The rockism debate (with bonus essay!)

Yeah, despite this all being synthesized, I'd think you'd still call this song symphonic. It's hard to deny that it is. Or it's at least trying to be.

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One thing that really annoys me, which is prevalent in all genres to one degree or another is "vocal masturbation", where singers will draw out one particular note for little reason. It's a little thing, but it's the culmination of such little things that lead to people getting disillusioned with genres.

I find particularly upbeat lyrics to be grating (especially when coupled with similar music), and so I avoid pop. I find songs that can be summed up with "woe is me" annoying, so I tend to avoid "indie" stuff.

I don't dislike any genre as such, just the things which happen to be more prevalent in that genre. I would liken it to someone hating zombie films because they're bored of drawn out death scenes involving the best friend; sure, not all zombie films have them, but it's an understandable reason to be wary of them. I feel like we should stop categorising music based on genre, or at least stop calling ourselves "rockers" or "metal heads" or anything of the sort.

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Oh, you mean like AND IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII-eeIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

Also, indie music is no more or less full of "woe is me" songs than most other genres.

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Yes, that's exactly what I mean.

As for the "woe is me" comment, that's just something I've observed, but I haven't listened to my fair share of indie music, so there's that. I feel as though it serves as a good example though; people say they don't like rap/hiphop when all they hear is Kanye West, people say they don't like pop when all they hear is Bieber.

If there's no hook to get you into a genre, then you stick with only hearing the stuff that made you decide you didn't like the genre, and you're not likely to hear stuff that will change your mind because you've decided you don't like that genre.

I write stuff sometimes. I also sometimes make youtube videos: http://www.youtube.com/user/majormarks

...Kanye West is what got me into rap :<

Now, if you want to see someone who can probably turn people off completely to rap, let me wheeze in your general direction...

edited 21st Sep '13 8:03:39 PM by 0dd1

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At least with his more recent stuff, Kanye West's music is more about the sonic aspect than the lyrical aspect, so I can see why he often serves as a gateway into more lyrical rap.

Although, telling from some of my teenmate's music, many rap songs can be enjoyed without listening into the lyrics. Often, the flow enough is...music to my ears.

edited 21st Sep '13 8:28:55 PM by chihuahua0

My gateway was the early stuff (Grandmaster Flash and Afrika Bambaataa). They were quite sonic back then. From then, I got into stuff like De La Soul, Public Enemy or Mantronix.

Personally, when it comes to Kanye West, I'd always recommend his first album as an example of when he is actually on-point both lyrically and musically. He actually has a surprisingly deft handle on some pretty hard social topics on that album. Example:

But yes, you can definitely enjoy hip-hop and rap without actually paying attention to what the actual lyrics are. A rapper's flow requires great prowess, to the same degree as a professional singer.

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My choice of Kanye wasn't a malicious one, I quite like some of his stuff, he was just the only guy I could think of.

I write stuff sometimes. I also sometimes make youtube videos: http://www.youtube.com/user/majormarks

It always amuses me how 'pop' is such a vague term, and yet at any point in time people will use it so specifically.

Just about all of the music released in the past sixty or so years could fairly be described simply as 'pop', and yet 'pop' has come to always mean a specific time, an ever evolving term.

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Shouldn't the word for the majority of music released be "popular music" instead of just "pop"?

Isn't "pop" just short for "popular music" anyway?

That's exactly what it's short for.

Put me in motion, drink the potion, use the lotion, drain the ocean, cause commotion, fake devotion, entertain a notion, be Nova Scotian

It used to be, but most people, singers and musicians don't like to be labeled as "pop" or having "pop" tastes. Because "pop" means Boyzone.

I like to think of "pop" as basically a distilled mix of snippets of blues, rock, soul, electronic, and whatever other music is out there into a catchier, further simplified format more or less meant for mass consumption.

Only Death Is Real

I like to think of pop as pretty much anything that can't be described as classical music. I think a large part of my reason for saying this is that Tim Smith always insisted that Cardiacs were a pop group, despite their music at times being about as far from anything you're likely to hear in the charts as is imaginable. Why? Well, they had a pop group line up (Guitar, Bass, Vocals, Keys, Sax, Drums, Misc. Percussion) and as a result could fairly be described as a pop group.

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I really don't get the difference between those two. Not clearly enough, at least.

I get that usually with "pop music" people refer to any piece of music that isn't world music or classical, dating back to the early 50's. This covers literally everything from jazz fusion and death metal to ambient and trip-hop.

Then there's the genre that covers all music that's mainstream, but not electronic enough to be obviously electronic nor rock enough to be classified as rock music. So, to put it simply, ABBA. I think this one's a bit too vague for me to ever to use anywhere.

Also, I'd like to point out that this thread has wandered off a bit from its original subject.

edited 22nd Sep '13 1:23:57 PM by Xeroop

I think it's best to see pop as a dualistic term in that it can be both genre and vague over-arching umbrella descriptor.

Only Death Is Real

I think popular music as a classification came about as a way to distinguish between "proper music", so to speak^note defined as the kind of music that takes many years of training to be able to play with some degree of proficiency—basically, classical concert music and the music of the people. Using this classification, we could technically count even medieval troubadour songs as popular music.

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As a part black guy who enjoys rock more than most other genres....

Well I just prefer music focusing on instrumentation rather than "lyrical poetry" or a percieved "beats"

David Bowie 1947-2016

Well, if you're gonna go with the whole "black guy" thing, if we wanna get technical, rock music was started by a bunch of black guys (e.g. Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Fats Domino). Except that credit was stolen away by the fact that a bunch of white guys were noticed more by the general public in its early days (e.g. Bill Haley and the Comets, Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis).

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Now now, I know that others don't and call me a sellout.

David Bowie 1947-2016

They callin' you a sellout for that? That's wack.

How easy is it to tell how white I am?

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I would argue that yes, medieval Troubadour songs are popular music, as long as they fall in line with the type of music popularly listened to at the time they were written.

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Well, they were pretty much the only form of music that the common folk could even ever hope to do, so I'd say they probably fell in line with that pretty damn well.

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