Music.... Wow, why is it getting worse?

[The Black Adder]

It's absolutely appalling, I listen sometimes in the van, but invariably turn it off cos it's so God awful. May be popular music has run its course? What could possibly come next after the dance music revolution of the 80s/90s?

Indeed... What could we all have expected after the 90s... Ed Sheerean? Who would have thought that!

I do wish the older artists would voice concern and not jump on the band wagon with the old 'Ed is great' line. I was surprised even McCartney did that. He didn't need to suck up like that. He's got more talent in his little toe than Sheeran.

Nobody's controversial anymore.

Sheerans style is something that wound me up about the creative direction of most the dross on the radio. A lot were trying to sound like him and succeeding. You would be hard pressed to think it wasn't him. So filling the airwaves with the same kack seems pointless and/or just lazy. It's truly awful and it seems nobody has the guts to say.

I guess the main players in this shocking exposure to brain dead music are the radio stations and DJs too... Every song they play is 'Great'... Not once does a DJ express a collective or personal account to a track. But then, if they did, they would be an ex DJ. Its all so formalistic and hermetically sown up that even the hosts can't voice a controversial word.

I agree, the end of the 90s (with exception to the odd artist) rang the deathnell of pop. There were some crap in th 90s too like any other decade but nothing like today.





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[Macca]

This is my ongoing gripe.

It is a reflection of the whole of our societal changes over the last 50 years, caused by a conflation of causes.
A shift to the right politically, starting with Thatcher, reduced the rebellious tendencies of the young; they were encouraged to pursue money via business rather than indulge as so many had done in the analytical protesting of the 60s and 70s.

Money tended to become a 'God', individuality was defined by personal acquisition rather than expression, and record companies stopped investing extensively in the artists over the following decades. PWL evolved to make their 'corporate formulaic music', to quote Peter Waterman, "Its just something for the kids to have fun with". It certainly was for me not art. They were indeed 'so lucky, lucky, lucky'.

The equipment available now does everything for the (supposed0 writer, no real ability is required, no virtuoso singing or mastering of an instrument. Just get a computer and loop a load of sounds, correct any errors on the screen, and produce yet another vacuous pallid bit of crap. If you are female, make sure your teeth are perfect as are your boobs and arse, if exaggerated, and hope to get rich and famous with that.

The young are too worried about their future to be rebelliously complaining, look at the pressures to which they are subjected.
I have yet to hear on the media anything resembling profoundly moving art containing powerful statements, sung with a real feeling for the writing, and which exposes new truths about life.

King Crimson's Epitaph, Steve Miller's Return to Eden, anyone? The words of both fit the dire state of the world we have produced.

I don't agree with the Thatcher thing (is there anything she's not supposedly to blame for?), loads of good bands came out of the early 1980s because everyone was on the dole and life was hard, they had the time and the motivation to make good music. The 80s wasn't just SAW.


I take the opposite view - that Youngsters today have it too easy, that's why their music is bland and crap and their films are mostly childlike super hero rubbish.

[Pigmy Pony]

Indeed... What could we all have expected after the 90s... Ed Sheerean? Who would have thought that!

I do wish the older artists would voice concern and not jump on the band wagon with the old 'Ed is great' line. I was surprised even McCartney did that. He didn't need to suck up like that. He's got more talent in his little toe than Sheeran.

Nobody's controversial anymore.

Sheerans style is something that wound me up about the creative direction of most the dross on the radio. A lot were trying to sound like him and succeeding. You would be hard pressed to think it wasn't him. So filling the airwaves with the same kack seems pointless and/or just lazy. It's truly awful and it seems nobody has the guts to say.

I guess the main players in this shocking exposure to brain dead music are the radio stations and DJs too... Every song they play is 'Great'... Not once does a DJ express a collective or personal account to a track. But then, if they did, they would be an ex DJ. Its all so formalistic and hermetically sown up that even the hosts can't voice a controversial word.

I agree, the end of the 90s (with exception to the odd artist) rang the deathnell of pop. There were some crap in th 90s too like any other decade but nothing like today.





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A song came on the radio earlier this week which I thought was Ed Sheeran. I commented to my lad and he was most offended as he is a big Sheeran fan (don't blame me, he's not my son, just my partner's). Turns out it was Michael Buble

[The Black Adder]

A song came on the radio earlier this week which I thought was Ed Sheeran. I commented to my lad and he was most offended as he is a big Sheeran fan (don't blame me, he's not my son, just my partner's). Turns out it was Michael Buble

Doh!.... Haha. Exactly.

I'm really not a bubble fan either. If I want to listen to a crooner, I'll listen to a real one.

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[The Black Adder]

I don't agree with the Thatcher thing (is there anything she's not supposedly to blame for?), loads of good bands came out of the early 1980s because everyone was on the dole and life was hard, they had the time and the motivation to make good music. The 80s wasn't just SAW.


I take the opposite view - that Youngsters today have it too easy, that's why their music is bland and crap and their films are mostly childlike super hero rubbish.

I kind of agree with the point made that rebellion was somewhat diluted with thatcher. But, creativity was still there and even though I wasn't a massive fan of 80s music back in the day, looking back to the charts or listening to a HITS LP, the content was much more diverse than it is today. And there was a great mix of styles of performing music too, some electronic, some guitar stuff, even some world music... Now it's just shrink wrapped plastic pack Sheeranesque inward looking, socially blind music performed by social climbing none entities.

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[walpurgis]

It's all about choice. People like listening to (and watching) rubbish. The freedom of social media steers society to 'the latest new thing' and popular older things and nobody would accuse society of having discernment or even good taste. Things find their own level.

[Pharos]

I agree that there was some good stuff in the 80s, but then a downtilt through the 90s.

I think even now, let alone by historians in the future, we will be of the view that from the 60s through to the 80s there was a renaissance, also beyond music and encompassing many aspects of life. Political correcteness surely tends to deny the ability to criticise.

It was said 25 years ago that society was dumbing down; this could be a correlate.

[struth]

the year the music died. 1959....

[dave2010]

the year the music died. 1959....

Boring stuff - like this:



which I think dates from 1959.

See also https://playback.fm/charts/top-100-songs/1959 - and there's Russ Conway at number 70.

Time and things have moved on....

[Barry]

the year the music died. 1959....

On February 3rd, to be precise.