Aminé’s “ONEPOINTFIVE” — Rhapsodies shaped by the streaming era, defying the definition of what a song is

A song is, in short, a story. Lyrics, melody, harmony, arrangement — everything in a song is meant to convey a storyline to the listener.

Sometimes, though, a song may present such an unexpected turn in sound, that it’s almost like a new story.

Lately, we’ve been seeing more and more songs that blend different styles, as if one single song told two (or more!) stories.

Think, for example, Travis Scott’s 2018 massive hit “Sicko mode”. It’s opened by Drake; around 1:00 Travis comes in, rapping in a whole different flow over a whole different beat. It might seem like Drake’s participation was just an intro for Travis (which would be interesting enough, because why not a separate intro track?)… but no: around 3:00, the beat changes again, and Drake comes back. “Sicko mode” is like 3 songs in one — and it works, not only because all three are good, but also because the entire thing keeps you entertained.

But combining many different musical ideas in one song is nothing new — it dates back to the rhapsodies that exist since the 18th century. Along with fantasias, rhapsodies were a composition genre used by composers who wanted to break free from traditional song structures, and try new approaches in composition.

We’ve seen it many times in the modern era as well, with Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” being the most remarkable case of blendition of musical ideas in modern pop music. Californian band No Doubt used to be a master of mixing different styles in one song too (like “Excuse me mr.”, overall a hardcore punk song, but with a ska bridge), and presenting musical changes in direction (their B-side “New friend” is a dancehall song for 3 minutes, then turns into rock’n’roll). In K-pop, an environment that is peculiar for its overload of information and content, it is also common to hear songs with big turnarounds — think Momoland’s 2018 hit song “Bboom bboom”, a disco-pop song with a twist to a trap beat in the second verse; and, of course, the epitome of K-pop’s “the more, the better” approach: Girls Generation’s “I got a boy”.

However, in the last years, especially with the thunderous success of trap music and hip hop (the #1 genre today in the United States, the world’s biggest music market), and the rise of music streaming services over albums and singles sales, the idea of no longer having to stay committed to one story during a track is reaching new levels.

While releasing albums with a big number of tracks seems to be an efficient way to increase streams in platforms such as Spotify, it is also a challenge for artists to keep the listener’s attention during the whole album. American rapper Aminé’s latest album, “ONEPOINTFIVE”, succeeds in this.

“ONEPOINTFIVE” is composed of 13 tracks — but you will only know this if you look at the tracklist. There are moments when the musical ideas are distributed between the tracks according to no apparent pattern, making it hard for you to identity which track is your favourite to add to a personal playlist — also, making it hard for you to just not let the entire album playing, without skipping tracks.

The album alternates trap rap with Aminé random talking, providing an experience of continuity, intensified by song transitions that sometimes are subtle, and sometimes are abrupt. But that’s where it gets interesting — some of these transitions occur inside one single track, like “Ratchet Saturn girl”; and some occur between two tracks, like the transition of “Why” to “Shine”.

The above mentioned songs challenge the perception of what a “song” is — or, for the very least, they highlight the difference between a “song” and a “track”.

“Ratchet Saturn girl”, for example, begins as a trap rap song, but suddenly turns into slow-jam.

The sequence formed by “Why” and “Shine” is even more interesting — here we have 2 songs and 2 tracks, but curiously, the beginning of the second song and the second track does not coincide. If you a consider a song as a sonic piece with a relatively consistent musical idea, then, “Shine”, the song, actually begins at 3:00 of “Why”, the track.

But do these difference matter? To whom it may concerns to distinguish a song from a track?

From the perspective of streams and sales, for charting purposes, it makes no difference if a track does or does not contain a frame of consistent musical ideas.

However, for music creatives in general, it will be interesting to see if such approach will reflect on their songwriting and production process. For now, the topic brings up a few discussions:

• How many songs would fit in a track?
• How much of a sonic piece is enough to be considered a totally different song, or just a turnaround in the same song?
• And where would this tool lead us, if it ever becomes a trend?

And, most importantly:

• How much should a song’s songwriting and production process be led by the perspective of composing an album, either if it’s for artistic or commercial purposes?

At the end of the day, as long as quality is not sacrificed, it’s okay — but even quality, in music, is subjective. Then, maybe, there are no right or wrong answers; just different purposes. And, whatever was Aminé’s purpose on “ONEPOINTFIVE”, he probably achieved it — at least for me, who’s still listening to the album on repeat, and can’t decide my favourite tracks or songs yet.