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What is the appeal to the modern style of pop music?

Combo

Combo

Banned
Jan 8, 2019
2,437
I must admit, I am not an expert in pop music to put it mildly. I listen to other things. However even from my perspective, what I have heard of pop music sounds like its gone down in quality in the last decade or two.

I have noticed three trends in modern pop music: 1, It's more bland and with less variety. 2, It's more depressing. 3, It's over sexualized even when the context is not appropriate.

There seems to be evidence in studies for all three points.

Thus, beyond the global perspective, we observe a number of trends in the evolution of contemporary popular music. These point towards less variety in pitch transitions, towards a consistent homogenization of the timbral palette, and towards louder and, in the end, potentially poorer volume dynamics.
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NEW YORK (AP) — A study of hundreds of thousands of popular songs over the past three decades has found a downward sonic trend in happiness and an increase in sadness, as the chirpy band Wham! gave way to the moody Sam Smith.
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I can't easily find a study on music being more sexualized but I have noticed that modern pop music listened by young girls is oddly sexualized. I had a family member who wanted to take their 6 your old daughter to a concert of a famous female pop star when I looked them up, the content was surprising sexual for someone with young girls as their fans. And when lyrics are sexual even though the music style sounds like it is not appropriate for that. Why is that?

I can understand music being more depressing (it may be a sign of the times) but I don't know why people lapped up music that is lower in quality. Why has that happened?

Edit:

I just found this paper:


The study sample consisted of the top 40 songs of Billboard Year End Hot 100 single songs for every 5 years from 1971 to 2011 (N = 360). There was a linear decrease over time in the proportion of songs with a love theme and in the proportion of songs with a combination of lust and love themes. In contrast, there was a significant increase in the proportion of songs with a theme focusing on lust in the absence of love.
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10.1177_2158244014547179-fig1.gif


Hall et al. (2012) found that sexualization did not increase from 1959 to 1999, then jumped substantially in 2009; consistent with this pattern, we observed a notable increase in lust only themes from 2001 onward. Our findings build on those of Hall et al.'s (2012) by suggesting that the increase in objectifying sexual content is not a function of a general increase in sexual content, but rather stems from a drop in romantic content and a disentangling of sexual content from romantic content.
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So it seems like the 2000s brought on the beginning of this change. The paper was written in 2014, so I suspect it's more pronounced now.
 
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Kevers

Kevers

The Fallen
Oct 29, 2017
14,637
Syracuse, NY
Are you sure it's more sexualized? The 90s and 2000s were pretty much filled with that shit, doesn't seem much different to me now in that regard.
 
boxter432

boxter432

The Fallen
Oct 28, 2017
9,410
wham! giving way to sam smith is an interesting choice to connect pop music.
is Panic at the disco's hey look ma I made it any less "chirpy" than a wham! song?

and was madonna not sexualized? the young pop stars of the late 90s/2000s Britney/Christina etc...?
 
Professor Beef

Professor Beef

Official ResetEra™ Chao Puncher
Member
Oct 25, 2017
22,506
The Digital World
this is one of those "music was better back in my day" topics and i am largely resisting the urge to say "ok boomer"

your tastes are your own, and not all music being released is gonna be for you. there's plenty of pop music - or music in general - that people all over the world enjoy that isn't gonna vibe with you, and that's ok
 
moblin

moblin

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,107
Москва
pop music writ large is bad, I listen to REAL music like johnny cash (but not other country music, which is bad)

I miss the good pop stars like Al B. Sure! and Jody Watley
 
scottbeowulf

scottbeowulf

Member
Oct 27, 2017
9,492
United States
Your argument could have been almost identical in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s etc. Pop music isn't normally something that you take with you as you get older.
 
SturokBGD

SturokBGD

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
2,414
Ontario
nsilvias said:
the monoculture doesnt exist anymore so labels are left to make things as bland and far reaching as possible to make money since everyone is into their own niche online now.
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This is a pretty commonly held opinion in the indie scene. What should have been an explosion of creativity thanks to technology has instead resulted in the record industry becoming more insular than ever. This isn't an "OK boomer" type of thing... it's quite literally how it is.

I mean there's more variety out there than ever for those that are interested, but nobody's making any money off of it.
 
Baccus

Baccus

Banned
Dec 4, 2018
5,307
It's direct, it's sexy, it doesn't have time for that melody shit, give me sex, drugs, freedom and and toxic relationships.

It's what we really crave in our very basic instincts.

Just embrace it.
 

Sixfortyfive

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
4,615
Atlanta
Even as someone who spends a lot of his morning/evening commute listening to Top 40 stations, I feel like the past 2 years have been especially boring and dire.

nsilvias said:
the monoculture doesnt exist anymore so labels are left to make things as bland and far reaching as possible to make money since everyone is into their own niche online now.
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This makes some sense.
 
OP
OP
Combo

Combo

Banned
Jan 8, 2019
2,437
Lol at all these people saying ok boomer. I am in my 30s. And you wont hear me saying music from the 50s, 60s, 70s etc was bland. This isn't about celebrating music from when I grew up.
 
Flame Lord

Flame Lord

Member
Oct 26, 2017
2,804
I think pretty much all media is reaching the point where they've used all of their data to just make the most inoffensively, bland, but still entertaining content they possibly can. So I guess I'd boil down it's appeal to: it sounds nice.
 
The Albatross

The Albatross

Member
Oct 25, 2017
39,227
It's harder than ever to define "pop music" today, so it's a hard comparison to make.

I think in the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s there was probably a greater variety of genres represented on something like a Top 40 at a given time of the year. Like, my golden age of listening to a top 40 I'll say was 1994 when I was 10... Contemporary R&B (Boyz II Men, R Kelly), boy band pop (All-4-One), girl band pop (Ace of Base), adult contemporary solo artists (From Toni Braxton to Mariah Carey to Elton John to Madonna to Celine Dion to Prince), but then also to contemporary hip hop artists like Warren G & Nate Dogg, TLC, Snoop, Coolio, and so on, and then to contemporary rock Beck, the Cranberries, Green Day, Weezer, Collective Soul, harder rock beyond that, over to more classsic rock acts like Tom Petty, Aerosmith, Bon Jovi, Bonnie Rait, John Melloncamp, etc...

Like... these acts were all on Top 40 radio... and I think they represent a really wide spectrum of different genres. Today, I don't think that top 40 "radio" does, so it's harder to define pop because people's niches or preferred genres are so much more accessible (like, actually getting exposed to a niche) today than they were 20 and 30 years ago, that it's tough to make a comparison.

But I don't think that pop music was any better 20 years ago than it is today. Or 40 or 60. I think it's a hard comparison to make. And, today, it's just so much easier to find your niche than it was when I was a teenager. Like, in 1995, if it wasn't being played on the boston rock station (for me, WBCN) then I wasn't exposed to it, but at the same top, the Top 40 station (Kiss 108 maybe?) probably had a broader contemporary genres to draw from than it would today.

It's definitely not more or less sexualized today.
 
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OP
OP
Combo

Combo

Banned
Jan 8, 2019
2,437
boxter432 said:
and was madonna not sexualized? the young pop stars of the late 90s/2000s Britney/Christina etc...?
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It's a question of how much. In those days could you find more famous female singers that were not sexualized than today? I am not denying that singers of the past (even going back thousands of years) were sexualized.
 
luther manhole

luther manhole

Member
Oct 27, 2017
556
OKC
Lower in quality is pretty subjective. There is plenty of good pop in the current era (Slayyyter, Black Dresses, TR/ST, Solange, ABRA, George Clanton, The Beths, Charly Bliss, Kero Kero Bonito, Rina Sawayama, Perfume Genius, Crying, Lemon Demon, Kimbra, Weyes Blood, FKA Twigs, Charli XCX, 3776, Glass Beach, Yeule, literally dozens and dozens of others)

I think it's maybe more you just aren't familiar with a lot of music? Not trying to be condescending but so much good music comes out every year in all genres and I usually only hear "man current music sucks" from people who don't actually listen to a lot of new music.
 
Akita One

Akita One

Member
Oct 30, 2017
4,633
When will people learn that listening to the radio in your car is no longer the way to hear "new" music? Radio is strictly for the casuals now. The fact that you posted articles, instead of giving your specific opinion about different songs highlights this.

And...pop is MORE sexualized that it was 20-30 years ago? So basically you never listed to pop music? It's more tame than it used to be. Turn on some 90s pop when you get a chance. And remember this was a hit marketed to kids and teens:


Combo said:
It's a question of how much. In those days could you find more famous female singers that were not sexualized than today? I am not denying that singers of the past (even going back thousands of years) were sexualized.
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Huh? In what world? Please name any pop singer from the 80s/90s that was famous and didn't have alot of sex and sexuality in their hit songs besides Debbie Gibson maybe? Wilson Phillips? Are we really going there?
 
FeliciaFelix

FeliciaFelix

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,778
I'm in my 30s too and find pop music no better or worse than in the 90s.

"I have noticed three trends in modern pop music: 1, It's more bland and with less variety. 2, It's more depressing. 3, It's over sexualized even when the context is not appropriate."

1. Well the stuff in the radio has to have a wide reach. But since all music action is online, does it really matter? Every music service can and is usually customized to you. Like who actually seriously listens to radio? Like really listen, not just background noise in a store.

2. Sad doesnt mean bad.

3. There are idiot parents everywhere. And back in the day, there was a period in a girls life between baby dolls and boys where you got to play with Barbies. I think that niche is gone. But that's not just pop music, that's just culture overall.
 

Sixfortyfive

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
4,615
Atlanta
luther manhole said:
There is plenty of good pop in the current era (Slayyyter, Black Dresses, TR/ST, Solange, ABRA, George Clanton, The Beths, Charly Bliss, Kero Kero Bonito, Rina Sawayama, Perfume Genius, Crying, Lemon Demon, Kimbra)
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The only artist I'm familiar with in this list is Lemon Demon, and considering that that's only because I'm also familiar with Internet memelord Neil Cicerega, it leads me to wonder how "pop" this list really is if you still take the label to imply that the music is popular enough to chart.
 
ElectricBlanketFire

ElectricBlanketFire

What year is this?
Member
Oct 25, 2017
31,944
luther manhole said:
Lower in quality is pretty subjective. There is plenty of good pop in the current era (Slayyyter, Black Dresses, TR/ST, Solange, ABRA, George Clanton, The Beths, Charly Bliss, Kero Kero Bonito, Rina Sawayama, Perfume Genius, Crying, Lemon Demon, Kimbra, Weyes Blood, FKA Twigs, Charli XCX, 3776, Glass Beach, Yeule, literally dozens and dozens of others)

I think it's maybe more you just aren't familiar with a lot of music? Not trying to be condescending but so much good music comes out every year in all genres and I usually only hear "man current music sucks" from people who don't actually listen to a lot of new music.
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Charly Bliss rules.
 
thewienke

thewienke

Member
Oct 25, 2017
16,098
Akita One said:
Huh? In what world? Please name any pop singer from the 80s/90s that was famous and didn't have alot of sex and sexuality in their hit songs besides Debbie Gibson maybe? Wilson Phillips? Are we really going there?
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Off the top of my head I could only name Tori Amos and Melissa Etheridge. Or maybe Jewel like 90% of the time? I dunno.

None of those people were as big as Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera, Madonna, etc.

edit: forgot Sheryl Crow but again not as big of a name at all
 
FeliciaFelix

FeliciaFelix

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,778
Sixfortyfive said:
The only artist I'm familiar with in this list is Lemon Demon, and considering that that's only because I'm also familiar with Internet memelord Neil Cicerega, it leads me to wonder how "pop" this list really is if you still take the label to imply that the music is popular enough to chart.
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Kimbra is very good. Anyway, I'd say pop as a classification is dead and all that exists is just niches.
 
luther manhole

luther manhole

Member
Oct 27, 2017
556
OKC
Sixfortyfive said:
The only artist I'm familiar with in this list is Lemon Demon, and considering that that's only because I'm also familiar with Internet memelord Neil Cicerega, it leads me to wonder how "pop" this list really is if you still take the label to imply that the music is popular enough to chart.
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Pop Music is a genre with sub-genres. Pop music isn't just "music that charts", it's a defined umbrella genre. These artists are everything from synthpop to art pop to hypongogic pop to electropop to glitch pop to baroque pop to futurepop to progressive pop to power pop and so on and so on.

If you're not familiar with genres and stuff that doesn't make any of this music not pop, it's just a lack of knowledge of how music is categorized.

minor edit: also this isn't a new modern thing as well, even something like Pet Sounds is a combination of baroque pop, sunshine pop, progressive pop, and psyche pop.
 
Bronx-Man

Bronx-Man

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
15,351
Craig Jenkins wrote an incredible article a while back on the state of pop in the 2010s.

I've heard a few friends and colleagues rail against what one buddy cleverly referred to as the "Antonoff-ization" of pop music. (Indeed, Jack Antonoff has co-produced or co-written enough of the songs mentioned above that synth-pop riffs like the ones in "Beautiful Trauma" and "Out of the Woods" signal his involvement almost as cleanly as a producer tag.) I don't think it's his or any in-demand producer's fault that pop music feels like it's folding in on itself. They're just perfectionists providing a service a little too cleanly. I do believe that pop, as an art form and a business, is letting its capitalist roots show by zeroing in on a median sound and simply cloning it ad infinitum. The tactic only works for so long before interest trails off. Why give time to prim midtempo love songs that cynically call up tasteful hip-hop beats for momentary tension release when real street rap is delivering on hooks, style, and attitude? Audiences don't quite seem to know anymore.
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Dead Guy

Dead Guy

Member
Oct 25, 2017
7,624
Saskatchewan, Canada
Its trash music made to appeal to the lowest common denominator. It's as inoffensive and bland as possible to try and capture the widest audience. That's about all there is to it.
 
Akita One

Akita One

Member
Oct 30, 2017
4,633
nsilvias said:
the monoculture doesnt exist anymore so labels are left to make things as bland and far reaching as possible to make money since everyone is into their own niche online now.
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Sixfortyfive said:
Even as someone who spends a lot of his morning/evening commute listening to Top 40 stations, I feel like the past 2 years have been especially boring and dire.
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These are people that clearly go into their cars and turn on their local radio to hear music...in 2019. People also still use an abacus to do math.

If you don't have Spotify/Google Play Music/Apple Music/Pandora, then you don't know much about modern music. It's 2019 now, you also shouldn't judge Chinese food from your local place that sells chicken wings and Egg Foo Young.
 
Siggy-P

Siggy-P

Avenger
Mar 18, 2018
11,869
The appeal is a simple repetitive beat that you can make out in a bar or nightclub and lyrics you can sing along with when youre wasted.

People then buy the album's when sober because they associate that sort of music with a good time.

There are much better songs outside of pop music but you won't find those songs playing on a night out.
 
Cryptosporidium

Cryptosporidium

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
7,624
canada
Max Martin got bored and other less talented songwriters have taken his place.

One man has basically written all pop music since the fucking 90s.

 
Tawpgun

Tawpgun

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
9,861
I remember there was a thread like this not too long ago where OP was like

"why does modern day music suck"

followed up with

"I mainly listen to video game soundtracks"


I think the best conventionally popular, successful top 40 song in the past decade is Uptown Funk.

I don't care how much of a music snob or indie you are, that song SLAPS
 
xenocide

xenocide

Member
Oct 25, 2017
5,307
Vermont
If you want to understand modern pop music, you really need to look at the whole picture. There is a ton of variation within the genre of Pop Music. Like, compare these four songs:

Lights - Almost Had Me (Acoustic): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIj9921u6cA
CHVRCHES - Clearest Blue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZyzX4c1vIs
Grimes - Kill v. Maim: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2EJMd7ZN7w
Taylor Swift - Blank Space: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-ORhEE9VVg

These are all pop songs from the last 5 years, of varying levels of popularity, and they are VERY different. I mean, even consider the more popular songs of the past year or two. You've got Lizzo alongside Billy Eillish, and for the most part they are incredibly different. It's easy to write off Pop music as a bland mainstream genre, but I have spent the last 5-10 years actually giving it a chance and there's a lot of amazing music being made these days. I would even argue outside of the Top 40 (and even including it to some extent) we're seeing more variation in Pop music over the last decade than we have at almost any other point.
 
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