What happened to music?

[Cornflake]

As I got my last haircut I was vaguely listening to the music that Great Clips chooses to play. Elton John. Lennon and McCartney.

I sometimes stream CJPX in Montreal when I'm on the computer. New recordings. Old material.

It's as if no new and interesting music had been written in the last half century. Anybody have any ideas what accounts for this?

[majorminor]

Sept 17, 2024 11:38:09 GMT -5 Cornflake said:

It's as if no new and interesting music had been written in the last half century. Anybody have any ideas what accounts for this?

I think at some point in the aging process you are so busy trying to remember where your glasses and keys are, or if you just inadvertently pooped or peed yourself a little that you have no excess capacity for the exploratory imagination required to process and enjoy new music. Plus you can't hear anymore anyway.

[howard lee]

This may have been posted recently, but I always find Rick Beato's videos
to be educational and informative. He has interesting opinions, as well.

[Russell Letson]

"New and interesting" to what audience? I'm sure that there are distribution channels (which is what you're hearing at a store or restaurant or in an elevator) that feature new material that some particular audience slice finds interesting. When I had that loaner Outback for week, I finally got to experience Sirius XM, which is quite clearly "curated" to satisfy various slices. I found the Sinatra channel most "interesting"--and also interesting was the channel-grouping it was bundled with: Jazz/Standards/Classical, which also included Blues and New Age. Clearly some age/class demographic research at work there. And I strongly suspect that the Hip-Hop/R&B section includes material younger than fifty years old.

Once radio stations stopped being independently/locally owned and managed, we started to get nationally-controlled, closely-channeled playlists, and the rise of the internet and digital transmission systems makes it easy to stay in one's own musical silo. My own self, I've spent the last sixty-plus years making the entire history of music my present, so What's Happenin' Now, Baby is less interesting than What's Been Goin' On for 1000 Years. (Richard Thompson gets that, I think.)

[t-bob]

"It's as if no new and interesting music had beeken written in the last half century. Anybody have any ideas what accounts for this?" by Cornflake

Well it's very music because the Internet & AI - yikes!

I Find Good Interesting Music in My Pandora -

I talk/email with my friends/musicians and find new music

[papabill]

I'm guessing many, if not most, are busy listening to the processed voices of the latest "FLAVOR OF THE MONTH."
Maybe because that's what the commercial music industry wants to feed us.

[RickW]

There’s a huge amount of new, interesting music. It’s just that what’s hugely popular is not that great, for the most part. AI is a problem, and the music industry is a problem, as they would like to use AI, and use their marketing power to force people to hear it. They are also buying up things like smaller classical labels, and sending people to their purchased music when they want to hear older pieces.

The death of CDs really took a chunk out of small, indie musicians income, but they still tour, still record. You just have to look for it.

[coachdoc]

I’m listening and reading this on my thought deletion device. I want to use that term as much as possible to realize what is happening as I am reading or listening to my TDD.

[coachdoc]

Sept 18, 2024 22:14:55 GMT -5 coachdoc said:

I’m listening and reading this on my thought deletion device. I want to use that term as much as possible to realize what is happening as I am reading or listening to my TDD was not a thought deletion device.

[Dave Poor]

Sept 17, 2024 11:38:09 GMT -5 Cornflake said:

As I got my last haircut I was vaguely listening to the music that Great Clips chooses to play. Elton John. Lennon and McCartney.

I sometimes stream CJPX in Montreal when I'm on the computer. New recordings. Old material.

It's as if no new and interesting music had been written in the last half century. Anybody have any ideas what accounts for this?

In Boise, we're lucky. KRBX plays new music, old, like really old music I'd only heard '50's covers of, jazz, Australian jazz, bluegrass, folk.. Greg does world folk.. abstract sound sculptures, brand-new pop stuff, electronica, cerebral hip-hop, whatever any of four DJs think "Americana" is.. One DJ plays bands that are about to perform someplace near Boise, or just did.. and the late night shows get weird.
radioboise.org/
There's even a two-week rolling archive. Check 'em out.

[Marshall]

Record sales are dead. Radio is dead. The economic engine (record sales) that drove the music revolution of our day is no more.

There's plenty of new good music out there. You just have to go hunt for it. It's not being spoon-fed to us like it was before Napster, and the internet, and Spotify crushed record sales.

[drlj]

Record sales are not dead, but they are on life support. There have been several record stores open in the last year around NWIN and I see everyone from oldsters like Marshall to teenagers going in and coming out with new & used vinyl. It’s not like the old days but they seem to be moving a lot of records. 49 million new records were sold in 2023. That’s not what it was in 1970, but it’s more than you might have suspected.
Radio is Sirius now for those who subscribe & a person can pick & choose their favorite old music-pop, rock, country, classical.
Everything changes.
Old people lament it and young people don’t notice it.

[Marshall]

[Russell Letson]

I recognize every item in that cartoon--I think I even used to know what brand of speaker those are. I certainly recognize the design.

[Cosmic Wonder]

Mike

[epaul]

I am grateful I have my community band. Twice a week, I'm in the music. Not listening from a distance, but within it, a part of it. That, plus the bars and cookies we have during break.

[PaulKay]

I think it is true that the industry is declining. The idea that music has gotten too easy to make with computers is a contributing factor.
You can get ‘acceptable’ music without as much effort and expense.
So the bar is lowered.
But also, as Marshall noted, the industry just can’t make as much money as it used to. The payback on all that studio time isn’t returned.

Basically I think the main reason is that there just isn’t enough sales volume anymore to justify the studio expense.