So I was looking at the most popular genres of music on the Myspace music listing page, and I saw things that horrified me.
Rap and hip hop were number one and number two. This tells me that our society has lost its footing in the realm of decent music. Why is music that's so bad so popular? Why do people care about pimps, bitches, drugs, etc? And why do they love so much bass my car shakes? Is there something about that sort of music that makes people love it? Or is it just a sign that our musical culture is going to hell? The alternatives to those two seem to be "indie" and "emo", and then the people who love death metal come in. What happened to good music?
The music industry has been in a slump for a while now. There aren't any artists whose talent or appeal sets them above all the rest, so record companies have to rely on controversy and marketing genres instead of artists. This is also why they hardly play music videos anymore. Not enough people will actually watch them.
As for hip-hop, I don't know much about it, but I do know that there's more to it than hoes and gangstas. That's the mainstream stuff that's driven by an audience who have never been near a ghetto, like the white guys in Office Space. There used to be more variety, and to an extent there probably still is, but new artists have to learn to battle, brag about the thug life, and rap about booty. Anything else doesn't sell.
because people have stopped caring about the quality of music and more about the money that can be made. It doesn't matter if it sounds bad, it will sell.
Myspace is a spam machine, not a list that shows whats the most popular.
I can create an autobot that i can use on any artist i want, and bump him/her up WAAAY over the number #1 spot on there just in a few weeks time.
(would probobly look suspisious having 100 million plays and only 200 friends/visitors.)
But it is true, music in general is failing because the music we see on tv and hear on the radio is what sells.
Also, we are in an age of physical > digital transformation.
Musiclabels are dying because they dont want to let go of CD's but some do try and convert to the digital.
Music is dieing because:
A: the real talent isn't able to break in
B: the real talent breaks in, but sucks now that they're big-time
C: the RIAA doesn't care about quality, they care about money, and if they can get more money out of a worse artist, they will
D: people are just stupid
E: all of the above except D
F: all of the above including D and excluding E.
>>1 Perhaps I'm not understanding your post. If you are in fact saying that the "emo" and "indie" genres are a welcome escape from Hip-Hop then I would like to formally request that you kill yourself.
An opinion so poorly formed can only be made correct by it DYING with your body. Hip hop as of late may be completed crap (save a few tracks here and there on the latest releases from Common, NaS, and Jay-Z) and fell to a level now where it's not even a song, just some random assortment of crap thrown together to make some retarded looking dance to, but that doesn't give you a reason to say that somehow this "emo" and "indie" garbage are any better.
http://www.archive.org/details/audio
some of it may be bad, but there's shitloads upon shitloads of great music on there and you don't have to waste money on it. There's even a Grateful Dead section, too, so there you go! Dead FTW
If you're feeling cynical about the pop music of today, that's normal! You need to search and search deep for underexposed artists who may not have mass appeal but you might like them personally. Your music collection shouldn't be defined by genre either. If you think that way you might miss out on many things.
Also, give netradio a chance, there might be a bunch of stations playing underground or unpopular music and you might find a bunch of things you may enjoy that way.
Who cares what people on MySpace like? What matters is what you listen to.
On a tangent, I wonder what kind of person is actually listening to emo music. Everywhere I go it seems like people are mocking the genre. :) I do like some stuff that could be called indie (John Vanderslice comes to mind), and I know there's decent hip-hop/rap out there, even if it's the exception to the rule.
I thought emo died in the 1980s though what the fuck
>>9
I have some friends who listen to emo music, but they're otherwise great people and they don't buy into the whole subculture surrounding it. So I'd say a combination of people like that, and 14 year olds.
Two years ago before the emo boom I heard about emo on an Internet bbs called totse.
So I check the music out, and it wasn't interesting enough to keep me listening to it.
Now two years later everybody knows about the whole emo crap.
HEBI CHAN image video
The reason why rap and hip hop is number one is because of the direction it's taken. Back in the 90's rap was good because the only way to get noticed was by having dope lyrics.
Now mainstream listeners are just looking for the new
catchy song that they can sing till they can't anymore.
That is also the reason why most people dont hear "good" rap music, because ther stuff is not watered down enough to
get themselves noticed.
Emo died along time ago. Now it's just a joke.
I download all my crap music from Jamglue. No joke.
They need more 1997 Puff Daddy and BIG, though.
All mainstream music has always been terrible. Quit bitching and start listening to good underground genres, the intertubes will let you do that now.
>>17 is Emo.
music is dying because faggots like you dont know any other music then what you see on MTV... "music industry".. lame fucks.
I bet >>1 only listens to real serious music for real serious men... like nine inch nails, nirvana... etc.
I hate you all
I listen to Rhianna, Fall Out Boy, Justin Timberlake, Rogue Traders, Thirsty Merc, Missy Higgins and Greenday.
I listen to music that has an awesome beat, and unless it's a ballad, I don't give a shit about lyrics.
> what you see on MTV... "music industry"
> nine inch nails, nirvana
>>1
Just because you don't like it does not mean it crap.
I don't particularly enjoy listening to most classical music, but I'm not stupid enough to think it makes for shitty music. It just doesn't appeal to me.
>>23
TIP: Sarcasm doesn't work over the internet.
>>24
On any other forum, this would be obvious enough not to need to be said. Nevertheless, yeah, true.
if you don't like the music, then don't listen to it. who cares about all those fuckers listen to.
It's because if one person likes it, that person spreads it everywhere so everybody likes it. They only like it because it's "catchy".
world need something bad to make others looks good
It's because if one person likes it, that person spreads it everywhere so everybody likes it. They only like it because they "enjoy it".
i am personally excited by the zeitgeist of radio filth, it keeps the zombies fed and there is more space for the real production.
>>33
Actually, marketing can make people like what they originally didn't like.
That doesn't mean that it will make somebody like what they hated. But most of people is actually extremely tolerant, and good marketing will affect them, indeed.
more people are making music than ever before, if you're concerned about the current state of music it is because you are an idiot.
Please stop bumping this thread. It is stupid and should just die.
>>35
Don't be so optimistic. Do you know what's happening in spain? Google SGAE, it's even more scary than the RIAA.
If you don't like record industry groups, ignore them and look for live music within your community. Music is for everyone, it isn't something a few elites control. All this worry about the RIAA comes from the elitist idea that good music is produced only when a major label signs off on it, which is just not true -- their imprimatur is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for quality.
Ehr, the SGAE above, FORBIDS even charging for your music, if you don't belong to the SGAE. Basically, you play by they (twisted) rules, or you don't play, or you become a criminal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociedad_General_de_Autores_y_Editores