What's wrong with pop music?

[Benjamin Briggs]

I do but it's certainly not a response to anything. It's just chthonic waving his holier-than-thou musical penis around in our collective face.

Toxic is one of the top five songs of the last 30 years.

dunnah nunnah NUH nunna WRONG

this thread is for discussing why certain people (geek-chic hipster cockfags) dismiss pop music merely because it's popular, and whether or not that's fair

the idea is to get a bunch of different opinions on the matter and discuss them LIEK SOME KIND OF BOARD WITH MESSAGES ON THE INTERNET OR

so, if the goal is to get a bunch of different opinions on the matter, it only seems logical that the person prompting the discussion also shares his opinion, which I did

so yeah you can quit with the holier-than-thou bullshit whenever you like

[Fratto]

I VI IV V I

Repeat.

[Tenucha]

Toxic is one of the top five songs of the last 30 years.

Which Toxic?

[PriZm]

gay people most certainly are gay.

I VI IV V I

Repeat.

Shut the Frattop. That didn't even make sense.

[Devyn]

I dislike (most) pop music because of its common redundancy and lack of originality, not because of its popularity. I also dislike music about people's asses, money, and cars. It's shallow.

I don't give a crap about some pretty girl who I will never even talk to has 'taken control of her life' or some rapper 'who gets the hos and drives a ferrari', or some rock star who makes millions of dollars and pretends to 'be in darkness'

Now there's some good stuff in pop music every once in a while, but it's usually some jerk or barbie doll praising his/herself.

Also, there's too much focus on image. Many people are more concerned about the appearance of musicians rather than their abilities. This is bad for music because some of the best musicians are ugly, poor bastards who will never see the light on MTV, VH1, or whatever.

And the production is often too crisp. It sounds a little synthetic.

Hey. If pop floats your boat then fine, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that there's way too much syrup on the radio and the television. I won't ask you to forgive my elitist attitude - I've had it since I was 13 and it's not going to change. I'm going to wrap it up now: I think that there is a difference between 'pop' music and 'popular' music, so don't think I shun any record that hits gold.

[PriZm]

I dislike (most) pop music because of its common redundancy and lack of originality, not because of its popularity. I also dislike music about people's asses, money, and cars. It's shallow.

I don't give a crap about some pretty girl who I will never even talk to has 'taken control of her life' or some rapper 'who gets the hos and drives a ferrari', or some rock star who makes millions of dollars and pretends to 'be in darkness'

Now there's some good stuff in pop music every once in a while, but it's usually some jerk or barbie doll praising his/herself.

Also, there's too much focus on image. Many people are more concerned about the appearance of musicians rather than their abilities. This is bad for music because some of the best musicians are ugly, poor bastards who will never see the light on MTV, VH1, or whatever.

And the production is often too crisp. It sounds a little synthetic.

Hey. If pop floats your boat then fine, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that there's way too much syrup on the radio and the television. I won't ask you to forgive my elitist attitude - I've had it since I was 13 and it's not going to change. I'm going to wrap it up now: I think that there is a difference between 'pop' music and 'popular' music, so don't think I shun any record that hits gold.

If lyrics play an important part in your likes and dislikes of music and you dislike the general themes discussed by today's pop music, then, obviously, you won't like pop music and you'll have a good reason not to.

Also about the image thing, that's certainly true for many pop performers. But don't forget that those performers (rappers, divas, whatever) aren't generally the people who actually write or produce the music. And when they say: "I wrote my own songs", they often are talking about just the lyrics.

As for the difference between pop and popular music, sure, I don't think Pink Floyd should be classified as pop. But then again, maybe Christina Aguilera and Beyonce should be classified as RnB and others as nu-hardcore indie emo meta-heuristic punk-rock shit. But let's just say that pop music is : "Music that currently hits the top of the billboard".

[Bahamut]

Just as not all pop music is bad, music being popular does not validate it as good at all. I think even worse is the attitude from some that music being popular automatically validates it as good music.

Just thinking about it, does "pop" actually qualify as a valid classification of music? Generally, you classify music by artistic style, not by popularity, so that very notion sounds flawed.

If lyrics play an important part in your likes and dislikes of music and you dislike the general themes discussed by today's pop music, then, obviously, you won't like pop music and you'll have a good reason not to.

One of the problems I've found in particular with more modern pop lyrically is that it approaches traditional themes in such a poor manner, with songs like "Since U Been Gone" by Kelly Clarkson and "Girlfriend" by Avril Lavigne being perfect examples. The concept they portray is destructively negative without any decrying of such attitudes presented.

[Fenrir]

You can't look at American Idol and tell me that pop music isn't being manufactured.

[Avatar of Justice]

One thing that annoys me is that so much of pop music is about love and/or romantic relationships. Love is a great thing, to be sure, but it's not the only emotion. It's like only reading romance novels or something.

[Bahamut]

You can't look at American Idol and tell me that pop music isn't being manufactured.

Actually, one of the funny things is that Kelly Clarkson claims to write her music herself. But yeah, the American Idol competition by nature sort of selects for contestants with certain characteristics.

[The Author]

You can't look at American Idol and tell me that pop music isn't being manufactured.

Any music can be manufactured. American Idol just revealed something that has been going on in the industry. What we get is what some suits decide is good music.

Its only because of the Internet that this trend has begun changing. Before filesharing, many obscure bands had to either adapt to what producers wanted or chose to become popular off of tapes shared the old fashion way. In the pre-internet days, to be popular, you either had to sign a contract with a label (and conform to their demans), or somehow gain such momentum that the industry noticed you.

Now, the industry hates filesharing not only because of "profits" being lost, but also because they cannot control the music industry anymore. Musicians no longer beg for visibility, they have it. They can share online reaching a bigger market than any exec would have given them on a first CD.

Frankly, I like American Idol. It's a last attempt at the industry to manufacture celebrities while the internet is taking over their beloved industry in ways they could not foresee.

[zircon]

The problem with the internet and democratization of the process is that while you have 50x more music, the majority of it is crappy, and it makes it harder for people that are actually good to push through. In fact, this encourages the record label mentality - that you need to spend exorbitant amounts of money on marketing/promo/airplay to get noticed.

[eternal Zero]

Dunno if this'll help anyone, but:

I'm not one to discount an entire genre of music because of an image...or to discount multiple songs from a genre because I don't like the genre...except Country (sorry, just can't stand it). I think it's wrong to do anything other take each song individually and evaluating it then and there. I don't mind expecting a certain sound or quality from a specific band, but to completely discount a song because a certain band/genre made it is complete crap.

[Darklink42]

I'm less inclined to like pop music simply because it all sounds the same to me these days. Most (and I mean most, there are exceptions to everything) of the female singers all sing in exactly the same way, about exactly the same things. I can't really comment on male pop artists because I stopped listening to the radio and following pop music after a while out of disgust. Last time I checked, the fad was to be as emo/post-punk as possible. I could get behind some of that music, but the problem remained: They all sounded the same. The reason that pop music is pop is because it's all in the same vein of whatever is pop(ular) at the time. Unfortunatly popular has become less about variety and originality, and that's pretty sad. When people look back at the 80's, and the kind of "pop" music that came out that era, there are many artists with many different kinds of sounds. The 90's were more of a hint about what we have now. Artists started out original, with everything from Sugar Ray to Brittany Spears. But what was at first a craze out of left field in Brittany, suddenly has become the only way to do it. And with the advent of hip-hop/rap, it's becoming increasingly hard to define yourself in the pop genre.

As for the internet, I'm inclined to agree with Zircon. On the one hand it is a boon to artists that they can get there works out there, take this site for instance. But there are just too many sub-par artists, or artists that don't know what they are doing, that have to be slogged through before you can find a great sound, like Myspace.

[Imagist]

I'd say the worst part of the whole counter-culture thing is not the rejection of popular music just because it's popular, but the acceptance of "indy" music just because it's indy. Look at Modest Mouse. Near as I can tell, there's nobody on the planet who actually likes modest mouse, but everybody pretends to so they can say they listen to indy music. The funny part is, I don't think modest mouse even qualifies as being "underground" anymore, since everybody and their mother has heard of them.

I'm pretty sure Modest Mouse is bloody awesome so you can shove your generalizations up your ass. I (and a good deal of my friends) love lots of indie bands because we think they make good music that appeals to us, and we laugh at people who try to brag about how "indie" their tastes are ("OMG is that Explosions in the Sky I have like all their CDs in vinyl and have been to every show because I thought no one else around here heard of them"). If no one actually liked a band because they thought it made good music then you'd never hear of it, ever, because no one actually remembers and listens to and cares about bands that scenesters/hipsters/whatever talk about if the only reason for doing so is appearing "indie." If those people make up a band's entire fanbase, then the band might as well be in a black hole as far as the rest of the world is concerned, and the rest of us would never hear or talk about them.

[PriZm]

Indie music as a genre doesn't exist. The music a band makes cannot be categorized based on whether or not they're signed with a label or not.

So, basically, the problem with pop, or metal, or jazz (etc) occurs when people stop treating the art simply as an art and more like a way of life. People don't listen to The Backstreet Boys because it's 'gay', avoid 'My Chemical Romance' because it's 'emo' and Chrisitina Aguilera because she's a slut and this, before they even take the time to listen to their songs.

This, I think, is the problem with modern music, be it pop or anything else. It is marketed as a way of life instead of a way of communicating emotions. However, this doesn't mean current artists aren't as good as older ones, its just how they are presented.

And saying that all artists in a given genre sound more or less the same... well it's a given since the concept of genre wouldn't exist if there weren't similarities between the different songs. And I don't think all pop artists sound the same more than metal, rock or jazz artists do.

[Benjamin Briggs]

gay people most certainly are gay.

Shut the Frattop. That didn't even make sense.

yes it did, you just don't understand music

he posted a very common chord progression used in pop music

frankly, I love the standard punk progression I V vi IV.. especially when you shift it over by two chords to make vi IV I V

in fact, that last one is probably my favorite rock progression ever... I use it in almost all of my songs

edit: wait did this just get moved from unmod to gendisc it's the apocalypse

[DragonFireKai]

edit: wait did this just get moved from unmod to gendisc it's the apocalypse

Yup, the commies are taking everything.

[FiremanJoe]

-Not all pop(ular) music is bad

-People are stupid

-Hating something for it's popularity/liking something for it's indie-ness is also stupid

-Hating entire genres is stupid.

-There's always an exception to the rule.

The way I see it is this: If you create something that even the lowest lifeform can enjoy, it'll sell well, because there's just so many of that lifeform. Manufactured music is easily digested. Stupid people rarely want to think about what they're listening to. You don't have to listen to the radio or watch Mtv. Searching out new music on your own will do you a world of good, regardless of style.

[eternal Zero]

yes it did, you just don't understand music

he posted a very common chord progression used in pop music

I'm sorry, but this amuses me greatly. /elitism

[FuriousFure]

so when you guys say "music" you mean the words too? see, i'm under the impression that music would be discribed as the sounds that make up the melody or whatnot. and the words in that song (if any) would be called the "lyrics"

so saying pop MUSIC is shallow doesn't make any sense. saying the lyrics are shallow makes perfect sense to me. come to think of it, most lyrics you hear on the radio( anyone still listen to the radio?) are shallow and worthless, but not all. some songs tell great stories or express what the artist is feeling. but too few and far apart sadly.

Simon and Garfunkle are my key example of great songs. their songs are simply meaningful poetry put to beautiful flowing music

Classical is the way to go.

[PriZm]

yes it did, you just don't understand music

he posted a very common chord progression used in pop music

....

I wasn't serious.

--pZm

[Coffeeholic]

-Hating entire genres is stupid.

No it's not. Listen to some Brazilian funk and you'll see how much you're wrong.

I think everyone has at least one genre they'd prefer to cut their ears off than to listen to it.

[SwordBreaker]

My problem with pop music is that everything sounds the same these days. Aside from some unique sounds from Justin Timberlake's latest release, I'm not feeling any vibe from other people. It's the same case with R&B.

Man...the old days of George Michael and Micheal Jackson were the best.

[PriZm]

No it's not. Listen to some Brazilian funk and you'll see how much you're wrong.

I think everyone has at least one genre they'd prefer to cut their ears off than to listen to it.

True enough. What's wrong is saying an entire genre is uninspired bullshit. There are certain musical elements that make a genre a genre, and you're free to dislike it, but not say it makes the whole genre shit and that people who listen to it are stupid.