What WAS good in the 'Good Old Days'?

[Farm Boy]

If a kid doesn't like it, it's probably bad music? Like wine and whisky and cheese, maybe?

 

[Rg339]

That's funny, I would consider the Stones the beige/boring ones. Stuck in one sound, verse chorus, verse chorus. Have you listened to Hey Jude in full? Like actually listened to it?

Hey Jude is actually a great example, it broke the pop format, and was a pop song. It is completely wild and unhinged. If you've ever, say, listened to UK #1s in order, the coming of Hey Jude was like dropping acid and everything changed. There was nothing like it before, and for a long time after everything was trying to be it.

I wouldn’t dispute that the Beatles had more impact. But does that, in and of itself, automatically make them the better band?

Rap has been brought up in the thread earlier. Arguably, the earliest rappers had the most impact. They broke the mold.

Does that make them better than, say, Nas, a rapper that came later, but is arguably more technically proficient and a better lyricist than the earliest rappers?

I’m don’t listen to much rap so I might be outta my element, but I think the general point that impact and trendsetting =\= better stands. Stones IMO have better instrumentals.

stole everything they had from more-talented black artists at worst. That is not true of the Beatles.

That’s a little uncharitable IMO. Influenced by? Yeah, indisputably. Stole? Nah. Cultures are always influencing one another’s styles. Stole is too harsh.

 

[Hygro]

I'd credit rap music with allowing me to be way less racist than I otherwise would have been given my upbringing and millieu

It had the same effect on me and I was just trying to connect with the white girls that hung out with my friends xD

But the real sea change was once I liked the rap beat, it was easier to go back and like that slow R&B, and "worse" (better) "soul" from the early 90s that, well,

You hear ... in the grocery store, and it’s irritating, sounds phony... and you usually hear them in places you have to be, but don’t want to be

I remember Whitney Houston's cover of Always Love You on repeat in the gocery store, the clothing store, etc as a little kid stuck with my mom shopping.

Thought it was the worst song ever made.

Turns out it's ****ing amazing.


Grocery store songs slap.

 

[Akka]

Why, psychologically, did you think it was important to attack a perception that I think I'm being original in saying life is better acquiring the tastes required to fully enjoy your environment?

You were making a somewhat condescending lecture, which implies you thought you were providing some basic insight I lacked ? And I just pointed that I was already aware and that you went quite a lot too far into assumptions from what was a half-tongue-in-cheek comment ?

 

[Hygro]

I wouldn’t dispute that the Beatles had more impact. But does that, in and of itself, automatically make them the better band?

Rap has been brought up in the thread earlier. Arguably, the earliest rappers had the most impact. They broke the mold.

Does that make them better than, say, Nas, a rapper that came later, but is arguably more technically proficient and a better lyricist than the earliest rappers?

I’m don’t listen to much rap so I might be outta my element, but I think the general point that impact and trendsetting =\= better.

That’s a little uncharitable IMO. Influenced by? Yeah, indisputably. Stole? Nah. Cultures are always influencing one another’s styles. Stole is too harsh.

I will highlight the most important part of my post by deleting the parts that seemed to distract and color coding how some parts link up:

verse chorus, verse chorus. Have you listened to Hey Jude in full? Like actually listened to it?

Hey Jude is actually a great example, it broke the pop format, and was a pop song. It is completely wild and unhinged. the coming of Hey Jude was like dropping acid and everything changed. There was nothing like it before

 

[Hygro]

You were making a somewhat condescending lecture, which implies you thought you were providing some basic insight I lacked ? And I just pointed that I was already aware and that you went quite a lot too far into assumptions from what was a half-tongue-in-cheek comment ?

Sometimes the things we need to hear are things we already know ; )

 

[El_Machinae]

I'd credit rap music with allowing me to be way less racist than I otherwise would have been given my upbringing and millieu

Do you think today's music will be less effective in today's youth? Understanding that step-change is harder to measure (since you'll be raising less-racist kids). But even more importantly, do you think that the rap of the 90s made its audience 'less racist' than previous or later rap did? In statisitical terms, there's a modal listener. Did 90s rap cause a notable improvement in way its audience treated racial minorities?

 

[Farm Boy]

Didn't it allow black men to actually be audibly angry/upset about stuff without immediately being out of line, antisocial, and dangerous, possibly barbaric? Not that that doesn't continue happening... but am I being crazy when it seems like it opened up greater emotional range? Legit question. I don't like a lot of the genre, just some stuff from the 90s that happened to imprint at right brain age.

 

[Narz]

That’s a little uncharitable IMO. Influenced by? Yeah, indisputably. Stole? Nah. Cultures are always influencing one another’s styles. Stole is too harsh

Not too harsh, simply dumb, you can't put a copyright on a musical style.

To use their beloved hip-hop for example, hip-hop is now worldwide, should it have stayed in the New York only?

 

[El_Machinae]

There are definitely selections available that are bardic expression of the underlying concerns. But it's a separate question as to whether the people listening to the expressions of pain went on to engage in pain-reduction strategies. If a country song's audience has fewer trucks breaking down and fewer dogs running away after it becomes popular, how do we rate the 'betterness' of that song? Or, vis versa. Especially if the next 'generation' of songs also was followed by a measurable shift in trucks breaking down.

 

[Farm Boy]

Amazing Grace did work.

 

[sophie]

Do you think today's music will be less effective in today's youth? Understanding that step-change is harder to measure (since you'll be raising less-racist kids). But even more importantly, do you think that the rap of the 90s made its audience 'less racist' than previous or later rap did? In statisitical terms, there's a modal listener. Did 90s rap cause a notable improvement in way its audience treated racial minorities?

I'd say it's like the Matrix trilogy. If you're trans or a communist or somewhere on the periphery, it's a laser beamed directly into your brain. If you aren't, it's about how women are given preferential treatment in custody battles.

Listening to illmatic and Good Kid were very profound, transformative experiences for me. For other people not so much. Look at all the people who come onto twitter shocked to discover that the "Machine" RATM were Raging against was capitalism and the State. Reagan liked Springsteen. Obama consumes all kinds of "woke" media and his politics are absolutely putrid. Art is downstream of politics: you read yourself into the art, which reflects that read back to you.

 

[Hygro]

If a kid doesn't like it, it's probably bad music? Like wine and whisky and cheese, maybe?

100%

 

[Chukchi Husky]

I'd say it's like the Matrix trilogy. If you're trans or a communist or somewhere on the periphery, it's a laser beamed directly into your brain. If you aren't, it's about how women are given preferential treatment in custody battles.

Listening to illmatic and Good Kid were very profound, transformative experiences for me. For other people not so much. Look at all the people who come onto twitter shocked to discover that the "Machine" RATM were Raging against was capitalism and the State. Reagan liked Springsteen. Obama consumes all kinds of "woke" media and his politics are absolutely putrid. Art is downstream of politics: you read yourself into the art, which reflects that read back to you.

I remember when The Matrix first came out, everyone was telling me that it was this great action movie where people enter computers to become superheroes. When I first watched it, I saw a horror movie.

Last year I was talking to someone about Black Sabbath and they told me that Black Sabbath didn't take themselves seriously and their lyrics were full of humour. A band with songs about depression, PTSD, drug abuse and nuclear Armageddon.

 

[Farm Boy]

100%

Hehe, now I'm thinking I should have better metaphors than giving kids whiskey...

 

[sophie]

I remember when The Matrix first came out, everyone was telling me that it was this great action movie where people enter computers to become superheroes. When I first watched it, I saw a horror movie.

If you have any interest, I would highly recommend revisiting it. Hot tip: Neo is trans

 

[Chukchi Husky]

If you have any interest, I would highly recommend revisiting it. Hot tip: Neo is trans

I have been thinking about The Matrix a lot recently and how it's all going to be different for me now. Even little things I would've ignored before, like how Agent Smith always refers to Neo as Mr. Anderson, using his old name.

 

[sophie]

I have been thinking about The Matrix a lot recently and how it's all going to be different for me now. Even little things I would've ignored before, like how Agent Smith always refers to Neo as Mr. Anderson, using his old name.

Morpheus: I imagine that right now you're feeling a bit like Alice. Tumbling down the rabbit hole?
Neo: You could say that.
Morpheus: I can see it in your eyes. You have the look of a man who accepts what he sees because he's expecting to wake up. Ironically, this is not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate, Neo?
Neo: No.
Morpheus: Why not?
Neo: 'Cause I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.
Morpheus: I know exactly what you mean. Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know, you can't explain. But you feel it. You felt it your entire life. That there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there. Like a splinter in your mind -- driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?
Neo: The Matrix?
Morpheus: Do you want to know what it is?
(Neo nods his head.)
Morpheus: The Matrix is everywhere, it is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window, or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work, or when go to church or when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
Neo: What truth?
Morpheus: That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else, you were born into bondage, born inside a prison that you cannot smell, taste, or touch. A prison for your mind. (long pause, sighs) Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Matrix is. You have to see it for yourself. This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back.
(In his left hand, Morpheus shows a blue pill.)
Morpheus: You take the blue pill and the story ends. You wake in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. (a red pill is shown in his other hand) You take the red pill and you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes. (Long pause; Neo begins to reach for the red pill) Remember -- all I am offering is the truth, nothing more.
(Neo takes the red pill and swallows it with a glass of water)

 

[Hygro]

What's great about the Matrix is that it's totally a deliberate trans metaphor and also completely fungible.

 

[sophie]

What's great about the Matrix is that it's totally a deliberate trans metaphor and also completely fungible.

Yes. It is absolutely hilarious. The dude hatches from a literal egg after taking an estrogen pill, and then is promptly flushed out of society. He can re-enter society but only in disguise, and if he is caught then anybody, even apparently nice little old ladies can turn into agents of the State and attempt to destroy him. Like I completely get how people can mistake the metaphor for any old "awakening to political truth" but it's funny how blatant the allegory is and yet it became the cri de coeur for people who verbatim say **** the agents say in the exact movie.