Pop Music in General

The point is to make your own life what you want it to be, to only let into your life what you want there. .

Thats the gist of it. Easier said than done, though... not to succumb to peer pressure and have a sense of who you are and what you like. Not many have the self assurance to do that, imo.. : )

I remember a time when I was 15 and and went around singing praises of Hendrix to all the cool cats around me, while privately I just didn't 'get it'. It was all distorted noisy feedback.

Of course the Hendrix eureka moment did arrive a few years later but even within our little musician world I've felt the pressure to like what everyone else likes..
 
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This is an interesting thread. I see it from different points.

For the musician there is always a need to pay the bills. Many I know will play 'commercial' gigs to pay the bills and use that money to pay for their real passion. Similar to Ferret working to pay the bills then indulging in his passion. A lot of 'pop' bands also play/write different music away from their day job.

For most of the public 'popular music' is background music. Something simple to sing or hum along to whilst washing up or driving. I have no real dislike of popular music. For me anything that gets people discussing the merits of music is a good thing.

My Son's first band crush was 'Right Said Fred' and then to cap it off 'The Spice girls'. I didn't condemn his choice though because it was an interest in music, of whatever flavour, and that interest has grown into an appreciation of lots of different types of music. I started off with an odd mix of chart, rock and brass band music!!

I don't like Jazz. Never have understood it and never liked it but I won't condemn it because it gives people an interest in music and you never know one day I might get that revelation and learn how to appreciate it. So for me this thread is proof that pop music is a necessity in getting people interested in music whatever it's condition or quality. What we should be talking about is how to get people more interested and involved in music rather than musicians bashing away at each other to prove musical superiority.
 
This is going back a few posts, to the 'Visual Art' analogy and particularly Pollyanna's interpretation of it.

Visual art is - to some degree - less conservative. At least in the mainstream that we can see. You also have to remember that visual art (particularly static visual art) is controlled by a very, very small selection of elite collectors and artists who can change their minds in an instant as to what is the 'in thing'. Music is a small business at the top, but they have to satisfy shareholders, whereas artists do not. Exposure in music relies on a network of distribution, art does not. It is far more flexible.
 
Ok, living is over for now. Back to the PC :)

...genre is largely interpretation and interpretation is largely marketing or audience in the popular music world. The question that would need to be answered is which one is art?

Hmm, Yes and no. Also in the execution. Put a a ballsy (or overies-y) drummer and guitarist with an amp turned up to 11 together and you have rock. Execution and attitude. Or songs can also be jazzified, countrified etc. In the band before my current one we played The Stranglers's version of Walk On By. With the current band it's more like Dionne's, but we kept a few elements of The Stranglers in the chorus, arrangement and soloing. "Genre messing" is one of the joys of life IMO :)


Is the song "You Keep Me Hangin' On" any more 'sophisticated' than "Sugar Sugar." I would say perhaps, but barely and they both have the same social function, to sell records.

No way! Sugar Sugar is purely lovey dovey, YKMHO's lyrics are simple but convey powerful emotions. Which song would be better fit into The Wiggles's set list? As you say, SS is kids' music. Not everyone can teach PhD level astrophysics and someone has to supervise the finger painting at the kindergarten. Someone has to play music for the little ones. Not what I want to play, but good luck to those who do. I think bubblegum pop absolutely suuucks (or chews) but, as you've suggested, it still has value.


Jazz is losing its audience today, and classical music has been in decline for a decade now. People ask the question how do you save jazz, how do you save classical music? A lot of people's paychecks depend on it. A lot of musician's paychecks depend on the status quo. And people ask the question how do you market jazz to a new, perhaps younger audience. I think that as people are expressing the problem here, it is not one of marketing. Marketing is the problem. If you hear The Coltrane Quartet recording of Alabama, and it's meaningless to you, there is a bigger problem. You got no soul.

Is it *just" marketing? I know I'm *supposed* to like 'Trane because he gets so many raves but most of his music bores me. I'm not keen on bop. My big sister had a long relationship with a leading sax player/multi-instrumentalist. I went to jazz clubs hundreds of times. I *wanted* to like the music and went through a peer-influenced Aydee-esque phase where I thought non-jazz music was too unsophisticated to bother with (even tho I couldn't play it - lol).

But ... I've always been a closet pop fan - The Beatles, Madonna, early Elton, The B52s, The Bangles, Bryan Ferry, George Michael, old disco - all that uncool music. I'm a sucker for a good tune and a good feel. I didn't admit it at the time for fear of being thought of as just a ditzy girly-girl by my muso friends but I was absolutely NUTS for the riff/beat combo in The Knack's My Sharona.

Just because something is an acquired taste doesn't mean everyone will like it if only they get to know it. Just ask Con struct :) Horses for courses. A lot of jazz doesn't speak to me. My soul may not be too flash, but most of the moving parts still work.

Alabama would try the patience of most people. Great if you close your eyes late at night and drift into it, like classical, like Dark Side of the Moon or Eno or a whole bunch of moody things. Not much good for the unwashed otherwise, who often use music as a backdrop for their social lives and rarely if ever turn off the lights, turn up the volume and sail away on sound.

Why does Trane really move you but not others? Why do we like some people more than others? Similar questions.

Uncool non-muso types (hoik! ptui!) dig pop and rock'n'roll. They love a good tune, a contagious beat, words that describe something they've felt. Music that speaks to their generation or scene. Jazz has developed over the years to a point where subtleties that are only picked up by connoisseurs are considered to be of paramount importance. Forests and trees, ivory towers, rareified realms and all that. Just as intellectuals in the art world could never turn the public on to Jackson Pollock and his ilk, hard bop is a minority taste. Hell, so is all bop for that matter.

Why can't at least some jazzers compromise without giving us Kenny G wallpaper? Why not simplify and make the song structures more clear? Get more into composition. Melody. Rhythms that make you want to move. Hardly anyone gives a rat's posterior if a drummer plays polyrhythms (Polly Rhythms!) ... they just want it to sound cool. Is it a buzz? Is it beautiful? Does it "speak"?

Music doesn't have to be trite to reach a mass audience. Birdland did well and can be appreciated on a basic visceral level but if you want to dig deeper there's lots of nuances to enjoy. Kinda like The Simpsons :) Joe and co didn't play Birdland by rote; they improvised within a structure rather than tossing off the common jazz club fare:

1. theme
2. sax solo
3. piano solo
4. bass solo
5. drum solo
6. theme
7. Outtro

Unless it's VERY cleverly done, that just bores most people [expletive]less. Nice over dinner, tho ... as long as it doesn't get too intense.

For now, it looks to me that jazz, along with indie, world, prog, experimental, metal etc is just more of the sincere stuff running down the musical gutters (re: Aydee's and my chat earlier), occasionally being used as "compost" to fertilise the pop scene through samples, funk, and sessioners slipping some nuances into MOR tunes.
 
I think your first point is the thing that really pisses me off about music today. I was listening to this interview with Lez Zeppelin, and they said the treat The Led like it were a canonic work, like Beethoven. The reason why bands like The Zep and The Stones, ELP, Crimson were so good was because they could take, 'steal,' music but do something unique and interesting with it. Jazz was is fundamentally genre messing, and when you go back to Bach, Mozart and the Beethoven, they were doing the same thing.

It can be silly:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d7-2wooB9g

I think that you are right that it is the lyrical content of the Motown tune that separates it from bubble gumminess. Its 1967. Any song with 'Free' or 'Freedom' is making a statement whether it wants to or not. What if SS, was, "Freedom, oh, sweet sweet Freedom, here comes a bright new sun, and it leaves me wanting more." :) A song I always liked from that era was Build me up Buttercup.(You can't write a song like Eight Miles High and say you were innocent enough to think no one would take it as a drug reference.)

I think that the other important facet is that popular music is about the songs, and the lyric is on par, and often more important than what is happening musically, "Blowing in the Wind." And the visual can be as important as in musical theater, dance or musical film. That may be unnerving for musicians. If you can making living doing what you like like Bruford, Dejohnette or Billy Cobham, and make a living from it, my hat goes off to you. But I know quite a few jazz drummers who have taken gigs doing R and B and hip-hop. One of my favorite jazz drummers did hip hop a tour with this guy I worked with years ago.

You and I both have a pop sensibility. I love that live version of Down Let the Sun Go Down on Me, where the crowd goes wild when George Michael introduces Elton. GM has a great voice for pop It's going to leave me wanting more after a song or two. But we can also recognize a sense of musical accomplishment.

The reason why I mentioned "Alabama" specifically is because this is a piece that transcends music. It certainly transcends aesthetics. It was written after a racially motivated church bombing in Alabama left four young girls dead. The tune is more than music: moving, haunting, edgy and transcendental. The ability that the Coltrane Quartet had to just sit on that edge is breath taking and in this piece, it is fully realized. Knowing the narrative and listening to the piece, would one say that they are not moved by it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XbaMCOXM1fA
 
Haha - love the link! Well, for about 45 seconds :)

One of my faves was Pat Boone's version fo Smoke On The Water. I like it more than the original. It's both a crackup and classy.

What if SS, was, "Freedom, oh, sweet sweet Freedom, here comes a bright new sun, and it leaves me wanting more." :)

ROFL! Bullseye!

Yeah, we've touched on this on the forum a few times, the extramusical playing a major role in the music. When I was young I had a real hoik! ptui! attitude towards the extramusical. We thought that extramusical elements were BS that masked a lack of talent. These days I think that, unless the music is OUTSTANDING (and I don't use that term lightly), then music needs extramusical elements to be of high value (not necessarly $$).

After all, music stemmed from the extramusical right from the first vocalisations and clap sticks. It meant somthing, represented something, said something. Performances weren't so much this artificial thing we've developed where the musicians perform as artists or stars in front of a rapt audience. There was no separate "band" and "audience", just the whole tribe hving a pow-wow. The musos just had a certain role in the gig, along with the chief, shaman, dancers, people clapping along etc. If anything, some pop and rock bands come closest to that rootsy dynamic, often those playing small gigs and parties. It's not just about the music but everyone getting together to enjoy an uplifting experience.

The least interesting types of extramusical elements are sex and love. Common as muck, unless they are outstanding. Dance/disco/funk is also common - "get ya body movin' yeah". Comedy is a good one (I like comedy) and it frees up bands to get into a bit of genre bending a la Uncle Frank, early Tubes and Weird Al.

Then you have scenes that express group attitudes - the rebellion against prudishness of old RnR (and jazz, going back further), the ghetto expression of rap, the nihilism of punk, the anti-establishment of metal, the left wing politics and anti-hierarchy attitude of experimental music, blues's down-to-earth reconciliation with life's pain etc.

Singers usually understand this more than other band members because they're the ones who are have to present the words in a way that suggests that they agree with the lyric's worldview. I mean, no matter how great the music is, not too many singers will sing a song that promotes bestiality ... "Hey baby, I love your snout. I bet you like to get about. I love it when you swing your tail. Don't care if you're a girl or male" :)

So if singers are feeling or acting out the ideas in the lyrics, then image and stage presentation matters. You might not want to sing a plaintive version of Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood while wearing Daevid Allen's umbrella hat (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFZ1N22I_QU) but that outfit is fine for playing Radio Gnome Invisible.

But Alabama ... I'd not heard of it until you mentioned it. If the YouTube link didn't tell the story there is NO WAY I would have worked out the meaning from the music. I would have just thought of it as having some beautiful ethereal passages along with some fairly dull jazz noodling in the middle. No doubt the meaning would have been clearer at the time, but the song is abstract expressionism, which will always go over the heads of a lot of people.

Some think that art shouldn't need explanations to be clear, but I think that's too precious. Nothing wrong with providing explanations. The explanation becomes part of the art and allows it to be appreciated on another level. I guess that's marketing. And marketing - explanations - plays a much bigger role in art than we often care to admit, or we rail against it. But in a sense that's genre messing too, just on a broader scale.

So I don't care much for the connoisseur attitude of "pure music" being superior to other forms. As far as I'm concerned it's more a matter of "whatever it takes" to say what you want to say, just as long as it's not fraud like miming when people expect live music. Some musics are deeper than others, but depth rarely pays the rent. Probably because life itself is only occasionally deep, if at all - lol

As for jazz players in R&B bands, maybe they like playing jazz best but I expect they still love playing those gigs. It's hard to play music you don't like and perform with enough conviction to please other band members and fans. How about a monster R&B player like Jim Keltner who, like Bill and Billy etc, is also playing exactly what he wants to play? I suspect that many much-derided pop musos who are accused of playing crap for money are playing exactly what they love too.

The best situation is if good musos enjoy a wide range of styles like you do. Then the world is your oyster :) If I was a really good drummer I'd have that luxury too so I only get a taste and have to make my bucks producing management reports.
 
Pop music = Pretty Oustandingly Pathetic.

Its a producer's dream and a musician's nightmare. Imagine how much Picassos, Rembrandts, and Van Goghs would be worth if some art producer controlled the final product.
 
Pop music = Pretty Oustandingly Pathetic.

Its a producer's dream and a musician's nightmare. Imagine how much Picassos, Rembrandts, and Van Goghs would be worth if some art producer controlled the final product.

You mean like producers controlled Herbie Hancock and Captain Beefheart and Pere Ubu and Soft Machine Led Zep and ... ? You get my point. Apples and oranges, Doctor. Svengali type pop producers work with aspiring pop stars not great artists, who are rarely controlled and, if so, not for long.

Pop in the art world can be great. Gary Larson ain't no Picasso but he's one of my favourite people ever!
 
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Haha - love the link! Well, for about 45 seconds :)

I'm with you there.lol



Some think that art shouldn't need explanations to be clear, but I think that's too precious. Nothing wrong with providing explanations. The explanation becomes part of the art and allows it to be appreciated on another level. I guess that's marketing. And marketing - explanations - plays a much bigger role in art than we often care to admit, or we rail against it. But in a sense that's genre messing too, just on a broader scale.

So I don't care much for the connoisseur attitude of "pure music" being superior to other forms. As far as I'm concerned it's more a matter of "whatever it takes" to say what you want to say, just as long as it's not fraud like miming when people expect live music. Some musics are deeper than others, but depth rarely pays the rent. Probably because life itself is only occasionally deep, if at all - lol
.

The music is rarely pure. That's the problem:)

Historically, music was largely vocal so there was always a text. People knew what the music was about. The text that was paramount; the music served its needs. As music became more instrumental the Romantics created a programmatic context for it. Music was representational and had a story to explain it. Debussy questioned if music was really representational and Stravinsky came along and said "music doesn't represent anything but music." The twentieth century was defined. But he himself later admitted that in retrospect he was wrong about that.

The notion that music needs no explanation is going out of favor. And in today's post-modern world the notion that anything comes to us narrative-free is questioned. C-F-G has significant historical meaning, and as 'absolute' and pure as one may want to believe it is, it just ain't so. The definition of the chords and scales is a long historical narrative. It took a millennium to get to bubble gum. :) People used to argue that the narrative was to get us to C-F-G; but now we see that was only one stop on the narrative.

On the other hand you have a piece like Appalachian Spring, which evokes the gentle breezes and blossoming of spring in the mountain, it's cool, it's breezy, it's light and airy, and it was not named by the composer. All that was 'unintentional.' it's nice to sit in the middle and enjoy the wonderful narrative of a piece of music; but also be able to hear the beauty of the instrumentation, the counterpoint and harmony, the melodies and rhythms without them having any significance but that of music.

Today, some conductors will turn and address the audience, which had long been a faux pas. It certainly breaks down the forth wall. One can learn a lot from going to pre-concert lectures, and listening to conductors, composers and noted scholars. That's where you can get insights and education. Add good programming and people will come. It's the woman, woman in the 60s esp. really get into great music, and they get roused by music that is provocative, interesting and somewhat out of the ordinary of what we normally hear.
 
Interesting info, Ken.

The music is rarely pure. That's the problem:)

Yes, everything has a story if you dig deep enough. But how clear or interesting is the story?

Which of these performances has strong extramusical impact?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdhhfMQwvec

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsEHH0cDwHw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jwivHPit22A

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iYuyar-rrNY

Would you like to hear the story of my drum throne? There is a story behind it (or was that a behind on the story?), but it's not interesting for anyone who's not a keen chair sniffer :)
 
You mean like producers controlled Herbie Hancock and Captain Beefheart and Pere Ubu and Soft Machine Led Zep and ... ? You get my point. Apples and oranges, Doctor. Svengali type pop producers work with aspiring pop stars not great artists, who are rarely controlled and, if so, not for long.

Pop in the art world can be great. Gary Larson ain't no Picasso but he's one of my favourite people ever!

Captain Beefheart pop? Led Zeppelin??????

I don't think we are thinking in the same terms as what pop music is. I always thought of it as top 40 ish stuff, like Beyonce, Lil Wayne, and Kelly Clarkson of today.
 
Interesting info, Ken.



Yes, everything has a story if you dig deep enough. But how clear or interesting is the story?

Is that a rhetorical question?

I think the question is, " is the story musical?" When you listen to something like the Coltrane Quartet, there is always a strong musical narrative, though there may be a descriptive narrative as well. From the above examples, it would probably be the AC/DC. If you were to give me a choice of AC/DC and Bill Evans, I'd have to go with the Bill Evans.

I think people can be biased to say the jazz is a 'high' art form, when not all jazz is great music. Not everyone composing in Vienna in 1788 was a 'great' composer. Now you hear a lot of people saying rock should get the same recognition as ' a high' or great art form. It becomes classic. The term classical music comes from the same concept of being classic, old and exemplary of the greatness of its time. Now you have the classic era of the American song and musical theater 1940s and 1950s, the classic jazz era of the 1950s and 60s, and classic rock era of the 1960s and 70s. The music does become enshrined. In America, and NY in particular, people look back at the time as an artistic Golden Era. It may very well be that it was. In 1949, you could see Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hammerstein, or the great plays of Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller on Broadway, hear Monk, Bird or Bud Powell play in the nightclubs or Copland and Bernstein at the Philharmonic. But it is somewhat dangerous to go back to some time period and exemplify it and how great it was then, and it really sucks now.

Now is a very interesting time in the history of music because with the Internet you have a wide-open, global space to get music out. For the folkies, it was the music of the people that was as important or probably more important than what was being played on the radio. I think many big bands, like The Beatles, come to understand that about music, the marketing gets in the way. Things become hyped, and Brittany Spears becomes the number one album. Because it is the best thing happening at the time: p What is important to whom, when and why? Today you have such a proliferation of bands and artists; anyone could make a CD. Everyone could get their music out, and the concept of an overseer, the Church, The Censor, The Industry, is slowly diminishing. That is true republicanism, and in that world Does pop really have a place? (Bye-bye pop music.)
 
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Captain Beefheart pop? Led Zeppelin??????

I don't think we are thinking in the same terms as what pop music is. I always thought of it as top 40 ish stuff, like Beyonce, Lil Wayne, and Kelly Clarkson of today.

Doctor, you raised Picasso as an example of someone with artistic freedom. He was not "pop" but progressive for his day. Maybe the equivalent of Jimi Hendix (?) - different, strong technique, forward-thinking and original. He was too good to be controlled; why control something that people are already excited about?

So I chose bands that also enjoyed that freedom.

Ken, I thought true republicanism invloved going into debt to boost the military and going on hare-brained invasions :p

More seriously, I think pop will always be around because simple and catchy music works for those who don't listen hard enough to enjoy nuance, skill or originality. It's musical ice cream. I like ice cream but I don't want a diet of it. I eat a lot of veggies, which I enjoy because they are versatile, taste good, are nourishing and don't involve killing animals to satisfy my tatste buds. I like my musical veggies too :)
 
I try to avoid any lofty ideals when dealing with music. There is music for everyone. People such as Kenny Aronoff, Steve Gadd, Steve Ferrone, JR Robinson etc have all played on loads of so called "pop" music. Does this diminish their careers or what they have offered of themselves? I do not think so.

Anyway, what is pop? To me the punk of today, heavy metal and Kylie Minogue all comes under the banner of "pop music". Music by the Bad Plus and others of their ilk, is not pop music. Pop is simply a part of the mainstream culture.

I'll play it. I'll also play anything else offered. It's all music.
 
Yeah, I feel similarly. My understanding is that Steve Godd [sic] doesn't think any music is too easy for him because he sees the challenge in getting any track right. So I don't think he'd see it devaluing his career.
 
Steve Gadd still is, has long been and will probably always be my favorite drummer. People say he invented disco with "Do the Hustle" but it is quintessential Gadd from the upbeat tom in the intro, ghost notes, tom fills and two measure phrases. It's not just some basic four on the floor disco beat.

Ken, I thought true republicanism involved going into debt to boost the military and going on hare-brained invasions :p


. . .and blaming the democrats for it. :)

More seriously, I think pop will always be around because simple and catchy music works for those who don't listen hard enough to enjoy nuance, skill or originality. It's musical ice cream. I like ice cream but I don't want a diet of it. I eat a lot of veggies, which I enjoy because they are versatile, taste good, are nourishing and don't involve killing animals to satisfy my taste buds. I like my musical veggies too :)


I would hope that some day people will either realize they can just make that music themselves or teach their kids to do it. There is a very large community of folk music enthusiast here in the States, and esp. NY. They essential believe that people should write music to chronicle their own lives, and not have the pop industry do it for them. They can keep that chronicle for their grandchildrens' grandchildren.
 
Doctor, you raised Picasso as an example of someone with artistic freedom. He was not "pop" but progressive for his day. Maybe the equivalent of Jimi Hendix (?) - different, strong technique, forward-thinking and original. He was too good to be controlled; why control something that people are already excited about?

So I chose bands that also enjoyed that freedom.

Well that is pretty much my point as well. Pop art to Impressionists might equate to all the cheap copies of Whistler's Mother that hit the market to end up in people's dining rooms in the 1900s. And if we want to really draw a parallel to today's pop music producers, we must further prostitute the art to the point of cropping out everything in the painting beyond the subject because it is an "unecessary waste of space", with no commercial value. Imagine Picasso or Van Gogh allowing that to happen. I cannot picture Page or Hendrix allowing one of their songs to be carved up ala Rolling Stones or Beatle standards. Zappa? Ha ha ha - that's just entertaining to think about
 
I hold current pop music trends to the same esteem I give to my time while on the toilet. It should all go down the crapper and sent to a waste treatment plant. Too far?

But that being said, I don't think being the drummer for a pop band is selling your soul to the musical devil. Granted, a lot of the people that get hired (is it just me, or are they normally gospel chops drummers?) are advertised to the point that I don't want to have anything to do with the company they're representing, but they had to go through all the auditions and made it out on top. That has to mean something. N'Sync's drummer, Billy Ashbaugh, is actually a good, completely respectable drummer. I've looked up what he's been doing after the boy band, and he's a really fantastic player.
 
Play what you like. Life's too short to play music you hate...

(just my little 2 cent opinion)
 
Rosanna was a pop song. I am currently teaching that groove to about 6 students.

I realised some years ago that most people only like music. Some simply tolerate it while others give it no thought at all. What we as musicians miss is the understanding of the public's general lack of interest.

Sometimes too I am tired and just want to hear something light. Mostly I listen to world music and it is amazing. There's a great deal of choice. But you know, many musicians I have known have had the most limited taste of any people I have met. If a style does not fit into their idea of what is cool, most just close their ears. Especially the least experienced musicians.
 
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