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Mainstream Music Stinks!

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#122
Charlzm said:
Nearly all the popular music I hear these days (and by "pop music", I refer to Billboard's top singles/songs chart) has pitch-corrected vocals to the extent that it sounds like a robot is singing. There are no live instruments - everything is sampled or programmed. Generally, the music is incredibly simple and unsophisticated and has little to offer beside sonic hooks (particular sounds or noises) and vocal/lyric hooks. I tend to refer to it as "machine music" or "robot music" since there seems to be very little humanity to it.

I'm going to blame the cut-and-paste practices tied to the rise and growth of hip-hop in the 80's and 90's for the general dumbing-down of pop music over the last 30 years; based on their product, most commercially successful producers in these genres don't seem to understand any theory beyond the very basic rudiments, caring far more about "beats". This results in skeletal "songs" that occasionally have no discernible chord progressions and only the vaguest notion of overall harmony, and that came from whatever was sampled to create the "new song".
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Well stated! Excellent post! :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:
 
#123
I just turned 35, and I work with teens almost on a daily basis...over a hundred of them. A majority listen to decent music played by talented individuals.

The same concept at work that has some of them subjugated and listening to crap music and thinking Cardi B is worth a poopie is the same system that has y’all thinking that is what a majority of the youth listen to (at least some of them fall into that trap, too high a percentage imo).
 
#124
InhumanResource said:
It isn't a new thing in the record industry though. Billy Joel was singing about getting cut down to 3:05 like forty years ago.

For a while all you ever saw on the road was a silvery grey or champagne Toyota or Honda box sedan. No colors, no differences. Completely milquetoast to represent the safe bet. Media is the same.
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No, it's not a new thing in the record industry but it's an even more restricted/restrictive game now.
 
#125
Glenn Johnson said:
Am I just getting old or is the current mainstream, over-produced drivel pretending to be music the garbage I believe it to be. Sure, once in a blue moon something halfway worthwhile mysteriously finds it's way onto the radio, clubs, etc. - but that's rare. It"s almost as if the music moguls have brainwashed our youth into thinking that what they're hearing is worthwhile.

Anyone agree/disagree? Thoughts? Comments?

Edit: Yes, I know I sound like my dad.
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Yes.
You are getting old.
Mainstream music sucks and almost always has, with few exceptions.
I am not acquainted with your dad, but he sounds like mine, so that’s good enough for me to say yes, you sound like your dad. :)
 
#126
MultiScaleMale said:
The reason that we think music from the 70's was so great compared to today is that only the top 2% of music from the 70's survives and we're comparing the entire decode of music to a snapshot of today. That and old people hate rap.
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Well, a lot more than 2% of the music from just the last week of December, 1975 has survived pretty well. ;)

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#127
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#128
RichardW said:
Welcome to Talk Bass! You have already met two important criteria for success on TB. One, you are venting, and two, you think modern pop music sucks.

Other criteria include: strong options about flats vs. rounds, tort pick guards, Rickenbackers, how many strings on a bass are best, slapping, and which bass is best for metal.

Welcome, brother.
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And I hope you don’t wear your bass too low... or too high...
and we don’t really slap each other...;)
 
#129
AboutSweetSue said:
I just turned 35, and I work with teens almost on a daily basis...over a hundred of them. A majority listen to decent music played by talented individuals.

The same concept at work that has some of them subjugated and listening to crap music and thinking Cardi B is worth a poopie is the same system that has y’all thinking that is what a majority of the youth listen to (at least some of them fall into that trap, too high a percentage imo).
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I know some kids in their 20's that listen to Beatles and 60's-70's rock and can sing all the lyrics to these songs. My kid (19) (who plays great solo acoustic guitar) loves Frank Sinatra along with more current stuff like John Mayer, Maroon 5, etc. He doesn't like Cardi B.

I love some of the stuff that's out today. We played some in our cover band. Stuff like Bruno Mars can be very cool. Here's a great example of something good by Bruno (his bass player Jamareo Artis is playing some super basslines in this) although this wouldn't be considered mainstream.

 
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#130
Altitude said:
If you look back over a broad time period, mainstream music always seems to have simple and overused chordal structures and always sounds predictable as part of a larger musical fashion at whatever time.

But, the melodies and lyrics are often very good in my opinion. To wit, Herbie Hancock recorded an album of covers on then-current mainstream songs in the mid-90s called "The New Standard" which is wonderful. It has a cover of "All Apologies" (Nirvana) and "Thieves In The Temple" (Prince) on it.

I'll throw out a challenge - go to your streaming service. Listen to "Don't Dream It's Over" (Crowded House) and "Time After Time" (Cyndi Lauper), both mainstream hits in the 80s that seemed (to me) unremarkable at the time. Then listen to a few of the covers of each song that strip away the 80s production and lay bare the bones of the song. They are both outstanding pieces of work.
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He’s right about those two songs.
 
#132
groooooove said:
mainstream music would generally be driven by what the youth listens to. as someone who teaches a lot of teenage music students, i feel comfortable assuming (happy to try and confirm!) that none of them have literally ever in their life turned on a radio.

so in a weird way, that is actually a terrible way to measure what is popular. of all my teenage students, none of them are into "mainstream" (really bad) stuff.

the music business is not at all what it used to be. there are no major headliners that sell stadiums anymore. it's far more fragmented, and each young persons individual taste can be far more individualized - and they seem to like that.

Case and point, i have one teenage student who's obsessed with 1920s-30s ragtime piano music. fats waller and the like. knows the songs, the style, historical context, and so on.

I have another student who's only interested in korean pop music (K-pop for those of us in the know:thumbsup: )

neither of these things would be on the radar of the folks who grew up in the days of actually popular music on the radio.

and yes, ive heard the really lame stuff some of us are talking about. i'm sure they do have lots of fans, i just don't encounter them is all.
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Exactly! I'm sure there are some kids who are just into what's popular. But when we were kids, we only had access to what we heard on the radio and what some other kids told is about. Maybe if we were lucky, there'd be a music teacher or older kid. Kids now have instant access to vast amount of recorded music from every era, and a lot of them take advantage of it, if they're onto music.

On the other hand, a lot fewer schools have music programs, so bit as many kids are getting music instruction.
 
#135
There is always great new music being made, especially if you open your tastes to include other genres. If you see a void in the music scene, fill it.
 
#139
jerry said:
There is always great new music being made, especially if you open your tastes to include other genres. If you see a void in the music scene, fill it.
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The OP never stated otherwise. He didn't say there's no good music being made - he was referring strictly to "mainstream" music (in other words, the stuff that gets regular play on mainstream top 40 radio).
 
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