Your Opinion on Mainstream Music

[Vynce]

The content of the lyrics, more often than not, is irrelevant. The musical quality of the words is much more important.

Exceptions:

1. By some miracle, an angsty rock musician actually has something interesting to say.

2. The lyrics are on some Neo-Nazi shit or something like that, in which case, it’s probably better to avoid it.

I agree entirely. It’s cool when a song has good lyrics, but it’s not all that important, to me. The exception being rap music.

To me, the voice is just another instrument. I make the exception for rap because the talent is in delivery and content. It’s not about how pleasant the artist’s voice is.

[xes]

The content of the lyrics, more often than not, is irrelevant. The musical quality of the words is much more important.

Exceptions:

1. By some miracle, an angsty rock musician actually has something interesting to say.

2. The lyrics are on some Neo-Nazi shit or something like that, in which case, it’s probably better to avoid it.

Excepting Singer/Songwriter types and folk types.

Something like “American Pie” is catchy as hell, sure… but half the appeal was trying to figure out what the fuck it was about. Same with “You’re so Vain”, except who instead of what.

Or “Alice’s Restaurant”, which is both a song and very centered on the lyrics.

Edit: Swear to god, does nobody here remember about the '70s?

[goodm0urning]

I agree entirely. It’s cool when a song has good lyrics, but it’s not all that important, to me. The exception being rap music.

To me, the voice is just another instrument. I make the exception for rap because the talent is in delivery and content. It’s not about how pleasant the artist’s voice is.

With rap, the voice is almost a percussive instrument, with the rhymes being the accented hits. Being an outsider to the genre, I mainly notice when the lyricist writes those accents around the meter in an interesting way. I’ve noticed that a lot of rap sticks pretty close to the 1 and the 3, which, to my ears, sounds generic.

[Kromo]

I see what you’re getting at, but I don’t think there’s any specific feature of commercial music (beats, hooks, whatever) that people universally glom onto like lemmings. It’s more of a matter of formative musical experiences.

In my observation, if a piece of music reaches the average listener, it’s usually because of its similarity to something else the listener already likes, which can be anything. Some bands, such as Airbourne, have built their entire career on this.

Many people develop their values early on (again, the specific values aren’t really relevant) and those values get cemented hard and fast. Ergo, if it’s the beat that gets them, it’s not because the beat is intrinsically appealing anything like that, but because the specific beat is congruent enough with some earlier music experience they’ve had. If it weren’t, they would reject it.

This is why I have trouble with classifying artists and specific pieces of music as being “mainstream” or “underground”. In my opinion, “mainstream” is a formal thing. You can have an artist that relatively few people know about, but who plays utterly mainstream music–because it conforms to stylistic standards that a lot of people would be prepared to accept if they were exposed to it.

I think what you are missing is the idea of distribution. The popularity of mainstream music isn’t due to mass consensus, but rather media conglomerates buying up air time. Its not that people don’t like it, it is often the case they aren’t exposed to new music unless they go out of their way to leave their comfort zone… and for all intents and purposes, it is good enough.
While there always has and will be mediocre music, it is a relatively new phenomenon that media companies are basically allowed free reign to push their latest commodity.

[Vynce]

With rap, the voice is almost a percussive instrument, with the rhymes being the accented hits. Being an outsider to the genre, I mainly notice when the lyricist writes those accents around the meter in an interesting way. I’ve noticed that a lot of rap sticks pretty close to the 1 and the 3, which, to my ears, sounds generic.

Listen to Maroon 5’s Payphone. You’ll find Wiz’ verse especially jarring.

[goodm0urning]

I think what you are missing is the idea of distribution. The popularity of mainstream music isn’t due to mass consensus, but rather media conglomerates buying up air time. Its not that people don’t like it, it is often the case they aren’t exposed to new music unless they go out of their way to leave their comfort zone… and for all intents and purposes, it is good enough.
While there always has and will be mediocre music, it is a relatively new phenomenon that media companies are basically allowed free reign to push their latest commodity.

Your avatar looks like she’s milking a cow with really long teats.

[xes]

I think what you are missing is the idea of distribution. The popularity of mainstream music isn’t due to mass consensus, but rather media conglomerates buying up air time. Its not that people don’t like it, it is often the case they aren’t exposed to new music unless they go out of their way to leave their comfort zone… and for all intents and purposes, it is good enough.
While there always has and will be mediocre music, it is a relatively new phenomenon that media companies are basically allowed free reign to push their latest commodity.

Payola and corrupt distribution are hardly new either

The only difference is that now, instead of bribing the DJ, you bribe the corporate types or just buy the station outright… but the effect is the same.

[Kromo]

Your avatar looks like she’s milking a cow with really long teats.

My avatar is nothing but an window unto your soul

Payola and corrupt distribution are hardly new either

The only difference is that now, instead of bribing the DJ, you bribe the corporate types or just buy the station outright… but the effect is the same.

Except its not corruption, its the mass marketing of music, There is a difference between going from club to club paying people off and 90% of all the radio stations in a country stations having homogenous play lists.

[xes]

Except its not corruption, its the mass marketing of music, There is a difference between going from club to club paying people off and 90% of all the radio stations in a country stations having homogenous play lists.

I now feel old, meant radio DJ.

And it’s more the same than not. For instance, Dick Clark and Alan Freed, 2 of the most famous DJs of the '50s were implicated in promoting records published by labels they had a financial stake from.

It’s more institutionalized now, but it’s kind of distinction without difference.

[Little_Goten]

Depends on the song.

[Lazyjosh2]

1. I dont like people who listen to music and say a song sucks, and they have no idea what their singing about

2. If you like a song why not know what it is about?

[goodm0urning]

A song is a piece of music first. There are a million things to evaluate it by aside from the content of the words.

[Lazyjosh2]

so if a song says nothing but “fuck” the whole song and really good music that makes it good?

[goodm0urning]

so if a song says nothing but “fuck” the whole song and really good music that makes it good?

Depends on how the fuck is used.

[Shaft_Agent]

snip

if the music sucked but the lyrics were excellent, does that make it a good song?

[Nini_Heart]

i listen to katy perry because i imagine myself fucking her furiously, not so much her sound. but her music is not bad. light years ahead of keisha. god i hate keisha.

man fuck you, ke$ha is loads better than katy perry

[Shaft_Agent]

you said ‘loads’

[YungKratos]

I feel like music today is all about the money and the fame. People don’t really have a message and don’t have a movement behind them they just beg and plead to be famous. Music has to have a message to be good. I mean that as in you have to mean what you are putting out or it compromises the quality of your work as a musical artist. It’s kind of easy to tell when the work is weak too because I don’t think everyone is a music buff but people can tell when they are listening something that was engineered for the purpose of quickly catching their attention. It’s all gimmicky and empty and none of it sticks anymore, and if people didn’t recognize that we wouldn’t even be having this discussion. We have a bunch of performers now people who want to put on a show but very few artists, or true craftsmen.

[Shaft_Agent]

I don’t think everyone is a music buff but people can tell when they are listening something that was engineered for the purpose of quickly catching their attention.

nah, i disagree. most people don’t know most pop songs are between 72-80 bpm to match their heart rate; or even this

[media=youtube]5pidokakU4I[/media]

i’m very sure a person could like every single one of those songs and not realize the similarity.

[Manx]

Start playing jazz.
Realize that a lot of songs have similar progressions.
Get lazy and stop following chord changes altogether.
Don’t win a Grammy.
True story.
:tup: