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As a measure of popularity, the charts are still the best thing we have. And she consistently tops them, not once every so often, but near enough every song. And this has been the case for 14 years. How many other people could have the level of sustained success that she has had and still not get the acknowledgement and appreciation from music 'fans'.
3) Regardless of what you think, or choose to believe, the fact is when we're all dead and people look back to what was popular, what trends were around when we were young, they arent going to see Meredith Monk. They will see Beyonce, just like we see The Beatles, just like we see the Sex Pistols, Metallica, Nirvana, Jimi Hendrix, Elvis Presley. Beyonce is one of the defining artists of our generation, and based on her longevity I'd put her at the head of that list, making her THE defining artist.
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Dude that's like saying that when people look back at the 70's they define that generation by the Carpenters and Abba or looking to the 90's and saying that Celine Dion is the pinnacle of what was happening in music at the time
Record sales have almost nothing to do with artistic relevancy, they mostly reflect marketing and the size of the audience, and more often than not the ones with the potential to sell a lot of records are either a)the lowest common denominator or b)the most bland and mediocre/inoffensive. Sometimes good artist do sell a lot of records, but more often than not what's popular is entirely forgettable. I mean really Garth Brooks is the third highest selling musician in US history and how relevant is he in the history of music? Popularity is probably the worst metric of determining what has real relevancy because to most of the people buying the most popular stuff music isn't really important.
But to throw my 2 cents into the main argument here, while I won't claim to have listened to a lot of her music the 4-5 song's I have heard are trite and bland and entirely forgettable. The ability to hit a high note doesn't make someone a good singer, putting your heart and soul into what your singing is the mark of a great singer and I don't hear that in her music at all.