Lets talk about Music, was it better back then?
- Thread starter Raiden
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bengraven
Member
I think music hasn't changed at all. Since the beginning of time.
You're going to have musicians who are attempting to make money off it and put little heart in their work. You're going to have musicians who write only about love and innocence, or only about their God, or about politics. And you have people who are purposely trying to shock.
And you're going to have your boom periods when legendary musicians come out of the woodwork: Mozart and Beethoven era, The Beatles and Led Zeppelin era, early 80s hip hop, early 90s gangster rap, grunge or power metal or whatever your favorite music is, has had it's time and was brilliant for a while and so makes the intervening years look weak in comparison until the next big genre of music arrives and is huge.
It's the same formula that keeps getting repeated over and over again through the generations since, fuck, music was invented.
You're going to have musicians who are attempting to make money off it and put little heart in their work. You're going to have musicians who write only about love and innocence, or only about their God, or about politics. And you have people who are purposely trying to shock.
And you're going to have your boom periods when legendary musicians come out of the woodwork: Mozart and Beethoven era, The Beatles and Led Zeppelin era, early 80s hip hop, early 90s gangster rap, grunge or power metal or whatever your favorite music is, has had it's time and was brilliant for a while and so makes the intervening years look weak in comparison until the next big genre of music arrives and is huge.
It's the same formula that keeps getting repeated over and over again through the generations since, fuck, music was invented.
Jedeye Sniv
Banned
faridmon said:
But just as with everything else in our culture, the mainsstream means fuck all. Disregard it, it has no value. The mainstream isn't even what most people love, it's just what they're played. Or read or watch or whatever. If the 'mainstream' was somehow democratically chosen then it would be a good indicator of public taste. As it is, mainstream readio music is in effect chosen by businessmen marketing to children, it's a fallacy to think that this stuff has any value because it gets airplay.
In every avenue of culture the mainstream has been co-opted more aggressively than at any other period of time by massive companies with massive budgets that buy up the airwaves. That's not representative at all of what people actually want IMO, it's just what they're given.
viciouskillersquirrel said:
I just wanted to comment and say this completely goes against what happened to myself. When I was 15 I liked generic pop crap and that was all I listened to. While I still do listen to generic pop crap(it's a guilty pleasure) it's nowhere near my favorite genre. I mainly listen to rap, indie rock, metal...stuff I'd never have been caught listening to in my youth.
It's actually thanks to the internet and being exposed to various genre that my tastes broadened so greatly. Obviously, not everyone will seek out or look at new music on the internet but thanks to its creation I'd say your argument will become less and less common.
lunarworks
Member
Justin Bieber is no different from Tiffany.faridmon said:
Do you see where I'm going with this?
Also, if you look hard enough, you'll find today's influential equivalent to the Sex Pistols. You just won't know it for another 10 or 20 years.
bengraven
Member
Kusagari said:
I agree, I think the idea that you have a static music choice at 15 is completely wrong.
Every single person I know didn't start to cultivate musical interests until their teens and 20s. While some of my more musically inclined friends STILL listen to all kinds of new and older music, they would be connoisseurs. Most people in their 20s or 30s realize what kind of music they want to hear and then it's set.
My god, had I already chosen my favorite kind of music at 15, my life would be misery. I mean, seriously, when's the last time I actually LISTENED to Ace of Base? LOL
Shaka said:
THANK YOU. Anyone who says there is NO GOOD MUSIC means they are just NOT open to listening to less mainstream work. I fucking HATE the "there's nothing good out now" argument, which usually means they only watch MTV/VH1 or listen to the Current or some such nonsense.
Ignatz Mouse
Banned
Fusebox said:
When is back then? I can tell you as a Teen of the 80s that people listened to absolute crap, most of which has been forgotten.
Jedeye Sniv
Banned
Fusebox said:
No, like Bros or Sonya or the Stock Aitken Waterman records.
lunarworks
Member
I swear. You just can't knock the happy, nostalgic glasses off people, even with a direct blow to the face.
I could show them a 3 hour video of the worst, most vile, most popular mainstream music of a chosen decade, and they'd just say "I don't know what you just showed me. We had [Band X] back then, music was way better. Everyone listened to it."
Did your circle of friends include everyone?
I could show them a 3 hour video of the worst, most vile, most popular mainstream music of a chosen decade, and they'd just say "I don't know what you just showed me. We had [Band X] back then, music was way better. Everyone listened to it."
Case in point before I even hit "Submit".Fusebox said:
Did your circle of friends include everyone?
DieNgamers
Member
I always wonder what classic rock really is? The rock music that was in the charts in the 70s and 80s? No two people seem to have the same definition.Truant said:
bengraven
Member
DieNgamers said:I always wonder what classic rock really is? The rock music that was in the charts in the 70s and 80s? No two people seem to have the same definition.
Music changes every year. I would argue that music from this year can't be defined in a single category as 5 or 10 years ago.
Except that there is the "shit" category, which is universal.
lunarworks
Member
I didn't know Jesus liked Metallica.Fusebox said:
lunarworks
Member
Also, it's probably worth noting that people are far more likely to listen to awful "guilty pleasures" nowadays than they were in the past. They don't have to go out to the record store and be seen buying a record from some horrible pop act, and their iPod is their nice, private radio station that no one knows.
For all the people saying "I don't listen to that shit" today, in secret many of them probably are. That's just exacerbates the crap-music phenomenon.
Shame used to be such a good motivator in keeping us away from bad music.
For all the people saying "I don't listen to that shit" today, in secret many of them probably are. That's just exacerbates the crap-music phenomenon.
Shame used to be such a good motivator in keeping us away from bad music.
Jedeye Sniv
Banned
Fusebox said:
But that was the mainstream, at least when I was growing up in England. Bros were the fucking shit at the time, and the SAW sound dominated the 80's like some cowbelled behemoth.
Also, you seem to be holding Metallica up as a bastion on non-mainstream awesomeness. At the time maybe, but these days Metallica are a boring turgid old band whose records have aged badly.
Ignatz Mouse
Banned
Fusebox said:
No, like Rockwell, Corey Hart, Wham!, Kenny Loggins, Phil Fucking Collins and Genesis (post Gabriel), Lionel Ritchie post Commodores, STARSHIP for god's sake, Shiela E (I don't care if you're banging Prince, you suck), Journey, and great Eagles diaspora where they multiplied like bateria with solo albums: and since you like metal, you've cherry picked two good bands from a huge list of extremely mediocre garbage that was more focused on hair than music-- Whitesnake, Poison, Motely Crue and a few dozen with only a single hit but who still shitted up the airwaves.
I can list enduring music from the 80's that I think was great too-- and I think my high school even had, collectively, decent taste considering-- but that doesn't mean most anything you heard on the radio wasn't crap.
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
It was much better "back then." The 00's were horrid for music. And its not just my nostalgia talking because music from decades prior to the 80s/90s and going all the way back to the 30s is awesome and has its own unique fingerprint.
Every few months i turn the radio to a new music station and its unbearable.
Every few months i turn the radio to a new music station and its unbearable.
Jedeye Sniv
Banned
water_wendi said:
YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG.
Ignatz Mouse
Banned
I think the "back then" thing is just nostalgia, but I do thinh good music comes in waves, and it's not always easy to see at the time.
1964, 1967-9, 1977-82, 1991-4...
We might be even in one of these periods now, but we won't appreciate it until later.
1964, 1967-9, 1977-82, 1991-4...
We might be even in one of these periods now, but we won't appreciate it until later.
lunarworks
Member
As has been said many times already, there's your problem right there.water_wendi said:
Want good music? Go to the internet. There's plenty of online stations that will play you amazing new music. Commercial broadcast radio is the fucking Walmart of music. Always has been (although, they used to dedicate late-night hours to interesting stuff, because it was the only place to go).
DieNgamers
Member
I think 1968-1974 or so was the best time for modern music. So many styles of music had their most exciting/adventurous bands and artists releasing incredible stuff in that time..
water_wendi
Water is not wet!
Well i know that the best stuff is never played on the air (excepting a few years in the early 90s when there was so much fresh stuff being made for all genres) but i do that to get a general idea of whats happening.Jedeye Sniv said:
Woffls
Member
I'd say that music is as bad now as it's always been if you're just listening to the charts, it's just mostly different genres now. People forget that our view of decades past only includes things we like, obscenely popular stuff and what we find hilariously shit in an ironic way.
I suppose what I find annoying is how lazily people can make music these days. I don't mean like Status Quo recycling chords, I mean not even learning how to sing or play an instrument well, and passing it off as a gimmick (read: Autotune and your average rock guitarist).
Comparing the "best" bands in, for example, rock music, from now and let's say the 70's, it's really quite pitiful. It doesn't apply to all genres, because some have been around for less time than others and have been less extensively explored, but what has happened in rock music in the last decade?
There may well be as much innovation in music now as for the last 60 years, but in different genres - I don't happen to believe this is the case, but then I don't listen to all genres of music. One genre that has been pushing this last decade is heavy metal, and the metalcore scene has exploded in recent years, at least in the UK.
One final point is how distribution has changed how much music we can consume. Sure the big bands still benefit from being in the public eye, but indie bands never had this kind of market potential before thanks to the internet: widely available specialist radio, social networking and even samples. So I'd probably say that there's more diversity now, but you just need to be willing to look in the right places. If you don't care much about music and just look as far as you're told to, then you probably wont find it.
Summary: Some genres are better now, some are much worse, but nobody should be short of music to listen to that was released last year.
I suppose what I find annoying is how lazily people can make music these days. I don't mean like Status Quo recycling chords, I mean not even learning how to sing or play an instrument well, and passing it off as a gimmick (read: Autotune and your average rock guitarist).
Comparing the "best" bands in, for example, rock music, from now and let's say the 70's, it's really quite pitiful. It doesn't apply to all genres, because some have been around for less time than others and have been less extensively explored, but what has happened in rock music in the last decade?
There may well be as much innovation in music now as for the last 60 years, but in different genres - I don't happen to believe this is the case, but then I don't listen to all genres of music. One genre that has been pushing this last decade is heavy metal, and the metalcore scene has exploded in recent years, at least in the UK.
One final point is how distribution has changed how much music we can consume. Sure the big bands still benefit from being in the public eye, but indie bands never had this kind of market potential before thanks to the internet: widely available specialist radio, social networking and even samples. So I'd probably say that there's more diversity now, but you just need to be willing to look in the right places. If you don't care much about music and just look as far as you're told to, then you probably wont find it.
Summary: Some genres are better now, some are much worse, but nobody should be short of music to listen to that was released last year.
Ignatz Mouse
Banned
Kusagari said:
Case in point. 1973:
10: TOUCH ME IN THE MORNING - DIANA ROSS
9: YOU'RE SO VAIN - CARLY SIMON
8: WILL IT GO ROUND IN CIRCLES - BILLY PRESTON
7: CROCODILE ROCK - ELTON JOHN
6: MY LOVE - PAUL Mc CARTNEY & WINGS
5: LET'S GET IT ON - MARVIN GAYE
4: KILLING ME SOFTLY WITH HIS SONG - ROBERTA FLACK
3: BAD BAD LEROY BROWN - JIM CROCE
2: WHY ME LORD - KRIS KRISTOFFERSON
1: TIE A YELLOW RIBBON 'ROUND THE OLD OAK TREE - TONY ORLANDO & DAWN
Sure, there are a couple of good songs in the top ten, but also total crap. You don't hear Kris Kristofferson on the classic stations, but he was huge.
Back to my favorite era-- a lot of what you heard on 80s stations now never even charted, or barely. New Order and Madness are a lot more popular in retrospect than they were at the time.
Ignatz Mouse
Banned
bengraven said:
Not feeling it!
ColonelColon
Member
viciouskillersquirrel said:
My favorite music was generally released in the 70s and 80s, before I was born. I don't like most mainstream music released in the past decade, during my teenage years. To be honest, I could barely tolerate listening to songs from Rihanna, Katy Perry, Bruno Mars, Justin Bieber, Black Eyed Peas, Kanye West, Lil Wayne, Flo Rida, etc.
What is the relevance of singles charts when you are talking about an era where nearly every major act was album-oriented? The singles charts don't demonstrate that the Beatles outsold all of their contemporaries by a ridiculously large margin (the closest major act from the sixties on the best-selling artists of all time list -- the Rolling Stones -- has sold anywhere from a third to a fifth of what the Beatles sold, depending on which estimate you use). Nor does it at all reflect the massive presence of Led Zeppelin, a band whose largest hit has never been released as a single. What you should be looking at for a more accurate cross-section of the music being bought and listened to is the Billboard 200.Ignatz Mouse said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_number-one_albums_of_1973_(U.S.)
Ignatz Mouse
Banned
Fugu said:
Looking only at Number Ones doesn't really paint an accurate picture either. And since I was also talking about the 80s, the top 40 absolutely *does* matter. I noticed you didn't reply to my post listing the excessive amounts of crap from that era.
If you go to Billboard's site and look past the number ones, you'll see the same percentages of crap you do on the singles chart.
Crag Dweller
aka kindbudmaster
As I inch ever so closer to 50, I still have a hard time dealing with the fact that the music I grew up listening to is now "classic".
Classic was 50's music when I was coming of age in the 70's.
As far as was music better back then compared to now, I don't know. What I consider great music from when I was growing up elicits nothing but rolled eyes from my teenage sons, with an equally dismissive response from me when I hear some of the stuff they like. There is some common ground between us just like there was between my dad and I when I was that age, so I think it comes down to the listener as to whats better. Just like everything else that is subjective.
Now get off my lawn and quit listening to my music you dang whippersnappers!!!
Classic was 50's music when I was coming of age in the 70's.As far as was music better back then compared to now, I don't know. What I consider great music from when I was growing up elicits nothing but rolled eyes from my teenage sons, with an equally dismissive response from me when I hear some of the stuff they like. There is some common ground between us just like there was between my dad and I when I was that age, so I think it comes down to the listener as to whats better. Just like everything else that is subjective.
Now get off my lawn and quit listening to my music you dang whippersnappers!!!
lunarworks
Member
Mainstream radio is and was singles-oriented.Fugu said:
So, looking at singles charts gives you a good idea of what was playing on the radio.
I didn't reply to that post because I'm not refuting the notion that there has always been a legion of bands that weren't exceptional, mostly because it's impossible for that to not be true. My argument was, is, and continues to be that mainstream acts are no longer responsible for breaking ground as they once were. Prior to the era of music following the death of grunge in the mainstream, mainstream acts were largely credited with regular and significant musical innovation as noted by the frequent stylistic shifts and the development of major offshots of the music they were producing (British prog and new-wave, for example). The flowchart of innovation no longer begins at influence by major acts; the internet has broadened things out so much that the mainstream no longer carries the responsibility of being different and exceptional enough for everyone (or at least a lot of people) to like them because the internet has made it possible and likely that any given person will find something else that they like better. In this way I would agree with the notion that mainstream music has largely become devoid of any compositional talent, as opposed to in the past where the talentless outnumbered the talented but the talented were breaking such ground that their innovation justified their popularity.Ignatz Mouse said:
I'm certain there are a lot of "crap" (I'm not sure what you mean like this because music is impossible to evaluate qualitatively) bands that have made the Billboard 200; that was not the point of me telling you to use that instead of a Top 40 list. My point was that artists were heavily album-oriented during the time period that you are looking at so it is more accurate to point to the Billboard list (or a cross-section of both kinds of lists) when analyzing what was popular during that time.
ViperVisor
Member
billboard.com gives you all the top 10 charts and info on ranks of any specific thing in a graph
Song charts don't look like a good way to judge. "ranked by radio airplay audience impressions as measured by Nielsen" I don't even know what that means.
And under the table stuff was common until recently.
Back in the past new artists could release something are it could be 3, 6 or even 9 months before it would peak.
Today's model is hit now or never. That is a problem. You are more trying to add only a particular icing on the current tasty cake and not something on your own. I think this is a great example of this.
Grammy Award for Best New Artist 2011
# Justin Bieber
# Drake
MOTHER FUCKER PLEASE
Let me list the god damn producers for the 2 albums.
Usher Raymond IV, Scooter Braun, Antonio "L.A." Reid, Tricky Stewart, The-Dream, Dapo Torimiro, Midi Mafia, Benny Blanco, The Messengers, Bryan-Michael Cox, The Stereotypes
Lil Wayne, Cortez Bryant, Gee Robinson, Slim Williams, Birdman, Noah "40" Shebib, Al Khaaliq, Boi-1da, Crada, Francis and the Lights, Jeff Bhasker, Kanye West, No I.D., Omen, Swizz Beatz, Timbaland, Tone Mason
Like a god damn list of greek gods. Fuck me if I wasn't saved by copy and paste.
What exactly is new about clusterfucks like this?
Song charts don't look like a good way to judge. "ranked by radio airplay audience impressions as measured by Nielsen" I don't even know what that means.
And under the table stuff was common until recently.
Back in the past new artists could release something are it could be 3, 6 or even 9 months before it would peak.
Today's model is hit now or never. That is a problem. You are more trying to add only a particular icing on the current tasty cake and not something on your own. I think this is a great example of this.
Grammy Award for Best New Artist 2011
# Justin Bieber
# Drake
MOTHER FUCKER PLEASE
Let me list the god damn producers for the 2 albums.
Usher Raymond IV, Scooter Braun, Antonio "L.A." Reid, Tricky Stewart, The-Dream, Dapo Torimiro, Midi Mafia, Benny Blanco, The Messengers, Bryan-Michael Cox, The Stereotypes
Lil Wayne, Cortez Bryant, Gee Robinson, Slim Williams, Birdman, Noah "40" Shebib, Al Khaaliq, Boi-1da, Crada, Francis and the Lights, Jeff Bhasker, Kanye West, No I.D., Omen, Swizz Beatz, Timbaland, Tone Mason
Like a god damn list of greek gods. Fuck me if I wasn't saved by copy and paste.
What exactly is new about clusterfucks like this?
For the most part, the eras are the same. These points made throughout the thread are true:
1. Lots of crap used to be really popular
2. There's plenty of great music out today
The difference to me, though, is that 'popular' and 'great' intersected more often than they do now. I submit these two examples:
1. Beatles. They freaking took over the world, and are remembered today as geniuses.
2. Led Zeppelin. While not reaching the height of the Beatles, they were still ubiquitous. My mom has given input on this before, and from what she's told me every teenage and college girl wanted Robert Plant back in the day, and the band was incredibly popular.
Where are the counter-examples from the present-day? Radiohead, to me, is the band that most closely fits this mold, but even though they are very popular, I can't imagine they're nearly as popular as even Led Zeppelin was back in the early 70s, let alone the Beatles in the late 60s. They are very much a musician's and critic's band, and you won't catch many fourteen year old girls going crazy over them.
The other close example I can come up with is Kanye's first album, College Dropout. I've never so thoroughly enjoyed an new album that random people (as opposed to my musician and music snob friends) listened to en masse. But since then his creativity as seemed to fizzle out so I don't think he's a great example either.
1. Lots of crap used to be really popular
2. There's plenty of great music out today
The difference to me, though, is that 'popular' and 'great' intersected more often than they do now. I submit these two examples:
1. Beatles. They freaking took over the world, and are remembered today as geniuses.
2. Led Zeppelin. While not reaching the height of the Beatles, they were still ubiquitous. My mom has given input on this before, and from what she's told me every teenage and college girl wanted Robert Plant back in the day, and the band was incredibly popular.
Where are the counter-examples from the present-day? Radiohead, to me, is the band that most closely fits this mold, but even though they are very popular, I can't imagine they're nearly as popular as even Led Zeppelin was back in the early 70s, let alone the Beatles in the late 60s. They are very much a musician's and critic's band, and you won't catch many fourteen year old girls going crazy over them.
The other close example I can come up with is Kanye's first album, College Dropout. I've never so thoroughly enjoyed an new album that random people (as opposed to my musician and music snob friends) listened to en masse. But since then his creativity as seemed to fizzle out so I don't think he's a great example either.
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