The future of music?

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Nowadays, it's seems that we're running out of true musicians; I mean, remember 80's, 90's? Remeber Genesis, The Housemartins, The Cure, Tears for Fear, Inxs, Swing Out Sister, Iggy Pop, Rod Stewart, Level 42, Simple Minds, David Bowie, (well, the list may go on all the post)? Remember that in their songs you could listen to a guitar/saxophone/piano/drum solo? What we have now? Just synthesizers, only computer programs that make the music with the only effort-inspiration of pushing a couple of keys. I remember back then, you had a wide selction of artists, don't get me wrong, today's the same, but the difference is that in those days, the music they made, were not the same. Let me give you an example: there are few real styles these days: 4-5 boys-girls making the same music base (Britney, Backstreet's style); the typical rapper (you see their videos? a bunch of guys surrounded by semi-naked girls all dressed with NBA-NHL-MLB-NFL clothes); the non rapper but with the same style of them (videos are the same as before), the Blink alike group (yeah, the play guitars, bass, drum! but if you ask me, they just scratch the guitars and if you listen carefully, all those groups make the same sound); I don't know where you live but I have also the Luis Miguel-Ricky Martin style, a (good?) looking guy almost crying his romantic song (we have here almost 300 guys making the same thing). I may go even more: popular/local/cultural music; for me that will be tango; zamba, chacarera, chamame: back them they played "unplugged" instruments, and if you don't know, there is a huge difference between an accoustic and an electrical guitar, the same is to a electrical and non electrical drums; so, maybe you don't listen tango or "folclore" but today they sound almost like a Five song. Some people may say: "…is called progress…"; maybe you are right, but I still love the sound of a good guitar solo (like Gary Moore?, Mark Knofler?, Eric Clapton?, Bryan Adams?, Richard Marx?), I still love the sound of a good drum base (like in Dire Straits, Genesis, The Outfield, Morressey songs?) I still love a good piano performance (like Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Meat Loaf, Bruce Hornsby songs?).
But you know, this is just my opinion and how I like the music; by the way, there were many artists back then that made 1 or 2 records, bands/singers very commercial, I have this collection of not well known (should I say non commercial?) artists, they sound pretty well to me; do you know some of those kind of artists?

 

That is exactly why i dont listen to new music, it all SUCKS..except death metal of course..*grins weakly*

 

Ah, c'mon! No offence meant, but what the hell are you talking about? Maybe you just didn't go with the flow and feel sad that Rod Steward isn't putting out a good album anymore? You're old - so's your taste in music. (By the way, so's mine!) It's only natural that music leaves the biggest impression on anyone in his teen years. But:

1. The same argument has been brought forth again and again, decade after decade. Just listen to some 50's jazz maniac ranting about the 70's and 80's. Hell, for some people good and original music ended with the death of J.S. Bach!

2. You seem to like 80's guitar pop and a bit of rock. Not really an amazingly wide spectrum. And yet you complain about there being too little different styles today? Even the few you've listed (rap, bubblegum punk, boygroups, latin style pop,...) outnumber the different styles presented by your bands of choice by far. Where's the problem? There are more styles than ever before. Take metal: in the 80's there was NWOBHM, thrash, speed, and death. Nowadays you're drowning in gothic, black, pagan, grind, progressive, true, nu, death 'n roll, whathaveyou. And if all hiphop styles sound like rap to you, maybe this is because you're not part of that particular movement?

Cheer up, mate, I've got the solution for you: don't listen to Britney Spears anymore!

I don't know about "commercial", but there's quite a number of young bands you could listen to. What is wrong with Creed, Incubus, A Perfect Circle, Dead Soul Tribe, The Darkness, The Hives and stuff? Well, if all else fails there's always Nick Cave...

 

Well, I don't entirely agree with you. I think what the problem today is the monetary reason for playing music is more widespread than it was. All the music today is basically the same. You get band after band who copies what others are doing and that's how it goes. Blackthrone, I'm sorry, but Creed are clones of Pear Jam. I'll just keep to rock music, because that's what I know best, but today, you don't see bands that are leaders, inovators (or maybe there is some, but we haven't really noticed them). Where are the Led Zeppelins, Beatles, The Doors, Velvet Undergrounds, Pink Floyds of today?

That is why I don't listen to much new music. I actually strated to discover most of the groups mentionned above, and I'm seeing how what I was listening to before (Counting Crows, Everclear, Wallflowers, Matchbox 20, etc...) are just pale immitations.

And also, I do not really beleive that using eletronic equipment instead of real instruments is really a bad thing. I like real guitars and such a lot more than the artifial sounds, don't get me wrong. But it just offers more possibilities, cost reduction, etc. Besides, some musicians know how to take advantage of the opportunities electronic instruments allow. Some electronic and techno styles groups give really interesting results!

 

Even if I agree with Triactus that modern bands usually copy other modern bands or older bands, I have to point out that this has happened always and there are many of the legendary bands of 70's, who didn't hesitate to copy other bands. Listen "Always somewhere" by Scorpions and then "Simple man" by Lynyrd Skynyrd or "Child in time" by Deep Purple and then "Bombay calling" by It's A Beautiful Day and you'll see how similar these songs are.

 

I can understand your reasoning, Triactus. I think it is not correct, though. We may not be talking about the same things here, so let me try to explain:

1. Are we talking innovators in terms of song structure, instrumentation, harmonics, complexity? Then, surely, everything that came after after old music (Telemann, Bach, Händel) on the harmonic side was a step back. Mozart is simple compared to a four-part fugue. Pink Floyd is even more simple than that. On the other side there's disharmonics. This (sometimes purely) intellectual music reached its climax with Berg, Schönberg, Webern. Maybe after this we have some free jazz and fusion jazz sticking to complex themes, but everything else in popular music is just plain simple. Most of it adheres to the old song scheme stemming from medieval "minnesang". Sorry, no real innovation here, not even Beatles or The Doors.

2. It seems, therefore, that we are rather talking about fresh and unheard melodies. About something that touches us in a new way and stirs some untarnished emotions. I don't see why Creed should be any worse than Pearl Jam in this regard (I don't like either, btw, it was just an example for Sydax). And I don't see what should be so great about Nirvana or Pearl Jam, when you correctly trace their efforts back to Led Zeppelin, MC5 or the Stooges. Moreover, Led Zeppelin have been the biggest plagiators in their time, they just happened to create something special from well known ingredients.

3. If you term the Beatles innovators (rather than brillant creators of melodies), you've got to ask yourself for the reason why. Obviously, they founded a new genre, they tried something a bit different than what there had been before. If this is what you call Innovation, it strikes me as odd that you would look for "new leaders" in already existing genres. You'd have to broaden your horizon for something like that. You can't buy guitar based rock music that has been around for the last 40 years and expect something new within those well set boundaries. Instead, you'd have to move on to alien styles and visionary musical concepts. You pointed this out in your last paragraph.

4. If you're into rock, sooner or later you'll discover the Doors or Rush or Pink Floyd or... That's not because they have been the first, but because they've been good at what they've been doing. If "Hey you" brings tears to my eyes today it has got nothing to do with the fact that "The Wall" was an innovative piece of music with a concept hitherto unheard of. I weep because it is touching and brillant. Plain and simple.

5. Like I said before, it all depends on your history, age, and listening experiences. What's new for you may be stale for others. I'm not old enough for Led Zeppelin or Pink Floyd, I found out about them rather late. Both may have created something new, but I love Pink Floyd whereas I'm not really interested in Led Zep. Four good songs, much crap. I love, however, the metal movement which was inspired by bands like Led Zep. Funny, isn't it...

[Edit: BOC really has it all in his short reply]

 

Sydax, I don't want to be offending, but you seem to have no idea about modern (i.e. contemporary) pop music.

Sure, the charts are full of **** these days. Almost all radio stations around here play the Top 40 up and down. (And I don't want to speak about music television.)

But if you really search for it, you'll find good music. It still exists and the bands can survive because their fan base is big enough. They just don't get broadcasted.
Just don't think that you will find music sounding exactly like in the eighties.

As for your question after "independent" music:

If you like Genesis, try and listen to Tool, Dredg, Porcupine Tree, Pain of Salvation, late Opeth, Dead Soul Tribe, Disillusion, In the Woods... and Atreyu.
They make so called "Progressive Rock" in the tradition of Genesis and Pink Floyd.

I find it rather hard to find equivalents to the other bands. I know only of Franz Ferdinand who sound a little bit like 80's.

You could look into the "vintage rock" wave. Bands like The White Stripes, The Strokes, Hellacopters, Jet, Datsuns and even Audioslave sound like Led Zeppelin or Deep Purple.

Live, Anouk and Melissa auf der Maur make "normal" rock music. The Darkness are definitely Glamrock.

Contemporary Punk is even harder, but: Listen to the Beatsteaks, Dover or AFI (well, that's Hardcore, but still).

For sounds more mellow like the Simple Minds (which I find incredibly boring, btw) try Modest Mouse, Motorpsycho, Portishead or Beth Gibbons solo, Cake, Guided by Voices and Keane.

There are hundreds of bands and musicians out there that make good to brilliant music. Search, and you will find.

[ August 03, 2004, 14:01: Message edited by: Fabius Maximus ]

 

And then, if all else really fails, there's always old masters. Like William Shatner for example :

http://homepage.mac.com/sceldred/.Public/Steve/common_people.mov

 

There's still plenty of good music and bands out there, you just have to look harder and at the independant labels like Fabius Maximus said. Unfortunately radio stations these days cater to the masses and money. That's one of the reasons I don't listen to the radio anymore. It's sad when you hear the same song 8 times in 2 hours. Small and independant labels are a good source and many new bands on big labels are starting to pull away from the mainstream pop/hip hop/crap pot. I personally listen to classic rock like Zeppelin and Hendrix but I still like Primus, Tool, Finger Eleven and bands like that. And support your local bands, go to clubs or bars and take in a live show, you may be surprised. You never know, you may even catch the next great band in their infancy and you can say: " I knew them when they were small time and playing for 5$ a show." LOL

 

I agree with the fact that there is still plenty of good music and bands; but like Istolil says, radios/mtv/videoshows just care about bands/singers who are very well represented and not some guy who doesn't "belong" to a big discographyc.
@Darkthrone: Eminem, Twenty4Seven, Run DMC, MC MIkerG, just to say very few of them are rappers that I like, and believe me, I like very much RAP, not the new hip hop that I find very alike all of them.
I'm not against "electronic instruments"(I love Jean Michel Jarre,Vangelis,I like Moby,Depeche Mode,Pet Shop Boys, etc.), I'm just complain about the lack of imagination nowadays, yes, always, anything that has a little bit of success is to be copied, but it seems that today all have to be exactly the same.
Beatles where first is something that didn't exist, so they could be XXXX and still be the first, it was something really new, Rolling Stones and many more followed their steps but without being "exactly the same", so the same for another styles; .
My point is: I'm not against anyone, I just don't like them and that's all, I just see lack of imagination in the new generation of artists just making the same over and over and over; by the way, there are some new bands that I like, maybe is because I see some effort in doing some good music instead of copying someone else like "hey, this bang bang beat sells, I'll do it too"

 

Darkthrone, talking about Mozart and the like in a thread about the Future of Music is useless. Of course they came first, and therefore are the originals.

Even go back to the likes of The Beatles, and Doors, Led Zeppelin and The Who doesn't help figre out the future of music.

1. Rap: Rap suffered more damage then they are willing to admit with the death of Tupac. He was what was bringing rap out of it's stagnent course. He was original, he was thought provoking, he was contraversial. Now Rap has become the exact oppostie of that, it's all the same and there is nothing new or creative, and if there is, then it hasn't reached the mainstream because the music industry is geared around a "what can we use to make us rich" mentality that the record labels all have.

2. Rock: I'm just placing everything that you can break rock into, in one category, cause thats how I view music. Rock biggest problem started with the Arena Rock in the 80's. Kurt Cobain, and the like in the early 90's were beginning to get away from that and with a single gunshot much like Rap, rock became stagnent. We have clone bands coming out by the fistful, and rock continues to move farther away from what the forefather had started. Playing in clubs, travelling by van, tagging groupies, and so on. Now it's become all about the "show". There are some good rock bands out there people just have to look farther than MTV or the radio.

I'll finish this later, I have to go to work.

 

I agree with Darkthrone here. It’s probably not a big surprise to anyone that I identify more with music from 15-30 years ago than I do with today’s music, and I’d be hard pressed to name more than a handful of popular bands today, but I’m not about to dismiss current music as crap.

I do, however, agree with some of the other comments that commercial radio these days is pretty bland – it seems that nobody wants to take risks in what they play, and it does tend to play the same songs over and over again. I actually listen to a station out of one of our local universities – it’s current music, but it stays away from mainstream.

Bear in mind too that, if you’re looking at innovation now vs. days gone by, you're essentially reviewing music from a 30-40 year time frame and comparing to a current period less than 10 years; it only stands to reason that the former is going to give more examples than the latter.

And here you were all probably expecting a “back in my day” rant…

 

Well well, Mr Benan, you've been hurrying to work, so I'll take it you couldn't find the time to read through all of the above. Or is it just that you read a name like "Mozart" and - being proud of knowing where to place it - begin to dismiss him as not being part of nowadays pop culture in a reflex movement ? A valuable insight...

The argument which included the name "Mozart" was that it is difficult to term artists "unimaginative" or "not innovative" if you haven't defined what you mean by "innovation". Since the structures any band used in rock and pop music for the last 40 years have been around for hundreds of years, it is hardly justified to call (e.g.) Led Zeppelin innovative for using them. Therefore, someone talking about innovative popular music must have something different in mind. Clear?

As to what this meaning of innovation could be, I haven't read any idea or opinion in this thread from anyone. To me, it all boils down to the fact:One likes it or one doesn't.

As to your points:

Ad 1: What about Outkast, or more specifically, André 3000? It's original and mainstream.

Ad2: It's good to see that despite your opening sentences you nevertheless seem to belief that you have to look to the past to determine what the future may hold. I've got a few questions, though: what exactly was the big problem for rock music that started with arena rock? What was innovative about Kurt Cobain and the like? Was Cobain the only one out there to save mankind, or why is it that rock became stagnent after his death? When writing about the forefather: do you mean Cobain? What has "Playing in clubs, travelling by van, tagging groupies" etc. to do with innovative music? Is it good or bad for creative artists? If it's become all for the show recently: what the hell was arena rock all about?

Sorry, dude, but all I get out of your post is: "don't look to the past, look to the future!" and "There is no future, Rock is dead."

[Edit: I just read my reply again. Boy, am I touchy, or what?! I blame the coffee. And maybe too much sugar...]

[ August 03, 2004, 16:31: Message edited by: Darkthrone ]

 

Atreyu isn't "proggressive rock" and it is nothing like pink floyd

 

It's actually *easier* nowadays to find good music because of the internet. The radio blares out a heap of dross 90% of the time, so wouldn't exactly be the best source to discover your new favourite band(s). Current music (at least in the metal scene) is actually okay if you look for it hard enough. Some bands today I would dare say are actually *better* than their predecessors. Everyone complains about Metallica selling out, going soft, etc, etc. So what. Metallica for all their brilliance in their glorydays, pale in comparison to bands like Naglfar, Immortal (RIP), Opeth, Edge of Sanity, Children of Bodom, Amaran and up-and-comers Insomnium who are all infinitely more interesting and technical than all the metal bands of old. And they all sound different. I am enjoying this current era of metal much more than in the days of the big four (Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, Slayer). So just to reiterate, there *is* good, even great music out there, and some of it could even be a significant landmark in music history in 10 years time; you just have to discover it.

 

Anyways as I was saying, music is stagnent. All of it, except for the underground scenes.

But there is hope, music, like life, and civilization go in cycles. So eventually the decent music will make a comeback and the crap we have to enduure now will fade in Hair Metal oblivion.

 

In my very humble opinion, there is too much 'Yamaha Home Organ' music around these days. That is, it's just a beat with no tune. There's a button on the Yamaha Home Organ that does this in one touch.

 

I'm sorry, Darkthrone, I really was not clear in my previous post on what i meant by innovation. What I meant to say, is that when someone does not follow in a certain style with everybody else, who decides not to "go with the flow", to do his own thing, he becomes a leader in his genre (or genres). But when a band creates a new genre, he then becomes an innovator. Kraftwerk is a good example of an innovator band. They practically invented the keyboard as we know it today, and they're the fathers of all electronic and techno music. But you can't create out of nothing. Of course you'll be influenced by bands that came before. The thing is that you have to take what was done before and try to add something more, to make it better, or make something new out of it. It's how art evolves. In fact, it's how all inventions evolve. I hope it clearer now...

@Benan, I really don't agree with your oppening statement a few posts back. Looking at the past is essential for understanding the future. Knowing what happened unables you to understand the why to how things are now, which in turn, unables you to make a standing hypothesis on how things will be.

In that regard, in the 60's and 70's, there was the big hippie movement, that proned freedom, that rebelled against authority. It is normal that so many bands that were born in that era were experimental, that didn't want to just follow. But today, it is the era of the "we just don't care enough". Hence, the overpowereing number of mainstream bands that just don't care enough about music. (Of course, there were those type of bands in the 60's too, but it's just more widespread today)

Finally, in my earlier post, I was a little too harsh on music today. Of course there is still some good stuff. Most in the independant labels, but a few in the mainstream : Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead, etc.

 

There is alot of good music nowadays, artists with originality and innovation but they tend to drown in the insane amount of garbage , there's alot of mainstream music that sounds the same. And I really hate artists that don't write their own songs, it feels wrong and fake when you know it's not their own thoughts and words. (Don't know how common that was back in the old days but I belive bands like Beatles wrote their own songs...)

arg, that crappy "MAD MAD SUMMER!" just came on the radio, I truly deeply hate that song.

anyway

I feel that during the 60s 70s 80s and even the 90s music developed much faster , it's still under development today ofcourse but not at the same rate , we have slowed down a gear suffering from all the mainstream bands, making it harder for the originals reaching out to the people.

 

Thanks for the reply, Triactus. While I agree to most of what you say, there is, however, a point I consider crucial that has not been addressed to the correct extent:

On one hand we have the mainstream which is by definition not innovative. To reach mainstream, a certain style has to undergo a development, a process that lasts a certain amount of time and hence isn't fresh or new anymore by the time the masses pick up the interest in it.

If you're truly looking for crispy and sappy music without being restricted by blinders, you have to go to the underground. However, as you pointed out before, you have to leave the boundaries of already existing genres.

Because of this, I don't understand anyone saying "there's no innovative music except in the underground scenes". Seems self-evident to me. It's like saying "there are no new talents in football except for some young players."