On October 25, 2012, I read a blog titled “Has Pop Music Gotten Worse Over The Last 50 Years?” about what started as an argument between a girl and her boyfriend.
There were many comments after the blog, some very angry, about the different views that split two types of music:
* current radio (pop/hip-hop/dance/rap/diva)
verses
* alternative music (rock/ alt-country rock/ rockabilly/punk) which is NOT on the radio, but very accessible.
And what I found interesting was not so much the blog itself, but the irritated voices in the comments that followed it. It looked very much like a social war of words between many, many people that took sides and got heated. I’m talking hundreds.
Like a scene out of Quadrophenia, where the “Mods” and the “rockers” were fighting in the streets (and it really did happen), I read about how the “Alts” feel encroached upon and disenfranchised by the record companies and music business, selling out to snotty thugs riding around in cars, rubbing their “blaring feces” in everyone’s faces. Meanwhile, the “Pops” feel an almost racist anger coming at them by people who are not willing to conform to the “new” music standard. And they want to “shove it down their throats to acclimate them or choke them altogether”.
This is a real social war, a music war not unlike the fights in England in the early 70s’ mods vs. rockers. There is reported physical fighting and retaliation, as told to me by commentors I contacted. People who are riding the fence tend to stay quiet, not being immune to angry outbursts and shaming. But what is it all rooted in? Why is this happening?
One person said, “You can’t compare todays music to yesteryear’s”. Another, “You can’t compare pop and alt music because it’s too different”. But the angry views come from intelligent people who say, “All art CAN be compared”, or it’s “stupidity in splitting hairs (classical with violins vs. without violins). Long ago it was all called rocknroll. Who decided it needed to be cut into classifications, some anal music exec or a pop star that just wanted to stand out? Yet the sides are drawn.
And what about the record companies? Do they simply sell the latest regurgitated shlock that worked last month? Kids WILL buy anything their friends are buying, and that goes for soccer moms too. I heard Katy Perry blaring out of a SUV; mom driving kids somewhere (and the song was too x-rated for the kids in my opinion).
So I’m just looking for an opinion from as many as I can get. Is it becoming a war? Do these sides despise each other? I want to see this war on the internet right now as it is raging. If you hate pop or alt, say so. Let’s see who wins in this blog.
And to help you along, I’ll give you a simple choice for discussion. One pop song on the radio (choose any of your choice) or the other; Two songs by a really cool rising alt. underground group called PC & The Angels of Death (stoner country rock). Click on the Youtube links here to see and listen.
and
Keep in mind the songwriting, freshness, excitability, or just how it moves you and makes you feel. Everyone will have their own opinion, but fight it out right here, once and for all for the world to see how the world feels. The record companies are listening too.
independentnewsofsound 