It’s onerous to recollect, however in 2007, it was comparatively uncommon to listen to dance music on pop radio. Go away it to the consummate risk-taker Rihanna to vary all that with “Don’t Stop The Music,” a track that arguably kicked off the EDM / pop crossover in earnest. In a catalog crammed with huge hits, it could simply be some of the influential in Rihanna’s profession.
When requested in regards to the track’s dance-inspired rhythm and melodies, manufacturing duo StarGate outlined their pondering for the manufacturing, saying in an interview with EW, “It was a seminal record in the sense that, prior to that song and Justin Timberlake’s ‘SexyBack,’ dance music was basically non-existent in American pop.” The track confirmed that dance music had a house within the U.S. “People would always say, ‘That four-to-the-floor kick-drum pattern doesn’t work in America, it’s not going to work on radio.’ And up until that point, they would’ve been right.”
The infectious “Mama-say, mama-sa, ma-ma-koosa” hook you hear all through the track? That was impressed by Michael Jackson’s Nineteen Eighties hit “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’.” That track interpolated it from the legendary Nineteen Seventies disco smash “Soul Makossa.” David Mancuso, some of the celebrated New York DJs ever, made “Soul Makossa” a staple of his units. It’s an enchanting little bit of historical past, to have the ability to draw such a transparent throughline from one of many authentic New York disco hits to the rise of EDM on pop radio in america.
“Don’t Stop the Music” was the fourth single from Good Woman Gone Unhealthy, following the smash “Umbrella,” “Shut Up and Drive,” and “Hate That I Love You.” Whereas it didn’t fairly attain the stratospheric chart heights of “Umbrella,” it was an unlimited hit world wide. Two years later, David Guetta’s One Love album would trip on that wave to large success. And Rihanna? She was busy setting new traits with Rated R.
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