Whats wrong with popular music? Rant. - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

Magpie0001 · 05-11-2003, 04:45 AM

I dont know about youz but popular music, right now, drives me nuts. IMO it isnt music, Its not creative, Its a process. The lyrics are usually (there are exceptions) one dimentional, symplistic, sometimes idiotic & often convey a materealistic self promoting theme.
Dont get me wrong here I love music, I have literally mountains of Cd's Mp3's wax, tapes. All styles from Donovan to Deltron, from Prokofiev to Pizzicato. If I am not listening to music every minute of the day there IS a problem.
Radio stations, magazines, MTV

and many other forms of media cooperate with the publicity machine to bombard us with the flavour of the moment. Why do I know all the lyrics of songs I absolutely hate? Every day fatcat fuckers try to cram this shit into my ears. & it works too, I see cattle go to the Eminem movie & then go out & buy the album. Thats what they want you to do. They know better than you how to push your buttons. If somebody tells me the like pop music then as far as Im concernd they dont like music. The reason they like it is because someone told them to like it, It is forced apoun them.
Promotion is first, music is second (if even) . Money the motivation "music" the vehichle. JLo's ass, P. Diddy's diamonds, Avrils tie, JayZ's bentley, TaTu's (fake) lesbian shenanigans, the list goes on, Everybody has a gimmick, a hook a way to get talked about, written about, featured in <Insert magazine name> Frontpage, Interview, merchandising, concert promotion. Promote the image & they will come. Plaster thier face everywhere & the cattle will buy the album. Gauranteed.
Music is my first love, & It will be my last. They will not get my sale.
Fuck them all.

brandon11983 · 05-11-2003, 09:57 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Magpie0001
Fuck them all.

Couldn't have said it better myself.

Gortexfogg · 05-11-2003, 12:16 PM

I totaly agree Magpie. Music, which used to be about music, is now more image oriented. Today, if you don't have looks, you don't have talent. Not only that, but hardly any band or musician writes their own music. You got a team of songwriters, composers, and producers making music for their robots to sing.
At least I can listen to old good stuff...

bullgoose · 05-11-2003, 12:39 PM

I've been against the "You've GOT to like it, everybody does" mentality for longer than a lot of the people who post here have been alive. Shitty pop music is nothing new; it's aimed at a public mentality that would actually spend their time watching "Pro" wrestling or "Reality" shows (read: soap opera) on TV, It's the public willingness to accept a diet of crap that enables the media giants to hire illiterate writers with the creative ability of a dead buffalo and make unGodly amounts of money doing it. Any Sci-Fi fans out there; read C.M Kornbluths "The Marching Morons" and see if you can find any parallels. Note : "The Marching Morons" was written about 45 years ago, but it sure sounds like today.

Jeff · 05-11-2003, 04:49 PM

Some of the best artists don't last, because they're label gets bored of them and dumps them. I believe Tom Petty went off on this subject a while ago.

krwlz · 05-11-2003, 06:29 PM

agreement is there, i dot even listent to modern music, i listen to classic rock primarily, and im 18, so thats a little unusual, but fuck it

BulletBob · 05-11-2003, 07:07 PM

The people I hate are the elitist son of a bitches who bitch and moan when their favorite band sells a few records. "Well, I liked them back in the day but now that they're actually making money from their talent they suck".

Tophat665 · 05-11-2003, 07:48 PM

<b>BulletBob</b>, you say elitist like it's a bad thing. Those people annoy me too. Fortunately, I am better than they are.

The fact of the matter is that popular music sucks in large part because it is popular. This doesn't apply to any one song or group, but, as a class of music, what is popular today doth suck mightily. Yeah verily, and biteth that one which is called big.

It's safe music. It holds no surprises. It is boring.

The reason is that the folks responsible for making records (the companies, not the individual producers - though some are villians of the first water - and not the bands - though some would suck in any case - I'm talkin' to you Durst!) have realized that they can use a formula or two to make songs that will sell. Sell the song, sell the album (only takes one song to sell a teenager a whole record), turn a profit, pay the dividends, make the shareholders smile, raise the stock price, get even more money to use the formula again. It's the difference between Ikea and Louis XIV. They are risk averse, and have no reasons to take the kind of risk that generates good music until the formula stops working. Of course, at that point Kazaa will be blamed, so there will be a period where the formula is still being used, but isn't working any more. Execs will try to redirect blame, and it will work for awhile. Then something small will start somewhere where none of us expect (or maybe a very few of us do - but it's just wishful thinking at this point), that will present a viable alternative to the formulaic tripe, someone with some money will run the numbers and figure the risk is acceptable. Money will flow, music will happen, at length the formula will be found, and the whole damn thing starts over again.

maximusveritas · 05-11-2003, 08:46 PM

Who cares if popular music sucks? Don't listen to it. There's still plenty of good music out there.

BulletBob, I agree completely. Those people make me sick. They're not fans of music, they just want to be in on the latest band. Once it isn't "cool" anymore, they ditch the band.

Lovely · 05-12-2003, 12:20 PM

Let's blame pop-industry. Let's blame the God of pop-industry. LET'S BLAME ROI!!!!! =)

Here we go: ROI says: I want my profit and I want it now! "Ok", says the boss of the record company, (who by the way happens to be God from the musicians' point of view..):I have two A&R persons; Goldfinger and Madaboutmusic. Which do you wanna work with? ROI chooses Goldfinger,and Madaboutmusic gets fired.

Goldfinger now needs to build a super brand. One that has less than three flaws. One that the average consumer can be persuaded to like.

Raw-material sucks. A human being is usually needed to give a face and a mouth to the brand. Music is needed, too. And musicians, like most artists mean trouble to the hard-working, money-loving, efficiency-oriented, next-to-god- Goldfinger.

Goldfinger first tries to break up a band he has signed before. He wants the songwriter from there. But this irritatingly talented idiot tells his band, and Goldfinger receives a photo of five bare asses with autographs. Goldfinger turns to his old songwriters. Asks them for any leftovers, that they haven't given to their favourite artists. He then takes a pretty girl who wants to be a star to lunch. Finds out all about her. Finally she, and some others are rated on showmanship, sex appeal, looks and musicianship. A mind that can easily be tampered with is a plus, too...

Finally there are songs, there is the performer, and all you need is Marketing!!! Making up the story of the artist. Deciding the look. And "preparing" the future star for interviews and making sure she developes the "right" attitude. Goldfinger is happy.

This story has a happy end. Goldfinger didn't have to resort to the more troublesome and inefficient alternative; an artist or a band who writes their own music and waste a lot of time putting their hearts into their art - these people who have this imaginary world inside their heads and who find music more important than the color of their pants. And - who dare bore the hell out of magazine readers dwelling on music instead of telling people which designer fills their wardrobe this season.

ps. I'm wearing pink pants

juanvaldes · 05-13-2003, 01:08 AM

It's "Popular" only because the media tells you it is. They control what is played on MTV, BET, ClearChannel, etc, and can manufacture anything to make it appear "popular" and that's all it takes. People are heard animals, we buy what we think other people buy because we want to belong.

Pyrate · 05-13-2003, 04:20 AM

Death to all popstars! Hang, draw and quarter them all! Well, most a them. Some of them are pre-tt-y good, although I dont like em...

80 pcnt of popstars r pants.

Derwood · 05-13-2003, 11:25 AM

Here is an example of how this all works:

I used to work at a Camelot music store in a mall. You know where they have the display that has CD's organized as the "Top 25"? Well it's bullshit. They aren't the top 25 based on anything.....except what the companies want you to buy. It's all a marketing gimmick, and it works. People always stopped by the Top 25 rack first before going anywhere else.

Magpie0001 · 05-13-2003, 12:49 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by maximusveritas
Who cares if popular music sucks? Don't listen to it. There's still plenty of good music out there.

Totally max, problem is, its taking over, its everywhere, I fucking despise it, & even though I kazaa to the max, I live in a city that has a thriving underground music scene, I gig regularly (id love to more) I am always on the look out for mew grooves & will give anything a chance its still impossible to escape this monotinous crap. There are no words strong enough to describe the magnitude by which I hate this garbage. Even still, with all this I know (vageuly) that Britney has boy problems, some other arse-head is on tour & crap weasel over here is artist of the month!!

Fuck them all.

teph · 05-13-2003, 11:23 PM

Some of the best arguments I've heard on the subject have been from Magpie and Tophat . Gotta say, I totally agree. Can't say as I've ever heard anything that I listen to on the radio (that's new, anyway) except Radiohead and Tom Petty. Older rock is so much better than everything they've been cranking out today.

And Jeff , Petty has been talking a lot about that in his concerts recently.

"And did we tell you the name of the game, boy?
We call it Riding the Gravy Train"

Pink Floyd - Have a Cigar

gibber71 · 05-14-2003, 07:09 AM

One of the problems is that todays music is groomed to make money fast with little regard to the artists longevity,much like it was in the 50's when there were different flavors of the week every week. Also, for the same reason we have artists who are big stars with seemingly questionable talent,if they have talent at all. Image rules the airwaves more than ever and unfortunately takes priority.The best recent example is Lisa Marie Presley who couldn't carry a tune if she had a shotgun pointed at her head. The reason she was even allowed in a recording studio--her daddy's name. The ultimate solution is hopefully artists from every genre will try and put there best foot forward and think music rather than money.If that plays out,then it is up to the consumers to decide what is good and what is crap which leads us right back to where we are.

jujueye · 05-14-2003, 08:47 AM

Glad to see I'm not alone. At work people think I'm some sort of elitist music lover with tastes only on Jazz and "old music." In fact, its just this sort of thing that irritates me. After listening to NPR more as I age, I'm hearing lots of stories that most artists really are not making any money, and are heading out to create their own labels and make some serious cash. Record companies complain that they're NOT making any money, but in fact have trouble letting new artists out of these contracts because they have not paid the big cats off yet. WTF????? Yeah, gimme jazz. Jazz seems to be a place where better musicians can hang out and do some good work.

And the comments about Presley....HAHAHAHAHA.. Holy Shiatt....I heard her on..was it SNL or something. She sucks! Good lord, she is so awful. She shouts all of her lyrics, and honestly cannot carry a tune or even remotely approach singing. What a joke.

One more rant...the price of CDs continues to move upwards, when we all know that we can head to CompterGeeksRUs dot com and buy a spindle of them for less than 50 cents apiece. ooooooooo. Dont get me started on that one.........haha.

gibber71 · 05-14-2003, 09:50 AM

[QUOTE]Originally posted by jujueye
[B]

And the comments about Presley....HAHAHAHAHA.. Holy Shiatt....I heard her on..was it SNL or something. She sucks! Good lord, she is so awful. She shouts all of her lyrics, and honestly cannot carry a tune or even remotely approach singing. What a joke.

I saw her on Letterman and even Dave and her band were laughing.I think she mentioned it was her 4th time actually playing live.Go figure.As for jazz, I love it mainly because I play it on the geetar.Also love Led Zep and play them to.:

Halx · 05-14-2003, 10:17 AM

Yea verily. This cannot be said enough.

But think of this - everyone here agrees with you - where is the 'popular'? Do popular people simply not come to the TFP? Of course not, if you all are of legal age to be at the TFP, then you're out of the target range of the record companies to see music to.

05-11-2003, 04:45 AM	#1 (permalink)
Magpie0001 Nobody Loves Me Location: Irish In Madrid	Whats wrong with popular music? Rant. I dont know about youz but popular music, right now, drives me nuts. IMO it isnt music, Its not creative, Its a process. The lyrics are usually (there are exceptions) one dimentional, symplistic, sometimes idiotic & often convey a materealistic self promoting theme. Dont get me wrong here I love music, I have literally mountains of Cd's Mp3's wax, tapes. All styles from Donovan to Deltron, from Prokofiev to Pizzicato. If I am not listening to music every minute of the day there IS a problem. Radio stations, magazines, MTV and many other forms of media cooperate with the publicity machine to bombard us with the flavour of the moment. Why do I know all the lyrics of songs I absolutely hate? Every day fatcat fuckers try to cram this shit into my ears. & it works too, I see cattle go to the Eminem movie & then go out & buy the album. Thats what they want you to do. They know better than you how to push your buttons. If somebody tells me the like pop music then as far as Im concernd they dont like music. The reason they like it is because someone told them to like it, It is forced apoun them. Promotion is first, music is second (if even) . Money the motivation "music" the vehichle. JLo's ass, P. Diddy's diamonds, Avrils tie, JayZ's bentley, TaTu's (fake) lesbian shenanigans, the list goes on, Everybody has a gimmick, a hook a way to get talked about, written about, featured in <Insert magazine name> Frontpage, Interview, merchandising, concert promotion. Promote the image & they will come. Plaster thier face everywhere & the cattle will buy the album. Gauranteed. Music is my first love, & It will be my last. They will not get my sale. Fuck them all.

05-11-2003, 12:39 PM	#4 (permalink)
bullgoose Insane Location: Central N.Y.	I've been against the "You've GOT to like it, everybody does" mentality for longer than a lot of the people who post here have been alive. Shitty pop music is nothing new; it's aimed at a public mentality that would actually spend their time watching "Pro" wrestling or "Reality" shows (read: soap opera) on TV, It's the public willingness to accept a diet of crap that enables the media giants to hire illiterate writers with the creative ability of a dead buffalo and make unGodly amounts of money doing it. Any Sci-Fi fans out there; read C.M Kornbluths "The Marching Morons" and see if you can find any parallels. Note : "The Marching Morons" was written about 45 years ago, but it sure sounds like today. __________________ "If I had it to do all over, I'd do it all over you."

05-11-2003, 04:49 PM	#5 (permalink)
Jeff And we'll all float on ok... Location: Iowa City	Some of the best artists don't last, because they're label gets bored of them and dumps them. I believe Tom Petty went off on this subject a while ago. __________________ For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us. --Charles Bukowski

05-11-2003, 07:48 PM	#8 (permalink)
Tophat665 Minion of the scaléd ones Location: Northeast Jesusland	<b>BulletBob</b>, you say elitist like it's a bad thing. Those people annoy me too. Fortunately, I am better than they are. The fact of the matter is that popular music sucks in large part because it is popular. This doesn't apply to any one song or group, but, as a class of music, what is popular today doth suck mightily. Yeah verily, and biteth that one which is called big. It's safe music. It holds no surprises. It is boring. The reason is that the folks responsible for making records (the companies, not the individual producers - though some are villians of the first water - and not the bands - though some would suck in any case - I'm talkin' to you Durst!) have realized that they can use a formula or two to make songs that will sell. Sell the song, sell the album (only takes one song to sell a teenager a whole record), turn a profit, pay the dividends, make the shareholders smile, raise the stock price, get even more money to use the formula again. It's the difference between Ikea and Louis XIV. They are risk averse, and have no reasons to take the kind of risk that generates good music until the formula stops working. Of course, at that point Kazaa will be blamed, so there will be a period where the formula is still being used, but isn't working any more. Execs will try to redirect blame, and it will work for awhile. Then something small will start somewhere where none of us expect (or maybe a very few of us do - but it's just wishful thinking at this point), that will present a viable alternative to the formulaic tripe, someone with some money will run the numbers and figure the risk is acceptable. Money will flow, music will happen, at length the formula will be found, and the whole damn thing starts over again. __________________ Light a man a fire, and he will be warm while it burns. Set a man on fire, and he will be warm for the rest of his life.

05-13-2003, 04:20 AM	#12 (permalink)
Pyrate Psycho Location: London, CorBlimeyLand	Death to all popstars! Hang, draw and quarter them all! Well, most a them. Some of them are pre-tt-y good, although I dont like em... 80 pcnt of popstars r pants. __________________ ?

05-11-2003, 12:16 PM	#3 (permalink)
Gortexfogg I and I Location: Stillwater, OK	I totaly agree Magpie. Music, which used to be about music, is now more image oriented. Today, if you don't have looks, you don't have talent. Not only that, but hardly any band or musician writes their own music. You got a team of songwriters, composers, and producers making music for their robots to sing. At least I can listen to old good stuff...

05-11-2003, 06:29 PM	#6 (permalink)
krwlz Fledgling Dead Head Location: Clarkson U.	agreement is there, i dot even listent to modern music, i listen to classic rock primarily, and im 18, so thats a little unusual, but fuck it

05-11-2003, 07:07 PM	#7 (permalink)
BulletBob Psycho Location: Rupp Arena	The people I hate are the elitist son of a bitches who bitch and moan when their favorite band sells a few records. "Well, I liked them back in the day but now that they're actually making money from their talent they suck".

05-11-2003, 08:46 PM	#9 (permalink)
maximusveritas Winner	Who cares if popular music sucks? Don't listen to it. There's still plenty of good music out there. BulletBob, I agree completely. Those people make me sick. They're not fans of music, they just want to be in on the latest band. Once it isn't "cool" anymore, they ditch the band.

05-12-2003, 12:20 PM	#10 (permalink)
Lovely Upright	Let's blame pop-industry. Let's blame the God of pop-industry. LET'S BLAME ROI!!!!! =) Here we go: ROI says: I want my profit and I want it now! "Ok", says the boss of the record company, (who by the way happens to be God from the musicians' point of view..):I have two A&R persons; Goldfinger and Madaboutmusic. Which do you wanna work with? ROI chooses Goldfinger,and Madaboutmusic gets fired. Goldfinger now needs to build a super brand. One that has less than three flaws. One that the average consumer can be persuaded to like. Raw-material sucks. A human being is usually needed to give a face and a mouth to the brand. Music is needed, too. And musicians, like most artists mean trouble to the hard-working, money-loving, efficiency-oriented, next-to-god- Goldfinger. Goldfinger first tries to break up a band he has signed before. He wants the songwriter from there. But this irritatingly talented idiot tells his band, and Goldfinger receives a photo of five bare asses with autographs. Goldfinger turns to his old songwriters. Asks them for any leftovers, that they haven't given to their favourite artists. He then takes a pretty girl who wants to be a star to lunch. Finds out all about her. Finally she, and some others are rated on showmanship, sex appeal, looks and musicianship. A mind that can easily be tampered with is a plus, too... Finally there are songs, there is the performer, and all you need is Marketing!!! Making up the story of the artist. Deciding the look. And "preparing" the future star for interviews and making sure she developes the "right" attitude. Goldfinger is happy. This story has a happy end. Goldfinger didn't have to resort to the more troublesome and inefficient alternative; an artist or a band who writes their own music and waste a lot of time putting their hearts into their art - these people who have this imaginary world inside their heads and who find music more important than the color of their pants. And - who dare bore the hell out of magazine readers dwelling on music instead of telling people which designer fills their wardrobe this season. ps. I'm wearing pink pants

05-13-2003, 01:08 AM	#11 (permalink)
juanvaldes Banned Location: shittown, CA	It's "Popular" only because the media tells you it is. They control what is played on MTV, BET, ClearChannel, etc, and can manufacture anything to make it appear "popular" and that's all it takes. People are heard animals, we buy what we think other people buy because we want to belong.

05-13-2003, 11:25 AM	#13 (permalink)
Derwood Who You Crappin? Location: Everywhere and Nowhere	Here is an example of how this all works: I used to work at a Camelot music store in a mall. You know where they have the display that has CD's organized as the "Top 25"? Well it's bullshit. They aren't the top 25 based on anything.....except what the companies want you to buy. It's all a marketing gimmick, and it works. People always stopped by the Top 25 rack first before going anywhere else. __________________ "You can't shoot a country until it becomes a democracy." - Willravel

05-13-2003, 11:23 PM	#15 (permalink)
teph Insane Location: Atlanta, GA	Some of the best arguments I've heard on the subject have been from Magpie and Tophat . Gotta say, I totally agree. Can't say as I've ever heard anything that I listen to on the radio (that's new, anyway) except Radiohead and Tom Petty. Older rock is so much better than everything they've been cranking out today. And Jeff , Petty has been talking a lot about that in his concerts recently. "And did we tell you the name of the game, boy? We call it Riding the Gravy Train" Pink Floyd - Have a Cigar Last edited by teph; 05-13-2003 at 11:33 PM..

05-14-2003, 07:09 AM	#16 (permalink)
gibber71 Loser	One of the problems is that todays music is groomed to make money fast with little regard to the artists longevity,much like it was in the 50's when there were different flavors of the week every week. Also, for the same reason we have artists who are big stars with seemingly questionable talent,if they have talent at all. Image rules the airwaves more than ever and unfortunately takes priority.The best recent example is Lisa Marie Presley who couldn't carry a tune if she had a shotgun pointed at her head. The reason she was even allowed in a recording studio--her daddy's name. The ultimate solution is hopefully artists from every genre will try and put there best foot forward and think music rather than money.If that plays out,then it is up to the consumers to decide what is good and what is crap which leads us right back to where we are.

05-14-2003, 08:47 AM	#17 (permalink)
jujueye alpaca lunch for the trip Location: in my computer	Glad to see I'm not alone. At work people think I'm some sort of elitist music lover with tastes only on Jazz and "old music." In fact, its just this sort of thing that irritates me. After listening to NPR more as I age, I'm hearing lots of stories that most artists really are not making any money, and are heading out to create their own labels and make some serious cash. Record companies complain that they're NOT making any money, but in fact have trouble letting new artists out of these contracts because they have not paid the big cats off yet. WTF????? Yeah, gimme jazz. Jazz seems to be a place where better musicians can hang out and do some good work. And the comments about Presley....HAHAHAHAHA.. Holy Shiatt....I heard her on..was it SNL or something. She sucks! Good lord, she is so awful. She shouts all of her lyrics, and honestly cannot carry a tune or even remotely approach singing. What a joke. One more rant...the price of CDs continues to move upwards, when we all know that we can head to CompterGeeksRUs dot com and buy a spindle of them for less than 50 cents apiece. ooooooooo. Dont get me started on that one.........haha.

05-14-2003, 09:50 AM	#18 (permalink)
gibber71 Loser	[QUOTE]Originally posted by jujueye [B] And the comments about Presley....HAHAHAHAHA.. Holy Shiatt....I heard her on..was it SNL or something. She sucks! Good lord, she is so awful. She shouts all of her lyrics, and honestly cannot carry a tune or even remotely approach singing. What a joke. I saw her on Letterman and even Dave and her band were laughing.I think she mentioned it was her 4th time actually playing live.Go figure.As for jazz, I love it mainly because I play it on the geetar.Also love Led Zep and play them to.:

05-14-2003, 10:17 AM	#19 (permalink)
Halx Please touch this. Owner/Admin Location: Manhattan	Yea verily. This cannot be said enough. But think of this - everyone here agrees with you - where is the 'popular'? Do popular people simply not come to the TFP? Of course not, if you all are of legal age to be at the TFP, then you're out of the target range of the record companies to see music to. __________________ You have found this post informative. -The Administrator [Don't Feed The Animals]