of the world around him/her as his/her source of inspiration and tools in creating said work. Having said that, I have come up with four (4) questions that could help you decide whether your favorite singer is really the artist you claim he/she is.

1. Who composed the song he/she popularized and who wrote the lyrics?
In my earlier definition of what an artist is, I pointed out that whatever piece of art he/she creates, it comes from within. That’s the problem with pop musicians. They usually have someone or a group of people write the songs they sing and claim those songs as their own. It’s like me having someone else paint a bunch of scenic pictures whilst I take credit for the success of the exhibit! The dilemma that most pop music writers face is that even though the song they worked on for many sleepless days and nights may be the number one hit song in several music charts, the only credit they will get is a small (read: tiny!) “this song is written by” in the CD inlay. Real artists compose their own songs.

2. What is the motive behind his/her being a musician?
Pop music is mainly written for the money or for popularity (which in turn leads to money, ha!). Why do you think pop music appeals to the general populace? It’s because they are tailor-made by writers so that listeners could have something to relate to. And the singers hype this up some more by rallying the listeners to embrace the feeling that a particular song brings, i.e “It’s okay to be brokenhearted! There are a lot of fish in the sea!”, when in fact, that said singer hasn’t even experienced a broken heart! It doesn’t matter if you’re living under false pretenses so long as the fans are happy. Happy fans equals more money. More money equals happy fat, greed record company CEO’s. Real artists write music as a way of freely expressing themselves, regardless of the number of people who can relate to the songs they play. Real artists only need to please themselves. Of course, praise from others is always welcome, but it’s not a priority.

3. How does he/she respond to popularity/success?
Like what I said earlier, artists only need to please themselves with their work. But it can’t be helped that other people would enjoy their work as well, and voila, a fanbase is born. The bigger fanbase an artist has, the better are his/her chances of being discovered by a record label. This is a critical moment in an artist’s career. It’s either you sell out on all your beliefs and take the money and run or you pass off a chance of a lifetime and stick to the grassroots. Signing to a major record label usually spells success and success spells money, but again, those things mean little to real artists. Of course, if you get to sign to a major record label AND keep your values intact, so much the better.

4. Does he/she know how to play any instruments?
I believe that a musician whose only weapon is his/her voice isn’t an artist. Don’t get me wrong, a song needs great vocals but if it’s all you’ve got, it makes you kinda weak. It’s like being a writer who has great ideas and a colorful imagination but doesn’t even know how a pen works. That’s how it is with some pop musicians. Their voices are their sole contribution in creating music. They record vocals and let the composers and producers worry on how the song should sound like. Real artists toil on the songs they make from composition to distribution. The artist/s him/her/themselves decide on how a song should sound like and this would be impossible without knowing how to play a musical instrument. They could always hire someone else to play an instrument but it wouldn’t be the same. An artist could include his signature guitar riff or his signature drum/bass/piano/harmonica solo on the song. A hired musician could play the part right, but he’d play it his way, not how the artist specifically wants it played. Again, a piece of art is an extension of the artist’s being.

Start hating me for making your favorite musician look bad.