Encapsulating the 80's

[ytserush]

On 5/18/2022 at 8:06 PM, stoopid said:

The irony in your post (rant?  ;) ) is that MTV was spoon feeding you certain artists and songs, opposite of that same freedom you next talk about with radio stations that played deeper cuts and lesser heard/lower charting artists.

 

I'm also a product of that exact era of MTV and classic rock radio.  I don't miss it.

I know what you speak of with regards to limited selection, but the same issues existed then that exist now... the listener has to find a source for variety.  Most people in the 80s listened to the 'top 40' stations and/or watch MTV (and eventually VH1) to be told what was "good music".  The listener assumes "If it's on this station, and tons of people are listening to it, then it must be good".  Not all of it was bad, but a fair bit of it was or hasn't aged well.  It's the same today, mainstream sources emphasize "sponsored" artists, the ones with record company backing that get put onto playlists.  It's the same formula to sell music, different medium.

 

 

MTV became that way eventually even as far back as 1983, but when they started they would play nearly any video they had because there wasn't anything else. They were begging for videos. Viacom buying MTV in '84 just accelerated the narrow casting.

 

There needs to be some middle ground between being spoonfed and finding those needles in musical haystacks that have exponentially proliferated since that time

[stoopid]

1 hour ago, ytserush said:

There needs to be some middle ground between being spoonfed and finding those needles in musical haystacks that have exponentially proliferated since that time

Bandcamp is a good place to start.  Spotify and Pandora offer some 'similar artists' playlists, and I know from personal experience it's not hard to get music onto those sites.  Getting enough clicks to be included in the random cycle is another thing.  That's where backed artists still have the upper hand.

 

We need to be clear - aside from perhaps college radio and nowadays the streaming DJ/playlist community, it has ALWAYS been difficult to find new artists.  And when I think about it, how exactly would one go about creating a platform that reads my mind and knows exactly what I'm going to like?  And how does that platform even find me to offer that solution?  Pandora and Spotify are the closest thing we've ever had, as flawed as they are.

[cygnify]

On 5/18/2022 at 8:09 PM, stoopid said:

 

This thread's premise is rooted entirely in nostalgia.  The point is looking back fondly, not looking back critically.  I don't have a fondness for this era, I'm not going to pretend I ever did.  When metal and grunge took over late 80s onward is when I feel like "music" started to filter into the mainstream.  It was a decade of massive variety on the airwaves, but eventually we came back to cheese and marketing dominating.  I equate the grunge era with the hippy music of the late 60s, neither fit the mold at the time and came out of nowhere... and at some point the movement faded and record company marketing departments took over again.  Much like other things in life, modern music seems to ebb and flow in cycles.

You and I will fundamentally disagree about nostalgia for the 80's vs. 90's.  And I would continue to disagree with you regarding any sort of current "aggregator";  there is just too much shit out there to weed through and everything is firmly siloed. As you mentioned, Bandcamp is a possibility; but even there, who has time to weed through 38,000 struggling prog bands to find an actual original one. So, yeah the whole industry has changed many times since that early 80's era.  My reference to MTV is really relating to the first couple years.  There just weren't that many videos out there (neither the channel nor the musicians really knew how to fully exploit this delivery yet.)  Thus, you had a bunch of really weird artists played right up against each other.  Oingo Boingo followed by Dio followed by Devo followed by Rush...  Things that I would have never listened to in a million years (certainly not on even my favorite radio stations in Albany...) that opened me to a wider reality.  In fact, I would owe no small amount of my Rush fandom to early MTV.  

[stoopid]

5 hours ago, cygnify said:

... And I would continue to disagree with you regarding any sort of current "aggregator";  there is just too much shit out there to weed through and everything is firmly siloed. As you mentioned, Bandcamp is a possibility; but even there, who has time to weed through 38,000 struggling prog bands to find an actual original one...

So... you WANT the record company to decide for you?  You want variety, just don't want to spend the time to sort through it?  But expect someone else will know what you will like?  And you seem pretty passionate/adamant about it!  The more you reply, the less I understand your 'beef' or even responses to what I'm posting.  I suspect you don't know exactly what you want from this discussion, other than stoopid doesn't share the same opinions about music.  You had a hard stance on people not liking the last Tool album as well [although there were/are still many of us], so at least you're consistently obstinate.

 

The "genius" of early MTV isn't genius, it was desperation.  The variety of styles was a result of the handful of artists that adopted the music video format, and as a result got some exposure.  It wasn't organic in any way, just shit luck that they chose to make music videos and the channel suited for playing them survived/grew.  Much of that music in those earliest MTV years sucked ass (then and now), it's not genius to have a great song followed by a bad song, or brilliant band like Rush followed by some garbage.  It exposed the listener to as much crud as you're suggesting one would need to wade through on music streaming platforms today, except maybe you'll have better odds an algorithm might hook up with a winner every 10 or so artists that get randomly selected based on similar tastes of other music listeners.

 

To me, it sounds like you're frustrated with something related to this topic but isn't this topic.

Edited May 23, 2022 by stoopid

[stoopid]

On 5/22/2022 at 10:54 AM, stoopid said:

We need to be clear - aside from perhaps college radio and nowadays the streaming DJ/playlist community, it has ALWAYS been difficult to find new artists.  And when I think about it, how exactly would one go about creating a platform that reads my mind and knows exactly what I'm going to like?  And how does that platform even find me to offer that solution?  Pandora and Spotify are the closest thing we've ever had, as flawed as they are.

Obviously this bears repeating.

[invisible airwave]

On 5/22/2022 at 9:06 AM, ytserush said:

 

 

MTV became that way eventually even as far back as 1983, but when they started they would play nearly any video they had because there wasn't anything else. They were begging for videos. Viacom buying MTV in '84 just accelerated the narrow casting.

 

There needs to be some middle ground between being spoonfed and finding those needles in musical haystacks that have exponentially proliferated since that time

Yep, Warner originally owned it before Time merged with it.  They even owned The Movie Channel before it merged with Viacom's Showtime to be it's Cinemax equivalent.

 

Agreed on the middle ground as well.  Most of those needles tend to be typical indie hipster bands with the same sound.  At least college rock back in the 120 Minutes era of MTV then actually did "rock" like The Pixies and Hüsker Dü.

[Entre_Perpetuo]

Not that this thread is about new music discovery, but since the discussion turned there I thought I'd chime in with a mention for, well, this!  Internet forums!  Talking to real people with their own opinions and tastes who more often than not know something (or likely many things) you don't!  If I'm ever thinking to myself "I need something new," usually the first thing I do is try to remember the last thing someone on TRF recommended to me. And those recommendations are usually great!

 

Anyway that's my small chime. Enjoy the MTV debate.

[stoopid]

18 hours ago, invisible airwave said:

... At least college rock back in the 120 Minutes era of MTV then actually did "rock" like The Pixies and Hüsker Dü.

I couldn't for the life of me remember the name of that show, I found/enjoyed many bands between 120 Minutes and Headbanger's Ball.

[stoopid]

18 hours ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

Not that this thread is about new music discovery, but since the discussion turned there I thought I'd chime in with a mention for, well, this!  Internet forums!  Talking to real people with their own opinions and tastes who more often than not know something (or likely many things) you don't!  If I'm ever thinking to myself "I need something new," usually the first thing I do is try to remember the last thing someone on TRF recommended to me. And those recommendations are usually great!

 

Anyway that's my small chime. Enjoy the MTV debate.

Yup, this forum and other internet discussions have introduced me to most of the new (to me) bands I listen to.  Word of mouth is as organic growth as a band can hope for, and is vastly more significant in gaining new fans than all the marketing in the world can hope to accomplish.

[cygnify]

On 5/23/2022 at 2:33 PM, stoopid said:

So... you WANT the record company to decide for you?  You want variety, just don't want to spend the time to sort through it?  But expect someone else will know what you will like?  And you seem pretty passionate/adamant about it!  The more you reply, the less I understand your 'beef' or even responses to what I'm posting.  I suspect you don't know exactly what you want from this discussion, other than stoopid doesn't share the same opinions about music.  You had a hard stance on people not liking the last Tool album as well [although there were/are still many of us], so at least you're consistently obstinate.

 

The "genius" of early MTV isn't genius, it was desperation.  The variety of styles was a result of the handful of artists that adopted the music video format, and as a result got some exposure.  It wasn't organic in any way, just shit luck that they chose to make music videos and the channel suited for playing them survived/grew.  Much of that music in those earliest MTV years sucked ass (then and now), it's not genius to have a great song followed by a bad song, or brilliant band like Rush followed by some garbage.  It exposed the listener to as much crud as you're suggesting one would need to wade through on music streaming platforms today, except maybe you'll have better odds an algorithm might hook up with a winner every 10 or so artists that get randomly selected based on similar tastes of other music listeners.

 

To me, it sounds like you're frustrated with something related to this topic but isn't this topic.

 

Seriously, back to the Tool album?  "beef" "obstinate" "frustrated" (ha!) Check the mirror man, you've consistently spouted your disdain for 80's music - in a thread about encapsulating one's favorite 80's music. I merely expressed my disagreement with your opinion; but to bring it back to our pre-pandemic Tool disagreement it quite telling.

 

Granted, I'd agree that the eclectic diversity early MTV was luck - and I admitted above that I probably wouldn't have said I liked a bunch of their playlist at the time.  But I was quite young and finding my way musically (81-82ish); and this eclectic mix had some gems. Now, I do harbor a sense of nostalgia for the era and recognize some of it as "good". MTV was probably the first time I heard the Police, Big Country, Duran Duran, etc, etc. It wasn't my first exposure to Rush, but the channel certainly fostered my early fandom.  I wouldn't call it my ideal "playlist" or anything close to that, but a sort of random sampler of weird things; some of which I liked. I imagine the level of stylistic diversity on (very) early MTV was something akin to the station Neil wrote about in 'The Spirit of Radio" (CHUM?) as he discussed in various interviews at the time.  Of course, that situation was rapidly changing and disappearing. to the echoes of salesmen..

 

If I had an ulterior motive in my post, as it relates to the 80's, it's was to highlight that MTV is usually pigeon-holed for the heaping pile of crap that it became (as you seem to imply was always the case, yet later express your own influence from Head-Bangers Ball and 120 minutes...) Many younger Rush fans might not even be able to comprehend that at one time the channel was actually a prime source of Rush - ESL got regular midnight showings and individual songs all day, all the way through the P/G concert (simulcast) and The Big Money debut, etc. In those early days, that channel exposed the band to a broader public and grouped them with bands other than the typical Zeppelin, Prog, etc. comparisons (maybe that influenced Rush in a way to go more current and synth?)  So, yeah, MTV had a bunch of crap and it only got worse - but there was some really good stuff to take there too. Taken as a whole, MTV probably encapsulates the 80's best (for all the bad & good that came with it).

[stoopid]

My reaction when I saw the notification that I was quoted was "ugh".  Appreciate the reply.

[BastillePark]

On 5/24/2022 at 11:45 AM, stoopid said:

I couldn't for the life of me remember the name of that show, I found/enjoyed many bands between 120 Minutes and Headbanger's Ball.

Someone or someones have compiled a whole bunch of 120 Minutes info and most of them have a video attached. There are bands I've never heard of (and after watching the video there's a good reason for that) and there are the ones everyone has heard of. If nothing else it's a great time waster.  120 Minutes archive

Edited May 25, 2022 by BastillePark

[stoopid]

On 5/25/2022 at 4:21 PM, BastillePark said:

Someone or someones have compiled a whole bunch of 120 Minutes info and most of them have a video attached. There are bands I've never heard of (and after watching the video there's a good reason for that) and there are the ones everyone has heard of. If nothing else it's a great time waster.  120 Minutes archive

Wow, cool resource.  Now I know where I 'found' Catherine Wheel (their videos appeared on the show several times in 1993 / 1994, which is definitely at a time I was watching).  Lots of good stuff late 80s into the mid 90s on that show.

[ytserush]

On 5/22/2022 at 1:54 PM, stoopid said:

Bandcamp is a good place to start.  Spotify and Pandora offer some 'similar artists' playlists, and I know from personal experience it's not hard to get music onto those sites.  Getting enough clicks to be included in the random cycle is another thing.  That's where backed artists still have the upper hand.

 

We need to be clear - aside from perhaps college radio and nowadays the streaming DJ/playlist community, it has ALWAYS been difficult to find new artists.  And when I think about it, how exactly would one go about creating a platform that reads my mind and knows exactly what I'm going to like?  And how does that platform even find me to offer that solution?  Pandora and Spotify are the closest thing we've ever had, as flawed as they are.

 

Just speaking for myself here, but I don't need a platform that knows what I'm going to like. Part of the joy of discovery is finding out what I like and don't like.

[ytserush]

On 5/23/2022 at 2:33 PM, stoopid said:

The "genius" of early MTV isn't genius, it was desperation.  The variety of styles was a result of the handful of artists that adopted the music video format, and as a result got some exposure.  It wasn't organic in any way, just shit luck that they chose to make music videos and the channel suited for playing them survived/grew.  Much of that music in those earliest MTV years sucked ass (then and now), it's not genius to have a great song followed by a bad song, or brilliant band like Rush followed by some garbage.  It exposed the listener to as much crud as you're suggesting one would need to wade through on music streaming platforms today, except maybe you'll have better odds an algorithm might hook up with a winner every 10 or so artists that get randomly selected based on similar tastes of other music listeners.

 

I'm not saying it was genius, but it was a lot more free form than what it devolved into even if that was an accident rather than by design.

[ytserush]

On 5/23/2022 at 8:04 PM, invisible airwave said:

Yep, Warner originally owned it before Time merged with it.  They even owned The Movie Channel before it merged with Viacom's Showtime to be it's Cinemax equivalent.

 

Agreed on the middle ground as well.  Most of those needles tend to be typical indie hipster bands with the same sound.  At least college rock back in the 120 Minutes era of MTV then actually did "rock" like The Pixies and Hüsker Dü.

 

 

Caught the 120 minutes thing a few times.  Wasn't really a fan of that because they would only play a certain type of band.

 

Early MTV made me a fan of bands such as The Fixx or Joe Jackson. Bands that I've enjoyed even after the calendar to 1990 and beyond.

 

No way to know this but I would think that even college radio has difficulties trying to figure out what to play these days given the sheer volume of music to choose from.

[stoopid]

1 hour ago, ytserush said:

 

Just speaking for myself here, but I don't need a platform that knows what I'm going to like. Part of the joy of discovery is finding out what I like and don't like.

My post was mostly in response to another member's post. 

 

"Just speaking for myself", I've mostly leaned on word of mouth to get introduced to new bands in the past decade+ [plus a brief 1 year stint writing prog music reviews].  I don't spend as much time listening to music now, so a slow accumulation of a few new artists a year seems to be enough to keep my interest.  I can't imagine blindly sorting through Bandcamp (or Spotify/Pandora/etc) is much fun, but that's why they offer streams based on genre and that's a least a start.  It's like turning on the radio to the oldies, classical, pop, easy listening or classic rock station back when record companies didn't completely control the playlists like they do now.  Some degree of randomness, just with a lot more selection.

Edited May 28, 2022 by stoopid

[tangy]

The 80's encapsulated for me was exit stage left.

 

That and she blinded me with science and hyperactive by Thomas Dolby.  Lol

 

[goose]

What a decade for music...

Edited May 29, 2022 by goose

[invisible airwave]

19 minutes ago, goose said:

What a decade for music...

 

There's some debate about London Calling since it came out in early 80 in the states but in December 79 in the UK.  Rolling Stone called it the best album of the decade from what I've read.

[stoopid]

Prince was from this decade, that might be a valid argument in suggesting it was a time of variety in the mainstream.  His music was, and still is, a bit strange when you consider it was as popular as it was.  Prince was also an early adopter of music video and also supports the argument that his choices that landed him time on MTV were a big factor in the success he had.  Truth be told, I didn't care for Prince during his peak years during the 80s.  Until one of his 90s albums caught my ear did I go back to his first few albums and appreciate them.  So while MTV drove my CD buying into mainstream bands like Tears For Fears, Thomas Dolby, Thompson Twins, Cindy Lauper, Men at Work, Weird Al, Def Leopard, etc there were other bands that it did nothing to improve the appreciation of their music enough to prompt a music purchase. Music is after all subjective, so what we like we like, what we don't we don't.  Not even MTV video brainwashing changed that, it was just a conduit like any music delivery medium to get music to our ears.

Edited May 30, 2022 by stoopid

[custom55]

On 5/29/2022 at 6:44 PM, invisible airwave said:

 

There's some debate about London Calling since it came out in early 80 in the states but in December 79 in the UK.  Rolling Stone called it the best album of the decade from what I've read.

The Pretenders S/T album  ( shown in the picture ) was released Dec 27, 1979 ( in the US ) but let's not split hairs.  It's didn't get traction until 1980.   I love that album.

Edited May 31, 2022 by custom55

[Rick N. Backer]

On 5/29/2022 at 6:23 PM, goose said:

What a decade for music...

I was just talking to my Deadhead hippie cousin about this recently.  Think about all the rock bands (including the inspiration for this board) whose signature work was released sometime between 1980 and 1983.

 

[Entre_Perpetuo]

On 6/1/2022 at 4:33 PM, Rick N. Backer said:

I was just talking to my Deadhead hippie cousin about this recently.  Think about all the rock bands (including the inspiration for this board) whose signature work was released sometime between 1980 and 1983.

 

 

 

Hmmm, last time I checked, A Farewell To Kings came out in the 70s... 

 

Edited June 2, 2022 by Entre_Perpetuo

[Rick N. Backer]

1 hour ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

 

 

Hmmm, last time I checked, A Farewell To Kings came out in the 70s... 

 

See what I mean?