What the hell happened to music???

reply to post by Thecakeisalie


Speaking as an American youth, I don't care for Skrillex. I see it the same way you do.

I much prefer rock, alternative, a TINY portion of rap, some country, some "normal" stuff, and I love older music. 90s music really gets me... I also love David Bowie, even though his music was about a decade before I was born

The movie Labyrinth got me hooked on him, though.

I'm with you. I'm a fan of ACTUAL music.

Except that at some point in time music ceased to exist.

I half-agree with this - in the mainstream, there is not much music, and there is a lot of "rhythmic noise" or "rhythmic distortion with lyrics" sold as music. Also the clichés are shamelessly repeated, without even slight variations to bring refreshing change.

But music can't cease to exist, because it's not dependent on earth half-animals making it or not.

Music is something that

Then suddenly you jump from these sort of philosophical half-truths into DEFINITION OF MUSIC? Wow, here is where we really part ways. And since this is the rant section, I am not going to soften my words, or opinion about you "player-purists", who think it's not music, if you didn't PLAY it.

That's the same as saying it's not a car if you didn't build it yourself, or it's not a house, if it's not made of wood.

Many people here seem to confuse PLAYING INSTRUMENTS (just a feat of repetitive learning on how to strum or press something - hardly creativity) with COMPOSING MUSIC. Those are two completely different things.

Music can be composed in many ways - with or without 'real instruments'. Have you familiarized yourself thoroughly with current VST instruments that replicate (with samples) what the 'real instruments' can do, pretty well? In a skillful composer's hands, music can be produced that I bet you wouldn't be able to tell whether it has been "played" or just "composed" with a computer. Even less skillful composers can produce things that sound very realistic with these things.

But where does the arrogance come from where you think you can not only DEFINE music, but you JUDGE that it MUST be composed by using archaic, "real instruments"? What makes you the judge on whether a computer is considered an instrument or not?

Let's follow a logical train of thought. Take a piano, for example. You play it with a keyboard, and the playing mechanism happens out of sight somewhere inside the apparatus.

Then you can introduce "electronic pianos", that sound exactly the same (because of samples used), and which a regular human being would NOT be able to tell from a 'real' piano. That is a real enough piano for a lot of people, but according to you, composing music using such a piano is not real music?

Don't you understand that music is not about the instruments - it's about the music itself? If the music is bad, it's bad, no matter how many real instruments have been used. If the music is good, it's good, no matter how many electronics, computers, sound effects or voice modulations or processing has been used.

You are not about music - you are about PLAYING INSTRUMENTS. So you should not be the one to define what music IS and what music ISN'T. A well-made cell phone beep can be beautiful piece of music just as well as an orchestral symphony! Music doesn't REQUIRE anything like playing skills or certain, specific, human-made instruments? Why would it matter whether someone is playing a MIDI-keyboard, connected to a computer, utilizing a music software that acts as a host to a VST instrument that gives you a nice variety or realistic piano sounds (among other zillions of wonderful-sounding things), or if that someone is playing a 'real piano'? The end result is still the same.

Playing is not the same as composing, try to accept that in your mind. Write it 500 times on a wall or a paper if you have to, but ACCEPT IT, because it's the truth! The two things have nothing to do with each other. Maybe you think just 'messing with your guitar' is the same thing as composing, but it isn't.

Composing is a spiritual event where something beautiful is channeled through you when you get 'in the zone' - you don't need a guitar or to be playing or to even be able to play anything for this to happen! Think of Mozart writing a complex song with just pen and paper while travelling! THAT is composing. And you think just 'messing with a guitar' can be composing - when in fact, it's just random tinkering, without giving you peace and quiet for actual composing to really happen.

Composing happens INSIDE of you, not OUTSIDE of you.

It's the difference between someone who operates a car and between someone who designs cars. The designer doesn't have to be a skilled race "driver" to be able to create cars, and no matter how skillful the car operator may be, he is never designing a car, just using it.

You USING a guitar doesn't make you a composer, no matter how 'skillfully' you are able to use it. You are just a user.

A turntable is not an instrument.

You are about instruments, not about music or composing. Just as I suspected. ANYTHING can be an instrument! Who are you to limit what people can use as instruments? Why does it have to even BE an instrument?

Sure, you can learn to be 'skillful' at using a guitar, just the same as you can be skillful at running a floor polisher at WalMart.

I agree with this.

Well since everyone else is posting music that allows thier souls to soar, I will too =)


Here are a few of my favorites

rap is crap aye? we'll if you think that you are probably close minded anyway, so I'm sure nothing will change your mind, but there's some great hip hop being made right now.

Any 'genre' can be good, if done right (except maybe 'metal' of any kind).

They made some really fun and funny rap in the 80's - ever heard "Nightmare on my street"? Really good for a rap-song - it tells an interesting story, and listening it as a kid (not completely understanding it yet because I didn't grow up with english) send shivers to my spine.

Of course as a rap-song it's repetitive and can't really explore interesting melodies, but for what it is, I think it's very atmospheric and immersive - provoking your imagination and exciting your emotions in a subtle but fun way.



And it of course tells a story, based on the 'Nightmare on Elm Street' movies.

This kind of rap I like - I don't think anything needs to be aggressive, distortive, completely musicless - there can be musical elements and harmony in most genres, if the composers want it.

Btw, those judgmental, narrow-minded, egobloated 'instrument-playing purists' really don't understand anything about music. They think just because they press certain strings or buttons, that makes them somehow special compared to someone who plays or pushes a different set of buttons.

I wonder what it is about guitars or pianos that make people into such blind, tight-ass idiots, full of self-praise and self-importance.. maybe the sound waves of real guitars somehow re-arrange people's brains or something, I don't know.

I know a skilled guitarist who was a genius in composing music with computers - and this was an era before VST instruments and such, and he didn't even use a sequencer! And yet his songs are so good I still listen to them to this day. He also combined his talents and creatively added a Korg synthesizer, controlled by the computer (still not a sequencer), to his recorded guitar-playing! The end result was something so unique and beautiful that I almost cry because I miss those songs so much. I just wish everyone could hear them.

These 'player-purists' who worship INSTRUMENTS so much that they lose the sight (and hearing) of MUSIC, should really familiarize themselves with computers, and see that computers can be just more instruments to add to their collection. They should see that COMPOSING doesn't require an INSTRUMENT - you can compose in your head, with pen and paper, or with any system you like. Computers just make this way more handy and convenient, and make it possible to 'build' on things in a way that would have been impossible previously for people who aren't geniuses.

I mean, you can make a bassline, and then listen to it, until you get inspiration for a fitting melody for it. Then you can build the melody and while doing so, tweak the bassline to fit the melody even better, and so on. This is just as real composing as ANYTHING anyone has ever done with the aid of a 'guitar' or 'piano' or whatever. Using an 'instrument' just makes the process more tedious, slow, and less intuitive, more convoluted and difficult than it needs to be.

Composing doesn't require the ability to play an old instrument. And even if you like playing a lot (just don't call it 'composing'), why would anyone rather play with just ONE piano, for example, when they could be playing with a MIDI-keyboard (or synth) that you can get almost unlimited amount of different instruments to? I mean, with a MIDI-keyboard and computer, there's practically no limit to the kind of instrument or sound that you can play - without ever having to drag heavy pianos around or clumsy guitars and such. You can play anything from drums to guitars, violins, tubas, pianos, synthesizers, human voices, animal voices, natural sounds, your own voices or sounds, to any other sounds that you can think of that can be sampled and produced. You can even connect analog synths to your PC and then use those with the MIDI keyboard - that way, it's 'the real thing' instead of just emulation (certain analog sounds are very hard to emulate because of their quirky sound artifacts and unpredictable filter effects and such).

But that's not "real"? How is that not real? Why would it matter whether the sound wave is created by a speaker or a string? Besides, if you make music with a guitar, and then PLAY it back, it will still be soundwaves created by a speaker. There will be no real difference to most listeners anyway.

Sure, skillful playing is always great to listen to, and if an orchestra plays well together, it can be downright amazing. But that doesn't mean that music needs INSTRUMENTS to exist, or that computers can't be just as good (and in many ways better) instruments than the archaic, clumsy, physical, plastic and wooden and metallic ones.

I'd rather have 1000000 instruments with one keyboard than 5 'real instruments' taking a lot of space.

My main point is: composing requires CREATIVITY, playing an instrument DOES NOT.

reply to post by Thecakeisalie


You are quite right...Nice to see a 'young un' see the light...

I'm nigh on 52 and my era for music is the 70's and early 80's, I'm mostly into Jazz Funk, soul & disco but listed to the popular hits of the day. Now what's important for me is that to be called a musician you had to either play or sing and those people could, there was no auto tuning so these folk could and DID perform live without the need to lip sync to tracks.

People say its a generational thing but I don't believe it for me, yes I've heard many people say the classic lines like "now that's what we called music in my day" or "Pah, you call this music" but I like many forms of music from stuff in the 60's right through to some 2000 stuff but when sampling & auto tuning became the norm I switched off.

I still get kids around my estate amazed when I know one of their tracks, its normally because its either a cover of an old tune with some sampled funky drummer beat on it or there are samples in there.

For me, people today define music by loudness, does the bass make your lungs bang around, is it so loud you hair flaps about but its NOT music, its noise at very loud volume and its that mix of noise, actually feeling the sound waves buffet your internal organs and the loudness they like.

I used to go and see a reggae sound system called King Tubby's who still tour to this day, now Keith's system was the cleanest and meanest of all the UK systems, when Keith and co played out the buildings shook, the body felt it but at the heart of it was you still could hear the tune, the real bass guitar, the real drummer, the real organ etc.

They played music hard and loud but not an ounce of distortion, it was not noise for the sake of it, when the people sang you heard the lyrics and the people listened to them, not just a constant boom boom.

This constant output of auto tuned rubbish annoys me, can these people sing live, no, could they actually do any of it live, very rarely, I'm from very times when you went and saw Luther Vandross (rip) sing live and the man sounded BETTER than the record. Now its all lip syncs and spectacle to try and hide the fact the Spice Girls etc could not sing live.

A band called Earth Wind and Fire did shows in the late 70's early 80's where the show was amazing to watch, they incorporated magic tricks like levitation, spectacular light shows, dance routines BUT they all still played and sang LIVE, ok you heard the odd bum note rarely because of the energetics of the routines but they were live and damn did they sound good.

Now we have lyrics laced with profanitites simply for the sake of it, that wasn't what rap and hip hop was about, it was about messages, now its pure word porn (and tuned), people in clubs dance to constant repeated samples and rely on getting out of their skull to 'enjoy' the evening, I went to see and hear the band and the music, getting drunk only destroyed the evening and the idea of taking drugs never entered my head (and never has).

Give me real people singing real songs of their own creation with only mixing used on the tracks, use real musicians, not samples, make them perform live.

Music is not just a noise, its a skill, a wonderfully learned skill be it creating the lyrics , singing them or playing the instruments, watch Elvis live to see a man who understood all that, listen to Whitney Huston or Maria Carey at the start of their careers for the raw power and ability in their voices. Watch people like Eric Clapton, Santana, the Rolling stones etc for people who lived and breathed the music, stoned or not they had more talent in their finger than N'dubz or other useless people like them.

The entertainment scene has changed, music is simply money to both stars and the people behind them, the system is crooked and the performers false. Real talent is rare these days, its out there but gloss and TV image are put well ahead of it.

Talents shows produce 1 hit wonders these days and the audience for these shows is flagging because people know its all scripted, the acts are pre picked and its just a sham.

Sorry, give me the good old days of live acts and genuine musical people...

I recently heard a lecture with a Swedish researcher called Gunno Klingfors on the development of the music industry. He was educated in Salzburg in classical music and is currently mostly enganged in research on the history of music or especially in different tunings techniques they used before we went over to using equal temperament tuning (mostly) to give a sense of what those compositions actually used to sound like. Anyway he also employed the royal collage of music in sweden.

It would seem he would be biased toward classical music...well he is not, in his opinion music conservatories usually hampers innovation, that they are temples to the old gods and that most of the education is based on what teaching what is good and what is bad, despite that being very subjective. He works at a music conservatory but he says there are a lot of internal issues for which classes are more "proper". Jazz was barely considered a an art form there until the the late 80's despite it being at least as compositionally challenging as classical music and was listed under "misc. music forms" in the curriculum despite being very influential for the development of modern music.

They are so behind in the times and stuck in what's "proper music" that they forget to look ahead and innovate, a good argument for why institutionalized state funding hampers progress, but that's another discussion. Indoctrination is essentially his opinion of what goes on in most music conservatories, too much time for learning what is proper and too much time spent only to copy and play what someone else wrote 100-200 years ago, they can mostly play from sheets and shiver in fear when a jazz musician ask them to improvise with them, but then again the jazz musician shivers in fear when the classical musician puts a note sheet in front of him to play along to. There needs to be a healthy mix for the development to truly flourish, one is not better than the other.

He has also made orchestral compositions with computers that composers have been unable to tell that they were emulated instruments because the software is so good these days, though he said that it would probably be impossible to do unless you have been a professional composer and a professional player of some bowed instrument (he's played violin for 40 some years) because of the difficulty that lies in emulating the sound of a humanly played bowed instrument, the hardest except for voice which is the only part that still can't accurately be mimicked.

I dont listen music. at all.
If i mjs, and if i listen music, then it will be:
Il Divo
Ivo Gamulin Giovanni
and dubstep,
i prffer music without word,
music is one more way to people sell their own emotions.

OP:

Music, as well as art, is merely a "transport" for emotions; if it doesn't work for you, it might for others.

Not understanding something (dubstep/house/trance/electro/etc) and call it names is like saying certain pieces of art are not art because you just don't like them. People have ALWAYS complained about music they don't listen to.

Here is 17 year old french Madeon "gluing" clips and loops:

Based on your critic, I could probably judge you know something about actual music recording, maybe playing an instrument or so, but have never actually sat down to record stuff on a DAW, use midi controllers, mix, how hard it is to actually make things sound right.

It's not art if it's not unique, or easily reproduced. So there, if dubstep is not some weird form of art, just random loops easily glued together, go ahead and try to make yours sound better.

Warning: not recommended for people who suffer seizures easily

Originally posted by Konoyaro
It would seem he would be biased toward classical music...well he is not, in his opinion music conservatories usually hampers innovation, that they are temples to the old gods and that most of the education is based on what teaching what is good and what is bad, despite that being very subjective. He works at a music conservatory but he says there are a lot of internal issues for which classes are more "proper". Jazz was barely considered a an art form there until the the late 80's despite it being at least as compositionally challenging as classical music and was listed under "misc. music forms" in the curriculum despite being very influential for the development of modern music.

I think he can only judge what he has been involved in. He has not been to every college or conservatory. This is an old argument, that somehow education stifles creativity. I don't think it's true. In my experience, I was not taught what music was "proper" in college, rather I was taught skills. I was taught how the sing properly and there is a way to do that much to the chagrin of most of the posters here, but that is just a framework that allows you to build. (now, as an aside "properly" does not refer to styles in any way, it is purely technical and involves placement, breath control, and such things) The problem is conservatory and most colleges assume the person attending is interested in either music education or performing classically. There are other schools you can go to if that is not your interest. There are some very progressive schools out there if you look. In conservatory and college you are taught theory, analysis, history and technical skill. What you choose to do with it is your own business.

Either way, what we call education would be laughed at by the masters who almost always studied composition under another composer. Most early classical musicians were trained from early childhood in ways that would make most posters shriek. That education didn't seem to stifle the creativity of history's most famous classical musicians. I sound much better now than I did before I began taking lessons years ago. I've picked up a few pitches on the top end and have better control in general. I don't think there is anything overly extraordinary about me as my range isn't fantastic on the bottom edge (i go from Ab3 to C7), but then I am a soprano. I wasn't built for the low end. I do still write my own vocal lines from time to time and my education has actually aided me in that.

Blaming education for uncreative people is like blaming construction equipment for ghastly buildings. It's just a tool in the end, you choose how to use it.

43 here and I quite like Dubstep. I enjoy the futuristic sound of it and the grungy, rhythmic grooves that just course through the body while you listen to it. Dubstep has actually given me some hope that music is finally coming back to some cool stuff after the several decades of horrible rap and hiphop. I know there are good aspects to those as well. Eminem, Watsky, Beasties, Bloodhound Gang, Etc. These people are serious about their craft, but there has been a great deal more crap out there than good stuff. And thankfully, none of it is quite as bad as Country music. But I enjoy everything from opera and classical to punk, rock, heavy metal, and everything in-between. Except Phil Collins- who never should have existed.

But, here's a funny Dubstep video that you might enjoy - it get's a little on the edge of morality(hilariously though), so, if you're sensitive to stuff like that, just skip it.

www.youtube.com...

This discussion has been done to death in all generations. The same was said about The Beatles and Elvis etc.

Peoples musical taste is like your ass; It's split

It's great that everyone is expressing their views on the subject, whether you think I'm full of B.S or not. I've enjoyed reading the responses, everyone has their own tastes and interpretations of what music is.

My playlist includes everything from Pink Floyd to Pantera, and I enjoy modern music as well, Mumford & sons, Bruno mars, etc. I'm not saying that all modern music is rubbish, there has been rubbish music in the past. But at least these $h!t musicians actually took the time to pick up and instrument and learn to play it, no matter how it sounded.

What annoys me is how most 'hits' nowadays consist of a drum machine, voice synthesizers, and so forth. It doesn't take much effort to conjure up something with Cakewalk or ACID.

True musicians are like gourmet chefs, A lot of the chart toppers nowadays seem like cheap microwave dinners.

Call me a dinosaur, I don't care.

Originally posted by Thecakeisalie
...I'm not saying that all modern music is rubbish, there has been rubbish music in the past. But at least these $h!t musicians actually took the time to pick up and instrument and learn to play it, no matter how it sounded.

What annoys me is how most 'hits' nowadays consist of a drum machine, voice synthesizers, and so forth. It doesn't take much effort to conjure up something with Cakewalk or ACID.

True musicians are like gourmet chefs, A lot of the chart toppers nowadays seem like cheap microwave dinners...

edit on 10-2-2013 by Thecakeisalie because: (no reason given)

That is precisely the point, because the "instruments" these new artists use do not resemble instruments you got to know and respect, doesn't make them invalid or that the music created with them doesn't required knowledge, talent and practice, lol.

It's like complaining that people over at the office are not doing real work because you ARE doing it down at the mines. It's all work at the same time, all art, and they all employ REAL talent and effort.

reply to post by Thecakeisalie


Money and Tech

Most songs now are formatted, there was a time when you heard a vocalist and you new who it was.
Now it's Business and as such you apply current Business Models

Shows like X Factor, Pop Idol amount to nothing more than Product Deveopment

reply to post by antonia


You misunderstood much of what I said but I have to apologize myself for not making everything as clear as it should be. One part of the problem is I can't recall everything he said on the subject or retell it as good as he did in his six hour lecture that I've only heard once, though I would like to hear it again as it was very interesting.

Of course he hasn't been to every music school but he has been to many. He didn't say education stifles creativity only that institutionalized education with a certain preference considers one art form to be greater than the other and view non-classical styles as lesser arts stifles creativity.
This has it's roots in the elite society that theory is greater then performance, nobles didn't do hard work only using the mind was considered proper and the performance arts are of lesser worth though both are equally necessary one cannot be without the other as it has to be a whole.

This then extended from elite society to the general public that classical music was somehow of more worth than other musical art forms which also touches the politicians way of handling this. That is why there are far fewer non-classical musical schools than state sponsored classical conservatories, it wouldn't be proper to give much money to some more equalized musical school or program in their minds.

I mean classical music is not the most favored style of music and hasn't been for a long time, it seems strange that those schools receive the most funding for teaching mostly archaic style that doesn't bring that much money and is not of interest to the general public. I'm not saying that we should forget classical music because it is a the very foundation upon which we stand. But the focus and bias toward classical by mostly the teachers and professors of these renowned temples of worship is out of line with the current world, and less time should be invested to over-analyzing certain passages or playing what others have made before and more creative courses should be established for the development of the person as his/her own genius not just playing or reinterpreting what has already been played and reinterpreted a billion times before.

I agree that the masters of old would probably laugh at us for not knowing the art by heart in the same way. I mean usually a concert would only be performed once or twice for rich people and then it was never played again and the composer would write a new "experience" this changed a lot with the invention of recordable music. Now days we listen to something many many times and have time to point out small things that no one would have thought about only hearing it once. Bach could keep an entire score in his head only writing it down for the conductor the same day as the performance, that is just unbelievable

Most composers today also study under another composer for about 5 years when they get to a certain level, usually with a group of 4-5 people where at the end probably only one will be chosen and get to make performances for orchestras and it often isn't the most innovative that gets chosen but the one most akin to the professors preference, so we carry on the tradition of reinterpreting old works again. Of course there are known innovative composers who have gone through the traditional system of classical conservatories. This would of course not be a problem if it weren't that this is the "correct path" to walk according to the current education system, children don't know this when they want go for the musical path, they just go along with it.

reply to post by Shoujikina

A well-made cell phone beep can be beautiful piece of music just as well as an orchestral symphony!

If that's the case, why hasn't the Nokia ringtone made the hottest 100?

But in a way I agree. The greatest day in modern musical history was when some guy recorded himself going "da da da dee dee da da" sped it up, and added a monotonous drum loop. Days later and BANG! you get crazy frog. What an epic beauty that was.

reply to post by SimonPeter


The word RAP I will fill you in on. Actually the word rap is actually short for Rapture to be specific Blondie's song Rapture. You got it. Blondie invented rap and recorded the first rap song!


And here you have it the first rap song. The term rap came from a Blondie song.




And any one who doesn't believe it look for the term rap describing any song before rapture.

reply to post by tabov


The device the kid is using what are they called? I have been looking for one.

Skrillex became the face of American dubstep, which is (I guess) a re-packaged or dare I say "disney-fied" version of a type of sound that originated in the UK, particularly in south Croydon. No disrespect to Skrillex though. I mean, he's doing his thing, but even a lot of people that are into the newly revitalized EDM scene (electronic dance music) consider Skrillex to be adolescent and somewhat corny. In fact, this American sound (which is all over the place now, car commercials, clothing commercials, pop stars, slews of producers) shares little in common with English Dubstep, save for the name. But there are some really amazing producers that came out of variations on the english dub and dubstep styles, particularly (in my opinion) future garage and a lot of the ambient type artists.