Janszoon

No, I think pop music will continue to evolve, just as it always has. It will probably continue to be somewhat lowest common denominator though, just as it always has been.

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A Night in the Life of the Invisible Man

Time & Place

25 Albums You Should Hear Before the Moon Crashes into the Earth and We All Die

last.fm

Ska Lagos Jew Sun Ra

Led Zeppelin? I'd like to know what modern equivalent there is in terms of songwriting sophistication in the mainstream.

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Al Pacino = God

Rage Against the Machine

I never had any hope in it to begin with.

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Janszoon

I'm not all that wild about Led Zeppelin and I am not sure how to measure "songwriting sophistication" so I have no idea how to answer that. To me Led Zeppelin are just an okay band and I have no doubt that there a currently other okay bands that are popular. But that's beside the point. The bigger point is that then, just as now, a lot of what charted was lame, lowest common denominator music. I mean, look at what the number one song was the year I was born (1977):

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A Night in the Life of the Invisible Man

Time & Place

25 Albums You Should Hear Before the Moon Crashes into the Earth and We All Die

last.fm

Ska Lagos Jew Sun Ra

Regardless, there was still somewhat of an alternative. Led Zeppelin definitely had moments that proved they were sophisticated song writers. I think "In my time of dying" showcases quite a lot of instrumental prowess, and legit adherence to gradual progression through the course of a song.

What's the likelyness you'll ever hear anything this patient coming from a mainstream band(or 'act' since bands are going the way of the dodo entirely) in this day and age?



I mean, even the clip you showed showcased a little more songwriting effort than "turn on the drum machine... repeat a vaguely sexual sentence 50 times". I mean, honestly, put the total melodic content of a common pop song in a line, excluding vocals, and you'd be shocked to find more than ten seconds of prewritten melody/drums.

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Al Pacino = God

Janszoon

Sigur Ros is a platinum-selling band who write nothing but "patient" music. That's just the first example that came to mind, I'm sure there are others.

Well this was the number one single in 2010:



Insipid, yes, but I don't think it's any more so than "You Light Up My Life". In fact, I'd even go as far as saying I prefer it. At least it's sort of fun, as opposed to shoot-yourself-in-the-head boring.

__________________
A Night in the Life of the Invisible Man

Time & Place

25 Albums You Should Hear Before the Moon Crashes into the Earth and We All Die

last.fm

Ska Lagos Jew Sun Ra

by modern terms, platinum isn't that mainstream. I mean, firstly, their last platinum selling album seemed to be in the 90s according to wiki, and selling one million albums in 10 years compared to Enimen's recovery which sold 5 million within one year, it's hardly a blip on the 'upper crust'.

Then again, mainstream is so difficult to define. In my eyes, it simply means things that are subject to massive media exposure, and radioplay. Thanks to the Internet, obviously things that aren't sold through traditional mainstream means can sell well but it doesn't mean they're mainstream, or their existence is realized as such. It's still not nearly as well as the select few superacts which are hogging all television exposure.

Musicians aren't getting worse, and pop is not getting worse. However, the marketing machine is doing a **** of a lot to promote safer, more controllable predictable cult of personality based acts, promoting decreasing variety through centralization, and trying to weed out the concept of promoting acts on their musical merit.

To me, that's an undeniable.

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Al Pacino = God

Phantom Limb

I was just having an argument the other day with a friend who said that pop music today is as good as pop music has ever been. i personally think this is false. i tried to argue that big band jazz (just one example) was the popular music of its time and that it is far more complex than anything in the top 40 now-a-days. For some reason, he also seemed to think that music played with instruments is not anymore legit than **** created on a computer. I just think that popular music has devolved a lot. It started with Classical music (infinitely more complex) and we are now at Ke$ha.

Janszoon

Classical music wasn't the popular music of its day, it was the art music of its day. Stuff like "Yankee Doodle" was the pop music.

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A Night in the Life of the Invisible Man

Time & Place

25 Albums You Should Hear Before the Moon Crashes into the Earth and We All Die

last.fm

Phantom Limb

ok, well **** me. it was the popular music of the elite.