Monitoring the Top 40 this week and I found something quite interesting.

33. Alexandra Burke - Let It Go, new entry. Set for only 1 week in the top 40.

32. Jennifer Lopez - Dance Again, down 21 places. Spending only 2 weeks in the top 40.

31. Kylie Minogue - Timebomb, new entry. Set for only 1 week in the top 40.

30. The Saturdays - 30 Days, down 13 places. Set to spend only 3 weeks in the top 40.

29. Far East Movement - Live My Life, down 10 places. Spending only 4 weeks in the top 40.

All these songs fit in with the dance genre that is apparently more popular then ever. However, judging by the unpopularity of these songs.. and the success of more alternative songs like We Are Young and Somebody I Used To Know, is the UK finally tiring of the dance trend? It's just an observation, what are your thoughts?

Thank ****. If looking for rigidly alternative hipsters-can-bash-one-out-to songs, you can do a lot worse than fun. and Gotye, but anything's better than what the UK and US dance scene has become.

The funniest thing about all this repetitive "dance" music that's been churned out for like two years is....
Most of it's rubbish to dance to.

When we had proper club anthems people could actually dance to them, now people just jump on the spot with their hands up.

Can't wait for it to go... Hopefully Pitbull and Guetta's careers go the same way.

It isn't going anywhere unfortunately. The ones you mentioned are low in the charts but there are still a lot of artists at the top of the charts with their 'club bangers'.

All you need to make a pop song now is get either David Guetta or Calvin Harris to produce a dance tune and sing a crappy vocal over it.

Dance in one form/style or another has been around for twenty odd years...longer if you count 'disco', so no, i dont think for 1 second that some style of music that you can dance to is going anywhere fast.

I'm really, really sick of seeing David Guetta's name everywhere. Does the guy ever take a day off?

But what about Where Have You Been, Chasing The SUn (I guess), Young, Starships, Laserlight, Let's Go?

Scream by Usher is set to chart high too, just like Dj Fresh

Call My Name by Cheryl is out next week, that's going to go #1

No...it's the in thing at the moment and will be for quite a while.

It is dominating less but there is still a lot of dance tracks around and it probably wont be going away for a while.

Loreen - Euphoria new entry at number 3?

Rihanna - Where Have You Been non mover at 6?

David Guetta & Sia still in the top 40 with Titanium?

I think it's just a blip...

I suspect the songs you mentioned are charting poorly because they are not getting any radio AirPlay more than an end to the dance trend. Also most of the acts mentioned have been around for awhile and for some reason established acts don't appear to be selling aswell as they used to, David Guetta and Adele are the exception rather than the rule.

Yes, I think it's quite obvious that dance music is finally going away.

It'll never completely disappear, but I think in a few years (e.g. in say, 2015), it'll be only 4 or 5 dance-pop songs in the chart each week, like it was back around 2004 time.

Notably, Pitbull and Flo Rida's latest songs are much less dance-influenced than usual, so perhaps the record label bosses are noticing it's not selling as well as it was 12 months ago.

I cant see it ever going away, not even to those low levels. what will replace it? Its standard now that pop music has a beat you can dance to.

There will always be some dance songs. There have been my entire life, but last year we had a week with I think 30+ dance-pop songs in the top 40, and now it's much less than that, and looks likely to continue decreasing.

What will replace it? Well, in 2004 when there was little dance-pop, there was a lot of RnB, hip hop, non-dance-pop, etc. in the charts. You can dance to a lot of hip hop songs, and you can dance to other genres like grime, dubstep, drum and bass, so pop music can draw from those genres. It currently is even more and more, a couple of months ago we have the first EVER drum and bass #1 in UK, and just today, we've already got our 2nd one. And this is a style of music that was just producing #39 hits back in the 90's.

It's not just dance music that's underperforming.

Cover Drive - Sparks, Dappy - Rockstar, JLS - Proud, Plan B - Ill Manors, Labrinth - Last Time, Stooshe - Love Me, Tinchy Stryder - Bright Lights, Marcus Collins - Seven Nation Army, Cher Lloyd - Want U Back, Usher - Climax, Conor Maynard - Can't Say No and many other songs are all plummeting after high peaks.

It's more to do with the fact radio are only intent on playing the same songs all the time (Mama Do The Hump, Titanium, Call Me Maybe, We Are Young, Somebody That I Used To Know, Wild Ones, Domino, Good Feeling, Next To Me, Starships)....all songs that, funnily enough, spent an eternity in the top ten.

But thats what im getting at, theres dance music and music you can dance to, whatever charts itll be 'danceable'.

This has to be the daftest observation ever. So a load of pop stars who have slightly dancey directions flop and that means dance music's dead? Ever considered all that lot flopped because they are crap songs?

Depends how you define "dance" as well. These days it seems to be word that defines bland pap, but you know, if you go back through the mists of time there were people that actually did good music in the genre. Like anything else it got homogenised and suddenly every M.O.R. popstar were going on about there "NEW" dance direction.

Its like how the word "pop" star got ruined as well. Pop very simply meant anything that is popular, so that literally means anything in the charts that charts high, and really encompasses all genres of music. These days the term has become muddied and just defines the likes of the acts you listed above and manufactured X-Factor clowns.

Ultimately, any style of music is good if the people making it are making good music. I get fed up of narrow minded people who hate a particular style exclaiming "Rock/Pop/Hip Hop/Dance,etc,etc is DEAD!"

Its only dead when the fat lady stops singing.

Yes. But hip hop, grime, drum and bass, dubstep, etc. all have completely different rhythmns to the dance-pop that's dominating the charts at the moment.

Do you even listen to chart music? Because a couple of people seem to be in complete denial of this dance explosion we've had the past few years, but trust me, there IS one. The fact that dozens and dozens of other members here notice it, and that random people keep starting threads on it show that. It's not just something people have made up. Most people are aware it's happened.

Most songs in the chart the past few years have used slight variations of this instrumental: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qR3teFwWsnI And use the same tempo and percussion pattern as what's in the first 30 seconds of that.

- Hip hop is about 80 beats per minute with emphasis on 3rd beat of the bar

- Dance-pop is about 120 beats per minute, and the drum beat is a kick drum that hits on every beat (so it's really boring, and this is what is dominating)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dance-pop
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electropop

- Grime is about 140 beats per minute, originally branched off from UK Garage music

- Dubstep is also about 140 beats per minute (and emphasis on 3rd beat of the bar like hip hop)

- Drum and bass is about 170 beats per minute (the current #1 is in this genre, and is the 2nd DnB song to get to #1 in history, which is more evidence that the David Guetta-style dance-pop is getting less popular, since people are moving to other styles of music again)


Yeah, the bold bit is what we're on about here.

Most of the rest of this post sounds like another person that doesn't listen to chart music. If you did, you'd know exactly what we were on about.

Nobody is saying the genre will "die". We mean that it'll stop dominating the charts, and it's heading that way. It's like how rock music isn't in the charts anymore. Rock music isn't dead because it's not in the charts, so dance-pop music won't die because it's not in the charts either, but it's definitely dominating less and less.

There's always been dance-pop, and there always will be. When I was a kid there were dance-pop ones similar to what's dominating now, that I used to hear on the radio. But, especially in 2011, it reached unprecedented levels of domination.

This whole post has basically summed up what I meant, YOU ARE BRILLIANT Alot of people seem to be missing the point, I'm talking about a certain type of dance-pop music that has been dominating the charts for awhile. People above have mentioned other dance-pop songs that are doing successful and yes that's true. However, it seems for the first time in this 2 year domination that alot of these type of songs are beggining to flop. It's all I was pointing out.

I disagree it was a "daft observation" thankyou Dragon Lance. You're observation was clearly the daftest since you failed to understand what I'm talking about, instead of ranting on about aload of pretentious rubbish

bib... not much, its all too samey, ive a reasonable knowlege, thats mainly due to keeping up with music for the pop music quizes i attend! lol.

oh i dont deny theres alot about, i just dont expect it to go away, my initial post refered to dance music in some form.

Nevermind 'dance' music. It's the pernicious, virulent cancer that's very broadly collectively bracketed under 'RnB' / 'urban' that needs lancing from the UK charts.

There is vey little RnB or urban music in the charts atm .