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The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

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Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#11

Post by devindotcom »

Not to contradict the writer in any way, obviously in popular music this format has largely disappeared. But even so there are lots out there and a ton of diversity. Some from recent listening: James Blackshaw, Zoe Keating, Max Ananyev, Mary Lattimore, Anna von Hausswolf, Goldmund.

and of course Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebro, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and Jack Rose, RIP.

Individual musical artists have so many more tools now that they can produce a whole song with multiple instruments plus vocals much more easily than 10 years ago, let alone 50. But the trend is still interesting to track.

Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#13

Post by Agentlien »

devindotcom wrote: post #11

Not to contradict the writer in any way, obviously in popular music this format has largely disappeared. But even so there are lots out there and a ton of diversity. Some from recent listening: James Blackshaw, Zoe Keating, Max Ananyev, Mary Lattimore, Anna von Hausswolf, Goldmund. and of course Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebro, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and Jack Rose, RIP. Individual musical artists have so many more tools now t…

I find it fascinating that despite listening to a lot of music I don't recognise a single name in this list.

Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#15

Post by yamazakiwi »

svachalek wrote: post #10
wolframhempel wrote: post #3

To be fair, Polyphia is a great band and Tim Henson still a star instrumentalist...

Yes, I was surprised to find no mention of Polyphia, even to dismiss it. Are they not as popular as I thought?

They are reasonably popular but I personally don't find their talent better than other bands I've heard in the past in their genre, even though their main guitarist is quite talented.

In contemporary music I believe King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are a better sell for talented instrumentalists.

Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#16

Post by alex_lav »

svachalek wrote: post #10
wolframhempel wrote: post #3

To be fair, Polyphia is a great band and Tim Henson still a star instrumentalist...

Yes, I was surprised to find no mention of Polyphia, even to dismiss it. Are they not as popular as I thought?

Anecdotally I've never met another person that'd even heard of them. I only know of them because YouTube forces them at me a lot.

Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#17

Post by tallies »

The article asks two different questions, one about the decline of the instrumental hit and one about the decline of the instrumentalist, and doesn't go far to answer either.

I'd be interested to see a breakdown of the instrumental hits throughout the decades. Is the decline simply due to classical and jazz going out of fashion? How many are soundtracks? Surely most modern instrumental hits are EDM, yes? This data-driven history could use some more data.

As for the other question, the article's examples of popular instrumentalists were much more famous as bandleaders than as clarinetists or trombonists. Cheap recorded music and digital music production has pushed both the band and the virtuoso performer out of popular culture, replaced by the solo artist and their multi-instrumentalist producer (sometimes the same person). This is true even outside of hip hop. I bet a non trivial amount of pop fans would be able to name Jack Antonoff from his work with Taylor Swift, Lorde, and Lana del Rey.

Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#19

Post by devindotcom »

Agentlien wrote: post #13
devindotcom wrote: post #11

Not to contradict the writer in any way, obviously in popular music this format has largely disappeared. But even so there are lots out there and a ton of diversity. Some from recent listening: James Blackshaw, Zoe Keating, Max Ananyev, Mary Lattimore, Anna von Hausswolf, Goldmund. and of course Emahoy Tsegue-Maryam Guebro, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and Jack Rose, RIP. Individual musical artists have so many more tools now t…

I find it fascinating that despite listening to a lot of music I don't recognise a single name in this list.

I listen to a fair amount too but someone's list from jazz or metal or some corner of classical would be totally unfamiliar to me too. Fortunately it's so easy to search for a name, click a track, and listen for 10 seconds that you can breeze through recommendations super fast.

Of course lazy commenters like me don't link to representative tracks... perhaps a task for AI. "Go to top YouTube video for selected text" would probably suffice.

Re: The decline and fall of the hit instrumental song

#20

Post by recursive »

yamazakiwi wrote: post #15
svachalek wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I was surprised to find no mention of Polyphia, even to dismiss it. Are they not as popular as I thought?

They are reasonably popular but I personally don't find their talent better than other bands I've heard in the past in their genre, even though their main guitarist is quite talented. In contemporary music I believe King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are a better sell for talented instrumentalists.

> mathy

Are they? I thought math rock was all about weird time signatures. By contrast, Polyphia is pretty accessible. And I've never heard them play a weird time signature.

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