Some times I think I've lived too long...'cuz I really don't get it!

[Count Arthur]

Were the charts ever the place to find the best, most interesting music? What gets into the charts, by definition has broad appeal and is often rather "middle of the road".

Even as a teenager, I found most of what was in the charts rather dull and formulaic and would discover far more interesting music via DJs like John Peel, who rarely went anywhere near the charts. However, there are always exceptions and every now and then something comes along that's just so catchy that it just worms its way into your head.

There was an intersting documentary on the BBC a while back about how chart music is "scientifically" average, you can see it here:

 

[Fluffy]

It's just pop music appealing to the musical and cultural sensibilities of its era and demographic. That's why it's succeeding now, and why everyone will forget about this song in five years.

 

[Ceburaska]

I don’t dislike Bad Guy, but nothing about it perks my interest. However that may be because my usual listening for the last few years has been classical and jazz.
It appears to have an almost hypnotic effect on some friends’ kids I know.

 

[Koeitje]

I teach high school seniors, and sometimes I play music over the classroom’s sound system during independent work, and the amount of boys that will try to get me to play music by NLE Choppa and the like just makes me sigh:

Shooting enemies, degradation of woman, etc.

That said, the acting tough and bragging type of rap isn’t always off-putting to me, I like ‘ISIS’ by Joyner Lucas and Logic for instance, and it doesn’t hurt that I like dance and Fik-Shun’s choreo/freestyle to it is great:

I like rap/trap, it’s just that there is a smaller % that I like compared to other genres.

Well difference between those 2 is pretty stark, the bottom one has better rap flow and better beats.

 

[MZKM]

Well difference between those 2 is pretty stark, the bottom one has better rap flow and better beats.

Right, but they are in the same category and the top one is very popular with the younger demographic, as they like to be considered more “hard”.

 

[Eetu]

I'd argue that the older one gets the more one sticks to 'the classics' / old favorites and less and less time is used to actively search new artists. So one's view of current music is influenced proportionately more & more by the radio / chart nonsense and not the good non-mainstream stuff. This is an over-simplification of course.

 

[Wombat]

Until video killed the radio star the airwaves were full of great music. Pop was only a part of it and that was often pretty good, too.

 

[mhardy6647]

I can't believe I just ordered the original Readers Digest 5CD set and the two Singles CDs of The Carpenters.


Re the latest big thing - every so often the old, in this case angst and soul bearing, is reinvented as new for the times:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03...nny-cash-singer-songwriter-rock-star/12091824

Torch songs/singers.

Blues singers such as Bessie Smith and Big Momma Thornton.

I swear I thought you were gonna say you ordered the Readers' Digest 5CD... set of... Billie Eilish.

Some songs are better when accompanied by a video, some become more likable once you've read the lyrics.

Patty "got" the MTV culture of the early '90s.

 

[TLEDDY]

Hmmm...

A most entertaining thread!

I am 78, so here is a blast from the past:

Everyone recalls “Big Bad John”

How about “Small Sad Sam”... anyone?

And the Irving:

http://www.songlyrics.com/allen-sherman/ballad-of-irving-lyrics/

Hint: “Even on the range, he kept two sets of dishes!”

 

[bluefuzz]

Some music journo – I can't remember who – once said something to the effect of 'pop music released today doesn't just have to compete with whatever is currently in the charts but with all recorded music released in the last 100 years'. For folk or classical one could extend that to the last 1000 years. This I think is very true. There is nothing new under the sun and with the immediate availability of music, any new music today can be instantly compared (and found wanting) with what has gone before.

Good teen pop deals with the issues relevant to the teens of the time as I'm sure Billie E. does very well. What often annoys the older generation is not so much the songs themselves but the sound or production techniques used, which often reflect the technological fashions of the time. Today it's autotune, in the 80's gated digital reverb, the 60's fuzzboxes and mellotrons etc. ...

Richard Thompson – an aging white guy with a guitar – demonstrated this very well with his 1000 Years of Popular Music' show a few years back:

 

[Koeitje]

I don't get the "rap" thing either, probably because I'm not personally aspiring to be an inner-city hustler/pimp/thug/drug dealer/cop killer of some sort.

You can also channel your inner cop

McCoy: “Is this classical music?” Spock: “Yes I believe it is.”

Anyway, rap isn't only about that.

 

[Count Arthur]

 

[DarrylG]

My new avatar and the boredom of quarantine has me thinking strange thoughts.

Where does this fit into the history of "music"? What do the youngest ASR members think about this song and its genre? Is it good? Bad? Dumb? Insightful? Lasting? Ephemeral pop? (Then again, long before the advent of music videos, my generation had songs in the 1950's like "Yellow Polka Dot Bikini", "Transfusion" by Nervous Norvus, "Stranded in the Jungle" and "The Purple People Eater".)

If you're a baby boomer, younger generations of musicians haven't shown you anything you haven't heard before, so respectfully, I don't get why you're so puzzled.

 

[DarrylG]

I probably haven't "gotten it" since all the "big" names turned into "song and dance" acts.

I don't get the "rap" thing either, probably because I'm not personally aspiring to be an inner-city hustler/pimp/thug/drug dealer/cop killer of some sort.

So, when I semiannually cruise the current Top 40, I see what the intro sounds like, skip into the first verse, skip to see if there's a bridge or not, skip to see if the "second verse is same as the first", skip to the crescendo near the end (just to check that box off), and skip on to the next in the list.

Nothing, and I mean nothing, in the popular realm has stuck with me for a long long time.

I know who some of them are, can admire their ability to rake in the cash, but take it to heart and hum it in the shower or try to pick it out on a fretboard, no.

Rap has been popular for 40 years. By the time rock was as old as rap, it was past the peak of its popularity.

 

[Bamyasi]

The problem with (older) people claiming today's music is garbage is that they don't seem to make an effort to research beyond the Billboard lists.

Do they still exists?? Link please, never seen Billboard lists in decades.

 

[Bamyasi]

Rap has been popular for 40 years. By the time rock was as old as rap, it was past the peak of its popularity.

Rap is not music, period.

 

[Prana Ferox]

Do they still exists?? Link please, never seen them in decades.

Older people? Yes, they're all over the place.

Rap is not music, period.

This is a bit silly. Electronic and rap / hip hop as genres are 3 generations old now. Aphex Twin and Diplo get used in luxury car commercials.

Soundcloud rap is of course rubbish.

 

[DarrylG]

Rap is not music, period.

Ok. After 40 years of popularity, rap doesn't have to argue with you.

 

[scott wurcer]

Rap is not music, period.

More than 40yr. and this is music.

 

[DarrylG]

It's like someone still denouncing rock n' roll in 1995.