It seems very few artists stick to the direction their music goes into and wish to sell out to collaborate with popular artists or a popular in-genre to get a hit.

An example of which is McFly. They were a pop-rock act who had top 10 hits and a few number 1s plus popular with the youngsters. Now they are doing a duet with R and B artist Taio Cruz with an R and B song which will obviously get them a top 5 without fail.

Other examples are Ellie Goulding who has a planned single with Tiny Tempah another urban act, and Kylie doing a song also with Taio Cruz.

What is wrong with sticking with your own chosen genre and appealing to the fans that way? Surely 10 out of 10 for originality and being you counts more than being a sell-out and being like every other act in the charts and in the industry,

Does it really matter if albums and singles don't sell as long as you have the fanbase to support this or are artist nowadays focused by seeing pound signs in their eyes and for the fame?

What do you think?

I absolutely HATE it when pop acts go all RnB on me. I like them because they're pop - there is more than enough RnB out there to the point where good pop music has really suffered during the last five years or so.

I think artists should remain true to themselves and honor the fans who fell in love with their original style. Usually going from pop to RnB doesn't work for most acts anyway and just pisses off the people who they could have made more money from on a longer term basis.

Me too, I hated Britneys music when she paired up with Pharell, she was better singing Baby One More Time etc rather than that Slave 4 U and Boys crap.

The thing with this selling-out nonsense is this creates a very "homogeneous" chart and industry where everything is pretty much the same. I mean is R n B the be-all and end-all to stay in the limelight?

My tip to anyone wanting to be the industry and to stay true is stay underground or low-profile.

nelly furtado must be the biggest culprit of this,she really cheapened herself by going down the cliche look at me i am really sexy r'n'b route.

Don't think you can say Ellie Goulding has sold out at all really just because she did the hook on a Tinie Tempah song. I'm sure her next album will be just as good as her 1st and wont be R&B based.

But she's forgiven in my eyes because Maneater and Promisuous were such fantastic tunes. Sometimes it's nice to have a radical change in direction. I love both Folklore and Loose to bits

Artists don't have to stick to one genre.
They can experiement. I loved McFly's Party Girl. If they were to make music in the same genre for their whole career, it'd be boring.

Sorry if i interpreted the OP wrong, if i did

To quote Bowling For Soup - "This song sounds like a dance song, cos dance songs are cool now."

I really hope you're right. Ellie is one of my favourite discoveries of 2010 and I'd be so disappointed if she changes her style so drastically after just one (fantastic) album.

Well said! One collab with a rap artist is hardly 'selling out', I have high expectations for Ellie's next album and I see this as being a seperate project as she's merely being featured on somebody else's record.

Whilst I agree with the idea of this topic in principal, I don't think acts should always restrict themselves to one genre. Changes of style can be good, if they're done for the right reasons.

I hate to say it, but a lot of artists are mates, and love collabirating with each other. If those two artists generally sing different styles of music, then one of them have to change.

Jay-Z is very RnB going on rap. Alicia Keys is very soulful. Empire State Of Mind worked brilliantly!

*looks at thread title*

Metallica and Megadeth.

\end thread

Gwen Stefani......

Going from No Doubt a ska punk band to singing about Hollaback Girls in a cheerleading outfit at age 40 surely has to be one of the biggest sell outs in recent years?

Sometimes selling out pays off, just look at Mariah Carey.
And Ellie Goulding and Tinie Tempah's track is great.

Well said. WTF can they not change or evolve. I left school and started a job which I did for nearly 20 years. Now I do something completely different. People change. Singers are people. Stop being precious over someone because they suddenly do something you dont like.

Some change naturally, others seem very forced. Thats the difference.

Look at Rihanna right now, she made a "rock" album, tried to be edgy that wasn't as well received as her previous pure pop one, so she runs back to being happy smiley pop girl.

LOL in no way was Rihanna's album even remotely rock. Even her song with Slash had mimimal guitar riffing in it, didn't even have a guitar solo for goodness sake :sleep:

I never said she was rock hence the inverted commas, just going by what she herself described it as in interviews. My point was she tried to be edgy, she failed so she returned to singing dance pop. Nothing natural about her change.

RnB is pop these days. It's taken a while for RnB to dominate the charts over here, but in America (as far back as 2003-04) virtually every main-chart No. 1 is RnB/Hip-hop influenced.

They were a shite 'Busted' wanabe to begin with but McFly have sold out SO bad.

They seem to be mimicking the music styles of Ne-Yo, Taio Cruz, Usher ETC.

I wonder what they have done with their instruments.

I'm slightly confused by this thread. "selling out" implies some kind of moral or artistic stance, a position which the artist can abandon.

McFly, are hardly the Dead Kennedy's, they didn't stand for anything they just made good pop songs, now they are making ..... slightly less good pop songs.

If for example M.I.A made a record insupport of the indonesian government for a pile of cash then yes she would be selling out. The people mentioned in this thread have just gone from making one kind of pop music to making a slightly diferent kind of pop music.

Its hardly Queen playing sun city, in the grand scheme of dodgy ethical musical decisions

I was thinking (very sadly and with a few exceptions) Manic Street Preachers.

I see it as also meaning diluting their music in order to gain a broader share of the market.

The reason people go more "urban" (or R&B) is because it's what the sheeple want and will buy and, sadly, the music world is a harsh place where it's all about the money. Nelly Furtado, as mentioned above, probably done it because her original sound wasn't bringing in the big bucks for the record label.


I feel the same. A lot of acts have diluted their sound in order to become more successful. It may not be them to blame when the record label forces this upon them, but what's wrong with being moderately successful, playing medium sized venues etc?