Are you tired of 'M' TV yet?

This thesis (thread) has been written to be purly internet interactive. The thesis will direct you to several websites and demand you experience the topics being discussed for it to work. If you do not have time to complete this thesis in whole, then come back when you have time to sit down and immerse yourself for an hour or so. The website has been approved by moderators of this website, and I warn you now that some of the material discussed is not for the faint of heart and not work safe.

Onward with my thesis:



Once upon a time in the 70's and 80's there began a time when a creative music writer could write a piece of music and get it shuttled onto the radios and MTV in a heartbeat. The average joe could orchestrate a song with himself or a band in a garage and become instant celebrities.

Over the years, the garage door bands are finding it harder and harder to get their music heard. Corporations slowly took over the music industry, mass consolidated all the connections, and then began to dicate which songs were good and bad without letting it be heard by the mainstream listeners first. Songs were no longer picked on popular listener opinion, but rather were chosen from a list of an already censored list. Who's to say a song wasn't written that had the potential to become a world-wide hit? Who picks these sensors? Sensors? Ahh yes the "agents" that pick and choose which bands are good and bad in the office listening to a poorly digitized audio tape before the time would even be spent to masterly digitize the music and lyrics.

Ahh yes, the good ol' days when music was good? Things changed quickly between the 1970's and 2004. One must go to New York or California and hope to be heard by some lower agents that report to higher agents. Long are the days that people send a tape in the mail to several agents hoping one likes your approach to music. There are several types of new types of music that some people can't even comprehend it's play-style and odd arrangements of melody's and musical instruments used, that are listened to by the entire world in several different languages.

What am I trying to portray here in this thesis? I'm going to introduce you to several new genres of music, that most American's know very little about, yet, its so big that you can't beleive you missed it. (I'm also not assuming every single member on this board doesnt know about this music, so if this music is old news to you, please don't flame and try to build on the discussion instead)

For sake of mood and mindset of discussion, I chose to specifically tune myself into these new types of music and try to portray their incredible depth to you. I'll pick a few songs to use as examples that you can readily listen to, on Heavy.com as video's..

Interactive directions: Go to website: www.heavy.com and click the lower right-hand box (last on the list of boxes) that leads to the SumoSonic webpage.

On the first page of the SumoSonic list is the song: Chromeo - Needy Girl .. I ask you to first watch this video now, and when you finish come back and read my take on this genre.

.. go watch it

..

Ok, weird song indeed. Crazy digitalizing and syncing in the song. Yet, after you watch the whole video you clearly see that none of it was digitally mastered using any type of computer technology that most songs use now. Yet, it's so immersly catchy and mastered that you can't help but grasp at any notion its writers/performers were able to pull off such a crazy song with just a few digital keyboard syncs and amplifiers? Yes, music so deep, yet its not just crappy computer digitize on top of poorly written lyrics.. .. a true work of art. Go watch it again and think about this line of thought.. listen to the music and how it all oddly comes together in the end.

Judging by the digital effects of the video, the video plot, and pullback double-plot, I'm assuming its not something 2 guys thought up alone. It was worked on by a studio of directors. So it's quite apparent its been recognized as a great song and great approach of music that some agent outside of the American mainstream music picked it up and promoted it. The only reason you haven't seen it on MTV is because the big corporations don't see it as a song that's going to bring in money. Again, picking and choosing what songs are viewed by the American listeners?

For another band that follows the same genre, listen to M83 (click the upper music playlist on the SumoSonic homepage and go directly to M83's track) Or you could also find thier video on the video list


Now, Go watch the next video.. Client - In It For the Money

.. are you watching it?

.. hope so!

Notice this song is a bit more tamed down and normal. A completely different type of genre then the previous song. Did you notice the insane amount of computer animation? It would take a complete computer graphics professional to pull off the kind of cad-like buildings animations in that video. Again implying that this song writer is extremely wealthy. Asking yourself why you never heard of this band before? This band is one of the most worldwide known bands. They tour the entire globe. Here is an article review about this band, its quite apparent you're now seeing that your music sucks, and that's there's an entire melting pot of music you've never heard of ... www.inmusicwetrust.com...



Here's an odd change..

*WARNING* This next movie is not work safe, and I recommend no one under 18 watch it, and if you have a weak stomach, I suggest avoiding this video... it borders on the line of satanic culture and acceptable.

Go watch the movie by Liars - We Fenced Other Gardens With the Bones of Our Own

.. go watch it ..

..

I'm sure by now you're slightly disturbed.. I was.. Notice how the video starts off like some poorly made home video portraying people playing as primal animals. The video through this mindset spirals into the world of nature, death, dog-fights to an almost unexceptable extreme of gore. Again, this video may be slightly over the top, but it's clearly a work of art.. it sparks the primal rage to kill that is dormant deep down inside of all of us. Notice the multilayered digital mastering of the kaleidascope, again, something not acheived by college students playing on a home computer.. implying again, that a lot of money was poured into the production of this video.. are you starting to see my point yet?


One more video genre walkthrough and then I'll procede my conclusion..

3rd page of the SumoSonic has a song by Morrissey - First of the Gang to Die

.. Go watch it, it'll totally make you forget about the previous video, I promise..

.. have no fear, watch it

Absolutly Amazing. Here we have a guy that is worshipped outside the United States, but I'd bet my ATS account that very few Americans have heard his music. There is no special effects in this video.. there doesn't need to be to feed off its spirit. You witness thousands of people that are absolutly in love with his music. Grown men crying to touch this man, women cheering in passionate love, a civil and completely interactive crowd. The crowd going to an almost riot trying to rush the stage just to touch this man. Wow. You almost feel as if you were at his concert after watching this video. Truly amazing.



Why haven't American mainstream be given the oppurtunity to witness such passion, creativity, and love for music that the rest of the world has? Why does our music always stay the same, same new rap, same new rock, same new pop... Ever notice it all sounds relativly the same? There are so many different genre's of music that has been guarded from the American consumer that it's too many to list. What am I trying to portray in my thesis? I'm portraying that until now, several hundred of you have been living a dull life devoid of wonderful masterpieces and artists only because the America Mainstream Media have been sensoring our songs and making loads of cash off poorly written, poorly acted, and poorly chosen genre's of music. Open the doors, view the world's offerings and I guarentee by the time you're done listening to the music on this website, you'll be asking yourself what Heavy.com has been asking you for a long long time.. Are you tired of the crappy music on "M" TV? I am.

I encourage members to listen to most of the songs on this website, I only touched on a few of the many genre's of music that this website offers.. experience it for yourself.

Written by: QuietSoul

[edit on 18-9-2004 by QuietSoul]

Any views, comments and/or complaints are welcome. I'm writing this thesis for my College course and decided to take a different approach to the just write-and-tell type of thesis. I'm trying to dig into the phycii some..

Figured I'd post it here and get popular opinion/comment and make changes from there.. thanks guys

Want to comment on another video/song.. this one hit the spot for me with today's living conditions...

2nd Page -- Faithless - Mass Destruction

I'm really not sure what you are trying to get at to be honest. As a musician myself I could expose you to music that would make make you question what exactly music is. There has been odd and strange music written since time began, and todays music is not very different.

I'm not intending for this to flame you, but you do set yourself up for it a little bit by saying that in the 70's and 80's creative music was allowed to blossom.

The so called "new" genre's that you tell us about are really not all that new. This music has gradually been growing over time and in many cases they just repeat old ideas in the music. Rock, for example, usually has a very basic setup following certain timing, timbre', form, etc. and rarely deviates from it. On the other hand, if you listen to 1910's-1920's attempts to combine Classical and Jazz you would think you were listening to music with no form (oftentimes skipping around going from AABA to AABC or such), no timing, etc. and you would think it was a really bad Classical Opera. Upon first hearing it you would be shocked that this music was around during the early part of the 20th Century. Even back then this genre', for example, was quite unheard by the mainstream audience.

On August 21, 1935 Swing-Jazz was born and ushered in the era of Pop music that now dominates. People tend to forget that the era of corporate sponsored music has been around this long if not longer only on a much smaller scale.

Also, what makes you think everyone likes music produced by "garage bands" and the like? I, being a Jazz musician, will attest to this. I don't particularly care for Rock music all that much, but I don't think its wrong for others to listen to it...that would be absurd. Most of the music you are speaking about was particularly influenced by the works of Fusion artists such as The Mahavishnu Orchestra and fringe artists like Bill Frisell.

What is wrong with synthesized music? Most musicians themselves will tell you that music is about the overall sound, and not about what effects you use to produce it. Thus, many of them incorporate them into the songs to enhance certain notes. Using Bill Frisell as an example again he improvses using extensive modern extended tonal vocabulary and elements of Fusion, Country, and standard Jazz. He usually uses effects to give new textures to a melody, and is very thoughtful in the process.

As far as what you say about this new genre's...and I listened to a few of them. I'm just not hearing anything "new" or "special" here that seperates them into any other genre's. In fact, I've heard most of it before as I notice many of them are simply taking different music vocabularies and making a amalgamation of new sound to express there ideas...again, nothing new here!

Plus, I noticed in your writings that you are primarily focused on the videographical and lyrical content of the music. While this is not totally bad, upon closer examination, the "music" is what conveys the meaning of a piece, and not the "words" and "actions" of the people creating the music.

You then go on to rant about why American music isn't allow to expand. Give me a break...seriously! The United States has always had the motivation and means to usually create new genre's of music before anyone else. All of Jazz, Rock, Blues, Pop, Rap, and countless others were solely innovated within the United States because of all the different cultures that were thrown together here. If you think about it in this way no music created is "completely original", and most music is simply created from borrowed forms of other music. One example is Country, as it was created out of traditional British based Folk music and American Blues (which itself extended from the highly pentatonic forms of music found in Africa).

Thus, most of the music you presented in neither new or very innovative in any way. Its just that the evolution of different musical styles have created it, and music like this has been going on to some extent for the last 20-40 years if not longer.

You then say "Why does our music always stay the same, same new rap, same new rock, same new pop... Ever notice it all sounds relativly the same?"...I have already explained the reason why you think they sound so similar. Mainly its due to the fact that Modern Pop, rap, and Rock are one in the same. Rap is derived from poor African Americans who could not afford to go to the expensive Disco joints in the '70s. Disco itself is derived from Homosexual bar music earlier, and that music was a brach that eventually broke off from the continued Swing generation of the '30s and early '40s. Rock itself is derived almost directly from Blues with some hints of Jazz and Western country thrown in. In this way you can see that most modern music has a common ancestor, and is why you may think it sounds so similar...because it is very similar! However, the music you presented is also derived from many of the same original sources of Pop and Rap therefore making it neither new nor any more innovative than other genre's.

Now, as far as corporations controlling what we listen to...to some extent this is true. However, they want to push music that will sell to the largest and most diverse audience possible they must themselves sell "what is most popular". The average 13-18 year old is not able to fully analyze the music they are listening to, and therefore contribute to what corporations tell them is "cool" music. This is not a bad thing though...music is music. No matter what form it comes in at least they are being exposed to different form whether they be different forms within one genre' or many.

As far as MTV is concerned, why would any adult want to watch that anyhow? Most don't have the time to, and even if they did would rather watch something else. So, MTV, VH1 and others are forced to play the music that will have the widest range of effect on younger generations. Younger generations not being fully capable of analyzing music properly as I pointed out before will go with the music that is most "catchy" and consists of simple sing-along melodies and catch phrases that is more centered around the lyrical content than that of the musical content.

You started a good topic, but some of your observations are clearly lacking the fundamentals that explain your thesis properly. You are also compromising your position by telling others what "bad" music is and that what you listen to is "best." This is a flaw that many are guilty of, and few have corrected.

Anyhow, I'm through with my observations on this topic, but please do some research on music theory et al, and you will see exactly what I am talking about.

Originally posted by QuietSoul
Any views, comments and/or complaints are welcome. I'm writing this thesis for my College course and decided to take a different approach to the just write-and-tell type of thesis. I'm trying to dig into the phycii some..

Figured I'd post it here and get popular opinion/comment and make changes from there.. thanks guys

Since you are writing this for a thesis, and I have plenty of experience with that...never include your own opinions in your writing! That is a fundamental flaw that many people, including myself, have made. I would be willing to help you in any capacity that I can however!

PS- If you dont mind me asking...what course is this for, and what year of college are you in?

Thanks for the information and views Jazzerman, I'll do some research

But by all means, I don't want this to be the end of this thread.. though Jazzerman seems to have a very high understanding of music, many americans (like myself) were/are quite ignorant to it all.

Lemme know whatcha think

PS- If you dont mind me asking...what course is this for, and what year of college are you in?

4th year of a 8 year course for Computer Engineer. Writing papers like this isn't my stronghold, I'm better at fixing broken stuff I'm in a 4th year college composition course and this is actually my first thesis I've ever written.. so I'm going to take all your (everyones) opinions and recommendations very seriously They basically said 'write a thesis about modern day entertainment' and let us go from there

[edit on 18-9-2004 by QuietSoul]

Absolutely. I don't want this thread to die either as its different than most of the topics here on the ATS and for that I am glad you brought it up. Hopefully some others will chime in with more information and you could get a good research project going here.

Anyway, would you mind telling me what class this is for and what year of college you are in? If you don't want to disclose that information I understand

[edit on 18-9-2004 by Jazzerman]

See above ---^

Just wanna note that this is more of a research project (like you said) thats going to give me a starting point for my thesis.. think of it like a community thesis! ;p

(I'm also going to reference this thread in my thesis as a source of information in my paper)

Originally posted by QuietSoul
4th year of a 8 year course for Computer Engineer. Writing papers like this isn't my stronghold, I'm better at fixing broken stuff

I'm in a 4th year college composition course and this is actually my first thesis I've ever written.. so I'm going to take all your (everyones) opinions and recommendations very seriously

They basically said 'write a thesis about modern day entertainment' and let us go from there[edit on 18-9-2004 by QuietSoul]

Very cool. One of my better Thesis' was a 126 page essay on The Daughters of the Confederacy and their contribution to the social culture of the South after the Civil War. Thus, I know how hard it could be especially for someone that regularly does technical things. In contrast, I'm always amazed at "computer guys" because I'm terrible when it comes to anything like that and it seems so easy for them. I think what they do is very hard, and when I told them what my major was they thought it was hard.

I have helped plenty of people back in college that didn't know much about writing a research paper or something similar so if you have any questions I will do my best to answer them. Good luck on the paper...now if only more people would respond to your thread

So far I'm gathering I made a few mistakes with my approach.. firstly calling this music "new" .. I see exactly what you're implying, that most of the music is built off old idealogy and transpired from there.

Also, you stated in your response regarding synthesized music being good.. I completely agree with you, it adds depth to the song. But I was unaware that so many songs and bands have built their entire music on strictly this type of music, and little to no lyrics whatsoever. Careful not to trend into the "techno" genre but seemingly mysterious..

Also, like you said, I need to remove my notions about what I think is good music and bad.. I wasnt trying to portray this in my inital post, but after re-reading it I do see how I come off sounding like I'm right, and you're wrong.

As for not many people responding, well, its a long post and requires some listening and whatnot.. people may not want to contribute the time to it ;p


I have 2 months and posted this exact post on a couple of forums I frequent hoping to get all kinds of feedback .. this one being the biggest and most used.


Let me ask you one thing Jazzerman, and this pertains alot to my thesis.. do you not think the american music media is somewhat censoring the music they think is good? I mean, I've listened to every single one of these songs on this website and every single one of them strike me as works of art.. true music.. yet, they're so popular everywhere except the US? Maybe its just me not looking outside the box.. I know the music is available to the public, but at what cost does it stand that our media doesnt reveal it to us?

[edit on 18-9-2004 by QuietSoul]

Yes, essentially you are correct in your assumption. The American media outlets, I think, are very different than other places, and the entertainment fringe seems to be no different. As far a censoring goes I don't think thats really the issue. I think its more of a "how can I make money the fastest way possible" issue for the big record companies. There are plently of record companies that promote musicianship, and plenty that do not.

The bigger companies have the money and the means to see their goals accomplished...ie making money by selling the most records. This is why tunes with simple melodies and catch phrases are the biggest sellers...not because they are better, but because the bigger companies have the means to promote these artists better than the smaller companies. Its simply Capitalism at work I guess you could say! Just like anything else in a Capitalistic society (and the US is the biggest) its the big companies whom control everything. Therefore, if they want people to hear what they want to sell, then that will be the biggest seller as people are quick to catch onto fads so quick.

I'm not sure about other countries and this type of music's popularity, but if their socio-economic structure is different than that of the US, then that could be a reason why they hear more of this genre' than we do. A less capitalistic society may have different cultural values that would determine what they listen to.

Hard question to answer, but very interesting nonetheless!

When was the last time there was actually a music video on MTV? They should just rename it the Teen Reality Show Channel (TRSC)...

I'm 25 and I tuned out years ago.

I haven't watched since the early ninties. Right about when The Real World showed up things went all downhill.

Reruns of TRW, God help me.

One of the reasons for the "forgetting" of thousands of good records by good musicians is the fact that radio is different from what it was. Until more or less, the 80s, the radio networks in Portugal played what they wanted, the programs where made with the choices of the person responsible for the program.
Then the radio networks started to have competition from other small radios, and they started to cut the expenses. One of the big expenses was the buying of the records, so they started to ask the record companies for samples, and then they reached a situation where they could not buy the records if they wanted and they could not refuse the records from the record companies, because then they would be out of that group and had to start buying them again.

I do not know if this is the same in other countries, but here it has the result of all the radios play the same songs, and all programs play the same songs, the songs the record companies want us to buy.

Also, the record companies prefer the artists who get less royalties, and this is a complicated thing. See this for more information.

I wish I war around to see the days when Mtv Played the late night heavy Metal Video list.

i remeber when MTV was cool, when they lived up to there name and had something to do with music. When is the last time you saw a music video on MTV? all thats ever on is real world, road rules, pimp my ride, cribs, and other sad crappy reality shows. Yet they are still called music television

Originally posted by phantompatriot
i remeber when MTV was cool, when they lived up to there name and had something to do with music. When is the last time you saw a music video on MTV? all thats ever on is real world, road rules, pimp my ride, cribs, and other sad crappy reality shows. Yet they are still called music television

Yeah, they should be fined for a lack of truth in advertising! Either that, or change the channel's name at this point...

When I was in high school (late 80's, early 90's), MTV actually lived up to its name -- it had hour-long shows devoted to music videos of all music genres (except classical music). There was a pop rock/love song show, a heavy metal show, a rap show, a rhythm & blues show, a country music show... The reality shows and cartoons were few & far between, only used to fill in gaps in the programming blocks... and they actually had something to do with music. (For example, Beavis & Butt-Head watched music videos on their TV and made fun of them between segments...)

I stopped watching it when the M no longer stood for Music....

yup now the only time i watch mtv is when im home sick and theres nothing else on. oh and BTW WTF is that little itty bitty link at the bottom that goes to some unus page?