There is something very, very wrong with today’s music

[vert]

Kate Bush and Metallica are not Boomer Gen but Gen X, FYI whoever was dropping the B word earlier. Gen X had so many great bands that never got proper recognition. Yet KB, Dead Can Dance, The Cure, The Pixies, the Cocteau Twins, Metallica, EVH etc. invented new sounds and influenced countless people. I remember then being constantly told by "boomers" that The Beatles were so much better than everybody else and you still hear that today. If you want to play that game, it can be argued they can't hold a candle to the Great American Songbook composers but that's another discussion. There's always going to be a war of generations aspect, but "there's only two kinds of music: good and bad".

I agree with the OP that current music sux, with exceptions. My wife and children give me plenty opportunity to sample current offerings. Once in a while I catch some really nice melodies and harmonies. Interestingly my 16 year old is maturing in his tastes. But that is the exception. Yet I hear great stuff all the time from relative unknowns on YouTube who play guitar-centric stuff - my favorite instrument. No amount of control from the industry can dictate what people will play or listen to. The upside of the current situation is music is super accessible. I never used to listen to classical music but now do, to a good extent through Internet radio. Plenty of opportunities to ignore the often stale dictums of the "industry". I think it should go, but in the meantime, one can very simply just ignore it, simply tune out the silly crap at one's will.

 

[Axo1989]

Ok. I looked up the first four names on your list, and you know what? They are ALL on Apple Music. The second largest music service. I didn't check Spotify, because I don't have an account and hate them. But you know what? I think your full of shit and pushing an unfounded political agenda. Why Because when I put those names into DDK, I came up with feature in such conservative papers as the Washington Post. So no. These people are not in anyway being suppressed. They are not being censored. At the very most, they are being called out for being the insurrectionist, fascist, nazi adulated pieces of crap that they are in one or two articles. But that is too much for the offing snowflakes of the fascist right to deal with, so they lie, lie ,lie.

Why this effing right wing political propaganda continues to get the OK while a single thread about LGBTQ musical artist has to be shut down makes me rethink my contribution.
Edit to add: What Jimster is doing is called Gish Galloping (a well known phenomena in debating). Post as many lies as you can in the space you have allotted, because it always takes longer to defeat the lie than to state it. The fact that I had to spend time looking up his bullshit claims is an indictment. If you claim something, support it! don't make others deny it. Isn't that the very definition of science?

I didn't find evidence of censorship. I expect evidence of chart success would be similarly sparse. Comparing Mr Blow to Ms Del Rey (the first artist I enjoy who sang in front of old glory and traded in Americana that came to mind) is likely typical ...

Spoiler: Forgiato

Spoiler: Lana

Blow fits entirely on that page view, Lana goes on and on, but I went for a fair and balanced view and trimmed similarly at the top 5.

 

[Axo1989]

Kate Bush and Metallica are not Boomer Gen but Gen X, FYI whoever was dropping the B word earlier. Gen X had so many great bands that never got proper recognition. Yet KB, Dead Can Dance, The Cure, the Cocteau Twins, Metallica, EVH etc. invented new sounds and influenced countless people. I remember then being constantly told by "boomers" that The Beatles were so much better than everybody else and you still hear that today. If you want to play that game, it can be argued they can't hold a candle to the Great American Songbook composers but that's another discussion. There's always going to be a war of generations aspect, but "there's only two kinds of music: good and bad".

I agree with the OP that current music sux, with exceptions. My wife and children give me plenty opportunity to sample current offerings. Once in a while I catch some really nice melodies and harmonies. Interestingly my 16 year old is maturing in his tastes. But that is the exception. Yet I hear great stuff all the time from relative unknowns on YouTube who play guitar-centric stuff - my favorite instrument. No amount of control from the industry can dictate what people will play or listen to. The upside of the current situation is music is super accessible. I never used to listen to classical music but now do, to a good extent through Internet radio. Plenty of opportunities to ignore the often stale dictums of the "industry". I think it should go, but in the meantime, one can very simply just ignore it, simply tune out the silly crap at one's will.

Kate Bush was born in 1958 (a year after my father). The post-war baby boom was 1946-64, so she fits, I think.

Spoiler: generation timeline

 

[Jimster480]

So I only looked at one

Ok. I looked up the first four names on your list, and you know what? They are ALL on Apple Music. The second largest music service. I didn't check Spotify, because I don't have an account and hate them. But you know what? I think your full of shit and pushing an unfounded political agenda. Why Because when I put those names into DDK, I came up with feature in such conservative papers as the Washington Post. So no. These people are not in anyway being suppressed. They are not being censored. At the very most, they are being called out for being the insurrectionist, fascist, nazi adulated pieces of crap that they are in one or two articles. But that is too much for the offing snowflakes of the fascist right to deal with, so they lie, lie ,lie.

Why this effing right wing political propaganda continues to get the OK while a single thread about LGBTQ musical artist has to be shut down makes me rethink my contribution.
Edit to add: What Jimster is doing is called Gish Galloping (a well known phenomena in debating). Post as many lies as you can in the space you have allotted, because it always takes longer to defeat the lie than to state it. The fact that I had to spend time looking up his bullshit claims is an indictment. If you claim something, support it! don't make others deny it. Isn't that the very definition of science?

The fact that you are calling my posts political propaganda when I deliberately didn't write anything political about the overall movement and just mentioned how these artists who hit top billboard charts are suppressed at every turn on every mainstream platform has me questioning your mental state.
Instead of pushing fake news propaganda here like you just did in your post, you should try to atleast stay somewhat on topic here. We aren't discussing your favorite political party and their overall agenda. This is not a polticial forum and I would very much like for it not to become one, politics have already ruined every other aspect of the world today. Mainly because of people such as yourself.
We were simply discussing censorship which you obviously agree with as your post is literally now basically asking for my censorship because you just don't like what I had to write.
If you simply don't like someone elses viewpoint; you don't have to post about it, especially in such a slanderous way.

Simply put, skip this topic because I think it isn't for you. I didn't go post walls of text and article links and go dig up tons of information on the censorship because I don't want this to become a political forum and make this thread into a bunch of political debates. You can follow whatever politics you like, I'm not here to try to change anyone's political interests.
So let's please just leave politics out of this forum, before it goes to hell like the rest of the internet.

 

[Jimster480]

I didn't find evidence of censorship. I expect evidence of chart success would be similarly sparse. Comparing Mr Blow to Ms Del Rey (the first artist I enjoy who sang in front of old glory and traded in Americana that came to mind) is likely typical ...

Spoiler: Forgiato

View attachment 223453

Spoiler: Lana

View attachment 223454

Blow fits entirely on that page view, Lana goes on and on, but I went for a fair and balanced view and trimmed similarly at the top 5.

The concept of censorship is not to find said censorship. Remove views, remove followers, remove playlists, remove songs.
Delete entire accounts, etc.
Then when you look them up; of course their accounts don't show plays. They are constantly being removed. That is indeed censorship.

Anyway I intentionally didn't even want to mention the names here because I was sure someone would go on some flame rant and this has already happened. So lets just drop the subject entirely.

 

[Axo1989]

The concept of censorship is not to find said censorship. Remove views, remove followers, remove playlists, remove songs.
Delete entire accounts, etc.
Then when you look them up; of course their accounts don't show plays. They are constantly being removed. That is indeed censorship.

Anyway I intentionally didn't even want to mention the names here because I was sure someone would go on some flame rant and this has already happened. So lets just drop the subject entirely.

I was referring to my earlier post that I didn't find evidence of censorship on Apple Music. Each artist you mentioned had a full artist's page with the usual treatment (if they were censored there they would obviously be absent). You've just said "suppressed at every turn on every mainstream platform" which is objectively untrue.

Having established that, I logically doubt your framing narrative. This isn't where I expected my inquiry would lead so I won't continue the discussion either, but I did appreciate you responding. Back to the (gnostic) music:

 

[BALKAN_RAKIA]

Maybe not that stuff but I like a lot of different music. That sounds like a train going by from six feet away but I jumped around and only gave it a minute or two.

That's exactly it - sounds like trains crashing. Electronic music the way I've experienced it is about following DJs rather than individual artists. I am sure we overlap - everybody likes Faithless, but the experience of listening electronic music for me is listening to 2 hour live sets rather than individual albums or songs. Very different from other genres where I listen to full discographies.

Here is some Balkan music you might like

 

[Byrdsmaniac]

My interest is more for 'classical' music than pop/rock, and every BBC Prom season here I despair at the new compositions being performed, sometimes premiered, at each year's proms. Why do most modern compositions sound like someone throwing a piano down the stairs? It's all Pink-Plonk, Crash, Screech, Bang. No melody or tune one can whistle or hum. Nothing remotely memorable except for its awfulness. It's not even a recent phenomenon, it goes back at least 50 years, but the lack of melody, the lack of a tune, seems to characterise contemporary 'classical' music. It's as if dynamics (as in crash-bang) and dissonance have taken over from creating a harmonious sound.

I can hum along to Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, even modern composers like Walton and Elgar, but spare me mid-late 20th Century onwards.

S.

Try Jennifer Higdon or Max Richter.

 

[sergeauckland]

Try Jennifer Higdon or Max Richter.

Thanks for that. I see they have a presence on Spotify - albeit they are listed as 'Artist' not Composer and their works are labelled Songs!

I'll be listening this evening.

S.

 

[Dxnc]

I'm classic prog rock fan. Who are some of these newer bands you like?

Below are just a few example albums that scratched the itch for me in the 1990s after I'd already mined the accessible classic prog. Some sounded retro, some were new and unique, some mellow, some heavy. There were (and are) hundreds of bands cranking out prog within many sub-genres.

- echolyn - Suffocating the Bloom (1992)
- Angagaard - Hybris (1992)
- Anekdoten - Vemod (1993)
- Marillion - Brave (1994), Afraid of Sunlight (1995)
- Citizen Cain - Somewhere But Yesterday (1994)
- Grey Lady Down - The Crime (1994)
- IQ - Ever (1994), Subterranea (1998)
- Spock's Beard - The Light (1995)
- Glass Hammer - Perelandra (1995)
- Pendragon - The Masquerade Overture (1996)
- Steve Hackett - Darktown (1999)
- Ten Jinn - As on a Darkling Plane (1999)

I should also mention Dream Theater's Images and Words (1992) and Scenes from a Memory (1999), but I consider Prog Metal to be a separate style.

Too many to list since 2000, but here are some notable releases that fit my tastes:
- Porcupine Tree - Lightbulb Sun (2000), In Absentia (2003)
- Marillion - Marbles (2004)
- OSI - Free (2006)
- Frost - Milliontown (2006)
- Phideaux - Doomsday Afternoon (2007)
- Presto Ballet - The Lost Art of Time Travel (2008)
- Big Big Train - The Underfall Yard (2009)
- Transatlantic - Whirlwind (2009)
- Haken - The Monutain (2013)
- Steven Wilson - The Raven That Refused to Sing (2013)
- Major Parkinson - Twilight Cinema (2014)
- Magic Pie - King for a Day (2015)
- Lunatic Soul - Through Shaded Woods (2020)
- Pattern-Seeking Animals - Prehensile Tales (2020)

 

[mhardy6647]

A banjo player returns home after a gig one evening...​

Parking his car by his housing, he realizes he forgot to bring in with him his banjo from the backseat. He let's it go, thinking it'll probably be there in the morning still. Next morning he approaches his car, and notices that the rear window of his car has been smashed in! Uproared, he rushes to the car, and what does he find once he gets there? Two banjos in the backseat.

Accordionists have the same problem.

 

[Bob from Florida]

Accordionists have the same problem.

Now that you mention accordion.

Do you know the definition of"perfect pitch?"​

When you toss a banjo into a dumpster & it hits an accordion!

 

[mhardy6647]

Now that you mention accordion.

Do you know the definition of"perfect pitch?"​

When you toss a banjo into a dumpster & it hits an accordion!

Along similar (not congruent!) lines...
Q: What key results when one drops a piano down a mine shaft?
A: A flat minor

 

[Martin]

Music isn't important anymore in the way it was in our youth.

I agree.

When I was young whenever I was in my car I had music blasting, either FM, 8-track or later, CD. Today I prefer hearing that flat six wail.

I listen to music several times a week at home but when I was young it was a constant.

Martin

 

[Hugo9000]

Fascinating that someone who illegally and immorally promotes theft of IP (and profits off said theft) and corruption of gaming to the detriment of honest players using their actual skills has the gall to complain about 'censorship' (which it isn't, since what's being whined about was done by private parties/companies and not the government) and 'slander' (also incorrect, but don't let that stop you).

The forum does not allow links to sites that provide illegal file sharing links, I think that should extend to banning illegal software cracks/cheats and other theft of intellectual property. Particularly since it is done for profit. @amirm @AdamG247 @BDWoody is there already a policy on this?

 

[AdamG]

Fascinating that someone who illegally and immorally promotes theft of IP (and profits off said theft) and corruption of gaming to the detriment of honest players using their actual skills has the gall to complain about 'censorship' (which it isn't, since what's being whined about was done by private parties/companies and not the government) and 'slander' (also incorrect, but don't let that stop you).

The forum does not allow links to sites that provide illegal file sharing links, I think that should extend to banning illegal software cracks/cheats and other theft of intellectual property. Particularly since it is done for profit. @amirm @AdamG247 @BDWoody is there already a policy on this?

Of course you already know that we do not permit or promote any methods or means of violating and/or the outright theft of intellectual property. A PM has been sent to the individual in question and has been requested to remove said link from profile. First offense is a Polite Request to not do this here. Second offense may include sanctions against the offender.

Thank you for pointing this out to us and we appreciate your support and assistance.

 

[Jds81]

Christian & Conservative Rap is censored heavily in the USA at this point in time. Since it sounds like the oldschool rap of the 90s and early 2000s for the most part, but doesn't fit with the agenda's. I agree that it is definitely something for another thread.

Music censorship has existed throughout history and has created some of the greatest music in history as the struggling populaces of the world often used music as an outlet of their frustrations or injustice. Many of the great classical pieces were written during dark times, sometimes under persecution.

Since I got quoted for this derailment, I gotta say I disagree.
Conservative thought is broadcasting 24/7 on all forms of media, Christian music is an industry to itself with crossover to mainstream for stuff with broader appeal.
It's disingenuous to take on the mantel of plight and persecution.
Others have demanded examples and busted those claims.
I was interested in actual examples as the original comment I responded to had set out. Artistic output deemed illegal.
Just clarifying since I sorta got roped in, and I am a newbie.
Edited to fix typo, "an" became "and" in original post. All else the same.

 

[Vacceo]

So I only looked at one

Ok. I looked up the first four names on your list, and you know what? They are ALL on Apple Music. The second largest music service. I didn't check Spotify, because I don't have an account and hate them. But you know what? I think your full of shit and pushing an unfounded political agenda. Why Because when I put those names into DDK, I came up with feature in such conservative papers as the Washington Post. So no. These people are not in anyway being suppressed. They are not being censored. At the very most, they are being called out for being the insurrectionist, fascist, nazi adulated pieces of crap that they are in one or two articles. But that is too much for the offing snowflakes of the fascist right to deal with, so they lie, lie ,lie.

Why this effing right wing political propaganda continues to get the OK while a single thread about LGBTQ musical artist has to be shut down makes me rethink my contribution.
Edit to add: What Jimster is doing is called Gish Galloping (a well known phenomena in debating). Post as many lies as you can in the space you have allotted, because it always takes longer to defeat the lie than to state it. The fact that I had to spend time looking up his bullshit claims is an indictment. If you claim something, support it! don't make others deny it. Isn't that the very definition of science?

The genres I like overlap with a lot (and I mean a looooot) with bands and musicians that range from aesthetically curious to direct card members of openly national socialist and fascist parties. For years and years, I have never seen a single hint of censorship or supression at militand Black Metal bands (I´m hesitant to post names, but I have no problem doing so if requested) or even neofolk acts that are nazi-curious (Sol Invictus or Death in June, no surprises there).

Interestingly enough, these guys never portray themselves as victims and they couldn´t care less they are "prosecuted", "censored" or hated. Conversly, bands that are openly stalinist are also there and I also haven´t found a single dot of censoship. Their narrative of not caring about bein "prosecuted", "censored" and so on is the same.

All these cases are spined narratives compared to what can happen to you if you get cought owning Blasphemy material (among a looooooong list) in a country like Saudi Arabia. For not so drastic measures, I´d have to check out, but I think Mayhem are still banned from performing in Poland; I think their records can be sold and owned.

Years ago I was supposed to get to a Slayer concert in Santiago de Compostela. The organizers, the arch diocesis of Santiago, canceled it when the say they had records such as Hell Awaits. Censorship? Well, commonly speaking, yes; but even being the catholic church, they still are not the Spanish government, and that would have been a completely different case.

Since I got quoted for this derailment, I gotta say I disagree.
Conservative thought is broadcasting 24/7 on all forms of media, Christian music is an industry to itself with crossover to mainstream for stuff with broader appeal.
It's disingenuous to take on the mantel of plight and persecution.
Others have demanded examples and busted those claims.
I was interested in actual examples as the original comment I responded to had set out. Artistic output deemed illegal.
Just clarifying since I sorta got roped in, and I am a newbie.
Edited to fix typo, "an" became "and" in original post. All else the same.

I think I gave you some examples that are easy to track. For cover art, the list is long and often times, glorious: from Electric Ladyland to Appetite for Destruction. My fave, though, is Autopsy´s Acts of the Unspeakeable.

I was referring to my earlier post that I didn't find evidence of censorship on Apple Music. Each artist you mentioned had a full artist's page with the usual treatment (if they were censored there they would obviously be absent). You've just said "suppressed at every turn on every mainstream platform" which is objectively untrue.

Having established that, I logically doubt your framing narrative. This isn't where I expected my inquiry would lead so I won't continue the discussion either, but I did appreciate you responding. Back to the (gnostic) music:

You may actually like something as peculiar and weird as Aluk Todolo.

 

[rdenney]

A banjo player returns home after a gig one evening...​

Hey, it could happen!

Rick "FTFY" Denney

 

[Jds81]

I think I gave you some examples that are easy to track. For cover art, the list is long and often times, glorious: from Electric Ladyland to Appetite for Destruction. My fave, though, is Autopsy´s Acts of the Unspeakeable.

Agreed, I find your input very interesting. My listening tastes don't bump up against these issues often, except cover art and song titles at times. Now cross that over to literature and I am more aware.
Here is a good case where we can learn a lot from "old" music, and again we are on a continuum. Art should push boundaries, in form, subject, thought etc.