ambient Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 (edited) Some interesting points. [url="http://www.facebook.com/paul.j.watson.71/videos/10153981394626171/?pnref=story"]http://www.facebook.com/paul.j.watson.71/videos/10153981394626171/?pnref=story[/url] Edited March 5, 2016 by ambient Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PlungerModerno Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 Some very interesting claims - He's right that the pop music charts are dominated by cynical guff . . . I'm not convinced there's a conspiracy behind it though, more likely it's a few big players copying each other to death while everyone else struggles to get even a fraction of their trade! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassBus Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 He is brainwashing us to believe this is a new thing. This could be applied to the 60s, 70s, 80s and,...well I lost interest after that. Holland Dozier and Holland, Chin and Chapman, Stock Aitkin and Waterman anyone. None of this is new. It's been happening since the beginning of pop music. Listen to Brian Mathews' Sounds of the Sixties and you will hear everything he has described in the video. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grandad Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 Much of what's said rings true. He is talking about the music 'business' though. As an amateur I do not envy those who have chosen to make a living out of their art. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cato Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 If anything the industry is slightly more honest about manufactured bands & writing pop music to formulas than it was back in the days of the Monkees. There has always been a huge market for that knd of stuff and probably always will be. As for dumbed down lyrics, at the risk of transatlantic ire 'Love me do' and 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand' were not exactly Shakespeare. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrevorR Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 [quote name='BassBus' timestamp='1457164218' post='2995867'] He is brainwashing us to believe this is a new thing. This could be applied to the 60s, 70s, 80s and,...well I lost interest after that. Holland Dozier and Holland, Chin and Chapman, Stock Aitkin and Waterman anyone. None of this is new. It's been happening since the beginning of pop music. Listen to Brian Mathews' Sounds of the Sixties and you will hear everything he has described in the video. [/quote] What he said... Probably is even worse now, though. He's right though there is a small group of people whose aim is to control and monetise what we hear. Yes, I'm looking at you Norrie Paramore, Joe Meek, Berry Gordy, Brian Epstein,... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
colgraff Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 What I find most I interesting about music industry analyses is that the vast majority seem to use a point in the past as a reference point and imply that it was a steady state. The music industry has never settled into one particular model and has always evolved rapidly in response to commercial pressures and technological advances and I suspect that it always will. The only commonality between different eras is people bemoaning how it was better when they were younger. There was concern over the decline of public performance as gramophones and 78rpm discs became cheaper and more popular. Then there was the same when 45rpm singles. This reversed as technology made large scale public performances possible. Then the period of naval-gazing re singles/album sales. etc. etc. ad infinitum. One could track technological/social development in the popularity of bass playing, too. A relatively unpopular instrument in gramophone and radiophone days as speakers prevented bass from being easily heard. A huge boom in bass in the 60s and 70s when speaker and recording technology improved so bass was readily heard. A slump in 80s as tinny Walkman's were in vogue, then a boom again as micro speaker technology improved further. Plus ça change Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
grandad Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 All of Simon Napier-Bell's books are worth reading. Best one is "Ta-ra-ra Boom de-ay" . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mykesbass Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 [quote name='BassBus' timestamp='1457164218' post='2995867'] Listen to Brian Mathews' Sounds of the Sixties and you will hear everything he has described in the video. [/quote] This has always been my response. Amazing how selective memory can be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mykesbass Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 [quote name='Cato' timestamp='1457167571' post='2995891'] As for dumbed down lyrics, at the risk of transatlantic ire 'Love me do' and 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand' were not exactly Shakespeare. [/quote] "We all live in a yellow submarine...now what do I follow that line with" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul_5 Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 Theodore Adorno wrote a paper claiming the exact same thing (homogenised, pseudo-individualistic product) in 1936. It's called 'On Jazz' and is well worth a read. Different schools of thought either vilify it or laud it, but it just goes to show that this undercurrent rejecting modern musical 'development' has been happening for a good long while... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrevorR Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 Yeah, a few years ago the Beeb did a Which Decade Was Best series of pop music debates looking at the 50s onwards. There was a show for each decade and then one to decide the best decade. One of the most interesting bits of each programme was the little feature running down the top ten most popular/biggest selling songs of the decade. They were to a huge majority stuffed with awful, commercialised pap, not the songs that end up on greatest lists! Our memories are so very selective, nostaligia driven and skewed to support our underlying view of the world... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4stringslow Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 [quote name='BassBus' timestamp='1457164218' post='2995867'] He is brainwashing us to believe this is a new thing. This could be applied to the 60s, 70s, 80s and,...well I lost interest after that. Holland Dozier and Holland, Chin and Chapman, Stock Aitkin and Waterman anyone. None of this is new. It's been happening since the beginning of pop music. Listen to Brian Mathews' Sounds of the Sixties and you will hear everything he has described in the video. [/quote] Yep. What goes around, comes around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MacDaddy Posted March 5, 2016 Share Posted March 5, 2016 [quote name='Cato' timestamp='1457167571' post='2995891'] If anything the industry is slightly more honest about manufactured bands & writing pop music to formulas than it was back in the days of the Monkees. [/quote] That's rather unfair to The Monkees. It was only ever meant to be a TV show. However its success fuelled by public demand led to the actors becoming the band. Micky Dolenz said something along the lines of 'an equivalent would be Leonard Nimoy actually becoming a Vulcan'. The original Tin Pan Alley had a corporate stranglehold over popular music from the late 19th century. So as others have posted, it's nothing new. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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