DavidEduardo said:
MarcR said:
Programmers also have to take into consideration the "burn" factor, and considering that many, or most, of today's "hits" are of a far lower caliber than the hits of, say, the sixties and early seventies, they can burn quite rapidly, and playing them more than 140 times a week certainly doesn't help.
Yeah, try telling a Jonas Brothers fan that their music sucks.
Today's songs are as good for today's generation of Top 40 listeners as the stuff of the 60's was for that generation. Saying anything else is just generational bias.
WABC spun the top hits every 90 minutes in the 60's... that is Top 40.
And today, we can see burn happening and move songs down or out if they get crispy. In the 60', all we could do is find out sales and juke box plays, so we could easily spin the songs more times now than back then with confidence in the appeal of each song.
In time, people will inevitably grow out of Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers. As they mature and their tastes become more refined, these acts will inevitably be forgotten.
The music of past decades was far more organic and had much more universal appeal than the acts of the present day. Bands like Depeche Mode and New Order had music that was constructed around a synthesizer, but their songs had depth and creativity which virtually all of today's music lacks.
These days, too much of the music you hear is more the work of the producer(s) than the artist(s). Hip-hop has been reduced to embarrassing cliches (it's a sad state of affairs when Soulja Boy Tell 'Em has one of the biggest hip-hop hits), too many acts depend on bland song doctors for their material, and the majority of songs out there feature no proper instrumentation and feature tons of vocoder, AutoTune, and other studio effects. Kanye West and Taylor Swift are a couple of artists that have had quite a few hits and can do no wrong in their fans' eyes ... however, if you've ever seen them perform live, you know they're both terrible.
The bulk of today's music is disposable and will not stand the test of time. Yes, Miley Cyrus and the Jonas Brothers are huge now ... but so were Ohio Express, The DeFranco Family, New Kids On The Block, Debbie Gibson, Tiffany, Hanson, NSYNC, 98 Degrees, etc. Do you hear any of these acts on the radio today? The only time a bubblegum act has any longevity is when they're a tabloid trainwreck, like Britney Spears.
There is definitely a lack of relevant music receiving mainstream recognition. Sure, there's plenty of terrific bands out there, and some of them have enough popularity to play arenas, but they're fortunate if their albums even go platinum. The biggest "rock" bands right now are The Killers, Fall Out Boy and Nickelback. The Killers are Duran Duran redux, Fall Out Boy are
Tiger Beat posing tween sensations, and Nickelback ... well, it's like someone dredged up the ghost of '70s/'80s corporate rock, only this band makes you actually long for the days of Styx and Journey.
Where do we point the finger? Perhaps we can thank downloading for turning the music industry into a singles-driven medium again. Maybe we can lay the blame on
American Idol. Whatever the case is, it's very rare for an important band to go platinum these days. We'll see if the majority of popular acts today still have careers even 10 years from now. One would think that eventually people are going to tire of Nickelback's incessant rehash, but never say never ... AC/DC has proven that you can write the same song over and over again and still be hugely popular.
