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Why BOOMERS Hate POP Music - YouTube

stalepie2

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Summary:

1. No tempo variation, not done to a click, real players, drift was okay
2. Repetitive sounds, drum machines
3. All diatonic changes, doesn't change key, four chords or less
4. No dynamic variation except when people use sidechain compression (ducking), additive production values, little sonic variation (?)
5. Very simple, nursery rhyme-like melodies
6. Autotune, the robotic sound
7.
 
I think it's usually written by boomers! Aren't there a lot of 40+ people writing the teeny bopper stuff?

I mean, at the very least it was boomers who wrote the software. What if some of those plugins are written in FORTRAN.
 
It's a more interesting video than the clickbait title would suggest.
 
Summary:
...
In German we say 'jemandem aus dem Herzen sprechen', if somebody else expresses just what we're feeling in his own words.
That's what you did in your post: 'speaking out of my heart' !
 
This is a video about why HE hates current "pop" and explains why because he is a musician. Most boomers would not have the slightest idea about what the 6 items listed in the summary are, and they would not care one bit as most of them have better or more important things to do or care about. Sure, there are boomers who visit ASR and understand and share the views of the video creator but those are NOT the majority of boomers.
It's like.. I am a musician and do not have a particular fondness for current pop.. I am a boomer. Therefore!! Boomers hate pop.
BTE, this video was already discussed on a thread in Sep2020
 
I think it's usually written by boomers! Aren't there a lot of 40+ people writing the teeny bopper stuff?
Boomers are more like 60+ or at least pre 1965 depending on which definition of 'Boomer' you use. That's not to say they don't still write some of the current pop hits but probably not many. But hasn't 'pop' always been about repetitive rhythms, simple melodies, minimal chord changes and asinine lyrics? Nothing wrong with that if it works.

I will admit to finding that whiny petulant vocal affectation (autotune?), that currently seems popular, immensely annoying. And I'm (only just) not a Boomer ... ;-)
 
I think it's usually written by boomers! Aren't there a lot of 40+ people writing the teeny bopper stuff?

I mean, at the very least it was boomers who wrote the software. What if some of those plugins are written in FORTRAN.

“What if some of those plugins are written in FORTRAN.”
That right there is funny.
 
I mean, at the very least it was boomers who wrote the software. What if some of those plugins are written in FORTRAN.

What's wrong with FORTRAN? I wrote my very first programs in FORTRAN, keying them on punchcards, 72 columns per line!

EDIT: I guess this qualifies my as a real boomer ... ;)
 
This is a video about why HE hates current "pop" and explains why because he is a musician. Most boomers would not have the slightest idea about what the 6 items listed in the summary are, and they would not care one bit as most of them have better or more important things to do or care about. Sure, there are boomers who visit ASR and understand and share the views of the video creator but those are NOT the majority of boomers.
It's like.. I am a musician and do not have a particular fondness for current pop.. I am a boomer. Therefore!! Boomers hate pop.
BTE, this video was already discussed on a thread in Sep2020

I get your point, but I think it's a bit more nuanced than that. He's using a musician's understanding to compare what's popular today to what was popular when boomers were young and finds that the new stuff is less sophisticated and more sterile than the old stuff. So far so good. He then makes the logical leap that this isn't just correlated to what boomers like but in fact causative. I think that needs more evidence.
 
The most boomer thing about this video is all the complaining about the young generation.

Look, dance music has always had repetitive, consistent beats, simple chord progressions, sound effect fads (god I hate that Yamaha DX7).

Dance music is like candy: Tastes good, but not very nutritious.

Here is a boomer version of the same (1984).

 
There's no accounting for taste.
 
Worldwide popular music had astonishing richness and complexity, and was at the forefront of the high art of lyrical, harmonic and melodic innovation, from the mid-to-late 1800s into the early part of the 1950s. It was called opera, classical, ragtime, it was military marches, Broadway, it was derivative of drinking songs, it was a dizzying melting pot of Caribbean, Latin, European, Native American, African. Middle Eastern and Asian influences. It was crazy town. It was beautiful. It came to evolve in many directions, including a particularly miraculous stream called jazz. But in terms of those niceties finding their way so regularly into popular music currently, that ship has sailed. And no I’m not anything close to that old.

Boomers can take a very, very, very long hard look in the mirror if they want to understand how the aesthetics of popular music declined and degenerated, after a brilliant start in the mid-to late 1800s including La Paloma and Bizet’s Carmen.

All IMHO. :p
 
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The most boomer thing about this video is all the complaining about the young generation.
No. There's a lot of young people who really like good music, good in the sense of well produced, letting personal taste aside.

Here is a boomer version of the same (1984).
I'm afraid you're missing the point, and I don't know whether it's by accident or by purpose. If you see just one albino elephant, would you say that all elephants are white?

In my opinion, and this is really nothing more than my personal opinion, 'good' music is always handmade for the most part, not generated. It should sound natural regarding timbre as well as dynamics. This does not only apply to purely acoustic, 'unplugged' music.

In pop music, it was always kind of a challenge to find those gems that are really 'good' regarding their musicality. But I believe that back in the 1970's or 1980's it was at least a bit easier to find some of these gems. Where are they today?

Excessive use of computer audio in the studios kills musicality, as well as excessive use of alcohol kills common sense. Enjoyed moderately, both 'drugs' can be fun!
 
This turns into a generational war easily. Like we need any excuse for that.

But I make an absolute distinction between pop of different periods, and the definition of pop. In the 50's and early 60's, the producers dictated the sounds of their studios, and manufactured artists (by discovering and cultivating talent) to fit with that product vision. In the 80's through today, the producers still dictate a lot of what gets recorded and how. The late 60's and 70's, however, was an open window in "music for young people", where groups could explore very wide concepts. Some of them worked and some didn't, but there was a lot of freedom to explore in the studio. Perhaps some baby boomers miss that. I know I do.

Before unloading on me, there have always been those who found ways to put their unique vision out there. But I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about how experimental groups could be with mainstream record-company money and support.

I suspect lots of the oldest boomers like the pop music of the late 50's and early 60's just fine, and it was as cheesy and formulaic as anything produced now. The OP's summary of complaints applies to much of that just as much as it does to current pop.

Of course, we tend to hear the best of the past, because only the music that stood the test of time still gets played.

Do we use the term "pop" to describe some of that 70's stuff that did not conform to those generalizations? I'm thinking of groups like Yes, King Crimson, Jethro Tull, Genesis (particularly when Peter Gabriel fronted the group), ELP, the Moody Blues, and many others of that ilk. However bombastic and self-indulgent that genre was at times, it was not formulaic, and was filled with complex rhythms, tonalities, variations, true improvisation, experimentation bordering on the avant garde, and dynamic contrast. But the Yes of 1970 (and particularly in the 7 or 8 years that followed) wasn't "pop" in the sense that, say, Bobby Sherman was pop. Even Elton John of 1970 was not pop in the sense that the Monkees were, though that's much less obvious. Was David Bowie or Emerson, Lake and Palmer pop in the sense that the 5th Dimension, or even the Jackson Five, was? Of course, some of those pop stars broke out of mere pop and made the genre something more special because of it, but those (e.g. Michael Jackson) were the exception, it seems to me. Yet that prog-rock (as we call it now) stuff was right at the center of rock music adored by baby-boomer musicians.

As I said, there are groups doing that sort of thing now, and some of it is remarkable. But those aren't the groups you'll see or that will be represented on American Idol.

Rick "get off my lawn!" Denney
 
Excessive use of computer audio in the studios kills musicality

Well, the old writers used pen and paper. And then typewriters appeared. George RR Martin still uses "WordStar", a program from the 80's.

I imagine the novels that are written on a Google Doc to be vastly inferior. :cool:

Seriously though, what's novel for the previous generation is just part of the environment for the next. It's another way of saying "new medium".

Here is what happened to vocoders in 2005.

 
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