Music snobbery

[Special At Specialist]

Pop music is the worst, electro is the second worst. The music is shit and people only listen to it so that they can seem all "fresh" and "cool" and conform to this fucked up society.

I mean, have you listened to the lyrics of some pop songs? "Baby, baby, baby oooh!" Clearly the singer is a complete retard and needs to go back to high school to learn and develop a real talent.

And electro music isn't even real music, it's just a bunch of computer noises. It's not natural or meaningful or pleasant to hear. Computers are not instruments. I might as well make a song composed of the sound of the toilet flushing and a cow mooing, because that would be more artistic than what music is like nowadays.

I miss rock songs and classical music - both pleasant to hear and requiring real talent to play. Those were the songs that lasted and lasted, because no one would want to forget about great classics like Beethoven, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, John Farnham, U2, Nirvana and Coldplay (not their new song "Paradise" because that one sucks). With stuff like Justin Bieber, it becomes too "old" and "out of fashion" for the little kiddies that listen to it after a few weeks, hence why he has to keep making new music (if I can even call it that).

Preteens don't know what they want. All they know how to do is imitate others around them, who unfortunately happen to be stupid and immature a lot of the time. Ask any grown, mature person what he/she calls "real music" and then you will understand why we need to get rid of pop, techno and "house" music.

[Professor Polonsky]

I might as well make a song composed of the sound of the toilet flushing and a cow mooing, because that would be more artistic than what music is like nowadays.

Actually...

Pop music is the worst, electro is the second worst. The music is shit and people only listen to it so that they can seem all "fresh" and "cool" and conform to this fucked up society.

The Beatles were quite 'popular' and 'cool' if I recall correctly...

I mean, have you listened to the lyrics of some pop songs? "Baby, baby, baby oooh!" Clearly the singer is a complete retard and needs to go back to high school to learn and develop a real talent.

Meh. There are a fair share of damn good songs with crappy lyrics. The "She loves you yeah, yeah, yeah" refrain can't be much more complicated than the JB one. Not that I'm comparing The Beatles to Bieber - they were truly revolutionary in many ways.

And electro music isn't even real music, it's just a bunch of computer noises. It's not natural or meaningful or pleasant to hear. Computers are not instruments.

The former statement is subjective. And what is a musical instrument, then?

I miss rock songs and classical music - both pleasant to hear and requiring real talent to play. Those were the songs that lasted and lasted, because no one would want to forget about great classics like Beethoven, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, John Farnham, U2, Nirvana and Coldplay (not their new song "Paradise" because that one sucks).

Yeah, undoubtedly, some music ages much better than others... But popularity tests don't really tell much. There are overrated artists, and unjustly forgotten ones.

With stuff like Justin Bieber, it becomes too "old" and "out of fashion" for the little kiddies that listen to it after a few weeks, hence why he has to keep making new music (if I can even call it that).

Yeah, again, pop music is a bit of a revolving door. But that's not always the case - how long has Madonna been around for? MJ? And I don't even like their music. On the other hand though, there are some rock bands which are only known for a few songs even though they have a lot more than that.

Preteens don't know what they want. All they know how to do is imitate others around them, who unfortunately happen to be stupid and immature a lot of the time. Ask any grown, mature person what he/she calls "real music" and then you will understand why we need to get rid of pop, techno and "house" music.

Are you telling me that The Beatles weren't popular amongst preteens? Give me a break. And that there aren't adults who like pop/techno/house? I think you'd find a few of them in this thread.

So this means that either you don't consider Eno as innovative or you don't consider him as electronic? I would count him as a recommendation.

I see Eno as more ambient/pop/rock (depending on his phase) rather than electronic. I think his ambient works stand out a bit from the electronic music which I know - I mean, one is designed to be ambient and the other to get you to dance...

Eno's catalogue is massive and I'm still getting through a lot of it, but I like what I hear.

[Drunk]

So much ignorance in this thread

[kamil9876]

I think his ambient works stand out a bit from the electronic music which I know - I mean, one is designed to be ambient and the other to get you to dance...

I consider that electronic (I would count him as one of my favourite artists of electronic music) and I certainly include ambient music as part of electronic music(one of my favourite genres) regardless of whether the intention is to get you to dance or not.

Eno's catalogue is massive and I'm still getting through a lot of it, but I like what I hear.

  Me too, Amen to that.

[Fluttershy]

Wow, I leave for a few days and I come back to this. I don't even know where to begin, there's so much I disagree with. Thanks Mao, I would +1 everything you've said if I could. I'm only going to reply with a massive generalization here, because if I were to refute everything I disagreed with here, I'd be here all night.

Music is a form of expression of the imagination. If you want to boil music down into a science about what is and isn't music, fine, you do that. But ultimately, music is SUBJECTIVE, because it is based on SUBJECTIVE perspectives. If you're going to claim that a genre isn't as 'pure' or 'human' as another, like electronic dance music (which I strongly disagree with, for the record), at least try to be sensitive of others' opinions, and try not to degrade a group of people simply because their views are different to your own.

Polonius, there are definitely new things happening in electronic music all the time; there are plenty of examples of rock influenced by electronic music and vice versa (such as Pendulum or Modestep, to name a couple of more popular artists). Oh, and I'd recommend checking out Seven Lions- his style is instantly recognizable, and it's one of the more innovative sounds in 'popular' electronic music, as well as being perhaps more 'emotional'. I do agree with a lot of what you're saying, though. EDM is an acquired taste, and a lot of what is portrayed to the public as EDM is not representative as a whole. Popularity seems to be more about connections and being introduced at the right time, rather than true innovation.

Oh, thanks everyone for replying! I thought this thread was dead

[Yendall]

All forms of music are an art form. How can you even argue that one genre is less than the other? I don't care whether it's electronic, jazz, blues, silence. Every genre has its own unique interpretation of sound.

[Special At Specialist]

All forms of music are an art form. How can you even argue that one genre is less than the other? I don't care whether it's electronic, jazz, blues, silence. Every genre has its own unique interpretation of sound.

What if I make up a new genre called toilet noises, which consists solely of the sound of different toilets flushing in symphony? Or if I did the same with fart noises? Would they be just as artistic as classical music or rock music?

[Yendall]

What if I make up a new genre called toilet noises, which consists solely of the sound of different toilets flushing in symphony? Or if I did the same with fart noises? Would they be just as artistic as classical music or rock music?

It's all a matter of personal opinion. Personally, I don't think it would be as interesting, but that doesn't matter. It is still considered a form of music, no matter how abstracted it may be.

[QuidProQuo]

What if I make up a new genre called toilet noises, which consists solely of the sound of different toilets flushing in symphony? Or if I did the same with fart noises?

Actually, that was pretty much the basis of Percy Grainger's 'free music' - music deriving from the sound of a ball going town a tube etc.
Personally, I find it difficult to comprehend as music but accept its legitimacy as a musical experiment.

[Fluttershy]

What if I make up a new genre called toilet noises, which consists solely of the sound of different toilets flushing in symphony? Or if I did the same with fart noises? Would they be just as artistic as classical music or rock music?

I'd consider that to be just as artistic. From my perspective, if you can find beauty in air rushing through metal tubes, strings being ground against other strings and sticks being hit against stretched skins, why not appreciate the sound of water rushing through piping, or rushes of air through narrow cavities? For me, sound is just vibrations through a medium, and music is a bunch of sounds placed together in a vaguely organized, or disorganized manner.

Sometimes, I wonder what music great classical composers like Mozart or Rachmaninoff would make if they lived in this time. Would they all choose to stick only to 'traditional' instruments such as strings and woodwind, or would some of them experiment with creating their own sounds, in order to truly encapture the visions in their minds?

[QuidProQuo]

Sound is just vibrations through a medium, and music is a bunch of sounds placed together in a vaguely organized, or disorganized manner.

You've converted me. Amen

Sometimes, I wonder what music great classical composers like Mozart or Rachmaninoff would make if they lived in this time. Would they all choose to stick only to 'traditional' instruments such as strings and woodwind, or would some of them experiment with creating their own sounds, in order to truly encapture the visions in their minds?

Good question...I think it would depend as much on the era as it would on the composer's family and their upbringing/lineage. Mozart's father was a rigid classicist, teaching Wolfgang convention from the minute go - so whilst WA Mozart epitomised the classical era and explored it to its fullest capacities, he didn't seek to change musical convention or develop a new musical language, so to speak. Someone like Beethoven though, was an artistic revolutionary; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEZXjW_s0Qs This piece was described (in paraphrase) by Stravinsky as a piece that will remain contemporary forever. So I would say the era, whilst having a primal influence, doesn't necessarily determine a composer's direction.

So for me that leads to the question: do we necessarily need new instruments or musical paradigms or technologies to develop musical ideas in the modern world? I don't think we do, looking back on the progression of music from the Renaissance right to the present day. But having said that, we are discovering tremendous uses for technology in music - especially in genres like jazz, with pickups, leads etc, and also for classical, I may say. It's meaning when used in electro type genres is subjectively determined of course, so that's not to be treated objectively (although the structural elements of the genre can be objectively assessed, and I'm not so fond of it in this regard. Like, structurally, The Godfather is clearly a better film than Project X - but someone might enjoy the latter more than the former, and that's perfectly fine...)

There's so much to be said and debated, but at the end of it all I think what would be best for music, in addition to the survival of good music, wherever it may be found, is for all conceptions of music - free, organised, whatever, to exist in tandem...so says Leonard Bernstein in his Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award acceptance speech

[ShortBlackChick]

Pop music is the worst, electro is the second worst. The music is shit and people only listen to it so that they can seem all "fresh" and "cool" and conform to this fucked up society.

I mean, have you listened to the lyrics of some pop songs? "Baby, baby, baby oooh!" Clearly the singer is a complete retard and needs to go back to high school to learn and develop a real talent.

And electro music isn't even real music, it's just a bunch of computer noises. It's not natural or meaningful or pleasant to hear. Computers are not instruments. I might as well make a song composed of the sound of the toilet flushing and a cow mooing, because that would be more artistic than what music is like nowadays.

I miss rock songs and classical music - both pleasant to hear and requiring real talent to play. Those were the songs that lasted and lasted, because no one would want to forget about great classics like Beethoven, The Beatles, The Beach Boys, John Farnham, U2, Nirvana and Coldplay (not their new song "Paradise" because that one sucks). With stuff like Justin Bieber, it becomes too "old" and "out of fashion" for the little kiddies that listen to it after a few weeks, hence why he has to keep making new music (if I can even call it that).

Preteens don't know what they want. All they know how to do is imitate others around them, who unfortunately happen to be stupid and immature a lot of the time. Ask any grown, mature person what he/she calls "real music" and then you will understand why we need to get rid of pop, techno and "house" music.

Oh gosh, this is too funny. I love it when some self-entitled professor on 'real music' that places their self-worth and identity in the music they listen to comes along and tells people what they have to like.

It's like I'm sitting at home eating a bowl of corn flakes, when out of the blue someone like yourself comes along to go:
"Pip pip madam, do you have no dignity? the texture of those cornflakes is so mind-numbingly simple and bland. And served with milk? at least add some berries you cotton-headed nini muggins. You eat like a 6 year old who just learned how to sufficiently maneuver a spoon. Why don't you try crépes with jam, complimented with an omelette, coffee and a croissant (he says in a french accent). Don't you see how the flavours balance each other out". Then you snort and adjust you glasses and walk away with the so much self esteem having just educated a lower being on how to eat breakfast like a grown, mature person.

I have to hand it to you though, when people like you come across it provides me with some semblance of surprise entertainment I don't get all too often. Bravo sir, carry on!

PS: Bach is mediocre and beethoven is totes boring

[Professor Polonsky]

I consider that electronic (I would count him as one of my favourite artists of electronic music) and I certainly include ambient music as part of electronic music(one of my favourite genres) regardless of whether the intention is to get you to dance or not.

Fair enough

Have you listened to Here Come The Warm Jets or Before and after Science? There's a good argument that Eno was a no less capable rocker than anything else he did. The latter has a bit of ambient in it as well, but it's still mostly a rock album.

[Fluttershy]

So I would say the era, whilst having a primal influence, doesn't necessarily determine a composer's direction.

So for me that leads to the question: do we necessarily need new instruments or musical paradigms or technologies to develop musical ideas in the modern world? I don't think we do, looking back on the progression of music from the Renaissance right to the present day. But having said that, we are discovering tremendous uses for technology in music - especially in genres like jazz, with pickups, leads etc, and also for classical, I may say. It's meaning when used in electro type genres is subjectively determined of course, so that's not to be treated objectively (although the structural elements of the genre can be objectively assessed, and I'm not so fond of it in this regard. Like, structurally, The Godfather is clearly a better film than Project X - but someone might enjoy the latter more than the former, and that's perfectly fine...)

Well first off, I'm glad we agree on something To me, music is what you make of it, not what someone tells you it is, and I don't find any genre of music objectively superior to another, no matter how complex or intellectual it may be. In the end,we listen to music because we enjoy it, whether that be through appreciating the complexity and innovation of a composer's songs or through something perhaps a bit simpler, like dancing to a catchy rhythm and tune.

My question about classical composers was actually about whether they would have incorporated synths and employed electronic effects such as EQing, distortion etc. in order to better convey the music that they envisioned. In terms of the actual material they would have made, I'm not so sure if someone like Mozart was around now, having been classically trained by his father, whether he would have continued along the orchestral/acoustic path. It's also a possibility that he would have gone into electronics and EDM- quite a number of 'popular' EDM producers such as Zedd (apparently a prodigy with the piano) and Borgore (also from a classical background, and a drummer in a metal band) are from origins in classical and rock music. You never know!

[Lolly]

This elitism reminds me of something my Grandfather woud say. He doesn't think that anything apart from the classical is "real music" and modern musicians and musicians from my parent's era don't have any talent. I asked him "What about Queen?" and he said "Who is she?" XD

Music is music and I think that great musical minds inhabit all genres.