YouTube Rock Music Trends - May
By ICX Media - May 31, 2019
May's surprising "Rock Music" trends on YouTube
YouTube is a cultural lens. People use the channel to consume videos about all of the things that interest them; by analyzing these interests at scale, you can get a better idea of who your audience is and what their interests are. Seeing how interests change over time can help you identify popular trends that you can use to inform your content creation and promotion.
We summarized the most popular trends in YouTube’s “Rock Music” category over the month of May to see how the topic has grown and evolved. The trends this month followed a “throwback” theme, surfacing old familiar faces like Stevie Nicks, Nikki Sixx, and Lionel Richie leading us to check the date more than once.
We’ve grouped these trends into those that were rising and those that were falling. The trends rising in popularity saw a meaningful lift in engagement and occurrence from the previous month. Those falling in popularity saw a meaningful decrease in engagement from the previous month.
Rising
Fleetwood Mac + Stevie Nicks
With the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony happening just a couple of weeks ago, many of the popular trends within this category originated from who was inducted, who performed at the ceremony, and who didn’t make the cut. Stevie Nicks, in particular, was popular this month with her birthday giving her an annual spike in engagement (May 26), her induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame providing an additional boost, and a series of popular duets with Harry Styles that have been massively successful. These videos brought enough attention that both Stevie Nicks and her band Fleetwood Mac were top rising trends in May for Rock Music.
Motley Crue + Nikki Sixx
For the exact opposite reason, Nikki Sixx and Motley Crue found themselves trending for not making the induction cut this year. Nikki Sixx, the bassist for the heavy metal band, made some comments about how he felt the band would never be inducted into the hall of fame. And this inspired a lot of engagement from their audience driving him and the band to be a top rising trend.
Falling
American Idol + Lionel Richie + Katy Perry
The season finale of American Idol earlier this month lifted the popular show and two of its judges into the top trends. As the show was approaching its exciting conclusion, interest in videos of the contestants and the judges were driving a lot of engagement. But as the show concluded, that interest quickly died down with “American Idol”, “Lionel Richie”, and “Katy Perry” each being popular but falling trends.
These types of trends can help you understand how cultural tastes are evolving and how popular headlines are impacting YouTube video consumption. By analyzing your specific audience’s interests and the types of content trending with them specifically, you can tailor an impactful video content strategy. ICX Media is a video audience intelligence company that can deliver a broad understanding of what’s trending in social video as well as deep audience insights. See how deep audience insights can inform your video marketing strategy.