Mainstream Music

[ddrxero64]

Originally Posted by midnghtraver

I like the way katy perry sings but the rest of its just bad.

Yup, she could do so much more. But in this case, she's probably one of those musicians that foes it for the music and not the money. So if she likes her own music, we can't do much but either support her or support someone else. You can't really stay mad at her after seeing her SNL sketch XD

[3lijah]

I actually like Lady Gaga. Does anyone know how fuccing talented that woman is on instruments? And I kinda like weird chicks anyway. Also, the transvestite shit aint true. And even if it was, i'd still fucc her.

[ddrxero64]

Originally Posted by 3lijah

I actually like Lady Gaga. Does anyone know how fuccing talented that woman is on instruments? And I kinda like weird chicks anyway. Also, the transvestite shit aint true. And even if it was, i'd still fucc her.

Bold statement, respecting you for standing by your statement. She is talented I agree, but her aim is at money, not the music. She makes money making songs, and her visual style is marketed at that.

[3lijah]

Originally Posted by ddrxero64

Bold statement, respecting you for standing by your statement. She is talented I agree, but her aim is at money, not the music. She makes money making songs, and her visual style is marketed at that.

WELL UH.... just to make things clear, there wouldn't be any intercourse if she were to still have a penis. That would be awkward.

[midnghtraver]

Originally Posted by 3lijah

I actually like Lady Gaga. Does anyone know how fuccing talented that woman is on instruments? And I kinda like weird chicks anyway. Also, the transvestite shit aint true. And even if it was, i'd still fucc her.

You can be talented and mainstream at the same time. Theres a reason they are mainstream, if they weren't talented they wouldn't have any followers at all.

Originally Posted by 3lijah

WELL UH.... just to make things clear, there wouldn't be any intercourse if she were to still have a penis. That would be awkward.

+1 To the topic.

[ddrxero64]

Originally Posted by 3lijah

WELL UH.... just to make things clear, there wouldn't be any intercourse if she were to still have a penis. That would be awkward.

ROFL Nah I got it, I was just saying that what you said was clear and concrete. You know for a fact that stuff isn't true, the last bit was more to emphasize the point. But lol wow, yea I get it. Just respecting the fact that you make your own opinion and stick to it.

Yes, it would be awkward.

[twitchywindowbreaker]

Kesha has no talent that I know of Katy Perry is Hot Justin Beiber is a little girl with terrible hair. I actually Love Lady Gaga and Lil Wayne lol I love to hear other people's input though

[midnghtraver]

Originally Posted by twitchywindowbreaker

Kesha has no talent that I know of Katy Perry is Hot Justin Beiber is a little girl with terrible hair. I actually Love Lady Gaga and Lil Wayne lol I love to hear other people's input though

They all sound the same to me.

[3lijah]

Originally Posted by midnghtraver

They all sound the same to me.

this. Watered down nonsense, is all.

[FFR4EVA_00]

mainstream music sucks therefore i am smart listen to this generic newgrounds music that i worked 15 minutes on in fl studio

[Phlegmatism]

There is no truly successful mainstream artist with no visual representation. Music wouldn't be what it is without television and youtube.

[Nyokou]

Mainstream Korean pop is awesome.

I used to like Lady GaGa until I decided I didn't want to be part of a bunch of braindead idiots who think she is a God or something. Plus I really liked the way she looked in Poker Face. The black eyebrows and ugly yellow hair is ugh. And her songs are ugh now too. I listen to pop music for the fun of it, which is why The Fame was so great. And so was The Fame Monster (the music videos for that album were godawful though). After that I just completely lost interest in her.

Plus the fans are annoying as fck. It's annoying to see some asswipe go to music vids of someone I like and say "Looks like Lady GaGa". I mean, seriously, fck off. Fans are so dumb. Just cause Lady GaGa does something or wears something, it's automatically credited to her. Practically everything she has ever worn is a total rip of Roisin Murphy and even Madonna.

[MopeyJoe]

Main stream music really sucks these days. Not going to sugar-coat it, mainly because - like what some people said - it's about money. "Artists" these days have figured out the best way to make money is to slap together the worst possible sounding sh*t into some amazing sounding late 80's-early 90's music.

All I ever hear on the radio from rappers are how they either:
-Have sex with random girls
-Do drugs
-Have money
-Have been hurt from some girl
-How they think they are better than everyone in the world

It's really getting repetitive. It also seems like a bunch of mainstream "music" is just auto-tuned crap. If I could simply talk into a microphone and have someone edit what I said into some robotic sound, then turn that into something that will make people freakout whenever they hear it, I'll start saving for an auto-tuner.

It also seems like there is a new "number one hit" on the radio every week. People who listen to mainstream "music" remind me a lot of hardcore multiplayer fans - they will play/listen to whatever is newest, and then stop playing/listening to whatever when the next game/"song" comes out.

People these days are easily distracted. They have about has much attention span as my cat. The only thing they ever seem to listen to is whatever happens to be playing on the radio. And I know this because the bus I take to and from school is filled with stupid people who listen to mainstream crap, and I hear a different song coming from a different "artist" or group every week. And people love it... how terrible.

One last thing: I thoroughly believe that the current mainstream "music" is corrupting the younger generation. On top of what I mentioned above, rap "songs" tend to talk about murder, rape, and gangs. Ever heard of the NWA? It stands with n-word With Attitude. Believe it or not, they actually have a song called "Cop Killer." And they also have a song called "Express yourself." Killing cops... expressing who you "truly are," these could possible be contributing to younger kids becoming more troubled.

I rest my case.

[Treia]

Cop Killer was written by Body Count, not NWA.
Ice-T (the lead singer) wasn't even associated with NWA . . .

As for liking mainstream, and saying that it's corrupting the minds of the young; what do you think of artists like Mumford & Sons, Coldplay, Relient K, Fleet Foxes, or Imogen Heap? I've yet to really see how artists who have exposure really be negative influence on our minds, as far as who we are as people or choices we make. I let people have their opinions, listen to what they want, like who they like, and all that, but I never understood how they could walk all over an artist and their music, and give it a bad name - because that's no different than slapping the faces of people who enjoy it. We can all come up with reasons why we listen to something, or not like something, and no one will ever be right, if you think about it.

I don't know, maybe there's just something wrong with me . . .

[twitchywindowbreaker]

Uh NWA didn't do Cop Killer Body Count did

[agonist]

Its not going to change until people open their eyes to the bs and stop following each other like blind herded sheep. MTV and its jersey shore shit isn't really helping either. Our government wants us to be mindless idiots basically

[MopeyJoe]

Originally Posted by agonist

Our government wants us to be mindless idiots basically

Which apparently it's working for them because there a ton of people without the common sense to do simple tasks.

And Treia, it would be difficult for you to understand and realize that I live right next to a very bad city. There are so many troubled kids in that city, and all they seem to listen to is rappers, and it just so happens to be that a good chunk of kids from that city go to the same high school as me, so I can clearly see what terrible people they are. The rap "music" may be contributing to what is making them troubled, but I also blame their parents, but this isn't the thread for that.

[Treia]

I don't want make it sound like I'm a golden rule or exception, but I actually grew up on hip-hop, rap, and reggae. My parents weren't the most positive influence, or best they could be either. I never got the Birds and the Bees talk (I still don't know it, so I have to create my own way to teach my children, if that day comes). They never sat me down to teach me the repercussions of drugs, alcohol, and choices I make. They are heavy drinkers, and smokers (unfortunately). And, well, they never really invested in any of my interests. As you might of guess, I've been severely shorthanded by them, even to this day. I was born in 1990, and urban music was the only music I even considered listening to and liking, up to 2004. In late 2004 was when I actually started to consider other music, and even then, I thought rock and classical was for "pussies". I felt embarrassed when in mid-2005, that's when I started to really like other types of music that I never liked before, and felt like a hypocrite. So you do the math, in all my life, I haven't been listening to other types of music half as long as I have been listening to urban music.

Currently, I'm a fairly open minded, humbled, Hispanic individual. I celebrate all walks of life, and respect everyone, and receive them without bias or prejudice.

Hip-hop and Rap are integral to my music life, and dear to me, because they give me a sense of home (I mean, I grow up with it, how can I not?). But to use music as a scapegoat is sheepish, and pussyfoots from the real issue. You brought up the main issue, which is the community that we live in. I grew up in New Jersey (really close to the Jersey shore haha). I wouldn't doubt that if I lived three hours up, in New York, my upbringing might be totally different, even in a negative direction. As sad is it may seem for me to say, "Hey, living in New York means you're going to be a corrupted," but I'm only speaking about it in the sense that it is more realistically possible for it to occur there than elsewhere. I have a lot of friends and family from New York who don't even have a shred of the "hood" mentality, but we can't dismiss that urban life has its negative effects. It's important to note that there are no absolutes as to what really may or may not make a person "corrupt", like me growing up in New Jersey, should we consider Mark Chapman.

In regards to negative lifestyles, the connotation of bad neighborhoods and upbringing can be attributed to the lifestyles of the people who live there. But again, using music as the culprit is dead wrong. Not everyone is passionate about music. Some people listen to it just because it's there. Realizing this, who are we to say that music has a considerable effect on anybody knowing that not everyone really cares about music?

Music is a form of expression, and urban artists do express their hood lives, but they don't do it to commandeer our minds or body to take action in anything; that's solely our doing. Like Cop Killer, looking over the lyrics, or listening to the song, one might get the impression that cops are bad people, the enemy, and we must do away with them. To people in tuned with music, they would understand that it wasn't a song to say let's kill cops, because it was a response to the unjustified brutalities of the 90's, but the artists' social commentary and metaphysical concept to this issue that's more relevant as a statement then as it is now. But what about the people who are indifferent to music?

If an artist is writing about the hood life, are they to blame for lives people live? What people listen to, how they listen to it, where they hear the music, is totally out of the artists' control. Sure, they have a responsibility for the music that they write, like any action we commit, but that's what makes them an artist. If not, we might as well program robots to write music. The state of a neighborhood is governed more by the people who live there, and not the music that just so happens to be popular in that area. Public Enemy's "Fight the Power" is the only song I can honestly say was relatively created to incite a mental movement and reaction in the listener. I feel that some of the lyrics were a bit abrasive, but these challenging expressions of truth are necessary to grow from.

If we become corrupt individuals, we as people are to blame. People who force on us negative lifestyle choices, like violence, and theft. People who force on us negative and unrewarding ways of thinking. We are a product of what we take in from the world. We might not have a choice of where we live, and some of us have it so hard that there is no easy escape. Yes, music does define a culture, but plays no major role in who we are and what we do. Ultimately, we have full control and final say of who we are, and what we do, as our surroundings is ours to discretion their potency to us. Corruption is us as a person who tries to be like other people, perhaps from fear, or for our ill-perceived notion of "success". People who can help or guide others from growing up corrupted like this, but don't, are more to blame than music, because I've yet to see anyone toting music like the Bible. Blaming, and taking away music isn't the solution, because another art form will be in its place, because art is everywhere and will always be everywhere, regardless the type or demographic. If music's purpose was to really dictate our lives like "Think this way. Live this way. Express yourself this way. This is the truth, and the only truth," wouldn't you think we'd all have the same opinions and beliefs?

If I was listening to Beethoven on my iPod, and I walked passed you, would you instinctively know all of this about me? Let's say scenario A doesn't happen. Instead, what if I walked passed you one day, and I had the Marshall Mathers LP in my headphones, would you tell me to stop listening to it, and say I'm being corrupted?
(yes, these are rhetorical questions)

[MopeyJoe]

So much reading....

I'm not saying that it is rap or hip-hop's fault for corrupting children, I'm saying that it could be a contributing factor. And even if it's not, I have noticed that kids with troubled lives usually listen to some form of rap or hip-hop. And you can't say your life wasn't troubled because you said your parents never seemed to take interest in your interests.

Living right next to Pontiac, and having half of their teenage population come to my high school makes me clearly see that there are a bunch of troubled kids, and they just so happen to listen to rap. And how do I know this? Because they can't shut up about their favorite rapper. They are rude, disrespecting, troubled, and ignorant. I'm not saying you are, but these kids... are terrible.

Once again, I'm not saying it's rap's fault, but it could contribute to it. I think the main contributing factor to troubled kids is actually their parents not caring enough for them, but this isn't the thread for that.

[3lijah]

I personally think that the music industry involves a lot of hypocritical point of views. The term "mainstream" honestly is used for music performers that make a salary out of the music they create for the general public, whatever you would call mainstream music. Over the years there has been invalid arguments over ridiculous points and those arguments usually tend to venture outside the point. Imo, the only ppl that actually have an understanding of what music really is are the people that really do listen to EVERYTHING. By listen to everything I don't mean a couple songs that happen to be in that genre, I mean the same way you listen to hip hop or metal or country or whatever the fucc ppl listen to these days. Those are the only ppl. And even those ppl can be biased because they still favor one genre over the other music. And who doesn't do that? The biased opinions will always exist. Whatever music that you really enjoy, I haven't one doubt in my mind that you have at least one biased opinion on it. I like to enjoy music that has a lot of musicianship and creativity(dare I say). With that, I listen to metal, all kinds(and that's why I said, "dare I say"). I enjoy it because I am a musician myself and have been playing guitar for years. Except I can't say the same for metalcore, that's repetitive bullshit(see what i mean?? lol). But I also enjoy other music too, because sometimes, when you wanna chill and listen to some tunes, Derek Rydquist or Randy Blythe aren't the ideal chill-out singers to listen to.



.... totally forgot where I was really going with all this, but idgaf. I wasnt on the debate team in high school for a reason.