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Comment by thom | Hacker News Reader

Even so, is it really a big deal? There is more - and more varied and complex - music now, than there has ever been at any point in history. And you can find and access almost all of it instantly! Who cares or even knows what's in the charts these days? I can be a huge kids-these-days curmudgeon about music, and the recommendation algorithms aren't even that good, but I have found more music in the last five years that I truly love than I did in the entirety of teens.

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Agree! I'm deep into dungeon synth these days, I love how people find new art expressions in the sea of mediocrity that is this industry.

yeah. Hip hop / pop or whatver the nomenclature is, is way more compoex now. Why? because the real artist is no longer the rebellious young girl or the face tattooed young boy, but the geeky/middle aged music producer behind the scene. Making even the lamest mumblings enjoyable. The singer is just the brand. The face.

Agreed! My hot take among my millennial friends is that popular music today is way more varied and interesting than what we grew up with. Sorry 50 cent. And it’s not like that music disappeared. We get both!

My only complaint is how short songs are now. Everything is tiktok optimized.

More than TikTok optimized, stream optimized. Artists get paid by individual stream, so they make their songs shorter in hopes of getting more streams per album.

I've not noticed that, if anything I'm always delighted to find a 3-minute song these days, it feels like a bit of a lost art.

I always thought most songs were too padded out. E.g chorus repeated 3+ times

Generally speaking you have a lot more diversity in sound.

Latin pop is much bigger and often is present. Kpop makes regular appearances. And now joining their Carribean music cousins are Afrobeats tunes.

I think that’s really it. Pop used to be much better because pop was a serious thing that attracted the best musicians and discerning listeners. Now the best musicians and listeners are all in niche musical communities. Pop is dead.

This mirrors a broader trend. There really isn’t a majority anymore or a popular culture. There are only a million fluid ever changing niches and subcultures, seemingly so rapidly changing and evolving that they can’t even be named.

>pop was a serious thing that attracted the best musicians and discerning listeners.

When was this ever the case? I'm not trying to be a dick, honestly. When was that statement true?

It's more true now than it ever has been. The majority of well known mainstream pop artists are highly competent musicians with an entire team behind them. The technical skill level of the engineers, music directors, and producers working in pop is unreal right now.

This is also true of pretty much all genres too I'm not trying to put anyone down here. The level of quality across all music is just exceptionally high these days.

But also https://youtu.be/eSuK_5zW2iM?si=2g9xUznIm1nCxhqV&t=653

This is probably my geriatric grumpiness speaking, but this seems subjective so I can disagree. Today's pop stars are beautiful faces with teams of highly competent, mostly invisible, professionals working behind the scenes to prop them up with music. It's much easier to take a handsome/pretty person and use technology to manufacture formulaic music around him or her, than it is to take a talented musician and make them picturesque and sellable.

It was also the case years ago, but somehow even moreso today.

I fully agree that quality outside of the mainstream / performance artists is better than ever though!

OK! I won't try to convince you!

There are enough people who are talented and pretty, no need to compromise.

Here's my favorite example of a pop song (though arguably second-tier in actual popularity) from the early 90s that, in my opinion, had some sophistication in the music, if not the lyrics: "That's What Love is For" by Amy Grant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPOe8VKqgJM Observe the way it moves between keys, the chord progressions in the chorus, and the way the guitar solo leads into a key change. Contrast that with so many later pop songs that are just a repeating four-chord pattern all the way through. I mean, there have been four-chord songs for decades (there's that famous Axis of Awesome video), but the classic four-chord songs usually didn't repeat those four chords through the whole song.

Here's a more recent example of a popular song on the theme of love and marriage from the UK.

From a band that focuses on the poetry and word play and who now draw in collaborators from about the globe and routinely pack venues.

The music is minimal but from song to song constantly inventivelt simplistic.

Official Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKcbSOjIzjQ

Live @Nottz Arena: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cGo4isi1Tw

Lyrics: https://www.google.com/search?q=mork+and+mindy+song+sleaford...

Just watch Rick Beato's interviews for some hints.

We can start with the Police, all three of whom he's done: tell us who nowadays is as good as Andy Summers or Stewart Copeland? Or Sting, of course.

Or watch The Wrecking Crew. Or Hired Gun.

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