Music today vs. Music of yesterday (phillybass101)

[phillybass101]

Music today is as good as it ever was. The problem is radio sucks and the people behind radio and music recording and distribution want to capitalize and homogenize all music into a product. Radio used to be the means of getting out new music (all kinds) to the masses. The challenge was to be the first station to play the next new song or to introduce the next new hot group. Those days are long gone. The challenge today is to suppress any thing new or different. In the past there were many hits by many different artists. Each band or artist could be different. Nowadays you'll hear the same crap by the same crappy band several times within an hour.

Today we're getting less exposure through standard formats. Thankful that we have the internet and we can put our ownstuff out there. To quote I think Frank Zappa "If you don't sound like the five bands that sound the same, you don't have much of a chance in the music business."

 

[sunmouse]

I agree - much of the radio content out there consists of clones of a few songs - but not all. Some of the more unusual stations can carry some good stuff and some weird stuff too - viz, the (now defunct) "birdsong" station on DAB - yep - it played birdsong - just birdsong! Planet Rock has some good stuff even if its focus is mainstream. Shoutcast is a good place to look as well.

 

[straycat113]

Wow I could not disagree with anything as much as I can with that statement. The last decade was the worst I have ever seen in music, not to say there is no talent out there and to agree on your point about radio.

But if you look at the artist from the 50s and the birth of it all to the 60s with the British Invasion, and the acts that were on lables like Motown or Atlantic records, Dylan and the Folk scene and that decade also producing Hendrix,Clapton, Beck and Page just to name a few or I could be here all day besides the start of heavy metal. Then going into the 70s and 80s with again just to many great artist to mention.

Today you have Hip Hop and all the fabricated tween artist and Idols dominating eveything. But there have always been Teen Idols from the day Elvis got drafted from Fabian and Frankie Avalon to David Cassidy ,Bobby Sherman and Donnie Osmond but none of those guys were even taken serious, today they are what is the driving force in music. As much fun as MTV was when it first came out it was almost a prophecy with the first video ever played- Video really did Kill the Radio Star as bands and artist looks are more important than what talent they have. I never thought I would ever see the music business in such ruins. All you can hope for is someone with huge talent to bust out big, that causes a movement that rights the ship.

 

[Bassmedic14]

BIG COMMERCIALISM! play blah music with mostly no soul or they play a descent song to death!

 

[BassMent]

When I started listening to the radio in the 60's, it was easy to find great music. Same in the 70's. Same in the 80's if you had an "alternative" or "new wave" station in town (I did). IN the 90's as Clear Channel started buying up every station in every market, it became more and more difficult to find interesting music on the public airwaves.

But I disagree that music from the 50's and 60's was "better." It's different, and the radio emphasis has obviously changed (for the worse, IMHO). But with bands like Wilco and the Shins and Fleet Foxes and My Morning Jacket and The National and artists like Gillian Welch and Ben Folds out there making music, don't be telling me that what I was listening to 40 years ago was "better." That, to me, is simply an uninformed opinion.