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Author Topic: 2016 - A New Low?  (Read 10474 times)
JK
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« Reply #25 on: April 14, 2016, 02:58:44 PM »

I've 100% convinced that most of today's pop sells simply because people can't get the songs out of their head. 

Thanks, maybe, to the videos. I have a distinct aversion to videos.

I have never heard (and enjoyed) as much new music as I have done since joining this forum. My other forum has its surprises too, but this one has many more posters and a mind-bogglingly wide spectrum of tastes. Thank you, folks.

As for 2016, I'm sure there will be much to love musically about this year. If not now, then in a few years' time, when we only have the best of 2016 to contend with....     
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"Ik bun moar een eenvoudige boerenlul en doar schoam ik mien niet veur" (Normaal, 1978)
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« Reply #26 on: April 14, 2016, 07:19:27 PM »

I'm actually less likely to watch the music videos for popular videos. I don't think I saw the Hotline Bling video until late 2015/early 2016. But then when I ask people if they've seen Foster the People's music videos (which I think are quite weird and artsy and fun), nobody seems to know about them.
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"We are pushed to the wall as the heap fills the room to its limits. The window breaks. The house bursts. A heartbreakingly fine Scotch plaid passes before our eyes. Pinstripes carry us into Manhasset Bay."
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« Reply #27 on: April 14, 2016, 08:31:02 PM »

My thumb is really off the pulse of modern artists. I don't know half the new artists that have any talent, because A. how the hell do you find them anyway? (and I'm pretty skilled at finding obscure, even homemade artists from any other decade)
IndieShuffle
SoundCloud
birp.fm
bandcamp
Free Samplers (of Montreal's in there somewhere)
reddit: Music in general, indie
Pitchfork: I'm attracted to albums with interesting covers, ha. Pretty sure that's how I found out about artists like Blur and Battles and other weird artists.
The "What are you listening to now thread?"

Sorry to overwhelm you, but I actually struggle finding time to listen to EVERYTHING that's out there. I know some newer artists but not nearly as much as I could, even when I try really hard. I can be pretty picky with the modern artists I like, too. But give it some time. It's totally worth it. Smiley

Another thing I'll do, especially after getting a lot of new music, is put my whole iPod on shuffle. Then I'll walk around campus with headphones on. I've made a few good discoveries that way.
« Last Edit: April 14, 2016, 10:29:06 PM by undercover-m » Logged

"We are pushed to the wall as the heap fills the room to its limits. The window breaks. The house bursts. A heartbreakingly fine Scotch plaid passes before our eyes. Pinstripes carry us into Manhasset Bay."
alf wiedersehen
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« Reply #28 on: April 14, 2016, 09:34:03 PM »

My thumb is really off the pulse of modern artists. I don't know half the new artists that have any talent, because A. how the hell do you find them anyway? (and I'm pretty skilled at finding obscure, even homemade artists from any other decade) and B. 95% is absolute garbage.

It's unfortunate this decade doesn't have the culturally-ingrained endless-feedback-loop circle jerk that convinces everyone to buy garbage like the 60's does.

box-sets of previously recorded music

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« Last Edit: April 14, 2016, 09:45:43 PM by Hüsker Düde » Logged
Emily
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« Reply #29 on: April 14, 2016, 09:40:32 PM »

Husker dude.  Cheesy I like it.
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JK
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« Reply #30 on: April 15, 2016, 04:12:52 AM »

I'm attracted to albums with interesting covers, ha. Pretty sure that's how I found out about artists like Blur and Battles and other weird artists.

Haha. Battles are cool. They made this great single with Gary Numan, another of my idols:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkgQ88G8Hj8

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« Reply #31 on: April 15, 2016, 05:07:32 AM »

After you guys were talking about that discover weekly thing I decided to download spotify and seem to have found a decent avenue for 'discovering' new artists. If it stops crashing, at least. Anyone else ever experience that? Or do I just need a new laptop?
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the captain
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« Reply #32 on: April 15, 2016, 05:26:44 AM »

I use the free Spotify on my laptop (Mac) and it sucks. It's the slowest to load, to run, etc. Doesn't usually crash, but it is trash. And yet, hey, it's free and has a lot of music. So...

To aid you in your search and save you time on trying out sh*t, I'd stick mostly to recommendations from people in the new music thread over just random site- (or magazine-, or whatever corporate entity-) recommended new releases. Not that they may not turn out well. Personally I just trust people's opinions more, especially as some familiarity of tastes builds.
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« Reply #33 on: April 15, 2016, 05:50:20 AM »

I use the free Spotify on my laptop (Mac) and it sucks. It's the slowest to load, to run, etc. Doesn't usually crash, but it is trash. And yet, hey, it's free and has a lot of music. So...

To aid you in your search and save you time on trying out sh*t, I'd stick mostly to recommendations from people in the new music thread over just random site- (or magazine-, or whatever corporate entity-) recommended new releases. Not that they may not turn out well. Personally I just trust people's opinions more, especially as some familiarity of tastes builds.

In my issue of Classic Rock magazine, they include a sampler CD of new music each month.  It's a mix of newer acts and new music from the classic artists.  Granted, you have to sift through a lot, but that's how I first heard Wolfmother, Blood Ceremony, Purson, Ghost, Rival Sons, Dragonforce, and Airbourne. 
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the captain
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« Reply #34 on: April 15, 2016, 05:54:40 AM »

I use the free Spotify on my laptop (Mac) and it sucks. It's the slowest to load, to run, etc. Doesn't usually crash, but it is trash. And yet, hey, it's free and has a lot of music. So...

To aid you in your search and save you time on trying out sh*t, I'd stick mostly to recommendations from people in the new music thread over just random site- (or magazine-, or whatever corporate entity-) recommended new releases. Not that they may not turn out well. Personally I just trust people's opinions more, especially as some familiarity of tastes builds.

In my issue of Classic Rock magazine, they include a sampler CD of new music each month.  It's a mix of newer acts and new music from the classic artists.  Granted, you have to sift through a lot, but that's how I first heard Wolfmother, Blood Ceremony, Purson, Ghost, Rival Sons, Dragonforce, and Airbourne. 

In the mid-00s I used to write for a music site and thus got dozens of promo CDs every month to check out. (Yes, in those days, we still used CDs. It was kind of a heavy and bulky endeavor.) Actually the vast majority was somewhere between mediocre and crap, but it was nice to have something entirely unexpected every now and again. That was how I came across what later became favorites like Puerto Muerto, Herman Dune, Voxtrot, and Fiery Furnaces, to name a few. But really, a LOT was just dreck. I still like good old recommendations from friends most of all.
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Demon-Fighting Genius; Patronizing Twaddler; Argumentative, Sanctimonious Prick; Sensationalist Dullard; and Douche who (occasionally to rarely) puts songs here.

No interest in your assorted grudges and nonsense.
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« Reply #35 on: April 15, 2016, 06:05:23 AM »

I use the free Spotify on my laptop (Mac) and it sucks. It's the slowest to load, to run, etc. Doesn't usually crash, but it is trash. And yet, hey, it's free and has a lot of music. So...

To aid you in your search and save you time on trying out sh*t, I'd stick mostly to recommendations from people in the new music thread over just random site- (or magazine-, or whatever corporate entity-) recommended new releases. Not that they may not turn out well. Personally I just trust people's opinions more, especially as some familiarity of tastes builds.

In my issue of Classic Rock magazine, they include a sampler CD of new music each month.  It's a mix of newer acts and new music from the classic artists.  Granted, you have to sift through a lot, but that's how I first heard Wolfmother, Blood Ceremony, Purson, Ghost, Rival Sons, Dragonforce, and Airbourne. 

In the mid-00s I used to write for a music site and thus got dozens of promo CDs every month to check out. (Yes, in those days, we still used CDs. It was kind of a heavy and bulky endeavor.) Actually the vast majority was somewhere between mediocre and crap, but it was nice to have something entirely unexpected every now and again. That was how I came across what later became favorites like Puerto Muerto, Herman Dune, Voxtrot, and Fiery Furnaces, to name a few. But really, a LOT was just dreck. I still like good old recommendations from friends most of all.

I get recommendations from friends every now and again, especially the ones I used to work with when I was in radio.  Sometimes they hit. 

I was still in radio when The Darkness hit the states in 2003.  So, I got to find out about them and even see them live months before they first single hit the airwaves.  Still one of my favorite bands of the 2000s.
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SMiLE Brian
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« Reply #36 on: April 15, 2016, 06:06:46 AM »

Thats the great thing about online streaming services, it has maybe helped to heal the fragmentation of music in the 21st century. The suggested artists links are great for expanding horizons.
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the captain
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« Reply #37 on: April 15, 2016, 06:12:34 AM »

The only negative about fragmentation in my view is if one sticks to one fragment. But in terms of diversification and availability of broader ranges of music, it's never been better. So that, I love.
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« Reply #38 on: April 15, 2016, 06:34:31 AM »

It seems with each passing year though, it gets tougher for me to find time to seek out new artists. 

I'm still going backwards and finding stuff I like. 
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the captain
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« Reply #39 on: April 15, 2016, 06:39:20 AM »

I think that's a natural part of aging. Everyone I've known says that. Older friends, family, and acquaintances have always said as much, "I stopped paying attention to new music in my [teens, twenties, whatever]." Jobs, relationships, family, etc. It just gets harder to find the time, not to mention interest.

After Radiohead's Kid A was released in 2000 or whatever, there was a big, scathing review in ... The New Yorker? Something unusual like that. But the main point of it was really along those lines, actually: "I don't have time to figure this sh*t out." It talked about how a 15-year-old can obsess, can listen and re-listen, but once one grows up, that's just not the way life works. I disagreed vehemently with that being a negative about that album--I loved and love that album--but the underlying assumption was true. Most of us just have more time and energy in our younger days for such things.
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« Reply #40 on: April 15, 2016, 06:45:36 AM »

I think that's a natural part of aging. Everyone I've known says that. Older friends, family, and acquaintances have always said as much, "I stopped paying attention to new music in my [teens, twenties, whatever]." Jobs, relationships, family, etc. It just gets harder to find the time, not to mention interest.

After Radiohead's Kid A was released in 2000 or whatever, there was a big, scathing review in ... The New Yorker? Something unusual like that. But the main point of it was really along those lines, actually: "I don't have time to figure this sh*t out." It talked about how a 15-year-old can obsess, can listen and re-listen, but once one grows up, that's just not the way life works. I disagreed vehemently with that being a negative about that album--I loved and love that album--but the underlying assumption was true. Most of us just have more time and energy in our younger days for such things.

So true.  When I was single, and I got a new album, I could take the time to listen to it many times to really get into it. 

Prime example, one of my favorite bands of all time is Iron Maiden.  They've gone is a more progressive direction in the 2000s, so their new albums demand attention and repeating listens to really get a feel for them (a music director once told me you need to listen to an album at least three times to get a true feel for it). 

In 2010, when they put out The Final Frontier, I knew that album front to back two weeks after the release date. 

In Sept 2015, they released Book of Souls, their most ambitious album to date.  Seven months later, I'm still trying to get a feel for some of the tracks. 

Plus, since I don't have as much time to listen to music these days, when I do, I gravitate to the albums I already love.  It's like, I could go on the internet and seek out something, or I can listen to Quadrophenia for the first time in two years. 
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Emily
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« Reply #41 on: April 15, 2016, 06:49:09 AM »

Nobody likes to think that as they age they 'get old'. But we do.  Sad I try hard to keep an open mind and not react to new music with my old-person prejudices, and I've found some new things I really like, but I certainly don't have the new music compulsion that I had when I was younger.
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« Reply #42 on: April 15, 2016, 06:52:36 AM »

Nobody likes to think that as they age they 'get old'. But we do.  Sad I try hard to keep an open mind and not react to new music with my old-person prejudices, and I've found some new things I really like, but I certainly don't have the new music compulsion that I had when I was younger.

Quite frankly, I don't think anyone should be worried about what's perceived as "old-person prejudices."  You like what you like. 

I've had "old-person prejudice" against much new music since I was in my teens.  I've still found some good new stuff along the way. 
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the captain
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« Reply #43 on: April 15, 2016, 06:55:33 AM »

This phenomenon--gravitating to music we already like in lieu of trying new things, as KDS said, and old-person prejudices, as Emily said--is why I try to keep myself and others on all sides of the debate (as if it were a serious issue!) dispassionate about it.

To me, the ranting and raving about how bad things are these days, that's such a blatant rehash of what every aging person in the history of the western world has said as to be laughable. Why would it suddenly be REALLY true this time? To feel that way is about the listener, not the music itself. It's the predictable (and understandable) opinion of someone who has strong emotional attachments to music already, and who has less time and energy for new things. That's fine. But it's really not about the new music, then. No reason to get all up in a huff about your own personal lifestyle, preferences, etc.

And the "old music sucks" opposite opinion--obvviously not found much on a board like this--is equally idiotic. The kid in her teens is of course enamored with the new thing, with what her friends are listening to, with the soundtrack to her first kiss or wild night out, while generally opposed to the music of the generation(s) against which she's rebelling at that particular moment.

It's just so predictable, so common, and so not about music.  
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« Reply #44 on: April 15, 2016, 07:08:13 AM »

Capt,

I'm going to go ahead and play devil's advocate about this since I'm the OP, and I started this because, as I said new pop had hit a new low. 

Maybe it's my aging, I don't know.  But I also know I'm not alone at all in this. 

Usually, if a certain song/style/genre isn't my cup of tea, I can at least understand why people like it. 

Examples:

The Beach Boys - Love You is one of my least favorite BB albums, but I get why people enjoy it.

I'm not a fan of Michael Jackson's music.  But, I'll acknowledge those are well crafted pop songs.  Just not my cup of tea.

I'm not a Garth Brooks fan, but he's a first rate entertainer.  Country's just not by thing. 

Basically, I'm saying that while I don't like this stuff, I think there's a level of talent there.   If I hear Michael Jackson or Garth Brooks at a bar or grocery store, its not fingernails on a chalkboard. 

I don't hear that level of talent now.  Just about every pop song I've heard in the last four or five years is just an ear worm to me. 

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the captain
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« Reply #45 on: April 15, 2016, 07:12:36 AM »

Totally fair. And I don't mean to say that the pop music world (any more than any other topic) is so one-dimensional. There absolutely is such a thing as talent, right? We agree on that. So if so, and if different people have different levels of talent, it does stand to reason that over time there will most likely be different amounts of talent among the numbers of popular musicians out there. So sure, when all is said and done, it might turn out that there are particularly good and bad years. (In hindsight, many fans and critics alike point to 1965-68, for example. It's hard to deny that those years had an enormous quantity of music we now consider brilliant.)

Maybe my point would be that while we're in the moment and subject to our own biases, it might be hard for us to make big-picture judgments.

Of course we don't have to make big-picture judgments. We're perfectly entitled to our opinions and our own worlds. My main point is just to let history worry about it.

I still do disagree with you on the merit of earworms, which is a whole other discussion.
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« Reply #46 on: April 15, 2016, 07:13:08 AM »

Not everyone's approach but I try to think through and remove from my thinking as best I can any prejudices.
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JK
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« Reply #47 on: April 15, 2016, 07:15:26 AM »

What I see all the time on YouTube is the "I was born at the wrong time" argument of young people, who enthuse about tracks from the sixties and say the stuff today is shite, before wheeling out all the usual suspects. I don't know----it just seems a bit short-sighted to me.
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"Ik bun moar een eenvoudige boerenlul en doar schoam ik mien niet veur" (Normaal, 1978)
You're Grass and I'm a Power Mower: A Beach Boys Orchestration Web Series
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« Reply #48 on: April 15, 2016, 07:17:36 AM »

What I see all the time on YouTube is the "I was born at the wrong time" argument of young people, who enthuse about tracks from the sixties and say the stuff today is shite, before wheeling out all the usual suspects. I don't know----it just seems a bit short-sighted to me.
I think it's an everybody prejudice to say that what they don't like sucks.
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KDS
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« Reply #49 on: April 15, 2016, 07:17:57 AM »

What I see all the time on YouTube is the "I was born at the wrong time" argument of young people, who enthuse about tracks from the sixties and say the stuff today is shite, before wheeling out all the usual suspects. I don't know----it just seems a bit short-sighted to me.

I couldn't agree with them more.   I know I was born in the wrong era. 
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