@@JonHerseyMusic If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's yours. Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity. Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note. The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples: - California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas - Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra - Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones - We can work it out by the Beatles - Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples. It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox. Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music. The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
@@talltodd yeah, I was in a band for a bit that wasn’t making money but was spending money every week to rent rehearsal space. And we weren’t the only ones, of course.
@@ssssssstssssssss Adam Neely has a video explaining why virtual jamming will never be possible because of latency. Like it literally comes down to the speed of light lol
I don't get why people get so obsessed over the state of mainstream music. To me, basing an argument solely on that is ignoring 70% of the actual big picture. There's always an underlying argument that anything with a low amount of plays/views doesn't count in this scenario but I argue that it actually does. Modern music history shows that innovation hasn't always come from the mainstream, but from the "underground" too, and basing one's own take on the future of music just on the billboard top 100 misses the point pretty hard. It would've missed the point just as hard 40 years ago. I also don't agree with the argument of listener lazyness or cheapness. The same people that say that music is getting devalued are the same people that don't want to spend half an hour on Bandcamp searching for something they like. Giving *all* music a fair chance with the same expectations is what the internet facilitated, and it's a beautiful thing. Music *as a whole* has never been as good as now and will continue to get better. Sorry for the rant and the bad english.
Thanks for your thoughts. One reason to care about the state of mainstream music is that it reflects either the state of the culture, the state of the industry, or both (probably both to some degree, although I'll grant that it may be a lot more algorithms and thus industry). So IF mainstream music is getting significantly worse (which I didn't actually argue here), and IF you care to live in a healthy culture with a music industry that reflects that, then you should care about the state of mainstream music. Which argument are you saying is based on the state of mainstream music? I actually didn't weigh in on its state. What I said is that if we want to even talk about this, we need a clear standard of evaluation-what makes music good or bad-and then we need to apply it to consider older versus newer music. Do you have thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
@@JonHerseyMusic Regarding the math you mentioned, since I listen to a lot of music and add a lot of albums to my library, 10€ a month is pretty low. That's why I try to support the artist directly on bandcamp when I can.
Financial incentive is key. That's exactly the reason why I am not writing 20 minutes symphonies. People don't understand the big composers had rich patrons. Also rock stars used to be able to buy a castle. The song writers could buy a nice house with one hit. Now isn't easier. It's easier to create but the insensitive isn't big so motivation isn't there. But there is great players? Yes, out of eight billion people there will always be crazies who would do it for the love of music.
There are good players but none of them produce anything of note. When was the last time you saw a Tiktok guitarist change music history? Exactly. These arguments here are complete nonsense.
this isn't bad that now its easy to make your own sounds and drums, its cool as hell, and you can still find drummers or bandmates if you want to. the problem isn't tech its capitalism. it sucks that bands or artists who want funding can't get it because others can do it cheaper. but this is the nature of this economic system.
It’s natural that things get cheaper, including even the quality things, as tech and availability improves. I think the driver here is shallow art and shallow tastes based on bad ideas. Do you have thoughts on the questions posed at the end?
Rick has made some excellent points. If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's this guy's. I'll just repost what I already commented here: Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity. Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note. The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples: - California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas - Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra - Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones - We can work it out by the Beatles - Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples. It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox. Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music. The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
@@Weweta Or we could sit people down and have them perform. How you supposed that'd go then? Oh, we already know considering their live non performances just putting on the album and having multiple vocals with the live very very low on the mix as has been shown. These are just facts you can check it out yourself with the tools available. Also classic comment before watching which is a hilariously st_pid thing people do and shows lack of something that's for sure. Maybe intelligence, the school system is worse too go figure. Sure there is great music after you wade through the trash similar to literally any streaming service where people spend 1 hour browsing just to not actually end up watching something and pick the phone back up. Have to swim through so much poop water to find 1 average thing then call that good b/c your eyes are covered in shit. Meanwhile average movies from the 90s beat the sh_t out of so called good movies today you can just sit and compare directly.
My biggest problem is it is Rick says he knows about today's music, because he studies the Spotify top 10 every other month. Then he compares that to how much he cherished his Led Zeppelin and Pat Metheney albums in the 1970s - musicians who would have been virtually unheard on top 40 radio of the late 1970s or whatever comparable to the spotify top 10 was. If he wants to argue KC and the Sunshine Band or Captain and Tenille were making far better music back then to what is out now, he might have a more apples to apples comparison. Rick goes on about innovation and notes how bad and overused the trap beat drum thing is in pop music. Go back to the 70s for the disco beat. Sure it was played by real drummers., but it was overused ad nauseum in pop music and even the now taken for granted 100% great musicians like Rod Stewart, the Stones , Kiss, Queen, Pink Floyed , etc put a disco beat to follow the absurd trend of the day. Your survivor theory point is what I would say most people on Rick's side need to look at more. Rick's not doing 'What Makes this song great' videos about "Convoy" by CJ McCall or 'You Light Up My Life" by Debby Boone.
@@JonHerseyMusic I don't have Spotify, I do listen to SiriusXm at work. I have heard a few songs recently that made me buy a CD - boygenius and Sam Fender. Have hit a concert or two of newer bands I hear. do spend less money on music then 20 years ago. I'm also mid 50s for age.
First off I wanted to say I really like this video, considering as well you to seem be someone more within the camp of Beato's audience and such, it's refreshing to see a nuanced take on this conversation. I'm answering these questions as someone who creates music both within the realms of rock and electronic, I love both sides of music equally. 1. I think in general when it comes to the ideas of music and life in music changing, I think we've seen a wave of Gen Z post-irony coming in to a lot of the concepts of music as a whole. My generation is both one that is in many ways trying to be genuine, but doing so behind a mask of humor and absurdism. I think a great example of this in the rock sphere is Black Country New Road's album "Ants From Up There", a record that for what it is, a complex chamber rock record, has been very successful since it's release in 2022. The lyrics feature a lot of modern lingo, referencing texting and artists like Billie Eilish, but also being painstakingly genuine and sincere. The entire record chronicles Isaac Wood coming to terms with a relationship, and himself, through a painfully vulnerable lens. On the other hand, I think pointing to the rapper Ice Spice shows a mix of humor, absurdism, and modern language to convey personal ideas as well. On her song "Boys A Liar Pt.2" with Pinkpanthress, an electronic artist, they balance each other out while discussing the strains of relationships. Panthress is the more emotional side of the track, discussing how she feels hurt by a partner who won't commit. Ice Spice is more brash, giving more of a "fuck you I'm hot, don't treat me like shit, but I'm also still hurt", conveyed through fun and catchy language. While post-irony is not always present, I see it come up more and more again with modern artists, even finding its ways into shows and performances. This is a bit more niche but I've seen online and played shows with people who have someone playing a video game on stage as a sort of visualizer, and lots of concert goers now will also record footage on Nintendo 3DS', for its really bad and funny video quality. I think a lot of this has to do with the general absurdity with our world as it is today, and I think this is one of the many ways my generation copes with a world that cannot explain itself. Now while I do think this is true, I don't think overall there's been a huge change in how ideas in music have changed. I think the bigger thing is that the newer generations have their own way of expressing ideas that is new compared to the previous. These concepts are really just different ways of communicating feelings that everyone experiences. I would even argue that many things have repeated themselves throughout history, just look at Rock n Roll vs Rap music. Both were dominant for decades, having a wide variety of subgenres and starting out as controversial before becoming mainstream. We saw in the 90's and 2000's how Rock started to decline, and I would argue we're seeing the same thing happening with rap now. A lot of people in rap circles talk about how there hasn't been as many big rappers coming on to the scene in the last few years that are changing the game. There might be a few big stars (like Ice Spice), but the biggest rappers are mostly all already established. Things ebb and flow as all culture does, and I wouldn't be surprised if we see instrument based music make a rise once again. 2. I don't really think there is any "standard" to measure, as culture will always be evolving and changing. The only time we can really see if something was of quality is 20 years later as you mentioned, what lasts and what doesn't? The real thing to consider in the moment is does this speak to people? Does it communicate something that maybe the youth or general population is feeling? That's really all we can ask ourselves. The standard of how to gauge ideas from the 90's is far different from the 50's, and we can see how true that is based on the unwillingness of many older folks to embrace the new. Their standards are different than ours, and that's to be expected. I think this also ties into the first point, as there are a lot of things that older generations don't consider when talking about "back in my day". There are explicitly sexual songs from the 50's as we have sexual records today, but the spread and acceptance of those concepts is far different. I think the real solution is not that music is getting better or worse, it's just that popular music is different. I firmly believe that we are in one of the greatest revolutions in all of art, where accessibility has created less and less of a genuine mainstream. Every single person can watch, listen, and read whatever they want, and find exact niches to their taste. The mainstream barely matters anymore, and record companies are realizing this. What is in mainstream culture sure is definitely popular, but some of the biggest trends happen on a single app, from someone recording themselves in their bedroom. The niche rules supreme, as algorithms cater to every persons exact taste. ( here's some other thoughts I had, apologies for the essay) I think in your argument about the messaging of a piece, there's a few shortcomings to consider. This is also me coming from my background as an art student, I've had to interpret a lot of stuff I like and don't like. First off, no piece is without validity, no matter how stupid, bigoted, or irrelevant it seems, every piece of art has inherent value by being art. This unfortunately includes everything from Contemporary Art (usually mislabeled as Modern Art), to any doodle that you make on a napkin. There's an adage about as soon as you draw something you're an artist, and that is 100% true. Art is human, we in a modern context try to put value on art, but it is a fundamental part of being human. Taking this into consideration, we can only use our own tastes as a scale for value. Does it mean something to you? Do you feel something when experiencing this art? Does it bring you some sort of pleasure, or catharsis? That's really all that matters plain and simple. In this way, we can't put an inherent value on any piece of art. As mentioned before, standards change, and even with things we consider as baseline standards being tempo, production, feeling, music theory, these are all just personal values. Looking at this question even from an international standpoint would be ridiculous, as the western version of music theory is a singularity that is far different across other parts of the world. To put it simply, trying to determine whether the "quality" of a message within a song is worthy is useless, as art itself is entirely made up of personal tastes. We can ask ourselves whether HOW they got their is cohesive, or if WE pick up on it, but the message itself is valid. Trying to answer whether something is better or worse is incredibly arbitrary. Also, as for my streaming per album cost, I use UA-cam Music, but I make monthly playlists so I could calculate it myself. As i write this it is the 27th, but I feel it's more fair to use this month than that last since it was an outlier as I had a lot more time to listen to albums. I have 7 albums that I have been actively listening to, and the standard for YT music is about 11 dollars, so I've been paying about $1.57 per album. A great deal if you ask me.
Im honestly just sick of this tired argument. Why does everyone on the internet have to be so negative about every art form in the modern era? Oh yeah because it gets clicks. Not saying there isnt any issues in any modern art forms and theres certainly plenty of issues that need to be adressed but im just sick of seeing people with so much infleunce constantly spread misinformation and negative viewpoints on modern art simply because they dont understand it. And whats worse is there audiences take this as gospel because they cant be bothered to research or experience the art themselves which causes such a toxic shitty environment full of assumptions and broad generalisations that are usually incorrect. Just let modern art be itself ffs
Are you talking about me being negative, or Rick? If it's me, then I'd point out that I essentially don't HAVE an audience (This was literally my first video of this sort on my channel, and I now have still under 100 subscribers). Nor did I voice an opinion here that music or art or any subset of either is awful. So I'm wondering if you watched the video. I will share my thoughts on what standard we could use to evaluate art and then how today's art actually fares. But in the meantime, I ended with some questions. Would be interested in your thoughts.
@JonHerseyMusic oh no i didnt mean you im more just on about this conversation in general online. I quite enjoyed your analysis and take on this topic. Sorry for the confusion!
Because we can compare it directly to older stuff now that everything is available. The writers suck in hollywood compared to old movies you can just literally use your eyes and watch. For music you can literally just use your ears and listen. I'm not from the 80s but 80s music is better than today just like my era. Maybe git gud and learn to art. In hollywood its just propaganda films they do not understand literature basics this is obvious so if you don't understand that its ok the education system is also worse now.
Because this guy is simply wrong. And you could find that out simply by just comparing the top 100 billboard charts of each year and therefore comparing apples to apples. Not that surviorship bias BS he claims it is. He is simply wrong. I'll just repost what I answered to this video so keep in mind if I'm saying you I mean him not you personally. But here we go: Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity. Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note. The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples: - California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas - Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra - Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones - We can work it out by the Beatles - Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples. It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox. Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music. The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
from my perspective as a rap producer who uses only vsts and midi drums, i think new technology has allowed for so much, from incorporating real instrument sounds in music in weird ways to promoting on social media. i've found multiple rappers, managers, and more through social media pages and tiktok posts, it's an amazing tool for networking without needing to leave your home. i can admit that some artists are too reliant on tiktok (making songs just for a viral moment), but that's a small minority. there are so many good rappers and producers out there if you look.
Yes but digital technology is also stifeling creativity. Read up on what the choice paradox is. People are less happy with their choice when they have an overabundance of options. That is exactly what we see. There is always something else to try out since the options are endless. His examples with Les Paul are pure nonsense. He never has millions of choices. Same goes for the Beatles.
Using streaming services to sift through and find bands I love and would buy physical media from is spot on. There are bands I love that I would have never heard of without Spotify, bandcamp, and other social media. That also made me remember how a friend of my mine found two bands we loved. He picked up two albums from just the cover art back in the mid 90s before ever listening to them.
What bands? Those are always fun finds, but of course, the music doesn’t always live up to the cover art. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic the first albums from Bleach (Space is the album) and Skillet (self titled - has a skillet on the front cover 😂)- some obscure Indy Christian bands at the time. Bleach put out about 6-7 albums over the years. Skillet is still putting out albums but they’ve changed a lot over the years.
It stil cheapens the experience. That is the whole point. Going to a record store and actually putting in some leg work to find something of course changes how you cherish music. That is a truism and the mental gymnastics that this guy does to disprove Rick is truly embarrassing.
I don't think we need a bunch of moralism in music criticism. Otherwise we get situations like pitchfork where artists who are seen on the surface as "bad" people, conservative etc are automatically discounted to a large degree.
It sounds like you're saying that Pitchfork in particular has been unjust in how it's treated certain artists or albums. If so, the proper response is to point out what the critic got wrong so that he can either correct his behavior or face losing credibility. It's not just to say, "Well, sometimes critics are wrong, or say things I don't agree with, so they should stop judging what actually counts."
@@JonHerseyMusic It makes sense for the contents of lyrics to weigh on a review. I don't think an artists actions or statements outside of the music should have much if any impact on a review in most cases. Especially if those actions and statements amount to a nebulous image of a person who wouldn't fit in at your cool kids table.
I don't think Trent Reznor debunks Rick's point. He wasn't talking about using electronic instruments - he was talking about the replacement of humanity and creativity in music with algorithms and mechanicalism. Perfect inhuman beats. Perfect inhuman vocals. Perfect inhuman instrumentation. Perfect inhuman lyrics and melodies. Modern music is becoming more and more inhuman. It's not a matter of whether you use technology, it's whether the technology is using you. You are completely missing the point. Yes, having the answers handed to you lets you skip learning how to derive the answer on your own. Yes, Music colleges admit plenty of students - and what (listenable) music do they end up creating? Not much. Rick isn't talking about what some Berkeley progressive jazz band is doing - he's talking about what is showing up on top of the charts of Spotify and Why? He's talking about what music is reaching the greatest audience and why. The musicians train the audience, but then the audience's preferences prescribe what musicians are more likely to do - due to what will become more popular, and what will be more profitable. There's always a feedback loop happening - it's not just one-sided. You say Rick is biased towards "instruments played by people" -- yeah, that's called "Music." Yes, he prefers invented melodies over inventive chord progressions and possibly with some unique time signatures or rhythms. Also, that's music. I think he's absolutely correct to point out that (mainstream) music is becoming far less sophisticated, less interesting and frankly, dumb. And the overuse and misuse of technology isn't helping.
Well I agree with all these points, essentially, so you can’t possibly have watched more than a few minutes. Let me know if you finish and have any thoughts on the two questions at the end. Did you do the per-album or per-song math? All the best.
@@JonHerseyMusic I don't pay to stream music other than MP3's I've actually bought - so I can't do the equation. I heard the entire video, and I think you totally miss Rick's point, he's clearly talking about popular and mainstream music and songs that are gathering an audience, not niche artists. He repeatedly proves his point by going through the top 10 Pop and Rock Songs on Spotify, which nearly all suck and are totally unimaginative and dull. Everyone doesn't have to be progressive, but you can twist bend and break the rules the way that the Beatles, Earth Wind and Fire and Nirvana did and be imaginative. Even a solo artist - like myself - can make music that doesn't repeat the I-IV-V trope. Taylor Swift has written dozens of songs with the same chord progression. Thats pathetic. I tend to be fan of bands like Rush, KIng's X and Extreme who are all highly technical, but also accessible. On the other hand I find Dream Theater obnoxiously pretentious. Porcupine Tree far less so. Punk just plain stinks, they might as well bang tin cans together and claim it's "music.' John Cage with broken piano and ball-pin hammer is more musical. IMO Expectations by the audience on most mainstream music these days are essentially in the toilet. They've been trained by auto-tune, auto-grid and formulaic writing to accept mediocre music and be happy with it. They don't even realize how much more musical things could - and arguably should - be.
This guy here accusing Rick of making piss poor arguments but actually only supports Rick's arguments. All these Tiktok guitarists might be good guitar players but have done nothing of note. Not a single song I could name you that is significant for music history. Also concerning the claim of survivorships bias you can easily debunk. Just compare the top 100 billboard chart for each year. I left a very long comment elsewhere. Read it. In there I list some of the songs. 1966 had Frank Sinatra with Strangers in the night. I am not aware of a SINGLE song in the last 20 years that would even come close to that monster of a world hit. Not even a tiny bit close. Not even in the same universe. By the way I'm a late millenial so it's not my nostalgia talking. Even I knew in the 90s growing up that most big rock bands and the time of huge concerts was over and that it was only going downhill from there. When they invented the programmable keyboard in the 80s to make cheap horrible souding synth pop that was the beginning of the end. People who should never have touched an instrument started to make "music.".
I think you nailed it when you suggest that Beato prefers a certain type of music and he is ultimately lamenting the decline of that style (band oriented, rock or jazz, complex or "sophisticated") and looking for a thing to blame for why his preferred style is not more widely popular and then making these arguments that don't seem to hold up otherwise.
Anthony Edwards makes almost the same argument as well. There is a lot of agreement among a certain age cohort that wants classic rock or prog rock to be the dominant social form of music consumption.
In many ways I side with Rick. Hip hop and electronic music have always simply taken recordings and added things on top of them. That’s nothing new and I’m not saying there’s anything ‘wrong’ with it but we’re about to enter an era where people ‘write’ a bunch of songs that in actuality they prompted an AI and hit the refresh button and so my point is this… Music is about sound more than it is about words. If you take a great track and use it as your background music or beat, I think it’s safe to say that the great background music you’ve stolen is doing pretty much all of the heavy lifting. If the actual music/instrumentation part is good, it already IS good, and you’ve essentially contributed absolutely zero. You could say that this is being elitist or rockist or jazzist or whatever buzz word, but before AI obliterates music and your one weird friend starts “releasing country albums”, I think it’s worth calling a spade a spade and giving credit where credit is ACTUALLY due
@@jasonsteakums6067 >electronic music have always simply taken recordings and added things on top of them Have you actually ever listened to electronic music? Sampling of already existing material is not at all prevalent, a lot of electronic music is written from scratch. Electronic music has unlimited possibilities for creating soundscapes, it also can convey emotions and tell a story through them.
You make a great point by bringing up the question of the “why”. I think there is an intersection with the “how” that does affect the quality of modern music. I always think about the influence that EDM had in pop music in the 2000’s. Using the same book analogy, one could argue that music up until the 90’s had better musical “storytelling” because harmonic progressions worked in service of the lyrics, but now most singer-songwriters write over 4 chord loops premade by producers, and I think that greatly subtracts from a song’s emotional impact. I make music because I want to tell stories and to be able to write your own harmonic progressions definitely makes a difference in how that story reaches the listener.
My nephew was getting quite a few hits making music he put on his youtube channel. Some of it was pretty good, if repetitive and autotuned, and I asked "how did you play the keyboard on it?" He said he just found the sample and looped it, and didn't know chord theory or how to play any instrument at all. People attending music school means little to refute Rick's point that less people are learning their instruments to make music.
you’re assuming that your nephew would’ve picked up an instrument if production wasn’t an option, which is a false dichotomy. I’m pretty sure that MORE people are picking up instruments these days than any other time in history, but they represent a lower percentage of musicians than they used to, since a lot of people who never would have picked up an instrument are dabbling with music through production But that doesn’t mean less people are learning instruments. The amount of instruments sold, the amount of people going to music colleges to study, those are the metrics that matter in regards to the overall amount of instrumentalists coming on the scene, not the percentage they represent in said scene
also, you have a biased view of which skills are important and which aren’t. In an alternate reality: “My nephew was playing beautiful music on the piano, if a little boring timbre-wise. I asked him how he made the sound of the instrument, and he said he just bought the piano and the sound was built in. He doesn’t know any sound design theory, or how to use a modular synthesizer to craft the perfect sound, he just presses a key and the MACHINE does the sound-making for him” Now granted, I doubt your nephew is a professional synthesis musician, but if you value only one aspect of music making you could always dismiss even the most talented of musicians.
@@dotcircles9926dude also contradicts himself. "he didn't know how to play any instruments" followed by "he was sampling". sampling machines/softwares have been considered instruments for a long time now
"Music is getting worse because now people make it on a computer instead of playing instruments" is the same as "music got worse when people could make it with just a 4- or 5-people band instead of a symphonic orchestra" or "paintings got worse when people could buy paint instead of having to buy pigments and make their own paint at home". I used to enjoy Rick's channel, but he became a caricature of old-man-yelling-at-clouds lately, and I can't stand it anymore. And while I'm not a fan of most mainstream music he also criticizes, there's TONS of good music still being made.
Definitely agree that there’s tons of great stuff still being made. Any thoughts on the two questions I posed at the end? Working on the video answering what makes good music good now. Looking forward to your thoughts. You’ll see, it’s quite a different take than Rick’s. Thanks. 🙏
@@JonHerseyMusicWell, I don't think I have an answer to those questions. In my teens I used to be a prog rock/classic rock snob, and ended up missing out on good contemporary music. Over time I learned to evaluate music on its own terms - criticizing EDM for not having complex harmonies is as dumb as criticizing Ping Floyd for not being able to dance to it. This realization broadened my taste in a big way, but now I can't pinpoint specifics on why I enjoy a song. I supposed being surprised by a song is still a big factor for me. I don't want to hear things I heard a hundred times already. And music has to move me in some way. But within these definitions, "good music" could be virtually anything. I guess I'm not any help at all here. :)
In the spirit of your conclusion I'll respond with what I think are important questions: *Do* genres actually get abandoned, or are they merely forced out into the fringe? Who controls what music/genres the public hears most? Does the public actually know what they want or are they just responding to the world's most addictive algorithms? Do young people fathom the huge difference between the first 100 years of recorded music and the radio/Napster collapse/advent of streaming era? Does recorded music's inherent value have anything to do with tangible products? How balkanized are musical niches today vs how they were before, in terms of how visible they were to the public? Are genres actually organized and catalogued properly for the public these days? Did the monoculture actually die or has it become musically strangled of its variety in genre? Growing up, I felt that every genre was equally represented, except for "oldies," which even by that categorization felt like a valid and accessible placement for older music with lesser recording quality. These days, I see genres *completely devouring* others. Rock, which once used to dominate the radio, has done a vanishing act, and not of its own volition. Rock is still very much being made and is not *allowed* to have the same level of exposure it once did, which by default has reshaped popular musical taste to eschew it. I'm just using Rock as the most obvious example which Fantano seems to ignore, as if he didn't grow up like I did, absurdly watching Limp Bizkit (of all things) make it onto the worldwide stage. Rock could have been reeled and reined in, not erased from what is deemed "appropriate" for general audiences while Hip-Hop and other electronic genres clearly take its place in terms of artistic rebellion. My memory will not forget that Rock once used to have a place in both the underground AND mainstream. FYI: I have NOTHING against Hip-hop! I thought I did until I realized it was misplaced frustration; it's hardly Hip-hop's fault for this effect, it never used to be this way. It used to be that we'd go to the record store, wait in line on album release day with a long line of fellow fans, chat and buy early copies of our favorite artist's new album. That was amazing. I used to be able to go to a BOOK store, walk into the music section, put on headphones and preview any album they had in the store. Now I get that we have the convenience of the internet these days, but the truth is that the big money that used to go into properly organizing/cataloguing music evaporated along with the record sales business model after 1999. We now live in the streaming era and music is discovered very differently. In fact, thanks to apps like TikTok, the birth of the song blip or 15-second clip occurred. Obviously, nothing is trendier than this, but even the most vapid trends scream for nostalgia (see: the sped up '60s 'oh no' song meme) and the overt diversity of genre we once had. People are obviously very hungry even to *accessorize* older music, even if it is to wear it like a fashion trend. It's fine if Fantano would argue that the top of the music mountain was not as genre-diverse as any record store and therefore we should blindly accept whatever the streaming companies and their algorithm shit out at us, but I wholly disagree. Algorithms do not recognize talent, they recognize addiction. Music has gotten mediocre because our addictions are mediocre. It's obviously not just music either. All art and media has favored the sugary banal over the risky innovators. We are obsessed with comfort food where once we were obsessed with greatness. I didn't expect to write all this, oops. Not sorry, haha. Anyway I agree with you, I just wanted to point out how crucial this is. Solid video. Pinned comment is right, you should expect a flood of subs soon.
Wow, tons of interesting points and questions here. Going to copy and paste this into a note and let those questions stew for a while. Regarding the "sugary banal" point, I go into more detail on this in my forthcoming video (should be up in the next couple days). Looking forward to your thoughts on that one. Thanks!
How are we still seeing music charts as some sort of indicator of literally anything. I feel like bands that are popular now are specifically niche enough and creative enough that they’re no longer trying to create easily digestible commodities for the market, they’re making actual art now and not compromising themselves. I’ve discovered so many amazing bands in the last two years alone that blow a lot of bands I used to be into out of the water. They’ve distilled the essence of what was great about those bands while still innovating. It’s common to feel like society is changing for the worst the older you get, and that your golden age was the height of existence. You get it in every genre. People always say there’s no real hip hop anymore. Those people are just as jaded and delusional.
Regarding all the bands you've discovered, please make some recommendations! Also, any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
@@JonHerseyMusic The answer to the second question is purely subjective. Theres no objective truth to whether music is good or bad, it’s purely down the individual to judge. I don’t really understand the first question, the way music is consumed has changed due to the evolution of technology, this is a constant process. I don’t feel like the ideas or way they’re being conveyed have really changed that much though. We’re still dealing with the communication of basic human archetypes. The same complaints could have been made when we moved from big band orchestras to smaller groups and bands due to the advent of electronically amplified music allowing fewer people to project more volume. Sure. Polyphia make amazing progressive classical metal hybrid music, Die Spitz make great grunge, surfbort make great punk music, futurians make great cyber punk futuristic noise music. There’s literally probably hundreds of thousands of bands killing it at the moment, it’s just its globalisation we have access to way more music, dividing the listener base. Music isn’t a monolithic thing controlled by radio anymore. We’re just getting older and more cynical. I’ll probably join Rick in his criticisms in a few years, as I get more out of touch with culture. But make no mistake, I’ll be the problem, not music culture. I’m not criticising you. Rick can just be a bit disconnected sometimes and doesn’t seem to have much ability for self criticism or reflection.
If you're talking about music he's written or co-written, I guess it'd be one of the two with his band Billionaire. The Goodnight Sky (1998): ua-cam.com/play/PLpC5Zm7Z932Vc7IajixAXRIWFbDvI6Igi.html&si=zr6fkOJYyWHMcIL2 Ascension (2000): ua-cam.com/play/OLAK5uy_lmt9sBlU7NRftzH1bhV826KSngxqLaUh0.html&si=q308XI9H1yPcuOAG Thoughts? He also put this up a year ago: ua-cam.com/video/J2IoROGaSY4/v-deo.htmlsi=yxJIWWOJ91Mnnir2
1. Who even cares about the state of Pop music? Pop has always been 80% trash. 2. I think chasing viral hit songs instead of making heartfelt music is the actual problem. So many artists take all the shortcuts they can to get their 15 minutes. 3. The endless buffet metaphor only holds up if you imagine that the buffet is an endless maze and although you can ask the staff for directions to your favorite meals, their recommendations for similar meals you might like are crappy. 4. Avid readers have been arguing for a looong time that books have been getting worse with time. Back in the Middle Ages, only the most educated (monks) wrote, with the exception of some playwrights. From the Renaissance until the Romantic era it was primarily the upper classes (soldiers, courtiers, noblemen, priests, etc.) who wrote. As the common man started to write (Romantic-Modern era) literature became arguably less profound as serialized stories started to emerge. It became important to write not to spread your ideas, but to make money. This is mirrored in other media. Nowadays, you can find lots of terrible books with grammatical errors that have crappy reviews but are said to be "great for falling asleep to", as well as fanfiction and the like. Writing literature has become more accessible at the loss of quality control.
I've never liked most pop either, but it makes me wonder, given that there IS a lot of good music out there, why isn't more of it popular? I think it's worth thinking about.
Very thoughtful and for me educational video. I do enjoy watching some of Rick's videos but it is good to get other perspectives. You made good points about the technology throughout the decades being experimented with. I would add artists such as Steve Roach, Michael Sterns and Tangerine Dream just to name a few who mastered electronic music to new levels. I hope this channel grows fast.
Thanks for watching-glad you liked it, and I hope you're right about growing fast! I was just checking out Steve Roach and Michael Stearns and thought it was funny that the photos of both on Apple Music are them in front of large racks of electronics : )
@@jonolacy2644 perhaps in part it’s related to that idea, what gets measured is what gets managed. UA-cam metrics indicate that punditry = doing something right. I don’t know; I’d love to ask him about this. @Rickbeato what are your longterm goals?
Thank you! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
@JonHerseyMusic I am seeing them in Toronto. I have Qobuz, Apple Music, Tidal, and Prestomusic for streaming and learn about new music from online and digital magazines, or I simply visit an online record shop and see what the staff are enjoy. There is an overwhelming amount of great music, and I feel sorry for Rick Beato's poorly thought video. He could be of greater service by offering artists that other folks may enjoy. Kelly Lee Owens and Phoebe Bridgers would be a start. He could also try Billy Woods. I am looking forward to your next video.
I'm seeing them in Boston. Can't wait! That's a lot of streaming services. What magazines do you read? I agree that someone like Rick could be of greater service by spending more time spotlighting the good stuff that is always coming out instead of merely giving his critique of the Top 10, which he's pretty much guaranteed to hate. I'll check out these artists. Thanks for the recommendation!
@@JonHerseyMusic The magazines I read are: The Wire, Songlines, BBC Music, Gramophone, Diapason. Classica, Billboard, Choir and Organ, and Under The Radar. There are also online sources such as stereogum among others. Have a look at this interview. ua-cam.com/video/03vThmG46A8/v-deo.html&ab_channel=RickBeato
Yeah, I liked the comment where someone said that he should start producing bands again. The best response to bad music is to create good music and show the way forward.
You mentioned that streaming services free up the consumer’s money to spend on concerts and events. I think this overlooks the role reversal between the relationship of live music to the recorded medium. Before streaming was widespread, concerts were much cheaper. Like, 20.00 to see your favourite band cheap. In this economy, the live show acted as a promotion for the album and the artists music as a whole. There’s a reason why people saw it as insane that artists like Kate Bush didn’t bother touring, as this would cripple your own record sales. Now, in the streaming service economy, access to music is cheap. To find a band or artist you connect with is easier than ever, but the money made per listener barely scratches that of a true record sale. The album or single in today’s economy, acts as an advertisement for an artist’s live show. I don’t really think money is being saved if you were to see as many concerts as audiences did in the 70’s and 80’s. Streaming makes listening to music cheaper, but to experience it is more expensive than ever.
Well, we sort of take it for granted that artists have no choice but to put their music on streaming services that give them some tiny fraction of a cent per listen. But that's a choice, not a necessity. For example, Tom Bukovac and Guthrie Trapp recently released a record, In Stereo, only on CD, vinyl, and Bandcamp paid download. Within about a week, they had already recouped the tens of thousands of dollars it cost them to make it, and then some. And on the rare occasion they announce a show (Tom doesn't play live much these days), it's usually at a tiny place that sells out fast. I've toured with a handful of bands. I'd be interested to see how much tickets really have gone up when we account for inflation. One factor in this has to be the production, including lighting, set / stage design, and so on. Mid-level acts, and even some very small ones, invest a LOT in the people, design work, and technology that goes into creating an immersive and aesthetically pleasing show. And not only do they have to rent all that gear, they've got to lug it around and pay people to set it up, run it, tear it down . . . Of course, huge stage productions are not new, but I think these sorts of production elements are a lot more ubiquitous today.
He also made other piss poor arguments. I'll just repost what I wrote to him: If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's yours. Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity. Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note. The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples: - California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas - Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra - Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones - We can work it out by the Beatles - Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples. It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox. Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music. The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
I think the thing that I enjoy about older recordings is how they tended to focus on the energy of live performance and also a more organic sound. I do like dance music and innovative electronic music but there’s now a lot of music that sounds bland from treating it like a technical project with a set idea of high production slick hooks and all sounds mixed to the front heavy bass line. It’s a boring aesthetic and it’s rarely used to capture the moment of musicians expressing their art form. I think a rawer and organic aesthetic that doesn’t necessarily sound pleasant on your ear but expresses emotions and interesting textures are what we need. Music that challenges and doesn’t conform.
It's interesting that, in his review of the new Camilla Cabello album, Fantano sort of concedes Rick's point. He doesn't spotlight the elements you do here, but he essentially says that a lot of new pop albums are bland garbage aimed at creating some sort of social media moment. Mind you, I only listened to it once while cooking or something, but that was my half-engaged takeaway, for whatever it's worth.
@@JonHerseyMusic I think it’s less about technology and where music meets commercial. It’s now easy to make music and self publish that sounds so called professional but I think the most interesting music and art even pop has been created by experimenting and exploring and using sound to express emotions paint pictures poems and tell stories. I’m sure this lots of people still doing this but it’s devalued by the way you can build a professional Lego style paint by number song and avoid the process of really trying to play and develop something unexpected.
1. I think with music, it’s really tough for me to say what is ACTUALLY good or bad. I’m one of those people who was driving to work listening to the new Lil Yachty and Ian single, followed by a couple tracks from Journey’s 1981 Houston escape tour album, and later in the day was jamming some Alchemist and also Dave Matthews 🤣 maybe I just have no taste, but I genuinely get positive enjoyment out of all of these. My top two artists on Spotify last year were Future and Bruce Springsteen (hey man listen, they both are great🤣) Even tho Yachty is probably talking about something way different than Steve Perry is, I think both are honest from each artist and I think it works! So moving to 2. I don’t know personally if there even exists an idea that ideas are getting better or worse. Rick Beato might judge Yachty by his lack of profound lyrical content, but to be fair, what is Steve Perry crooning about love or heartbreak that hasn’t been covered a million times over? And wth is Dave Matthews even talking about half the time?? But you know I’m still gonna be jamming!!! The parts that resonate for people will find them, and the rest can pass in my opinion. If something Taylor Swift writes REALLY hits home with someone, hell yeah! If Young Thugs unique delivery on a beat makes somebody get out of their seat and dance, hell yeah!! I love that no matter where music falls on the spectrum, it can resonate. I see that as a reason to celebrate how much we can do as humans-between Taylor Swift, Bach, Jpegmafia, Willie Nelson, Cole Porter, like I just think it’s cool SO many different things can all exist at once. Let Ice Spice and Neil Young appear on the same playlist-cuz why not!!!! I don’t think one has to trump the other. (Also I’m not confrontational at all and I’m not arguing anything you’ve said-just giving my take! Yay music and I’m definitely gonna check out your other work! ) Also doing the math-yes I’m very lucky to be in the era of streaming paying for music instead of having to buy all these albums separately 🤣 Really liked hearing your breakdown and take on these vids. Also a shameless plug-my cousin has a band based in Austin, TX (with live musicians and everything🤪) called Wrongbird and they just released their new album “Don’t Quote Me On That”. Give it a shot and let me know what you think!
There's a lot I like about this take. I also think there's great music in every genre, and I welcome the many genres yet to be invented, whether they feature live musicians or are primarily based on computer programming (though, I certainly think I'll always prefer the former). I DO think we can form standards for evaluation, but I also think they must be applied within an individual's unique context, including their purpose in listening (whether to relax, get pumped, get married, or a million other legitimate goals). Questions I'll be exploring more are, (1) is there music that serves NO (or nearly no) legitimate goal; and (2) what is and isn't legitimate. These relate to the questions I posed before. I'm in Paris on my way home from Africa, but I aim to at least START answering these questions this week. Thanks for taking the time. I'll check out Wrongbird. I have friends in Austin. I'll tell them, too.
This guy here makes nonsense arguments. Most of them I have addressed elsewhere but I'll just repost one of my most imporant points for those who say we just don't remember the bad music of the past: The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples: - California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas - Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra - Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones - We can work it out by the Beatles - Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
Otoh, it's worth remembering that live-created music heard in person is literally the ultimate antidote to machine-created "AI" music. It's possible that people will get sick of autotuned AI "creations", and find themselves motivated to hear music that they know is "real", because ofc "real" music is an experience completely unlike listening to music at home or in the car or whatevs. Life music will likely have a resugence, eventually. Imho, ofc.
More people are making music because it's easier to produce. There's just too much to listen to, no one has time to give it all a chance. If you don't make it a point to really listen, the good stuff passes unnoticed, and you'll gravitate to the catchy, hooky, gimmicky stuff that gets it's point across in 30 seconds. When I bought an album in the 70's, I listened to every song, because I paid for them. I gave it all a chance. it's just not like that now. The cheesy trendy stuff grabs everyone's attention, the good stuff passes unnoticed. Gillian Welch rules, by the way. lol
I'm curious about why exactly it is that people "gravitate to the catchy, hooky, gimmicky stuff." I think there are a combination of factors here. As I said in response to another comment: It's a scientifically proven fact (see David Huron's book Sweet Anticipation) that part of what makes music pleasurable is novelty that subverts our expectations. Creative musicians are constantly looking for new ways to innovate. I think one factor in people gravitating to the "catchy, hooky, gimmicky stuff" is that it's MUSICALLY catchy, in that it subverts some expectation. So the musician/producer did a good job on that front. However, they too often leverage that hooky quality not to convey something worthwhile (as I think even a fair amount of pop music used to do) but instead something trite.
@@JonHerseyMusic Sometimes good music has to grow on you. I didn't like a lot of the stuff that's now among my most favorite when I first heard it. These days there are just too many choices to give everything a fair chance. So, the most immediately appealing will rise to the top. That can be a problem. Although as you say, it's not the only problem., to be sure.
Well at the moment since I'm a uni student and struggling artist, I don't spend that much money if any at all on records but I do try and support the local bands from where I live, because I think there is a direct way for a band to make their living through gigging. About the questions I think it has changed but not completely, maybe it has come to a point where it is the majority, but most music I listen to that is recent touches on similar points of what all other art I consume does, which is in the way that it is about life, the writers perspective on it, their struggles through it and a lot of existentialism, etc, I find that these topics tend to represent the overall human experience and that's what I connect with the most and that is the same stuff that appealed to me from older bands too. Also another point that connects all of these is a certain level of boundaries pushing and experimentation, which I really appreciate because hearing the same thing over and over just feels stale, so I appreciate bands/artists that try to enovate. Most popular music at least right now, maybe will touch on 1 or 2 of those and play everything else really safe which makes it so that I can't connect with it has much but from time to time there is a pop artist that is appealing and interesting to me, the biggest problem that I have with popular music is that it feels like it has been too engineered by a "late capitalist machine" that is just trying their hardest to hit the points they know are the safest and will pull on your heartstrings the hardest in a completely fake, overdone and board approved way. As long as an artist is being a real human I may like their work it just has to feel human and real to me.
Rick is the victim of his own biases. Obviously, I don’t know him, but I’m a guitar player that’s played in bands and Rick and I are the same age (b. 1962.) But, where ,I like a lot of musicians, took a few lessons and then figured out how to play by playing with others and forming bands, Rick learned guitar at an earlier age than I, learned far more than I ever did and came into a world of older pro musician mentors. As a result, if you look at the overall catalog of his “What Makes This Song Great” videos, he skews towards older music - Prog, AOR and Fusion - than many in his Punk-era cohort and doesn’t dip into alternative music until Nirvana. (At least not that I’ve seen - I’m unaware of a “What Makes This Song Great” episode breaking down Television, the Buzzcocks, Magazine or Dinosaur Jr.) Consequently, Rick privileges these virtuoso genres over underground, more grass-roots genres and, coming to Nirvana utterly out of the context of a preceding twenty years of underground music, Rick attributes far more deliberate craft to Nirvana’s songwriting than Kurt probably would concede or even recognize. Not to say Cobain didn’t care about song craft, but he certainly didn’t know he was playing a minor ninth extension over the tonic or whatever; he just moved his fingers over the guitar neck until something sounded cool. Nirvana stumbled onto this stuff. Just as folks stumble onto stuff when muddling through new technology, so superior musical knowledge is no more a sure driver of innovation than inferior, more rudimentary technology is. As for his anti-streaming arguments, I think he comes at it entirely backwards. Music consumers aren’t undervaluing music because it is easily streamed for pennies on the dollar compared to physical media, the industry undervalues music and musicians and up and coming artists no longer have the financial backing - backing that Rick and his pro musician friends enjoyed for decades - of an industry vested in their success. Finally, what Rick seems unable to understand is that the turn towards DAW-based recording and electronic DIY solutions is often one of necessity for many new artists just as unsigned (and sometimes unsingable) underground musicians turned towards 4-track porta studios and self-released cassettes in the 80s. That’s my two cents, buy yourself a single on iTunes.
Most of my favorite riffs are things I have just stumbled on. Theory can help me orient myself to what someone else is playing, provide some context and parameters, but rarely does it deeply impact my ability to be creative. I like the quote from Niels Bohr in the Oppenheimer movie when they’re discussing math. He says that math is like sheet music. It’s less important that you can read than that you can hear the music. Cobain and many other creative musicians might not be able to read or understand most theory, but they can hear the music. Could you elaborate on the streaming point? I’m not sure I understand. Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end? My video on the what actually makes good music good is in the works. Looking forward to your take on it. Thanks.
The fact that emerging talented artists depend on you tubers like Rick Beato and Anthony Fantano to be noticed is actually the main problem preventing innovative, interesting and beautiful new music to get on the surface
I want to hope it’s not for lack of artists trying to have more organic elements in their music, but labels know they can save money by using a program instead of hiring regular studio musicians.
I think it depends on the artist, but I honestly don’t see labels TELLING artists they’ve got to do it one way or another. It’s more like “well this is my budget, and this is what I’m going for.”
The main topic of discussion is monopoly, abusive contracts, the impact on the culture of the entertainment industry and the possibilities of musicians to make a living from music, honestly, I have never seen Fantano talk about those topics or very quickly, very much. They do not talk about the roots of the problem (business and greed) and effects (cultural impact) of those problems, Beato put those ideas on the table with more echo and that in itself is excellent.
Yeah, I think Fantano touched on the problems with algorithms in response to Beato, but I don't think this is really his area of expertise. Beato knows more about this through work in the industry, contacts, and the interviews he does. Although I agree these are factors, though, I don't think they are the full story. I don't think we can take all blame off the artists themselves.
This is excellent. Great job, Jon! I love both of those guys and think they both kind of whiffed. Rick is just out of touch, which is kind of sad, because he generally has a really open heart when it comes to music stuff. Fantano ripped his dopey argument apart, for sure, but there was a weird bias in Fantano's rebuttal that kind of argued around Rick's point because Rick's made his point so poorly.
I think this entire topic is subjective to who you are, and what music means to you, if you have this notion or idea of a long awaited fortune or some clout found in sharing your music you may be setting yourself up for disaster, but if you are only interested in creating melodies and structures that are uniquely yours, so that you can look back in nostalgia one day, and invest in the future, that is entirely different, I believe young people will always enjoy making music and listening to other music because of this, but as you age it seems it becomes easier for less skilled, less great music to be released by the day, but in turn this does not really mean anything either, this is the bottom of the barrel and great music deserving of attention will always surface from the underground and theres some scene for it and a place to find it.
I think it's contextual, not subjective, and that the difference is really important. Subjective means that there's no basis in fact for preferring one thing over another, that it's entirely a matter of opinion. In that case, one could mount no argument that Mozart's clarinet concerto or "Taxman" by the Beatles is better than random noise. If someone happened to pretend that they prefer random noise, that they think it is esthetically superior, and that that's just their subjective taste, there'd be no means of answering them. I'll be discussing this more, but for some thoughts on it, check out this talk I gave: ua-cam.com/video/VeAl67voe4c/v-deo.htmlsi=JRdP6pK8WBfg3Ojj
@@JonHerseyMusicif he really believes it’s harder to “Innovate”/ make new rock genres and other guitar based styles then he’s kinda contradicting himself if he also pretty much he claims that real instruments would make music more innovative
@@Juan-kh2yl yes, still very interested in why that is, and I don’t think it’s solely due to companies and algorithms. More on this to come. Thanks for watching.
@@JonHerseyMusic No math required its an instinctive sign of the times. Bands are dead too.. There have only been 4 bands that have hit no 1 in thr past decade. As opposes to 41 the previous decade.. 43 the decase before & even more bedfore that. 🤷♂️ The new era is solo artists & duos.. soon to be kids on their sofas using Ai creating beats & getting on the algorithms 😂 wait for it....its coming.
Great Video! You present things well and you've got a new sub! I think Rick's wrong and hypocritical about this because he wants to gripe about kids, but ignores the incredibly innovation using technology that his friends and favorite musicians use. On top of that, as a subscriber to Beato, he tends to have a ton of videos basically just being mad at kids, being the stereotye that he gets so offended over. His interviews are good though and occasionally I think his points are valid, just not on this topic. Fantano I think just made a pretty standard, for him, response without digging too deep, strawmanning some of Rick's points, and just looking to capitalize on the drama. I don't hate him for it, just what his video felt like to me and what his overall Fantano (vs theneedledrop) channel tends be. I think as far as the story folks are trying to tell these days its too varied which I think is what weirds older guys like Rick out. I think, really, its agelessness can only really be judged in 20-30 years. I don't think we can make a standard for judging music in general, its why I think more people need to get it through their heads that people like Rick or Fantano or you or I don't really have the authority to dictate good music (outside of technical aspects like you discuss towards the end), but just give our opinion on what good music *may* be.
Thanks! I'm with you on most of this, but I don't think musical evaluations are totally subjective. Would love your thoughts on my recent followup to this video where I lay out an albeit quite general framework for judging music. ua-cam.com/video/Wm5j8-WGxck/v-deo.html Thanks again.
I agree with you mostly. I think Rick is stuck in his ways, that’s fine. The music HE likes isn’t being made as much. But there isn’t as much interest in rock bands as there used to be, it’s been done to death. People are and have been sick of it for decades now. As you said, in Nashville there’s so many talented people wanting to be in bands and make music that they end up as waiting tables. The previous generation has ALWAYS said this about the actions of newer generations and their music stylings. It happened with jazz, it happened with rock, it happened with rap, and so on. There was been several great pop records recently, from the likes of Charli XCX and Chappell Roan. This music is likely not appealing to you, and that’s okay, it’s not really targeted at you, but many people like it for a reason. it’s very telling you used Kesha’s Joyride as an example, I think it might be the worst song you could have chosen to make your point. Mind you, I grew up loving metal and rock and I still do. Joyride is a truly weird song, with dissonant and unique instruments for the pop genre, digital or not. I think it’s great and a breath of fresh air in pop. It would be impossible to make something that sounds like that with acoustic instruments, and that’s what makes it GOOD. And especially now that she is working solo, away from the abuse of he previous managers, even more lends its self to how important being able to produce solo music is. There has and will always be trash pop music. But it fades into obscurity and we fall into the same “back in my day” trap every single generation.
One reason "Joyride" stuck out to me is because it's such a clear example of vulgarity in pop. You seem to praise it for exactly the things that I am saying get too much attention with regard to this question: the elements of HOW it's made. On this, Rick might praise it, but I would maintain that looking at the WHAT-the IDEAS-conveyed will be a lot more fruitful for assessing whether or not pop music is getting or has gotten worse. So if you have answers to those questions I posed at the end, I'd be interested to hear them. Thanks.
I just get fed up with all the whining that "music sucks because doesn't chart any more". It's the way of the world - genres come and then they fade to become nostalgia whether that's 70s rock, punk, techno, or mediaeval chant. At some point little new is being said in the genre or the audience has simply moved on and the genre no longer speaks to them.
I want to explore this topic more. Here's part of what I think happens: It's a scientifically proven fact (see David Huron's book Sweet Anticipation) that part of what makes music pleasurable is novelty that subverts our expectations. Creative musicians are constantly looking for new ways to innovate. If they're married to a particular genre, they push the bounds within that genre as much as they can. Depending on how many creative people are working within that genre, this process can go on for decades. Sometimes they push the genre itself into entirely new territory, forging a sub-genre. And if they AREN'T married to a genre, they may even come up with entirely new ways of doing things, leading to a sound or style that warrants its own distinct genre label. But, less subtly creative people can't innovate in wholesome ways that lead to music people genuinely connect to. Instead, they appeal to base desires to create something that will momentarily pull the spotlight to them, typically by pushing the bounds of vulgarity, whether sexual, aggression-related, or otherwise. It's the equivalent of a sloppy drunk at a party-frustrated that everyone seems to be rapt by a speaker who has something of substance to say-standing up on a table and yelling nonsense. And when enough "artists" in a particular genre do this, they sink that genre. They discredit it, and people stop looking to it for anything good or new. It doesn't change the fact that there IS good music in every genre and people are free to continue to create more of it, but it definitely infects listener expectations. So I think genres can go peacefully, having been played out and revolutionized into something new. Or they can go violently, choking on vomit.
@@JonHerseyMusic I would add the desire for comfort food in the aging audience. It puts pressure on artists to fulfill that need for safety. I get frustrated by the talented young guitarists shredding their grandparents' record collections for easy boomer Likes. I'm sure Jimi could have shredded his grandparents' record collections but that's not what made him great. I get it, it's nice to get nostalgic but when I want to hear Hendrix, I listen to Hendrix even if some youngster can out-Hendrix him. I look forward to a young guitarist standing on the shoulders of giants and saying something new. I don't know what it will sound like but it won't sound like anything we've heard, and if it upsets my generation it will be worth listening to.
@JonHerseyMusic I think aesthetic values change with time, either as commentary on perceived contemporary mores or in reaction to previous trends. For example, it's hard to rate art on the basis of complexity, not because we can't distinguish information density but because accrued meaning lends itself to compression. An earlier generation's novelty becomes the next generation's meme. Virtuosity is likewise fluid as an era that has mastered rapid portamento might struggle evoking feeling out of slow, more spartan melodic lines (and vice-versa). So much of our value judgments favor what we encounter first, but there's something to be said for perfecting the form. Eric B & Rakim's Paid in Full is a great song, but I'd still give the nod to Pump Up the Volume. Personally, I give props to sophisticated (layered) works that reward close and repeated listening -- hail craft -- but who am I to turn up my nose at the savant who stumbles intuitively into a moving, affective, long-popular piece? It's terribly hard to pin down "excellence," which is why I look forward to hearing your rubric! ☺️
All "content" consumption is changing. I used to have to go to a store buy a CD. You better believe I listened to that CD non stop. Now I have everything but it feels like I don't. Weird
Art imitates life. I dont think you need 26 minutes to answer whats allready pretty obvious. While life has been improving exponentially in many aspects, its everything but inspiring. And music at its core is just that. Inspiration. While i dont judge people making music on a laptop, its just never going to be as inspiring as say nirvana or the prodigy. Because back then people actually *experienced* life in so much more of a rich and complete way. And that much was evident on their music.
@@JonHerseyMusic Its hard to pinpoint but yes thats the short answer. People are just not living that much/in the same way, not the way they did back in the day. So in essence what used to be heartfelt music that came from life experiences and interactions has now become statistics and algorithms and while it kind of tries to retain some authenticity more often than not it becomes bland and stale. Obviously iam all for the modern accessibility of music but it just doesnt hit the same. Life has become more computerized and hence its hard to recapture the same passion and raw feeling. A quote from fight club should make this more clear: "sticking furthers up your bu## doesnt make you a chicken". Writing music about something you felt and experienced is not the same as looking up whats trending and producing it. The end result might be "similar" but never truly the same. Iam almost fully with beato on this one. Obviously iam biased because thats also how i feel but i have been blessed to see both sides of the spectrum (caring too much about music vs thinking music is overrated). Its just hard to always blame nostalgia. Maybe i have grown out of it in a lot of ways and become cynical. All in all i still have hope, i think kids have proven just how much they can shape the future and while arts in general have been at a steady freefall, i wouldnt put it past them to create truly wonderful works that stand the test of time.
Well, a key part of his argument, which I think is correct, is that much modern music is NOT complex-musically OR lyrically. Whether this tells us anything about whether music is getting worse is another question. Any thoughts on the two questions I pose at the end of this video? Thanks for watching.
It's difficult to assess music in this era. 50 years ago there were perhaps 50 Lps released a week. Now it seems to be 500, or more. I've little to no idea what is coming out of Estonia, Bolivia, Fiji.......
Well, the conversation these critics are having centers on pop music, meaning stuff at the top of the charts in America and perhaps Europe. This narrows the deluge of new music quite a bit. The basic question essentially is: IS the stuff at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 today significantly worse than it was in previous decades? And to answer this, I think we need to first decide what standard we're using to judge whether music is good or bad, and then take a magnifying glass to the things we're comparing to make sure we're comparing apples to apples, not-as Rick often does-apples to oranges.
@@JonHerseyMusic Would make an interesting study, take a lot of time to forensically analyse. I must confess I've little to no idea as I largely stopped noticing what tracks/lps were at the top of the charts in the early 80s. I do know the 70's were a halcyon period for pop/rock, as well as Jazz, Classical, Electronic, 'African' and I'm told 'Latin' released were stong as well, but can't verify this as 'Latin' records rarely appeal. I do think it is increasingly difficult to generate more 'novel' sounds in a range of genres, but I still bump into gorgeous innovative pop tunes that have been released recently.
You can find gorgeous music from the 15th century AD and no doubt some will be made in the 25th century AD, however it does seem that quality of sound varies over time /space. I looked at the 20th century awhile back, not forensically as it would take years to explore releases from 200 or so Nation States. It seemed to me the 1970's was an unusual period. The Classical, Jazz, Electronic, African, Indian, Pop/Rock, Soul.....releases acrosss many Nations overall of a much higher standard than what was available in other decades. As to why? Probably lots of theories out there!
Could you say more about the method you used to examine the music? And what would you do different if you WERE examining it "forensically"? Interesting stuff.
@@JonHerseyMusic I take the view some humans have more sophisticated ears than others, or musical sounds are more resonant for them. Thus more able to discern quality. Which is not surprising, as one can say the same for skills in relation to understanding physics, painting, chess, brick laying, etc etc. Having spent a lot of time with some of these folks for 40 odd years by and large there is agreement as to quality of sounds and some consensus the 70's were a remarkable period. However even the deeper listeners/diggers are not going to cover all the ground, so the forensic angle would necessitate exploring what was coming out of Mongolia in the 90's, Fiji in the 00's etc etc. Sounds that may not have any Internet presence to date.
There's an album in a genre you don't know about that's waiting to be your favorite. Modern diversity, niche and access is wild. A dark 6h Electronic Concept album was a trending hit (Everywhere at the End of Time). International pop groups are in the mainstream while bedroom pop projects find their audience. SoundTracks are IN, from all sources. Some decades are better, but 2010 and 2020 have been top tier. AND Kali Uchis charts in Spanish, not just a verse. Lastly, to think that our current artists aren't playing with a sense of life would be a denial of every time we sang "It's gonna be Alright". Hype for your next one, "good" music is something I struggle to define. "AI" tunes are here...
Thanks for the comment, but there's a lot I don't understand here, to be honest. Are you making some music recommendations? Let me know. And to be clear, I didn't say anyone isn't "playing with a sense of life." Actually, I think that's impossible. The question is, WHAT sense of life, what does the artist or artwork convey? We’ve all known people who are incredibly sour. It doesn’t matter how good things are in their lives. If anything goes wrong, they treat it as the norm. And we all know others who are absolutely bombproof. They might have some fluctuations in their mood, but they roll with the punches and see life as essentially positive. These two types have very different senses of life. If you think that life is a Shakespearean tragedy, that we’re all doomed to pursue dreams that we can never attain, then you will make music that expresses that view. If you believe deep down that life is wonderful and that your dreams are yours to achieve, you’ll make music that portrays that view-and so on for every shade and variety in between. More on this topic here: ua-cam.com/video/VeAl67voe4c/v-deo.htmlsi=JRdP6pK8WBfg3Ojj
This music got worse because "there's no bands" playing "real instruments", Music is an artistic discipline set centuries ago and any way of making pieces that fall in some ways of the standards of it are valid. This elitist mindset of being stuck up and prioritizing "real instruments" is absolutely classist, make music how you want in the way that you can, no music is better than the other just because one was a band of 4 to 5 dudes playing established instruments while the other is making music on his PC with a midi keyboard, mic and audio interface, or even smith more primitive. At the end of the day, don't say shit is worse or going downhill just because you're stuck in the past and remember a time houses costed a peanut. The more accessible and "easy" is to make music the better imo, because more people from many more different backgrounds and upbringings can express themselves and find solace in something they would only associate with white privileged hipsters doing it. People should think of music as doing art and experimenting and that should be done in whatever way imaginable if you pressure people to only make it one way, shit is not gonna evolve and it will become boring. More artist should be more motivated to push boundaries and question what is the music playing field around them and see what ways for them to stand out and have fun. Pop music is the best example of the evolution of music in these past years. Pop is better than ever, more varied than ever before. And has someone who went through a cringe rock and metal are the best, pop and rap are shit phase I can tell you that pop music has in the past decade the most to offer. Also no one likes the band experience, everyone is a flake they put shit priorities, their lazy and can't decide on anything and for the most part end up making bland shit, there are some few exceptions like The Last Dinner Party, but sometimes is better to be a solo artist as you can be more yourself and communicate your ideas more deeply and rawer. I think that's way more artistic than oh just get a bunch of fat old white dudes to play some instruments in uninteresting ways. With that being said, the comment you made about Tik-Tok only being a good platform for solo artists is just not true, there are plenty of bands popping on Instagram and something that only someone as old and out of touch as Rick is unaware, THERE. ARE. JAM. SESSIONS. ON. TIK.TOK! literally some of the most popular kind of musictok content is someone playing an instrument, and then someone stitches than and bounces of it with a different instrument, and so on a so forth as the insanity goes and goes off. My main point is music is art and it should be done in all ways humanly possible, done.
To the extent I get your point, I don't really disagree that there can be good music in any genre made in any way. You say that pop is better than ever. The point of my video is that to actually assess this, we need a clear standard of evaluation-which I say should focus not on the HOW of music creation but on the WHAT, the IDEAS being conveyed-and then we need to more systematically apply that standard to gauging whether some subset of music has gotten better or worse. So, let me know if you have answers to the questions I pose at the end. As for the TikTok point, that's from an article in The Guardian, and I merely said that it may be some SMALL factor, but not the sort of world-ending factor that Rick seems to think. I'm trying to give him whatever benefit of the doubt can be granted on that point. Sure, of course bands can use TikTok. It's just more ideal for solo artists. Anyways, that's really small potatoes in the context of this discussion. Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I mean the ideas and the "what", as you say, are important in to discuss and getting deep into that can often make us appreciate the music more, but the idea of there being a standard, it's not something as cut and dry as I think you're implying. Because there's plenty of songs that aren't the deepest thing ever, but can be very good as long as it illustrates a vibe and perspective from the artist. And even with those existing, there's also plenty of deep, ambitious concept albums or songs that are pretty big in the music fandom community. Also there's a point I'd like to make, I don't remember if you said anything about this, but people are as interested in music and groundbreaking ones, but that music is just never gonna be in the billboard charts at least not as high as Rick wants it to be, and it's fine, not everyone needs to get into it, as long as the artists build a good die hard fanbase that's all that matters really.
There’s a huge difference between the innovations of what Les Paul did where people are actually playing the guitar as opposed to the dehumanization of music brought on by people who can’t play a single instrument but can create music with just a laptop. It’s called going too far.
I agree, and I think that’s what Rick meant, though he seriously overgeneralized. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
do you think the people who just use a laptop just press one button and have a song? you do realise that there is still human input in making music digitally? just because someone plays the guitar over producing in a laptop doesnt make it better or worse. its just another way to express musically.
@@JonHerseyMusic beato is talking about technology making it easier for corporate suits to get something done quickly and cheaply. As apposed to hiring (and trusting) a professional. Think about Beato’s statements in the context of artists Maroon 5, Olivia Rodrigo, or anything written by Benny Blanco lmao
Ha, not always. But here, he definitely didn't do his best. Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
I like Rick Beato but he does go overboard in thinking the more chords a song has, the better it is. Judging by results, today's tech has made a lot of artists sound the same but whose fault is that?
Music is just as good as it’s ever been , probably better . But music in the popular domain is the dumbest useless shit we’ve ever known. Look away from that crap and there’s thousands of great bands with great musicians.
To say that what you are paying per song or album is equivalent to dividing your monthly fee by the number of songs or albums you add to your library is misleading. You are paying for the right to listen to them for a limited time. It is impossible and meaningless to calculate the value of each song and album individually. Would you include the price of your cell phone plan? Your home internet plan? Do you take into account all the monthly fees you will pay in the future from your first listening? Also, there is no context in the act of acquiring music, for the act itself has been removed. And the context brings another value to music that goes beyond the monetary worth. So in a way it makes sense to say that music is valueless since we no longer pay for it but for the right to have access to it on a temporarily unlimited basis, with all that that entails. Its value has been diluted and dissociated and it is impossible to compare it with the value we give it when we buy a record.
Yeah, I agree that there's an important difference in connection to music that stems from merely paying for a right to listen to it. You're comment actually brings to mind a helpful analogy: It's the difference between buying and renting a home. When you buy a home, it's yours, and you treat it as a reflection of you. When you rent, maybe you let the grass grow a foot high and only clean up the cat puke on the carpet after two days. You're just a temporary occupant, and you don't care so much. Likewise, streaming music is a temporary, transient statement about yourself, not something you commit to and look back on with nostaliga and perhaps, at times, mild embarassment. Good points about the price of your cell phone, service, and ISP. This undergirds that point I was actually making there, though, which is that although Rick and others like to say that we're listening to music essentially for free, the fact is that we're not. We're just paying for all of these transient things instead of for physical, if less convenient, CDs and vinyl. And the deeper point is that the actual monetary price you pay for something is at best a proxy measure for how much you actually value it. I think the more important difference here is not between paying more or paying less, though, but between renting and owning, as you point out. I disagree that the music we pay to listen to is valueless, but I agree that its value is diluted by comparison to owning. Thanks for your thoughts. Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end of the video (also in the description)? Mine on this topic coming soon.
IMO, both are correct to a degree, rick basically points out the abuse of "tech". while fantano points out trying harder to make music doesn't make it better. i think tech that rick meant mostly are things like apps or autotune, not literal technological advancements like sound engineering. at the end of the day music is subjective, but i have to agree that music is getting blander and more similar to each other, and going to a concert nowadays isn't worth the money, as you are paying for the production, not anymore for special moments like songs being customised by bands.
I'm with you regarding Beato and Fantano, and about music getting blander. But I don't think musical judgment is entirely subjective. I shared some ideas on more objectively evaluating music in my latest video. Looking forward to your thoughts: ua-cam.com/video/Wm5j8-WGxck/v-deo.html
@@JonHerseyMusic ofc good music is not subjective. i was trying to actually appeal to most people by saying it is subjective. imho, there is actually good music and in contrast, taylor swift.
There are many nuances that both Rick and Fantano miss in both sides, and you addressed some of it. I really enjoyed your comments on this, however I think the state of music is just positive feedback from the transformations in our society. Without a spcific order of importance but I think these are some of the factors that originate this discussion : Industry side: 1-Major labels like to play safe, so they tend to promote formulas that they know it work. Because of that they tend to invest the same type of artists, and since they invest on it they have to promote them agressively to get to the public. Leaving less space for the others; This as an effect not only on the artist but also on the type of music produced. The AR's nowadays aren't looking for new tallent but for the beat that they know it work. Less risk less variety. 2-You mentined in your video about the single artist trend. This is also promoted by the industry. Is much cheaper for a label to have a group of producers that are bassicly emplyees with a small royallty then have a full band to split royalties with. Technological side: 1-It is way more easy to produce nowadays, which is great, I believe that there is much more people doing music nowadays then in the past, but this also produces alot of noise in the market, nobody have time to keep up with so much music being released daily, and therefore the artists feel the dredg of not being listened, but the pool of new music is much bigger then it was before the the online streaming services. In a way the gatekeepers of the past were replaced by the algorithm. 2-Who controls the algorithm are in this to make money, the algorithm doesn't care about the quality of music. Again, as major labels this companies play safe and tend to give preferences to the artists pushed by these labels, that respect the formulas that work, so on and so forth. This loop will be very hard to break. 3-The bigger the artist and consequently the bigger the venues the simpler the music have to be (less notes, less delays/verbs, instrumentations) due reflection and spreadout sound (this was explained by some technical guy) this makes that the recording music recorded by this huge artists, tend to simplify in order to be played in stadiums vs a club or a theater. Sociological side: 1-The world changes and so the consuming habits of the people. In the past and now people that aren't really into music, just listen to what the radio give to them, and most of the comercial radio gave to the people what the labels told them. Now they replaced the radio for the playlist algorithm. There isn't a big difference here, the difference is that there is less money to distribute for more artists; 2-Nobody buys CD's anymore, but now a lot of more people go to see live music. However the market feels saturated with the amount of gigs happening in the big cities the idea that I have is that the money is not going to the artists. Venues, tickets services, touring agencies, in some cities now the artists even have to hire a service to sell merch. BIG FUCKERY. 3-Because of the point above, many labels, promoters and venues tend to prefer solo artists, less logistical issues, and less people to share money with. 4-Gentrification in the cities are causing the closure of small venues where the local bands and upcomming artists would play. Not only is destroying the places to play but it is also destroying the places to practice. Less spaces to practice even more expensive and out of towns then before, it is a huge barrier to have a band. This is another reason of the growing of the solo artists versus the bands. 5-I agree with Rick that the social networks have also influence. More on the consumer side then on the creation side. The attention span of the consumer is really short, just a very small minority listens to an entire album nowadays, not even long songs. It is possible to see that trend, nowadays we already have many singles that don't get to 2 and half minutes. Artist release the songs one by one, before they have the entire album because they know if it is not a single nobory will ear. I saw in an interview one of the guys from Duran Duran, sayin that with the amount of information nowadays it is perfectly normal that people lean into shorter a simpler music, just to much happening at the same time. We are all sufering from a level of ADHD. In conclusion, there is still a lot of people playing instruments and doing great and different music, but it is harder and harder to get to the them besides there isn't virtually any gatekeepers. The different genres will be a niche scene that the average consumer have to actively look for to listen to.
There is a lot here I agree with, and some I disagree with. But, any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
@@JonHerseyMusic never done the math, but personally I don't add that many albums to my playlist monthly. Which l think leads a little bit with the buffet analogy you did in your video. The average listener don't listen to that much new songs every month. I think a good way to tackle this issue was presented by Jack Stratton in Vulfpeck Yt channel where he suggests that the fee that an user pay for apple music or spotify should be divided only for the listens the user does. For example, Instead of the fixed price per stream, if you only listen to songs from a single artist during a month, that artist would receive the total amount of that payments, minus the service fees. If you listen to 10 different songs from 10 diferent artis each artist would receive 1€, minus the service fees. This way of compensation I believe it could help in some of the issues mentioned.
Another problem is the dearth of possibilities for poor artists even to get into the business now. The fragmentation of the music industry and gatekeepers effecting who may enter the charts, so people my age(boomers) are the big problem, though I can say there is always new innovative music that most people my age would hate, and that's probably a good indication that innovation still exists
Isn’t it easier and cheaper than ever to start making music? I got an 8-track recorder when I was 16. My parents paid a couple hundred bucks for it. No such thing even existed even just a decade earlier. It seems there have never been MORE opportunities for people of any income level to make and record music. Thoughts on what makes good music good? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I agree that in theory is true and it’s oft stated as fact. I think prob a variety of reasons against this. One reason likely is the gatekeepers in the industry (Spotify, record companies, Ticketmaster dictatorship et al) make it difficult to get those recordings heard (outside of TikTok), while even creating your own service like 100 gecs, pc music and others have done costs some money and a big time investment (or money to pay people to do that) while not guaranteeing exposure. Also if you want to put out music with the probable exposure, you encounter the gatekeepers who demand the same music that everyone is complaining about while taking an ever increasing amount of the artists money . There are still a few producers outside of the industry who are music fans (like Chess records etc was for the blues back in the 50s ) but they don’t seem to have a lot of resources and I’m not sure how easy it would be for someone truly poor.
As a zoomer myself who loves old and new music, social media has killed our generation's attention and fried our dopamine. People my age don't want to learn instruments because it's hard and doesn't have instant gratification. Rick is correct. Learning an instrument is just not as popular as it used to be.
Sad you think so, but I'd need to see data to think this is really the case. From what I've heard, instrument sales and online lessons soared during the pandemic. Was it only or primarily old people getting into playing? Will look into this. Any thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusicI hate to say it, but it’s what I’ve noticed with my generation. I grew up right before social media started. I played trumpet K-12, but I was one of the few who didn’t quit. Most quit because music edition is not very appealing or fun, but they at least tried. Now, I rarely see any young people learning an instrument. Their free time is their screens. It’s funny you mention the pandemic cause that’s when I got back into learning instruments. I picked up piano and guitar, and then I later started learning singing. I’ve heard the same thing that music instrument sales blew up. It makes sense cause people had the time. I don’t know how many were young people though and how many stuck with it. I didn’t do the math cause I’m one of the very few my age who stills buys all their music (mostly CD for better quality). I use streaming for anything I don’t have. I love it. But I think what Rick is getting at is that because of this easy access to, music is more of a product than an art now. It’s more about consumption. It’s a very passive listening experience. People mostly use music to fill silence. They don’t actively listen and appreciate it.
@@JonHerseyMusic Look, I do think Rick is onto something bwhen he talks about the way we consume music now. The internet has a way of pulling our attention spans in so many different directions that it makes it increasingly difficult to meaningfully engage with music, or anything in general. We see this in every aspect of our lives that have been digitised. The human brain just can't handle that much stimuli. While I'm not saying we should get rid of streaming platforms, social media, or the internet. We do need to acknowledge these problems so that we can find ways to mitigate them.
Sanity. Clarity. Thanks, Jon. All of a sudden my own outlook on music today is less gloomy (and I can forgive bandmates for crapping out on me, as well as justifying doing things solo on Logic). Oh, and thanks gor The Warning. Very cool band. I was listening to Baby Animals’ self-titled 1991 debut album yesterday evening (a CD I bought on release) and The Warning reminds me of their energy in all the best ways.
Oh, sweet, I'll have to check out Baby Animals. Is it just me, or was there something enormously special about those final days of rock on analog tape in the 90s?
@@JonHerseyMusic indeed. Of course, a lot of those bands would pride themselves on the “DDD” legend on the back of their CDs, too… But Baby Animals, being from Australia and of a bluesy-pubbish bent, went analog. I guess Grunge was the last analog hurrah. Or maybe some of the Power Pop revivalists ofvthe Nineties.
Live bands being as niche as D&D or Magic the Gathering is funny. I think any band who is as popular as these 2 games has absolutely made it. Also why should pop charts even be the standard. Metal and Rock festivals are huge. Band based music is still incredibly popular. It might not be the biggest thing in music but you don’t have to be Taylor Swift to be a successful musician.
Yeah, you know, some D&D and Magic player friends pointed out to me that these games are still huge. I still have Magic card decks from when I was a kid, but I didn't keep up with that world and didn't realize that it's allive and kicking. Good for them. But, I think the analogy works because they're still pretty underground; it's just that the underground was deeper than I imagined! I don't think pop charts SHOULD be the place we go look to see if there's any good music. This is the dead horse that Rick likes to beat. But I DO think that, although there's still plenty of good stuff out there if you dig for it, some genres definitely HAVE gotten worse, and I think pop is one of them. It's an interesting question, I think, whether this is actually true and, if so, why it has happened. My thoughts on this coming in the next couple days, but curious if you have any. Thanks.
Yes, it’s about pop music-that’s quite clear in the video. Would be interesting to see those stats, and I would likewise guess that everyone who isn’t Taylor Swift doesn’t have the draw that artists used to, at least as a percentage of total listeners (given that total listeners has no doubt gone up a lot). Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's yours. Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity. Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note. The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples: - California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas - Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra - Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones - We can work it out by the Beatles - Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples. It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox. Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music. The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
@@JonHerseyMusicI don’t pay for music, I only use UA-cam. I listen to like 85% video game music, but I did love your analogy to buffets; despite them making sense, I pretty much never go to them and would prefer to find individual meals I could like on my own! (Also, to be fair, if I had only read ‘Fantano’, I’d assume that pronunciation too lol)
Well, I've probably heard him say his name a hundred times (I'm a fan, but haven't been watching him nearly as long as Rick), so no excuses. Yeah, I'm not a big buffet guy myself, when it comes to actual food : )
I at least partially think thus whole development will lead to a new appreciation of live music, though more in the "playing dnd" version you mentioned, or at a shut-in in a bar or so
Yeah, I like what another commenter said about real musicians being those who can still play if there's a power outage. Those who can't are merely computer programmers.
@@JonHerseyMusic Nah, that is the opposite of what I'm trying to say, guess I'm more referencing the social act of making music, or how people will still pay for handmade things, think of the early days of etsy. The whole idea of a Star Musician is a fairly new invention anyways. I in no way think that someone messing around with computers is less of a musician. You also could take that idea further and say that the real musicians are those that can play when their strings break
Hey Nicholas, FWIW, my goal is not to get people to unsubscribe from Rick. I think he puts out a lot of really great content. I just don't think he's a super careful thinker when it comes to this topic, and so he makes some really questionable arguments. But, personally, I still dig his interviews and stuff. Thanks for watching!
Nice Burial in the Sky clip... love that band. Rick and Anthony both talk passed one another. Rick's point on drumming annoys me (as a drummer) especially when he flippantly remarks "Crappy drummers nowadays". Yeah because the likes of JD Beck, Mat Gartska, Alex Rudinger, Larnell Lewis and Chris Coleman just suck because they aren't John fuckin Bonham. I hate that Rudi and Gartska practiced thier asses off to to sound that good. Also i that he basically shits all over the younger artists he's interviewed too,
Thanks! I’m on a plane and it’s not loading, so I’ll have to look later. Might have been Augustus. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
Here are the four albums, I think it was the Augustus one: Tomorrow Is the Question! by Ornette Coleman Ragtime World by Augustus Ohio Players by The Black Keys Keep Me Fed by The Warning
Much as i am on Beatos side in this dispute, the ultimate (not the proximate) reason for his rants is that the world has had the blatant indecency of moving on since his childhood. And he really cant accept that 😅
Hmm… yeah I’m with @hakonberg8003 on this one. I think there are legitimate grounds for thinking most of what gets popular today is trash, and that Rick hits on SOME of the minor ones. I just think he fails to address the MAJOR ones, the ideas conveyed in music.
@@JonHerseyMusicno I'm kinda lazy. I just agree on what you said and really hope Rick engage in the critique he gotten, but have he done that before? I think he likes being the old man yelling at the clouds haha
No music is not getting worse. I understand that the most popular music has simple chord structures and melodies. Yet, there are still artists who can create amazing music that isn’t anywhere close to the most popular around the world.
I take it you probably watched a few seconds or minutes and then stopped the video. What you're saying is not even being debated here; as I clarify, Rick made some big overgeneralizations, but even he clarifies that he doesn't think music IN GENERAL is getting worse, but POP music. If you watch the rest, let me know if you have thoughts on the two questions at the end. All the best.
first off: it makes much more sense to categorize between "traditional" music (1) and electronic music (2). it is like painter and graphic designers. 1: the problem with the musicians/painters today, they don't have the gardens anymore to grow over decades (meaning gettin experience with hundreds of collaborators for example). so this and social media leads to "sport"-intrumentalists with great chops and no background, almost useless. 2: while now almost for decades in the electronic music realm -> producers can see plain DJs gettin famous without even producing any music. it is fucked up and the art is getting LOST. but IMPORTANT: this is not only happening in music, its everywhere.
As somebody that is personally learning sound design and learning how to compose solely on Ableton Live 12 (I also practice guitar and record it as well), I find it stupid how some DJs that have literally never made a beat or made a GOOD beat in their lives can just get famous off of DJing. It just feels so disrespectful to the art of electronic music, and then people look at that and think "Oh, i guess electronic music is lazy". Oh, and there are GREAT electronica producers out there. We got Aphex Twin, Autechre, and Squarepusher, Flume, SOPHIE, and so many others that have actually put in the work to learn how to make unique music that CAN stand the test of time. You just wont see them (barely) in the mainstream at all.
I agree with most of Rick's takes. You're giving examples of innovation from Metheny but there's no proof that the music is good or better, just new sound ideas. Remember Prince's The Black Album. Brand new drum sounds lol. It actually takes away from the songs vs if it was a basic acoustic sounding kit. Musicians are continuing to get better and better at younger ages its crazy what some of these kids can do now. But how many of them can write a good song? At the end of the day, the money is not there in music like it used to be. The cash incentive is so small many guys can't afford to even have a band. If you're rehearsing 2x a week. That's time, fuel etc. If you're gigging and making $100 each per night (has this rate gone up at all?) for a Fri-Sat, you're playing for 3 hours there for 5. That's $20 per hour basically for 10 hours how many times per month? If you're a solo act then it's easier to have a gig where you can bring in a few hundred bucks all for yourself. Personally I believe people gravitated towards solo gigs as they'll get paid more money and get all the attention. The financial incentive for an album or single hitting the charts etc lol. Those days are gone. These record contracts are just loan basically and you have to pay that back through record sales and they pay back and a crap rate usually. Another big issue is that people have different lives compared to 40 years ago. When we were kids, we had school, tv, video games(Atari was popular, not long before the Nintendo came out) and music. We played sports etc but as far as taking in some entertainment, music was tops. Now, kids barely even listen to a full song let along a full album. Music doesn't mean as much to this newer generation as it did to us. And that's fine, we just have to acknowledge that it's happened and take it into consideration when making comparisons to previous eras. The listener doesn't give af as to how the song was produced. All they care about is how it sounds to them and how it makes them feel. Personally I don't think most listeners can tell the difference between real drums and sampled drums. Especially if they're buried in the mix a bit. I personally have a very hard time finding anything I'd actually pay for. Most is fine but if it were gone I'd be fine with an inferior replacement. But the beauty of music is that you usually know within a few seconds if you're interested or not and by the time the chorus hits again you already know if you're gonna play this song for a second time or keep moving. There isn't a lot of great music as of 2024, there's a lot of great musicians, but not that many great song writers. When you find one, you will know it. I'm doing a deep dive all through the 70's and it's so wonderful. Best era of music by far. Can we reproduce similar sounding songs recording out of the box sure? Would that be preferential? Yes of course. But sometimes having to wait, gives you that time to hone in that song more and more until it's the best it can be. Get The Knack or Appetite For Destruction are 2 examples of really working through the songs for the debut album. Both were tops of the year and AfD is considered one of the best debut of all time. The last good song I found and liked was from the 'Phantom of the Paradise" by Paul Williams. The song is called 'Hell Of It'. 'Beach Baby' by The First Class is one from my childhood that is so well written. I don't dude, if I had to guess I'd say that most of the stuff I hear these days 'sounds' fine but it's missing something like 'soul' or something along those lines. I will say that scarcity breeds value. And what we have now is the opposite. So the 'perceived value' has dropped simply because it's all so easy to access at little to no money. So if that's the default setting for the younger generation, why tf would they pay for anything? I wouldn't either.
@@JonHerseyMusic Those are 2 great points, my apologies for not finishing your vid while you had vital info remaining. It's very difficult to really quantify things the way we used to. Like with physical sales. Now with streaming being available for basically everything that would be considered pop music, what is the incentive to actually purchase music? So to me this is a huge factor. Now they try to find a way to compare stream in a ratio kind of formula assuming 10:1 streams to physical copy or whatever. It's tough for that to be an accurate comparison. Is it actually diminishing in perceived quality? And do we have a way to know this or not? This to me is very tough because like you said, the tech used gets so much attention but what about the way we write songs and how many songs sound very similar to one another? I'm just spit balling here but to have certain things be a 'masterpiece' there's a criteria. To be able to judge music created today vs 50 years ago is very difficult without such parameters to compare. I'm just finishing up 1975 fav songs and to try to compare this to Swift or similar is very difficult. When those songs came out many were groundbreaking with something or another like different recording techniques or something new to the production of music. Now other than say autotune, most things aren't so aware to the listener. Like the ability to easily fix things in the recording without using a razor blade. So what makes a great song? That's a great question. And I'm curious as to the answer so I'm gonna like and subscribe with the hopes of a future video of yours that might come up with some good ideas as to how we can compare music that is 80-90% subjective. (Sometimes a song sounds bad sonically for whatever reason, most of us can agree when we hear it) See you at the follow up!
6:46 this is the exact problem with Rick Beato. He is of the opinion that music played on live instruments is the best kind, but this is just an opinion, and he can't support it with evidence because its completely subjective. I find it frustrating because his standard ignores hip hop and electronic music, two genres which are not based in the performance of live instruments, and he closes himself off to new music in that way.
@@JonHerseyMusic I didn’t do the per album thing, because I’ve come up pretty much entirely in the streaming age. I’m 18 now but we had spotify since I was a kid and back then it was free. I probably listen to hundreds of new albums each year so I think I’ve saved thousands of dollars with streaming. I try to avoid any sort of standard for universally judging music. Everything has to be considered relative to its individual purpose and how well it does that. A dance song doesnt have much of a “message” usually, but if it makes you dance, it can be just as good as something with a deeper meaning.
Point is, there are only so many chord progressions and rhythms available before music becomes repetitive. People are attempting polyryhtms now, but that gets stale very quickly. There hasn't been a song in the last 2 decades that actually has longevity.
What about TOPICS to write about, timbres, instrument combinations? There is plenty of room for creativity. Hell, Mark Knopfler is nearly five decades into his career and is still innovating.
Mr Brightside. Hell, people are still putting out new Christmas songs with longevity, like "Santa Tell Me" by Ariana Grande. Just because you don't listen this music that doesn't mean other people aren't.
That's cool to talk about musicians from over 50 years ago but Rick's point is about musicians now & the lack of innovation & originality in 2024 & the major difference between Rick vs. Fantano rick is an actual musician that recorded albums & produced albums for other artists while Fantano is some guy in his basement reviewing albums with no musical background he is just giving his opinion and rick is right about music nowadays if your a millennial or Gen-Z this stuff is amazing when in actuality its not
@JonHerseyMusic I have no idea what you mean with pre order anything but today's music is lacking if I had a choose between Rick or Anthony give me a Rick Anthony knows nothing about music or music theory I've been watching his channel from since it began Anthony likes experimental noise that's why alot of that garbage gets high scores and praise from him.
As an acoustic musician who plays a bunch of instruments functionally rather than well, I like to jest that if there is a power cut and you can't perform, you're not a musician you're a computer programmer. I get where Rick is coming from. Pat Metheny using the studio as an instrument as shown here is a massive outlier. That said pop music at any given moment is mostly poor. Pick a 'classic year' and look at its hit singles. Most of them will be horrible. If people want to enjoy that stuff then let them. The good stuff will surface eventually.
I really like that point about power cuts. I toured with an old time band (as an instrument technician and stage manager) for a few years and really loved the fact that they could literally walk out into a field and play just as the same as they would anywhere else. I don't understand how the Orchestrion album is an outlier, though. What about the Beatles? Please explain. Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
The power cut joke is super closed minded. There's nothing about knowing how to create or modify a synth sound and perform with it using computers that takes less musical skill or makes you less of a musician than performing with a piano. If anything it takes more skill since I doubt most piano players know how to tune or build the sound of a piano from scratch in the same way
You are correct, Rick Beato, is not actually proving his thesis, that music has gotten worse. This probably comes down to 2 main reasons. According to his area of expertise, he think it is obvious, that is has. Because his area of expertise is in music theory. Not in production (in a modern context, not just recording straight to tracks), not in song lyrics writing (and not in youth culture). So from this perspective contemporary pop seems simplistic. (on the other hand he is overlooking the simplicity of music of the past, even many songs that have stood the test of time) And 2, I believe his teenage children, who have been influenced by his opinion, seemingly agree with him, making him feel like he is connected with the youth, and thus discarding any need to consider if his opinion might be biased because of his age. But of course bands will have a harder time today. With more complex productions, the band members would be even less important today. Look at classic rock bands, in most bands, it was the lead singer and a possibly lead guitarist (who wasn’t also the singer) that was the center of the band. In more complex productions, where the instrumentalists are even less important, how would you even market a band. It would make more sense to have instrumentalists as featured artists.
i love how rick spits in the face of all modern musicians hes had on his show and calls "friends" tosi abasi, tim henson, and my favorite matteo mancuso, do me a favor and look those guys up and tell me if they are worse for wear. i dont think so, those three guys alone have made some of the best guitar music to date
I think the argument here is about "popular" music getting worse, not music in general. I'm constantly discovering amazing music (according to my decidedly non-mainstream tastes) and I'm convinced there's more great music available than ever before. I don't give a damn what's "popular" -- most people have bad taste (or, equivalently, I have bad taste) and I'm going to listen to the music I like. What I'd like to see some stats on is whether "popular" music commands as great a portion of the music-listening audience as it did before the internet or streaming services. My suspicion is that "popular" music isn't as popular as it used to be, and that many more people are listening to music in "the long tail" that resonates with them personally.
Agreed, that's what's under discussion: pop music. Would be interesting to see those stats, and I would likewise guess that everyone who isn’t Taylor Swift doesn’t have the draw that many artists used to, at least as a percentage of total listeners (given that total listeners has no doubt gone up a lot). Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I went looking for stats about how flat Spotify's curve is, and the best I could come up with is this marketing blurb: "In 2023, Indies generated nearly $4.5B on Spotify. This marks the first year ever that Indies accounted for about half of what the entire industry generated on Spotify, which totaled $9B+." That's not as flat as I'd like to see, but it does show the trend over time is for more and more people to listen to independent (non-major-label, I guess?) artists. I couldn't really do the per-song math, because I typically only add artists to my Library, not albums or songs. When I find an artist I like (like my latest find, Kikagaku Moyo) that suddenly drops all their albums in my listens for the month.
Maybe so, or maybe it's not a problem with the MAJORITY of musicians but with the majority of those who, for some reason, are most popular. Any thoughts on the two questions I posed at the end of the video? Thanks for watching.
How is this channel under 200 subs? this video felt like this guy already has 30k subs
@@daveb4093 it was my pilot ❤️ Thanks for watching. Thoughts on the questions I posed? New video with some preliminary answers next week.
@@JonHerseyMusic If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's yours. Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity.
Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note.
The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples:
- California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas
- Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra
- Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones
- We can work it out by the Beatles
- Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys
I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox.
Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music.
The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
Another thing in regard to bands is that’s it’s hard to find practice spaces these days nonetheless afford them.
@@talltodd yeah, I was in a band for a bit that wasn’t making money but was spending money every week to rent rehearsal space. And we weren’t the only ones, of course.
@@JonHerseyMusicthis is exactly the class issue I'm talking about 😊
Best to split the cost amongst 1 or more bands.
I think VR can possibly help solve that problem. Is there nothing available for VR now?
@@ssssssstssssssss Adam Neely has a video explaining why virtual jamming will never be possible because of latency. Like it literally comes down to the speed of light lol
I don't get why people get so obsessed over the state of mainstream music. To me, basing an argument solely on that is ignoring 70% of the actual big picture. There's always an underlying argument that anything with a low amount of plays/views doesn't count in this scenario but I argue that it actually does. Modern music history shows that innovation hasn't always come from the mainstream, but from the "underground" too, and basing one's own take on the future of music just on the billboard top 100 misses the point pretty hard. It would've missed the point just as hard 40 years ago.
I also don't agree with the argument of listener lazyness or cheapness. The same people that say that music is getting devalued are the same people that don't want to spend half an hour on Bandcamp searching for something they like.
Giving *all* music a fair chance with the same expectations is what the internet facilitated, and it's a beautiful thing. Music *as a whole* has never been as good as now and will continue to get better.
Sorry for the rant and the bad english.
Thanks for your thoughts. One reason to care about the state of mainstream music is that it reflects either the state of the culture, the state of the industry, or both (probably both to some degree, although I'll grant that it may be a lot more algorithms and thus industry). So IF mainstream music is getting significantly worse (which I didn't actually argue here), and IF you care to live in a healthy culture with a music industry that reflects that, then you should care about the state of mainstream music.
Which argument are you saying is based on the state of mainstream music? I actually didn't weigh in on its state. What I said is that if we want to even talk about this, we need a clear standard of evaluation-what makes music good or bad-and then we need to apply it to consider older versus newer music. Do you have thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
Precisely!!!
@@JonHerseyMusic Sorry, I wasn't clear. I was actuallly referring to Rick Beato's points.
@@JonHerseyMusic Regarding the math you mentioned, since I listen to a lot of music and add a lot of albums to my library, 10€ a month is pretty low. That's why I try to support the artist directly on bandcamp when I can.
Financial incentive is key. That's exactly the reason why I am not writing 20 minutes symphonies. People don't understand the big composers had rich patrons. Also rock stars used to be able to buy a castle. The song writers could buy a nice house with one hit. Now isn't easier. It's easier to create but the insensitive isn't big so motivation isn't there. But there is great players? Yes, out of eight billion people there will always be crazies who would do it for the love of music.
I argue that most people are doing it for the love of music and have steady day jobs.
I mean do your clients NOT have day jobs? How do they afford you?
"insensitive"? Did you mean incentive?
It’s still possible to make money with music, but just as you have to be creative with the music, so you can’t follow the herd on the business side.
There are good players but none of them produce anything of note. When was the last time you saw a Tiktok guitarist change music history? Exactly. These arguments here are complete nonsense.
this isn't bad that now its easy to make your own sounds and drums, its cool as hell, and you can still find drummers or bandmates if you want to. the problem isn't tech its capitalism. it sucks that bands or artists who want funding can't get it because others can do it cheaper. but this is the nature of this economic system.
I don’t get it. Can you take another crack at explaining?
@@JonHerseyMusic The fundamental need for constant growth and cost cutting is killing music. absolutely zero aspect of tech is the problem
I agree 100%
@@Trex._.1589 Right on!
It’s natural that things get cheaper, including even the quality things, as tech and availability improves. I think the driver here is shallow art and shallow tastes based on bad ideas. Do you have thoughts on the questions posed at the end?
I think Ricks worst augment is to think that popularity has anything to do with quality.
@@lennyghoul well, my understanding of Rick’s argument is that he thinks there’s an increasing disconnect between popularity and quality.
Rick has made some excellent points. If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's this guy's. I'll just repost what I already commented here:
Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity.
Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note.
The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples:
- California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas
- Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra
- Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones
- We can work it out by the Beatles
- Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys
I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox.
Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music.
The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
“Music is getting worse” = “pop mainstream music is not going in the direction I want it to go”
Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I made the comment before watching the video, that was just my interpretation of what Rick Beaton was saying tbh
Got it. Let me know if you have thoughts on those two questions. Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic sure
@@Weweta Or we could sit people down and have them perform. How you supposed that'd go then? Oh, we already know considering their live non performances just putting on the album and having multiple vocals with the live very very low on the mix as has been shown. These are just facts you can check it out yourself with the tools available.
Also classic comment before watching which is a hilariously st_pid thing people do and shows lack of something that's for sure. Maybe intelligence, the school system is worse too go figure.
Sure there is great music after you wade through the trash similar to literally any streaming service where people spend 1 hour browsing just to not actually end up watching something and pick the phone back up. Have to swim through so much poop water to find 1 average thing then call that good b/c your eyes are covered in shit.
Meanwhile average movies from the 90s beat the sh_t out of so called good movies today you can just sit and compare directly.
I'm gonna do a vid like :
"have you seen jon Hersey's vid about beato vs fantano? They are all wrong, here is why :..."
LOL, OK, point out my errors please. 😊
@@JonHerseyMusic jk. Imagine if everyone make this, it will be the best vids centipede ever.
if you have some good points, that would be one fire of a discussion!
My biggest problem is it is Rick says he knows about today's music, because he studies the Spotify top 10 every other month. Then he compares that to how much he cherished his Led Zeppelin and Pat Metheney albums in the 1970s - musicians who would have been virtually unheard on top 40 radio of the late 1970s or whatever comparable to the spotify top 10 was. If he wants to argue KC and the Sunshine Band or Captain and Tenille were making far better music back then to what is out now, he might have a more apples to apples comparison.
Rick goes on about innovation and notes how bad and overused the trap beat drum thing is in pop music. Go back to the 70s for the disco beat. Sure it was played by real drummers., but it was overused ad nauseum in pop music and even the now taken for granted 100% great musicians like Rod Stewart, the Stones , Kiss, Queen, Pink Floyed , etc put a disco beat to follow the absurd trend of the day.
Your survivor theory point is what I would say most people on Rick's side need to look at more. Rick's not doing 'What Makes this song great' videos about "Convoy" by CJ McCall or 'You Light Up My Life" by Debby Boone.
Hahaha, lots of good examples here! Thoughts on the two questions I pose at the end? And did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks!
@@JonHerseyMusic I don't have Spotify, I do listen to SiriusXm at work. I have heard a few songs recently that made me buy a CD - boygenius and Sam Fender. Have hit a concert or two of newer bands I hear. do spend less money on music then 20 years ago. I'm also mid 50s for age.
First off I wanted to say I really like this video, considering as well you to seem be someone more within the camp of Beato's audience and such, it's refreshing to see a nuanced take on this conversation.
I'm answering these questions as someone who creates music both within the realms of rock and electronic, I love both sides of music equally.
1. I think in general when it comes to the ideas of music and life in music changing, I think we've seen a wave of Gen Z post-irony coming in to a lot of the concepts of music as a whole. My generation is both one that is in many ways trying to be genuine, but doing so behind a mask of humor and absurdism. I think a great example of this in the rock sphere is Black Country New Road's album "Ants From Up There", a record that for what it is, a complex chamber rock record, has been very successful since it's release in 2022. The lyrics feature a lot of modern lingo, referencing texting and artists like Billie Eilish, but also being painstakingly genuine and sincere. The entire record chronicles Isaac Wood coming to terms with a relationship, and himself, through a painfully vulnerable lens. On the other hand, I think pointing to the rapper Ice Spice shows a mix of humor, absurdism, and modern language to convey personal ideas as well. On her song "Boys A Liar Pt.2" with Pinkpanthress, an electronic artist, they balance each other out while discussing the strains of relationships. Panthress is the more emotional side of the track, discussing how she feels hurt by a partner who won't commit. Ice Spice is more brash, giving more of a "fuck you I'm hot, don't treat me like shit, but I'm also still hurt", conveyed through fun and catchy language.
While post-irony is not always present, I see it come up more and more again with modern artists, even finding its ways into shows and performances. This is a bit more niche but I've seen online and played shows with people who have someone playing a video game on stage as a sort of visualizer, and lots of concert goers now will also record footage on Nintendo 3DS', for its really bad and funny video quality. I think a lot of this has to do with the general absurdity with our world as it is today, and I think this is one of the many ways my generation copes with a world that cannot explain itself.
Now while I do think this is true, I don't think overall there's been a huge change in how ideas in music have changed. I think the bigger thing is that the newer generations have their own way of expressing ideas that is new compared to the previous. These concepts are really just different ways of communicating feelings that everyone experiences.
I would even argue that many things have repeated themselves throughout history, just look at Rock n Roll vs Rap music. Both were dominant for decades, having a wide variety of subgenres and starting out as controversial before becoming mainstream. We saw in the 90's and 2000's how Rock started to decline, and I would argue we're seeing the same thing happening with rap now. A lot of people in rap circles talk about how there hasn't been as many big rappers coming on to the scene in the last few years that are changing the game. There might be a few big stars (like Ice Spice), but the biggest rappers are mostly all already established. Things ebb and flow as all culture does, and I wouldn't be surprised if we see instrument based music make a rise once again.
2. I don't really think there is any "standard" to measure, as culture will always be evolving and changing. The only time we can really see if something was of quality is 20 years later as you mentioned, what lasts and what doesn't? The real thing to consider in the moment is does this speak to people? Does it communicate something that maybe the youth or general population is feeling? That's really all we can ask ourselves. The standard of how to gauge ideas from the 90's is far different from the 50's, and we can see how true that is based on the unwillingness of many older folks to embrace the new. Their standards are different than ours, and that's to be expected. I think this also ties into the first point, as there are a lot of things that older generations don't consider when talking about "back in my day". There are explicitly sexual songs from the 50's as we have sexual records today, but the spread and acceptance of those concepts is far different.
I think the real solution is not that music is getting better or worse, it's just that popular music is different. I firmly believe that we are in one of the greatest revolutions in all of art, where accessibility has created less and less of a genuine mainstream. Every single person can watch, listen, and read whatever they want, and find exact niches to their taste. The mainstream barely matters anymore, and record companies are realizing this. What is in mainstream culture sure is definitely popular, but some of the biggest trends happen on a single app, from someone recording themselves in their bedroom. The niche rules supreme, as algorithms cater to every persons exact taste.
( here's some other thoughts I had, apologies for the essay)
I think in your argument about the messaging of a piece, there's a few shortcomings to consider. This is also me coming from my background as an art student, I've had to interpret a lot of stuff I like and don't like.
First off, no piece is without validity, no matter how stupid, bigoted, or irrelevant it seems, every piece of art has inherent value by being art. This unfortunately includes everything from Contemporary Art (usually mislabeled as Modern Art), to any doodle that you make on a napkin. There's an adage about as soon as you draw something you're an artist, and that is 100% true. Art is human, we in a modern context try to put value on art, but it is a fundamental part of being human.
Taking this into consideration, we can only use our own tastes as a scale for value. Does it mean something to you? Do you feel something when experiencing this art? Does it bring you some sort of pleasure, or catharsis? That's really all that matters plain and simple.
In this way, we can't put an inherent value on any piece of art. As mentioned before, standards change, and even with things we consider as baseline standards being tempo, production, feeling, music theory, these are all just personal values. Looking at this question even from an international standpoint would be ridiculous, as the western version of music theory is a singularity that is far different across other parts of the world.
To put it simply, trying to determine whether the "quality" of a message within a song is worthy is useless, as art itself is entirely made up of personal tastes. We can ask ourselves whether HOW they got their is cohesive, or if WE pick up on it, but the message itself is valid. Trying to answer whether something is better or worse is incredibly arbitrary.
Also, as for my streaming per album cost, I use UA-cam Music, but I make monthly playlists so I could calculate it myself. As i write this it is the 27th, but I feel it's more fair to use this month than that last since it was an outlier as I had a lot more time to listen to albums. I have 7 albums that I have been actively listening to, and the standard for YT music is about 11 dollars, so I've been paying about $1.57 per album. A great deal if you ask me.
Im honestly just sick of this tired argument. Why does everyone on the internet have to be so negative about every art form in the modern era? Oh yeah because it gets clicks. Not saying there isnt any issues in any modern art forms and theres certainly plenty of issues that need to be adressed but im just sick of seeing people with so much infleunce constantly spread misinformation and negative viewpoints on modern art simply because they dont understand it. And whats worse is there audiences take this as gospel because they cant be bothered to research or experience the art themselves which causes such a toxic shitty environment full of assumptions and broad generalisations that are usually incorrect. Just let modern art be itself ffs
Are you talking about me being negative, or Rick?
If it's me, then I'd point out that I essentially don't HAVE an audience (This was literally my first video of this sort on my channel, and I now have still under 100 subscribers). Nor did I voice an opinion here that music or art or any subset of either is awful. So I'm wondering if you watched the video. I will share my thoughts on what standard we could use to evaluate art and then how today's art actually fares. But in the meantime, I ended with some questions. Would be interested in your thoughts.
@JonHerseyMusic oh no i didnt mean you im more just on about this conversation in general online. I quite enjoyed your analysis and take on this topic. Sorry for the confusion!
Because we can compare it directly to older stuff now that everything is available. The writers suck in hollywood compared to old movies you can just literally use your eyes and watch. For music you can literally just use your ears and listen. I'm not from the 80s but 80s music is better than today just like my era. Maybe git gud and learn to art. In hollywood its just propaganda films they do not understand literature basics this is obvious so if you don't understand that its ok the education system is also worse now.
Because this guy is simply wrong. And you could find that out simply by just comparing the top 100 billboard charts of each year and therefore comparing apples to apples. Not that surviorship bias BS he claims it is. He is simply wrong. I'll just repost what I answered to this video so keep in mind if I'm saying you I mean him not you personally. But here we go:
Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity.
Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note.
The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples:
- California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas
- Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra
- Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones
- We can work it out by the Beatles
- Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys
I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox.
Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music.
The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
from my perspective as a rap producer who uses only vsts and midi drums, i think new technology has allowed for so much, from incorporating real instrument sounds in music in weird ways to promoting on social media. i've found multiple rappers, managers, and more through social media pages and tiktok posts, it's an amazing tool for networking without needing to leave your home. i can admit that some artists are too reliant on tiktok (making songs just for a viral moment), but that's a small minority. there are so many good rappers and producers out there if you look.
Any thoughts on the questions I posed about changes in the ideas prevalent in music?
Yes but digital technology is also stifeling creativity. Read up on what the choice paradox is. People are less happy with their choice when they have an overabundance of options. That is exactly what we see. There is always something else to try out since the options are endless. His examples with Les Paul are pure nonsense. He never has millions of choices. Same goes for the Beatles.
Using streaming services to sift through and find bands I love and would buy physical media from is spot on. There are bands I love that I would have never heard of without Spotify, bandcamp, and other social media.
That also made me remember how a friend of my mine found two bands we loved. He picked up two albums from just the cover art back in the mid 90s before ever listening to them.
What bands? Those are always fun finds, but of course, the music doesn’t always live up to the cover art. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic the first albums from Bleach (Space is the album) and Skillet (self titled - has a skillet on the front cover 😂)- some obscure Indy Christian bands at the time. Bleach put out about 6-7 albums over the years. Skillet is still putting out albums but they’ve changed a lot over the years.
It stil cheapens the experience. That is the whole point. Going to a record store and actually putting in some leg work to find something of course changes how you cherish music. That is a truism and the mental gymnastics that this guy does to disprove Rick is truly embarrassing.
I don't think we need a bunch of moralism in music criticism. Otherwise we get situations like pitchfork where artists who are seen on the surface as "bad" people, conservative etc are automatically discounted to a large degree.
It sounds like you're saying that Pitchfork in particular has been unjust in how it's treated certain artists or albums. If so, the proper response is to point out what the critic got wrong so that he can either correct his behavior or face losing credibility. It's not just to say, "Well, sometimes critics are wrong, or say things I don't agree with, so they should stop judging what actually counts."
@@JonHerseyMusic It makes sense for the contents of lyrics to weigh on a review. I don't think an artists actions or statements outside of the music should have much if any impact on a review in most cases. Especially if those actions and statements amount to a nebulous image of a person who wouldn't fit in at your cool kids table.
I don't think Trent Reznor debunks Rick's point. He wasn't talking about using electronic instruments - he was talking about the replacement of humanity and creativity in music with algorithms and mechanicalism. Perfect inhuman beats. Perfect inhuman vocals. Perfect inhuman instrumentation. Perfect inhuman lyrics and melodies. Modern music is becoming more and more inhuman. It's not a matter of whether you use technology, it's whether the technology is using you. You are completely missing the point.
Yes, having the answers handed to you lets you skip learning how to derive the answer on your own. Yes, Music colleges admit plenty of students - and what (listenable) music do they end up creating? Not much.
Rick isn't talking about what some Berkeley progressive jazz band is doing - he's talking about what is showing up on top of the charts of Spotify and Why? He's talking about what music is reaching the greatest audience and why. The musicians train the audience, but then the audience's preferences prescribe what musicians are more likely to do - due to what will become more popular, and what will be more profitable. There's always a feedback loop happening - it's not just one-sided.
You say Rick is biased towards "instruments played by people" -- yeah, that's called "Music." Yes, he prefers invented melodies over inventive chord progressions and possibly with some unique time signatures or rhythms. Also, that's music. I think he's absolutely correct to point out that (mainstream) music is becoming far less sophisticated, less interesting and frankly, dumb. And the overuse and misuse of technology isn't helping.
Well I agree with all these points, essentially, so you can’t possibly have watched more than a few minutes. Let me know if you finish and have any thoughts on the two questions at the end. Did you do the per-album or per-song math? All the best.
@@JonHerseyMusic I don't pay to stream music other than MP3's I've actually bought - so I can't do the equation.
I heard the entire video, and I think you totally miss Rick's point, he's clearly talking about popular and mainstream music and songs that are gathering an audience, not niche artists. He repeatedly proves his point by going through the top 10 Pop and Rock Songs on Spotify, which nearly all suck and are totally unimaginative and dull. Everyone doesn't have to be progressive, but you can twist bend and break the rules the way that the Beatles, Earth Wind and Fire and Nirvana did and be imaginative. Even a solo artist - like myself - can make music that doesn't repeat the I-IV-V trope.
Taylor Swift has written dozens of songs with the same chord progression. Thats pathetic. I tend to be fan of bands like Rush, KIng's X and Extreme who are all highly technical, but also accessible. On the other hand I find Dream Theater obnoxiously pretentious. Porcupine Tree far less so. Punk just plain stinks, they might as well bang tin cans together and claim it's "music.' John Cage with broken piano and ball-pin hammer is more musical.
IMO Expectations by the audience on most mainstream music these days are essentially in the toilet. They've been trained by auto-tune, auto-grid and formulaic writing to accept mediocre music and be happy with it. They don't even realize how much more musical things could - and arguably should - be.
This guy here accusing Rick of making piss poor arguments but actually only supports Rick's arguments. All these Tiktok guitarists might be good guitar players but have done nothing of note. Not a single song I could name you that is significant for music history.
Also concerning the claim of survivorships bias you can easily debunk. Just compare the top 100 billboard chart for each year. I left a very long comment elsewhere. Read it. In there I list some of the songs. 1966 had Frank Sinatra with Strangers in the night. I am not aware of a SINGLE song in the last 20 years that would even come close to that monster of a world hit. Not even a tiny bit close. Not even in the same universe.
By the way I'm a late millenial so it's not my nostalgia talking. Even I knew in the 90s growing up that most big rock bands and the time of huge concerts was over and that it was only going downhill from there. When they invented the programmable keyboard in the 80s to make cheap horrible souding synth pop that was the beginning of the end. People who should never have touched an instrument started to make "music.".
I think you nailed it when you suggest that Beato prefers a certain type of music and he is ultimately lamenting the decline of that style (band oriented, rock or jazz, complex or "sophisticated") and looking for a thing to blame for why his preferred style is not more widely popular and then making these arguments that don't seem to hold up otherwise.
Anthony Edwards makes almost the same argument as well. There is a lot of agreement among a certain age cohort that wants classic rock or prog rock to be the dominant social form of music consumption.
Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks!
In many ways I side with Rick. Hip hop and electronic music have always simply taken recordings and added things on top of them. That’s nothing new and I’m not saying there’s anything ‘wrong’ with it but we’re about to enter an era where people ‘write’ a bunch of songs that in actuality they prompted an AI and hit the refresh button and so my point is this…
Music is about sound more than it is about words. If you take a great track and use it as your background music or beat, I think it’s safe to say that the great background music you’ve stolen is doing pretty much all of the heavy lifting. If the actual music/instrumentation part is good, it already IS good, and you’ve essentially contributed absolutely zero. You could say that this is being elitist or rockist or jazzist or whatever buzz word, but before AI obliterates music and your one weird friend starts “releasing country albums”, I think it’s worth calling a spade a spade and giving credit where credit is ACTUALLY due
@@jasonsteakums6067 >electronic music have always simply taken recordings and added things on top of them
Have you actually ever listened to electronic music? Sampling of already existing material is not at all prevalent, a lot of electronic music is written from scratch. Electronic music has unlimited possibilities for creating soundscapes, it also can convey emotions and tell a story through them.
You make a great point by bringing up the question of the “why”. I think there is an intersection with the “how” that does affect the quality of modern music. I always think about the influence that EDM had in pop music in the 2000’s. Using the same book analogy, one could argue that music up until the 90’s had better musical “storytelling” because harmonic progressions worked in service of the lyrics, but now most singer-songwriters write over 4 chord loops premade by producers, and I think that greatly subtracts from a song’s emotional impact. I make music because I want to tell stories and to be able to write your own harmonic progressions definitely makes a difference in how that story reaches the listener.
@@malnati5496 yeah, definitely seems like integration between music and lyrics isn’t a high priority for many artists.
My nephew was getting quite a few hits making music he put on his youtube channel. Some of it was pretty good, if repetitive and autotuned, and I asked "how did you play the keyboard on it?" He said he just found the sample and looped it, and didn't know chord theory or how to play any instrument at all. People attending music school means little to refute Rick's point that less people are learning their instruments to make music.
Your cousin attended music school? Is it the case that he knows how to play but just chooses not to?
you’re assuming that your nephew would’ve picked up an instrument if production wasn’t an option, which is a false dichotomy. I’m pretty sure that MORE people are picking up instruments these days than any other time in history, but they represent a lower percentage of musicians than they used to, since a lot of people who never would have picked up an instrument are dabbling with music through production
But that doesn’t mean less people are learning instruments.
The amount of instruments sold, the amount of people going to music colleges to study, those are the metrics that matter in regards to the overall amount of instrumentalists coming on the scene, not the percentage they represent in said scene
also, you have a biased view of which skills are important and which aren’t.
In an alternate reality:
“My nephew was playing beautiful music on the piano, if a little boring timbre-wise. I asked him how he made the sound of the instrument, and he said he just bought the piano and the sound was built in. He doesn’t know any sound design theory, or how to use a modular synthesizer to craft the perfect sound, he just presses a key and the MACHINE does the sound-making for him”
Now granted, I doubt your nephew is a professional synthesis musician, but if you value only one aspect of music making you could always dismiss even the most talented of musicians.
@@dotcircles9926dude also contradicts himself. "he didn't know how to play any instruments" followed by "he was sampling". sampling machines/softwares have been considered instruments for a long time now
sampling is a staple of rap music so ima call this racism
You make some good points in here Jon! I'm going to check out your other videos. Good luck with your channel!
"Music is getting worse because now people make it on a computer instead of playing instruments" is the same as "music got worse when people could make it with just a 4- or 5-people band instead of a symphonic orchestra" or "paintings got worse when people could buy paint instead of having to buy pigments and make their own paint at home".
I used to enjoy Rick's channel, but he became a caricature of old-man-yelling-at-clouds lately, and I can't stand it anymore. And while I'm not a fan of most mainstream music he also criticizes, there's TONS of good music still being made.
Definitely agree that there’s tons of great stuff still being made. Any thoughts on the two questions I posed at the end? Working on the video answering what makes good music good now. Looking forward to your thoughts. You’ll see, it’s quite a different take than Rick’s. Thanks. 🙏
@@JonHerseyMusicWell, I don't think I have an answer to those questions. In my teens I used to be a prog rock/classic rock snob, and ended up missing out on good contemporary music. Over time I learned to evaluate music on its own terms - criticizing EDM for not having complex harmonies is as dumb as criticizing Ping Floyd for not being able to dance to it. This realization broadened my taste in a big way, but now I can't pinpoint specifics on why I enjoy a song.
I supposed being surprised by a song is still a big factor for me. I don't want to hear things I heard a hundred times already. And music has to move me in some way. But within these definitions, "good music" could be virtually anything.
I guess I'm not any help at all here. :)
In the spirit of your conclusion I'll respond with what I think are important questions:
*Do* genres actually get abandoned, or are they merely forced out into the fringe?
Who controls what music/genres the public hears most?
Does the public actually know what they want or are they just responding to the world's most addictive algorithms?
Do young people fathom the huge difference between the first 100 years of recorded music and the radio/Napster collapse/advent of streaming era?
Does recorded music's inherent value have anything to do with tangible products?
How balkanized are musical niches today vs how they were before, in terms of how visible they were to the public?
Are genres actually organized and catalogued properly for the public these days?
Did the monoculture actually die or has it become musically strangled of its variety in genre?
Growing up, I felt that every genre was equally represented, except for "oldies," which even by that categorization felt like a valid and accessible placement for older music with lesser recording quality. These days, I see genres *completely devouring* others. Rock, which once used to dominate the radio, has done a vanishing act, and not of its own volition. Rock is still very much being made and is not *allowed* to have the same level of exposure it once did, which by default has reshaped popular musical taste to eschew it.
I'm just using Rock as the most obvious example which Fantano seems to ignore, as if he didn't grow up like I did, absurdly watching Limp Bizkit (of all things) make it onto the worldwide stage. Rock could have been reeled and reined in, not erased from what is deemed "appropriate" for general audiences while Hip-Hop and other electronic genres clearly take its place in terms of artistic rebellion. My memory will not forget that Rock once used to have a place in both the underground AND mainstream. FYI: I have NOTHING against Hip-hop! I thought I did until I realized it was misplaced frustration; it's hardly Hip-hop's fault for this effect, it never used to be this way.
It used to be that we'd go to the record store, wait in line on album release day with a long line of fellow fans, chat and buy early copies of our favorite artist's new album. That was amazing. I used to be able to go to a BOOK store, walk into the music section, put on headphones and preview any album they had in the store. Now I get that we have the convenience of the internet these days, but the truth is that the big money that used to go into properly organizing/cataloguing music evaporated along with the record sales business model after 1999.
We now live in the streaming era and music is discovered very differently. In fact, thanks to apps like TikTok, the birth of the song blip or 15-second clip occurred. Obviously, nothing is trendier than this, but even the most vapid trends scream for nostalgia (see: the sped up '60s 'oh no' song meme) and the overt diversity of genre we once had. People are obviously very hungry even to *accessorize* older music, even if it is to wear it like a fashion trend. It's fine if Fantano would argue that the top of the music mountain was not as genre-diverse as any record store and therefore we should blindly accept whatever the streaming companies and their algorithm shit out at us, but I wholly disagree. Algorithms do not recognize talent, they recognize addiction. Music has gotten mediocre because our addictions are mediocre. It's obviously not just music either. All art and media has favored the sugary banal over the risky innovators. We are obsessed with comfort food where once we were obsessed with greatness.
I didn't expect to write all this, oops. Not sorry, haha. Anyway I agree with you, I just wanted to point out how crucial this is. Solid video. Pinned comment is right, you should expect a flood of subs soon.
Wow, tons of interesting points and questions here. Going to copy and paste this into a note and let those questions stew for a while. Regarding the "sugary banal" point, I go into more detail on this in my forthcoming video (should be up in the next couple days). Looking forward to your thoughts on that one. Thanks!
How are we still seeing music charts as some sort of indicator of literally anything. I feel like bands that are popular now are specifically niche enough and creative enough that they’re no longer trying to create easily digestible commodities for the market, they’re making actual art now and not compromising themselves. I’ve discovered so many amazing bands in the last two years alone that blow a lot of bands I used to be into out of the water. They’ve distilled the essence of what was great about those bands while still innovating. It’s common to feel like society is changing for the worst the older you get, and that your golden age was the height of existence. You get it in every genre. People always say there’s no real hip hop anymore. Those people are just as jaded and delusional.
Regarding all the bands you've discovered, please make some recommendations!
Also, any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
@@JonHerseyMusic The answer to the second question is purely subjective. Theres no objective truth to whether music is good or bad, it’s purely down the individual to judge. I don’t really understand the first question, the way music is consumed has changed due to the evolution of technology, this is a constant process. I don’t feel like the ideas or way they’re being conveyed have really changed that much though. We’re still dealing with the communication of basic human archetypes. The same complaints could have been made when we moved from big band orchestras to smaller groups and bands due to the advent of electronically amplified music allowing fewer people to project more volume.
Sure. Polyphia make amazing progressive classical metal hybrid music, Die Spitz make great grunge, surfbort make great punk music, futurians make great cyber punk futuristic noise music. There’s literally probably hundreds of thousands of bands killing it at the moment, it’s just its globalisation we have access to way more music, dividing the listener base. Music isn’t a monolithic thing controlled by radio anymore.
We’re just getting older and more cynical. I’ll probably join Rick in his criticisms in a few years, as I get more out of touch with culture. But make no mistake, I’ll be the problem, not music culture.
I’m not criticising you. Rick can just be a bit disconnected sometimes and doesn’t seem to have much ability for self criticism or reflection.
What’s Rick’s best album that he had ever recorded? I want to hear it.
If you're talking about music he's written or co-written, I guess it'd be one of the two with his band Billionaire.
The Goodnight Sky (1998): ua-cam.com/play/PLpC5Zm7Z932Vc7IajixAXRIWFbDvI6Igi.html&si=zr6fkOJYyWHMcIL2
Ascension (2000): ua-cam.com/play/OLAK5uy_lmt9sBlU7NRftzH1bhV826KSngxqLaUh0.html&si=q308XI9H1yPcuOAG
Thoughts?
He also put this up a year ago: ua-cam.com/video/J2IoROGaSY4/v-deo.htmlsi=yxJIWWOJ91Mnnir2
@@JonHerseyMusic thank you! I going to listen to his Music. The way he complains about Music, I would assume that he has far better Music .
1. Who even cares about the state of Pop music? Pop has always been 80% trash.
2. I think chasing viral hit songs instead of making heartfelt music is the actual problem. So many artists take all the shortcuts they can to get their 15 minutes.
3. The endless buffet metaphor only holds up if you imagine that the buffet is an endless maze and although you can ask the staff for directions to your favorite meals, their recommendations for similar meals you might like are crappy.
4. Avid readers have been arguing for a looong time that books have been getting worse with time. Back in the Middle Ages, only the most educated (monks) wrote, with the exception of some playwrights.
From the Renaissance until the Romantic era it was primarily the upper classes (soldiers, courtiers, noblemen, priests, etc.) who wrote.
As the common man started to write (Romantic-Modern era) literature became arguably less profound as serialized stories started to emerge. It became important to write not to spread your ideas, but to make money. This is mirrored in other media.
Nowadays, you can find lots of terrible books with grammatical errors that have crappy reviews but are said to be "great for falling asleep to", as well as fanfiction and the like. Writing literature has become more accessible at the loss of quality control.
I've never liked most pop either, but it makes me wonder, given that there IS a lot of good music out there, why isn't more of it popular? I think it's worth thinking about.
Very thoughtful and for me educational video. I do enjoy watching some of Rick's videos but it is good to get other perspectives. You made good points about the technology throughout the decades being experimented with. I would add artists such as Steve Roach, Michael Sterns and Tangerine Dream just to name a few who mastered electronic music to new levels. I hope this channel grows fast.
Thanks for watching-glad you liked it, and I hope you're right about growing fast! I was just checking out Steve Roach and Michael Stearns and thought it was funny that the photos of both on Apple Music are them in front of large racks of electronics : )
why doesn't rick start producing new bands
Even if he wanted to, he'd cost too much and the music wouldn't make the money to pay him back.
Yeah, but if what he most cares about is a future of good music, I think he could find talented people and make them a fair deal.
@@JonHerseyMusic That’s it though. He cares most about music punditry and telling modern musicians what they’re doing wrong.
@@jonolacy2644 perhaps in part it’s related to that idea, what gets measured is what gets managed. UA-cam metrics indicate that punditry = doing something right. I don’t know; I’d love to ask him about this. @Rickbeato what are your longterm goals?
@@JonHerseyMusic he plans on yelling at clouds
This was a very well put together video.
Thank you! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
Great take, and you put to words some thoughts I had, but didn't know how to say. Subscribed
Thank you! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
Thank you for your thoughtful posting. I will also be seeing The Warning in October. I look forward to more from your channel.
Thanks! Where are you seeing them? Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
@JonHerseyMusic I am seeing them in Toronto. I have Qobuz, Apple Music, Tidal, and Prestomusic for streaming and learn about new music from online and digital magazines, or I simply visit an online record shop and see what the staff are enjoy. There is an overwhelming amount of great music, and I feel sorry for Rick Beato's poorly thought video. He could be of greater service by offering artists that other folks may enjoy. Kelly Lee Owens and Phoebe Bridgers would be a start. He could also try Billy Woods. I am looking forward to your next video.
I'm seeing them in Boston. Can't wait!
That's a lot of streaming services. What magazines do you read?
I agree that someone like Rick could be of greater service by spending more time spotlighting the good stuff that is always coming out instead of merely giving his critique of the Top 10, which he's pretty much guaranteed to hate. I'll check out these artists. Thanks for the recommendation!
@@JonHerseyMusic The magazines I read are: The Wire, Songlines, BBC Music, Gramophone, Diapason. Classica, Billboard, Choir and Organ, and Under The Radar. There are also online sources such as stereogum among others. Have a look at this interview. ua-cam.com/video/03vThmG46A8/v-deo.html&ab_channel=RickBeato
Rick needs to start looking up more indie bands on UA-cam. That rabbit hole never ends
Yeah, I liked the comment where someone said that he should start producing bands again. The best response to bad music is to create good music and show the way forward.
music is not getting worse, obviously. the music industry and mainstream culture are getting worse, obviously.
Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
You mentioned that streaming services free up the consumer’s money to spend on concerts and events. I think this overlooks the role reversal between the relationship of live music to the recorded medium.
Before streaming was widespread, concerts were much cheaper. Like, 20.00 to see your favourite band cheap. In this economy, the live show acted as a promotion for the album and the artists music as a whole. There’s a reason why people saw it as insane that artists like Kate Bush didn’t bother touring, as this would cripple your own record sales.
Now, in the streaming service economy, access to music is cheap. To find a band or artist you connect with is easier than ever, but the money made per listener barely scratches that of a true record sale. The album or single in today’s economy, acts as an advertisement for an artist’s live show.
I don’t really think money is being saved if you were to see as many concerts as audiences did in the 70’s and 80’s. Streaming makes listening to music cheaper, but to experience it is more expensive than ever.
Well, we sort of take it for granted that artists have no choice but to put their music on streaming services that give them some tiny fraction of a cent per listen. But that's a choice, not a necessity. For example, Tom Bukovac and Guthrie Trapp recently released a record, In Stereo, only on CD, vinyl, and Bandcamp paid download. Within about a week, they had already recouped the tens of thousands of dollars it cost them to make it, and then some. And on the rare occasion they announce a show (Tom doesn't play live much these days), it's usually at a tiny place that sells out fast.
I've toured with a handful of bands. I'd be interested to see how much tickets really have gone up when we account for inflation. One factor in this has to be the production, including lighting, set / stage design, and so on. Mid-level acts, and even some very small ones, invest a LOT in the people, design work, and technology that goes into creating an immersive and aesthetically pleasing show. And not only do they have to rent all that gear, they've got to lug it around and pay people to set it up, run it, tear it down . . . Of course, huge stage productions are not new, but I think these sorts of production elements are a lot more ubiquitous today.
He also made other piss poor arguments. I'll just repost what I wrote to him:
If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's yours. Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity.
Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note.
The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples:
- California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas
- Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra
- Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones
- We can work it out by the Beatles
- Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys
I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox.
Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music.
The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
Nice to have your thoughts on this topic. You definitely made some very astute observations.
Thanks! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
I think the thing that I enjoy about older recordings is how they tended to focus on the energy of live performance and also a more organic sound. I do like dance music and innovative electronic music but there’s now a lot of music that sounds bland from treating it like a technical project with a set idea of high production slick hooks and all sounds mixed to the front heavy bass line. It’s a boring aesthetic and it’s rarely used to capture the moment of musicians expressing their art form. I think a rawer and organic aesthetic that doesn’t necessarily sound pleasant on your ear but expresses emotions and interesting textures are what we need. Music that challenges and doesn’t conform.
It's interesting that, in his review of the new Camilla Cabello album, Fantano sort of concedes Rick's point. He doesn't spotlight the elements you do here, but he essentially says that a lot of new pop albums are bland garbage aimed at creating some sort of social media moment. Mind you, I only listened to it once while cooking or something, but that was my half-engaged takeaway, for whatever it's worth.
@@JonHerseyMusic I think it’s less about technology and where music meets commercial. It’s now easy to make music and self publish that sounds so called professional but I think the most interesting music and art even pop has been created by experimenting and exploring and using sound to express emotions paint pictures poems and tell stories. I’m sure this lots of people still doing this but it’s devalued by the way you can build a professional Lego style paint by number song and avoid the process of really trying to play and develop something unexpected.
1. I think with music, it’s really tough for me to say what is ACTUALLY good or bad. I’m one of those people who was driving to work listening to the new Lil Yachty and Ian single, followed by a couple tracks from Journey’s 1981 Houston escape tour album, and later in the day was jamming some Alchemist and also Dave Matthews 🤣 maybe I just have no taste, but I genuinely get positive enjoyment out of all of these. My top two artists on Spotify last year were Future and Bruce Springsteen (hey man listen, they both are great🤣) Even tho Yachty is probably talking about something way different than Steve Perry is, I think both are honest from each artist and I think it works! So moving to 2. I don’t know personally if there even exists an idea that ideas are getting better or worse. Rick Beato might judge Yachty by his lack of profound lyrical content, but to be fair, what is Steve Perry crooning about love or heartbreak that hasn’t been covered a million times over? And wth is Dave Matthews even talking about half the time?? But you know I’m still gonna be jamming!!! The parts that resonate for people will find them, and the rest can pass in my opinion. If something Taylor Swift writes REALLY hits home with someone, hell yeah! If Young Thugs unique delivery on a beat makes somebody get out of their seat and dance, hell yeah!! I love that no matter where music falls on the spectrum, it can resonate. I see that as a reason to celebrate how much we can do as humans-between Taylor Swift, Bach, Jpegmafia, Willie Nelson, Cole Porter, like I just think it’s cool SO many different things can all exist at once. Let Ice Spice and Neil Young appear on the same playlist-cuz why not!!!! I don’t think one has to trump the other. (Also I’m not confrontational at all and I’m not arguing anything you’ve said-just giving my take! Yay music and I’m definitely gonna check out your other work! )
Also doing the math-yes I’m very lucky to be in the era of streaming paying for music instead of having to buy all these albums separately 🤣
Really liked hearing your breakdown and take on these vids. Also a shameless plug-my cousin has a band based in Austin, TX (with live musicians and everything🤪) called Wrongbird and they just released their new album “Don’t Quote Me On That”. Give it a shot and let me know what you think!
There's a lot I like about this take. I also think there's great music in every genre, and I welcome the many genres yet to be invented, whether they feature live musicians or are primarily based on computer programming (though, I certainly think I'll always prefer the former). I DO think we can form standards for evaluation, but I also think they must be applied within an individual's unique context, including their purpose in listening (whether to relax, get pumped, get married, or a million other legitimate goals). Questions I'll be exploring more are, (1) is there music that serves NO (or nearly no) legitimate goal; and (2) what is and isn't legitimate. These relate to the questions I posed before. I'm in Paris on my way home from Africa, but I aim to at least START answering these questions this week. Thanks for taking the time. I'll check out Wrongbird. I have friends in Austin. I'll tell them, too.
@@JonHerseyMusic excited to hear your thoughts bro. I’m excited for you and future content. And very cool man, thanks, and safe travels home👍
This guy here makes nonsense arguments. Most of them I have addressed elsewhere but I'll just repost one of my most imporant points for those who say we just don't remember the bad music of the past:
The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples:
- California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas
- Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra
- Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones
- We can work it out by the Beatles
- Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys
I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
Otoh, it's worth remembering that live-created music heard in person is literally the ultimate antidote to machine-created "AI" music. It's possible that people will get sick of autotuned AI "creations", and find themselves motivated to hear music that they know is "real", because ofc "real" music is an experience completely unlike listening to music at home or in the car or whatevs.
Life music will likely have a resugence, eventually.
Imho, ofc.
Yes, nothing will ever replace it for me, and hopefully there are enough of us out there to never let it go. Thanks for watching!
Glad you discovered The Warning, I helped fund their first two full albums on Go Fund Me and Kickstarter. I love them.
Cool man! Wish I'd known about them earlier on. So rad.
Bro this is so underrated I hope you blow up soon
Thank you! Tell your friends, please!
More people are making music because it's easier to produce. There's just too much to listen to, no one has time to give it all a chance. If you don't make it a point to really listen, the good stuff passes unnoticed, and you'll gravitate to the catchy, hooky, gimmicky stuff that gets it's point across in 30 seconds. When I bought an album in the 70's, I listened to every song, because I paid for them. I gave it all a chance. it's just not like that now. The cheesy trendy stuff grabs everyone's attention, the good stuff passes unnoticed. Gillian Welch rules, by the way. lol
I'm curious about why exactly it is that people "gravitate to the catchy, hooky, gimmicky stuff." I think there are a combination of factors here. As I said in response to another comment: It's a scientifically proven fact (see David Huron's book Sweet Anticipation) that part of what makes music pleasurable is novelty that subverts our expectations. Creative musicians are constantly looking for new ways to innovate. I think one factor in people gravitating to the "catchy, hooky, gimmicky stuff" is that it's MUSICALLY catchy, in that it subverts some expectation. So the musician/producer did a good job on that front. However, they too often leverage that hooky quality not to convey something worthwhile (as I think even a fair amount of pop music used to do) but instead something trite.
@@JonHerseyMusic Sometimes good music has to grow on you. I didn't like a lot of the stuff that's now among my most favorite when I first heard it. These days there are just too many choices to give everything a fair chance. So, the most immediately appealing will rise to the top. That can be a problem. Although as you say, it's not the only problem., to be sure.
Really good video and you touch on the points I've felt haven't been addressed in this whole is new music worst conversation! Got a sub out of me!
Thank you! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
Well at the moment since I'm a uni student and struggling artist, I don't spend that much money if any at all on records but I do try and support the local bands from where I live, because I think there is a direct way for a band to make their living through gigging.
About the questions I think it has changed but not completely, maybe it has come to a point where it is the majority, but most music I listen to that is recent touches on similar points of what all other art I consume does, which is in the way that it is about life, the writers perspective on it, their struggles through it and a lot of existentialism, etc, I find that these topics tend to represent the overall human experience and that's what I connect with the most and that is the same stuff that appealed to me from older bands too. Also another point that connects all of these is a certain level of boundaries pushing and experimentation, which I really appreciate because hearing the same thing over and over just feels stale, so I appreciate bands/artists that try to enovate.
Most popular music at least right now, maybe will touch on 1 or 2 of those and play everything else really safe which makes it so that I can't connect with it has much but from time to time there is a pop artist that is appealing and interesting to me, the biggest problem that I have with popular music is that it feels like it has been too engineered by a "late capitalist machine" that is just trying their hardest to hit the points they know are the safest and will pull on your heartstrings the hardest in a completely fake, overdone and board approved way. As long as an artist is being a real human I may like their work it just has to feel human and real to me.
4:55 lol is that my boy Lars "fixing" a sloppy drum fill? Great synthesis video, subbed. Keep em coming
LOL, just saw Metallica last weekend, and it was epic. Thanks for watching/subscribing!
@@JonHerseyMusic Cheers! I saw them last weekend as well, great show 🤘
@@celkat no way! In Foxboro, MA?
The very place :)
@@celkat haha, we’ve breathed the same air 🤘
Rick is the victim of his own biases. Obviously, I don’t know him, but I’m a guitar player that’s played in bands and Rick and I are the same age (b. 1962.) But, where ,I like a lot of musicians, took a few lessons and then figured out how to play by playing with others and forming bands, Rick learned guitar at an earlier age than I, learned far more than I ever did and came into a world of older pro musician mentors.
As a result, if you look at the overall catalog of his “What Makes This Song Great” videos, he skews towards older music - Prog, AOR and Fusion - than many in his Punk-era cohort and doesn’t dip into alternative music until Nirvana. (At least not that I’ve seen - I’m unaware of a “What Makes This Song Great” episode breaking down Television, the Buzzcocks, Magazine or Dinosaur Jr.)
Consequently, Rick privileges these virtuoso genres over underground, more grass-roots genres and, coming to Nirvana utterly out of the context of a preceding twenty years of underground music, Rick attributes far more deliberate craft to Nirvana’s songwriting than Kurt probably would concede or even recognize. Not to say Cobain didn’t care about song craft, but he certainly didn’t know he was playing a minor ninth extension over the tonic or whatever; he just moved his fingers over the guitar neck until something sounded cool. Nirvana stumbled onto this stuff. Just as folks stumble onto stuff when muddling through new technology, so superior musical knowledge is no more a sure driver of innovation than inferior, more rudimentary technology is.
As for his anti-streaming arguments, I think he comes at it entirely backwards. Music consumers aren’t undervaluing music because it is easily streamed for pennies on the dollar compared to physical media, the industry undervalues music and musicians and up and coming artists no longer have the financial backing - backing that Rick and his pro musician friends enjoyed for decades - of an industry vested in their success.
Finally, what Rick seems unable to understand is that the turn towards DAW-based recording and electronic DIY solutions is often one of necessity for many new artists just as unsigned (and sometimes unsingable) underground musicians turned towards 4-track porta studios and self-released cassettes in the 80s.
That’s my two cents, buy yourself a single on iTunes.
Most of my favorite riffs are things I have just stumbled on. Theory can help me orient myself to what someone else is playing, provide some context and parameters, but rarely does it deeply impact my ability to be creative. I like the quote from Niels Bohr in the Oppenheimer movie when they’re discussing math. He says that math is like sheet music. It’s less important that you can read than that you can hear the music. Cobain and many other creative musicians might not be able to read or understand most theory, but they can hear the music.
Could you elaborate on the streaming point? I’m not sure I understand.
Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end? My video on the what actually makes good music good is in the works. Looking forward to your take on it. Thanks.
The fact that emerging talented artists depend on you tubers like Rick Beato and Anthony Fantano to be noticed is actually the main problem preventing innovative, interesting and beautiful new music to get on the surface
I loved this!!!!!!!!!!
Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks!
I want to hope it’s not for lack of artists trying to have more organic elements in their music, but labels know they can save money by using a program instead of hiring regular studio musicians.
I think it depends on the artist, but I honestly don’t see labels TELLING artists they’ve got to do it one way or another. It’s more like “well this is my budget, and this is what I’m going for.”
I'm subscribing so I can get notification of your next video
Thanks! Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
@@JonHerseyMusic You mean based off of my own listening figures?
The main topic of discussion is monopoly, abusive contracts, the impact on the culture of the entertainment industry and the possibilities of musicians to make a living from music, honestly, I have never seen Fantano talk about those topics or very quickly, very much. They do not talk about the roots of the problem (business and greed) and effects (cultural impact) of those problems, Beato put those ideas on the table with more echo and that in itself is excellent.
Yeah, I think Fantano touched on the problems with algorithms in response to Beato, but I don't think this is really his area of expertise. Beato knows more about this through work in the industry, contacts, and the interviews he does.
Although I agree these are factors, though, I don't think they are the full story. I don't think we can take all blame off the artists themselves.
Fantastic points!!
Thank you! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
This is excellent. Great job, Jon! I love both of those guys and think they both kind of whiffed. Rick is just out of touch, which is kind of sad, because he generally has a really open heart when it comes to music stuff. Fantano ripped his dopey argument apart, for sure, but there was a weird bias in Fantano's rebuttal that kind of argued around Rick's point because Rick's made his point so poorly.
Thanks for watching. Looking forward to your thoughts on the following videos in this series!
I think this entire topic is subjective to who you are, and what music means to you, if you have this notion or idea of a long awaited fortune or some clout found in sharing your music you may be setting yourself up for disaster, but if you are only interested in creating melodies and structures that are uniquely yours, so that you can look back in nostalgia one day, and invest in the future, that is entirely different, I believe young people will always enjoy making music and listening to other music because of this, but as you age it seems it becomes easier for less skilled, less great music to be released by the day, but in turn this does not really mean anything either, this is the bottom of the barrel and great music deserving of attention will always surface from the underground and theres some scene for it and a place to find it.
I think it's contextual, not subjective, and that the difference is really important. Subjective means that there's no basis in fact for preferring one thing over another, that it's entirely a matter of opinion. In that case, one could mount no argument that Mozart's clarinet concerto or "Taxman" by the Beatles is better than random noise. If someone happened to pretend that they prefer random noise, that they think it is esthetically superior, and that that's just their subjective taste, there'd be no means of answering them. I'll be discussing this more, but for some thoughts on it, check out this talk I gave: ua-cam.com/video/VeAl67voe4c/v-deo.htmlsi=JRdP6pK8WBfg3Ojj
The funniest thing is Rick beato even admitted himself it was harder to innovate/come up with new guitar based genres in a video.
Harder than what? Thoughts on the questions I posed at the end? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusicif he really believes it’s harder to “Innovate”/ make new rock genres and other guitar based styles then he’s kinda contradicting himself if he also pretty much he claims that real instruments would make music more innovative
you're Jon Hersey from Objective Standard!
Yup 👍 Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks for watching.
"Good modern music never reaches the mainstream". That's the Beatos point that none of these guys catch. Please guys, listen more.
@@Juan-kh2yl yes, still very interested in why that is, and I don’t think it’s solely due to companies and algorithms. More on this to come. Thanks for watching.
@@Juan-kh2yl but I do catch that. Hope you caught that (or maybe you didn’t watch that far).
They not wrong... they just ahead of your time... you'll see 😂👍
Any thoughts on the two questions I posed at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic No math required its an instinctive sign of the times. Bands are dead too.. There have only been 4 bands that have hit no 1 in thr past decade. As opposes to 41 the previous decade.. 43 the decase before & even more bedfore that. 🤷♂️ The new era is solo artists & duos.. soon to be kids on their sofas using Ai creating beats & getting on the algorithms 😂 wait for it....its coming.
Great Video! You present things well and you've got a new sub!
I think Rick's wrong and hypocritical about this because he wants to gripe about kids, but ignores the incredibly innovation using technology that his friends and favorite musicians use. On top of that, as a subscriber to Beato, he tends to have a ton of videos basically just being mad at kids, being the stereotye that he gets so offended over. His interviews are good though and occasionally I think his points are valid, just not on this topic.
Fantano I think just made a pretty standard, for him, response without digging too deep, strawmanning some of Rick's points, and just looking to capitalize on the drama. I don't hate him for it, just what his video felt like to me and what his overall Fantano (vs theneedledrop) channel tends be.
I think as far as the story folks are trying to tell these days its too varied which I think is what weirds older guys like Rick out. I think, really, its agelessness can only really be judged in 20-30 years.
I don't think we can make a standard for judging music in general, its why I think more people need to get it through their heads that people like Rick or Fantano or you or I don't really have the authority to dictate good music (outside of technical aspects like you discuss towards the end), but just give our opinion on what good music *may* be.
Thanks! I'm with you on most of this, but I don't think musical evaluations are totally subjective. Would love your thoughts on my recent followup to this video where I lay out an albeit quite general framework for judging music. ua-cam.com/video/Wm5j8-WGxck/v-deo.html Thanks again.
I agree with you mostly. I think Rick is stuck in his ways, that’s fine. The music HE likes isn’t being made as much. But there isn’t as much interest in rock bands as there used to be, it’s been done to death. People are and have been sick of it for decades now. As you said, in Nashville there’s so many talented people wanting to be in bands and make music that they end up as waiting tables. The previous generation has ALWAYS said this about the actions of newer generations and their music stylings. It happened with jazz, it happened with rock, it happened with rap, and so on. There was been several great pop records recently, from the likes of Charli XCX and Chappell Roan. This music is likely not appealing to you, and that’s okay, it’s not really targeted at you, but many people like it for a reason. it’s very telling you used Kesha’s Joyride as an example, I think it might be the worst song you could have chosen to make your point. Mind you, I grew up loving metal and rock and I still do. Joyride is a truly weird song, with dissonant and unique instruments for the pop genre, digital or not. I think it’s great and a breath of fresh air in pop. It would be impossible to make something that sounds like that with acoustic instruments, and that’s what makes it GOOD. And especially now that she is working solo, away from the abuse of he previous managers, even more lends its self to how important being able to produce solo music is. There has and will always be trash pop music. But it fades into obscurity and we fall into the same “back in my day” trap every single generation.
One reason "Joyride" stuck out to me is because it's such a clear example of vulgarity in pop. You seem to praise it for exactly the things that I am saying get too much attention with regard to this question: the elements of HOW it's made. On this, Rick might praise it, but I would maintain that looking at the WHAT-the IDEAS-conveyed will be a lot more fruitful for assessing whether or not pop music is getting or has gotten worse. So if you have answers to those questions I posed at the end, I'd be interested to hear them. Thanks.
Bro’s spitting Ideas of Math on the subject 🤘
Haha, math is NOT my forte, but it doesn’t take much to show that the cost per song or album is not literally zero. Thanks for watching!
I just get fed up with all the whining that "music sucks because doesn't chart any more". It's the way of the world - genres come and then they fade to become nostalgia whether that's 70s rock, punk, techno, or mediaeval chant. At some point little new is being said in the genre or the audience has simply moved on and the genre no longer speaks to them.
I want to explore this topic more. Here's part of what I think happens: It's a scientifically proven fact (see David Huron's book Sweet Anticipation) that part of what makes music pleasurable is novelty that subverts our expectations. Creative musicians are constantly looking for new ways to innovate. If they're married to a particular genre, they push the bounds within that genre as much as they can. Depending on how many creative people are working within that genre, this process can go on for decades. Sometimes they push the genre itself into entirely new territory, forging a sub-genre. And if they AREN'T married to a genre, they may even come up with entirely new ways of doing things, leading to a sound or style that warrants its own distinct genre label.
But, less subtly creative people can't innovate in wholesome ways that lead to music people genuinely connect to. Instead, they appeal to base desires to create something that will momentarily pull the spotlight to them, typically by pushing the bounds of vulgarity, whether sexual, aggression-related, or otherwise. It's the equivalent of a sloppy drunk at a party-frustrated that everyone seems to be rapt by a speaker who has something of substance to say-standing up on a table and yelling nonsense. And when enough "artists" in a particular genre do this, they sink that genre. They discredit it, and people stop looking to it for anything good or new. It doesn't change the fact that there IS good music in every genre and people are free to continue to create more of it, but it definitely infects listener expectations.
So I think genres can go peacefully, having been played out and revolutionized into something new. Or they can go violently, choking on vomit.
@@JonHerseyMusic I would add the desire for comfort food in the aging audience. It puts pressure on artists to fulfill that need for safety. I get frustrated by the talented young guitarists shredding their grandparents' record collections for easy boomer Likes. I'm sure Jimi could have shredded his grandparents' record collections but that's not what made him great. I get it, it's nice to get nostalgic but when I want to hear Hendrix, I listen to Hendrix even if some youngster can out-Hendrix him.
I look forward to a young guitarist standing on the shoulders of giants and saying something new. I don't know what it will sound like but it won't sound like anything we've heard, and if it upsets my generation it will be worth listening to.
Can't wait to hear your rubric for music appreciation
Thanks! And do you have thoughts on those questions?
@JonHerseyMusic I think aesthetic values change with time, either as commentary on perceived contemporary mores or in reaction to previous trends. For example, it's hard to rate art on the basis of complexity, not because we can't distinguish information density but because accrued meaning lends itself to compression. An earlier generation's novelty becomes the next generation's meme. Virtuosity is likewise fluid as an era that has mastered rapid portamento might struggle evoking feeling out of slow, more spartan melodic lines (and vice-versa). So much of our value judgments favor what we encounter first, but there's something to be said for perfecting the form. Eric B & Rakim's Paid in Full is a great song, but I'd still give the nod to Pump Up the Volume.
Personally, I give props to sophisticated (layered) works that reward close and repeated listening -- hail craft -- but who am I to turn up my nose at the savant who stumbles intuitively into a moving, affective, long-popular piece?
It's terribly hard to pin down "excellence," which is why I look forward to hearing your rubric! ☺️
All "content" consumption is changing. I used to have to go to a store buy a CD. You better believe I listened to that CD non stop. Now I have everything but it feels like I don't. Weird
@@BubblegumCrash332 yeah, and in a sense you don’t, and not even just in a sense if you just stream with a subscription.
Art imitates life. I dont think you need 26 minutes to answer whats allready pretty obvious. While life has been improving exponentially in many aspects, its everything but inspiring. And music at its core is just that. Inspiration. While i dont judge people making music on a laptop, its just never going to be as inspiring as say nirvana or the prodigy. Because back then people actually *experienced* life in so much more of a rich and complete way. And that much was evident on their music.
So music is not as good today because people aren’t writing from the same level of life experience? Did I understand correctly?
@@JonHerseyMusic Its hard to pinpoint but yes thats the short answer. People are just not living that much/in the same way, not the way they did back in the day. So in essence what used to be heartfelt music that came from life experiences and interactions has now become statistics and algorithms and while it kind of tries to retain some authenticity more often than not it becomes bland and stale. Obviously iam all for the modern accessibility of music but it just doesnt hit the same. Life has become more computerized and hence its hard to recapture the same passion and raw feeling.
A quote from fight club should make this more clear: "sticking furthers up your bu## doesnt make you a chicken". Writing music about something you felt and experienced is not the same as looking up whats trending and producing it. The end result might be "similar" but never truly the same.
Iam almost fully with beato on this one. Obviously iam biased because thats also how i feel but i have been blessed to see both sides of the spectrum (caring too much about music vs thinking music is overrated). Its just hard to always blame nostalgia. Maybe i have grown out of it in a lot of ways and become cynical.
All in all i still have hope, i think kids have proven just how much they can shape the future and while arts in general have been at a steady freefall, i wouldnt put it past them to create truly wonderful works that stand the test of time.
Beato’s ideal music seems to be 70’s and early 80’s bands. Modern music is complex, collaborative and highly fragmented. No wonder he feels lost…
Well, a key part of his argument, which I think is correct, is that much modern music is NOT complex-musically OR lyrically. Whether this tells us anything about whether music is getting worse is another question. Any thoughts on the two questions I pose at the end of this video? Thanks for watching.
It's difficult to assess music in this era. 50 years ago there were perhaps 50 Lps released a week. Now it seems to be 500, or more. I've little to no idea what is coming out of Estonia, Bolivia, Fiji.......
Well, the conversation these critics are having centers on pop music, meaning stuff at the top of the charts in America and perhaps Europe. This narrows the deluge of new music quite a bit. The basic question essentially is: IS the stuff at the top of the Billboard Hot 100 today significantly worse than it was in previous decades? And to answer this, I think we need to first decide what standard we're using to judge whether music is good or bad, and then take a magnifying glass to the things we're comparing to make sure we're comparing apples to apples, not-as Rick often does-apples to oranges.
@@JonHerseyMusic Would make an interesting study, take a lot of time to forensically analyse. I must confess I've little to no idea as I largely stopped noticing what tracks/lps were at the top of the charts in the early 80s. I do know the 70's were a halcyon period for pop/rock, as well as Jazz, Classical, Electronic, 'African' and I'm told 'Latin' released were stong as well, but can't verify this as 'Latin' records rarely appeal. I do think it is increasingly difficult to generate more 'novel' sounds in a range of genres, but I still bump into gorgeous innovative pop tunes that have been released recently.
You can find gorgeous music from the 15th century AD and no doubt some will be made in the 25th century AD, however it does seem that quality of sound varies over time /space. I looked at the 20th century awhile back, not forensically as it would take years to explore releases from 200 or so Nation States. It seemed to me the 1970's was an unusual period. The Classical, Jazz, Electronic, African, Indian, Pop/Rock, Soul.....releases acrosss many Nations overall of a much higher standard than what was available in other decades. As to why? Probably lots of theories out there!
Could you say more about the method you used to examine the music? And what would you do different if you WERE examining it "forensically"? Interesting stuff.
@@JonHerseyMusic I take the view some humans have more sophisticated ears than others, or musical sounds are more resonant for them. Thus more able to discern quality. Which is not surprising, as one can say the same for skills in relation to understanding physics, painting, chess, brick laying, etc etc. Having spent a lot of time with some of these folks for 40 odd years by and large there is agreement as to quality of sounds and some consensus the 70's were a remarkable period. However even the deeper listeners/diggers are not going to cover all the ground, so the forensic angle would necessitate exploring what was coming out of Mongolia in the 90's, Fiji in the 00's etc etc. Sounds that may not have any Internet presence to date.
There's an album in a genre you don't know about that's waiting to be your favorite. Modern diversity, niche and access is wild. A dark 6h Electronic Concept album was a trending hit (Everywhere at the End of Time). International pop groups are in the mainstream while bedroom pop projects find their audience. SoundTracks are IN, from all sources. Some decades are better, but 2010 and 2020 have been top tier. AND Kali Uchis charts in Spanish, not just a verse. Lastly, to think that our current artists aren't playing with a sense of life would be a denial of every time we sang "It's gonna be Alright".
Hype for your next one, "good" music is something I struggle to define. "AI" tunes are here...
Thanks for the comment, but there's a lot I don't understand here, to be honest. Are you making some music recommendations? Let me know.
And to be clear, I didn't say anyone isn't "playing with a sense of life." Actually, I think that's impossible. The question is, WHAT sense of life, what does the artist or artwork convey? We’ve all known people who are incredibly sour. It doesn’t matter how good things are in their lives. If anything goes wrong, they treat it as the norm. And we all know others who are absolutely bombproof. They might have some fluctuations in their mood, but they roll with the punches and see life as essentially positive. These two types have very different senses of life. If you think that life is a Shakespearean tragedy, that we’re all doomed to pursue dreams that we can never attain, then you will make music that expresses that view. If you believe deep down that life is wonderful and that your dreams are yours to achieve, you’ll make music that portrays that view-and so on for every shade and variety in between. More on this topic here: ua-cam.com/video/VeAl67voe4c/v-deo.htmlsi=JRdP6pK8WBfg3Ojj
This music got worse because "there's no bands" playing "real instruments", Music is an artistic discipline set centuries ago and any way of making pieces that fall in some ways of the standards of it are valid. This elitist mindset of being stuck up and prioritizing "real instruments" is absolutely classist, make music how you want in the way that you can, no music is better than the other just because one was a band of 4 to 5 dudes playing established instruments while the other is making music on his PC with a midi keyboard, mic and audio interface, or even smith more primitive. At the end of the day, don't say shit is worse or going downhill just because you're stuck in the past and remember a time houses costed a peanut. The more accessible and "easy" is to make music the better imo, because more people from many more different backgrounds and upbringings can express themselves and find solace in something they would only associate with white privileged hipsters doing it.
People should think of music as doing art and experimenting and that should be done in whatever way imaginable if you pressure people to only make it one way, shit is not gonna evolve and it will become boring. More artist should be more motivated to push boundaries and question what is the music playing field around them and see what ways for them to stand out and have fun.
Pop music is the best example of the evolution of music in these past years. Pop is better than ever, more varied than ever before. And has someone who went through a cringe rock and metal are the best, pop and rap are shit phase I can tell you that pop music has in the past decade the most to offer.
Also no one likes the band experience, everyone is a flake they put shit priorities, their lazy and can't decide on anything and for the most part end up making bland shit, there are some few exceptions like The Last Dinner Party, but sometimes is better to be a solo artist as you can be more yourself and communicate your ideas more deeply and rawer. I think that's way more artistic than oh just get a bunch of fat old white dudes to play some instruments in uninteresting ways. With that being said, the comment you made about Tik-Tok only being a good platform for solo artists is just not true, there are plenty of bands popping on Instagram and something that only someone as old and out of touch as Rick is unaware, THERE. ARE. JAM. SESSIONS. ON. TIK.TOK! literally some of the most popular kind of musictok content is someone playing an instrument, and then someone stitches than and bounces of it with a different instrument, and so on a so forth as the insanity goes and goes off.
My main point is music is art and it should be done in all ways humanly possible, done.
To the extent I get your point, I don't really disagree that there can be good music in any genre made in any way. You say that pop is better than ever. The point of my video is that to actually assess this, we need a clear standard of evaluation-which I say should focus not on the HOW of music creation but on the WHAT, the IDEAS being conveyed-and then we need to more systematically apply that standard to gauging whether some subset of music has gotten better or worse. So, let me know if you have answers to the questions I pose at the end.
As for the TikTok point, that's from an article in The Guardian, and I merely said that it may be some SMALL factor, but not the sort of world-ending factor that Rick seems to think. I'm trying to give him whatever benefit of the doubt can be granted on that point. Sure, of course bands can use TikTok. It's just more ideal for solo artists. Anyways, that's really small potatoes in the context of this discussion. Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I mean the ideas and the "what", as you say, are important in to discuss and getting deep into that can often make us appreciate the music more, but the idea of there being a standard, it's not something as cut and dry as I think you're implying. Because there's plenty of songs that aren't the deepest thing ever, but can be very good as long as it illustrates a vibe and perspective from the artist. And even with those existing, there's also plenty of deep, ambitious concept albums or songs that are pretty big in the music fandom community.
Also there's a point I'd like to make, I don't remember if you said anything about this, but people are as interested in music and groundbreaking ones, but that music is just never gonna be in the billboard charts at least not as high as Rick wants it to be, and it's fine, not everyone needs to get into it, as long as the artists build a good die hard fanbase that's all that matters really.
There’s a huge difference between the innovations of what Les Paul did where people are actually playing the guitar as opposed to the dehumanization of music brought on by people who can’t play a single instrument but can create music with just a laptop. It’s called going too far.
I agree, and I think that’s what Rick meant, though he seriously overgeneralized. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
do you think the people who just use a laptop just press one button and have a song? you do realise that there is still human input in making music digitally? just because someone plays the guitar over producing in a laptop doesnt make it better or worse. its just another way to express musically.
I think most are overlooking Beato’s commercial point of view on this topic.
Which is what?
Also, do you have thoughts on the questions I posed at the end? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic beato is talking about technology making it easier for corporate suits to get something done quickly and cheaply. As apposed to hiring (and trusting) a professional.
Think about Beato’s statements in the context of artists Maroon 5, Olivia Rodrigo, or anything written by Benny Blanco lmao
Rick makes us old heads look bad.
Ha, not always. But here, he definitely didn't do his best. Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
I think he’s fine
I like Rick Beato but he does go overboard in thinking the more chords a song has, the better it is.
Judging by results, today's tech has made a lot of artists sound the same but whose fault is that?
@@nationstolemyrobots someone should right “Rick Beato’s Favorite Song,” with 50 chords and and 25 transpositions. 😂
Music is just as good as it’s ever been , probably better . But music in the popular domain is the dumbest useless shit we’ve ever known. Look away from that crap and there’s thousands of great bands with great musicians.
😂 yes, agreed. But I think it’s still an interesting question why there’s so little overlap between what is good and what is popular.
To say that what you are paying per song or album is equivalent to dividing your monthly fee by the number of songs or albums you add to your library is misleading. You are paying for the right to listen to them for a limited time. It is impossible and meaningless to calculate the value of each song and album individually. Would you include the price of your cell phone plan? Your home internet plan? Do you take into account all the monthly fees you will pay in the future from your first listening? Also, there is no context in the act of acquiring music, for the act itself has been removed. And the context brings another value to music that goes beyond the monetary worth. So in a way it makes sense to say that music is valueless since we no longer pay for it but for the right to have access to it on a temporarily unlimited basis, with all that that entails. Its value has been diluted and dissociated and it is impossible to compare it with the value we give it when we buy a record.
Yeah, I agree that there's an important difference in connection to music that stems from merely paying for a right to listen to it. You're comment actually brings to mind a helpful analogy: It's the difference between buying and renting a home. When you buy a home, it's yours, and you treat it as a reflection of you. When you rent, maybe you let the grass grow a foot high and only clean up the cat puke on the carpet after two days. You're just a temporary occupant, and you don't care so much. Likewise, streaming music is a temporary, transient statement about yourself, not something you commit to and look back on with nostaliga and perhaps, at times, mild embarassment.
Good points about the price of your cell phone, service, and ISP. This undergirds that point I was actually making there, though, which is that although Rick and others like to say that we're listening to music essentially for free, the fact is that we're not. We're just paying for all of these transient things instead of for physical, if less convenient, CDs and vinyl. And the deeper point is that the actual monetary price you pay for something is at best a proxy measure for how much you actually value it. I think the more important difference here is not between paying more or paying less, though, but between renting and owning, as you point out. I disagree that the music we pay to listen to is valueless, but I agree that its value is diluted by comparison to owning.
Thanks for your thoughts. Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end of the video (also in the description)? Mine on this topic coming soon.
IMO, both are correct to a degree, rick basically points out the abuse of "tech". while fantano points out trying harder to make music doesn't make it better. i think tech that rick meant mostly are things like apps or autotune, not literal technological advancements like sound engineering. at the end of the day music is subjective, but i have to agree that music is getting blander and more similar to each other, and going to a concert nowadays isn't worth the money, as you are paying for the production, not anymore for special moments like songs being customised by bands.
I'm with you regarding Beato and Fantano, and about music getting blander. But I don't think musical judgment is entirely subjective. I shared some ideas on more objectively evaluating music in my latest video. Looking forward to your thoughts: ua-cam.com/video/Wm5j8-WGxck/v-deo.html
@@JonHerseyMusic ofc good music is not subjective. i was trying to actually appeal to most people by saying it is subjective. imho, there is actually good music and in contrast, taylor swift.
There are many nuances that both Rick and Fantano miss in both sides, and you addressed some of it. I really enjoyed your comments on this, however I think the state of music is just positive feedback from the transformations in our society.
Without a spcific order of importance but I think these are some of the factors that originate this discussion :
Industry side:
1-Major labels like to play safe, so they tend to promote formulas that they know it work. Because of that they tend to invest the same type of artists, and since they invest on it they have to promote them agressively to get to the public. Leaving less space for the others; This as an effect not only on the artist but also on the type of music produced. The AR's nowadays aren't looking for new tallent but for the beat that they know it work. Less risk less variety.
2-You mentined in your video about the single artist trend. This is also promoted by the industry. Is much cheaper for a label to have a group of producers that are bassicly emplyees with a small royallty then have a full band to split royalties with.
Technological side:
1-It is way more easy to produce nowadays, which is great, I believe that there is much more people doing music nowadays then in the past, but this also produces alot of noise in the market, nobody have time to keep up with so much music being released daily, and therefore the artists feel the dredg of not being listened, but the pool of new music is much bigger then it was before the the online streaming services. In a way the gatekeepers of the past were replaced by the algorithm.
2-Who controls the algorithm are in this to make money, the algorithm doesn't care about the quality of music. Again, as major labels this companies play safe and tend to give preferences to the artists pushed by these labels, that respect the formulas that work, so on and so forth.
This loop will be very hard to break.
3-The bigger the artist and consequently the bigger the venues the simpler the music have to be (less notes, less delays/verbs, instrumentations) due reflection and spreadout sound (this was explained by some technical guy) this makes that the recording music recorded by this huge artists, tend to simplify in order to be played in stadiums vs a club or a theater.
Sociological side:
1-The world changes and so the consuming habits of the people. In the past and now people that aren't really into music, just listen to what the radio give to them, and most of the comercial radio gave to the people what the labels told them. Now they replaced the radio for the playlist algorithm. There isn't a big difference here, the difference is that there is less money to distribute for more artists;
2-Nobody buys CD's anymore, but now a lot of more people go to see live music. However the market feels saturated with the amount of gigs happening in the big cities the idea that I have is that the money is not going to the artists. Venues, tickets services, touring agencies, in some cities now the artists even have to hire a service to sell merch. BIG FUCKERY.
3-Because of the point above, many labels, promoters and venues tend to prefer solo artists, less logistical issues, and less people to share money with.
4-Gentrification in the cities are causing the closure of small venues where the local bands and upcomming artists would play. Not only is destroying the places to play but it is also destroying the places to practice. Less spaces to practice even more expensive and out of towns then before, it is a huge barrier to have a band. This is another reason of the growing of the solo artists versus the bands.
5-I agree with Rick that the social networks have also influence. More on the consumer side then on the creation side. The attention span of the consumer is really short, just a very small minority listens to an entire album nowadays, not even long songs. It is possible to see that trend, nowadays we already have many singles that don't get to 2 and half minutes. Artist release the songs one by one, before they have the entire album because they know if it is not a single nobory will ear. I saw in an interview one of the guys from Duran Duran, sayin that with the amount of information nowadays it is perfectly normal that people lean into shorter a simpler music, just to much happening at the same time. We are all sufering from a level of ADHD.
In conclusion, there is still a lot of people playing instruments and doing great and different music, but it is harder and harder to get to the them besides there isn't virtually any gatekeepers. The different genres will be a niche scene that the average consumer have to actively look for to listen to.
There is a lot here I agree with, and some I disagree with. But, any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
@@JonHerseyMusic never done the math, but personally I don't add that many albums to my playlist monthly. Which l think leads a little bit with the buffet analogy you did in your video. The average listener don't listen to that much new songs every month. I think a good way to tackle this issue was presented by Jack Stratton in Vulfpeck Yt channel where he suggests that the fee that an user pay for apple music or spotify should be divided only for the listens the user does.
For example, Instead of the fixed price per stream, if you only listen to songs from a single artist during a month, that artist would receive the total amount of that payments, minus the service fees. If you listen to 10 different songs from 10 diferent artis each artist would receive 1€, minus the service fees.
This way of compensation I believe it could help in some of the issues mentioned.
Another problem is the dearth of possibilities for poor artists even to get into the business now. The fragmentation of the music industry and gatekeepers effecting who may enter the charts, so people my age(boomers) are the big problem, though I can say there is always new innovative music that most people my age would hate, and that's probably a good indication that innovation still exists
Isn’t it easier and cheaper than ever to start making music? I got an 8-track recorder when I was 16. My parents paid a couple hundred bucks for it. No such thing even existed even just a decade earlier. It seems there have never been MORE opportunities for people of any income level to make and record music. Thoughts on what makes good music good? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I agree that in theory is true and it’s oft stated as fact. I think prob a variety of reasons against this. One reason likely is the gatekeepers in the industry (Spotify, record companies, Ticketmaster dictatorship et al) make it difficult to get those recordings heard (outside of TikTok), while even creating your own service like 100 gecs, pc music and others have done costs some money and a big time investment (or money to pay people to do that) while not guaranteeing exposure. Also if you want to put out music with the probable exposure, you encounter the gatekeepers who demand the same music that everyone is complaining about while taking an ever increasing amount of the artists money . There are still a few producers outside of the industry who are music fans (like Chess records etc was for the blues back in the 50s ) but they don’t seem to have a lot of resources and I’m not sure how easy it would be for someone truly poor.
As a zoomer myself who loves old and new music, social media has killed our generation's attention and fried our dopamine. People my age don't want to learn instruments because it's hard and doesn't have instant gratification. Rick is correct. Learning an instrument is just not as popular as it used to be.
Sad you think so, but I'd need to see data to think this is really the case. From what I've heard, instrument sales and online lessons soared during the pandemic. Was it only or primarily old people getting into playing? Will look into this.
Any thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusicI hate to say it, but it’s what I’ve noticed with my generation. I grew up right before social media started. I played trumpet K-12, but I was one of the few who didn’t quit. Most quit because music edition is not very appealing or fun, but they at least tried.
Now, I rarely see any young people learning an instrument. Their free time is their screens.
It’s funny you mention the pandemic cause that’s when I got back into learning instruments. I picked up piano and guitar, and then I later started learning singing. I’ve heard the same thing that music instrument sales blew up. It makes sense cause people had the time. I don’t know how many were young people though and how many stuck with it.
I didn’t do the math cause I’m one of the very few my age who stills buys all their music (mostly CD for better quality). I use streaming for anything I don’t have. I love it.
But I think what Rick is getting at is that because of this easy access to, music is more of a product than an art now. It’s more about consumption. It’s a very passive listening experience. People mostly use music to fill silence. They don’t actively listen and appreciate it.
@@JonHerseyMusic Look, I do think Rick is onto something bwhen he talks about the way we consume music now.
The internet has a way of pulling our attention spans in so many different directions that it makes it increasingly difficult to meaningfully engage with music, or anything in general. We see this in every aspect of our lives that have been digitised. The human brain just can't handle that much stimuli.
While I'm not saying we should get rid of streaming platforms, social media, or the internet. We do need to acknowledge these problems so that we can find ways to mitigate them.
Rick's advise at the end of the video is good example of aquetly dealing with this problem.
Sanity. Clarity. Thanks, Jon. All of a sudden my own outlook on music today is less gloomy (and I can forgive bandmates for crapping out on me, as well as justifying doing things solo on Logic). Oh, and thanks gor The Warning. Very cool band. I was listening to Baby Animals’ self-titled 1991 debut album yesterday evening (a CD I bought on release) and The Warning reminds me of their energy in all the best ways.
Oh, sweet, I'll have to check out Baby Animals. Is it just me, or was there something enormously special about those final days of rock on analog tape in the 90s?
@@JonHerseyMusic indeed. Of course, a lot of those bands would pride themselves on the “DDD” legend on the back of their CDs, too… But Baby Animals, being from Australia and of a bluesy-pubbish bent, went analog. I guess Grunge was the last analog hurrah. Or maybe some of the Power Pop revivalists ofvthe Nineties.
Live bands being as niche as D&D or Magic the Gathering is funny. I think any band who is as popular as these 2 games has absolutely made it. Also why should pop charts even be the standard. Metal and Rock festivals are huge. Band based music is still incredibly popular. It might not be the biggest thing in music but you don’t have to be Taylor Swift to be a successful musician.
Yeah, you know, some D&D and Magic player friends pointed out to me that these games are still huge. I still have Magic card decks from when I was a kid, but I didn't keep up with that world and didn't realize that it's allive and kicking. Good for them. But, I think the analogy works because they're still pretty underground; it's just that the underground was deeper than I imagined!
I don't think pop charts SHOULD be the place we go look to see if there's any good music. This is the dead horse that Rick likes to beat. But I DO think that, although there's still plenty of good stuff out there if you dig for it, some genres definitely HAVE gotten worse, and I think pop is one of them. It's an interesting question, I think, whether this is actually true and, if so, why it has happened. My thoughts on this coming in the next couple days, but curious if you have any. Thanks.
Yes, it’s about pop music-that’s quite clear in the video. Would be interesting to see those stats, and I would likewise guess that everyone who isn’t Taylor Swift doesn’t have the draw that artists used to, at least as a percentage of total listeners (given that total listeners has no doubt gone up a lot). Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
If anyone's arguments are piss poor it's yours. Everything you mentioned actually supports Rick position. Concerning the technology people like Les Paul never had the choice paradox. Read up on that. It's phenomenon we observe in the presence of overabundance of choices. The Beatles never had the choice between millions of amp sounds either. That is why limiting choice at least to manageable amount actually increases creativity.
Tiktok or Instagram guitarists represent talented musician only on a technical level. When was the last time you heard a real music history changing song coming from them? Exactly. They don't exist. That is exactly what Rick was arguing. The talent is there but they mostly play solos not real full songs. Good technical abilities does not equal good musicianship. Completely false equivalence. Rick expressedly addressed that. None of the Instagram guitarists have done anything of note.
The survivorship bias argument is one of the worst ones I have ever heard. Yes that argument gets used very often but easy to disprove. First of all we are not selectively comparing the best of the best to all of music today. We are comparing oranges to oranges. The best of the past to the best of today. For anyone who uses that argument I say to take a look at the top 100 billboard charts of 1966. We have in a single year more culturally significant monster world hits like Sunny by Bobby Hebb than we had in the past 20 years COMBINED. Here just a few examples:
- California Dreamin' by the Mamas and the Papas
- Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra
- Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones
- We can work it out by the Beatles
- Barbara Ann by the Beach Boys
I dare you to name me just ONE example that is as culturally significant as Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra. Just one. There are no such recent examples.
It is also not true that it not the technology that is to blame. All technology comes with a cost. The car made us move less and therefore less fit. Better access to food made us fatter. And an overabundance of technology will create laziness. Humans are an intelligent species and we can see that even in crows: We try to get the desired result with the least amount of effort. And while some people are able to withstand that most are not. So absolutely it is also the technology. You are comparing digital technology to analogue one. That is not comparable in the slightest. No analogue technology ever gave us practically unlimited choise. Again read up on the choice paradox.
Rick also never said that we should completely reverse technological advancement in music.
The point about cheaper music meaning money is freed up for other things is utterly irrelevant to the points Rick made. The point is that you cherish something you had to pay a lot of money for. That is a truism and no amount of mental gymnastics refutes that.
Came out swwingin’ with “Fan•tawn•o”
LOL, yeah, I mispronounced his name, my bad. Thoughts on the two questions I posed at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusicI don’t pay for music, I only use UA-cam. I listen to like 85% video game music, but I did love your analogy to buffets; despite them making sense, I pretty much never go to them and would prefer to find individual meals I could like on my own!
(Also, to be fair, if I had only read ‘Fantano’, I’d assume that pronunciation too lol)
Well, I've probably heard him say his name a hundred times (I'm a fan, but haven't been watching him nearly as long as Rick), so no excuses.
Yeah, I'm not a big buffet guy myself, when it comes to actual food : )
I at least partially think thus whole development will lead to a new appreciation of live music, though more in the "playing dnd" version you mentioned, or at a shut-in in a bar or so
Yeah, I like what another commenter said about real musicians being those who can still play if there's a power outage. Those who can't are merely computer programmers.
@@JonHerseyMusic Nah, that is the opposite of what I'm trying to say, guess I'm more referencing the social act of making music, or how people will still pay for handmade things, think of the early days of etsy. The whole idea of a Star Musician is a fairly new invention anyways. I in no way think that someone messing around with computers is less of a musician. You also could take that idea further and say that the real musicians are those that can play when their strings break
Thanks man. I wasn't sure before, but now, I'm unsubbing from Rick.
Hey Nicholas, FWIW, my goal is not to get people to unsubscribe from Rick. I think he puts out a lot of really great content. I just don't think he's a super careful thinker when it comes to this topic, and so he makes some really questionable arguments. But, personally, I still dig his interviews and stuff.
Thanks for watching!
Yes.
Nice Burial in the Sky clip... love that band. Rick and Anthony both talk passed one another. Rick's point on drumming annoys me (as a drummer) especially when he flippantly remarks "Crappy drummers nowadays". Yeah because the likes of JD Beck, Mat Gartska, Alex Rudinger, Larnell Lewis and Chris Coleman just suck because they aren't John fuckin Bonham. I hate that Rudi and Gartska practiced thier asses off to to sound that good. Also i that he basically shits all over the younger artists he's interviewed too,
Hmmm… not a drummer myself (only in my dreams). I’ll have to check these guys out. Which artists do you think he shits on? Thanks. 🤘
Really great video! But one little question: what's the name of the record between the ornette coleman's and the warning's album? Could not read it
Thanks! I’m on a plane and it’s not loading, so I’ll have to look later. Might have been Augustus. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
Here are the four albums, I think it was the Augustus one:
Tomorrow Is the Question! by Ornette Coleman
Ragtime World by Augustus
Ohio Players by The Black Keys
Keep Me Fed by The Warning
That “sense of life” phrase is your first clue is that he’s an Objectivist. Just to give you a clue about where he’s coming from.
The video and sound are out of sync by 4 frames.
@@damirregoc8111 how did you calculate it? Thanks!
@@JonHerseyMusic Imported in Davinci, and moved 'till it was synced. Sound comes before video for 4 frames.
@@damirregoc8111 noted, thanks! 🙏
Much as i am on Beatos side in this dispute, the ultimate (not the proximate) reason for his rants is that the world has had the blatant indecency of moving on since his childhood. And he really cant accept that 😅
Has nothing to do with that. He's already debunked this lazy hypothesis.
@@Mansplainer452 he may say so. But the subconscious is a powerful mechanism
Hmm… yeah I’m with @hakonberg8003 on this one. I think there are legitimate grounds for thinking most of what gets popular today is trash, and that Rick hits on SOME of the minor ones. I just think he fails to address the MAJOR ones, the ideas conveyed in music.
Amen!
Thanks! Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the math to figure out how much you're actually paying per song or per album?
@@JonHerseyMusicno I'm kinda lazy. I just agree on what you said and really hope Rick engage in the critique he gotten, but have he done that before? I think he likes being the old man yelling at the clouds haha
No music is not getting worse. I understand that the most popular music has simple chord structures and melodies. Yet, there are still artists who can create amazing music that isn’t anywhere close to the most popular around the world.
I take it you probably watched a few seconds or minutes and then stopped the video. What you're saying is not even being debated here; as I clarify, Rick made some big overgeneralizations, but even he clarifies that he doesn't think music IN GENERAL is getting worse, but POP music. If you watch the rest, let me know if you have thoughts on the two questions at the end. All the best.
first off: it makes much more sense to categorize between "traditional" music (1) and electronic music (2). it is like painter and graphic designers. 1: the problem with the musicians/painters today, they don't have the gardens anymore to grow over decades (meaning gettin experience with hundreds of collaborators for example). so this and social media leads to "sport"-intrumentalists with great chops and no background, almost useless. 2: while now almost for decades in the electronic music realm -> producers can see plain DJs gettin famous without even producing any music. it is fucked up and the art is getting LOST. but IMPORTANT: this is not only happening in music, its everywhere.
I agree with that last point. So is there an underlying cause? Does it have to do with ideas?
As somebody that is personally learning sound design and learning how to compose solely on Ableton Live 12 (I also practice guitar and record it as well), I find it stupid how some DJs that have literally never made a beat or made a GOOD beat in their lives can just get famous off of DJing. It just feels so disrespectful to the art of electronic music, and then people look at that and think "Oh, i guess electronic music is lazy".
Oh, and there are GREAT electronica producers out there. We got Aphex Twin, Autechre, and Squarepusher, Flume, SOPHIE, and so many others that have actually put in the work to learn how to make unique music that CAN stand the test of time. You just wont see them (barely) in the mainstream at all.
I agree with most of Rick's takes.
You're giving examples of innovation from Metheny but there's no proof that the music is good or better, just new sound ideas. Remember Prince's The Black Album. Brand new drum sounds lol. It actually takes away from the songs vs if it was a basic acoustic sounding kit.
Musicians are continuing to get better and better at younger ages its crazy what some of these kids can do now.
But how many of them can write a good song?
At the end of the day, the money is not there in music like it used to be. The cash incentive is so small many guys can't afford to even have a band. If you're rehearsing 2x a week. That's time, fuel etc. If you're gigging and making $100 each per night (has this rate gone up at all?) for a Fri-Sat, you're playing for 3 hours there for 5. That's $20 per hour basically for 10 hours how many times per month? If you're a solo act then it's easier to have a gig where you can bring in a few hundred bucks all for yourself.
Personally I believe people gravitated towards solo gigs as they'll get paid more money and get all the attention.
The financial incentive for an album or single hitting the charts etc lol. Those days are gone. These record contracts are just loan basically and you have to pay that back through record sales and they pay back and a crap rate usually.
Another big issue is that people have different lives compared to 40 years ago. When we were kids, we had school, tv, video games(Atari was popular, not long before the Nintendo came out) and music. We played sports etc but as far as taking in some entertainment, music was tops.
Now, kids barely even listen to a full song let along a full album.
Music doesn't mean as much to this newer generation as it did to us. And that's fine, we just have to acknowledge that it's happened and take it into consideration when making comparisons to previous eras.
The listener doesn't give af as to how the song was produced. All they care about is how it sounds to them and how it makes them feel. Personally I don't think most listeners can tell the difference between real drums and sampled drums. Especially if they're buried in the mix a bit.
I personally have a very hard time finding anything I'd actually pay for. Most is fine but if it were gone I'd be fine with an inferior replacement.
But the beauty of music is that you usually know within a few seconds if you're interested or not and by the time the chorus hits again you already know if you're gonna play this song for a second time or keep moving. There isn't a lot of great music as of 2024, there's a lot of great musicians, but not that many great song writers. When you find one, you will know it.
I'm doing a deep dive all through the 70's and it's so wonderful. Best era of music by far. Can we reproduce similar sounding songs recording out of the box sure? Would that be preferential? Yes of course. But sometimes having to wait, gives you that time to hone in that song more and more until it's the best it can be. Get The Knack or Appetite For Destruction are 2 examples of really working through the songs for the debut album. Both were tops of the year and AfD is considered one of the best debut of all time.
The last good song I found and liked was from the 'Phantom of the Paradise" by Paul Williams. The song is called 'Hell Of It'. 'Beach Baby' by The First Class is one from my childhood that is so well written.
I don't dude, if I had to guess I'd say that most of the stuff I hear these days 'sounds' fine but it's missing something like 'soul' or something along those lines.
I will say that scarcity breeds value. And what we have now is the opposite. So the 'perceived value' has dropped simply because it's all so easy to access at little to no money. So if that's the default setting for the younger generation, why tf would they pay for anything? I wouldn't either.
Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, or did you do the per-album or per-song math?
@@JonHerseyMusic I think I may have stopped with a few mins left. Let me go rewatch and come back.
@@JonHerseyMusic Those are 2 great points, my apologies for not finishing your vid while you had vital info remaining.
It's very difficult to really quantify things the way we used to. Like with physical sales. Now with streaming being available for basically everything that would be considered pop music, what is the incentive to actually purchase music? So to me this is a huge factor. Now they try to find a way to compare stream in a ratio kind of formula assuming 10:1 streams to physical copy or whatever. It's tough for that to be an accurate comparison.
Is it actually diminishing in perceived quality? And do we have a way to know this or not? This to me is very tough because like you said, the tech used gets so much attention but what about the way we write songs and how many songs sound very similar to one another? I'm just spit balling here but to have certain things be a 'masterpiece' there's a criteria. To be able to judge music created today vs 50 years ago is very difficult without such parameters to compare. I'm just finishing up 1975 fav songs and to try to compare this to Swift or similar is very difficult.
When those songs came out many were groundbreaking with something or another like different recording techniques or something new to the production of music. Now other than say autotune, most things aren't so aware to the listener. Like the ability to easily fix things in the recording without using a razor blade.
So what makes a great song? That's a great question. And I'm curious as to the answer so I'm gonna like and subscribe with the hopes of a future video of yours that might come up with some good ideas as to how we can compare music that is 80-90% subjective. (Sometimes a song sounds bad sonically for whatever reason, most of us can agree when we hear it)
See you at the follow up!
6:46 this is the exact problem with Rick Beato. He is of the opinion that music played on live instruments is the best kind, but this is just an opinion, and he can't support it with evidence because its completely subjective. I find it frustrating because his standard ignores hip hop and electronic music, two genres which are not based in the performance of live instruments, and he closes himself off to new music in that way.
Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I didn’t do the per album thing, because I’ve come up pretty much entirely in the streaming age. I’m 18 now but we had spotify since I was a kid and back then it was free. I probably listen to hundreds of new albums each year so I think I’ve saved thousands of dollars with streaming.
I try to avoid any sort of standard for universally judging music. Everything has to be considered relative to its individual purpose and how well it does that. A dance song doesnt have much of a “message” usually, but if it makes you dance, it can be just as good as something with a deeper meaning.
Point is, there are only so many chord progressions and rhythms available before music becomes repetitive. People are attempting polyryhtms now, but that gets stale very quickly. There hasn't been a song in the last 2 decades that actually has longevity.
What about TOPICS to write about, timbres, instrument combinations? There is plenty of room for creativity. Hell, Mark Knopfler is nearly five decades into his career and is still innovating.
Mr Brightside. Hell, people are still putting out new Christmas songs with longevity, like "Santa Tell Me" by Ariana Grande. Just because you don't listen this music that doesn't mean other people aren't.
If you can’t find any good new music, that’s on you.
That's cool to talk about musicians from over 50 years ago but Rick's point is about musicians now & the lack of innovation & originality in 2024 & the major difference between Rick vs. Fantano rick is an actual musician that recorded albums & produced albums for other artists while Fantano is some guy in his basement reviewing albums with no musical background he is just giving his opinion and rick is right about music nowadays if your a millennial or Gen-Z this stuff is amazing when in actuality its not
Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@JonHerseyMusic I have no idea what you mean with pre order anything but today's music is lacking if I had a choose between Rick or Anthony give me a Rick Anthony knows nothing about music or music theory I've been watching his channel from since it began Anthony likes experimental noise that's why alot of that garbage gets high scores and praise from him.
As an acoustic musician who plays a bunch of instruments functionally rather than well, I like to jest that if there is a power cut and you can't perform, you're not a musician you're a computer programmer. I get where Rick is coming from. Pat Metheny using the studio as an instrument as shown here is a massive outlier. That said pop music at any given moment is mostly poor. Pick a 'classic year' and look at its hit singles. Most of them will be horrible. If people want to enjoy that stuff then let them. The good stuff will surface eventually.
I really like that point about power cuts. I toured with an old time band (as an instrument technician and stage manager) for a few years and really loved the fact that they could literally walk out into a field and play just as the same as they would anywhere else.
I don't understand how the Orchestrion album is an outlier, though. What about the Beatles? Please explain.
Any thoughts on the questions I posed at the end, and did you do the per-album or per-song math?
The power cut joke is super closed minded. There's nothing about knowing how to create or modify a synth sound and perform with it using computers that takes less musical skill or makes you less of a musician than performing with a piano. If anything it takes more skill since I doubt most piano players know how to tune or build the sound of a piano from scratch in the same way
Fellow content creator here, &.new sub! happy to see your content. Thank you algo-rhythm. You made some good points!
10:50 I'm looking at YOU COLDPLAY
Haha, thank you. Any thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks again.
You are correct, Rick Beato, is not actually proving his thesis, that music has gotten worse.
This probably comes down to 2 main reasons.
According to his area of expertise, he think it is obvious, that is has. Because his area of expertise is in music theory. Not in production (in a modern context, not just recording straight to tracks), not in song lyrics writing (and not in youth culture). So from this perspective contemporary pop seems simplistic. (on the other hand he is overlooking the simplicity of music of the past, even many songs that have stood the test of time)
And 2, I believe his teenage children, who have been influenced by his opinion, seemingly agree with him, making him feel like he is connected with the youth, and thus discarding any need to consider if his opinion might be biased because of his age.
But of course bands will have a harder time today. With more complex productions, the band members would be even less important today. Look at classic rock bands, in most bands, it was the lead singer and a possibly lead guitarist (who wasn’t also the singer) that was the center of the band. In more complex productions, where the instrumentalists are even less important, how would you even market a band. It would make more sense to have instrumentalists as featured artists.
Interesting points. Thoughts on the two questions at the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math?
i love how rick spits in the face of all modern musicians hes had on his show and calls "friends" tosi abasi, tim henson, and my favorite matteo mancuso, do me a favor and look those guys up and tell me if they are worse for wear. i dont think so, those three guys alone have made some of the best guitar music to date
I think you're seriously misunderstanding Rick's point, which I explain in this video.
I think the argument here is about "popular" music getting worse, not music in general. I'm constantly discovering amazing music (according to my decidedly non-mainstream tastes) and I'm convinced there's more great music available than ever before. I don't give a damn what's "popular" -- most people have bad taste (or, equivalently, I have bad taste) and I'm going to listen to the music I like.
What I'd like to see some stats on is whether "popular" music commands as great a portion of the music-listening audience as it did before the internet or streaming services. My suspicion is that "popular" music isn't as popular as it used to be, and that many more people are listening to music in "the long tail" that resonates with them personally.
Agreed, that's what's under discussion: pop music. Would be interesting to see those stats, and I would likewise guess that everyone who isn’t Taylor Swift doesn’t have the draw that many artists used to, at least as a percentage of total listeners (given that total listeners has no doubt gone up a lot). Any thoughts on the two questions toward the end? Did you do the per-album or per-song math? Thanks.
@@JonHerseyMusic I went looking for stats about how flat Spotify's curve is, and the best I could come up with is this marketing blurb: "In 2023, Indies generated nearly $4.5B on Spotify. This marks the first year ever that Indies accounted for about half of what the entire industry generated on Spotify, which totaled $9B+." That's not as flat as I'd like to see, but it does show the trend over time is for more and more people to listen to independent (non-major-label, I guess?) artists.
I couldn't really do the per-song math, because I typically only add artists to my Library, not albums or songs. When I find an artist I like (like my latest find, Kikagaku Moyo) that suddenly drops all their albums in my listens for the month.
The majority of the current generation of musicians doesn’t understand that you can’t shortcut real talent and good taste.
Maybe so, or maybe it's not a problem with the MAJORITY of musicians but with the majority of those who, for some reason, are most popular. Any thoughts on the two questions I posed at the end of the video? Thanks for watching.