Elton's underrated in the singer-songwriter big ups. Man's the geekiest, whitest man alive, but wrote some top, top shit.
Is music in a terminal decline?
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
- Start date
The best albums always take their time to grow on you.
And the most groundbreaking albums will need even more time in some cases. I still remember being dumbfounded for weeks by much of Kid A, and only persisted due to the fact I'd loved OK Computer and The Bends. Same deal with a lot of Animal Collective records, who in my mind are one of this millenniums great innovators. Merriweather Post Pavilion sounded like a messy melange of bleeps and bloops when I first listened to it. Now I think it's probably the greatest pop album released this side of Y2K. Similarly, what Panda Bear and The Avalanches did with samples on Person Pitch and Since I Left You was at the time so unfamiliar, it took weeks for me to get my head around them.
On the flip side you have groups like Boards Of Canada taking cues from Eno & Carpenter and creating something that sounds familiar but still stunningly unique. Or even just guys like The New Pornographers who aren't creating anything new, but are just a far more musically interesting version of The Cars or Cheap Trick.
In summary, don't despair Pogue. I think you hit the nail on the head. Less and less people have the time to immerse themselves into the album format and as such, you'll find less and less canonisation of great albums from here on out. I don't think for a second that means the state of music at large is poorer for it. We'll just have to fight harder for people to accept that our obscure favourite albums deserves a listen.
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There are definitely plenty of young'uns like myself that listen almost exclusively to older music but I'd say that is more about ignorance and incuriosity, or just general laziness. It's easy to find good music from the 60s, 70s and 80s because it's been analysed and critiqued from every angle by experts in their field and organised in an easily digestible way. The wheat has been separated from the chaff and now all we have to do is stroll in and pick up those rich pieces of wheat. With modern music you need to go out and find the good music yourself and that involves a much larger degree of passion and knowledge of music in general.
I suppose that's what's different about this generation of music - the volume produced dictates that you need to go out and find the music yourself. With that comes an almost limitless amount of choice and that allows you to shape your own individual music tastes in a way that wasn't really possible to this degree before. What that means though is there's something of a shift in responsibility of decision-making from the experts - the producers, the music critics or even the radio hosts - to everyone else, the people who know relatively little.
I was watching a documentary the other day which mentioned that some radio stations across America just played Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band on loop for days because it was like nothing they'd ever heard before. The people who consumed this music didn't go looking for it, they didn't choose it, it was just given to them by people who lived and breathed the music industry and had the passion and knowledge to find music of real value. The listeners had a choice in the sense that what they liked was then played on the radio non-stop because of how it was received by them, but they had no input on this music being exposed to them in the first place.
That's fundamentally different to how music is now consumed. As it's now so readily available people pick and choose the music they want and take almost complete control over what they're exposed to. The only way people are now exposed to music on a regular basis that they didn't personally choose is through a declining radio and, to a lesser extent, pub/club music and live music.
I suppose now there's so much potential for choosing what you want to listen to as an individual it's become a lot more difficult for one particular band or one particular sound to really captivate society in the way the Beatles & co. did. The decline of the radio plays a big part too, I think. There was a time when millions of people across the country were listening to the exact same song at the exact same time through the exact same medium. That doesn't really happen any more. People have their own personal libraries of music that they listen to at a time of their pleasure. I'm not sure there's anything on the internet that's replaced that yet. You still have the radio and you have music channels on tv but these are now inhabited almost exclusively by pop music of some form.
I'm not really sure where I was going with this to be honest. Basically the good music is still there but the role of the music consumer has fundamentally changed because the way you consume music has fundamentally changed. It's now your responsibility to have that knowledge and passion for music that the music critics, radio hosts etc. had because you are the one who chooses what to listen to nowadays, not them. If you don't have that then you will never find the good music because what is presented to you is the music that can make the most money, not the music that has the most artistic merit. The question then is why the music that has the most artistic merit and the music that can make the most money are never the same thing any more, but that probably has something to do with short attention-spans, albums not being able to grow on you etc. as you mentioned.
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I don't believe it's in a terminal recline. Speaking for myself as a metal fan and for 'my' genre at least. There is still a lot of evolution going on in that genre (if you can still even categorise it as 1 genre). And the same is probably true for many other genres or subgenres that don't get as much airplay as the Biebers, One Directions, Gagas and Rihannas of this world.
You have to look harder for it though and look further than most of the mediocre stuff that gets in the charts these days. Brwned made some good points as well in his last two paragraphs. The consumer has changed, the way we listen to music has changed and there is just so much out there these days which is so accessible that it is difficult for one band or new genre to quickly gain new ground.
I do think there is less and less innovation and 'revolution' in music these days. I have the feeling that good musicians in the 60s and 70s were much more experimental and had the opportunity to go a bit more extreme (and be succesful doing so) than now. Record companies don't seem to want to take risks anymore. Sometimes I come across bands who really do try to shake things up. Diablo Swing Orchestra is one of those bands, just doing whatever the hell they feel like and mixing all kinds of different styles (jazz, metal, prog, classical, opera, some electronics, latin influences, some folky and gypsy influences...) to a great, new sound of their own. But these kind of bands are quite rare, and find it very difficult to reach the bigger public.
Take these two songs for example, from the same album. The first one starts with a calm intro using classical instruments and ends with a dubstep-like outro. The whole buildup and transition to the outro is just great. And I normally don't like any electronic music...
And the other feels more like a jazzy/swing song, but they use an operatic voice and contains some heavier guitars and drums as well.
Bands like these make me feel that good, experimental music isn't dead
You have to look harder for it though and look further than most of the mediocre stuff that gets in the charts these days. Brwned made some good points as well in his last two paragraphs. The consumer has changed, the way we listen to music has changed and there is just so much out there these days which is so accessible that it is difficult for one band or new genre to quickly gain new ground.
I do think there is less and less innovation and 'revolution' in music these days. I have the feeling that good musicians in the 60s and 70s were much more experimental and had the opportunity to go a bit more extreme (and be succesful doing so) than now. Record companies don't seem to want to take risks anymore. Sometimes I come across bands who really do try to shake things up. Diablo Swing Orchestra is one of those bands, just doing whatever the hell they feel like and mixing all kinds of different styles (jazz, metal, prog, classical, opera, some electronics, latin influences, some folky and gypsy influences...) to a great, new sound of their own. But these kind of bands are quite rare, and find it very difficult to reach the bigger public.
Take these two songs for example, from the same album. The first one starts with a calm intro using classical instruments and ends with a dubstep-like outro. The whole buildup and transition to the outro is just great. And I normally don't like any electronic music...
And the other feels more like a jazzy/swing song, but they use an operatic voice and contains some heavier guitars and drums as well.
Bands like these make me feel that good, experimental music isn't dead
tbh I don't really feel that way personally. I think that the breadth of music available to us these days is incredible. When I was a kid I would, at best, get to buy two old 12" albums a month from the record shop in the corn exchange basement. They would probably have 10 tracks on them at most, and if they turned out to be crap, tough. I know Hunky Dory really well because it was one I had as a kid so it got played 100 times. However I also had Final Cut by Pink Floyd, which was crap, but that got played 100 times as well because I only had 50 albums or so and they were all overplayed. So yes you got to know the albums better, but that didn't mean they were all good.
Plus if you looked at my record collection aged 16 it was mostly two genres - guitar bands from the 90s backwards, and hardcore from 1992 onwards. Even that was weird among my friends, who usually liked one genre. There was no jazz, classical, blues, dub or soul in there. When your budget is £20 a month you're inevitably going to play it safe and go for something you already know. Rather than risk someone you've never heard of you just buy another album by the same artist and hope its good.
Nowadays I love all those genres and a hundred modern mini-genres too. At the moment I have Dopplegangaz, Shpongle, Django Reinhardt, The Who, Ali Farka Toure and Lone on heavy rotation. The 16 year old me would have been in hog heaven with that kind of selection.
Dealing with fractured attention spans and information overload is a very real problem in the modern era of course. I wouldn't say that its exclusive to music, but it does include it. At some point we each need to figure out how to control where we focus. I personally have a bigger problem choosing something to watch on Netflix where I end up scrolling for ages without watching anything. But in the end that still feels like a better problem than just having four channels to watch.
hard to say. the funny thing is, whenever I ask for recommendation from certain genre, it's mostly bands from 70's that I get. if someone asks you for some prog. rock bands, would you mention any of the new bands from same genre before Pink Floyd, Yes, King Crimson, Genesis and Zappa? I look at my favourite artists like Waits, Cohen, Cash, Cocteau Twins and Pink Floyd and I struggle to find anyone who is even close to them. doesn't necessarily mean anything, though.
some genres are in better state than ever, though I'd argue it's mostly because they are new. Massive Attack and Portishead are still active bands and they are BRILLIANT, but it's not like they had any "competition" in past. I often put them on the same playlist with Bjork, who is also active musician. trip hop is pretty modern genre so it's hard to compare them with anyone from the past. same goes for post rock/metal bands, drone and many electronic subgenres.
I also like ambient music and even though almost no one can compete with Steve Roach or Tangerine Dream, there are enough modern ambient bands that aren't worse, just different. I absolutely love Shpongle which is much more than just an "ambient" band, Boards of Canada, Carbon Based Lifeforms, even Dead Can Dance can be included here... so, I'd say there are more variety than ever in electronic subgenres.
it mostly depends on genres, i'd say...
some genres are in better state than ever, though I'd argue it's mostly because they are new. Massive Attack and Portishead are still active bands and they are BRILLIANT, but it's not like they had any "competition" in past. I often put them on the same playlist with Bjork, who is also active musician. trip hop is pretty modern genre so it's hard to compare them with anyone from the past. same goes for post rock/metal bands, drone and many electronic subgenres.
I also like ambient music and even though almost no one can compete with Steve Roach or Tangerine Dream, there are enough modern ambient bands that aren't worse, just different. I absolutely love Shpongle which is much more than just an "ambient" band, Boards of Canada, Carbon Based Lifeforms, even Dead Can Dance can be included here... so, I'd say there are more variety than ever in electronic subgenres.
it mostly depends on genres, i'd say...
Hello! I will confess to having heard a lot of different styles of music, but I can assure you that I only have an extremely superficial knowledge of any given genre.
Some people just enjoy being music hipsters.
Elbow.
Hipsters have better taste.
Tried Simon Posford's other band (one of them anyway) Younger Brother? Last Days of Gravity sounds like a homage to Pink Floyd to me.
I did, love it. actually, I love pretty much everything associated with Posford and Twisted Records. His album "In Dub" mixed by Ott is also very good but nothing beats his (or Hallucinogen's) first two albums. it's shame that Hallucinogen is his least active project, but I won't complain as long as Shpongle is still recording
Kanye West is probably the most important figure in hip-hop in the last 10 years, by virtue of that he's cemented his legend status. Whether you like his music or not doesn't diminish that very fact.
Couldn't care less about what hip hop fans think of him and his "legendary status". In fact, "important figures" are the least relevant thing when I'm judging quality work. I think his music is very mediocre.
That's ignorant on your part since you don't actually listen to hip-hop or even recognize it as a rich genre of music to begin with. Kanye has produced great music throughout the years. People just seem to hate him and his music based on his crazy antics, his mainstream status, and his personal life.
He's no Madlib.
Do you like hip-hop but not West, or do you not like hip-hop at all? Also keep in mind that that the people who hold him in such high regard aren't just hip-hop fans; many of them are just music fans in general.
I've listened to his music and it's average. That's not ignorance since I gave it a shot.
To each his own I guess.
Kanye is a pisspoor rapper, and that's a fairly important aspect of hip hop for me. His flow and lyrics are rank. I wouldn't purposely listen to a band fronted by a shit singer, so I don't see the appeal of listening to a rapper who can barely rap.
I think his records stand up well when considered solely in a pop-music bracket. But from a purely hip-hop perspective, his records don't come close to touching the very best hip-hop records.
I think his records stand up well when considered solely in a pop-music bracket. But from a purely hip-hop perspective, his records don't come close to touching the very best hip-hop records.
I find his lyrics to be as bad as p to the diddy's. I can't fathom how his lack of ability, creativity and imagination as a writer and performer of words is even disputed. As a pop music producer he obviously has something that people like, I'm not a fan personally but people like different things.
People like Dylan or Cobain could hardly be called brilliant singers either yet they've achieved legendary status at this stage regardless. I don't think it matters if musicians are weak in certain areas if the overall output is good enough.
Fair point. Still, I think a poor singer can get away with not being too skilled if they have a certain way of delivering it, as Cobain did, and how long of iconic punk rock vocalists have done, despite not being technically good singers.
For me, I don't think that is transferable to hip-hop. A bad rapper will always sound bad if they don't have skill.
I think Kanye's records sound very good from a production point of view, but his rapping just makes it unlistenable for me.
After hearing Ginger Baker's 13 minute drum solo on the Live at the Fillmore version of Toad, my dad asked me never to play it again when he was in the house. That's how I feel about much of the newer music - they may, or may not, be great players but it's just not something I want to listen to.
Flow is a huge part of rapping. Method Man is great as much for how he sounds than what he says. Busta Rhymes even more so.
Sorry to just jump in on this but Dylan and Cobain were just unbelievable songwriters aswel as lyricists, both probably the best of their generations. I also don't think Kanye's lyrics stand up anywhere near either of them never mind within his own pop/hip hop genres.
Just me tuppence worth like.
Is that flow or the quality of their voice? Busta Rhymes just sounds cool as feck, no matter what he says. He's got that great, raspy sound in his voice. Kind of the way Cobain sounds so well suited to his songs, whether or not he's got a good range or intonation.
Kanye's voice has so much less character to it. Really unmemorable. Although I wouldn't know good flow if it bit me on the arse so maybe he's got that bit right.
It's a bit of both. You'd notice bad flow instantly.
A friend of mine showed me the music video to Major Lazer's 'Pon da Floor, and I proceeded to lose it.
I was shocked and horrified at both the music, which was boring and strange in a new way to me, and the video that featured inordinate amounts of daggering and other weird things that weirded me out and fascinated me in equal measure. After a solid few minutes, when I realised that this song was not going to progress into something else, something resembling a full-fledged song, I ended it prematurely and promptly youtubed some jazz to get the bad taste out of my ears.
Then I started thinking... Was this what it was like to be a crotchety old man when jazz reared its head? Is this some genius turn in music that I'm failing to appreciate? Have I turned into a grumpy old fart at the tender age of 28?
I like to think that's not the case... but if not, I'm certainly not going to pull a Randy Marsh in order to seem "with it" (that's what young folk say nowadays, right?)
Anyway, I agree with the view a fair few people have mentioned on here: shit music is pretty much the default of most eras. We're also partially screwed by the digital age and marketing coupling itself with the music business more and more... Some bimbo with big tatas can be stuck into a booth, make some noises, have those noises made to sound like any other contemporary singing bimbo's voice, and be edited to be in key. It's far too easy to get untalented people in the door in the biz these days.
I was shocked and horrified at both the music, which was boring and strange in a new way to me, and the video that featured inordinate amounts of daggering and other weird things that weirded me out and fascinated me in equal measure. After a solid few minutes, when I realised that this song was not going to progress into something else, something resembling a full-fledged song, I ended it prematurely and promptly youtubed some jazz to get the bad taste out of my ears.
Then I started thinking... Was this what it was like to be a crotchety old man when jazz reared its head? Is this some genius turn in music that I'm failing to appreciate? Have I turned into a grumpy old fart at the tender age of 28?
I like to think that's not the case... but if not, I'm certainly not going to pull a Randy Marsh in order to seem "with it" (that's what young folk say nowadays, right?)
Anyway, I agree with the view a fair few people have mentioned on here: shit music is pretty much the default of most eras. We're also partially screwed by the digital age and marketing coupling itself with the music business more and more... Some bimbo with big tatas can be stuck into a booth, make some noises, have those noises made to sound like any other contemporary singing bimbo's voice, and be edited to be in key. It's far too easy to get untalented people in the door in the biz these days.
Comparing Major Lazer to Jazz is largely unproductive considering they're both totally different genres really meant to be listened to in different environments and for different occasions.
Argh... Have I started an Entertainment forum version of "You can't compare Bramble to Zidane"?
I don't know much of Major Lazer... but I know that 'Pon da Floor is somehow both outlandish and boring (to me). I'll draw the comparison as much I as like, tyvm.
No it's just comparing a genre which is heavily based in high levels of musicianship to another which is deliberately repetitive and mostly designed to be pumped out really loud and mixed into other songs to people jacked up on MDMA doesn't make any sense when trying to figure out whether modern music as a whole is in decline.
I guess my jokey posts don't come across like they should. It was just a thought that struck me... a what-if.
That might be part of why Kanye seems to have received so much acclaim from indie/rock critics and fans who might not usually be into that type of music. Kanye's strong points (production, changes in style from album to album, ability to get quality material from his collaborators, ability to write credible "pop" songs, some semblance of artistic integrity, focus on the album as an art form) are all very compatible with indie/alt rock sensibilities while his weaknesses probably aren't as apparent to that audience as they would be to hip-hop purists.