The Decades: Wrapped

How have audio features changed for popular music over time?

Note: bpm, loudness and duration audio features have been excluded as their units do not correspond to the other unitless metrics, and their scales are incompatible.

We can draw some interesting insights from this graph:

acousticness: There has been a dramatic decrease in acousticness over time. This is likely due to the development of electronic instruments and digital sound mixing, which created new genres such as pop and electronic music that dominate the Top 100’s
danceability: There has been a gradual increase in how easy it is to dance to music as decades have passed. This could reflect a cultural shift towards dance clubs becoming more widespread - and the need for music to fill these venues
energy: There has been a similarly gradual increase in how energetic popular music has been over the decades, probably again because of a cultural shift towards mainstream dance clubs
liveness: The presence of live audiences in recordings has remained steady over time
speechiness: This has also remained fairly steady over time, until slowly increasing to reach a peak in the 2000’s when rap music became more popular
valence: It appears there has been an overall decrease in the mood of popular songs, especially in the past 20 years. Perhaps this could be due to a greater awareness of mental health in recent years, leading to artists creating music regarding these topics. Perhaps this prompted a greater awareness and expression of negative emotions, that listeners can appreciate