The Triple J Hottest 100 of All Time 2009 and the Dominance of the Rock Canon

In a recent issue of Meanjin, ex-triple j presenter Lawrie Zion gave an account of the first Hottest 100 (or Hot 100 as it was then known) on 2JJ in 1989.[1] Zion initially suggested the station run a poll of listeners’ favourite songs as a counter to the typical ‘greatest albums’ lists produced by magazines such as Rolling Stone, with the usual tired sixties rock suspects being glorified and newer, different music being ignored. This first poll was a great success, but was a poll of only Sydney listeners. It was broadcast in early March, prior to the period of upheaval at the station that saw it move from being based only in Sydney to being a national broadcaster, and saw many of the Sydney-based announcers removed in the process, causing uproar among loyal listeners.[2] By the time the poll was run in 1991, triple j was being broadcast in most capital cities, and when the Hottest 100 of All Time was broadcast in 1998, triple j was describing itself as a truly national network, having expanded into many regional areas as well as the capital cities, and votes were being cast on the station’s website as well as via more traditional methods. By 2009, the station claimed to be reaching 98 per cent of Australians when listeners were invited to vote for the 20th anniversary edition of the poll. Listeners were asked to vote online during June for up to ten songs, and the 100 songs that received the most votes were broadcast over a week in early July.

While the Hottest 100 was a successful event for the station, with more than half a million people voting for 13,000 different tracks, the final chart was controversial. There were very few female artists or black artists. The songs in the list were mainly traditional rock, with major musical styles of the last decades such as rap and electronica being largely ignored. Questions were asked in the media, on blogs and on the station itself—what was it that had led the widespread and apparently diverse triple j youth audience to vote for such a restricted range of music, music reminiscent of the Rolling Stone lists for which triple j was trying to create an alternative? As the station’s music director Richard Kingsmill observed, although the largest voting group was 19- to 21-year-olds, ‘seeing their favourites, you’d think it was a much older demographic’.[3]

It seems that the classic rock ‘canon’—the songs and artists that have come to be regarded as the ‘best’ examples of rock music—has become so dominant that it has been internalised by audiences of all ages. The increasing dominance of the canon can be seen when earlier versions of the Hottest 100 of all time are compared with the 2009 poll, where artists such as the Beatles and Bob Dylan occupy more places in the chart than ever before. This is to the detriment of the indie and alternative staples of previous charts, and means there are few places for any artists who aren’t white males playing electric guitars. The canon has become more dominant, to the point that suggesting the Beatles might not be the greatest rock band ever, or that Nirvana aren’t really worth listening to, is akin to blasphemy. The worth of the canonic bands has become an almost completely undisputed truth in popular culture, underpinned by the documentaries on these bands, nostalgic magazines proclaiming their greatness, and the use of certain songs as the soundtrack to the golden past. Triple j has also failed to provide listeners with an alternative that they could draw upon when deciding how to vote. While much of the media and online discussion at the time the list was released concentrated on the lack of female artists, I’m inclined to think that the age factor and the ‘classic rock’ canon flavour of the list also help explain this omission, insofar as the rock canon has always neglected women.[4]

There are some interesting differences between the 1989, 1991, 1998 and 2009 polls. As noted above, there were some differences in the voting audience for each poll, and this will have some influence on the results. Another thing to bear in mind is that in 1993, triple j changed the way the poll was run, and since this time there has been a Hottest 100 each year where listeners can only vote for songs released in the previous twelve months. The Hottest 100 of All Time polls in 1998 and 2009 were special polls run in addition to the normal yearly Hottest 100. It is worth remembering, then, that in 1989 and 1991 there was no separate yearly poll to determine the best songs from those years, and this might mean there is an over-representation of recent songs. This particularly seems to be the case in the 1991 poll, where almost thirty of the songs voted for were from that year or the previous year.

Only eight songs appeared on all four charts, and sixteen were common to the Hottest 100 of All Time polls conducted nationally in 1991, 1998 and 2009.[5] Fifty of the songs in the 2009 chart had not been in any of the previous charts. However, only around half of these were songs that had been released since the previous poll in 1998—so, rather than voting for newer songs, the listeners were voting for older songs (see Figure 1). In 1989, the average age of songs was just over eight years; by 2009 it had more than doubled to over eighteen years.

Another noticeable change is in the country of origin of the bands included. Figure 2 shows the three main countries of origin of the band for each song. This chart shows that the representation for England has stayed relatively stable, but Australian songs have declined from 26 per cent to 14 per cent, and US artists have almost doubled from 25 per cent to 46 per cent. (Countries such as France, Ireland, Jamaica and New Zealand only ever have one or two songs making the poll.) This is particularly surprising given the emphasis that triple j places on Australian music and supporting Australian bands, and also given that in 2008–09 42 per cent of music played on the station was by Australian artists.[6]

One of the main objections people had to the result of the 2009 poll was the lack of female performers. There has been an increasing trend for women to be left out of the Hottest 100 and the number dropped from seventeen women in 1989 to seven in 2009, not one of whom was a solo female artist. Those who made the list included Gillian Gilbert, the former keyboard player of New Order who is so invisible that most commentators forgot to even include her; and D’arcy from the Smashing Pumpkins, a band dominated by the tortured-romantic artist figure Billy Corgan. The only female voices heard were guest vocalists on tracks by Massive Attack. By contrast, the 1989 list included artists such as Laurie Andersen, Sinead O’Connor and Kate Bush, and Enya, as well as bands such as Blondie.

The 1989 list also included artists such as Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye and the Warumpi Band, which made it a more ethnically diverse list as well. Across the four lists there is less diversity over time no matter which criteria are chosen for analysis. There are fewer countries represented, fewer ethnicities, fewer women and fewer styles of music. The only place where there has been an increase in diversity is that in 2009 more separate bands were included—seventy-six discete bands or artists, compared to sixty-three in 1998, sixty-two in 1991 and seventy in 1989.

So in 2009 triple j listeners[7] voted for a more homogenous group of artists, representing more US-based music and older music than they had ever done in the past. Interestingly, in the yearly triple j hottest 100 polls, where voters can only choose songs that have been released in the previous twelve months, the problem of a lack of diversity is not as evident: women, Australian artists and a variety of musical styles are well represented.[8] This makes it too simplistic to assume that the triple j audience is inherently conservative (or, as was suggested in some discussions, sexist or racist). The issue seems to be rather that the songs voted for (particularly the ones that are new inclusions in the chart but weren’t released since the last vote) conform to the ‘classic’ rock canon. While the list still contains indie stalwarts such as Joy Division, The Cure and newer entries such as Modest Mouse and Hilltop Hoods, there is a very strong showing from artists such as the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin and the Beach Boys who are constantly (and, since the turn of the millennium, increasingly) being feted in our culture as the ‘best’ examples of rock music.

This is a concern because this canon, like canons in other fields such as literature, is not so much an objective reflection of what is the ‘best’ rock music as a reflection of the tastes of powerful groups in society.[9] Often those people will be in a position to influence the opinions of others; rock journalists, for example, play a decisive role here as does the readership of certain key publications. These people tend to have a shared world view and are highly influenced by ‘romantic’ notions of what art is with a focus on ideas such as ‘genius’ and ‘artistic autonomy’. Not all music has an equal chance of being included in the canon on merit. Older songs are more likely to be granted a place, and to keep it, since the earliest versions of the rock canon (usually focused on the late sixties) ‘were the first to define its requirements and standards’[10] and therefore continue to have a strong influence on more recent constructions. Once bands are accepted as part of the canon, it is hard to shift them. Newer music is judged by comparison to the ‘classics’ of rock. This has a double effect. First, these ideas about what is ‘great’ music influence what musicians do and the type of music they produce. The canon helps define what rock music is, and is therefore likely to be emulated and used as inspiration by those trying to make rock music. Second, breaking into the canon becomes even harder for new bands, since what they are doing can so easily be seen as derivative and ‘not as good as the original’.

The canon is, of course, highly contested and is never entirely set in stone. Over time songs and artists enter and leave the canon, and the struggles over who is included reflect wider struggles in society over which groups have their voices heard or are seen as legitimate producers of culture (it is not coincidental that white men make the ‘best’ rock music in a society still dominated by white men). Researchers have demonstrated that different canons exist for different groups. For example, Anntti-Ville Kärjä distinguishes between ‘alternative’ canons established within smaller groups or subcultures, and a ‘mainstream’ canon that ‘brings together large numbers of people from diverse social groups and across large geographical boundaries in common affiliation to a musical style’.[11] The triple j chart arguably represents the replacement of an ‘alternative’ canon with a more ‘mainstream’ one.

Recently, Ralf von Appen and Andre Doehring collated the result of thirty-eight ‘100 greatest albums of all time’ lists from the early 2000s into a ‘meta-list’ of thirty albums. The meta-list is dominated by the Beatles (with five albums included) and Bob Dylan (with three). The songs on the albums in the meta-list overwhelmingly ‘have a four-four time, very rarely exceed the time limit of four minutes, were composed by the musicians themselves, are sung in English, played by a ‘classical’ rock formation (drums, bass, guitar, keyboard instruments) and were released on a major label after 1964. The fact that nearly all musicians are white males from the USA … or Great Britain … is striking.’[12] These characteristics apply to the majority of songs in the triple j list also. Many of the artists represented in the meta-list are also represented in the triple j poll. For example, Nirvana’s Nevermind is the third album on the meta-list and that band has three songs in the Hottest 100. Bands such as Radiohead and Oasis that have more than one album in the meta-list also tend to have several entries in the Hottest 100. So the question then becomes, what effect has the canon had on voters and how has this convergence come about?

Some answers can be found in online discussions, such as those on the triple j forums and the Australian music website FasterLouder. One thing that can be seen in the discussions that took place during the period of voting for the Hottest 100 is that while some people are voting for their own personal favourite songs, the majority of participants in discussions are considering more than just what they like. They are also thinking about what is likely to be included in the chart—they don’t want to feel as though they have ‘wasted’ their votes on songs that are too obscure. So, for example, in a discussion on eventual number one song ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ on the triple j forums, a poster identifying as ‘Mischa’ says: ‘It is a brilliant song, and although it’s not my favourite nirvana song (come as you are, or maybe lithium), how could you not vote for it after the impact it’s had on an entire generation … i wasn’t even born when it was released, and i still love it.’[13]

On Faster Louder, ‘Mooney88’ says ‘Personally im voting for songs that i think MIGHT get in. But in saying that i still have to really love these songs.’[14] Such comments suggest that the songs participants vote for were those that exist in a space that overlaps between ‘what I like’ and ‘what I imagine everyone else likes’. It appears that voters had some idea of a canon in their heads to which they were comparing their own lists.

The idea of something being influential or artistically important also appears frequently in discussions, and this idea of something needing to be ‘influential’ in order to worth voting for partly explains the increasing age of the list. Forum participants suggest that if a song is too new, its worth or influence cannot be properly measured yet. There was, for example, a surprising amount of fury expressed when Kings of Leon’s ‘Sex on Fire’ appeared at number 90 in the chart: ‘Whoever allowed Kings of Leon to infiltrate their poisonous drone into the Hottest 100 of All Time … I want to butcher your testicles.’[15] Other slightly less vehement posters attempt to explain their anger. ‘Braydo’ says ‘Gotta agree with everyone else on KOL. Does not even come close to deserving a spot. They’re (this song especially) a fad. Give them a few years and they’ll have been forgotten about’;[16] while ‘David’ argues that ‘maybe people should give a song some time to mature b4 they go and stick it in the hottest 100 of all time. I think at least 10 years. I think if kol were played in 2 years people would start groaning.’[17]

The implication is that people should only vote for songs that have shown they can ‘stand the test of time’. People have not only remembered and come to believe in the importance of the songs and artists included in the classic canon, but also have internalised the reasoning that is used by critics, journalists and other cultural commentators when called upon to justify canonic choices.

Triple j maintains its ‘cool’ through ‘privileging newness in music. Songs are phased out after a certain number of plays on high, medium or low rotation, to maintain the subcultural capital of the music mix’.[18] Because of this, the station does not really have a way of creating its own canon, and listeners therefore need to consult sources outside the station (along with previous Hottest 100 lists) to get an idea of what is considered the ‘best’ music and ensure their votes are not ‘wasted’. The ‘best music’ lists like the ones discussed by von Appen and Doehring are one possible source of such information, along with playlists of other radio stations, music documentaries and magazines. All these lists reinforce the idea that the Beatles and Dylan are the best that rock will ever have to offer.

An increasing fragmentation of music audiences has allegedly occurred with the advent of the digital age. I say ‘allegedly’ because claims about the fragmenting of audiences seem to have been made for a long time (apparently FM radio was going to cause this also), and need to be treated with some caution. However, the proliferation of music and musical styles that are available and much more easily accessible via the internet means music audiences are less likely to be listening to the same new music. There could be a case made that grunge (which performed very strongly in the Hottest 100) was the most recent big musical moment in the West, something that resonated throughout the cultural landscape. If people are creating canons in their heads that then influence what they vote for, perhaps no one has the sense that many recent things belong there because they feel no one style or band has had a large enough audience.

The young people who have voted in the triple j Hottest 100 of All Time appear to have bought into the idea of a great body of work, and to have lost confidence in their own tastes and opinions. The search for an outside arbiter of taste reinforces and gives greater power to the classic rock canon. The outcome of this is that those who are already culturally marginal in Australia—women, non-Caucasians, those producing music that doesn’t involve guitars and, for that matter, Australian artists—find their impact reduced even further. The voice of cultural authority has remained with white men. How has this canon become so firmly stuck in the public consciousness? Is it possible to dislodge it and to allow greater discussion on what constitutes ‘great’ music? One noteworthy result of the triple j poll was that it spawned other lists. There was the Hottest 100 women list compiled on Twitter, and posters on FasterLouder also started a thread for their own hottest 100. These, and the debate that arose around the triple j list, show the continued contestation over musical value, and the continued formation of alternative canons.

Notes

1. Lawrie Zion, ‘My Hot 100 Summer’, Meanjin, vol. 65, no. 3(2006), pp. 147–54. Back to article

2. Katherine Albury, ‘Spaceship Triple J: Making the National Youth Network’, Media International Australia, no. 91 (1999), pp. 55–66. Back to article

3. Mark Juddery, ‘And it makes us wonder’, Australian, 25 June 2009. Back to article

4. Catherine Strong, ‘Remembering and Forgetting the Women of Rock’, in B. Curtis, S. Matthewman and T. McIntosh (eds), TASA/SAANZ Joint Conference 2007: Public Sociologies: Lessons and Trans-Tasman Comparisons, Department of Sociology, University of Auckland, 2007 Back to article

5. Thanks to Andrew Woolcock for his work on the statistics for this essay. Back to article

6. ABC annual report 2008–09. Available at http://www.abc.net.au/corp/annual_reports/ar09/, accessed 3 October 2009. Back to article

7. This assumes triple j listeners do the majority of the voting. Given the online voting system, people who do not listen to the station may have voted, and in particular groups of fans of specific artists may have campaigned to raise their profile in the list. However, online research has not revealed any such campaigns being promoted to a significant degree, and online discussions and on the station itself show enough engagement by listeners to allow us to assume that most voters were also (to some extent) members of the triple j audience. Back to article

8. Lauren Istvandity ‘Just Ace’: A Study of Triple J’s Hottest 100 as a Canon of Alternative Australian Music, Honours Thesis, Griffith University, 2009. Back to article

9. Motti Regev, ‘Producing Artistic Value: The Case of Rock Music’, Sociological Quarterly, vol. 35, no. 1 (1994), pp. 85–102. Back to article

10. Ralf von Appen and Andre Doehring, ‘Nevermind the Beatles, Here’s Exile 61 and Nico: “The Top 100 Records of All Time”—a Canon of Pop and Rock Albums from a Sociological and an Aesthetic Perspective’, Popular Music, vol. 25, no. 1 (2006), p. 26. Back to article

11. Antti-Ville Kärjä, ‘A Prescribed Alternative Mainstream: Popular Music and Canon Formation’, Popular Music, vol. 25, no. 1 (2006), p. 11 (quoting Jason Toynbee). Back to article

12. von Appen and Doehring, ‘Nevermind the Beatles’, p. 22. Back to article

13. Posted 8.50 p.m., 4 June 2009, at http://www2b.abc.net.au/tmb/Client/Message.aspx?b=3&m=378137&ps=20&dm=1&pd=3. Back to article

14. Posted 6.48 p.m., 6 June 2009, at http://www.fasterlouder.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=23504&highlight=triple+j. Back to article

15. ‘emma’, posted 10.16 p.m., 10 July 2009, at http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hottest100_alltime/countdown/cd_81-90.htm. Back to article

16. Posted 10.00 a.m., 11 July 2009, at http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hottest100_alltime/countdown/cd_81-90.htm. Back to article

17. Posted 9.50 p.m., 8 July 2009, at http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hottest100_alltime/countdown/cd_81-90.htm. Back to article

18. Albury, ‘Spaceship Triple J’, p. 58. Back to article