Pop music
Pop Music is short for Popular Music. Typically, the popularity of the music directly correlates to the project's commercial success. Because the goal of music is to appeal to the widest audience, the creative and expressive goals are clearly secondary to unit sales.Because the music's goal is to foster group acceptance (groupthink) and commercial success, Pop music encompasses many more aspects than just music. There is much more to the act than what you see on stage. Some of these off stage roles include studio personnel, promotions, acquisition and repretoire (A&R), executives, commercial endorsements, talent agents, duplication and production, distribution and retail. Everyone gets a cut along the way.
Pop Music was an outgrowth of the Rock and Roll movement of the early 1950s, when record companies realized the commercial opportunity. Teenagers were the perfect target market to capitalize upon.
That said, it is sometimes difficult to discern popular music by muscial traits alone. Pop Music usually follows some type of musical trend. Any style of music can "become" pop music if given the right timeframe. Blues-influenced Rock & Roll and Rockabilly were popular in the 1950s. Acid and Folk Rock were popular in the 1960s. Disco in the 1970s. New Wave in the 1980s. Grunge in the 1990s. These, of course, are gross generalizations and are just meant to illustrate some patterns.
True creative effort usually starts the trend, then commercial success of that trend causes it to "turn pop." Sometimes, these artists are said to have "sold out." An example of this process can be illustrated by examining an abbreviated evolution of punk. Sex Pistols
Some artists, however are Pop from the onset. Some examples are:
> Green Day
> Good Charlotte.