Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is massive competition to be a chosen producer or song writer. Being chosen as the one who is marketed is where the competition is. Their positions are earned.
They're earned the same way big movie star roles are earned -- by knowing the right people or sleeping with the producer.
Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
221–230 of 266 posts
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#222Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think they mean pop music lacks musicality, most of what they listed were to do with sonic tricks that are not really tied to musicality or musicianship. Anyone with even a vague understanding of music can write a song on the same level as a pop song. Every now and then a great musician makes it into the pop scene, and you get interesting chord progressions, melodies and rythms. So it's not the pop style that's bad…
> Anyone with even a vague understanding of music can write a song on the same level as a pop song. Ok, why don’t you prove it by writing a hit pop song? Come back to this thread when you have your gold record, I’ll wait
The entire point is making the song isn't the hard part. Marketing and managing the artists image is.
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#223This would be great. The idea of “best ranked music” results in mediocre, bland music that’s mostly ranked based on the social connections of the artist. Musical culture and genres are extremely diverse and trying to rank individual pieces of music makes discovery harder. I doubt they’ll actually do this of course. Their monetization model relies on ranking.
Based on the songs being aggresively pushed by record labels, it seems that the ultimate goals of mainstream music industry are: - To glorify violence, substance abuse, disrespect of women, domination behavior, anti-intellectualism. - To reinforce racial stereotypes, including fear of minorities. - To make people superficial. Songs are an effective way to deliver a message to be repeated over and over and over again…
The ultimate goal of the main stream music industry is to make money. Those are just what they've found to be the most effective ways to do it.
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#224Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many conspiracies can be just explained through emergent behavior. For example, there could be demand for that music, and the labels are just creating content to respond to that demand... without any ethical considerations about what they're promoting, that is. But to be honest, a conspiracy of some kind could be an explanation, who knows. For some people, there are substantial tangible, material benefits to dumbing…
> conspiracy of some kind could be an explanation, who knows Actually we do know. It’s safe to say that conspiracies involving a lot of actors are mathematically impossible. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal...
Can this model be used to accurately predict real data? How reproducible is this research?
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#225Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ooorr... because those measures correspond to something in the experience, that humans have been found to value.
This is obviously wrong, because there are entire classical traditions (centuries or millennia long) from outside of Europe that prioritize musical features beyond traditional western harmony. Any claim that harmonic complexity is fundamental to human experience or uniquely valuable among musical expression is ignorance at best.
All words in my mouth.
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#226Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think they mean pop music lacks musicality, most of what they listed were to do with sonic tricks that are not really tied to musicality or musicianship. Anyone with even a vague understanding of music can write a song on the same level as a pop song. Every now and then a great musician makes it into the pop scene, and you get interesting chord progressions, melodies and rythms. So it's not the pop style that's bad…
> pop music lacks musicality, most of what they listed were to do with sonic tricks that are not really tied to musicality or musicianship This is a paradox, though. You’re saying that one of the most popular types of music “lacks musicality”. The only way that can be true is if you start with a narrow and arbitrary definition of what “musicality” is. If you examine the history of ideas of what is “real” or “authenti…
I had watched that a bit earlier, it is excellent. I am definitely aware of the vast expanse of music culture though, I think my use of the word musicality could better be replaced by the word substance.
I think saying western Top40 lacks musicality within the context of western music is a totally fine thing to do though, because it's not that it's something different and good. It's trying to be western music, but it's derivative and shallow interpretations of it. Western music being a broad brush, including many of the subcultures of music contained within somewhere like America.
Top40 is often the crap versions of the good stuff that's out there, cheap versions of the culture that dwells beneath. My main point is that it's popularity is not because of musical excellence regardless of what that excellence is for the given genre/culture, it's manufactured popularity through repetition and distribution. Sometimes they pick good songs to pedal, so I'm not saying Top40 contains zero good music. It's just not a good representation of the state of music culture by any means.
It's hard to talk about music without seeing it through your own experience, because it is a language you share with those who know it. Adam Neely about his Jazz Ambassador tour, said he felt he could connect only tangentially with the Mongolian performers. There was some crossover and they could speak some of the same musical terms, but there was much of their musical language that wasn't immediately compatible. Sort of like a French language speaker sometimes interjecting English words, you can hear them but you can't intuitively know the context, and unless you knew both you couldn't really comment on how well the sentence was executed. But of the genres that end up in Top40, I typically know good music in those genres, so I feel I am able to comment on their quality.
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#227Earlier quoted context omitted.
I can tell Nicki Minaj from them, but I can't tell Selena Gomez, Taylor Swift, or Ariana Grande apart and they've been looping on the radio for years. I can point out a specific song that I've heard before and looked up who it was, but whenever a new song pops up, I can't tell them apart. They've completely merged into the same media personality with the same music.
You can't tell Taylor Swift from Ariana Grande? I think this speaks more to the way you view pop music, than sonic similarities.
I was on onboard with plenty of pop music stars having a similar sound (90% of everything is crap, pop music included), but taylor swift does at least have a somewhat unique style.
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#228Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think they mean pop music lacks musicality, most of what they listed were to do with sonic tricks that are not really tied to musicality or musicianship. Anyone with even a vague understanding of music can write a song on the same level as a pop song. Every now and then a great musician makes it into the pop scene, and you get interesting chord progressions, melodies and rythms. So it's not the pop style that's bad…
> Anyone with even a vague understanding of music can write a song on the same level as a pop song. Ok, why don’t you prove it by writing a hit pop song? Come back to this thread when you have your gold record, I’ll wait
As the other commentor said, that's my point. I could write a song that sounds just like a hit pop song, but it wouldn't be a hit because the music that gets popular isn't the best examples of music, it's just the music chosen to be pushed and sold.
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#229Earlier quoted context omitted.
The music industry has never hidden that they manipulate listeners into consuming more and more media, so it's pretty much the opposite of a conspiracy. It's like saying the ad industry is conspiring to manipulate us into buying their clients' products and services.
I don’t think conspiracies have to be secret.
Yes, they do. Like, that's literally the definition of "conspiracy".
noun a secret plan by a group to do something unlawful or harmful. "a conspiracy to destroy the government"
Re: Is Spotify Killing the Top 40?
#230Earlier quoted context omitted.
The difference being that American Idol contestants are often actually quite artistically good - they only managed to get where they are because of skill and looks and luck, instead of just the latter two. (This isn't universal; it's often the case they pick someone up who is actually pretty awful but is interesting for the whole mechanics of the show, either being very attractive or standing out in some other way...…
I think a lot more of them can hold a tune than you give them credit for, it's just that pitch adjustment in the studio is stretching them beyond their natural vocal range, so when they try to reproduce it live, quality suffers. Unless you're specifically talking about artists like T-Pain, but their whole thing is that autotune is their vocal instrument.
That was definitely the way he marketed himself. He knew exactly what he was doing and is a great example of marketing vs music. T-Pain knows music, and is a fantastic musician, check out his NPR gig with just a keyboardist and his natural voice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIjXUg1s5gc