9 ms·

Why are people in their 30s giving up on music?

29 points by nigerian1981 4y ago

PaulHoule 4y ago
Autotune. People in the music industry would rather die painfully than admit it, but autotune music just washes over people without making any impression. If you go to a gas station or similar place that has background music you can get people into conversations about 70s, 80s, even 90s music but for people on the street modern music is a cipher. They can't tell you who is singing, they even struggle to tell if it is country music or rap.
- uberman 4y ago
  I actually think part of the problem is that so many songs are both country and rap (pick any pop like genre really and add rap). Everything is so formulaic with seemingly mandatory sections designed to partially appeal to all audiences. This is not a knock on rap rather a nod that it appears so influential that it has a mandatory bridge in the middle of almost every "new release". In the end everything that I listen to seems to blend together.
  - P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y ago
    I don't know if this is true or not, but is there a word or phrase to describe this phenomenon? Porn does the same thing, right? a little bit of everything to try and find something everyone can enjoy.
    - uberman 4y ago
      This seems close : https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MultipleDemographicAppeal https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MultipleDemograp...
      - qbrass 4y ago
        https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LowestCommonDenominator https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LowestCommonDeno...
    - PaulHoule 4y ago
      You might not listen to enough of this album https://www.discogs.com/release/930684-Various-Grind-2-All-Night-House-Music-Party https://www.discogs.com/release/930684-Various-Grind-2-All-N... to realize how excellent it is if you heard the beginning of the first track and thought "this sounds exactly the same as every other 'House' track".
- Slow_Hand 4y ago
  I'm no fan of autotune and I agree with your statement that a lot of music these days lacks a sense of personality that makes it hard to distinguish from others. One thing I'll add is that we're at our greatest point of exposure to the worst music of our era. Every era has a surplus of low-quality, unoriginal, or maddeningly trend-focused music that gets a lot of exposure. In time these lackluster records will be filtered out and mostly forgotten. In time people will look back on this period with a fondness for the great songs of the era that have endured and forget about the works that failed to differentiate themselves. As such, it's easy for us to look back on the music of the last 70 years and think that things were better then because we don't have daily exposure to the lackluster songs of those past decades.
  - felipeccastro 4y ago
    This is a great point, but I wonder if it's all there is to it. I grew up in the 90s, yet for a long time preferred music from 60s to 80s (I like some things from all decades, but not as much), and I know a lot of people that find the same, regardless of when they were born. I've heard many arguments against this "nostalgia", including the always present "there's still great music, you just need to know where to look" (almost always without any specific examples). Perhaps there's a case to be made that these older songs are still listened so much today, even by those who weren't alive back then, because by some abstract measure of soul satisfaction they were better? I'm careful with this hypothesis as I don't want to be unfair with newer generations of artists, but I don't think it's so crazy to consider either. For example, the last 10 years or so have been greatly influenced by social media and fear of saying the wrong thing and being "cancelled". Of voluntarily silencing ourselves. How wouldn't that impact the artistic output of this generation? Couldn't this be a reason for a lot of modern music "lacking a sense of personality"? I feel with social media we have gone pretty far into investing in appearances alone, and I think I'm not alone in this belief. Maybe the next years will be marked by more and more people sharing a wish to return to the overlooked authenticity which we used to call "art with a soul".
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  Plenty of good artists using autotune. Most is garbage but most of every subcategory of music sucks. Some bleeding edge zoomer culture hyper pop, 100 gecs, for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PWMiy4RysI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PWMiy4RysI
- ryandrake 4y ago
  > If you go to a gas station or similar place that has background music you can get people into conversations about 70s, 80s, even 90s music but for people on the street modern music is a cipher. They can't tell you who is singing, they even struggle to tell if it is country music or rap. I wonder how much of that is just lack of familiarity with the new artists/songs. My own music taste is kind of stuck in the Prog rock, early electronic, and Krautrock eras, and I can easily tell you within 5 seconds or so whether I'm listening to Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Yes, Jethro Tull, or Rush. But, if you were to hand me 20 songs from modern day pop or rap artists, let me listen and study them for as long as I wanted, I probably couldn't correctly identify any set of other songs by the same artists. Some of their voices literally (in the actual meaning of literally) sound the same to me. I'm not sure how much of it is just a lack of an ear for modern pop singers, and how much of it is autotune actually making everyone's voices sound identical.
  - synthpop 4y ago
    This POV is making the wrong equivalency, though. Prog, Krautrock and early (usually more abstract/experimental) electronic music) weren’t usually released to meet “pop” ambitions. Sure, the most remembered ones from decades ago did yield some form of crossover appeal with mainstream radio audiences/marketing efforts at the time, but it’s not like those genres or their influence just vanished. Check out newer ‘prog’ bands like Black Midi, just as an example. They’re not on the radio or magazine covers but still have a significant following among music nerds, much like King Crimson 40 years back. I think autotune and Top 40 charts are too often used as a scapegoat by people that simply became too lazy to seek out stuff on their own without first being filtered through a marketing campaign. The radio or the front page of any given streaming service is designed to appeal to the mass audience, so why would you be surprised as a fan of more outsider sensibilities when it doesn’t immediately represent your niche tastes? You’d be more likely to find that type of stuff in a music store, printed review, or some random blog not too long ago. Now, that may as well be discogs or wikipedia, and the internet is much more powerful today as a resource than the record store of old. I feel like many people are more bitter over their music taste not being socially validated by the mainstream rather than just enjoying what they like and being content with the circumstance that it’s “not for everybody.” TBH I feel like it’s more desirable as an artist to have a dedicated following of fewer number than being one that’s involuntarily shoved down everyone’s throat. Most modern pop and rap is as ubiquitous as it is because of enormous label astroturfing and marketing, just as genres like New Jack Swing or Nu-Metal or whatever was dominating MTV back when that was a 'relevant' source of music discovery. It's always been commercial! So it doesn't do much good to bemoan the corporate machine's aggressive shoveling of its corporate properties, just tailor your sources of discovery to places that better suit your interests if the lowest effort option isn't doing it for you. To me, people that have a chip on their shoulder about autotune are frankly just projecting some other abstract frustrations and nostalgia over a nonexistent time where all music culture was contained to TV and radio. It wasn’t! Do some old fashioned digging and go deeper than just the surface, you’ll find plenty of good new stuff and a thriving music community if you actually try.
- MivLives 4y ago
  I think Autotune just happened to popup at the same time the real "issue" pops up. In the 70s,80s, even 90s you had finite music. There's only so much time on a radio station, only so much space in the store. Small labels existed but how did you hear about them? With streaming I can now access so much more. It's easier for someone to be say, a fan of folk punk while located somewhere without a scene. Why does that person care about background music in a random place? Why should they?
Juliate 4y ago
Would it be also because the main medium of music today doesn’t help/encourage serendipity/encounters/curiosity from a physical perspective? K7, vinyls, CDs are social objects. You can handle them, lend them, personalize them, put them on display, let anyone’s gaze fall on them, etc. Digital files are less so.
- zeristor 4y ago
  Music in a QR code, maybe a little midi file?
  - pathartl 4y ago
    I think a QR code would be pretty limiting. Even just the intro from Doom II is 2KB.
    - zeristor 4y ago
      Phones have 4k cameras, I’m not sure if there’s a QR code limit. Or. QR codes, or RFID tags embedded in objects with a reference to an online audio file. There has been some tech making the control tangible by moving objects like pebbles around. Or generative music from AR recognition of the placing of items in relation to each other.
JediLuke 4y ago
I’m a millennial so this is largely speculation, but I think in the 60s-90s music was all about finding your tribe (as in, social group). That trait still exists and is bigger than ever, but it’s moved to social networking. MySpace was a very important link in the chain in this respect, because it bridged the gap between using your taste in music to finding other like-minded strangers online.
- chubot 4y ago
  Yes, I’d add that for many or most people, music is a way to connect with peers and mates in your teens and 20s If you no longer have as much time or motivation for that due to having a family, it’s only logical that you won’t spend as much time on that activity Not judging one way or another, but I liked music for non social reasons as well, and I still seek it out in adulthood. Kexp and tiny desk on YouTube are a constant source of great artists and performances
willio58 4y ago
The studies in the article say people in their 30s give up on new music. This is understandable, and has always been the case. This doesn't just happen with music but culture in general. As we age we become less easily malleable in our beliefs and there's an easy attraction to resent the younger generations
- Spivak 4y ago
  Which is quite sad because the current culture of music fueled by TikTok is insanely good. Lots of niche genres are thriving by being able to connect to their audience in a manner that doesn’t require fans or would-be fans to explicitly seek it out.
  - gnuj3 4y ago
    Music culture fueled by TikTok. Jesus, I’m glad I’m one of those people in their 30s that gave up on new music.
    - Spivak 4y ago
      Yeah, the TikTok algorithm has hit some sweet spot that's able to organically direct people to niche interests and one of those is music discovery for different music genres. Okay so let's just assume you really like neo-classical, here's what you might have discovered on TikTok: Woodsman, Zir Bujou, Austin Farewell's new single, Duomo, Amity Fall, Joep Beving, Fabrizio Paterlini's new album, Airginio Aiello's new single.
  - chubot 4y ago
    Examples? I’m not on TikTok but I am an older person who actively seeks out new music :) I would join for some wholesome or not-wholesome creativity
    - MivLives 4y ago
      Spotify actually has a playlist for this (I think) https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DX5Vy6DFOcx00 https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DX5Vy6DFOcx00 That said here's some people who are big in that sorta sphere (I'm not a tiktok user but I feel it's ripples): Mathematics - BBNO$(pronounced Baby No Money) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH_i76JVTDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH_i76JVTDg There's a whole genre that popped up called Phonk, and then what got more popular on the internet is something called Drift Phonk. It's music that's meant to be played over drift compilations. Disaster - KSLV https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pnq1_3BXIqA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pnq1_3BXIqA A lot of tiktok is just a mixture of new and old popular music. So if you look at a chart of the most popular songs you'll see things like Day N Night by Kid Cudi, or Heat Waves by Glass Animals mixed with Doji Cat, Joji, and Bieber If you want some creative music in general: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-WTfP3WJc4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-WTfP3WJc4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WDRxtd-2dQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WDRxtd-2dQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkngTNyKaW4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkngTNyKaW4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w3-YLE04bo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w3-YLE04bo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBeWek3LPqQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBeWek3LPqQ
themadturk 4y ago
This reminds me of an old line from Dave Barry, who once observed that men eventually age to the point where they only like one song. I haven't reached that point, but have come to prefer only a few genres (none of which are pop). I'm not entirely stuck in the music I grew up with, but classical, soundtracks and epic music seems to be what I prefer about 90% of the time, and my passion for most other stuff is fading.
- hammyhavoc 4y ago
  As a musician, my interest shifted over time to more complex and less repetitive music. As a result, now a composer for games and picture. It feels like all the musical innovation is happening within scores and almost everything else is bland and formulaic.
  - themadturk 4y ago
    It seems that film music (and by extension, game music) has been very innovative over the years, especially with the influx of composers who started out in popular music or jazz as opposed to the classics. Even television scores have turned from background music to worthy of listening on their own.
  - sirspacey 4y ago
    Definitely how my tastes have evolved - love Hades soundtrack as an example. What’s caught your ear lately?
    - themadturk 4y ago
      The last soundtrack to catch my ear was Hans Zimmerman's score to Interstellar. I've also been rediscovering John Barry's classic film scores, everything from Born Free to James Bond movies -- not exactly up to the minute, but quality lasts!
s1artibartfast 4y ago
In my opinion it is mainly because people no longer maintain music collections. With vinyl, CDs, and MP3s, I could view my collection, select music I like, and build a deep relationship to it over time. With algorithmic radio, all of artists and tracks become fungible. Easy come, easy go. Sometimes I will find a specific artist or track I like and take control to put it on, but after a month or so it too is forever forgotten. Another issue is that stereo systems have gone out of style. Great music is enhanced by great quality. Music optimized to play from a cellphone or cheap Bluetooth speaker gives up a lot. I Miss music, but apparently not enough to build a new collection and set up a stereo
- GloriousKoji 4y ago
  To add to that it feels like newer albums no longer tell a complete story the whole way through and are just a collection of random singles that would rather be placed on and off as the next song selected by an algorithm for a streaming service. Maybe I'm just being nostalgic for the days of when I'd be excited for a new release and listen through a whole album of artists like Pink Floyd or Daft Punk and having a level of satisfaction similar to reading through a book or watching a movie.
  - ksaj 4y ago
    A lot of people don't consciously notice it. But I remember the first time I read through the lyrics for the Scorpions "Love at First Sting" album and noticed there are a couple of consistently intertwining stories going on. The same thing goes for Ozzy both with and without Black Sabbath. There's a momentum from beginning to end that is really clear when you look for it.
- wintermutestwin 4y ago
  I have a massive music collection in the form of the artists (etc) that I have added to my streaming library. The issue is that actually managing this massive collection is a huge PITA due to the extremely limited interfaces provided. I'm on Apple Music and the Mac app is trash that just seems like a bad port of their iOS app. The iOS app has tried to focus so much on "discovery" that "management" is a distant second thought. For example, of the 5 icons across the bottom of the screen, 3 of them are different flavors of discovery. Naturally, you can't customize the UI at all. Personally, I get all my external discovery via better mediums. The problem is that I keep adding and adding great music to my library and then can rarely find it.
telchior 4y ago
Based on the other comments I thought this article would be suggesting that there's a new trend taking place with people in their 30s. The author does seem to be trying to position it as "hey look at this interesting phenomenon" but doesn't actually claim that it's new in any way. So basically: we're becoming our parents, or repeating a story that every generation goes through. Personally, my parents had piles of records from the 60s-80s but didn't listen to that much music. I do listen to a few hours of music each day, including whatever new stuff I can find, but it's mainly work noise to cover up other sounds. Some of the declining interest can be likened to comedy. When you're 15 or 25, there are a lot of jokes you haven't heard before. If you're 35... or 65... certain routines start sounding pretty worn out. With music I suspect there's also a social learning component: we fall in love with music when we're young and still trying to find our place in the world. Music tickles the same communication centers in the brain that are used for social positioning, and the value of that, also, fades later on.
- master_crab 4y ago
  All seconded. And to add to that: Your (my) wonderfully delicious albums of RATM, Audioslave, The Killers, etc all become second class citizens when the true masters of the household want to listen to Baby Shark or Elmo.
- ozim 4y ago
  I would say it can also be linked to fact that music from your teens and twenties is important because you tie it with emotions you lived going to the parties with friends. After 30 most people have job, kids go for parties a lot less often.
omar_alt 4y ago
If more people are becoming dependent on playlists will future generations even be able to recall their favourite songs from memory as they enter middle age?
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
ksaj 4y ago
I think every generation says this about the younger generations to them. However, there is a difference today, and that is musicians releasing songs one at a time on YouTube instead of as an album. Even a large number of the older-generation musicians are doing it. Sure they often end up as albums, but they are originally heard as one-off products, and probably thereafter listened to by preference and not as intended. As well, it basically means songs that don't have videos are typically relinquished to the heard-once category.
jschveibinz 4y ago
For those looking for something new, I’ll put in a pitch for jazz. It is harmonically and rhythmically complex and the vocal styles are always unique. There are many different flavors of jazz to explore for any time of day. And live performances are usually accessible in cozy venues and they don’t cost an arm and a leg.
silent_cal 4y ago
My 2 cents: Honestly I think I've just outgrown modern music - it's geared towards younger people. What seemed complex and interesting now seems repetitive and empty. Before you accuse me of being arrogant: I feel like I should be mature enough to start listening to "real" music (e.g. classical) by now, but I find that it's too far over my head. So I think I'm in a musical "limbo".
- spywaregorilla 4y ago
  Have you considered searching for music that is both modern and not empty?
  - silent_cal 4y ago
    Yes - and maybe "modern" isn't the best word - mean the popular genres like R&B, alt rock, etc. But it's the same problem - I don't know who the good composers are of "real" music, and I don't know where to start looking.
    - synthpop 4y ago
      Any attempt to hold music by some metric of purity ('real'ness) is always bound to be reductive and rather joyless imo. Surely there has to be 'classic' artists or genres that you've enjoyed at one time or another. Leverage the existing knowledge or potential curiosities that are within that pallette, and explore the rabbit hole a little deeper. Go back to your favorite tunes and look beyond just the name on the box. (Who are the performers/producers on that great album I spun endlessly back in the day? What other works have they been a part? Did they ever namedrop other artists in old interviews? Who'd they tour with? What other stuff did their label put out? etc. This can be repeated endlessly with every new name you come across that piques your interest. Rateyourmusic, Discogs and Wikipedia are probably good starting points to reference this info.) I think anyone could likely find a trove of new (to you, at least) content by simply digging a bit outside of their comfort zone to try genres that are totally alien to your ears, like Avant Garde Jazz or Krautrock or Experimental music, just for example. Or by finding a genre you know you like, then exploring the likely myriad subgenres which emerged years later or are developing right now under its influence. A lot of the most satisfying things in life won't be fed to you, so the most important thing is to just keep an open mind and appreciate that although certain things may not click right away, it may not be worth writing off entirely. An important aspect of appreciating contemporary music is being aware of the cultural canon from which it was born and finds itself released within. I find that being able to connect some dots in one way or another between older and more contemporary artists/releases/genres will yield a greater appreciation of what's happening today. Applies to all forms of art, really.
wintermutestwin 4y ago
Just to counter the common thread of people aging out of contemporary music - I'm in my 50s and find new music that is awesome by devoting significant time and energy into discovery.
- giraffe_lady 4y ago
  Yeah same. I grew up on old-school straightahead jazz, prog & classic rock, and chicago blues, similar age as you. I love new music. The technical quality of modern hip hop and pop are just astounding. There are literally dozens of producers working right now who would have been singular TITANS even a generation ago. Thanks to the black church "farm league" world-class virtuosic drummers and singers who are expert improvisers are easy to find as session musicians and it has completely changed how ambitious producers and songwriters are able to be. And jazz now is fucking wild, it's unreal. The influence from hip hop & electronic I saw coming but metal, of all things, being a big one I did not. And the jazz/pop crossover influence is as fertile as it has always been. People need to get over their fear of autotune and let themselves have fun because it is. Sure yeah most music is not particularly interesting but that has literally always been the case. But right now there is more variety than there ever has been, more skill going into making it, more good shit happening than there ever has been I think.
  - wintermutestwin 4y ago
    >Sure yeah most music is not particularly interesting but that has literally always been the case. Exactly. And this is where the general whine about modern music stems from (which has of course always been the case). >But right now there is more variety than there ever has been, more skill going into making it, more good shit happening than there ever has been I think. Agreed. Modern music has fragmented into near infinite niches and it just takes some effort to find it.
draw_down 4y ago
mrpf1ster 4y ago
Since this thread seems to be a lot of people wanting to discover good “modern” music. Here’s some of my favorite albums (coming from a Gen-Zer): Big KRIT - Digital Roses Don’t Die: https://open.spotify.com/album/4hL6vCeDYZjW84055aEuM9?si=xSWMjBRZQime3--uhyv6hw https://open.spotify.com/album/4hL6vCeDYZjW84055aEuM9?si=xSW... Favorite songs: Show U Right, Just 4 You Anderson .Paak - Malibu: https://open.spotify.com/album/4VFG1DOuTeDMBjBLZT7hCK?si=FbHPAVKMSo6KMXoeQTRC9Q https://open.spotify.com/album/4VFG1DOuTeDMBjBLZT7hCK?si=FbH... Favorite songs: Parking Lot, Heart don’t stand a chance Kendrick Lamar - Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers: https://open.spotify.com/album/79ONNoS4M9tfIA1mYLBYVX?si=bZg6bGiQQdKCOgzXGw779Q https://open.spotify.com/album/79ONNoS4M9tfIA1mYLBYVX?si=bZg... Favorite songs: All of them Mac Miller - Circles: https://open.spotify.com/album/1YZ3k65Mqw3G8FzYlW1mmp?si=68Hoyv0lSlO8pUQE-_GnJg https://open.spotify.com/album/1YZ3k65Mqw3G8FzYlW1mmp?si=68H... Favorite songs: Complicated, Blue World
simonblack 4y ago
We all go through phases in our lives in which we like one genre of music but not another. For me it was Heavy Metal around the 70s and Rap in the 90s. They just didn't connect with me. I even went though a phase in the late-90s where I liked House and Trance Music while my step-son liked Classical. It used to make me laugh to see the looks on his girlfriends' faces as they came in the front-door past my thumping bass and moved through to his room where gentle Classical was playing.

29 points by nigerian1981 4y ago

Autotune. People in the music industry would rather die painfully than admit it, but autotune music just washes over people without making any impression. If you go to a gas station or similar place that has background music you can get people into conversations about 70s, 80s, even 90s music but for people on the street modern music is a cipher. They can't tell you who is singing, they even struggle to tell if it is country music or rap.

uberman 4y ago
I actually think part of the problem is that so many songs are both country and rap (pick any pop like genre really and add rap). Everything is so formulaic with seemingly mandatory sections designed to partially appeal to all audiences. This is not a knock on rap rather a nod that it appears so influential that it has a mandatory bridge in the middle of almost every "new release". In the end everything that I listen to seems to blend together.
- P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y ago
  I don't know if this is true or not, but is there a word or phrase to describe this phenomenon? Porn does the same thing, right? a little bit of everything to try and find something everyone can enjoy.
  - uberman 4y ago
    This seems close : https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MultipleDemographicAppeal https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MultipleDemograp...
    - qbrass 4y ago
      https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LowestCommonDenominator https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LowestCommonDeno...
  - PaulHoule 4y ago
    You might not listen to enough of this album https://www.discogs.com/release/930684-Various-Grind-2-All-Night-House-Music-Party https://www.discogs.com/release/930684-Various-Grind-2-All-N... to realize how excellent it is if you heard the beginning of the first track and thought "this sounds exactly the same as every other 'House' track".
Slow_Hand 4y ago
I'm no fan of autotune and I agree with your statement that a lot of music these days lacks a sense of personality that makes it hard to distinguish from others. One thing I'll add is that we're at our greatest point of exposure to the worst music of our era. Every era has a surplus of low-quality, unoriginal, or maddeningly trend-focused music that gets a lot of exposure. In time these lackluster records will be filtered out and mostly forgotten. In time people will look back on this period with a fondness for the great songs of the era that have endured and forget about the works that failed to differentiate themselves. As such, it's easy for us to look back on the music of the last 70 years and think that things were better then because we don't have daily exposure to the lackluster songs of those past decades.
- felipeccastro 4y ago
  This is a great point, but I wonder if it's all there is to it. I grew up in the 90s, yet for a long time preferred music from 60s to 80s (I like some things from all decades, but not as much), and I know a lot of people that find the same, regardless of when they were born. I've heard many arguments against this "nostalgia", including the always present "there's still great music, you just need to know where to look" (almost always without any specific examples). Perhaps there's a case to be made that these older songs are still listened so much today, even by those who weren't alive back then, because by some abstract measure of soul satisfaction they were better? I'm careful with this hypothesis as I don't want to be unfair with newer generations of artists, but I don't think it's so crazy to consider either. For example, the last 10 years or so have been greatly influenced by social media and fear of saying the wrong thing and being "cancelled". Of voluntarily silencing ourselves. How wouldn't that impact the artistic output of this generation? Couldn't this be a reason for a lot of modern music "lacking a sense of personality"? I feel with social media we have gone pretty far into investing in appearances alone, and I think I'm not alone in this belief. Maybe the next years will be marked by more and more people sharing a wish to return to the overlooked authenticity which we used to call "art with a soul".
spywaregorilla 4y ago
Plenty of good artists using autotune. Most is garbage but most of every subcategory of music sucks. Some bleeding edge zoomer culture hyper pop, 100 gecs, for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PWMiy4RysI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PWMiy4RysI
ryandrake 4y ago
> If you go to a gas station or similar place that has background music you can get people into conversations about 70s, 80s, even 90s music but for people on the street modern music is a cipher. They can't tell you who is singing, they even struggle to tell if it is country music or rap. I wonder how much of that is just lack of familiarity with the new artists/songs. My own music taste is kind of stuck in the Prog rock, early electronic, and Krautrock eras, and I can easily tell you within 5 seconds or so whether I'm listening to Pink Floyd, King Crimson, Yes, Jethro Tull, or Rush. But, if you were to hand me 20 songs from modern day pop or rap artists, let me listen and study them for as long as I wanted, I probably couldn't correctly identify any set of other songs by the same artists. Some of their voices literally (in the actual meaning of literally) sound the same to me. I'm not sure how much of it is just a lack of an ear for modern pop singers, and how much of it is autotune actually making everyone's voices sound identical.
- synthpop 4y ago
  This POV is making the wrong equivalency, though. Prog, Krautrock and early (usually more abstract/experimental) electronic music) weren’t usually released to meet “pop” ambitions. Sure, the most remembered ones from decades ago did yield some form of crossover appeal with mainstream radio audiences/marketing efforts at the time, but it’s not like those genres or their influence just vanished. Check out newer ‘prog’ bands like Black Midi, just as an example. They’re not on the radio or magazine covers but still have a significant following among music nerds, much like King Crimson 40 years back. I think autotune and Top 40 charts are too often used as a scapegoat by people that simply became too lazy to seek out stuff on their own without first being filtered through a marketing campaign. The radio or the front page of any given streaming service is designed to appeal to the mass audience, so why would you be surprised as a fan of more outsider sensibilities when it doesn’t immediately represent your niche tastes? You’d be more likely to find that type of stuff in a music store, printed review, or some random blog not too long ago. Now, that may as well be discogs or wikipedia, and the internet is much more powerful today as a resource than the record store of old. I feel like many people are more bitter over their music taste not being socially validated by the mainstream rather than just enjoying what they like and being content with the circumstance that it’s “not for everybody.” TBH I feel like it’s more desirable as an artist to have a dedicated following of fewer number than being one that’s involuntarily shoved down everyone’s throat. Most modern pop and rap is as ubiquitous as it is because of enormous label astroturfing and marketing, just as genres like New Jack Swing or Nu-Metal or whatever was dominating MTV back when that was a 'relevant' source of music discovery. It's always been commercial! So it doesn't do much good to bemoan the corporate machine's aggressive shoveling of its corporate properties, just tailor your sources of discovery to places that better suit your interests if the lowest effort option isn't doing it for you. To me, people that have a chip on their shoulder about autotune are frankly just projecting some other abstract frustrations and nostalgia over a nonexistent time where all music culture was contained to TV and radio. It wasn’t! Do some old fashioned digging and go deeper than just the surface, you’ll find plenty of good new stuff and a thriving music community if you actually try.
MivLives 4y ago
I think Autotune just happened to popup at the same time the real "issue" pops up. In the 70s,80s, even 90s you had finite music. There's only so much time on a radio station, only so much space in the store. Small labels existed but how did you hear about them? With streaming I can now access so much more. It's easier for someone to be say, a fan of folk punk while located somewhere without a scene. Why does that person care about background music in a random place? Why should they?

Juliate 4y ago

Would it be also because the main medium of music today doesn’t help/encourage serendipity/encounters/curiosity from a physical perspective? K7, vinyls, CDs are social objects. You can handle them, lend them, personalize them, put them on display, let anyone’s gaze fall on them, etc. Digital files are less so.

zeristor 4y ago
Music in a QR code, maybe a little midi file?
- pathartl 4y ago
  I think a QR code would be pretty limiting. Even just the intro from Doom II is 2KB.
  - zeristor 4y ago
    Phones have 4k cameras, I’m not sure if there’s a QR code limit. Or. QR codes, or RFID tags embedded in objects with a reference to an online audio file. There has been some tech making the control tangible by moving objects like pebbles around. Or generative music from AR recognition of the placing of items in relation to each other.

JediLuke 4y ago

I’m a millennial so this is largely speculation, but I think in the 60s-90s music was all about finding your tribe (as in, social group). That trait still exists and is bigger than ever, but it’s moved to social networking. MySpace was a very important link in the chain in this respect, because it bridged the gap between using your taste in music to finding other like-minded strangers online.

chubot 4y ago
Yes, I’d add that for many or most people, music is a way to connect with peers and mates in your teens and 20s If you no longer have as much time or motivation for that due to having a family, it’s only logical that you won’t spend as much time on that activity Not judging one way or another, but I liked music for non social reasons as well, and I still seek it out in adulthood. Kexp and tiny desk on YouTube are a constant source of great artists and performances

willio58 4y ago

The studies in the article say people in their 30s give up on new music. This is understandable, and has always been the case. This doesn't just happen with music but culture in general. As we age we become less easily malleable in our beliefs and there's an easy attraction to resent the younger generations

Spivak 4y ago
Which is quite sad because the current culture of music fueled by TikTok is insanely good. Lots of niche genres are thriving by being able to connect to their audience in a manner that doesn’t require fans or would-be fans to explicitly seek it out.
- gnuj3 4y ago
  Music culture fueled by TikTok. Jesus, I’m glad I’m one of those people in their 30s that gave up on new music.
  - Spivak 4y ago
    Yeah, the TikTok algorithm has hit some sweet spot that's able to organically direct people to niche interests and one of those is music discovery for different music genres. Okay so let's just assume you really like neo-classical, here's what you might have discovered on TikTok: Woodsman, Zir Bujou, Austin Farewell's new single, Duomo, Amity Fall, Joep Beving, Fabrizio Paterlini's new album, Airginio Aiello's new single.
- chubot 4y ago
  Examples? I’m not on TikTok but I am an older person who actively seeks out new music :) I would join for some wholesome or not-wholesome creativity
  - MivLives 4y ago
    Spotify actually has a playlist for this (I think) https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DX5Vy6DFOcx00 https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1DX5Vy6DFOcx00 That said here's some people who are big in that sorta sphere (I'm not a tiktok user but I feel it's ripples): Mathematics - BBNO$(pronounced Baby No Money) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH_i76JVTDg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tH_i76JVTDg There's a whole genre that popped up called Phonk, and then what got more popular on the internet is something called Drift Phonk. It's music that's meant to be played over drift compilations. Disaster - KSLV https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pnq1_3BXIqA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pnq1_3BXIqA A lot of tiktok is just a mixture of new and old popular music. So if you look at a chart of the most popular songs you'll see things like Day N Night by Kid Cudi, or Heat Waves by Glass Animals mixed with Doji Cat, Joji, and Bieber If you want some creative music in general: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-WTfP3WJc4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-WTfP3WJc4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WDRxtd-2dQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WDRxtd-2dQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkngTNyKaW4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkngTNyKaW4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w3-YLE04bo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w3-YLE04bo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBeWek3LPqQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBeWek3LPqQ

themadturk 4y ago

This reminds me of an old line from Dave Barry, who once observed that men eventually age to the point where they only like one song. I haven't reached that point, but have come to prefer only a few genres (none of which are pop). I'm not entirely stuck in the music I grew up with, but classical, soundtracks and epic music seems to be what I prefer about 90% of the time, and my passion for most other stuff is fading.

hammyhavoc 4y ago
As a musician, my interest shifted over time to more complex and less repetitive music. As a result, now a composer for games and picture. It feels like all the musical innovation is happening within scores and almost everything else is bland and formulaic.
- themadturk 4y ago
  It seems that film music (and by extension, game music) has been very innovative over the years, especially with the influx of composers who started out in popular music or jazz as opposed to the classics. Even television scores have turned from background music to worthy of listening on their own.
- sirspacey 4y ago
  Definitely how my tastes have evolved - love Hades soundtrack as an example. What’s caught your ear lately?
  - themadturk 4y ago
    The last soundtrack to catch my ear was Hans Zimmerman's score to Interstellar. I've also been rediscovering John Barry's classic film scores, everything from Born Free to James Bond movies -- not exactly up to the minute, but quality lasts!

s1artibartfast 4y ago

In my opinion it is mainly because people no longer maintain music collections. With vinyl, CDs, and MP3s, I could view my collection, select music I like, and build a deep relationship to it over time. With algorithmic radio, all of artists and tracks become fungible. Easy come, easy go. Sometimes I will find a specific artist or track I like and take control to put it on, but after a month or so it too is forever forgotten. Another issue is that stereo systems have gone out of style. Great music is enhanced by great quality. Music optimized to play from a cellphone or cheap Bluetooth speaker gives up a lot. I Miss music, but apparently not enough to build a new collection and set up a stereo

GloriousKoji 4y ago
To add to that it feels like newer albums no longer tell a complete story the whole way through and are just a collection of random singles that would rather be placed on and off as the next song selected by an algorithm for a streaming service. Maybe I'm just being nostalgic for the days of when I'd be excited for a new release and listen through a whole album of artists like Pink Floyd or Daft Punk and having a level of satisfaction similar to reading through a book or watching a movie.
- ksaj 4y ago
  A lot of people don't consciously notice it. But I remember the first time I read through the lyrics for the Scorpions "Love at First Sting" album and noticed there are a couple of consistently intertwining stories going on. The same thing goes for Ozzy both with and without Black Sabbath. There's a momentum from beginning to end that is really clear when you look for it.
wintermutestwin 4y ago
I have a massive music collection in the form of the artists (etc) that I have added to my streaming library. The issue is that actually managing this massive collection is a huge PITA due to the extremely limited interfaces provided. I'm on Apple Music and the Mac app is trash that just seems like a bad port of their iOS app. The iOS app has tried to focus so much on "discovery" that "management" is a distant second thought. For example, of the 5 icons across the bottom of the screen, 3 of them are different flavors of discovery. Naturally, you can't customize the UI at all. Personally, I get all my external discovery via better mediums. The problem is that I keep adding and adding great music to my library and then can rarely find it.

telchior 4y ago

Based on the other comments I thought this article would be suggesting that there's a new trend taking place with people in their 30s. The author does seem to be trying to position it as "hey look at this interesting phenomenon" but doesn't actually claim that it's new in any way. So basically: we're becoming our parents, or repeating a story that every generation goes through. Personally, my parents had piles of records from the 60s-80s but didn't listen to that much music. I do listen to a few hours of music each day, including whatever new stuff I can find, but it's mainly work noise to cover up other sounds. Some of the declining interest can be likened to comedy. When you're 15 or 25, there are a lot of jokes you haven't heard before. If you're 35... or 65... certain routines start sounding pretty worn out. With music I suspect there's also a social learning component: we fall in love with music when we're young and still trying to find our place in the world. Music tickles the same communication centers in the brain that are used for social positioning, and the value of that, also, fades later on.

master_crab 4y ago
All seconded. And to add to that: Your (my) wonderfully delicious albums of RATM, Audioslave, The Killers, etc all become second class citizens when the true masters of the household want to listen to Baby Shark or Elmo.
ozim 4y ago
I would say it can also be linked to fact that music from your teens and twenties is important because you tie it with emotions you lived going to the parties with friends. After 30 most people have job, kids go for parties a lot less often.

omar_alt 4y ago

If more people are becoming dependent on playlists will future generations even be able to recall their favourite songs from memory as they enter middle age?

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

ksaj 4y ago

I think every generation says this about the younger generations to them. However, there is a difference today, and that is musicians releasing songs one at a time on YouTube instead of as an album. Even a large number of the older-generation musicians are doing it. Sure they often end up as albums, but they are originally heard as one-off products, and probably thereafter listened to by preference and not as intended. As well, it basically means songs that don't have videos are typically relinquished to the heard-once category.

jschveibinz 4y ago

For those looking for something new, I’ll put in a pitch for jazz. It is harmonically and rhythmically complex and the vocal styles are always unique. There are many different flavors of jazz to explore for any time of day. And live performances are usually accessible in cozy venues and they don’t cost an arm and a leg.

silent_cal 4y ago

My 2 cents: Honestly I think I've just outgrown modern music - it's geared towards younger people. What seemed complex and interesting now seems repetitive and empty. Before you accuse me of being arrogant: I feel like I should be mature enough to start listening to "real" music (e.g. classical) by now, but I find that it's too far over my head. So I think I'm in a musical "limbo".

spywaregorilla 4y ago
Have you considered searching for music that is both modern and not empty?
- silent_cal 4y ago
  Yes - and maybe "modern" isn't the best word - mean the popular genres like R&B, alt rock, etc. But it's the same problem - I don't know who the good composers are of "real" music, and I don't know where to start looking.
  - synthpop 4y ago
    Any attempt to hold music by some metric of purity ('real'ness) is always bound to be reductive and rather joyless imo. Surely there has to be 'classic' artists or genres that you've enjoyed at one time or another. Leverage the existing knowledge or potential curiosities that are within that pallette, and explore the rabbit hole a little deeper. Go back to your favorite tunes and look beyond just the name on the box. (Who are the performers/producers on that great album I spun endlessly back in the day? What other works have they been a part? Did they ever namedrop other artists in old interviews? Who'd they tour with? What other stuff did their label put out? etc. This can be repeated endlessly with every new name you come across that piques your interest. Rateyourmusic, Discogs and Wikipedia are probably good starting points to reference this info.) I think anyone could likely find a trove of new (to you, at least) content by simply digging a bit outside of their comfort zone to try genres that are totally alien to your ears, like Avant Garde Jazz or Krautrock or Experimental music, just for example. Or by finding a genre you know you like, then exploring the likely myriad subgenres which emerged years later or are developing right now under its influence. A lot of the most satisfying things in life won't be fed to you, so the most important thing is to just keep an open mind and appreciate that although certain things may not click right away, it may not be worth writing off entirely. An important aspect of appreciating contemporary music is being aware of the cultural canon from which it was born and finds itself released within. I find that being able to connect some dots in one way or another between older and more contemporary artists/releases/genres will yield a greater appreciation of what's happening today. Applies to all forms of art, really.

wintermutestwin 4y ago

Just to counter the common thread of people aging out of contemporary music - I'm in my 50s and find new music that is awesome by devoting significant time and energy into discovery.

giraffe_lady 4y ago
Yeah same. I grew up on old-school straightahead jazz, prog & classic rock, and chicago blues, similar age as you. I love new music. The technical quality of modern hip hop and pop are just astounding. There are literally dozens of producers working right now who would have been singular TITANS even a generation ago. Thanks to the black church "farm league" world-class virtuosic drummers and singers who are expert improvisers are easy to find as session musicians and it has completely changed how ambitious producers and songwriters are able to be. And jazz now is fucking wild, it's unreal. The influence from hip hop & electronic I saw coming but metal, of all things, being a big one I did not. And the jazz/pop crossover influence is as fertile as it has always been. People need to get over their fear of autotune and let themselves have fun because it is. Sure yeah most music is not particularly interesting but that has literally always been the case. But right now there is more variety than there ever has been, more skill going into making it, more good shit happening than there ever has been I think.
- wintermutestwin 4y ago
  >Sure yeah most music is not particularly interesting but that has literally always been the case. Exactly. And this is where the general whine about modern music stems from (which has of course always been the case). >But right now there is more variety than there ever has been, more skill going into making it, more good shit happening than there ever has been I think. Agreed. Modern music has fragmented into near infinite niches and it just takes some effort to find it.

draw_down 4y ago

mrpf1ster 4y ago

Since this thread seems to be a lot of people wanting to discover good “modern” music. Here’s some of my favorite albums (coming from a Gen-Zer): Big KRIT - Digital Roses Don’t Die: https://open.spotify.com/album/4hL6vCeDYZjW84055aEuM9?si=xSWMjBRZQime3--uhyv6hw https://open.spotify.com/album/4hL6vCeDYZjW84055aEuM9?si=xSW... Favorite songs: Show U Right, Just 4 You Anderson .Paak - Malibu: https://open.spotify.com/album/4VFG1DOuTeDMBjBLZT7hCK?si=FbHPAVKMSo6KMXoeQTRC9Q https://open.spotify.com/album/4VFG1DOuTeDMBjBLZT7hCK?si=FbH... Favorite songs: Parking Lot, Heart don’t stand a chance Kendrick Lamar - Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers: https://open.spotify.com/album/79ONNoS4M9tfIA1mYLBYVX?si=bZg6bGiQQdKCOgzXGw779Q https://open.spotify.com/album/79ONNoS4M9tfIA1mYLBYVX?si=bZg... Favorite songs: All of them Mac Miller - Circles: https://open.spotify.com/album/1YZ3k65Mqw3G8FzYlW1mmp?si=68Hoyv0lSlO8pUQE-_GnJg https://open.spotify.com/album/1YZ3k65Mqw3G8FzYlW1mmp?si=68H... Favorite songs: Complicated, Blue World

simonblack 4y ago

We all go through phases in our lives in which we like one genre of music but not another. For me it was Heavy Metal around the 70s and Rap in the 90s. They just didn't connect with me. I even went though a phase in the late-90s where I liked House and Trance Music while my step-son liked Classical. It used to make me laugh to see the looks on his girlfriends' faces as they came in the front-door past my thumping bass and moved through to his room where gentle Classical was playing.