With the rise in popularity of music streaming sites over the last ten years, the days are gone when the majority of music fans listened to the ‘radio version’ of singles. With such a large entertainment industry, swearing has become a thing people expect to hear on their favourite TV shows, films, and in music. However, despite swearing becoming a more ‘normal’ thing to hear, there can still be a lot of controversy around the use of bad language.
which of our favourite artists are guilty of using expletive language to gain listeners
With this in mind, we were inspired to launch our own ‘Music Profanity Index,’ an in-depth analysis into the amount of profanity used by the world’s favourite musicians. Through this, we can discover which of our favourite artists are guilty of using expletive language to gain listeners, and which opt for more family-friendly approaches to music.
Analysing songs from 20 of the most popular musicians, across ten of the UK’s favourite music genres, our study counted how many times swear words were said in the top ten songs of all time performed by each artist. Some of the swear words tallied include ‘sh*t’, ‘cu*t’, ‘bit*h’ and ‘fu*k’, as well as variations of the words such as ‘motherf*cker’ and ‘b*tches’.
After a deep dive into all the data we are now excited to share with you our Music Profanity Index, revealing the artists, genres, and songs with the most swear words, popular in the UK right now!
Musicians
The top 20 musicians on the ‘Music Profanity Index’ are:
(Music artist and the total number of swear words in their top ten songs)
1 – Megan Thee Stallion – 467
2 – JID – 391
3 – Roddy Ricch – 255
4 – Lil Tjay – 249
5 – Baby Keem – 243
6 – Lil Baby – 206
7 – 2Pac – 193
8 – Doja Cat – 191
9 – YoungBoy Never Broke Again – 182
10 – Kodak Black – 174
11 – Pop Smoke – 170
12 – Polo G – 153
13 – Lil Wayne – 146
14 – Aminé – 146
15 – Jack Harlow – 145
16 – 50 Cent – 141
17 – Gunna – 135
18 – PARTYNEXTDOOR– 125
19 – Eminem – 115
20 – Tory Lanez – 111
Chart-topping rapper Megan Thee Stallion has been crowned the world’s most popular expletive music artist, with 467 incidences of profanity in her top ten songs alone. The rapper had 20% more swear words in her songs than her nearest rival, American rapper JID.
more than 27% of the swear words used were ‘b*tch’
Of the 467 swear words in ‘Megan Thee Stallions’ top 10 songs, more than 27% of the swear words used were ‘b*tch’ and variations of the word, followed by ‘sh*t’ which was sung a total of 114 times.
Other artists analysed who did not make the list, and had a total of zero swear words across their top ten singles include, Harry Styles, Imagine Dragons, Rihanna, and Taylor Swift.
Genre
The top ten genres on the ‘Music Profanity Index’ are:
(Music genre and the total number of swear words in the songs of the top 20 artists)
1 – Rap – 3,680
2 – R&B – 915
3 – Pop – 326
4 – Soul – 214
5 – Dance & Electronic – 132
6 – Punk – 130
7 – Rock – 95
8 – Alternative & Indie – 40
9 – Country – 35
10 – Classical – 0
Rap was discovered to be the music genre with the highest number of ’sweary songs,’ with more than 3,500 profanities in the most popular songs from the 20 top rap artists combined, and 17 rap artists making the final top 20 list of expletive-loving musicians.
indie, country, and classical were further down the list
Unsurprisingly, genres such as indie, country, and classical were further down the list as top artists weren’t heard cursing nearly as much, with the three genres having 2% of the total number of swear words combined.
Sweary songs
The top 20 songs on the ‘Music Profanity Index’ are:
(Song, Musician, and the total number of swear words in the song)
1 – Thot Sh*t by Megan Thee Stallion – 93
2 – NEVER by JID – 85
3 – F.N by Lil Tjay – 82
4 – Hot Girl Summer by Megan Thee Stallion (feat. Nicki Minaj & Ty Dolla $ign) – 82
5 – Off Deez by JID (feat. J. Cole) – 77
6 – Recognize by PARTYNEXTDOOR (feat. Drake) – 71
7 – Surround Sound by JID (feat. 21 Savage & Baby Tate) – 68
8 – Cash Sh*t by Megan Thee Stallion (feat. DaBaby) – 68
9 – Rule by Doja Cat – 66
10 – Zoo York by Lil Tjay (feat. Fivio Foreign & Pop Smoke) – 57
11 – FeRRis WhEEL by Tory Lanez (feat. Trippie Redd) – 56
12 – Captain Hook by Megan Thee Stallion – 55
13 – WHATS POPPIN by Jack Harlow (remix feat. DaBaby, Tory Lanez & Lil Wayne) – 51
14 – Life Goes On by Lil Baby (feat. Lil Uzi Vert and Gunna) – 51
15 – Tip Toe by Roddy Ricch (feat. A Boogie Wit da Hoodie) – 51
16 – Batsh*t by Sofi Tukker – 49
17 – Hit ‘Em Up by 2Pac – 48
18 – P.I.M.P. by 50 Cent – 47
19 – Ambitionz az a Ridah by 2Pac – 46
20 – range brothers by Baby Keem (with Kendrick Lamar) – 45
Megan Thee Stallion continues to top the profanity index, as the female rappers 2021 single ‘Thot sh*t’ was discovered as the most expletive song, containing a staggering 93 swear words. Four of Stallions other songs place in the top 20 swearing singles, as the rapper firmly dominates across all categories.
Vegas X-rated residencies
In line with our name and business, we of course couldn’t not look into our much loved Las Vegas resident artists and discover how the highest-grossing stars compare to the musicians analysed.
Once again using Last.fm we analysed the music artists who have previously had Vegas residencies which made over $100m gross. Of the musicians, Britney Spears and Jennifer Lopez were the only artists found to have explicit language in their top ten songs, with the female artists singing a combined total of five swear words.
American pop/rock band, Maroon 5 tops the list
Additionally, analysing other artists who are set to have residencies in 2023, American pop/rock band, Maroon 5 tops the list with 16 instances of expletive language. The band who previously headlined at the Dolby Live at Park MGM in March this year are set to return for their residency at the Vegas hotel later this summer.
Creating the ‘Music Profanity Index’ has been fascinating, discovering the most x-rated songs, and artists popular in the UK right now, as well as finding out if the use of explicit language is crucial in the popularity of an artist. It is clear from our findings that this may be the case for rap artists, as many performers in the genre regularly use curse words to express the meaning of their songs, however, it’s clear that this isn’t universal across all music genres.
So, whether you like your music squeaky clean or so explicit you wonder if the artist kisses their mother with that mouth, our Music Profanity Index will help you decide what to add to your next playlist.
Methodology
Vegasslotsonline.com took the top ten most popular music genres according to data from YouGov, the platform found the top 20 musicians in each genre as stated by Google. Analysing each artist on Last.fm, the platform then discovered each musician’s most popular ten songs of all time.
Once the artists were compiled the platform captured the lyrics to said songs and ran them through a profanity checker, tallying the number of swear words heard. Using the data the platform created an Index analysing all expletive language across each artist, song and genre.