Rick Beato on why music is getting worse

[PYP]

Hello, I love you, won't you tell me your name?
Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game
Hello, I love you, won't you tell me your name?
Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game

 

[Gregm]

the concert has changed for most popular music to a "show." (...) Are the people actually playing music?

I agree.
The show draws attention away from the actual musical part and the concert transforms into an "event". Actual musical composition is thereby secondary and can be easily simplified into a series of rythmic thumps, wrapped with intermittent sounds for embelishment and to introduce diversity. The DJ waves his hand in time with the thumping and spouts a few cool words (wazzup peeeeeople....). The croud follows suit entusiastically, jumping & thumping in unison, and we're all having a great time...

 

[wil]

I think that making music morphed for a large part to making stars and of course making money. These tools only make that easier. As someone who has seen a large quantity of live music of multiple genres the concert has changed for most popular music to a "show." The show has all kinds of things that us old guys did not grow up with. Are the people actually playing music? Why do we need all these others on stage and are they increasing our musical enjoyment or are they just there for everyone holding a phone to take pictures?
To me the more non instrument players the worse the music IMO.
My shock moment came a long time ago when I went to see Graham Nash and he appeared with only two live humans but it sounded like a complete orchestra with all kinds of effects. This in my mind was weird and for me not enjoyable, I believe in my heart the 'perfect" is the enemy of great and we see this all over today. I like the sound of live band even if there are warts and flaws. The over perfect, polished, overly repeatable is just IMO artificial and non human.
These tools take mediocre musical talents and
make them stars because of physical appearance or sex appeal or something else rather than the ability to write and perform live music. The music pre 1980 was nothing like this and bands had to sell records to survive and they had to tour to work on thier craft and promote the records. The business today is nothing like that.

The Graham Nash concert sounds awful.

 

[wil]

This comment really hits home. As some of you know, Sirius Radio has seasonal channels from time to time (Yacht Rock Radio/summer; Christmas songs/December). There is one on now called John Mayer Radio, in which he curates his favorite songs mostly from the 90s and 00's. I've been listening for a couple of months and I hear well-crafted songs (no surprise as Mayer is an excellent musician who knows a good song when he hears it), but I just can't relate to most of them as they are all sort of slice-of-life material that for the most part are inconsequential. They just don't resonate with any real meaning the way music of the 70's and 80's did, for me. So many have lyrics like " We went out for lunch, We had pizza with mushroom topping. It was good". They're all kind of like a Seinfeld episode, fleeting in substance that may resonate with some folks, but 30 seconds after the song is over, I neither miss it or remember it. So while Beato has a point, its not just the drum machines and autotune that support his argument, it's the movement away from the lyrics we found so meaningful in the music of the (60's), 70's, 80's which were so inseparable from our life experience that the music became the very fabric of our lives. "We want to hear the tape hiss" is indeed the perfect metaphor.

Unless it’s Dylan or Joni Mitchell, I’ve found it’s better to not pay much attention to lyrics. That goes for the 60s 70s 80s 90s and beyond!

 

[wil]

Hello, I love you, won't you tell me your name?
Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game
Hello, I love you, won't you tell me your name?
Hello, I love you, let me jump in your game

A great example of lyrics to ignore.

The lyrics from earlier eras are just as bad as the lyrics from the present.

 

[Gregm]

Unless it’s Dylan or Joni Mitchell, I’ve found it’s better to not pay much attention to lyrics. That goes for the 60s 70s 80s 90s and beyond!

While I understand where you're coming from, isn't this a bit harsh?
Lyrics from that period were not all so shallow, and some were memorable in their own way.
"...one day you find
Ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run
You missed the starting gun
And you run, and you run to catch up with the sun
But it's sinking..."

" when I was younger so much younger than today, I never needed anybody's help in any way... Help me if you can (etc)" or even "
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgment of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song"

And I bet many of us here sang to the story of smoke hanging over lake Geneva "we all out to Montreux/ on the Lake Geneva shoreline...".

Regards

 

[PYP]

A great example of lyrics to ignore.

The lyrics from earlier eras are just as bad as the lyrics from the present.

well, it does seem to capture an era. But, perhaps Bob Marley's warning about being an audiophile was more relevant to those on this thread:

Now you get what you want,
Do you want more? (want more)
Now you get what you want,
Do you want more? (want more)

You think it's the end,
But it's just the beginning.
You think it's the end,
But it's just the beginning.

 

[wil]

While I understand where you're coming from, isn't this a bit harsh?
Lyrics from that period were not all so shallow, and some were memorable in their own way.
"...one day you find
Ten years have got behind you
No one told you when to run
You missed the starting gun
And you run, and you run to catch up with the sun
But it's sinking..."

" when I was younger so much younger than today, I never needed anybody's help in any way... Help me if you can (etc)" or even "
We'll be fighting in the streets
With our children at our feet
And the morals that they worship will be gone
And the men who spurred us on
Sit in judgment of all wrong
They decide and the shotgun sings the song"

And I bet many of us here sang to the story of smoke hanging over lake Geneva "we all out to Montreux/ on the Lake Geneva shoreline...".

Regards

My point is that the rose colored glasses view of another era tend to distort the full reality of that era.

 

[Al M.]

My point is that the rose colored glasses view of another era tend to distort the full reality of that era.

True. There are so many songs from the 60s and 70s that are rightfully forgotten now, but which were popular at the time. Now it's just the classics remaining.

It's akin to looking at the time of Haydn and Mozart and forgetting about all the mediocre composers surrounding them (yet there are undeservedly forgotten ones, like Eybler, who was a close friend of Mozart and truly a great composer in his own right).

 

[hopkins]

True. There are so many songs from the 60s and 70s that are rightfully forgotten now, but which were popular at the time. Now it's just the classics remaining.

It's akin to looking at the time of Haydn and Mozart and forgetting about all the mediocre composers surrounding them (yet there are undeservedly forgotten ones, like Eybler, who was a close friend of Mozart and truly a great composer in his own right).

Sometimes the forgotten ones are those that were appreciated by the ones who are not forgotten...

An amusing example here (though the last example of Sinatra seems to contradict this, it's not his most famous work):

https://www.whatsbestforum.com/threads/do-vinyl-records-actually-sound-better-than-cds-we-take-a-closer-look-in-slashgear.38966/post-979464

 

[hopkins]

I think this is very insightful and holds a lot of explanatory power.

I still enjoy some of what I listened to as a teenager, and do have vivid memories associated with some of that music, but as we grow older, we change, and we distance ourselves from how we were then (perhaps this is a question for a psychoanalyst?). The emotional involvement associated with that music has decreased, at least for me. With a few exceptions, I also probably would have been less interested then in music that really moves me today.

 

[hopkins]

I still enjoy some of what I listened to as a teenager, and do have vivid memories associated with some of that music, but as we grow older, we change, and we distance ourselves from how we were then (perhaps this is a question for a psychoanalyst?). The emotional involvement associated with that music has decreased, at least for me. With a few exceptions, I also probably would have been less interested then in music that really moves me today.

Perhaps what some people miss from those early years (our youth) is the ability to listen to music without an audiophile perspective But that's a different story...

 

[PYP]

Rick Beato's credo:

I heard you on the wireless back in '52
Lying awake intent at tuning in on you
If I was young it didn't stop you coming through
Oh, oh

They took the credit for your second symphony
Rewritten by machine on new technology
And now I understand the problems you can see

Oh, oh
I met your children
Oh, oh
What did you tell them?

Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star
Pictures came and broke your heart
Oh, a-a-a, oh

 

[thedudeabides]

It is music centric threads like this that keep me coming back to WBF.

 

[PeterA]

Your comment applies to a few sad old men stuck in the past. Mr Beato seems to be the opposite of this.

I love classic rock from the late 60s early 70s: Cream Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple. Does that make me a sad old man stuck in the past?

I will say that listening to that music did not help me survive anything. I simply liked it then and I like it now, along with a lot of other stuff

 

[PYP]

I love classic rock from the late 60s early 70s: Cream Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple. Does that make me a sad old man stuck in the past?

That doesn't sound too bad. Some guys here are also stuck in the 70s, 1770s and continue to wear waistcoat and breeches while listening to their favorite music. THAT is being stuck in the past. No sir, you are a modern fellow!

 

[Al M.]

I love classic rock from the late 60s early 70s: Cream Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple. Does that make me a sad old man stuck in the past?

I love those and, when it comes to more modern rock, also Green Day, Porcupine Tree, Neal Morse, The Warning and others.

 

[treitz3]

Trust me when I say that there was just as much crap out there when we were growing up. It's the same today as it was back then.

The only difference is that it is all available now via streaming and you don't need to record a song on the radio or make a stop to the record store to try something new.

One can still definitely enjoy the old stuff (fo'sho'!!!) but you cannot discount the new stuff if you have the same passion to search for music that you enjoy.

Search for what hits your heart and passion. Listen and enjoy it. I do and I'm pretty sure we are of the same age. If we aren't? Yo' ass is old as dirt!!!!

I keeed, I keed...

A list of today's music may not suit you and your tastes, so I won't make one. I'll just say this. I do miss the albums that tell a story all of the way through. Not just a song that repeats the same damned beat and lyrics throughout. That does seem to be the norm nowadays and could be the reason you are thinking the way you do.

There is SO much more music out there to explore though....

Tom

 

[Robh3606]

Really any doubts about new music:

WKXP Seattle, WKXP Rekovick Iceland, Tiny Desk Concerts, Audio Tree, more You Tube channels than you can imagine, Bandcamp the list just keeps going.

There is so much to listen too!

Rob

 

[Rexp]

If you have a turntable and streaming, I wouldn't blame you for thinking new music is crap, because it does, on the whole, sound crap on streaming services. But if you go to a concert, you will hear it's not crap after all.