Pop music too loud and all sounds the same

Yep. The suits have increased their stranglehold on the scene. What we are hearing is the sound of cash registers. That's quality control ... so the stinkers are not quite as stinky as in the old days but they never reach the heights either ... Macarthur Park, Classical Gas, Bohemian Rhapsody, Time is Tight, Sasha, I Just Don't Know What to do with Myself, Bridge Over Troubled Water ... all tops hits.

Now it's all shake your booty assy baby (add melisma and autotune "character") boom boom boom boom. Yeah, Pig, let's paaarty! Not music I'd ever seek out.

Complete and utter words of wisdom in the truest sense....

It’s all "junk food". Maybe I’ve been at the age of the typical generational gap, I don’t know but the Pop music within the last many years to me has been nothing but the equivalent of “junk food” – pure industrial strength garbage. The crap I’ve heard (which is not much) sounds like it has no band – just a vocalist who attempts to sing to some sort of backing tracks not played by a group of humans. It seems though in order to qualify, the vocalist(s) must have the “look” to sell magazines and videos. All image and no substance.

So true.

...but yet, a simple, terrible song like "Call Me Maybe" will get lodged in your brain quicker than anything, and stick around for hours, despite all attempts to replace it with another, less obnoxious, catchy tune. THAT'S what sells, evidently...

I never heard this song until a few weeks ago when we had our daughter out at an amusement park. All the kids starting around 8 years old knew all the words and were dancing in their seats to this nonsense.

You know what Pop music I personally find somewhat musical? Some Top 40 Country. It seems as if someone is actually still trying to make music that can sell with some form of melody and decent musicianship. Though rare, I hear it on occasion while spinning through the dial and end up stopping there to listen. I don’t know if it’s all like that but I’ll take it over the pure sewage the other pop stations are playing.

If I were forced to play Top 40 music today, I'd only play Country to do it.
 
MAKE IT STOP. It's all the same drivel, some kind of merge between a really bad form of house music and autotuned crap. Same tempo, same key, same hooks apart from maybe a note or two changed. You can replace generic singer A with generic singer B and nobody will know the difference.
I hate going to clubs and stuff even though my friends persuade me to, because the DJs just play the same generic crap and the same songs they've been playing for the last 6 months. And for some reason my friends are happy with this!
 
It's a millennium-old argument, but it's interesting to see them go about it in a more quantifiable way than just "what's up with kids and their music these days, amirite?". I'll admit, however, that every once in a while a pop song will come out that I genuinely like (Katy Perry in particular has had a couple of those just on her own), although I would never argue that those have any lyrical depth whatsoever.
 
... I don’t know but the Pop music within the last many years to me has been nothing but the equivalent of “junk food” – pure industrial strength garbage. The crap I’ve heard (which is not much) sounds like it has no band – just a vocalist who attempts to sing to some sort of backing tracks not played by a group of humans. It seems though in order to qualify, the vocalist(s) must have the “look” to sell magazines and videos. All image and no substance.

For the sake of objectivity, I'd say the vocalists generally do more than just attempt to do the takes. These kids sing just fine, not awesome like Freddie or Dusty or Joe Cocker etc, but they are competent. And spunky, of course.

That brings us to the whole point of being a suit - to impose controls, minimise risks, rationally analyse threats (eg. cost of session players) and opportunities (eg. tech) and produce consistent and reliable outputs that become synonymous with the brand, providing security and assurance for stakeholders.

Pretty obvious what kind of effect this economic rationalist - *sensible* - process will have on the arts, with all its inspiration, creativity, craziness, outlandish ideas, imagination, chaos, irreverance etc. As per their function, the suits are increasingly adept at churning out safe and predictable product with defined functions, usually dance or background. The CQ has become tighter and tighter - "quality" = more $$.

There's no art to it. Agree with Duncan as per below - the choice is out there if we are active. I've been checking out Sun Ra clips on the Tube for the last few days ... out with autotune in with cosmic :)

BUT ... there are a lot of passive music consumers out there and they are at least somewhat shaped by this music. Many don't have the choice - many work groups listen to the radio all day. The choice of station always goes to the blandest and least offensive channel, depending on who makes the most aggressive push for conformity.

And the suits have just the right product to augment your groovy clubbing lifestyle, a fine fashion accessory for the chic young urban bros and babes. Welcome to the machine, kids.
 
BUT ... there are a lot of passive music consumers out there and they are at least somewhat shaped by this music. Many don't have the choice - many work groups listen to the radio all day. The choice of station always goes to the blandest and least offensive channel, depending on who makes the most aggressive push for conformity.
That's probably one of the biggest point.
Also, I think it's kind of "children's music", it's often child-like and childish in a way, and
young people are a huge market.
 
I blame the suits. They are the ones who have over-analyzed, over-processed, packaged, condensed, simplified and stripped pop music of any creativity it may have had. And in doing so they've created a new type of music consumer who has absolutely nothing invested into music as a passion anymore, but as a backdrop. And to keep the public's attention, the suits have processed the music to such a degree as to take all subtlety out of it, turning every pop song into a relentless power drill at [insert today's popular beat-per-minute here].
I don't blame the technology [except for autotune, which I hate with the intensity of 1 million red-hot supernovas], I blame the suits abuse of that technology. They heard about compression and turned it into a "thing". They found out people liked particular songs, so instead of having their artists write songs that were in the similar vein, they just sample them outright and add an uninspired drum machine track, essentially regurgitating the same stuff over and over.

There's no originality, no passion, and certainly no subtlety in pop music anymore. It's run by money-hungry people who have creatively lost their way.
 
I won't even read the article, but I do know that even semi-decent pop bands today like Coldplay may not have made it on radio back in the 1970s. There were a ton of bands who were just as good then. Heck, most music today is programmed, auto-tuned and could not even touch mediocre soft rock bands like England Dan & John Ford Coley or Seals & Crofts. Every female voice sounds like Katy Perry. She's cute and all but the talent ends there. And Disco wasn't the same as today's junk because there was at least some musicianship going on and an attempt to write a melody. Songs by Abba, Chic, Bee Gees, Donna Summer were actually quite good.
 
Pop music's been around for a long time, in a variety of styles too, there's always been the flops, the gems, the "must be avoided at all cost", most of them going up and down the charts.

For some of us, we've been through the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90' and 00's (yes I'm that old), and we've seen almost anything and everything, the drum machine and/or electronic drums started as far back as the 70's, so nothing's new here... today's music is no different, there's some good stuff still happening (Adele comes to my mind, good music, good voice and played by musicians), but in this day and age, anything that is somehow "good" is overplayed on every TV shows and radio stations, you just get tired to hear it after a while, no matter how good it is.

Yes, some music is on the "cheap" side, with the same video, the same drum track and the same overplay in all medias, but I'm not that bothered, I don't listen to charts music that much, my daughter's doing that for me, but as Duncan rightly said, if you're looking hard enough, there's still some good stuff around.

The "other" side of this topic is that we're discussing it among musicians, and we tend to have a different views than non-musicians, many people listen to music "for fun", and as long as it is catchy, danceable, easily available with a goog looking guy or chick, it's more than enough for them... just check the CD collections next time you're invited for a meal by some non-musicians friends, sometimes I want to cry... :)

You know, songs like Abacab, Rosanna, Sultan of Swing, Every Breath You Take, Baker Street, Get it On and many many more seems like they came not that long ago, geez, does times fly...

The worst one so far? it must be 'Born to be Alive" by Patrick Hernandez :)
 
I've played with mostly Punk bands, but I've also done rock cover bands, metal, even country and folk bands. And I will say shamelessly that there is NOTHING WRONG with pop music.

It's true that the media is forcing it - there's almost no rock music on the radio these days, but the artists can't help that. I dislike Justin Bieber's music, but I don't hate the kid or think he should die. He's a phase, and he'll fizzle out soon enough.

I do like Lady Gaga - her music always gets stuck in my head, and the rhythms are so unique. I also like classic Pop like Prince, and even some Michael Jackson songs were groovy.

I'll listen to anything that catches my attention. But if you want to talk about music that sounds the same? Look at Nickelback, Godsmack, Disturbed... I'd rather listen to modern pop than ANY of those three bands, just because all the albums and songs sound the same. Nickelback's first two albums were good Rock N' Roll. After that forget it.

I'm sure a bunch of people will assault this post - I could really care less. But the bottom line is: pop music is here to stay. So rather you love it or hate, you'd better get used to it.
 
I do like Lady Gaga - her music always gets stuck in my head, and the rhythms are so unique. I also like classic Pop like Prince, and even some Michael Jackson songs were groovy.

SE (I can't call you "Sticks" - there will only be one "Sticks") ... just trying to understand taste between generations. I like plenty of pop too. Do you enjoy this tune?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuPOwe-2EYA

I'm guessing that the production, instrumentation and arrangement will sound old to you. Can you get past it to enjoy the other aspects? Can you get past it to the point where you enjoy the songwriting, the vocal performance and the dynamics and musicianship?

Reason I ask is that I recognise that there are some groovy tunes, riffs and rhythms in modern pop but I find it hard to get past the drum machines, glossy production and not much songwriting.
 
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What worries me is the apparent dearth of artists in their teens/twenties who may look like they are capable of taking up the mantle of filling the larger venues of the world once their forebears are too old or too dead to carry on.

I mean, if you look at all the big gigs in the UK this year that were either festivals or part of some national event (e.g. Royal Jubilee/Olympics etc) - the vast majority of acts and certainly all of the headliners are artists that have been around forever:

  • Jubilee Concert - Sir Tom Jones, Sir Elton John, Sir Stevie Wonder, headlined by Sir Paul McCartney.
  • Download festival (Donnington) - Headliners: The Prodigy, Metallica, Black Sabbath.
  • Olympics - Mike Oldfield and Sir Macca again.
  • Reading & Leeds festival - Headliners: The Cure and Foo Fighters.
  • Also Sonisphere (Knebworth), which was cancelled but had scheduled headliners Kiss, Queen [i.e. Roger and Brian with some kid from American Idol or something], and Faith no More.

Now, this is all well and good but let's be honest most of these acts are past their best (in some cases considerably so) and I for one would very much welcome an act that is under 30 that is capable of putting on a decent rock/pop show of some magnitude. Let's not forget that John Bonham was 22 years old when Led Zeppelin first played Madison Square Garden and a mere 25 when they played that record-breaking gig in Tampa to around 60,000 people. I can't think of any drummer [certainly from the UK] that young who is regularly playing to such numbers these days. Dominic Howard of Muse and Will Champion of Coldplay are both 34 but there aren't any rock bands younger than them (that I know of) who can command the kind of audiences that they do.
 
Now, this is all well and good but let's be honest most of these acts are past their best (in some cases considerably so) and I for one would very much welcome an act that is under 30 that is capable of putting on a decent rock/pop show of some magnitude.

Robbie Williams is past 30 I think, but he sure can put on a great and world class
entertaining show, doesn't he?
 
For the sake of objectivity, I'd say the vocalists generally do more than just attempt to do the takes. These kids sing just fine, not awesome like Freddie or Dusty or Joe Cocker etc, but they are competent. And spunky, of course.
Remember what the singer who had the most number one hits in the last(20th) century said about Elvis even though he represented an entirely different style at the time. Paraphrasing He sings just fine and has talent, cant sing a ballad yet but that will come with time and experience. Btw the singer with the most number one hits in the last century was Bing Crosby. It's a good fact to remember. And also remember Jazz is pop music as are all of it's offshoots(rock etc) and a few of it's predecessors(Minstrel tunes, Ragtime, and Marching music held sway just previously) .
 
Remember what the singer who had the most number one hits in the last(20th) century said about Elvis even though he represented an entirely different style at the time. Paraphrasing He sings just fine and has talent, cant sing a ballad yet but that will come with time and experience. Btw the singer with the most number one hits in the last century was Bing Crosby. It's a good fact to remember. And also remember Jazz is pop music as are all of it's offshoots(rock etc) and a few of it's predecessors(Minstrel tunes, Ragtime, and Marching music held sway just previously) .

There's a coincidence! Obviously Bing wasn't a fan but saw potential, which makes sense since he would have given primacy to how a singers handles ballads.James Brown would have probably wanted Elvis to groove harder.

What I don't like is the bland Mariah Carey / Whitney model on which so many female singers base themselves. Kelly Clarkson etc. The only TOTP female singers of late who I enjoy are Anastacia (her voice - dislike those endless lurve hooks), Adele (one good song) and Christina Aguilera, who oversings but has a great voice. Less mainstream I love Fiona Apple's Criminal.
 
There's a coincidence! Obviously Bing wasn't a fan but saw potential, which makes sense since he would have given primacy to how a singers handles ballads.James Brown would have probably wanted Elvis to groove harder.

What I don't like is the bland Mariah Carey / Whitney model on which so many female singers base themselves. Kelly Clarkson etc. The only TOTP female singers of late who I enjoy are Anastacia (her voice - dislike those endless lurve hooks), Adele (one good song) and Christina Aguilera, who oversings but has a great voice. Less mainstream I love Fiona Apple's Criminal.

Agreed, though I happen to think that Miss Carey has a very fine voice and hasnt been served well at all by her writers. when over half the melodic interest is in her desperate ad lib melismas it's a sign of poor composition and the performer compensating for it as best they can. Same with Aguilera though she has had better luck in this regard. this oversinging is definitely not a model i would advise anyone to follow though it is an effective means of distracting a good number of people from the fact that many of these songs just arent well written in the first place.

Oh and as to Bing, he was pretty damn marvelous at an uptune and no stranger to faster tempos. He had the range and understood that it takes less breath control to sing a fast song than a ballad and more acting ability to put a ballad over convincingly than a fast number like Sweet Georgia Brown or to bring it back to Elvis All Shook Up. Actually the former is about 20 clicks faster than the latter on the respective recordings.
 
Agreed, though I happen to think that Miss Carey has a very fine voice and hasnt been served well at all by her writers. when over half the melodic interest is in her desperate ad lib melismas it's a sign of poor composition and the performer compensating for it as best they can.

"Desperate melismas" is perfect. May I borrow it? :)

None of this has been helped by the Idol shows, where the singers have one song to prove that they have the chops if required, so they show them off where it's not required (or even desirable).

The trend was already there, as you say, to provide some interest in slapdash, formulaic commercial tunes but the "sensitive talented female singer with the big voice who is cute and can dance" meme has been done to death.

Bring on the edgy women, I say!

Didn't know about Bing singing faster tunes, apart from his version of Caravan that IMO sounded anaemic as compared with Duke's.
 
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