The slow death of music

[Ukiah Bass]

The data in this article say people are consuming less music. Not just buying less of it, but also stealing (er, downloading) less music from share sites. Is this a statement on the quality of music? That there are better ways to spend time than by listening to music? Quite depressing for those who believe they might "make it" with music. The numbers are clear on one thing: there are not many hits. Probably why set lists often look the same.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/01/op...blow.html?_r=2

[DeluxeRed]

I think we're just reaching saturation. Most people have downloaded most of the music they are interested in. And people can download it a lot faster than people can make it (at least make it worth listening to), so the pipeline is pretty thin for new stuff.

There will probably be a noticable spike when The Beatles' catalog goes on-line in September.

[fenderx55]

I agree with the article that this isn't that shocking; and I put some of the blame on corporate radio. In big markets like NY every song has to be okayed by corporate, which means other markets actually have it before us. Now you have 3 or more top 40/urban stations all playing the same 15 songs on loop, and you have civilians (IE not ppl on tb/music blogs) forgetting that there is OTHER music out there than what's on 92.3/Z100/apple commercials.

It's just kind of sad. The women I work with go ape**** whenever they hear about some new lady singer-songwriter who isn't as good as fiona apple, sounds like fiona apple, but isn't as famous as fiona apple. shrug. Also, my 13 year old sister has stopped consuming music on an acquisition basis and is perfectly happy to stream from youtube. It's scary how right that guy was, at least empirically.

[superbassman2000]

i disagree. this isn't the slow death of music, just the slow death of pop music. I see the direction of music going back to what it was in the stone age, or at least how it was spelled out in the book "This is your brain on music". The book looked into the origin of music, and it was said that the first humans who sang or played music did it either for fun, mating, or for survival (for instance to keep awake at night to keep guard of the tribe). Music had been like that for thousands of years, until recently some businesspeople decided they could charge for it. Thats only a recent phenomenon. Not to say i don't think that musicians should get paid to do their art, I am just saying that gone will be the days of paying pop stars millions of dollars to sing (although with a lot of the studio work they can do now, you don't even really need to be great at that)

I also think that people will ultimately pay money for music if they feel they are worth paying money for. I think there are still a lot of live acts that i will pay 25-50 dollars to see live, and that ranges anywhere from NIN to Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears, and I am sure I am not the only one willing to do that. That is where musicians will make their money in the future--playing shows. Trent Reznor wrote a really nice piece on how new artists can forge their way into the future: http://forum.nin.com/bb/read.php?30,767183
I think he has some good ideas--he mentions that you should make your music as accessible as possible, because the more ears that hear it, the more people will like the music, and those people are more willing to come to shows and buy merch. You won't make a lot of money on your cd sales, but you can make it elsewhere.

no, music isn't dead at all.

[Rattman]

With the overproduced, banal lyrics and over saturated recording levels that are common on modern releases, I'm not the least bit surprised. Musicianship, songwriting and production standards are all substandard with what the 'norm' once was. This is not just nostalgic wishful thinking here. . . everything in nature runs it's course... and I see popular music pretty much gasping for air.

[Barkless Dog]

i disagree. this isn't the slow death of music, just the slow death of pop music.

I would say Corporate Pop Music for kids over 7 - 9yrs old.

I think people who really listen to music, like people who read books will still do so. Music & books are collectable & consumable.

I feel this has been a renaissance for the "open minded" listener. The whole world is there to enjoy. My daughter & her friends just went to Warped Tour & she bought a bunch of CD's from bands she liked (not heard on the radio). Her friend asked her in the car why buy them when you can download them?

She replied "she likes to own & collect something for bands she likes" She wants to support bands she likes. Half the music she listens to is rock the other half is Japanese bands she discovers online.

[Barkless Dog]

Originally Posted by Rattman

With the overproduced, banal lyrics and over saturated recording levels that are common on modern releases, I'm not the least bit surprised. Musicianship, songwriting and production standards are all substandard with what the 'norm' once was. This is not just nostalgic wishful thinking here. . . everything in nature runs it's course... and I see popular music pretty much gasping for air.

Funny but that is part of the reason I (and my daughter) like Japanese & overseas bands sung in their native tongues. What more can be said in English?

There is a uniqueness of Rammstein, JRock, that when sung in English is no nearly as good-it looses something.

[makanudo]

Blame it on the Disney products, they are not people anymore they are freakin PRODUCTS
Jonas Brothers
Miley
Etc.

Its way over saturated, thats why underground music is always the best.

[Rudreax]

Yep, popular music is slowly going down the toilet. But it's been like this for as long as music has existed; it's just that the process has sped up exponentially with the advent of radio and TV.

[xzzy]

Music's too big a part of human nature for it to die.

What's really happening is the money grubbing has locked the industry into a formula that focuses on short term return.. making their business model unsustainable. Even worse their stranglehold on media formats is so tight, listeners don't have an easy way to be exposed to new material. Decline in consumption is inevitable.

Something will spring up to replace it when the beast finally falls over. The internet is already solving this problem, it just needs the record labels out of the way for it to get serious attention.

[fdeck]

Originally Posted by xzzy

Music's too big a part of human nature for it to die.

This.

[Jim Campbell]

Originally Posted by makanudo

Blame it on the Disney products, they are not people anymore they are freakin PRODUCTS
Jonas Brothers
Miley
Etc.

Its way over saturated, thats why underground music is always the best.

trouble is that gradually as outlets dry up and fewer avenues exist for new music to find markets means more talented people will have to work outside of music to survive.......as independent retailers that are inclined to stock local indy acts are driven out of business by the chains who have little interest in anything but the major label stuff........better to play a top 10 or 20 playlist over and over until everyone is sick of it then release the next batch

living here is a great example of that.......an album that will sell say 200,000 copies in america projects sales of 20,000 here,as we are about 10% of americas population.....often those kinds of numbers discourage release of that album here,due to promotional costs and lack of profit potential.....i used to be amazed that stores in towns smaller than this in america would have a dozen albums by bands that were unheard of on radio here.....

i think that the mega acts will still rake it in,the indys will still sell enough at gigs and on the net to get by,but the ones that occupy the ground in between are in for a rough ride

[Jared Lash]

Music won't die. But the value of music recordings may drop nearly to zero, meaning that musicians make their money only on touring. For many, this is already reality.

I was talking to Jackie Greene (a local favorite who always seems at the tipping point but hasn't broken out nationally yet) after a show and he said that after three major label records he had yet to make a dime on any of those albums. All the money he makes from music comes from playing shows.

If you like roots (blues/folk/rock) check him out.

But the point is that music may get to a point where its just a vast, loosely collected listening environment online where musicians give their music away for free and survive making money playing shows.

The number of people making millions from music may decrease dramatically, but I don't see that as a bad thing. Wouldn't bother me if the same thing happened with movies. I'd love it if the profits shrank, the budgets had to be cut and filmmakers got back to making really good films rather than CGI filled crap-fests. But that's just me.

[PeaceSells775]

Yeah, music sales are definitely sharply decreasing since you can just sit at your computer and download or stream anything you want. I don't download personally, I like to support the artists by buying the cd (when I can afford it). I mean I'm only sixteen and I work part time making pizzas, so really I don't have a whole lot of money. But I'll spend my whole check on one ticket for a great show. In my opinion, cd sales shouldn't matter as much to the artist as concert attendance. That's just how I think anyway, but like I said I'm just a kid.

[iamlowsound]

Popular music is dieing, the major labels are dieing. Music is thriving.

IMO, part of the problem is that music is so badly produced and mixed that some people just don't bother listening to it. Just the other day I was listening to mewithoutYou on vinyl, who I have always considered to be very well mixed/produced, then I spun some trooper from the 70's and I couldn't believe the difference. The Trooper album was mixed a million times better. I guess people just cared about the product more.

lowsound

[jollygiantchris]

Originally Posted by xzzy

Music's too big a part of human nature for it to die.

What's really happening is the money grubbing has locked the industry into a formula that focuses on short term return.. making their business model unsustainable. Even worse their stranglehold on media formats is so tight, listeners don't have an easy way to be exposed to new material. Decline in consumption is inevitable.

Well said ^^^

My thought also is that most people are unwilling or don't have the time to sift through all of the crap to find the good music. I think eventually we will get back to the point where the DJs play whatever they want to instead of just sitting on a rotation picked by market researchers (which I think was the death of popular music to begin with). At that point I believe sales will pick back up as people get exposed to more original music.

[Byzcat]

Here, watch this

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...06244008931882.

It boils down to, the record companies get a bunch of people in a room for a focus group, play them thirty-second clips, and ask them if they like it. Yeah, there's a good way to decide what goes on the airwaves

One of the artists interviewed in the documentary said, "they don't play what people will like, the play what people will not hate enough to change the station".


I don't think it help that CD's are so freakin' expensive. The indie bands have got it right- charge about eight bucks, and people will buy your CD. Charge seventeen, I'll DL or listen online, thanks.

Sign some actual talent, charge a reasonable price for the product, and please, for the love of God, give the artists a decent share of the take, and people will start buying albums again.


Oh, and when I went to buy Judas Priest's <i>Nostradamus</i>, I was blown away. I was prepared to drop twenty-five bucks for a double CD album, and it only cost me twelve. For an awesome album. I wonder how they pulled that off, record companies being what they are.

[JAUQO III-X]

Originally Posted by Jared Lash

I was talking to Jackie Greene (a local favorite who always seems at the tipping point but hasn't broken out nationally yet)

Originally Posted by Jared Lash

after a show and he said that after three major label records he had yet to make a dime on any of those albums.

Maybe it's not all the labels fault. It could be the type of deal he signed.

[Taylor Livingston]

Every time I hear people talking about how pop music is going down the tubes, I have to roll my eyes. Pop music has always been terrible. Consider the top single of 1975 versus the top single of 2008. Is "Love will keep us together" by Captain and Tenille really any less stupid than "Low" by T-Pain? Is "My eyes adored you" by Franky Valli a masterpiece compared to "My Humps"? How about a number one single of 20 years ago, "How am I supposed to live without you?" by Michael Bolton, vs. "Single Ladies" by Beyonce? Pop music has always been mostly junk. People think the 60s was all The Beatles and Jimi, when in fact there was plenty of throwaway pop drivel going on then, too.

[Byzcat]

conical johnson

I'll give you half a "Word".

Pop music has always been mostly crap, but before the advent of the playlist, there was a lot more good stuff sprinkled amidst the crap.

Also, there has been an increasing amount of emphasis placed on looks, to the point where how you look is more important than how you sound.

Janis Joplin, Leslie West, hell, Deep Purple could never have made it in today's market.

Personally, I don't care what a band looks like visually (up to a certain point- if you're playing world-destroying apocalyptic metal, you really shouldn't be wearing chiffon while you're doing it) as long as they can play. I don't care if your lead guitarist had smallpox as a child and his face is one big scar, I don't care if your keyboard player is so fat that he has to be carried onto the stage on a forklift (although I might worry that he would have a heart attack in the middle of a really intense solo). If you can rock out, I'll be listening, and if I can scrape the bread together, I'll even come out and see you live.

Unfortunately, the Powers That Be in the music industry, and too much of our culture in general is very youth-and-beauty oriented, to the point that a good-looking artist will get signed over one who is actually good, and it's a damn shame.

OK, I lied. I do care about what a band looks like visually.

When it comes to heavy metal, the uglier, the better.