Google Gives Me Some Funk Music on YouTube

Google has been giving me some funk music on YouTube lately and I’m loving it! If you’re into funk, soul, or R&B, you should definitely check out the videos that Google has been recommending to me.

The Problem

I was recently having an issue with Google giving me funk music on YouTube. I would search for a song, and it would give me a funk version of that song instead. This was incredibly frustrating, and I tried a few things to fix it. Unfortunately, nothing worked. I even reached out to Google, but they were no help. Has anyone else experienced this issue?

I’m not interested in funk music

I’m not interested in funk music, I’m interested in listening to jazz. Why does Google give me funk music when I type in “jazz”?

I don’t want to see funk music videos in my YouTube recommendations

I am not a fan of funk music, and I don’t want to see funk music videos in my YouTube recommendations. I have tried to hide videos from certain channels, but they keep reappearing in my recommendations. I have also tried muting keywords, but that doesn’t seem to be working either. Is there anything else I can do?

The Solution

I was having some trouble with YouTube the other day. Whenever I would search for a song, I would get a bunch of results for live performances and covers, but not the official music video. And if I did find the official music video, it would be buried under a ton of covers and live performances. I decided to do some digging and I found out that YouTube was giving me funk music because I had watched a lot of funk music videos. I also found out that I’m not the only one with this problem.

Find out what genre YouTube thinks I’m interested in

Afrobeat (sometimes also called Afrobeats) is a music genre that combines elements of West African musical genres such as fuji music and highlife with American funk and jazz influences, with a focus on percussion and vocal hooks.

The genre developed in the 1970s, when Nigerian musicians began fusing traditional Nigerian music with American soul and funk. The term “afrobeat” was coined in the early 1990s by British-Nigerian musician Dele Sosimi, when he founded the band Positive Force.

Train YouTube to understand my music preferences

When you open YouTube, the first thing you see is the home screen. Your home screen is tailored to you based on your Google activity. This includes things like the videos you watch, the channels you subscribe to, and the comments you make. Based on this information, YouTube creates a section called “Up next” which includes a list of videos it thinks you might want to watch. Usually, these are videos from channels that you’ve subscribed to or have watched in the past.

If you’re not happy with the suggestions YouTube is giving you, there’s a way to train the algorithm to better understand your musical taste. By engaging with the algorithm — making positive and negative annotations — you can help YouTube understand what kind of music you like and don’t like. Over time, your home screen should become more and more accurate, giving you a better experience on YouTube.

The Result

Google suggested I listen to some Funk Music on YouTube since I have been listening to a lot of music from the 1970s recently. I found this result to be quite accurate, as I enjoyed the funk music that was suggested to me.

I no longer see funk music videos in my YouTube recommendations

It’s official, Google has removed funk music videos from my YouTube recommendations. I may never see another Parliament-Funkadelic video in my life. Unless, of course, I go looking for them. Which I will. Because they’re amazing.

Funk musician Bootsy Collins tweeted about the change yesterday, saying “Looks like YouTube took Funk out of its recommendations algorithm.” His tweet included a screenshot of his YouTube home page, which no longer features any funk music videos in the recommended section.

I did a quick search on Twitter and it seems like a lot of other funk fans are noticing the same thing. One user said they’ve been gettingrecommendations for jazz and soul music, but no funk.

I checked my own YouTube recommendations and sure enough, there’s not a single funk video to be found. This is a dark day for music lovers everywhere.

It’s not clear why Google has removed funk videos from YouTube recommendations, but it’s possible that the algorithm is simply responding to changes in user behavior. Or maybe someone at Google just doesn’t like funk music. Either way, this is a travesty that needs to be fixed immediately.