Sulphur on 9/8/2019 at 09:09
Quote Posted by Pyrian
Wait...
Oxygen is like
that for you? :D I only really notice oxygen when it's not available...
It helps set things on fire. ;)
Gray on 9/8/2019 at 09:47
What about when there is no music around? I always hear songs at the back of my head, usually They Might Be Giants, but could really be anything I've listened to recently. There's always a song. Always. But it's not loud enough to drown out that damn lawnmower down the street that woke me up, so now I have to put the stereo on.
:grumble:
Starker on 9/8/2019 at 11:23
Quote Posted by Gray
Is modern music getting worse or am I just getting old and whiny?
No, it's the children who are wrong.
I stopped watching TV a long time ago and know little of these commercials of which you speak, but I can imagine it also works the other way around, that someone hears a piece of music in a commercial and discovers a whole new song that becomes all theirs. So instead of your music being ruined, it's perhaps more like free advertising?
Gray on 9/8/2019 at 11:38
I've thought of that. Perhaps there are kids who never heard Depeche Mode: Personal Jesus, and might discover it through an ad for some crappy car. Good. Fine. But it pisses me off to no end that they've edited it for time, and also, WTF? This was clearly a decision made in a boardroom by a dozen people who have no idea what the song is about, but are using it either to trigger nostalgia in potential customers of my age, or just for the groove of it. So on one hand, good to get the exposure, on the other, stop ruining my adolescence! And don't use Beach Boys: Wouldn't it be Nice to sell crap, you're tainting the memory of my wedding. Piss off.
[Edit]
And when I say "modern music", I don't mean everything released in the last 15-odd years, but there's a trend that particularly upsets me. This really started in the 90s, with R&B (which, at the time, had neither rhythm nor blues). It's the wailing. That "soulful" way of singing that more often than not shows that the performer has no soul to speak of. This has then trickled down over the years to other genres, to the point where almost every new pop song has this laboured empty hollow singing, to the point that I actually notice the one artist or two that just sings it straight. I suppose I could use that as a filter to weed out all the crap, but it's so ubiquitous these days that hardly leaves anything left.
Starker on 9/8/2019 at 11:50
It's not just commercials and it's not just by boardrooms. Born in the USA has been used by political campaigns and Every Breath You Take at weddings for how long now?
Gray on 9/8/2019 at 12:06
Well Bruce Springsteen famously told Reagan to stop using his song. Sting has said repeatedly that his song is not suited for weddings, it's about stalking. But I see your point.
Gryzemuis on 9/8/2019 at 14:10
Quote Posted by Gray
... Depeche Mode: Personal Jesus ... a decision made in a boardroom by a dozen people who have no idea what the song is about,
I understand what you are saying. And I agree.
It's weird trying to sell cars by making people listen to a song about heroin.
Then I thought, let's check it. There is a whole wiki-page about just this one song. Weird.
(
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Jesus#Background_and_composition)
Quote:
It's a song about being a Jesus for somebody else, someone to give you hope and care. It's about how Elvis Presley was her man and her mentor and how often that happens in love relationships; how everybody's heart is like a god in some way, and that's not a very balanced view of someone, is it?
Huh ? What ?
Am I an idiot ?
So I checked the lyrics.
(
https://www.google.nl/search?complete=0&q=personal%20jesus%20lyrics)
Yup, it's about heroin.
Quote:
That "soulful" way of singing that more often than not shows that the performer has no soul to speak of.
Also agree. I understand that there is music that I like and music that I don't like. Personal taste. No problem. But there is also music that is bad, no matter what your criteria are. The "new" way of singing definitely qualifies for the label "always terrible".
The trick is to not get upset.
(
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon's_law)
Once you realize this, and accept it, the world loses some of its ability to irritate you. Accept it like it is a law of nature. Nothing you can do about. It's just the way it is. Accept it, ignore it, and only spend your time and energy on stuff that is worthwile (the other 10%).
Starker on 9/8/2019 at 14:26
Quote Posted by Sulphur
But still: to me, music's like oxygen. The right kind of song is like an electric tingle thrumming along my spine, setting each nerve aflame until it reaches my brain, and then I process the nuances like a perfectly executed bass swoop in time with the rest of the rhythm section, or a ridiculously liquid guitar line, or the synthesis of all of this with a lyrical melody that ties the entire piece together with exactly the right words. It's
that feeling, where this disparate bunch of sounds magically comes together to set your own soul reverberating like a taut bowstring against the fabric of the universe, that is what music means to me. It could have been math, it could have been stories, but it is this.
Jean-Michel Jarre agrees with you:
[video=youtube;6Q00HQwO2Sg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Q00HQwO2Sg[/video]
Renault on 9/8/2019 at 14:42
I don't get too worked up when I see one of my favorite songs in an ad or commercial. The most I'll do is laugh a little bit. Remember that the band/musician signed off on this (99% of the time), strictly to make a few dollars. No one is using these songs without permission. So if they are OK with it, who am I to argue?
Gray on 9/8/2019 at 15:09
Well, you're right, the musicians must be financially compensated, so they're probably fine with it. Why am I not? Because it's ruining my memories and what it used to mean to me when it's on TV 25 times a day IN A BADLY EDITED VERSION to sell some bloody car. I can't control when the ad comes on, but I can choose to play the song on purpose, to trigger memories.
There's an ad on now for some slimming product that uses Salt & Pepa's "Push It". This is particularly painful to me, because once back in the 1980's my then band played that song live, and it was a very humiliating and embarrassing event. So every time that ad comes on now, I'm reminded of it. I have to turn the sound down. I've not been on stage since, but that's unrelated, that's just because I have no talent.
And when it comes to bad music, sure, it's all about personal taste. Most of the time I can avoid stuff I don't like. What I object to is being exposed to horrible crap when it's beyond my control. A few months ago I went into a shop to buy sneakers, and the music was so loud I had to shout to the clerk and ask several times what he was saying. It was some recent hiphop crap that I can't name. I don't object to hiphop, I buy some on purpose, but in this setting it was counterproductive to the shop's main goal, which was to take my money. I did buy them, but the next time I needed shoes, I avoided that shop like the plague.
Quote Posted by Starker
Jean-Michel Jarre agrees with you
I very nearly posted the same thing. I grew up on JMJ.