Wheres decent chart books/sources ?

[Jon9]

What chart books are there for metal, indie-alterntive, dance, punk. If no singles from ep-Lp-album, then wheres there a playlist by radio DJ for that genre. Mostly 80's ,secondly 90's. Uk or u.s. Underground/specialist radio charts, not mainstream/pop charts. Can't use format of bands in alphabetical order; ... year of release , top chart position for the single, would be  jumbled up. Or is there a forum where best single song from each album is listed- listed by responsible owner/administrator of forum site- not ignorant , grandstanding/hubris syndrome- narcissist type symptoms, autistic spectrum, secondary type:schizophrenia in remission... making up rubbish ,misguiding lists on purpose etc. to gaslight.

[markm]

I'm late to this conversation and I don't have the patience to wade through all the post, but excluding charts,  it seems to me all the poster needs to do is go to any online list of the best metal albums or songs and get tracks like Crazy Train and War Pigs, Holy Wars, Breaking the Law, Master of Puppets, The Trooper and be done with it. 

To the poster, this is a site for people who are genuinely into metal rather than skim the surface for commercially viable hard rock.  

[FatherAlabaster]

Have you checked out Rate Your Music? You might find some of what you're looking for there. We have lots of lists of people's favorite metal albums by year or genre floating around here, if you feel like listening to a bunch of stuff and hopefully finding some music you like, but nothing along the lines of a definitive list of top singles. Good luck.

[Jon9]

Cheers for reply but wont bother as ive seen youtube playlists and some forum sites etc for stuff and its waste of time,boring effort. I hate the ones that say stuff like 'anyone can be goth with some Hot Topic (... Its a clothing chain) money and emo make-up. This isnt real goth like it was back in my day ' then i click on and theres no  playlist in YT commentors page of goth stuff or anything else-, just blank !?!?  😵   😱       💀

Ive got Virgin book of british hit singles for uk pop/mainstream charts. Singles listed in alphabetical order,band name,highest chart position,year of release,  to make vertical columns. Year of release is in last column which makes it easier putting a ruler vertically in that column to see last two digits of year, to check decade then colour code it. Took ages just doing that !!  I'd settle for that format if cant find the prefered one mentioned in my question. Format looks like this...

Singles name.  Band name. Highest chart position. Year of release

Singles name.Band name. Highest chart position. Year of release.

Martin C. Strong books maybe format of bands in alphabetical order, then potted history of band then other stuff; too clumsy. Got an indie book , indie hits 1980-1989 by barry lazell but only lists ep-lp-albums. Lover speaks - no more i love yous, not released as single. Not mentioned by author as would-be single. book seems to be incomplete- missing stuff out as not many bands in it, noticed ep's- albums missing from couple of bands i already know of. Cant be bothered going through all tracks on every album. If band's not on indie music label then not included in book-author says so in the forward- even if song sounds indie-alternative !?!?    😵   😱     💀

listening to sinead o'connor- mandinka, number 17. Xtc -nigel, number 17 too !! Police- synchronicity 2 (number 17) sounds bit indiepop but on major label probably, so maybe wouldnt get into indie charts.

Also,... Source: wikipedia ( with sources of info referenced in its articles),

Thompson twins- we are detective. Doctor doctor ;example of one tune each from two albums(they did more albums).

Examples of unreleased album tracks/bonus tracks; TT - If you were here, Judy do. Police- bring on the night. Bonus track worldwide except French singles chart, number 6.

Cyndi Lauper- all through the night . U.k mainstream singles chart ,number 64. U.S billboard hot 100 chart, number 5.  Bananarama -love  in the first degree u.k No 3. U.S bh 100,No 48. robert de niros waiting, u.k No 3, U.S b.h 100, No 95.

Cure- fascination street. Bonus track in u.k.  U.S bh 100, No 46.  U.S alternative airplay chart, No 1.

Also listening to Leitmotiv (u.k) - architect, played on u.k indie- alternative radio show, John Peel radio show.

... oh yeah, and Duran Duran-the chauffeur, bonus track from Rio album which is similar to Metallica-master of puppets album in that it has more than one good tuney-wuney on the albumy-walbumy.

Bananarama- love in the first degree escapee instrumental   😎.          

Edit: Just looked at site. clicked on Charts,then customise charts, then top singles of 1987.. include subgenres.. pop, united kingdom.

fleetwood mac-everywhere,No 6.  Little lies ,No 28. Did same search but excluded subgenres....  F.M not in top 40.  😵      😱           💀

Edited August 27, 2022 by Jon9

[SurgicalBrute]

Dude...no ones doing that kind of shit for a niche genre like metal. 99% of it doesn't even get on a chart to begin with, and about 85% of it, arguably, doesn't even follow the "release a single" style format since it doesn't get radio play. At best, you're probably going to find a book about rock that might include some bigger names from the metal world, but otherwise you're going to have to do your own leg work...that means going to places like Rate Your Music and Metal Archives and using search features.

[AlSymerz]

Yeah I agree with Surg. Several times I've wanted to know similar information about bands or specific albums and it's a slog to find even mainstream metal bands. There are some listings for specific bands, i.e what they sold and whether albums went gold, chart positions etc. But a source where all bands are compiled either doesn't exist or is bloody well hidden.

Any book I have ever seen on the topic is very specific, as in Metal of the 80's or 90's, or NWOBHM, or East Coast thrash etc, and the term Metal is often used very broadly. Most of those books are at least 15 years old, probably more, back in a time where people actually bought books and were interested in facts, not just waited for information to present itself on their screen.

I'm sure the data exists somewhere in record company databases, and I know Australia keeps some fairly good records for charting music in multiple genres, but it's not easy to source. A centralised Almanac of these things should be organised, all it needs is someone with a few hours of spare time

 

[GoatmasterGeneral]

What's a "chart book?" I've read his posts over 5 times each and I still have no idea what he's talking about or what specific information he's looking for or why he would even want it. Metal doesn't get any radio play so how could it have have singles or chart positions? Less than 1% of bands sell well enough to get on the mainstream album charts anyway. Not sure why anyone would think there'd be books of shit that doesn't exist. Album sales charts might be useful and interesting, but beyond that for metal his query makes no sense.

[AlSymerz]

Metal still has sales and those sales will be recorded.

Australia has a chart for most genres of music, other countries no doubt do as well.

Sure a problem arises because there is so many independently released albums these days and it would be hard to chart those but no list is perfect. It all depends on the data one is looking for, but a list of what bands are selling, have sold in the past and other such information is as good as historic stats about any topic. For those interested in such things such data will always have a higher value than for someone who doesn't care.

 

[GoatmasterGeneral]

Right, and if you'd read my post I said that album sales could be interesting and useful, but if we're talking about metal then there simply won't be any 'singles' charts or radio play charts because metal doesn't work like that. Those things don't exist.

[AlSymerz]

But they do exist, labels and record companies would have their own lists, and many countries have their own lists of what sells locally. Radio charts were simply one way of collecting data, they still track sales where they can and use those sales figures for many different things. Obviously it can't be done for every release, but these things are tracked it's just the data does not appear to be made readily available like it once was. Maybe that because there are too many anomalies, maybe it's because there is a huge conspiracy not to tell the public things, whatever the reason the data exists it's just a matter of finding it.

[GoatmasterGeneral]

7 minutes ago, KillaKukumba said:

But they do exist, labels and record companies would have their own lists, and many countries have their own lists of what sells locally. Radio charts were simply one way of collecting data, they still track sales where they can and use those sales figures for many different things. Obviously it can't be done for every release, but these things are tracked it's just the data does not appear to be made readily available like it once was. Maybe that because there are too many anomalies, maybe it's because there is a huge conspiracy not to tell the public things, whatever the reason the data exists it's just a matter of finding it.

No you stubborn orca, metal singles charts don't exist. Unless we're just talking about radio-friendly "pop-metal" type stuff and if that's the case then I really couldn't care less and feel free to disregard the rest of this post. Albums sales are a different story, there would have to be figures for those. And I agree they shouldn't be so hard to uncover.

But actual metal bands don't release 'singles' or expect to have 'hit' songs broadcast over the radio because actual metal doesn't get played on the radio and metal fans (especially extreme metal fans) are generally interested in buying whole albums, not singles. So obviously there wouldn't be any way to track these things for individual metal songs the way they do for pop music songs. If anything maybe there could be some kind of streaming statistics or bandcamp/amazon/itunes download statistics or something like that but the old 20th century way of doing things where a record company releases an album then picks a song to be the 'single' that gets ditributed to radio stations doesn't apply to metal.

[AlSymerz]

I never said the charts exist I said 'those things' existed, which is true, the data exists it's just not in the same form as it once was or seemingly available to the general public.

M-A shows 8000+ "singles" released in 2021 and there will no doubt be more. That figure is probably not a patch on what it might have been 30 years ago but it shows singles are still being released.

A look down any metal news site will show that bands release singles, they release video singles. Maybe they don't get played on radio as often as they used to but those singles are often released as physical releases and even where they aren't they have all sorts of statistics recorded about them. Streaming/bandcamp is today's way of collecting data, as well as other methods, the data may not be exactly the same as it once was but no one has claimed it was.

[GoatmasterGeneral]

9 minutes ago, KillaKukumba said:

I never said the charts exist I said 'those things' existed, which is true, the data exists it's just not in the same form as it once was or seemingly available to the general public.

M-A shows 8000+ "singles" released in 2021 and there will no doubt be more. That figure is probably not a patch on what it might have been 30 years ago but it shows singles are still being released.

A look down any metal news site will show that bands release singles, they release video singles. Maybe they don't get played on radio as often as they used to but those singles are often released as physical releases and even where they aren't they have all sorts of statistics recorded about them. Streaming/bandcamp is today's way of collecting data, as well as other methods, the data may not be exactly the same as it once was but no one has claimed it was.

I guess we must be talking about apples and oranges then. I don't ever look down any 'metal news sites' as I figured out 15 years ago that they only talk about mainstream stuff which I have no interest in. The only site concerning metal I go on is this one. I can't remember hearing a 'metal' song on the radio that was any more recently released than some 80's 'hair band' stuff or something off the black album. I can't even imagine any of the metal bands I listen to releasing 'singles' that 'chart' so which metal bands are you talking about? 

[AlSymerz]

If you only want to remain focused on one genre then of course you'll create hurdles, they might not be impossible to get over but they will be there and you'll need to jump higher. The OP didn't create the same hurdles you've created and therefore if I read his/her posts right (and I'm still not sure I am), what their asking is out there just not as easy as it once was to find. Anything commercially available will have the kind of data I think the OP is asking for, even black metal, but for whatever reason it's not made available in the same forms it once was.

[GoatmasterGeneral]

I'm not sure I read the OP right either, those two posts were a bit confusing. I thought he mentioned singles charts and radio DJ playlist data. But I know he said a bunch of other stuff too.

But yes it's certainly true that I come with preconceived notions of what 'metal' means, and I'm sure 'metal' could also mean lots of other things to lots of other people. Obviously I was not aware that 8,000 metal singles were released last year and now I'm mildly curious as to what kind of metal bands would be releasing 'singles' in this day and age. It's certainly possible that there could be markets outside of New York where maybe metal does get played on commercial radio? Just because the idea of hearing metal on the radio here in the NY metro area is laughable, doesn't mean it couldn't be happening somewhere else like maybe in Europe or wherever.

But that's why I said before that if we're just talking about mainstream catchy radio-friendly pop-metal type stuff or nu-metal or metalcore or something along those lines that I wouldn't ever listen to or consider to actually be 'metal' then I misunderstood and I don't really care. 

[FatherAlabaster]

My reading: the guy wants easy-to-understand lists of the "best" songs from non-mainstream albums in a few genres, mostly from the 80s, also the 90s. He doesn't want new releases or current data, or to listen to full albums or dig through random recommendations. He just wants authoritative sources to give him the cream of the crop so he doesn't have to waste his time with the deep cuts. Why read the article when you can get everything you need from the headline.

I do not dig it; it's the opposite of what I enjoy about listening to music; I can't help. Any of you guys feeling like an authoritative source?

[AlSymerz]

I know they aren't the sorts of bands you listen to but bands like Angelus Apatrida, Enforced, Korpiklaani, Exodus, and Pissing Razors released singles in 2021. So it's happening across a wide spectrum of metal, there is also 2100+ black metal (as classified by M-A) single releases for the same time. No doubt all that data could be correlated, maybe actual sales couldn't be worked out from M-A alone, but someone must have the data.

Bandcamp and streaming services have their own ways of data collection, number of streams, number of downloads, even number of sales (where applicable), not that far removed from what I think the OP is talking about that existed 20 odd years ago. But those services also don't appear to be completely honest with the data they wish to share and you can bet they don't share all the data they do collect. So while I think the information the OP is looking for is probably still collected, it's done a lot differently to those old Almanac type record keeping methods and it's not available to everyone as it once was.

 

7 minutes ago, FatherAlabaster said:

I do not dig it; it's the opposite of what I enjoy about listening to music; I can't help. Any of you guys feeling like an authoritative source?

Authoritative tomato sauce maybe.

[FatherAlabaster]

3 minutes ago, KillaKukumba said:

Authoritative tomato sauce maybe.

You'd be better off in tzatziki, I think tomato would be overpowering.

[AlSymerz]

 

2 minutes ago, FatherAlabaster said:

You'd be better off in tzatziki, I think tomato would be overpowering.

You've got a point, my stomach ulcer really acts up with too much tomato.

[SurgicalBrute]

2 hours ago, KillaKukumba said:

M-A shows 8000+ "singles" released in 2021 and there will no doubt be more.

That's not what "single" means on MA though. From what I can gather, OP is looking for the popular track on an EP or LP...i.e. the hit song(s)...which is what people are generally talking about when they say single. The term "singles" as it's used on MA is kind of a misnomer, as it's actually referring to a type of release format, in much the same way you would say EP or LP. They're used for promotion, may actually contain more than one song, and those songs don't always appear on the longer format releases a band makes, so they're not really comparable to an album single.

EDIT: ...and yes, some bands do still release a single off of the current album, and do videos to go with them (Amon Amarth for example), but these days it's because music streaming is king. Current generation rarely listens to full albums...instead they tend to select one or two songs to play over and over, and that's what drives a bands popularity

[AlSymerz]

All I've every know singles to be are songs released separate from the album, in whatever format. These songs stand alone from the album release.

If one just wants a 'peoples favourite' selection from a bunch of albums that's not something I've ever heard referred to as  a single. Even in the 80's and 90's when every second album released was a compilation album and the popular songs were taken off 20 different albums, I've never heard them referred to as singles.

 

[GoatmasterGeneral]

 

50 minutes ago, FatherAlabaster said:

My reading: the guy wants easy-to-understand lists of the "best" songs from non-mainstream albums in a few genres, mostly from the 80s, also the 90s. He doesn't want new releases or current data, or to listen to full albums or dig through random recommendations. He just wants authoritative sources to give him the cream of the crop so he doesn't have to waste his time with the deep cuts. Why read the article when you can get everything you need from the headline.

I do not dig it; it's the opposite of what I enjoy about listening to music; I can't help. Any of you guys feeling like an authoritative source?

It's the same old discussion I've had plenty of times about balancing the time and energy some of us spend digging, with how much good stuff we're actually yielding from it. It's clear that lots of people would love to find ways to cut corners and get the high yield results without having to do so much (if any) of the digging. While others of us don't want to cut corners becaue we enjoy the digging for its own sake. The Chase is Better as Lemmy used to say.

But yeah, at the end of the day the idea that anyone on the planet who is not me would ever be able to filter music for me and just give me their conclusions of what the best stuff was, or or maybe they would do some research to determine what the 'general consensus' of what the best stuff was, is just antithetical to the way I want to go about finding the music I'm listening to as well as the way I want to make a personal visceral connection with music. I need to do it my way, I'm just not the kind of person who's inclined to take anyone's word for anything, ever.

I listen to stuff all the time that I would never need to own or in some cases I might never even want to hear it ever again. But I'm still not usually sorry I listened to it, I usually feel like I got something out of it. The Cliff Notes method would just bypass the entire journey and drop you right at the destination. Perfect for some, but for me that would be sacrificing too much of the fun. But I guess the biggest thing for me is how could you ever be sure you weren't missing out on some killer stuff that you would've liked so much better than whatever you were given? To me this would be no different than trusting that some commercial radio program director is playing you the very best music there is. Or buying music thinking it's the best stuff out there just based on what's selling the best. I can guarantee that virtually 100% of the time these are going to be the worst ways of finding new music.

[SurgicalBrute]

23 minutes ago, KillaKukumba said:

All I've every know singles to be are songs released separate from the album, in whatever format. These songs stand alone from the album release.

Separately yes, because they were released ahead of the album release, but they were typically songs from the album....usually the ones a band wanted to highlight because they had potential to be popular. How often do you remember ever running across a band releasing their new "hit" song, and then not finding it on the actual album they're promoting? For example, War Pigs is a hit single off of Paranoid, and usually one of only two songs you'll ever hear from that album, but War Pigs is still a track on Paranoid.

"Singles" like they're talking about on MA, are a separate type of release that can contain anywhere from 1 to 3 songs on them. Additionally, those songs may be left to stand on their own and never make it on to a general release like an EP or LP. You see that all the time on Bandcamp, where a band releases a left over track or they drop an exclusive track to promote their upcoming album. That doesn't sound like what the OP was looking for though.

Here...this article will explain it a bit better: https://www.musicianwave.com/difference-between-single-ep-lp/

[AlSymerz]

You've lost me. I don't read anything in that link that is different to what I'm suggesting has been, and remains the norm for the music industry.

I'm going to teach myself Chinese it's easier than understanding anything in this thread.

 

 

[Thatguy]

5 hours ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

What's a "chart book?"

I dunno either. To me a book of charts would be written music. When I was tiny they used too sell flimsy books that had the lyrics of charting songs and the charts - the hit singles charts. But I am sure this is not what he meant either.

[SurgicalBrute]

1 hour ago, KillaKukumba said:

You've lost me. I don't read anything in that link that is different to what I'm suggesting has been, and remains the norm for the music industry.

Okay...from the article

"Before the new music industry took place, record labels used to select two songs from an artist’s album and sell this couplet as a single. With vinyl records, these two songs were placed respectively on each side of a 45 rpm disc. One of the tracks, on Side A, was usually the “main” single, the song most promoted and pushed on radio stations and TVs. The other song, Side B, was a more obscure one. This was a clever promotional strategy, as consumers were pushed to want more of the upcoming album."

In other words "single" generally referred to a song that was pulled from an existing album and was released to the public. It was still part of an album though, in the same way songs from a compilation would still be considered part of their original album. It didn't exist separately as it's own unique release. I believe this is what the OP was looking for information on, as these were typically the songs that would chart.

These days though, as I said, a single can have anywhere from 1 to 3 original songs on it. So "single" is no longer a song description because it's not referring to just a single song being released from a larger album. Instead "single" has become its own format description like EP or LP because it may refer to a collection of songs that exist independently from either an EP or LP.

Not sure if that makes any more sense now than any of my previous comments, but I'm going to leave it at that either way.