Who's Featuring Whom?

Every now and again, I will feel like a song is following me. Typically a song which has been around for a few months, it will be playing in every single store I go into and will then come on the radio within five minutes of getting into the car after I leave. Currently, the song following me is Jason Aldean's "Don't You Wanna Stay? (featuring Kelly Clarkson)". For the most part I don't mind being stalked by this song because I actually like Jason Aldean. (Trust me, I have been followed around by much worse songs in the past.) It's the second part of that title I have a problem with, (featuring Kelly Clarkson). And 'problem' is probably the wrong word because other than making the God-awful movie, "From Justin to Kelly", Kelly Clarkson has done nothing to wrong me on a personal level.

It just reminded me of a question I have always wanted an answer to, which is how come when two people sing an equal amount of a song one person gets top billing while the other person's name has to be put into parenthesis like the guy imputing the song listings had to be coerced into including their name at all? I understand that the song appears on Aldean's record, but that seems a fairly arbitrary way to decide things, especially when you consider Aldean didn't even write the thing. Seems that they did equal work and therefore should get equal billing. If anything it should be ladies first, because Clarkson has had the longer career with more Top-20 hits, even if she isn't thought of as a country artist.

This is not a new issue in my mind, because for as long as there have been duets in music the question of which name should appear first has existed. And I'm sure that where you stand on the artist goes a long way in defending who should have top billing. If you hold one artist in higher regard then you will obviously believe their name should go first, whereas if you can't stand a person you may feel they are lucky to even share a microphone with a certain artist. For example, who can say whether David Bowie was appearing with Bing Crosby or Crosby was appearing with Bowie? (Actually, I can: Crosby should have gotten top billing. He was the much more established star at the time.)

To be honest, this is hardly the worst offending song, because I can think of several rap tunes that have 'featured' a guest performer who ended up doing 90% of the singing. Recently, Chris Brown released a song "Deuces", which featured two other rappers and while they each took one verse apiece those two ended up saying a lot more than Brown did and yet he was the lead guy on the credits. Not to mention every time a rap artist releases a song featuring some great singer performing the chorus, that is who people end up remembering the most. (Always annoying to go searching for a song thinking it was by one particular artist, only to discover it was on the other guy's album.) So, here is my solution: I don't care who's album the song is on, just list the contributors alphabetically. It will make songs easier to find and save someone from being trapped in by parenthesis. Also, if we could start diversifying the music played in retail locations I would appreciate that as well.