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Music: Let's talk about modern pop music.

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  1.  (6772.21)
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      CommentAuthorjohnjones
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009
     (6772.22)


    I discovered this one on the show, "Chuck" and really liked it.
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      CommentAuthortexture
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009
     (6772.23)
    @ Cat Vincent:
    One of the worst of these for me is Come On Eileen

    That song also makes me want to stab myself in the ears.

    For the record, here's my list of Ten Songs It Is Not OK to Like (in no particular order):

    1 Come on Eileen by Dexy's Midnight Runners
    2 Wonderwall by Oasis
    3 Let it Be by the Beatles
    4 Imagine by John Lennon
    5 Hey Jude by the Beatles
    6 Brown Eyed Girl by Van Morrison
    7 Summer of 69 by Bryan Adams
    8 Daydream Believer by The Monkees
    9 Build Me Up Buttercup by The Foundations
    10 Chelsea Dagger by The Fratellis

    What these songs all have in common is either a horribly brain-enslaving chorus that goes nananananana or lalalalalala or doododododododooo, or such simplistic lyrics that even drunk England fans can understand them at 5am after ninety pints of watered down Costa Del Sol lager, or the fact that they mistily re-create a past that said hooligan never experienced but romanticises utterly (I'm looking at you, Lennon and McCartney, and especially you, Bryan Adams).

    Now I know lots of people will violently disagree with some of the songs on that list. But trust me - to understand why these songs should be erased from our collective memory, you have to have heard them being sung by three hundred pissed-up neanderthals in the Holiday Concentration Camp next door while you are trying to sleep. Or in a pub after any football match in England. Or at a wedding.

    Christ, I really need to go listen to something obscure with no lyrics now, my hands are shaking.

    PS. I have no problem with Lady Gaga - her music knows it is disposable. Also no point including novelty records on that list... no-one seriously considers The Mr Blobby song to be great pop. The point is, the people who like The Ten Songs actually think that they are classic pop music... that is why the songs must be destroyed.

    (sorry for the rant, please don't chuck stuff at me)
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      CommentAuthorjoe.distort
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009 edited
     (6772.24)
    But then, there's a vast amount of terrible avant-garde music, and terrible metal, and terrible hardcore and a HUGE amount of terrible indie. I don't know that it all balances out, but I know that just as there are inspired people making music in other genres, there are inspired people making music in the world of pop too


    this sums things up pretty well. a lot of music is just weak and uninspired in every genre. the amount of terrible records coming out is always an issue. its one of the things i like most about the digitizing of music- fewer bands that half-ass things putting out actual physical albums.

    i also think an important rule to remember is that most of what is being marketed to us in every genre is really just the most palatable/produced/focus-group tested. MOST. some good stuff gets through, but not much i know of.
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      CommentAuthorVaehling
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009
     (6772.25)
    I used to hate pop music but my definition of what pop is was overwrtten by the likes of XTC, They Might Be Giants, The Beautiful South and Les Rita Mitsouko a long time ago, and the partly reconstructed by early nineties Pet shop Boys, Sparks and rediscovered Eurythmics (all except for SISTERS, I hate that one with the passion texture and Cat Vincent have for COME ON EILEEN).

    When it's good, pop is catchy, fun and somewhat over the top. I like the instant quality of it. You don't have to engage in scholarly exercise to cherish it like you do with classical music and some jazz, you just pour a cup and enjoy.

    When it's bad, it's usually because it's generic crap that doesn't seem to come from inspiration but from demographic targeting. Also, most chart-oriented production puts me off. I almost liked Lily Allen's last album. It had a lot of catchy songwirting and fun lyrics. But the production killed everything, starting with the harmonies - they were drowned, I think.

    Good recent stuff includes the Ting Tings, the Go! Team, the Blood Arm, and yes absolutely the Polysics - I came across their Peel Session EP recently, and it blew me away. They're doing to New Wave what the Dukes of Stratosphear did to sixties pop.

    Oh, and I do love me some doodoodoo and lalalala vocals. Nothing wrong with that. And drunken campfire hooligans slaughter just about any music that's supposed to be good.
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      CommentAuthorVaehling
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009
     (6772.26)

    this sums things up pretty well. a lot of music is just weak and uninspired in every genre. the amount of terrible records coming out is always an issue. its one of the things i like most about the digitizing of music- fewer bands that half-ass things putting out actual physical albums.


    True, but bad indie pop and rock just passes you by without leaving an impression. That's its way of being bad. Bad pop music can do that too, but more often than not it keeps coming at you like a door-to-door salesman, creeping into your earlobes and urging you to sing along.
  7.  (6772.27)
    ha! true. if i dont like UNDERGROUND HIPSTER HYPE BAND #12, its not like im going to hear it 8oo times in stores, tv, radio ads, co-workers blablabla like with say, katy perry. or whatevers playing all the time now that i dont know the identity of because im old and i dont know what the hell is really popular anymore.
  8.  (6772.28)
    I've thought about this before and have decided we need to redefine the word Pop into two new words.
    One that describes the technique of pop music. That primal infectious magic that bypasses your thinking brain and makes you instantly joyful, dancing, singing along no-matter how inane the lyrics. Something that all music has to various degrees.
    Then we need a second word to describe the group of music (which though it seems predominantly comes from that stuff they call RnB, eurotrash dance music, and incresingly I've noticed country, but really can and does come from all types and styles of music) that is most popular, the top 40, the stuff played in clubs, commercial radio, supermarkets and music tv channels. Manufactured music made by concentration camps of song writers and session musicians to be sung by strippers and boy-men.

    I'm not sure exactly what these two new words should be...
  9.  (6772.29)
    Also, I think the word "modern" in this topics title is unnecessary. I've looked at the top selling music of the past 60 years, the number 1 singles, the top 40, and there has never been a Golden age of pop music. People look back at the 60's and see the success of The Beatles, The Beach Boys, Motown etc and think it must of been a wonderful time where radio's played non-stop wonderful un-cynical pop music. This isnt really true. It varies of course and depends where you live and how you accessed music, but the majority of popular music has ALWAYS been this crap. I cant think of any good examples cause no one likes to study mediocrity (oh wait cliff richard), but from the begining the Top 40 has been filled with shit.
    It always pisses me off when some pop svengali tries to defend their putrid plastic mindless creations by saying "We're just doing pop music, ya know like The Beatles, like Otis Redding."
    It also annoys me when my friends say they'd rather have been around in the 70's or the 80's and that they were born in the wrong time, because for every pink floyd, the clash, the smiths, there are (and always will be) a thousand Osmond families, murkying the water, making it harder to find the good stuff.
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      CommentAuthorcurb
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009
     (6772.30)
    I sometimes wonder if I would have liked some of the songs I like now had I heard them at the time they were originally released. Maybe the alternative history 1969 version of me would have hated Space Oddity, for example. Then again, I know for sure he would find ABBA as fucking horrible as I still find them now.
  11.  (6772.31)
    There's something genius in some artists who appreciate the pop formula but don't pander to the major labels. Costello is a prime examples of this...

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      CommentAuthortexture
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2009
     (6772.32)
    There's something genius in some artists who appreciate the pop formula but don't pander to the major labels


    Val, you've hit the nail on the head.

    for every pink floyd, the clash, the smiths, there are (and always will be) a thousand Osmond families


    Sloth, I couldn't have put it better myself.

    Also? Despite my earlier music-Nazi rant, there is no point arguing over matters of taste. It's like trying to convert people to atheism when they have deeply held religious beliefs. It's fun to debate, but to a certain extent you have to live and let live, because one man's pop is another man's pap. These kind of arguments are all fun and games until someone loses an eye... so sorry for the Beatles-baiting, it is a very bad habit of mine
  13.  (6772.33)
    Old pop.

  14.  (6772.34)
    Pop from The Sims 2 soundtrack.

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      CommentAuthorrickiep00h
    • CommentTimeSep 15th 2009
     (6772.35)
    For some reason Katy Perry's "Hot and Cold" gets stuck in my head at random moments, even though I've heard it less than half a dozen times. So I think that's probably the hallmark of a good pop track; it gets in your head when you barely know it well enough to recognize what you're listening to. I'm not a fan of hers by any means, but I appreciate what she's doing, even if it's forever ruining music from the inside out. Because that's all critics ever think about every band ever. "Band X is ruining pop music!"

    Actually, I'm going to have to hang onto that for an album title.
  16.  (6772.36)
    Ha. Band X will be "ruining" pop music until the end of time. Really, one of the greatest things about pop music is it's constant redefinition. This is why it can't be defined easily.
  17.  (6772.37)
    For some reason Katy Perry's "Hot and Cold" gets stuck in my head at random moments, even though I've heard it less than half a dozen times


    SAME HERE DEAR GOD WHY (although i like to look at her)
  18.  (6772.38)
    SAME HERE DEAR GOD WHY

    Hasn’t happened since I saw a clip of her attempting to sing live without auto-tuning.
  19.  (6772.39)
    I've been quite amazed at the social impact of pop music in terms of what others seem to force feed us. Way back in the late seventies I picked through my parent's collection of records, found this and put it on...



    I fell in love with it. Radio hadn't forced it upon me, my parents didn't point it out to me nor had I any idea how popular it had been when it had first come out in the 60s. It really made me realize the power music had when I did learn of it's popularity. The ability to touch just the right spot in so many consciousnesses, to bring their brains to the same tempo and groove. Few things are that magical, are they?
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      CommentAuthorapefist
    • CommentTimeSep 17th 2009
     (6772.40)
    Hurray for Super Furry Animals and Sparks!

    Morrissey still brings it, and I'm quite fond of Arctic Monkeys' new CD "Humbug". Bloc Party is good. Broadcast, Frightened Rabbit, Vampire Weekend, Modest Mouse (w/Johnny Marr), Asteroids Galaxy Tour, Stars, Jets To Brazil, Black Moth Super Rainbow, Grizzly Bear.

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