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An article wondering what happened to today's music


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Interesting. I can't wait to see if grey hair and pot-bellies show up to Fiddy-cen tribute bands in 30 years. I kinda doubt it.

 

If she's referring to the Staggers Act (deregulation of airlines, radio, etc.) that was signed by Jimmy Carter.

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Music was better pre-MTV.

 

The talent pool was much, much larger when it included people that would never be allowed on tv in the 21st century; and the industry was geared towards the music side of that equation. Likewise, today the equation is just appearances.

 

I recently re-discovered the pop music I took for granted as a kid in the 70's. It was so good back then. Strong melodies, tight arrangements, things all sounded different and had unique character...

 

Most of which would never have been allowed to happen in the 21st century, because they weren't photogenic enough.

 

 

Video killed not only the radio star, but the music industry as well.

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Absolutely... Videos are the worse thing that ever happened to pop music... Music is something you hear, not something you watch... And they're expensive too... I wonder how much money the music industry would be saving if there were no videos, considering how much it costs to make an album these days, where people have home studios, and the quality of project studios such that you can make masters for comparative peanuts??? There's gotta be a change in how music is being distributed and disseminated and I really think that taking videos out of the equation would be a great step forward...

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Music was better pre-MTV.


Most of which would never have been allowed to happen in the 21st century, because they weren't photogenic enough.


Video killed not only the radio star, but
the music industry
as well.

 

Guys like Billy Joel would never have been signed in the MTV era.

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Well... I have to say that most of those songs (cited in the column) gave me the shudders but not exactly chills up my spine... they were, indeed, by and large, what drove me to punk and new music.

 

But drop back a few years and the Top 30/40 really was filled with brilliant, memorable music.

 

I remember listening to Boss Radio Top 30 in the 60s and hearing Jimi Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane, the Cream, mixed with the Carpenters, and the Supremes and... well... anyway... don't make me go there. I'll probably break out or something... or go driving in the hills of Orange County looking for the country roads and working ranches that used to be up there.

 

 

Anyhow... I guess I've just been disaffected for a long time -- but, yeah, even the fluff from the late 70s and early 80s -- and a lot of it truly was fluff (remember Kagegugu?) -- even a lot of the fluff had more memorable charm than the nothingness I hear from (a lot) of the pop and rock and what passes for R&B today on the radio and TV...

 

 

That said, any era that produces a real pop classic like Black Eyed Peas' "Shut Up"... it ain't all, completely bad. ;)

 

I put that track on every time I make a point of trying to listen to a presidential speech or press conference. It's healing.

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Is the "Top 40" or any chart, compiled according to the old paradigm, actually relevant any more?

The articles referred to in this thread and in Billsters' "Sales of Music Plunge Sharply" thread,

and in all the RIAA FUD I read, seem to point to a decline in the music industry....

and yet everyone seems to agree there's more music available to the listener than ever before.

 

Somethings not adding up here....

 

If it was possible to actually quantify in it's entirety, the total amount of music available for

consumers to listen to, I wonder how much of that is actually included in "The Charts"?

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Well... I have to say that most of
those
songs (cited in the column) gave me the shudders but not exactly chills up my spine... they were, indeed, by and large, what drove me to punk and new music.

 

 

I agree.

I didn't like most of the songs mentioned, even at the time they were

released...I was glad when punk came along ... like a breath of fresh air...

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Is the "Top 40" or any chart, compiled according to the old paradigm, actually relevant any more?

The articles referred to in this thread and in Billsters' "Sales of Music Plunge Sharply" thread,

and in all the RIAA FUD I read, seem to point to a decline in the music industry....

and yet everyone seems to agree there's more music available to the listener than ever before.


Somethings not adding up here....


If it was possible to actually quantify in it's entirety, the total amount of music available for

consumers to listen to, I wonder how much of that is actually included in "The Charts"?

 

 

You're right, the "top 40" isn't really relevant anymore because it's not truly a "top 40".

 

I'm not a retail guy, but here's what I know about how the "numbers" works from others in retail (anyone out there can correct me if I'm wrong).

 

Traditionally, "Top 40" tracks units *shipped* to the retail stores, and not the actual units *purchased* by consumers.

 

However, part of the deal that labels have with retailers is what's called *returns* - that after a period of time the retailers can send back the unsold units back to the labels for reimbursement.

 

In the old days, this wasn't an issue because labels would try to ship what they think would sell, thereby minimizing returns.

 

These days, it's easier to inflate numbers of a particular artist by what's called "overstuffing the channel" - by flooding the market with shipped units - which is what "top 40" tracks in terms of album sales.

 

And if you're talking radio airplay, the game is worse.

 

In the really old days, payola was a huge problem where the labels would basically pay DJs to play their music (i.e. a bribe to the DJs). There was federal legislation on this I think in the late 1950s which banned this practice.

 

Fast forward to the 1990s. With radio consolidation and "canned" playlists, where you hear the same 40 songs, the top40 is irrelevant. Those 40 songs are paid for by the labels themselves to Clear Channel as a "marketing expense". It's almost like a bidding system whereby Clear Channel says "we have a 40-song playlist; getting those slots goes to the highest bidder". In other words, rather than having a bunch of independent DJs around the country with their own programming and playlists (which reflect what they think their local listeners wanna hear), it's one big corporation dictating what the 40 songs that the entire country *should* hear.

 

That's why I hereby name Clear Channel the Great Satan.

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So the top 40 is really a marketing/advertising mechanism and bears no relation

whatsoever to what's really happening!!

This would tie in with a disturbing trend Downunder where radio announcers

now announce new songs as "So & So's next big hit" before the song has

even been heard by many people.

How do they know it's gonna be a hit?

For that matter ... define "hit".

 

I have a growing suspicion the business is in much worse trouble than

people think...

 

Is it possible that all the scare mongering by the RIAA and others is only

applying to the small section of the total market which they control?

It's looking more and more like the record companies, publishers and even

many established acts, and even the collection societies have their head

in the clouds while the ground is falling away underneath them.

Following that analogy, it would seem they are only concerned with

preserving the nice fluffy texture of the clouds without even noticing

they are walking on thin air....

 

A bit like the old Warner Bros cartoons where a character races out over

the cliff edge and there's a moment of feet scrabbling in mid air before

the inevitable plunge to the bottom of the canyon and the little puff

of dust way down below.

 

More and more it looks to me like we're at the feet scrabbling in the air stage.

And we all know there's only one direction from there yeah?

 

DOWN!!!!!

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You also have to remember that what passes for education in the US is increasingly a joke (courtesy of the influence of big business, mostly); that music education is really virtually absent; that the few real songwriters left are a dying breed; that while the availability of music may look like it's grown, the actual ability to find the good stuff in the pile of pig dung is increasingly difficult, and the people around who used to be literate enough to help and who snuck into the corners of the corporate biz to keep the flame alive, have either passed on or given up.

 

We've left the Morlocks to fend for themselves, good luck.

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I was glad when punk came along ... like a breath of fresh air...

 

 

Same here. I love punk, postpunk, hardcore, wave, new romantic... all of those sounds.

 

Personally, I think a lot of the new stuff is great {Garage mostly... White Stripes, Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs, Franz Ferdinand, the Subways, Libertines, MorningWood, 5o other bands I can't think of at the moment, etc, etc, etc...}

 

I can see why people complain about hip hop and top 4o stuff but... they've always complained about top 4o. I really don't know why people are complaining about the rest of it.

 

http://www.nme.com/

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I think the music is adapting with the earth and the conditions-They do seem to parallel-I can deal with anything but when a guitar is looked at like a warshpan with a pole and a string then I will loose it-I must say I love all music and shame to see an instrument type that is never used anymore-I have seen the digital future and there is no instruments at all-They are now working on the vocals-That is all that is left-If it comes down to that this old man will learn -I must-Without music there is nothing

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It is difficult not to look back and say those were the good ol' days.

However, even though most of the stuff on the radio doesn't appeal to me personally, nobody knows which of it will last and which won't. Are the evil corporations responsible for the downfall of music? Maybe... Still, in 20 or 30 years, who knows what music todays teenagers will look back on and cry about the good ol' days.

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... music education is really virtually absent ...

The majority of pop music songwriters of the last 50 years brag about being untrained. Neither Lennon or McCartney had any education of repute in music. Most rock, etc. musicians on these forums brag that "educated" musicians can only play from sheet music and cannot improvise.

 

So, that's been a good thing, correct?

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I miss Pablo Cruise....

 

 

 

When my baby,

When my baby smiles at me,

I go to Rio

De Janeiro.

My-o me-o...

I go wild and then

I have to do the samba,

And la bamba.

 

Now I'm not the kind of person,

With a passion or persuasion

For dancin' or romancin'.

But I give in to the rhythm,

And my feet follow the beating

Of my heart.

 

whoa oh ohh...

When my baby,

When my baby smiles at me,

I go to Rio

De Janeiro.

I'm a Salsa fella,

When my baby smiles at me,

The sun lightens up my life,

And I am free at last.

What a blast!

 

Whoa oh ohh...

When my baby,

When my baby smiles at me,

I feel like Tarzan

Of the Jungle.

There on the hot sand,

In a bungalow

While monkies play above-a,

We'll make love-a.

 

Now I'm not the kind

To let vibrations,

Trigger my imagination

Easily.

No, that's just not me.

But I turn into a tiger,

Everytime I get the sight of,

What I love, love, love.

 

Ohh oh oh...

When my baby,

When my baby smiles at me,

I go to Rio

De Janeiro.

I'm a Salsa fella,

When my baby smiles at me

The sun lightens up my life,

And I am free at last.

What a blast!

 

Wooooo hooooo...

whoa oh oh ohh...

whoa oh ohh...

When my baby,

When my baby smiles at me,

I go to Rio

De Janeiro.

I'm a Salsa fella,

When my baby smiles at me

The sun lightens up my life,

And I am free at last.

What a blast!

 

(Rio)

 

When my baby smiles at me,

I go to Rio.

Rio,

Rio De Janeiro.

 

Take me back,

I put it in.

Take me where I know

I'm gon' to Rio.

Oh ohh...

 

Man, they just don't write songs like that anymore!

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