QotD: Modern Music

Which brings us, sadly, to today's music — and what a horrible state it's in.

I saw the beginnings of this in the punk scene, and soon afterwards with grunge as well. Punk, at least, was honest about its shortcomings. As the nihilistic "anti-music", it really didn't matter how well the musicians played and sang, or even if they could play or sing at all — and from an artistic perspective, that didn't really matter, because punk's statement was more important than punk music. Some really good bands came out of that era, by the way (eg. The Clash), but their time in the spotlight was lamentably short by comparison with, say, the Beatles.

But it was during the grunge area that we saw how a group of musicians could be brutally exposed by a lack of training. Most, even Nirvana, were garage bands who had been playing in a few clubs off and on, but for no appreciable length of time, and certainly not long enough to harden and hone their skills. Most survived just on raw talent, but, as they discovered after about two years in the spotlight and on the touring circuit, that talent was not enough, and most bands (and the individuals themselves) fell apart very quickly. They never played long enough for the musicians with lesser talent to be weeded out of their bands, and for those with true talent to shine through.

Some carried on, joining other bands, or setting up solo careers, but mostly, they disappeared without a trace, to be replaced by yet another wave of bands just like them — limited talent and no polish. The incessant demand by the music "industry" for new talent has created a kind of ghastly sausage machine, which chews up and spits out musicians at an alarming rate, and it's little surprise to me that pop music is nowadays simply referred to as "content" instead of as art, or music.

It's a good thing that pop music's audience is refreshed every few years by a new generation, because that lack of generational memory is the only thing which allows the process to continue.

Kim du Toit, "Polishing The Jewel", The Other Side of Kim du Toit, 2007-06-16