‘TikTok is age agnostic’: how Kylie and Fleetwood Mac discovered new younger followers | TikTok

They have lengthy been a staple of older music lovers’ playlists, however basic stars – from Kate Bush to Fleetwood Mac and Kylie Minogue – are bypassing conventional music platforms to seek out youthful audiences on TikTok, one of many app’s music heads has stated.

The platform, as soon as thought to be a teen dance fad, has advanced into one of many key gamers within the music business, permitting legacy superstars to attach with followers who had been born many years after they began releasing music.

“We don’t have any constraints as to who will be profitable,” stated Darina Connolly, head of TikTok’s Label and Artist Partnerships. “The group is de facto age agnostic and style agnostic, it doesn’t care how lengthy an artist has been releasing music.

“If it’s a style of music they’ve by no means listened to earlier than, they’re not going to say, ‘I’m not going to hearken to that’. They’re simply consuming music on a regular basis. And if a monitor resonates, for no matter motive, it then tends to do rather well.”

Final week, Kylie turned the primary girl over 50 to interrupt on to the Radio 1 playlist with a solo music in years. However the success of her current hit Padam Padam – No 8 on the UK charts – can be traced to TikTok, the place it was loved and shared by gen Z, regardless of youth radio stations refusing to play it for weeks.

Connolly stated Padam Padam had been profitable “as a result of it’s an absolute tune. It’s upbeat, it’s catchy, it naturally creates a way of pleasure and celebration.”

On prime of that, she stated, the LGBTQ+ group bought behind it, turning it right into a homosexual summer season anthem. “Kylie is a really well-known ally and her songs at all times promote acceptance and self-expression which actually resonates with that group.”

The monitor’s success echoed that of Kate Bush’s Working Up That Hill, which final yr discovered renewed consideration after it was featured on Netflix’s Stranger Issues. It instantly went viral on TikTok amongst younger devotees of the present, earlier than topping the UK singles chart 37 years after it was originally released.

“The group that was watching Stranger Things got here straight over to TikTok,” Connolly stated. “They’d by no means heard the music earlier than but it surely actually resonated with them as a result of they’d seen it on this actually epic TV second.”

At present, a few of TikTok’s most engaged artists are over the age of 70, Connolly stated. “Elton John completely is aware of easy methods to use the platform and have enjoyable with it. He posts about his music, his life, reside reveals, content material from behind the scenes, he brings buddies in. Rod Stewart can be tremendous engaged, serving to an viewers discover his music, which is able to once more be model new music to lots of people’s ears.”

Stewart’s monitor Do Ya Assume I’m Attractive was even on the centre of a TikTok dance development final yr, and a video of Stewart and his spouse leaping on the development has to date generated greater than 29m views.

The primary legacy monitor that basically took off on the platform was Fleetwood Mac’s Desires in 2020. After an infamous skating video, the monitor acquired a 374% soar in gross sales and an 89% rise in streams inside just a few months.

When Mick Fleetwood made his own recreation of the unique TikTok, the music re-entered the Billboard Sizzling 100 at quantity 21 after a 43-year absence, climbing to the Prime 10 of Spotifys International and US charts, and hit No 1 on Apple Music.

In the meantime, Miguel’s Certain Factor resurfaced just lately resulting from a sped-up remix on TikTok, ensuing within the authentic music re-entering the UK and Billboard Charts, turning into the singer’s greatest ever hit greater than a decade after its authentic launch.

“TikTok has completely modified the music business,” Connolly stated. “There’s democratisation [on the platform]. Every thing is up for grabs.

“It simply takes one creation to make a development, one second of magic that may result in 1000’s and tens of millions of creations, and, finally, success.”