please empty your brain below
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I suggest Johnny Flynn's latest album Sillion and anything by Eivor.
Both very talented singer/songwriters...
Tony Martin | 26.05.18 - 7:07 a.m. | #
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Would be interesting to read a parallel analysis from one of the youngsters on your doorstep - what is it about the music they like/respond to (or not). Do accessibility (download in a moment rather than going to a record store) and promotion have more of an impact than musicality and musicianship. Or we could ask Smashy. Or Nicey.
Waterhouse | 26.05.18 - 7:42 a.m. | #
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As regular (unpaid) chauffeur to my 18+ daughter and her possee of girlfriends, I am vaguely familiar with some of these dire instrument-less tracks.
They too sing the words, and often greet each (to me, virtually identical) song with unexpected excitement: "Oh, what a banger this is..!" I find this unfathomable, but also think this is the expected parental response.
Frank F | 26.05.18 - 7:52 a.m. | #
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My neighbour thinks I don't know who the performers are that their girl likes to mimic. I do but don't care for the sound they make...as you say, there is a distinct lack of tune or decent lyrics. However, it seems my finds in contemporary music are generally without any singing...apart from C Duncan whose output evokes vague references to 70's family tv shows. This both slightly apalls me and amuses me at the same time.
B | 26.05.18 - 7:59 a.m. | #
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It was quite a way into the chart run down before I could be certain you weren't making up the names of the artists.
Ian | 26.05.18 - 8:04 a.m. | #
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I didn't grow out of the music on Radio 1, but I grew out of the DJs.
When I do occasionally hear teenagers listening to music, I often say "Oh, I remember the original version of this song." Then wince as I remember my parents saying that to me.
Jon Jones | 26.05.18 - 8:10 a.m. | #
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Brilliant DG ha ha
I avoid listening to radio due to the inane chat and limited play list. Flo-motion radio or Resonance fm in London is a good alternative
Bruce Wayne | 26.05.18 - 8:16 a.m. | #
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Somewhere between the ages of 35 and 55, just about everyone seems to switch from appreciating (or at least tolerating) current pop music to disliking it.
However, it is rare to see such a well-argued negative review of the stuff. You have clearly taken to heart the advice (perhaps from an English teacher): "Don't just say that you like/dislike something - explain why".
Malcolm | 26.05.18 - 8:25 a.m. | #
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I'm disappointed at how little skill there is to making modern music. All I need is a copy of [Windows equivalent] Garage Band, a decent mic and a bit of luck.
I yearn for the days when the likes of Queen, Genesis and Led Zeppelin were filling the charts, not random nobodies off the street with a laptop and a horseshoe in their rucksack.
Raedwald | 26.05.18 - 8:28 a.m. | #
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I blame Simon Cowell......
Southern Heights (Light Railway) | 26.05.18 - 8:43 a.m. | #
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I think you are spot on here - I still see live music by new acts (when I get it - living outside a city there's precious little about) and listen to lots. But there is a terrible sameness, and the autotune/vocoderisation of the singers was innovative for a line, but deadly for a song. For a playlist...
I wonder if a lot of them would be better as 2:30 length 60s singles - they might not pall to the same extent if everything wasn't repeated a dozen times.
Still, at least you can't say "the bass is too loud and I can't hear the words". Unfortunately they are rarely worth listening to.
Nick Atty | Homepage | 26.05.18 - 8:49 a.m. | #
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'It's music, Jim, but not as we know it'. Roll on the Proms
100andthirty | 26.05.18 - 8:51 a.m. | #
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There are at least some bands trying to do more traditional, "proper" music, as Years & Years demonstrate.
Were the numbers you have omitted (eg 15, 16, 17, 19, 20) any better or any worse?
dg writes: They don't play the entire Top 40.
Andrew | 26.05.18 - 8:56 a.m. | #
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Your feeling that you had a broad appreciation of all music was exactly how I used to feel, until I too began to detest the Radio 1 output more and more. My biggest dislike is Autotune, and has been since Cher. Actually singing properly on a record seems to be entirely optional these days, if not discouraged!
Al | 26.05.18 - 9:08 a.m. | #
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You've avoided saying what it is you like - it could be Jimmy Osmond and Renee & Renato for all we know.
One of the most frequent comments on Youtube videos is that 'current' music is rubbish compared with that from the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s - so it does seem to be related to what you listened to in your youth.
The internet does offer unlimited access to music, I listen to stuff now that I'd have never have heard of otherwise, or have never risked buying (for example Balanescu Quartet), much as I enjoy 6music, I also realise that any 'broadcast' is still restricted to the 'radio edit' whereas thanks to the internet I can languish in the full xxx minute version of the track.
Still Anon | 26.05.18 - 9:08 a.m. | #
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Didn't Punk (V.1) come out of just this sort of dissatisfaction with 'mainstream music' and a bad political and economic situation?
It just took you a bit longer than the rest of us to get there. As Malcolm said above, 35-55 is the usual range... you got to nearly the latter.
May I recommend Johnnie Walker's Sound of the 70s, 3-5pm, Sunday afternoon, Radio 2?
Blue Witch | 26.05.18 - 9:12 a.m. | #
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I agree that pop music seems to be less universal than it used to be.
Question. How do the young people find out about this music? Growing up in the 80s, we youth were force fed the pop hits of the day on every children’s TV show. Even blue peter had pop bands!
Dan | 26.05.18 - 9:16 a.m. | #
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The problem is that far more new music is available now than used to be, so whilst the top 40 used to cover a large proportion of new music, now it can only cover a tiny percentage at the very top. If you had a top 500, you would see a lot more variety.
Jimbo | 26.05.18 - 9:25 a.m. | #
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George Ezra’s mum was my form teacher and his dad my PE teacher so I’ve followed his career quite closely. I might be biased but I think he’s a very talented young man.
Phil | 26.05.18 - 9:38 a.m. | #
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To think that I once considered joining this particular branch of the industry back in the 90s!
But I was 'healed' after working for a major for a month or so. Even back then, it was an industrial production process with the main purpose of generating income; the values within the music never mattered, not today, not 30 years ago.
There's always good new music beyond the charts, but ever after the music cassette, when the industry properly switched to a supply-driven model, the pop branch has been an artificial functional mass market.
commonliner | 26.05.18 - 9:56 a.m. | #
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Of course the school children may well not be listening to Radio 1. Average age of listeners to the station is still about 30. Also, I wonder is it the music that makes the track popular, or the video that goes with it. The chart is no longer 100% based on sales so it's not the same as when dg was more into it.
ap | 26.05.18 - 10:26 a.m. | #
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Oasis will never be topped
Luke | 26.05.18 - 10:30 a.m. | #
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My grandchildren all use spotify for their media needs.
Looking at that list I recognise only Ariana Grande, and that's because I took them on the 14 May to her Amsterdam concert.
Age is the biggest divider in music tastes.
YDU | 26.05.18 - 10:46 a.m. | #
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@commonliner
I think this is the point that everyone misses. The music industry is about making money. It tries to do this by promoting music that it thinks people will pay money for.
Shows like "Britain's Got Talent" or "The Voice" are all about making the producers money. The fate of the contestants is a side show.
I was involved in gigs at Uni. It was an eye opener as to how much the whole system is engineered. Encores? Pre-planned. Audience applause? Sometimes pre-recorded. And let's not get into how much (or little) the artists actually play live when on stage.
Jon Jones | 26.05.18 - 10:54 a.m. | #
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I'm 57 and, looking back i think i lost interest in 'current' music in the late 80's, early 90's unless it was Bowie or Ferry or anyone who had been important to me as a teen and was still around. And that, i think, is the point. These people - whoever they are - are so IMPORTANT to you as a kid in a way they will never again will be as cynicism and weariness with life takes over.
Mind you i'll swear the artistes i liked were a lot more talented than these buggers.
Harrumph.
Milo | 26.05.18 - 11:17 a.m. | #
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I was more brought up on late 60s and early 70s stuff; I remember excitedly going home from school on a Tuesday to see the top 20 which my mum had dutifully written down, complete with question marks when she hadn't properly heard the name of the song / artist.
I don't know exactly when I started listening to John Peel but that certainly changed my taste, primarily to punk and roots reggae; no longer would I care about the charts (apart from an occasional tune which caught my ear).
Tim | 26.05.18 - 11:23 a.m. | #
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What I miss is the excitement of new music coming out and how it felt to tie it to life experiences. The pirate stations were so vital to this; you'd get a track out one day and within weeks there would be loads like it, as if the telegraph had listened and responded.
Matt | 26.05.18 - 11:26 a.m. | #
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Thankyou for this list and the links DG. Interesting to listen to some bands I've never heard of.
Cornish Monkey | 26.05.18 - 11:55 a.m. | #
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I completed 5 years at uni in 1970 and about the same time gave up on the majority of pop music other than a handful of acts. I can remember the excitement when I first heard a Springsteen album ('Born in the USA') being played in HMV's Oxford St flagship shop in the 80s, I was hooked. Back in the early 60s I remember I enjoyed virtually everything in the Top 20, and still do. I think the problem is that there is a limit to he number of new melodies etc that can be created without some form of repetition. Maybe I am getting old but when I have the car radio on Radio 2 I may enjoy a song but I find very few if any distinctive voices which wasn't the case in my youth. And what happened to the instrumentals that played a huge part in the charts late 50s, early 60s, I could and still do listen to Duane Eddy for hours!
Old codger | 26.05.18 - 11:56 a.m. | #
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Like DG I tried to listen to the top 40 a couple of months ago. I gave up after a few songs.
I stop following the charts in the late 80s largely because work got in the way. I did keep track of music via magazines and the telly (MTV etc) but mostly switched to album purchases having amassed a lot of singles. Somewhere in the late 90s I stopped buying music altogether.
It is only in the last 12-15 months courtesy of twitter that I've found a series of good radio shows that have rekindled my interest but more towards 70s-90s music than current stuff. The one exception is grime which despite me being in wholly the wrong age group I rather like. It has some energy and relevance and variety.
I've also resumed digging around in record and charity shops to fill in gaps in my record collection as I've found music I missed from the 70s to 90s. It's nice to have regained some enthusiasm and to still be discovering "new" music.
PC | 26.05.18 - 12:21 p.m. | #
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Here's James Masterton's masterly analysis of this week's chart: https://chart-watch.uk/index.php/week-ending-may-31st-2018
diamond geezer | Homepage | 26.05.18 - 12:48 p.m. | #
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I think one of the key issues with modern music is that the music itself just doesn't matter as much any more. Pop stars are the modern version of yesterday's all-round entertainer, with concerts, acting, paid appearances and product endorsement at least as important to them as making music. Music is a means to an end, rather than an end in itself, the current hit matters for as long as it's a hit, and then fades away into the mush.
My daughter (early 20s) is amazed at how I can sing along to the lyrics of pretty much any record from the 50s/60s/70s. I asked her why she thought none of today's stars were making protest records, given there is plenty for millennials to protest about. She couldn't understand the concept of a protest record - music is just a feelgood background noise, you dance to it, it flogs perfume, and that's all. It just doesn't matter any more.
Philip | 26.05.18 - 1:33 p.m. | #
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It's really hard to differentiate not liking current music because you're getting old, as opposed to not liking it because it isn't very good.
In many ways history is the best judge of "pop music", if people are still listening to it 20 years later, if new singers are performing/covering these songs, if the music is still being used to accompany TV clips, then they're probably great "pop" music.
Mikey C | 26.05.18 - 2:22 p.m. | #
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To reinforce Mikey C’s point, in my experience the very best music grows on one and is often dismissed as banal on the first hearing. On the other hand, music that is liked on the first hearing quickly becomes an irritation and I have a long list of tunes considered “die happy if I never hear again”.
This I would cite as a fault with the Eurovision Song Contest where each entry is all but heard for the first time by the audience unless it is unoriginal.
ErwinH | 26.05.18 - 2:47 p.m. | #
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I recommend the legendary Radio Caroline, Europe's first album station: there should be a good signal on DAB+. Otherwise just pull the aerial straight up and tune manually to block 9A and move the radio around until it shows a signal. Alternatively, try good old steam radio on 648kHz AM / 463 metres medium wave (the old BBC World Service frequency).
Sixties and seventies aficionados have lots of online choice without commercials or mindless DJ waffle, e.g. the Oldies Project and Flower Power Radio, both of which feature many less well known and rare tracks.
Gerry | 26.05.18 - 3:29 p.m. | #
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@ Philip "music is just a feelgood background noise, you dance to it, it flogs perfume, and that's all. "
I think you've hit the nail on the head.
Today my son (17) muttered something about needing to make a 70s/80s/90s playlist for his phone because the "music was better back then"!
This revelation came about because he'd recently been exposed to Boney M's "Rasputin" on You Tube and now couldn't get it out of his head, which maybe goes to show just how low things have sunk today!!!
My kids have similar tastes to me (or maybe it's vice versa!) and have never bothered with chart stuff. They create playlists on Spotify.
Most of the "new" bands I listen to were introduced through them. If you ever see a 50-something woman rocking out to Avenged Sevenfold, AFI and Green Day - that'll be me!!
Cornish Cockney | 26.05.18 - 5:48 p.m. | #
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I think I must be lucky for staying out of those charts for my whole life, that I am not really troubled when I grow out of something.
At least the music industry here hasn't descended to the level that look is the only defining factor (I still prefer classical concerts even *when* I'm that low)
Patrickov | 26.05.18 - 8:30 p.m. | #
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There is a lot of very good music out there, it simply not played on the radio in this country. I go to 2 to 3 gigs a week and there is plenty to like and most regular concert goers listen to stations such as KCRW and KEXP over the internet.
Simply grab a copy of DIY or Loud and Quiet and head over to Hackney or Shoreditch and discover another world.
Veri Herga | 26.05.18 - 9:33 p.m. | #
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Thank you all for the wealth of information to expand my musical horizons!
Bob L-S | 26.05.18 - 10:14 p.m. | #
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the drake track is a impossible for. me to listen to. singing on top of a classic by Lauren Hill, I can't focus on one or the other.
Tim m | 26.05.18 - 10:38 p.m. | #
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A few months ago I was noshing away at my dinner with the TV on for company, not watching it really, and an advert came on with music that faded in and out, and when it got to the end, the voiceover announced it was the latest NOW music compilation of popular and chart music.
"Christ", I thought, "You'd think that for a compilation CD / download they would give you snatches of more than one track to hook you in."
About an hour later I was sitting down actually watching a programme when the same advert came on again. This time I was actually looking at the screen and I saw the subtitles that tell you what track is playing, and to my surprise they HAD shown about half-a-dozen different artists. But when I had just heard the tunes, I couldn't tell the difference between them. I then got very paranoid that I was getting old and had crossed into the realm of "new music all sounds the same to me".
I was reassured by my colleagues at work that in fact new music does all sound the same.
Uncle Audrey | 26.05.18 - 10:39 p.m. | #
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Thing is though. Round about 1988, music fragmented into hundreds of new genres that took a sharp turn left and disappeared off the top 40 radar. There's more music now than ever, but it's playing to 200 people in a sweaty basement. I get it, there is no mainstream. Which is different to the way it used to be. So?
Julian Bond | 26.05.18 - 11:26 p.m. | #
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Perhaps you should have gone to see the Rolling Stones performing this week at a stadium near you
Brian | 27.05.18 - 6:09 a.m. | #
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I believe there was a lot of crap music around in the 1950s/60s/70s/80s/90s but it wasn't so easy to get it out to a wide audience then, and it just got forgotten.
John | 27.05.18 - 8:47 a.m. | #
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It's all what I call 'phone music' designed to be heard in sharp definition on the tinny speakers to annoy fellow bus passengers.
NickW | 27.05.18 - 12:09 p.m. | #
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I was pleasantly surprised to find that I thought that Amy Winehouse had talent. I LOVE Elle King.
Antipodean | 27.05.18 - 2:14 p.m. | #
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@ Cornish Cockney - I love the comment about your 17 year old son needing to draw up a playlist because he's been "ear wormed" by Boney M.
I realise you may not need too much inspiration but I regularly listen to some shows on Phonic.FM (exeter community radio). They have a great spread of music but the shows I listen to are the Time Machine shows - variously covering the 70s, 80s and 90s. Oh and Two Knobs and an Oscillator (electronic music) which is a monthly show.
There are websites for each show with a playlist plus all the shows are on Mixcloud. It is far from being all mainstream stuff - lots of great stuff. I hear new (to me) tracks on every show.
I can also wholeheartedly recommend My80s, Sequins to Suburbs, Diamond Lights Express and the Cabinet of Curiosities on Mad Wasp Radio.
Finally Pistols to Pulp is also brilliant - all past shows on Mixcloud
Sorry if that feels like a lot of promo for radio shows but they're not mainstream stations.
PC | 27.05.18 - 2:47 p.m. | #
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I gave up pop music on the radio when the pirates closed in mid 1967. Now the only music I hear is from 78s - the dance bands of the 1920s and 30s had tunes with lyrics you could sing... and I do, as I'm dancing round the flat with my Hoover. "If I had a Million Dollars..."
Alex Mckenna | 27.05.18 - 5:09 p.m. | #
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Calvin Harris and Dua Lipa was a banger as soon as it was released. Agree it goes back to classic sunny type dance from a few years ago but still a top current tune.
Rick | 27.05.18 - 9:13 p.m. | #
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The missus likes to watch old TOTP and Vintage TV a fair bit for background noise. Ok, so I guess she listens rather than watches. (Cue usual argument about "the radio uses way less 'leccy than the TV!") But one thing I can confirm is that there are really only a few times over the years where the Top 40 *isn't* all a bit drab and samey. There are huge stretches of the 80s and 90s with very little of any appreciable merit on the charts. Granted, the highlights are HUGE, rather than the "same thing but done a lot better" that most big hits are these days. But I'm not sure there are a lot more places for music to experiment any more. And the Top 40 is increasingly irrelevant as it's so damned easy for people who like something different to go and get what they want elsewhere.
Having a 7 year-old, I get to only hear the true earworms. Some of them are pretty good. But again, nothing new under the sun. Last year, "You Don't Know Me" was impossible to avoid in the house and it managed to not annoy me. But then it's a lot of mmm-uhuh and nananana. Just done better. And I still want to go back in time and murder Cher and Eiffel65 before autotune caught on.
Chz | 28.05.18 - 8:43 a.m. | #
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I think @Julian Bond has it right. Mainstream music is now so much narrower, as anyone wanting to properly explore different genres doesn't need the mainstream as gatekeeper, they have all the resources they'll ever need at their fingertips. I'm 44 and going to more gigs than I ever did in my younger days, most of which are underground metal of one shape or another, usually in tiny clubs or pubs. I discover music through blogs, social media, playlists (Bandcamp etc), podcasts and from chatting to people at gigs. I've got the same thrill of discovery as I did back when it was all tape trading and fanzines and just have no need for playlisted commercial radio telling me what I should listen to.
Phil | 03.06.18 - 7:49 p.m. | #
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The reason everything seems to sound the same is because that's what the major record companies are aiming for. They are very risk averse and they deliberately stay close to the formula that they know works. It costs money to promote a record or an artist, so the companies will not stray far from what worked the last time and the time before that. It is also why TV talent shows exist -- the companies get to release material they can be confident will sell. Too bad if the results have little artistic merit.
Like DG but a few years earlier, I knew the charts of the 1970s well but wouldn't have the first clue what is in today's charts. So I must be getting older!
I remember being utterly blown away in 1972 when I first heard a single by 10cc. I'd never heard anything like it before. Nowadays, major record companies would not be so adventurous. Chart music was better back then, or maybe I'm just biased.
Danny Robinson | 09.07.18 - 2:52 a.m. | #
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A professor of musicology explains the changes to music in the 2010s:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-51061099
"Streaming changed the way we listened to music, and music changed in response to the way we listened. Songs got shorter, genres bled into one another, and language barriers dissolved."
diamond geezer | Homepage | 15.01.20 - 7:26 a.m. | #
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