It has long bewildered me how much the general population enjoys such music as Britney Spears, Rhianna, Jay Z and the like. I've tried to understand and enjoy such music, however I'm unable to get over the cheapness of it. I find no true virtuosity or artistic interjection within it. To my ears it just sounds like trash. I don't mean to be offensive, but it just doesn't appeal to me in the slightest degree. Cheap sparkles, talk of sex, drugs, and most of all money doesn't apprehend my attention.
To me, a good song has a lot of harmony, different sounds, and an interesting story or idea contained in the lyrics. I don't want to hear about wanting to be a millionaire so friggin' bad. I'd rather find beauty, truth, and wisdom... and some humor as well. This is where I think that the idea of culture comes in.
In the olden days (like Bach and Mozart's time frame) musicians made music so that they would get to eat, or the king didn't kill them. Even as late as the hippie culture, music was looked on as something to enlighten one's self. Although greed and vanity have been around since time immemorial, it didn't permeate every facet of society. This is where I see a change in palette of culture. We are so subjugated by movies, commercials, and advertisements everywhere showing people with so many possessions acting in total bliss that it entrances us to such a degree that we forget what true virtue and curiosity is and simply chomp at the bit. And with such a high degree of importance being put on greed and vanity, it has finally enveloped the vast majority of music. The idea of a quick buck has been turned into the idea of a quickly developed piece of music to make that quick buck. The tragedy is that it works, and society has bought into the idea that if it sparkles, we should forget about what we've built our whole lives upon and change domiciles to that of the new, forgetting everything but what entrances us in the present.
Not to say that crappy music is something new, but it seems to me that it has taken a front seat to the population's choice of what quality is. I aim to change this in my own life as best I'm able. Not only within the music I produce, but in everything I do and bring forth.
"And whatsoever ye do do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men; Knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance for ye." -Colossians 3:23
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Why people enjoy Britney Spears can confuse me as well. But the truth is that in the end, people think that the music I love can be ridiculous as well. Everyone is raised on a different taste. I remember hearing that back when Hayden made music, he was considered very dissonant and not good. Gives an interesting perspective right?
ReplyDeleteTrue enough.
ReplyDelete