Music has to be one of life's higher pleasures. If, with the benefit of knowing what music provides for us, it was suddenly taken away, prised from our hands, i really would be struggling to get through the endless wave of hours that are thrown at me without eating my foot. I like a lot of music, and I'm not just one of those people who says that, who claims to 'be into everything' but actually couldn't even spell the word music, let alone maintain a conversation about it. I really do, Folk, Metal, Rock, Blues, Bluegrass, Motown (when Boyz II Men exploit it) and even classical. If it has a catchy melody, i will listen to it. If it has strange timing, i will listen to it. However in recent years, there has been a hasty decline in not just 'good' music, but music in general. It is not that 'music' is not being produced, in fact the amount of 'music' that is churned out each month has reached new heights, it is that this 'music' is not music at all.
There is, i feel, a distinction to be made. It is instilled in human nature that much of our focus is on sex. It is an evolutionary drive, passed down from generation to generation to help us sustain and increase our numbers where we can. But, it is not always alright to express this drive; you may like the look of the girl you keep gawking at, but the minute you unzip your trousers, start licking your lips and begin trying to lick her 'lips', you're getting locked up. As such, we have strived for ways of having sex without having sex. Our solution? Dance. (Perhaps it should be said now that dance is also instilled in us to an extent, acting as mating rituals and so on).
So throughout time, we have had the urge to dance, to move rhythmically and provocatively or indeed eloquently, but with a member of the opposite sex all the same. And of course, this rhythmically based movement is aided by the addition of music, of a set rhythm. With this basis, of music and dance being entwined throughout history, the two have become near inseparable, so closely linked, we can effortlessly blunder back and forth, between the two, without even realising it.
And this what i think has happened. With our culture as centred around sex and as comfortable with the concept of sex as it is, and with our culture as technologically advanced as it is, it was only a matter of time before we made the unrecoverable step into face-punchingly bad, digital dry-sex noise.
I could begin stamping my foot to the first track off a dance album, and not stop until the end of the album. It's relentless in its invasion of the ears, and as mundane and monotonous as eating dry oats, listening to Morse code spell out 'Tinie Tempah wouldn't know decent music if it came up on shit on his head'.
On that note, i would like to use 'Tinie Tempah' as evidence that music has taken a great turn for the worse. No matter how much i would like to blame the man however, this simply isn't feasible since his songs are written by machines. He did write his lyrics though, and brought us such classic lines as; "I live a very very very wild lifestyle" and "I've got so many clothes i keep some in my aunt's house". There is such insight from Tinie there, such profound words, unrivaled even by Eric Clapton's lyrics mourning the death of his infant son, or Led Zeppelin's existential lyrics in 'stairway to Heaven'. Having listened to Tinie's 'Pass out', i felt compelled to seek out something that would raise my cerebral activity somewhat, such as picking my ball sack.
Tinie is not the only guilty one in today's 'music' industry that uses machines with which he constructs his work however . Almost every song on recent radio features a voice auto tuner, the gadget that gave Kanye the ability to sing (i think it speaks volumes that his live performances of his 'singing' album have gone down like a well lit orphanage). Even Fergie, a person who can sing un-assisted, who has a good voice, has resorted to this new-era bastard machine. When the singing is done by a machine, and the background bass and melody is also produced by a machine, there is nothing left for a human to do... the only reason Rihanna still gets paid for 'her' songs, is that she provides the legs, tits and arse of the record and video. This synthy, digital mess is not 'music' in the same way playing FIFA '10 is not football.
Perhaps it is just a phase. Perhaps there is still light at the end of this long, dark tunnel. Even in these dark times there are glimmers of hope; personally i think Professor Green's "i need you tonight" is an absolute triumph within the 'popular music' genre. His masterstroke is that he has used an old, classic track with melody and groove for his backing, and in the midst of the piles of ball-aching, machine music, it sounds both different and catchy because of it. Yes he hasn't written it still, but i would much prefer to hear an old musical track with a new spin, than a brand new track that just blends in with all the other disgraceful bollocks that has come out recently.
I would also like to quickly confront peoples objection to my traditionalist view that on the grounds that their taste is opinion, their stance is unquestionable. Incorrect. Yes, i cannot change your opinion of what you like, but with something like music, the more educated you are in the topic, the more your opinion stands for. If a dedicated football analyst tells me something opinionated about the premiere league, and then a uneducated, farming dweeb tells me something also opinionated about the premiere league, i will value the football analyst's opinion far more. The same applies here, I am not a music genius by any stretch of the imagination, i play several instruments to an average to good standard, but as such that makes me more qualified to talk about music than someone who cannot meet the same status. In the same way, the opinion of someone more qualified than me, with a greater understanding will count for far more.... Let's see who they would agree with here.
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