“Far out Johnny well I heard him say, stretched out back on the waterbed...Bluegrass music is a thing of the past and the same for rockn’roll. So I loaned him two or three dollars and he gave me the latest news... and left me here with a Rolling Stone and the Steam Boat Whistle Blues”
—”SteamBoat Whistle Blues- John Hartford (Aereoplain)
So, FreeperFolks here’s two examples of contemporary solid
music:
Lonesome River Band (Sammy Shelor Banjo Winner w/ Steve Martin): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6yPxxnmCac
Song written by the great Larry Cordle (Murder on Music Row)
AND, “Privateering” new from Mark Knopfler:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VM2IELQilSQ
“Lay with pretty women and drink the demon wine,
to hear the roar of thunder off a shore that isn’t
mine... Privateering.
It’s out there— gotta look. Deo Vindice. (and Go Mitt)
Then there is what is considered “good” music, and what I consider two keys to guaranteed success: (1) Pretentiousness, (2) Avangardism. See examples linked below. (I am afraid this “diva” will soon be fashioned as a new Streisand and we’ll never get rid of her. And why Chris Thile, as good as he is, got the half a million $ genius grant as if he were a starving artist, I dunno.)
http://acltv.com/episode/the-civil-warspunch-brothers/
Pretty much everything, starting with the complete banishing of any semblance of a melody.
According to Aristotle, man is the rational animal; his mind is the source of his distinctive actions, including his creative ones. The process of creativity, in this view, does not consist on gaining a mystic insight or in reacting to a neural twitch; rather, it is a form of thought. If so, the thought of artists, scientists, and other cultural creators would be like that of men in other fields; it too would be guided by a method, by a mode of integration. So the creators of really lousy music such as rap and hip hop are guilty of defective methods of thought.
What’s wrong with music today? Well, for one thing, it isn’t “music”.
We worked with the kids in Sunday School, trying to teach them choruses and hymns, but everyone just screamed words. Then I figured out that they listen to rap mostly, and there is no melody or tune.
I like Jerry Lee Lewis, and The Eagles for secular. For sacred, love the southern gospel quartets.
What passes for “music” today has, for the most part, no heart, no soul and not even a tune that you can hum.
While I love the old r’n’r of the ‘50’s, ‘60’s and ‘70’s, I have switched to Texas Country. The Texas music scene is filled with great artists who have shunned the Nashville sound. Max Stalling, Hayes Carll, Ray Wylie Hubbard, Guy Clark....the list is long and the music is great....helps if you like steel guitars, though.
Almost none are trained musicians who can control their voice. They just belt out, loudly, and they think it's singing.
No thanks.
Technology.
Back in the day, studio time was expensive, so you needed musicians that were good enough to get it recorded in the least amount of time.
Why is rap music so popular with music execs? It’s cheap to produce.
Music, as it’s defined in western culture, contains melody, harmony, and rhythm.
If a piece of aural art is missing any one of the above three components, it’s not music.
You mean that indescribable audible noise I hear on the radio is music?
I haven’t listened to much music since Jim Morrison died.
I don’t think I’ve missed much, either.
Oh, like that rant didn’t apply throughout history.
Only difference now is we can record, distribute, and replay particular performances with ease.
The problem with music today is that the publishing companies have figured out what makes music popular. Figured it out to the point of a Bisquick recipe. This has killed the experimentation in the music business, few are the artists that get to stretch out and try anything new anymore, because the publishing companies want their money back, and they know exactly how to do it. This makes everything that’s popular sound the same, because it is the same.
The good news is that the big music companies don’t have a monopoly, and in the internet age “off brand” music (which is still allowed to experiment) is easy to find. When in doubt Pandora, I’ve never thrown a band at it that was so obscure they couldn’t make a channel out of them (and I’ve got some pretty obscure stuff in my catalog), and once they get a handle on what you like they’ll introduce you to more you like, and a surprising amount will be current.