Posted on 03/22/2014 2:13:41 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Tony Bennett doesn’t have much patience for most modern music. The legendary singer, 87, told the BBC Radio 4’s Today program that most modern songs lack a “lasting quality.”
“The songs that are written today, most of them are terrible,” he said. “It’s a very bad period, musically, throughout the world for popular music.”
He added that today’s music industry leaders are more concerned with making money than making quality music.
“The corporations took it over and they want to make so much money and they don’t care whether the public likes it or not,” he said. “They think the public is ignorant, so their attitude is, ‘Don’t give them anything intelligent, because it won’t sell.’”
He also criticized what he sees as the music industry’s bias toward younger listeners.
“Today, record companies are failing because they are putting their accent just on the young, and I think that’s rather silly,” he said.
Bennett is a huge fan of one young pop icon, however; he’s collaborating with Lady Gaga on a new jazz album, Cheek to Cheek.
“She’s one of the best singers I ever heard,” Bennett told Parade.com in 2012. “She also plays great piano and dances very well. She’s an all-around great performer…I’ve met so many people in show business over the years and I’m very impressed with her. She’s one of the great talents coming up. She’s going to always surprise everybody with her artistry.”
Watch Bennett and Lady Gaga perform “The Lady Is a Tramp”:
I blame a lot of today’s off the wall antics by entertainers to be a result of the need by the public to see this over the top behavior and not see the need for talent.
I think Madonna may have started it and Miley is certainly capitalizing on it.
I actually listened to the “Lady Is A Tramp” video. GaGa sounds really good. And, politics aside, for a man his age Bennett’s voice is still great.
How about absolutely lacking any quality at all.
There is no "music" being composed today worth listening to.
Tony Bennett is an extreme Obama lover.
See ya, Bennett.
Good songs are still being written, it’s just that you’ll never hear them because liberals run the music industry today and it’s all about promoting the “agenda” more than anything else, music be damned.
*chuckle*
What was the penance for that transgression?
bookmark
She’s not deranged - she knows exactly what she’s doing.
ok. i may regret asking but what is a meat tuxedo?
There are plenty of brilliant composers, musicians and singers around, but I will agree that the music industry seems to be arrogantly useless.
The best musical advertisement that ever existed was MTV, which introduced the music buying public to hundreds of musical acts, that are still remembered today. But it was killed dead, not by the Internet, but by the music industry that could just not stand anybody making money off “their” music. Even if it was free advertising.
Their next mistake was to fight piracy, even if the music was not available for retail, sitting in their libraries. It still introduced the public to hundreds of artists, often they had not heard of before, and they wanted to buy their music.
Instead, the music industry just focuses on the top 20 singles that *they* promote, not that the public want. And usually even if the single is okay, it is sold only as an album with nothing else but filler.
Leftist creep. Who cares what he thinks? About anything.
Johny’s in the basement
Mixing up the medicine
I’m on the pavement
Thinking about the government
The man in the trench coat
Badge out, laid off
Says he’s got a bad cough
Wants to get it paid off
Look out kid
It’s somethin’ you did
God knows when
But you’re doin’ it again
You better duck down the alley way
Lookin’ for a new friend
The man in the coon-skip cap
In the big pen
Wants eleven dollar bills
You only got ten.
Maggie comes fleet foot
Face full of black soot
Talkin’ that the heat put
Plants in the bed but
The phone’s tapped anyway
Maggie says that many say
They must bust in early May
Orders from the DA
Look out kid
Don’t matter what you did
Walk on your tip toes
Don’t try, ‘No Doz’
Better stay away from those
That carry around a fire hose
Keep a clean nose
Watch the plain clothes
You don’t need a weather man
To know which way the wind blows.
Get sick, get well
Hang around an ink well
Ring bell, hard to tell
If anything is goin’ to sell
Try hard, get barred
Get back, write Braille
Get jailed, jump bail Join the army, if you failed
Look out kid
You’re gonna get hit
But losers, cheaters
Six-time users
Hang around the theaters
Girl by the whirlpool
Lookin’ for a new fool
Don’t follow leaders
Watch the parkin’ meters.
Ah get born, keep warm
Short pants, romance, learn to dance
Get dressed, get blessed
Try to be a success
Please her, please him, buy gifts
Don’t steal, don’t lift
Twenty years of schoolin’
And they put you on the day shift
Look out kid
They keep it all hid
Better jump down a manhole
Light yourself a candle
Don’t wear sandals
Try to avoid the scandals
Don’t wanna be a bum
You better chew gum
The pump don’t work
‘Cause the vandals took the handles.
Musicians are expensive - DJ's and backing tracks are cheap. :)
In the 70s studio time was expensive, and you’d better have musicians who knew what they were doing, because you didn’t have the luxury of doing a lot of takes.
I have the album where Lady Gaga sings ‘The Lady is a Tramp’ It’s even better when she sang it with Tony Bennett on TV.
I pretty much agree with him that most music today is terrible. Unfortunately there is no more Bing Crosbys, Frank Sinatras Doras Days, or Peggy Lees.
For more than 500 years music has been deteriorating from the likes of Gregorian Chant,through Mozart etc. to the amplified noise of today. It has generally been the result of the aftermath of a war or upheaval . The survivors take on a different verve and the music pace generally increases until today its become the amplified version of two cats fighting inside a garbage can. I liked the songs and sentiment from the 30’s and 40’s but that is just me. Some of that was pretty bad too but you could at least feel somewhat romantic or relaxed when listening to most of it. Can you imagine a 50 or 60 year old couple looking back on one of today’s gansta’ rap offerings as THEIR SONG?
Rock n roll’s been going downhill ever since Buddy Holly died.
Did you watch/listen to the video? She does a good job of it.
All of Tony Bennett's "duets" are on YouTube. Amy Winehouse, Gloria Estefan, KD Lang, etc
"I've always respected intellectual people and he's an intellect," Bennett said on CNN's "Piers Morgan Tonight."
"He's very bright, highly bright."
That doesn't make up for the other garbage she puts out...Did you hear what she did at SXSW?
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