Have you grown out of really listening to music?

[Shareefruck]

The one thing I will say is that there's nothing fundamentally new going on in music right now. Those peaks you speak of typically line up with some ground-shifting change of the music itself. Blues and jazz were revolutionary. Rock n roll and soul were revolutionary. The folk music of the 60s was revolutionary, as was the evolution of rock going into the 70s. Heavy metal was revolutionary. Disco was revolutionary. Punk was revolutionary. Etc, etc. And every single one of those genres had revolutions within their own spheres. None of that is happening right now. There are certainly movements within each genre. Just as an example, a strong movement in metal over the last 5 years had been djent... but djent is essentially a rearrangement and reinterpretation of existing elements of metal, rather than an evolution. There's nothing wrong with that, but nothing revolutionary about it either.

That being said, there's a whole lot of artists out there making incredible new music within those existing forms. I found a phenomenal metalcore album that just came out this year from a band called Polaris. Larkin Poe (roots rock) put out a really fantastic album this year. I could continue on. My point is that rather than thinking of things in terms of musical eras, which really have to be defined by musical revolutions, there's more than enough value and quality out there within genres that already exist. Not every album is going to be good, but one of the best parts about the industry right now is that there's still plenty to look at. The originality doesn't come from the scene artists play in, but rather from the artists themselves.

Agreed with most of the post, but this part is entirely dependent on whether or not you're the type of person who cares about that modest, non-revolutionary/non-peak degree of quality and value, which differs from person to person and should not be presumed. Like, obviously we don't all just like and gravitate towards anything that has just a modicum of above-neutral value/quality to it, it needs to be significant enough that it satisfies and feels worthwhile to us. If you're not that type of person (which, personally, I'm not-- I'm mostly interested in things that are in the ballpark of what I perceive as cohesive, complete, and inspired peaks), there really isn't "more than enough" out there or "something for everyone".

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

You all sound so old and sad. Just like our parents, or their parents before them, the "music today isn't what it used to be" refrain is so lousy and smelly...

Yeah, yeah, I'm too attached to some of the sensibilities and sounds that were with me through the better parts of this life, but the whole granddaddy complaining routine is kind of ridiculous. Music today is 1000x better than it was in the 80s - I'll give everything else to taste and knowledge and sensibility, but the 80s were objectively the low point in a lot of things.

 

[Tawnos]

Agreed with most of the post, but this part is entirely dependent on whether or not you're the type of person who cares about that modest, non-revolutionary/non-peak degree of quality and value, which differs from person to person and should not be presumed. Like, obviously we don't all just like and gravitate towards anything that has just a modicum of above-neutral value/quality to it, it needs to be significant enough that it satisfies and feels worthwhile to us. If you're not that type of person (which, personally, I'm not-- I'm mostly interested in things that are in the ballpark of what I perceive as cohesive, complete, and inspired peaks), there really isn't "more than enough" out there or "something for everyone".

In other words, your judgment of is based less on the music itself and more on things that surround the music. Perfectly acceptable point of view, but it kind takes the weight out of the idea that the quality of the music is lower today that it was then. You’re not really judging the music.

That Polaris album isn’t “modest.” It isn’t a “modicum of above-neutral value/quality.” It’s just as good as the albums that Killswitch Engage or Shadows Fall were putting out at the peak of the metalcore subgenre. The fact that it’s 15+ years later doesn’t matter. Ditto Larkin Poe lining up against CCR or The Band or whoever you want to pick from early roots rock stuff.

I think if you listened to the *music* honestly and without the pretension of all that other stuff, and it absolutely is pretension, you’d find plenty to enjoy. I’m not even saying you’ll enjoy the same albums I enjoy, either, but that you’d find plenty with a different attitude about it. And it wouldn’t be lowering your standards, but rather changing your approach. You don’t have to, of course. To each their own.

 

[Shareefruck]

In other words, your judgment of is based less on the music itself and more on things that surround the music. Perfectly acceptable point of view, but it kind takes the weight out of the idea that the quality of the music is lower today that it was then. You’re not really judging the music.

That Polaris album isn’t “modest.” It isn’t a “modicum of above-neutral value/quality.” It’s just as good as the albums that Killswitch Engage or Shadows Fall were putting out at the peak of the metalcore subgenre. The fact that it’s 15+ years later doesn’t matter. Ditto Larkin Poe lining up against CCR or The Band or whoever you want to pick from early roots rock stuff.

I think if you listened to the *music* honestly and without the pretension of all that other stuff, and it absolutely is pretension, you’d find plenty to enjoy. I’m not even saying you’ll enjoy the same albums I enjoy, either, but that you’d find plenty with a different attitude about it. And it wouldn’t be lowering your standards, but rather changing your approach. You don’t have to, of course. To each their own.

Huh? I think there might be some confusion here. I think that revolutionary periods of inspiration often coincide with the best music being created, for one reason or another (I thought that was the point you were making earlier, but I guess I'm mistaken), but I'm still judging that by how I feel about the music itself and not extranneous factors surrounding them that I find irrelevant like historical impact or influence. That's what I had in mind and what I was going off of based on what you said when I mentioned modest value (aka. some people may still appreciate things even though they don't hit absolute heights, whereas others only appreciate things that do-- both are valid), but I guess you don't see that the same way to begin with and instead feel that the heights are just as high if not higher (something that I don't see being the case at all, personally).

 

[Shareefruck]

You all sound so old and sad. Just like our parents, or their parents before them, the "music today isn't what it used to be" refrain is so lousy and smelly...

Yeah, yeah, I'm too attached to some of the sensibilities and sounds that were with me through the better parts of this life, but the whole granddaddy complaining routine is kind of ridiculous. Music today is 1000x better than it was in the 80s - I'll give everything else to taste and knowledge and sensibility, but the 80s were objectively the low point in a lot of things.

This is a common assumption that always frustrates me. If someone happens to genuinely feel that the 2010s are a relative low point in music, it's automatically assumed that they're saying that out of nostalgia for what they liked growing up, but that doesn't necessarily have to be the case, nor does it even make that much sense because most of us aren't 80 year olds who grew up in the 50s, 60s, and 70s or were open to listening to that stuff as a kid.

Personally, I first got into music during my college years in the late 2000s (back when I was completely ignorant, resistant and dismissive of things older than that), and now I like some of the previous decades a lot more (to varying degrees), even though I experienced them in the 2010s and were exactly as new to me as 2010s music.

Just because you happen to see as much value in a certain era as others, doesn't mean that everyone who doesn't is misguided or unfairly biased in some way that should be dismissed off-hand. It's just a disagreement/different experience.

 

[holy]

I find myself listening to K-pop until my ears bleed, so for about 0.4 seconds.

 

[hamzarocks]

I cant study without music. Even when studying for finals I need music in. Helps me concentrate.

I have like 50-60 songs which I'll run through a few times if I'm studying for long.

 

[Habsfunk]

Throughout my 20s and into my 30s, I loved discovering new bands and a good chunk of my record collection is from that period of my life. At some point, I lost that passion to check out new artists, but I still love listening to music. One thing I do find myself doing a lot these is going on Spotify and listening to bands I've overlooked in the past. Alice Cooper is a great example. I always dismissed him as shock rock, but turns out when it was a band called Alice Cooper and not just a solo act, the music was fantastic. I finally started listening to Roxy Music after hearing about them forever. The only David Bowie album I knew for a long time was Ziggy Stardust, but I've been listening to him quite a bit.

Probably because I'm older and don't go to shows anymore, I don't discover as many new bands, but there's still endless music to discover. Also, I'm sure there's tons of great bands out there today. They may not be as groundbreaking as the bands of the past, but they still make great music. I realize those last two sentences contradict each other, but in my peak music listening year I was always discovering great new bands, and I doubt original music has just fallen off a cliff.

 

[Ducks in a row]

You all sound so old and sad. Just like our parents, or their parents before them, the "music today isn't what it used to be" refrain is so lousy and smelly...

Yeah, yeah, I'm too attached to some of the sensibilities and sounds that were with me through the better parts of this life, but the whole granddaddy complaining routine is kind of ridiculous. Music today is 1000x better than it was in the 80s - I'll give everything else to taste and knowledge and sensibility, but the 80s were objectively the low point in a lot of things.

You sound like kids that say new is better and don't give a chance to things that came before they where born. When I was a kid others kids where the same as they are now with that attitude. Eventually when they grow up they start looking at older stuff and discover its better then they though it would be.

Music today isn't that great. I'm in my 30's and music I like most came from before I was born which I didn't listened to until years after I was a adult. Just because something is newer doesn't mean its always better.

 

[Eisen]

You all sound so old and sad. Just like our parents, or their parents before them, the "music today isn't what it used to be" refrain is so lousy and smelly...

Yeah, yeah, I'm too attached to some of the sensibilities and sounds that were with me through the better parts of this life, but the whole granddaddy complaining routine is kind of ridiculous. Music today is 1000x better than it was in the 80s - I'll give everything else to taste and knowledge and sensibility, but the 80s were objectively the low point in a lot of things.

Oh, the 80s had a lot of lowpoints, like Stock/Aitken/Waterman and the advent of boy bands, but it also had highlights in metal, hardrock, indie and punk. I just don't see that today. It's either hyperproduced, cast or buskers today. There is a decent act every now and then as well, but the genres I like simply don't produce a lot anymore. And what they call indie these days bears little similarity to what I consider indie.

 

[member 157595]

I don't hear this take a lot, but I completely agree with it. A lot of music lovers relish the discovery process, but personally, it's just a necessary means to and end for me, and one that's often tedious.

100% agreed.

I work full-time and have a family of my own (some of which are injured and require special care); free time is a rarity and music is primarily used during work hours. I don't have time to endlessly discover music anymore.

 

[archangel2]

Rarely listen to music from the last ten years

 

[WetcoastOrca]

I’m a lyrics and melody person as opposed to a technical music person. I understand from friends that if you can appreciate technically gifted musicians that there’s still tons of good stuff available.
For me, I’ve focused on discovering artists I’ve overlooked from past decades and there have been some amazing finds like the Velvet Underground, Nick Drake, Kate Bush, Tom Waits and others I largely overlooked in the past.
I think the fact that most new music doesn’t really interest me is a combination of things: I don’t have the time and the music isn’t that interesting. I also think that there’s a time in your life when lyrics just grab you and send a message that really resonates. Mostly in your teenage years and 20’s.
At least for me that’s the period where so many songs just had so much meaning. I can even recall where I was and what I was doing when I first heard many of those songs.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

You sound like kids that say new is better and don't give a chance to things that came before they where born. When I was a kid others kids where the same as they are now with that attitude. Eventually when they grow up they start looking at older stuff and discover its better then they though it would be.

Music today isn't that great. I'm in my 30's and music I like most came from before I was born which I didn't listened to until years after I was a adult. Just because something is newer doesn't mean its always better.

I wish I sounded like a kid, I'll take that as a compliment! As for the rest, thanks for the laugh.

Oh, the 80s had a lot of lowpoints, like Stock/Aitken/Waterman and the advent of boy bands, but it also had highlights in metal, hardrock, indie and punk. I just don't see that today. It's either hyperproduced, cast or buskers today. There is a decent act every now and then as well, but the genres I like simply don't produce a lot anymore. And what they call indie these days bears little similarity to what I consider indie.

I don't listen to as much music as I used to and I wish I could give you options here. Igorrr is no Slayer, but what he does is a lot more interesting than most 80s bands. As for indie, just like pop I'm not too sure what it means. I think a lot of what's interesting comes from the hip-hop/rap scene nowadays, and I'm not yet too fond of that. A guy like Scarlxrd, if you can get passed the juvenile themes (but hey, the metal bands we love often have very dumb lyrics too), produces stuff that sounds amazing and could get you a little excited. I don't know if Josh T. Pearson and Keith Kouna are indie, but I adore them and would rank very high on an all-time ranking for me. On a more lyrics-heavy side of things, Damien Saez made a lot of great songs in the last 10 years, comparable to Renaud at another time (I know 3 out of 4 are French or French speaking, but Igorrr doesn't use French much).

 

[HansonBro]

My peak was probably 14-20. At 14 I was a dishwasher and I'd buy a new CD before every shift. So 3-4 new CD'S a week started to add up pretty quick. I bought them based off one song I knew I liked, then would try and get every album that band produced.

Then around 18 I had a certain car and installed a real sound system. Subs, amps, head unit and speakers. What an amazing difference that made in sound quality and hearing the music the way it was meant to be. The subs were probably the biggest difference maker, even for rock music.

And of course that was around the time of Napster and Limewire etc... so I was burning like crazy.

These days it's pretty much just the radio while I'm working. Unfortunately we don't have a station that strictly plays my type of music anymore (Nirvana, Offspring, RATM etc). I can't stand the new alternative stations so I just listen to a station that plays like Halsy and Cammilla Cabello type music. I can't friggin stand those old rock stations that play the same ACDC songs ive heard 9 million times

 

[Shareefruck]

You sound like kids that say new is better and don't give a chance to things that came before they where born. When I was a kid others kids where the same as they are now with that attitude. Eventually when they grow up they start looking at older stuff and discover its better then they though it would be.

Music today isn't that great. I'm in my 30's and music I like most came from before I was born which I didn't listened to until years after I was a adult. Just because something is newer doesn't mean its always better.

Yes, and just because some people can have skeptical attitudes towards new music because they're older and it's foreign to what they're most comfortable with from when they grew up, doesn't mean that that's doomed to always be the case with everyone skeptical of new music for an eternity and that the sentiment can only ever be invalid. It's possible to happen to legitimately land on a weak period just like it's possible to happen to legitimately land on growing up during a golden age, and these sentiments should be taken at face value instead of treated with a blanket strawman designed to make people who disagree with you look bad. Hell most of the old out of touch people who grew up in the 60s/70s and scoffed at the 80s probably ended up being proven right, just because they happened to land on those eras.

All of the stuff I like most I discovered in the last ten years and don't sound anything like what I'm used to/familiar with from growing up, they just happen to not be from things released in the last ten years.

Personally, I think that a medium like videogames are currently on an up period while music is currently in a down period and that's just how the chips happen to have landed (and I have more childhood nostalgia in the former whereas I have more current interest in the latter, which doesn't line up with the generalization at all).

It's all very disingenuous and unfair.

 

[Desdichado93]

I'm into my 40s already and with Spotify and Youtube available I listen to allot more music then I did 20-25 years ago. My music taste have changed quite considerably over the
years as well and now I mostly listen to heavy metal (mainly power metal and symphonic metal) nowadays. There are still some good non-metal bands, like Baskery who do new music
and do it well although Baskery predominantly is a band that should be experienced live (have seen them 7 times).

 

[tarheelhockey]

Music today isn't that great. I'm in my 30's and music I like most came from before I was born which I didn't listened to until years after I was a adult. Just because something is newer doesn't mean its always better.

What you like isn’t “better” than what someone else likes. It’s just the thing you like.

At the end of the day we’re talking about commercial art which is based entirely on cultural cues. What listeners get out of the experience depends on what they bring into it. Someone who gets a lot out of Bruno Mars, and thinks Tom Waits is unlistenable, has just as valid of a take as someone who feels the opposite.

 

[beowulf]

Listen to music all the time, always have. I still buy CDs and records as I prefer to have a hard copy.

 

[Shareefruck]

What you like isn’t “better” than what someone else likes. It’s just the thing you like.

At the end of the day we’re talking about commercial art which is based entirely on cultural cues. What listeners get out of the experience depends on what they bring into it. Someone who gets a lot out of Bruno Mars, and thinks Tom Waits is unlistenable, has just as valid of a take as someone who feels the opposite.

They may have as valid of a take, but you can also subjectively disagree on what's "better" because of those differences. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Beyond that, I would still argue that there are probably differences in actual value in the universe that we can have a sense and opinion of even though we can never confirm it for certain (despite being able to logically argue it to some flawed degree), but that's a different thing altogether that isn't worth getting into.

 

[Pranzo Oltranzista]

They may have as valid of a take, but you can also subjectively disagree on what's "better" because of those differences. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Beyond that, I would still argue that there are probably differences in actual value in the universe that we can have a sense and opinion of even though we can never confirm it for certain (despite being able to logically argue it to some flawed degree), but that's a different thing altogether that isn't worth getting into.

You can make a semi-objective analysis of a work's merit in terms of originality or complexity, making it "high-art" or "low-art" to the trends of the time, but you won't ever get to the answer as if any of it makes it better or not.

I prefer stuff with harder edges, my gf loves Bon Jovi. I think it's pure crap, but she enjoys melodic elements and note sequences - her objective knowledge of music is 1000x mine and what she tells me go right over my head. I still think it sucks, but I can't deny that it has a much more blissful impact on her than any of my unlistenable stuff has.

 

[Teemu]

The streaming era has had a strange effect where there's a reduced incentive to try out new music because there's a nearly-endless catalog available to us from all ages. Furthermore, buying a record used to be an investment, but now you can just easily move onto the next one if the current one isn't to your liking. And since I (and most of my generation) don't really have the free time to go to shows anymore, it doesn't really matter too much if the music is current or not. Albums from 2020 are competing on equal footing with albums from every other year.

There's also probably a demographic effect in play--with all due respect to Billie Eilish, we aren't quite at the point where Gen Z is making an impact on music yet but the Millenial acts are getting a bit long in the tooth.

 

[Shareefruck]

You can make a semi-objective analysis of a work's merit in terms of originality or complexity, making it "high-art" or "low-art" to the trends of the time, but you won't ever get to the answer as if any of it makes it better or not.

I prefer stuff with harder edges, my gf loves Bon Jovi. I think it's pure crap, but she enjoys melodic elements and note sequences - her objective knowledge of music is 1000x mine and what she tells me go right over my head. I still think it sucks, but I can't deny that it has a much more blissful impact on her than any of my unlistenable stuff has.

That sounds mostly compatible with what I'm saying.

I just fundamentally disagree that "better" should necessarily be reserved as a strictly provable objective term the way that some people use it. To me, it's very subjective, because the purpose of the medium is subjective to begin with. Better is just what you personally see and argue that there's more value in, IMO. It doesn't need to be 100% objectively applicable to every human in the world for it to be fair to use that word, nor should anyone take it that way, in my opinion.

But even on the ACTUAL objective side, I would still lean towards thinking that either you or your girlfriend are more right about what they think, and that if you could step into each others brains and fully understand each other, you would be able to determine who was more right and come away with a similar experience. That's obviously technically impossible with current technology, so I agree that it makes no sense to ever be 100% certain of your opinions about good or bad (nor can any objective argument/superior knowledge ever prove that), but I disagree with the idea that our estimations of everyone's preferences should be treated as exactly the same, exactly as likely, and exactly as valid. Everyone just has their best guess that could very well be wrong. Just because you don't know the answer, doesn't mean that you shouldn't hold onto your best and most compelling guess and refer to that as what you "think" is better, IMO.

 

[tarheelhockey]

They may have as valid of a take, but you can also subjectively disagree on what's "better" because of those differences. I don't see anything wrong with that.

Beyond that, I would still argue that there are probably differences in actual value in the universe that we can have a sense and opinion of even though we can never confirm it for certain (despite being able to logically argue it to some flawed degree), but that's a different thing altogether that isn't worth getting into.

It's true that there can be a subjective argument. The problem we usually run into is that people have different subjective values, so the argument doesn't really go anywhere.

When it comes to music, some people are highly analytical while others are more experiential. Some people simply gravitate to a song with a strong beat, because of how it makes them feel viscerally. Others might gravitate to songs that bring them back to a particular time and place in their lives (seems like a common sentiment in this thread). Some want to hear music that makes them think about intellectual topics. Some really analytical types are interested in the technical form.

If we could CAT scan ourselves while listening, we'd see our brain flashing with dopamine when we stumble across our personal triggers. Being triggered by one thing isn't better than being triggered by the other, it's simply a different experience of what feels good. It's like sex. The world is full of flavors, and there's no accounting for all the factors that go into forming our tastes. We just like what we like, and sometimes our tastes can change for no discernable reason other than growing up and out of a phase.

Of course we can always defend our judgments in logical language, but at the end of the day there's no objective framework for these things. Someone who likes a song simply for the catchy beat has no absolute reason to care whether it's derivative or vapid. They don't share base assumptions that would allow an academic argument to even take place. Part of the reason science and technology move steadily forward, while the arts just kind of swirl around like eddies in a stream.

 

[Ozz]

If anything there's not enough time in the day to listen to everything worth listening to. I keep tabs on a large assortment of favorites and favorables, and spend a lot of time exploring new bands or older bands I may not have been exposed to in the past.

I think certain genres lend to this better than others. If I listened to radio music made for the masses I'd probably not be interested any longer either.