POP MUSIC NO LONGER SHARED LEADS TO ERRONEOUS CONCLUSIONS

Do You Know This Man?

Sound of Silver by LCD Soundsystem.

Wild Mountain Nation by Blitzen Trapper.

Mirrored by Battles.

You probably saw some of these albums topping critics’ year-end polls. These albums are on my list of personal favorites/best of the year. It’s something that music nerds are predisposed to: obsessing over the creation of lists and having an irrational need to classify everything. But beyond my discursive banter lies another problem with the artists mentioned above.

Even though they all made great music and really do belong on the list of top albums of 2007, I bet that about 90 percent of the people reading this haven’t heard any of these artists or albums.

In some ways it’s a good thing because it speaks to the decentralization of the music industry. There the big few no longer determine what the majority listens to. It also makes stumbling upon an artist that much more fun. Every musician on that list above I’ve found via an interview, a sampling of their music or an internet radio station. No matter how much people want to know about an artist, there’s always an inherit joy in finding out about an artist on your own rather than through friends.

Now for the bad part.

Due to the decentralization of said industry, we no longer have a shared experience with popular culture or popular music. Over the past few years, networks like VH1 have rode the nostalgia train to great success by using people’s longing for the days of yore as a foundation to build their brand of television Think of specials like 100 Greatest One-Hit Wonders, I Love the 80s or the most recent countdown: 100 Greatest Songs of the 90s. I mentioned that title last because starting with the release of Rhino Records’ Whatever: The 90s Pop & Culture Box in 2005, 90s nostalgia has kicked into third gear.

It’s easy to understand why when judged in the context of attitude and politics. Whether liberal or conservative, you have to agree that the 90s were some of the most peaceful times in the history of America (at least peaceful according to our standards). Most of the people reading this (and the person writing this) had the 90s as a background for their formative years and we’ll always hold our formative years on a pedestal compared to the rest of our lives.

It’s also natural to say that the music we grew up on is better than the music of today. It’s necessary for us to process that as true because it keeps the music of our younger years relevant. But the fact is since the rise of rock-n-roll as the dominant pop art form in the 1960s, that statement hasn’t been true. I’d argue with anyone that the same amount of great music comes out every year on a consistent basis give or take a few records. But herein lays the difference between this decade and previous decades. It’s easier for people of our generation to believe that the music of the 90s, when compared to this decade, is better because the 90s marked the last time we had a shared pop culture and pop music experience (and it’ll probably be the last one for a long while).

We can’t have something like Thriller-era Michael Jackson or Nirvana or even Puff Daddy circa 1997 in this new culture of pop music. We can’t have trends and musical styles like disco that envelope the country, force artists to step outside of their comfort zone in order to stay on the charts, swallow everything in its path and then die a fast, but still painful death. We can’t have landmark albums for good or bad like The Marshall Mathers LP or (insert N’SYNC related LP here) where a huge amount of people go out and buy an album on the release date like it isn’t going to be there on the shelf a month from now. That’s why the whole Kanye vs. Fiddy nonsense became a big deal. That use to happen at least three to four times a year with the old music industry. That was before this decade came along and shook things up.

We can’t have any of these things anymore because EVERYTHING has become a niche market. Rhianna’s Umbrella was one of the most played songs of the 2007 and fans and critics alike have named it one of the best if not the best pop song of 2007. But I know a few people (like myself) who didn’t even hear the song until the end of the summer when it had already been a smash on the charts. We’re no longer able to share a where-were-you-when-you-first-heard-an-artist conversation like we could about the 1990s or previous generations. There is no longer a real, true mainstream.

In order to have mass appeal in today’s music industry, with a few exceptions, one has to take no musical chances whatsoever, be as uninteresting as possible and have lyrics that are vague but sound like they really mean something (i.e. Daughtry). Not to knock what the former American Idol contestant has done, he’s does what he does very well, but the mainstream use to be more interesting than that.

That’s what people really mean when they say that music was “better” in a certain era. What they meant to say was that the music of the mainstream was better.

I’m saddened by the idea that some of my favorite records aren’t known to the general public. I’m not one of those fanboys that wants to keep their favorite artists in a box and hope that they don’t “sell out.” I want people to know about the artists I like. I want the groups I like to be wildly successful. But while the music industry self-destructs and figures out how adjust to the present day, all I’ll have is the occasional moment when an artist that I’ve had in iPod rotation ends up with a song featured in a commercial (CSS, Feist) in a television drama (TV On The Radio) or in a movie (Brandi Carlile).

In other words: Music has not gotten worse (every era has its share of hacks). Great music can be found every single year guaranteed, especially since it’s easier to find a rap/art-rock/metal/spoken word/comedian on some random website. But the difference between now and the time when we were in high school is that it was more VISIBLE. These days a fan has to work to find the good stuff. They shouldn’t have to.