Today's Mainstream Music

[donald]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song 

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

[retrokid67]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song 

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Yup I sometimes count just to make sure I'm not the one who's crazy  but seriously I don't understand how some of these people make it, it's like they're picked up off the street or something. every time I turn around a new rapper comes out or a new Justin Bieber type kid pops up but they all sound the same to me, I've lost track 

[bluesno1fann]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song  

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Yup I sometimes count just to make sure I'm not the one who's crazy   but seriously I don't understand how some of these people make it, it's like they're picked up off the street or something. every time I turn around a new rapper comes out or a new Justin Bieber type kid pops up but they all sound the same to me, I've lost track  

Yeah, the worst offenders would be the ones from the dreadful ARK Music Factory.
Arseholes constantly picking random 12 year old kids who can't sing sh*t and make shitty music in a failed attempt to make them the next Bieber, and the crappy music they put out ends up ruining the kids lives

[retrokid67]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song 

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Yup I sometimes count just to make sure I'm not the one who's crazy  but seriously I don't understand how some of these people make it, it's like they're picked up off the street or something. every time I turn around a new rapper comes out or a new Justin Bieber type kid pops up but they all sound the same to me, I've lost track 

Yeah, the worst offenders would be the ones from the dreadful ARK Music Factory.
Assholes constantly picking random 12 year old kids who can't sing sh*t and make shitty music in a failed attempt to make them the next Bieber, and the crappy music they put out ends up ruining the kids lives

I know Rebecca Black got death threats, she didn't deserve that but "Friday" had to be the worst song of that year 

[bluesno1fann]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song  

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Yup I sometimes count just to make sure I'm not the one who's crazy   but seriously I don't understand how some of these people make it, it's like they're picked up off the street or something. every time I turn around a new rapper comes out or a new Justin Bieber type kid pops up but they all sound the same to me, I've lost track  

Yeah, the worst offenders would be the ones from the dreadful ARK Music Factory.
Arseholes constantly picking random 12 year old kids who can't sing sh*t and make shitty music in a failed attempt to make them the next Bieber, and the crappy music they put out ends up ruining the kids lives

I know Rebecca Black got death threats, she didn't deserve that but "Friday" had to be the worst song of that year  

Agreed. But she's not the only one. There's others like Alison Gold, Nicole Westbrook and others who I don't want to know.
I hope one day that ARK Music Factory burns to the ground for the good of the music industry!

[the captain]

...they must have been on something when they decided to use auto-tune and put in a rap section.

The whole "if it's rap, it's awful" thing is so tedious. Like it or not--and clearly you don't--rap and hip-hop style in general are the dominant popular musical forces of the past 25 years or so. It's absurd to think that something so dominant could possibly be inherently lacking in value. Isn't it possible that it's a vital and worthwhile form that you just happen not to like? There isn't anything wrong with that, you know. Accepting it (even if you don't like it) doesn't take anything away from the music you do like.

Here is my honest take on rap music: First off I don't think I've ever explored the genre enough to make a very in-depth review of the subject matter.  From what I've heard there is some material that is enjoyable because it has a decent beat to it and I think that along with the fact that it has integrated it's way into the dance scene much like disco did in the late seventies is the main basis for it's appeal.  The only thing I'd comment on aside from that is speaking in the most general terms unless you grew up from somewhat of an impoverished background or at the very least a background in which you had to struggle every step of the way, then I think a great deal of the subject matter that is dealt with in a great deal of rap music is going to be beyond your depth.  I'm not saying you still can't enjoy it or dig the beat or whatever, but I never really bought into all these suburban middle class white kids claiming that they could empathize with Tupac's lyrics or whatnot.  Enjoy them yes, perhaps live vicariously though them but beyond that a great deal of rap music's following has the word farce shining above their heads in neon letters.  Not sure that speaks badly of the music or whatnot but something I've observed over the years nonetheless.

Edit: To illustrate my point, I remember in the mid nineties when rap was just starting to come into it's own (post MC Hammer crap), Mike Judge had his cartoons "Beavis & Butthead" comment on a Snoop Dogg rap video.  Beavis begins to empathize with the lyrics claiming that he "grew up in Compton" and was "West Side Since He Was Ten Years Old" and is quickly put down by Butt-Head who tells him "The only thing you were doing when you were ten was going to flea markets with your mom!".  Clearly this was Judge's commentary on rap music's burgeoning fraud fanbase, something which I wholeheartedly agreed with. 

That is an interesting point, but isn't that conflating the music itself with the subject matter for which it's most popular? People rap about a lot of things, with the whole gangsta thing really only popularized in the late '80s or early '90s and even then just being one subgenre. People rap about everything they sing about. If it's about honesty of experience, I'd question that, too, as songwriting is (or at least can be) fiction. See: Beach Boys, for one.

People who aren't rural Mississippi or Chicago area black kids have certainly fallen in love with blues; people not from Memphis or Chicago certainly loved rock and roll? Kids (or adults, for that matter) hopping onto bandwagons for the image of the thing is always annoying, but it's also just the way it goes, especially as the thing becomes commercial (and so moneyed kids can afford it and get a kick out of thinking they're somehow rebels for finding a new music by people their parents don't approve of singing [or rapping] about things their parents don't approve of [anymore because the new thing, despite being from 10,000 feet identical to their own rebel music of a few decades before, is somehow threatening or unappealing to them]).

As for the other posters' sampling debate, it's patently absurd. The creative use of anything, pre-existing or not, is legitimate in making art. You could argue Andy Warhol "sampled" in his visual art. You can point to quotations in music going back centuries in what you'd call classical music. The same thing has always happened in jazz. To put on a record by someone else, hit play, and say it's yours--that's pathetic. But to listen to Paul's Boutique, for example, and think that isn't creative art (despite making use of extensive samples) is baffling.

[retrokid67]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song  

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Yup I sometimes count just to make sure I'm not the one who's crazy   but seriously I don't understand how some of these people make it, it's like they're picked up off the street or something. every time I turn around a new rapper comes out or a new Justin Bieber type kid pops up but they all sound the same to me, I've lost track  

Yeah, the worst offenders would be the ones from the dreadful ARK Music Factory.
Arseholes constantly picking random 12 year old kids who can't sing sh*t and make shitty music in a failed attempt to make them the next Bieber, and the crappy music they put out ends up ruining the kids lives

I know Rebecca Black got death threats, she didn't deserve that but "Friday" had to be the worst song of that year  

Agreed. But she's not the only one. There's others like Alison Gold, Nicole Westbrook and others who I don't want to know.
I hope one day that ARK Music Factory burns to the ground for the good of the music industry!

Yea they suck too and I'm in complete agreement with you I'll take KidzBop over them  

[the captain]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song 

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Does it bum you out not being able to listen to the likes of "I Get Around"  and "Do You Wanna Dance" anymore?

[bluesno1fann]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song  

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Yup I sometimes count just to make sure I'm not the one who's crazy   but seriously I don't understand how some of these people make it, it's like they're picked up off the street or something. every time I turn around a new rapper comes out or a new Justin Bieber type kid pops up but they all sound the same to me, I've lost track  

Yeah, the worst offenders would be the ones from the dreadful ARK Music Factory.
Arseholes constantly picking random 12 year old kids who can't sing sh*t and make shitty music in a failed attempt to make them the next Bieber, and the crappy music they put out ends up ruining the kids lives

I know Rebecca Black got death threats, she didn't deserve that but "Friday" had to be the worst song of that year  

Agreed. But she's not the only one. There's others like Alison Gold, Nicole Westbrook and others who I don't want to know.
I hope one day that ARK Music Factory burns to the ground for the good of the music industry!

Yea they suck too and I'm in complete agreement with you I'll take KidzBop over them  

I've actually never heard of Kidzbop 
Just searched them up, I'm going to avoid their "music" at all costs

[bluesno1fann]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song 

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Does it bum you out not being able to listen to the likes of "I Get Around"  and "Do You Wanna Dance" anymore?

Those two songs aren't too repetitive. The same can't be said about a lot of recent songs

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

There are creative uses for samples...for me, it's if they're used in a fashion where the sampled track sounds very different from the original to the point where it takes a while to be able to tell what it was that sampled in the first place. From personal experience, I once sampled the opening from the a capella version of Brian Wilson's 'Your Imagination'...slowed it way the hell down, and reversed it. It sounded dark and evil, and only a keen ear could tell what it was originally. I also once sampled a whole bunch of body sounds (joint popping, finger snapping, ect) and used it to form a rhythm track for a song. As far as just taking a song, sampling it, and not making any changes, I'm not really cool with it except for one thing...when it's a song that today's youth may have not known about, sometimes they can be motivated to find the original song, exposing them to something they may not have heard otherwise. That can be a good thing.

[the captain]

One thing that annoys me about some of today's stuff is how some artists repeat the same line 30+ times in a 3 minute song 

I've heard some of those songs.   so I have a new rule;    After the third repetition, I change the channel or push the skip button.

Does it bum you out not being able to listen to the likes of "I Get Around"  and "Do You Wanna Dance" anymore?

Those two songs aren't too repetitive. The same can't be said about a lot of recent songs

You're joking, I assume (because it would be an uncharitable assumption otherwise).

"Do You Wanna Dance?" begins every verse with "Do ya wanna dance?." The refrain, which occurs several times through the song, is:

Do ya do ya do ya do ya wanna dance?
Do ya do ya do ya do ya wanna dance?
Do ya do ya do ya do ya wanna dance?

I Get Around refrain background vox, also repeated several times:

Get around round round I get around.
Get around round round I get around.
Get around round round I get around.
Get around round round I get around.

[JohnMill]

...they must have been on something when they decided to use auto-tune and put in a rap section.

The whole "if it's rap, it's awful" thing is so tedious. Like it or not--and clearly you don't--rap and hip-hop style in general are the dominant popular musical forces of the past 25 years or so. It's absurd to think that something so dominant could possibly be inherently lacking in value. Isn't it possible that it's a vital and worthwhile form that you just happen not to like? There isn't anything wrong with that, you know. Accepting it (even if you don't like it) doesn't take anything away from the music you do like.

Here is my honest take on rap music: First off I don't think I've ever explored the genre enough to make a very in-depth review of the subject matter.  From what I've heard there is some material that is enjoyable because it has a decent beat to it and I think that along with the fact that it has integrated it's way into the dance scene much like disco did in the late seventies is the main basis for it's appeal.  The only thing I'd comment on aside from that is speaking in the most general terms unless you grew up from somewhat of an impoverished background or at the very least a background in which you had to struggle every step of the way, then I think a great deal of the subject matter that is dealt with in a great deal of rap music is going to be beyond your depth.  I'm not saying you still can't enjoy it or dig the beat or whatever, but I never really bought into all these suburban middle class white kids claiming that they could empathize with Tupac's lyrics or whatnot.  Enjoy them yes, perhaps live vicariously though them but beyond that a great deal of rap music's following has the word farce shining above their heads in neon letters.  Not sure that speaks badly of the music or whatnot but something I've observed over the years nonetheless.

Edit: To illustrate my point, I remember in the mid nineties when rap was just starting to come into it's own (post MC Hammer crap), Mike Judge had his cartoons "Beavis & Butthead" comment on a Snoop Dogg rap video.  Beavis begins to empathize with the lyrics claiming that he "grew up in Compton" and was "West Side Since He Was Ten Years Old" and is quickly put down by Butt-Head who tells him "The only thing you were doing when you were ten was going to flea markets with your mom!".  Clearly this was Judge's commentary on rap music's burgeoning fraud fanbase, something which I wholeheartedly agreed with. 

That is an interesting point, but isn't that conflating the music itself with the subject matter for which it's most popular? People rap about a lot of things, with the whole gangsta thing really only popularized in the late '80s or early '90s and even then just being one subgenre. People rap about everything they sing about. If it's about honesty of experience, I'd question that, too, as songwriting is (or at least can be) fiction. See: Beach Boys, for one.

People who aren't rural Mississippi or Chicago area black kids have certainly fallen in love with blues; people not from Memphis or Chicago certainly loved rock and roll? Kids (or adults, for that matter) hopping onto bandwagons for the image of the thing is always annoying, but it's also just the way it goes, especially as the thing becomes commercial (and so moneyed kids can afford it and get a kick out of thinking they're somehow rebels for finding a new music by people their parents don't approve of singing [or rapping] about things their parents don't approve of [anymore because the new thing, despite being from 10,000 feet identical to their own rebel music of a few decades before, is somehow threatening or unappealing to them]).

I don't know, I still go back to my point regarding at least the initial popularity of rap and it fell into three categories.  The people who actually empathized with what was being said in the songs.  The people who just plain enjoyed the music and then the people who lived vicariously through the lyrics.  I contend that it is this third group that was responsible for pushing rap over the top.  In fact I was watching a documentary on some rap artist (It might have been Snoop Dogg) awhile back and they were talking about how during the summer of 1991, sales for this particular rapper's album skyrocketed due to the fact that the music was expanding outside of what was believed at the time to be it's target demographic.  Which means in layman's terms that suburban kids were buying this rap music and trying to pass off that they could actually relate to the songs.  I guess you can make the argument either way that if a songwriter is passionate enough about what he writes about then his audience is going to be able to more easily buy into what he is saying.  The Beach Boys were particularly good at this with all their surfing songs despite the fact that aside from Dennis, none of them were avid surfers.  Yet they sold that image to the masses and since the masses knew no different and the music were enjoyable to boot, that for better or worse became their image and one that persists to this day.

The problem a lot of people have with rap music is (or at least used to have) is that it seemed to provide nourishment for a lot of kids who were marginally angry about something in their lives.  These aspects of their lives which they were angry about, were more times than not miniscule at best and yet they found misplaced solace or kinship in the lyrics of a lot of these rap songs which were written by very angry and perhaps justifiably angry people.  You then had these kids who were marginally angry to begin with using rap music as a means of constantly feeding their anger until that anger turned into aggression and that is where a lot of the arguments against rap music came from.  Was rap music or any type of music that spoke of aggressive tendencies responsible for aggressive actions in it's listeners?  In my opinion, absolutely not but again it goes back to the idea of the way an audience can oftentimes try to identify with the artist when they have no business doing so in the first place and that happens across the board.  When Kurt Cobain killed himself in 1994, the were several copycat suicides in the weeks after by Nirvana fans because they for some reason felt whatever problems they were going through in their life were as insurmountable as Kurt Cobain's allegedly were.  Now if that doesn't speak of ridiculous thinking, I don't know what does.  But there is a viable connection there and a lot of it goes back to this notion of misplaced identification of pop culture heroes or their work. 

[Kurosawa]

...they must have been on something when they decided to use auto-tune and put in a rap section.

The whole "if it's rap, it's awful" thing is so tedious. Like it or not--and clearly you don't--rap and hip-hop style in general are the dominant popular musical forces of the past 25 years or so. It's absurd to think that something so dominant could possibly be inherently lacking in value. Isn't it possible that it's a vital and worthwhile form that you just happen not to like? There isn't anything wrong with that, you know. Accepting it (even if you don't like it) doesn't take anything away from the music you do like.

Here is my honest take on rap music: First off I don't think I've ever explored the genre enough to make a very in-depth review of the subject matter.  From what I've heard there is some material that is enjoyable because it has a decent beat to it and I think that along with the fact that it has integrated it's way into the dance scene much like disco did in the late seventies is the main basis for it's appeal.  The only thing I'd comment on aside from that is speaking in the most general terms unless you grew up from somewhat of an impoverished background or at the very least a background in which you had to struggle every step of the way, then I think a great deal of the subject matter that is dealt with in a great deal of rap music is going to be beyond your depth.  I'm not saying you still can't enjoy it or dig the beat or whatever, but I never really bought into all these suburban middle class white kids claiming that they could empathize with Tupac's lyrics or whatnot.  Enjoy them yes, perhaps live vicariously though them but beyond that a great deal of rap music's following has the word farce shining above their heads in neon letters.  Not sure that speaks badly of the music or whatnot but something I've observed over the years nonetheless.

Edit: To illustrate my point, I remember in the mid nineties when rap was just starting to come into it's own (post MC Hammer crap), Mike Judge had his cartoons "Beavis & Butthead" comment on a Snoop Dogg rap video.  Beavis begins to empathize with the lyrics claiming that he "grew up in Compton" and was "West Side Since He Was Ten Years Old" and is quickly put down by Butt-Head who tells him "The only thing you were doing when you were ten was going to flea markets with your mom!".  Clearly this was Judge's commentary on rap music's burgeoning fraud fanbase, something which I wholeheartedly agreed with. 

That sort of reminds me of how Ian Anderson said he felt fake playing blues numbers; they were white middle class kids from England, so playing music created by poor black men from the American south just felt fake to him.

I went through a brief period of listening to Dre and Snoop and I actually saw Snoop live once-he had a band with a horn section and everything. It's entertaining, I guess, but it just doesn't touch me, because it's not who I am or where I came from. Neither is blues, but I do love the blues for both the emotion and the instrumental brilliance.

To me, if a performer doesn't have something special going on musically, then I'm just not interested.

Only really huge current acts I like are Adele and Bruno Mars. There's a lot of less popular performers who are actually doing great things, however. People like Tame Impala and Alabama Shakes, etc.

[Myk Luhv]

I don't think people here understand that sampling doesn't have to be -- and almost never is -- just one melody that gets rapped over unchanged. Here's an immortal example of excellent sampling: "Jessica" by Herbie Hancock sampled for "Shook Ones, Pt. II" by Mobb Deep, which was created by Havoc, also one of the group's rappers. Clams Casino is another producer these days that is untouchable, his three instrumental mixtapes -- from 2011, 2012 and 2013 respectively -- are all stellar. It's not as if these things take no effort to think up and actually make happen since beat-makers aren't usually just using one sample; often it will be very many, sometimes hundreds. Of course, you have to keep in mind that after the Biz got sued for sample clearance in 1993 this basically made sampling financially prohibitive for a lot of labels and artists because the costs associated with clearing samples are often ridiculously high. You might then still be able to make a sample-heavy album like It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back or Three Feet High And Rising these days but the costs would be so much more because all the samples (many of which might not be able to get identified even by the people who made the beats!) would need to be cleared. I think that's a damn shame but it has for better or worse forced hip-hop beat-makers to be inventive in different ways, sampling or otherwise. This song is everything I love about Danny Brown, and the beat is absolutely insane: "ODB", which I think was produced by Paul White but I'm not certain. It was very unfortunately left off his last album, Old, because they couldn't clear some sample.

[Ron]

Today's Mainstream music I can't really get into, but I learned a long time ago that you can't really deny that other people may be moved or entertained by stuff that just sounds like crap to you.  It's been going on since the beginning of time, or at least the 50's when kids started liking things their parents or older adults couldn't understand.  

Also if you open your ears a little bit, don't be surprised to hear some pretty good songs underneath all that annoyance that the latest pop star is throwing your way.  

Recently, on "America's Got Talent", there was a pretty cool group of a guy and his girlfriend called "Alex & Sierra".  They sang, several times, some newer stuff like 1 Direction songs, and surprisingly, it was pretty damn good.  

Here's a good example, a 1 Direction song, sang by a couple people with talent, with a little bit different production and vibe, showing that it's a pretty good song that holds up IMHO.

Alex & Sierra  - Best Song Ever

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=hROdUDSoHUI#t=108

[Ron]

I read a lot of the posts about how there are a lot of acts with little talent, that make repetitive songs or whatever and thought I'd mention something I've noticed.

IN MY OPINION (and it's just my opinion, you may or may not agree) a certain phenomenon happens over and over again in music.  There are essentially a few types of musicians, or singers.

1. legitimately talented singers.  Guys like Bruno Mars... that guy is very talented.  The reason he is successful, is because he's talented.  Period.

2. People that aren't very talented, but are successful because they have something else extraordinary... usually, this is charisma. 

So you'll get somebody like Snoop Dogg, who arguably is talented (I think he is, when he wants to work hard at it), but generally got famous on his CHARISMA.  The reason Snoop was so successful was because he's got a ton of Charisma... people from 5 years old to 90 years old, generally like the guy, even if they don't like his music or would never listen to it.  This is a guy who was in prison for selling crack; almost went to prison for murdering a guy in a park... but is completely capable of making cartoons, appearing at awards shows, doing cameos in comedies, doing commericals for major retail companies like Pepsi... the guy has talent, but more importantly has that "IT" factor that means he doesn't even HAVE to have talent.  He can write any rap song he wants, and no matter how bad, some people will like it because they like HIM. 


So this rare second type of musician opens the door for the third type of musician

3. Talentless copycat.  This is the person that sees Snoop write lines like "Snoops Upside your Head, Snoop's Upside your head!" and thinks "Hey! I can do that".  Not only do they not have any talent as a songwriter, or a singer, or rapper, or whatever, but they also don't have the charisma Snoop has.  They still get some fanbase and everything, but there's hardly anything original or unique or even redeeming about what they do.



This happens all the time, Taylor Swift is a good example.  She's a great songwriter, but not a very good singer... so since she's so successful (beacuse she's such a great songwriter!), it makes everybody who can't sing worth a sh*t say 'Hey! I could do that" and you get 30 country singers who can't sing worth a sh*t releasing records and record labels actually singing them hoping they have the next Taylor Swift.

Same thing with Beiber mentioned above.  He's talented.  The kid can sing.  He also looks good... so now any kid who looks good thinks he can be as big as Beiber but they don't have the chops to pull it off.   

The outlyers like Snoop, or Taylor Swift really screw it all up for us, lol.  Another rapper that pulls the same thing off is Flavor Flav.  He has 0 talent but the guy's pretty cool, he has a lot of Charisma.  Now every crackhead with something hanging off their neck thinks they can be big, lol.  Old Dirty Bastard.  The guy was talented as hell but it launched about 30 crackhead rappers who have a similar ridiculous style and none of them can pull it off.  Garth Brooks comes along and does country music with a rock and roll influence... gets huge... and now half the sh*t on the country channel is really horrible country music with the guitars cranked up to max and compression drowning everything out, guys trying to sing like Rock Stars but don't know a G from an F. 

It always starts with somebody who gets over on some extra-ordinary part of their character (Taylor's songwriting skills... Snoop's personality...Lisa Loeb's geeky good looks... whatever) and then you get a whole sea of no-talent copycats who try to do the same thing without the extra-ordinary character trait.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Great post, Ron. Also agree re: Bruno Mars. He is somebody who has both style AND substance, and would be big in any era. I actually get a Marvin Gaye vibe from him.

[Ron]

Yeah, he's a good example of why you can't just write off EVERYTHING modern.  There's plenty more like him (talented) too, you just have to open your eyes.  I would also offer up Pink as a very talented 'modern' artist.  She's good, really good IMHO.

Pink - Who Knew? (Live Acoustic)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Rk1YDRjbIo

How anybody could write off somebody like that is beyond me.  THAT's modern, mainstream music.  That's how good songs have always been written.  Look how at ease she is singing some a effortless song, because she wrote it and understands what the song means.  No faking emotion, no trying to inflect the important parts... she wrote the song, it reflects her, so when she sings it it's natural and sounds authentic.  A-R-T-I-S-T like Picasso

[the captain]

I was hoping you'd post in this thread, Ron. Both your insights and taste are always refreshing to me (even when I disagree).

[Ron]

Thank you, that's very kind of you to say. 

[the captain]

Thank you, that's very kind of you to say. 

And now I'm going to start trashing you and your opinions... 

No, seriously, I just always appreciate that you can speak to and from what I'll call both populist and elitist positions when it comes to music. In my experience here, you are conversant in both sides and are capable of seeing the value in each without trashing the other. Diverse tastes, open mind, a certain perspective that includes the big picture / long term, literacy ... that's what I call a good conversationalist.

[Alex]

I don't mind mainstream music, but I don't take it seriously. I'll listen to it with friends, dance to it at clubs; but when I get home and turn on my sound system, you won't hear any of that crap on my speakers.

There is such a lack of humanity in modern mainstream music. I saw this yesterday, I think it applies here:



Says a lot about how shite music is these days.

Really it just says that specific song is shitty. Some days I really wish someone would force Beyonce, Gaga, Rihanna, Pink, etc. at gunpoint to work with Booker T. and Steve Cropper and/or any other surviving Stax guys, or surviving members of the Funk Brothers, or even the Dap-Kings with Mark Ronson producing.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

Shouldn't lump Pink in there...sh*t, that'd probably be one of her dreams come true.

[donald]

Anybody see Beyonce in Cadillac Records?  If you're an old fart like me, don't judge her untill you see the movie.  The woman oozes talent.  I just don't like the material she usually performs.