Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Hip-pop: The Death of Music

Everyone has different opinions of good music. You might cherish Shaq's Greatest Hits (which unbelievably exists) whereas your neighbor, God forbid, might enjoy the musical styling of an inspirational Yanni album to compliment a self-choreographed interpretive dance sequence with all 15 of their cats (or whatever the hell else fans of Yanni do.) And while he may be, in your opinion, the best songwriter of this or any generation, being the founder and sole member of his Facebook group does not make it true.

The music industry has been on a downward spiral ever since the release of such gems as "Walk It Out" and "Party Like a Rockstar", which both make about as much sense as crowd surfing at an Air Supply concert. Don't get me wrong, I realize and appreciate the dance functionality of both songs/being able to safely dry hump a stranger's leg in a dark club, but both contain the equivalent musical charisma of an old drunk person shouting at passing cars. With this new trend in music (mixing a 3rd grade vocabulary with obscenities and going all night with sexual references) I'm afraid we're flirting with the Armageddon of music. And not the reassuring, "Ben Affleck and Bruce Willis hold hands and save us before the credits roll" Armageddon. I'm talking about the real thing.

Screenshot from Armageddon.

Don't you ever wonder why we've never really had another Led Zeppelin or Pink Flloyd in this generation? Or why James Taylor and Peter Frampton end up on cell phone and Geico commercials? It's not because people have stopped making good music. It's because good music is now defined by a society that favors mindless, emotion-free, mainstream pop over soulful, revolutionary, musical poetry. I personally don't want to grow up in a world where music classes teach "How to Properly Superman that Ho" and "Bitches and Hos: A History of Pimpin' That Ain't Easy".

The times are definitely changing and younger generations are changing with it. They're being told what to like by mass media (otherwise known as "The Man") and as the appreciation for music slowly waters itself down like an Ice Cube album at WalMart, we're forced to rethink our own appreciation for music. Because even though we still have a handful of rock and roll powerhouses staggering onto stages across the world, they are going to die someday (see Keith Richards) and all that will be left are DJ Unk and Soulja Boy. Can you imagine your sweet little angel faced kids calling THAT classic rock? Well I sir, cannot.

So the next time you're at a bar and hear one of the aforementioned piles of crap on the dance floor, close your eyes and try to imagine the artist and record label execs realistically brainstorming the idea of a song centered around "licking it like a lollipop". It really makes you question whether or not the record label execs are actually immature 2nd graders that still laugh at the word "poop" and make hand turkeys out of construction paper and the glue they just tried to eat. There's not a whole lot of creative juices flowing around that studio. If you don't believe me, check out the sheer poetry of the lyrics on Google. I can't post them here because of the flat-out vulgarity, but it's very similar to what I imagine a script looks like for a poorly directed adult film.

Now, if you'll excuse me I have to finish the song I've been working on for the past 15 minutes entitled "Who wants a footlong?"

Additionally, that's what she said.

2 comments:

Mr. Brigham said...

What drives me nuts is that most of these beats are just random tinklings of three droning notes, over and over and over again. A retarded monkey (Vin Diesel, for the Daniel Tosh fans of the world) could make these beats. Children could make these beats. My wiener could make these beats. (not to be confused with beating my wiener). That's what kills me... I hate hip-pop. Good call on the gear-grinding...

KTrue said...

Of all places there was a great article in Maxim Magazine a couple of years ago about the state of the record industry. Having been relatively close to the record circle I have a little bit of explanation.

You're partially correct in the public being dumb enough to accept what passes for "music" as what it is.

However, pretty much all of the mainstream labels today are owned by one of four conglomerates. As a large corporation, they have one goal: Make money. Make lots of money. If you can't make money, you cut costs until you make money. The stockholders and investors need to see a good financial status.

What does that mean for the listener? Well, it means what I call "formula" music.

Ever wonder why there are so many songs and bands that sound exactly like Nickelback? Well it's because today record companies have less time and money for artist development. You find a band, plug in a formula that has proven to work, crank out a couple of hit songs on an album or two, and move on to the next artist when they flame out. Rinse and repeat. Radio plays the music because it's what is "popular." There has long been a direct relation between top 40 station ratings and current music selection (when there isn't good material out, ratings suffer).

The whole hip-hop phenomenon is something worth getting a doctorate degree over. I think it's a social issue that is kind of a self-propelling circle.

The advantage is that the Internet is changing the whole artist model. Now, instead of dying for a record contract and relying on the conglomerates to get your record into stores, you can do it yourself with a myspace page. You can become your own distribution model. With that, it also becomes easier for independent record companies to develop.

Of course, the record companies are fighting this tooth and nail. Funny thing is, the more they fight it, the more they lose. I guess we'll see how that turns out.