Darryl_P wrote:rocker654 wrote:Steve V. wrote:I feel like there has never been a worse time in music than right now.
I wholeheartedly agree. It gives me no pleasure to say that, either.
You guys are so wrong that it gives me actual physical pain!
Music is just as good now as it has ever been, it's just harder to find something more worthwhile because of the sheer amount of music that is being put out.
Even though we do have to sift through this bad watered down music to find the good things, the fact that ANYBODY can put out a record now is amazing. The older generation showed us that no matter who you are, you can do something great, you don't have to be a rock star to make an album. Now we know that, we're doing it. We're all putting out albums.
If the state of music, and thus the music industry was the same as it was as little as 15-20 years ago then a huge number of the people on this forum wouldn't be in bands or listening to the music we do.
I'm grateful that anybody and their grandma can put out a record, because it means a lot more good music is getting made. Imagine all the people and their grandmothers that couldn't have put out an album 30 years ago, not matter how good that album would have been simply because they weren't aware that they could.
I think you make a good point. But to find a middle ground between their gripes and your optimism: the sheer number of bands coming out, mixed with the total fragmentation of formats, distribution and advertising methods, mixed with the mainstream top sellers being predominantly banal garbage leaves us in a strange position.
Bands like My Morning Jacket, Wilco, even Flogging Molly can go out and make a living working hard. People like Feist and Cat Power can fill a hole left by our decades lack of alluring, original female music stars, even if they can never become as culturally relevant as Billie Holiday, Aretha Franklin or Janis Joplin for that matter. Hell, I would say the Shins actually had a streak of being an interesting band that reminded us that pop can actually be a craft instead of a commercial.
Nonetheless the fact that everything is so scattered means that little glimpses of authentic talent (Modest Mouse, the Decemberists) can pop through into the public eye, it is harder and harder for their to be a break through scene in the old sense. Sure Omaha sold some records but I don't see everyone still hanging on to every Bright Eyes or Cursive album, and lets face it the Faint was never really that good.
If anyone interesting busts through they have to resign themselves to being solitary, except for being loosely bundled into what a starbucks customer calls 'indie'. Bad for careerists, but great for ambitious bands looking for a very modest amount of success, or record collectors that follow imprints like Sub Pop, Matador, Drag City, Secretly Canadian, Dischord, Merge, K, Arts and Crafts, GSL, Anti-, Epitaph and about a million smaller labels releasing interesting music.