How Long Should a Career be to Not Count as a "Flash in the Pan"?

Various members here feel (at least when it comes to "pop" artists), that 7, 10 and 15 year long careers (and still going) are "flash in the pans". [See: Rihanna, Beyonce', Taylor Swift]

How long should a career be or how long does it need to be to constitute as a solid, stable career? 17? 20? 25? What timeframe does a pop artist need to survive to be considered "legitimate" or "lasting"? Is the timeline always floating? Should it float?

Does this also apply to rock artists? Should it apply to rock artists? Is rock inherently "longer lasting" and more "legitimate" than pop? Why is the "flash in the pan" argument never stated about anything other than pop?

 

4

 

A lunchtime.

 

Careers should be tallied in the number of hangovers.

 

For me, beyond 3 gold- or platinum-selling albums.

 

2 singles, 2 albums, 1 tour. Nothing less.

 

well Flash and the Pan had 6 albums

 

Can we bring up the Beatles yet?

 

4 years, which not-so-coincidentally is the same amount of time it takes to complete high school.

 

Who the hell thinks Rihanna, Beyoncé, Taylor Swift are flash-in-the-pans? I must have missed those threads. That's crazy talk.

Beyoncé is this generation's Diana Ross. Taylor Swift has had five multi-platinum albums. Rihanna topped the pop singles chart seven straight years and is now crossing over into movies.

If those ladies are flash-in-the-pans, so is Jimi Hendrix.

 

There's at least 2 or 3 members, especially on the last few pages who think that:

http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...-artist-on-earth.437499/page-22#post-12384322

This is just ONE thread where these views have been espoused. They're everywhere in other threads when discussing these artists.

 

Oh, lots of people do, believe me.

Whenever someone says something like that about a modern artist I can't help thinking - wow, do these people have a crystal ball or something? Don't they think it's a little bit premature to dismiss these artists at this point and not even try to give them the benefit of the doubt?

 

My favorite dismissal of modern pop is when someone posts something along the lines "Lets see if ____ is still worth posting about in 20 years." implying that the modern poppers are not worth "polluting" this board with talk of them until then.

 

You're apparently only supposed to like them if the charts, graphs, and future forecasts say it's OK. Pop artists can never have long enough careers for the naysayers.

We have Herman's Hermits fanatics here, so....

 

Okay. Well, I get the criticism of Taylor Swift from outside the US. I don't think they really got Garth Brooks, either. Doesn't make him any less of a superstar.

The rest is a whole bunch of cynical, "get off my lawn" -type stuff.

True.

In the cases of Taylor Swift and Beyoncé, there is a point to be made about stage parents pushing them into the spotlight early, but the same can be said about Michael Jackson. Ultimately, those ladies are successful because of their talent.

It's a bit early to be crowning Taylor Swift as "the best artist ever", but she has that potential. Dismissing her like she is Tiffany or something is just sheer idiocy.

 

http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...preciation-thread.434415/page-7#post-12351027

 

Brilliant!

 

Yes! I mean, this is not even about the actual quality of music which is subjective and up to the listener to rate - it's about popularity, the ability of an artist to stay relevant. You can't base your predictions on an artist's musical longevity on whether you think the music is any good - you have to take into account how the modern young audiences perceive these artists and what kind of music they like.

 

"Flash in the Pan" is an event of short duration and trivial substance. Unless both criteria are met, it's an inaccurate term to use, and often used as a derogatory put-down towards pop music, especially when an artist is still active.

I find "Flavor of the Month" to be a kinder term towards artists I'm not following that closely, or whose work I'm not too enthused about. It implies a certain appreciation or respect for their position, without the implication that their work is meaningless or trivial. And somebody can be "Flavor of the Month" for a long time.

Just my two cents...

 

Did you link directly to my post by mistake or did you interpret my comments about how Swift is not popular in Finland to mean that I think she's just a "flash in the pan"? Am I missing something here? Because that's not at all what I think. I mean, she's already been in the business for a decade. Surely that would be the longest flash ever.

 

That's a forum software glitch. I quoted/ responded to the other guy and it must have pulled your info by mistake. I simply copied and pasted the last page address for that thread and it pulled your info. That happens sometimes. Sorry.

 

Yeah, I figured that out since you had "liked" my post.

edit. but @dlokazip didn't.

 

A lot of times members will be misquoted by the software. I've been notified of quotes then I click on the alert and it will be a quote for another post I did not make.

 

"Flash in the pan" doesn't refer to the length of the career, but to the enduring nature of its impact.

According to Wikipedia, the career of The Bay City Rollers can be traced between 1966 and 2000, but you could certainly advance a case (and probably make it convincingly) that they were a flash in the pan because they were very successful only for a couple of years and they don't seem to have had any long-term effect, either as an influence or because their own records came to be regarded as "classics".

By contrast, Jeff Buckley recorded one complete studio album and a couple of live ones before dying but his influence is ubiquitous and his own recordings do seem to have the status of classics.

The problem is that the detractors of current pop acts want to rush history by claiming that they already foresee that the likes of Beyoncé & Taylor Swift will disappear from musical history. They'll either be right or wrong but I don't know why they feel the need to drag their Magic 8-ball certainty into every thread.

 

And sometimes even that "+Quote" button produces really strange results.