Do Songs with Names as the Title Effect their Naming Popularity?

Through this short paper we will take a look at a group of positively associated named songs and negatively associated named songs. To define a song as negatively correlated, I look to see if the lyrics had any of the following traits:

For clarification purposes, many of the positive songs do in fact speak kindly of the women’s promiscuity, but the context of the songs falling in the negative category classify them as such. The songs chosen are from the years 1960 to 1995. Each song has the previous 4 years and following 4 years of their release date, as the data becomes null before or after due to influence being lost. Here are the song categories:

Postive:

  • “Layla” by Derek and the Dominos

  • “Rhiannon” by Fleetwood Mac

  • “Michelle” by The Beatles

  • “Roxanne” by The Police

  • “Hey Jude” by The Beatles

  • “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond

  • “Rosanna” by Toto

Negative:

  • “Lola” by the Kinks

  • “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” by The Beatles

  • “Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson

  • “Jolene” by Dolly Parton

  • “Runaround Sue” by Dion DiMucci

  • “Angie” by The Rolling Stones

  • “Black Betty” by Spiderbait

The following graphs shows the popularity by percentage and the change over time, with markers on the release date.

Positive Names

Negative Names

There are some obvious jumps in naming popularity in both the positive and negative associated graphs. Rhiannon, Layla and Jolene seem to be the most drastic with Angie and Michelle trailing close behind in rising popularity after the song’s release date. Oddly, in the negative category, there doesn’t seem to be any association with names decreasing in popularity due to the song’s social implications. If anything, the names that were decreasing seem to have already been on the decline before the release date. The names that most dramatically rose to popularity were names that were already very low in popularity to begin with (Rhiannon and Layla). The influence of the song is obvious but the weight of which is to be taken lightly as only a small group of Rhiannon’s/Layla’s could cause such a visibly drastic change.

Most interestingly, Jolene shot up largely in popularity after being in declination for over a decade with a small increase before the release date. Given that the song is about a mistress stealing Dolly Parton’s partner, it could be assumed that the love for the song and Ms. Parton overrides the meaning and social implications of the song.

The three Beatles songs vary greatly in their influence. In the height of Beatlemania, the already very popular name Michelle rose even higher. While Jude decreased, maybe due it’s stronger ties to religion in the hippy sixties, it would be interesting to see if it affected the masculine naming pattern. Although the Beatles managed to prolong the diminishment of the name Lucy, it may have not been enough as the rise of name diversity as a whole during this time caused a decrease in classic names all around, as seen with Sue.