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[–] wahala 0 points 2 points (+2|-0) ago 

Very well said, although I do agree with @Nofatpeople's caveat that it's commercially produced modern music that sucks. Indies are still out there and know how to play their instruments. It's just way, way harder to find.

It feels like more and more, I am subjected to advertisements (mostly during live sport events, which can't be fast-forwarded) that contain a ton of shitty (what I thought were) jingles. Then later on I'm in the grocery store or a waiting room and hear the 'jingle" but it turns out that it was a full song. Apparently it's a thing now to cross-promote "pop" songs through the ads for beer, cars, etc. Hyper lame.

I read an article along these same lines relatively recently that studied the structure of modern music, which showed that instrumental introductions to songs are diminishing. See: Has music streaming killed the instrumental intro?

And auto-tune can die right now. Die, auto-tune, Die!

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[–] Whitemail [S] 0 points 1 point (+1|-0) ago  (edited ago)

I don't listen to enough shitty pop music to notice the lack of musical intros. To me I find it unusual to start singing right or away or after a short bit of music. That is also the first song on the album, so you turn it on, and he's singing within seconds.

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[–] Whitemail [S] ago 

There aren't any musical instruments or technology that I think are inherently bad. Synths in the 80s and auto-tunes in recent decades have been abused by shitty pop musicians. On the LIVE (the band called LIVE) album Distance to Here there is one part of one song where auto-tune is used, when it was something new. That was perfectly fine to have one or two lines auto-tuned into some kind of distinctly different sound from the rest of the singing on the whole album. After that the pop musicians got a hold of it and turned it into some retarded fad. Shitty musicians and people who can't sing kept using it until it was something detestable.

A lot of advertisements use songs from a specific generation to catch the attention of the target audience. Modern pop songs have been too expensive to use, though.

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[–] wahala ago 

Good point on LIVE. I loved that album when it came out. Thanks for the reminder on that.

I was also being a bit facetious when it comes to auto-tune. I completely agree synths and other electronic means of music can be amazing if used musically and not as a substitute for music. For example, when Jerry Garcia would break out the MU-TRON, aww yeah.

I disagree that modern pop music is too expensive for ads. Right now, Fitz & The Tantrums 'Hand-Clap' is being used in a Fiat ad. A Phoenix song is being used in a Calvin Klein ad. Honda is using Empire of the Sun's 'The Dreamer: Fantasy' in their current ads. I could go on, but I think you see where I'm going with this. They cross-promo on purpose.

When it comes to formulaic music, just give me a nice I-V-vi-IV and I'm good. Please tell me you've seen this - Axis of Awesome, 4 Chord Song