Let's Get Married: A Conversation with Matt Campbell

After DJing for a decade, Matt Campbell built a media company focused exclusively on wedding music. This week, we discussed how nuptial music is changing.

I’m about to turn 29. What that means is that every person I know is getting hitched. Some months it feels like I’m a professional wedding goer. Given the amount of time I spend making and thinking about music, I’m always fascinated by which songs couples choose to soundtrack their special day. Matt Campbell has turned that fascination into a career.

After DJing weddings for a decade, Campbell started My Wedding Songs, a multimedia company that gives DJs, planners, and couples everything they need to know about making the soundtrack to their cocktail hour and reception a hit. Over an hour, Campbell and I spoke about why wedding songs of the 1960s are dying, how TikTok has transformed wedding music, and why nobody ever needs to hear Bob Seger’s “Old Time Rock and Roll” ever again. If you’re interested in nuptial music, subscribe to Campbell’s newsletter, Wedding MusicLetter.

A Conversation with Matt Campbell

You’ve worked in the wedding music industry on-and-off for a long time. Can you tell me the biggest changes you’ve seen in weddings generally and wedding music over the decades?

I would say the influence of TikTok has really changed things. Back in the 1990s and 2000s, we would play a whole song and then fade things in and out. Nowadays, you're lucky to play over two minutes of a song. In other words, the biggest change is the amount of a song you’re playing. I guess there’s also some controversy surrounding streaming too.

What’s that about?

Back in the day, you’d be playing CDs, cassettes, or vinyl that you owned. But many people don’t own music these days. Streaming is more like a rental. So, there’s a big debate about if DJs are allowed to legally stream music.

So, are DJs still buying their music?

Typically, DJs get digital downloads through record pools. I always recommend having an actual copy of a song. I started in Montana. Up there, you could be DJing at a ski resort with no internet. Ownership avoids a ton of issues like that.

So, you started in Montana, but you currently live in Las Vegas. How do weddings and wedding music differ in those two locations?

In Montana, I really only had to know top 40 rock and dance music. Las Vegas is such a melting pot, though. You have to know afrobeats and K-Pop, and music from the Caribbean. People come from all over the world to get married here.

What I think is more interesting is that people these days often don’t want to hear the most popular wedding songs, like “Celebration” by Kool & the Gang and “Uptown Funk” by Bruno Mars. As DJs, we are very happy about that. There are so many hidden gems that people love.

You run My Wedding Songs, a company you founded where you work as a “wedding planner and wedding music consultant to engaged couples, DJs, and wedding professionals.” On your website, you have a “Random Wedding Song Generator” that allows you to select a mood and a genre and get a song back. I ran this a few times. I’m going to tell you what it spit back, and you can tell me why you think those songs work for weddings. Let’s start with what I got for a romantic country song: “Take Her Home” by Kenny Chesney.

It's funny you brought up the generator because we just built that three weeks ago to try to create some buzz. Part of the goal with that is to get people thinking about songs outside of your typical wedding songs. When a lot of people think of a romantic country song, they think of something like “I Cross My Heart” by George Strait. That Kenny Chesney song is another great song that doesn’t get as much love.

Next, I queried for a party time pop punk and got a bona fide classic, namely “The Middle” by Jimmy Eat World.

Pop punk is super popular at weddings right now. If you’re doing a pop punk set, that song always hits.

Let’s do one more. I asked for a chill hip-hop song and got “I Like You (A Happier Song)” by Post Malone and Doja Cat.

That’s a mid-tempo song that I might play during a cocktail hour or dinner. It’s contemporary, and it’s about being in love.

This generator allows you to select one of nine genres, including afrobeats, country, EDM, hip-hop, latin, pop, pop punk, R&B, and rock. How do you keep up with how wedding music evolves in all of these genres?

Every Friday, I spend six to eight hours discovering music. I use Spotify, Shazam, iTunes, Amazon, and a few other sources. At this point, I can listen to a song and know if it will be popular at weddings. Right now, for example, this new guy Tommy Richmond has a big hit with “Million Dollar Baby”. I may not consider it to be a great wedding song, but it’s exploding. It might be the song of the summer. That is going to be played at a ton of weddings. Will it be played at weddings in ten years? Probably not. But most stuff you hear these days won’t.

When you’re digging through all of that music does it feel like a job or are you genuinely interested in new stuff?

I enjoy it. Since I spent so much time DJing, I love hearing a song that I know will get a crowd excited. I also love trying to figure out what a song is about. Sometimes a song might sound happy, but it’s really about a breakup. You don’t want to be playing breakup songs at weddings.

Are there certain songs that couples often request even though they are really sad or about break-ups?

My feeling is that your wedding day is your day. If you want to play a super sad song because it means something to you, then you should go for it. At one wedding I worked, the couple’s first dance was to “Purple Rain” by Prince. The couple didn’t think that people would get it. “Purple Rain” isn’t really a first dance song. But the couple loved it, and it worked.

“Runaround Sue” is another great example of that. It’s a fantastic party song, but it’s about a breakup. As a DJ, you just have to use your judgement for what will work and what won’t.

You mentioned that the “Random Wedding Song Generator” is a new tool. Did you build that? I noticed on your resume that you also have some programming experience. How have you been able to unite your interests in computers and music?

I ran a company called DJ Express in the 1990s where I would DJ weddings and a ton of other events. When I moved to Las Vegas, I still loved music but didn’t want to keep DJing. So I built this website called WeddingMuseum.com — I know it’s a terrible name — where I would curate wedding music.

Are your web development skills self-taught?

Mostly. I’m not an expert, though. To go back to your other question, I did not build the “Random Wedding Song Generator.” That was a friend of mine.

I know WeddingMuseum morphed into My Wedding Songs. This company is interesting because it exists across a few media verticals. You run a newsletter. You host a podcast. You write books. How does this company make money?

That’s the number two question I always get. Number one, for the record, is about what I actually do. The money question is interesting, though. I run ads on my website. That was a substantial portion of my revenue for a while, but Google just revamped their search algorithm recently and that’s decimated traffic.

Matt Campbell, maybe the world’s foremost expert on wedding music

As that has shrunk, I’ve built up a paid subscriber base on Substack. I cover wedding music there. Most of my subscribers are DJs and wedding pros. After that, I do make some money from my books, which are also about wedding music.

Do you ever work directly with couples?

Not really. I would like to, though.

I noticed that your wife Sharon is involved with My Wedding Songs to some degree. Do you think people take your wedding music advice more seriously because you are married?

To some degree. When people come across my website, I think they appreciate that I am married.

On your site, you list the top 10 wedding songs of all time. Do you see any of these songs losing their grip on engaged couples?

10 . “The Way You Look Tonight” by Frank Sinatra
9 . “A Thousand Years” by Christina Perri
8 . “What A Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong
7 . “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” by Aerosmith
6 . “All Of Me” by John Legend
5 . “Bless The Broken Road” by Rascal Flatts
4 . “Marry Me” by Train