Recently, I looked at my playlist and something hit me. I now barely listen to any modern American artists. My playlist is basically a block of the pillows, a block of the Beatles, and a few songs from various artists(ex. NUMBER GIRL, Luminous Orange, Ted Leo, Pixies).

As a result of this, I am leaning towards the conclusion that American music simply fails now and too few individuals know how to make good music. It would be great if someone could prove me wrong with some artists who are still writing good songs.

I don't like any of the options, so am not voting.

However, I see it like this. There are good, great, and shitty artists everywhere. It's easy to find good Japanese artists here because people have dug them up and spread them to others. If you dig here in American music, you're sure to find good stuff.

Mare, by Modern American Artists, I'm pretty sure he's referring to mainstream music that is spewed out for the masses.

In this case, I say it's bad.

If this is not the case, oshii.


Anyway, it seems like this mainstream crap is just getting ridiculous now. Emo bands, the degradation of Rap and Hip-hop... whatever, there's hardly a breath of fresh air in the mainstream music department. It's the same trash regurgitated over and over. Will this trend ever stop? I don't know, maybe it will if American Idol dies. Hell, better yet, maybe the trend will begin to reverse if people were "smarter than a fifth grader."

Heh, I remember channel surfing sometime last week and I turned the channel to 307 or something and 7th Heaven was on. There were like two dumbass emo chicks and some idiotic kid who you could tell liked the two chicks... or one of them... or something. Those two babies (the twins) looked like they were seven now or something, but they still can't act for shit. They'd always say their lines in their dumb little robot voices. I'm glad that show got cancelled. I always hated it and it was so fricking stupid.

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I always feel like I'm forcing myself to isolate from any modern music in America or anywhere in general, but I know there's a few good artists out there. Yeah, the mainstream right now looks pretty ignorant to me but hey why not change that or try to. I'm just waiting for somebody to stand out and hopefully change more people's perspective of how music can be viewed as.
I'm tired of it being viewed mostly for show, almost fake at times but whatever, it's just how I see it.

Hm, well, how recent are we talking? There's lots of good musicians from the 90's, and there's still a lot today. You just have to realize that with new decades comes new genres of music.


Want some good bands/artists? :O Recover, Sparta, At the Drive In, The Mars Volta (Yes, I know those 3 relate ), Glassjaw, Young Love, Head Automatica (Singer of Glassjaw If you've only heard Graduation Day, give their other songs a chance, because Graduation day is utter shit. Try listening to "I Shot William H. Macy", or "The Razor"), the Fall of Troy, Poison the Well (although they've been around since the late-ish 90's), Bane, Piebald (I forgot how long they've been around), Devendra Banhart, Six Organs of Admittance, Kimya Dawson, Regina Spektor, Flogging Molly, Killswitch Engage (Try pre-Howard Jones, although I enjoy End of Heartache. The previous singer was better though.), Animal Collective, Iron and Wine, and I'm sure there are lots of other good bands that are new. You just have to give things a try.


Also, if you're gonna make a broad generalization like all American music pretty much fails now, I think you're probably too entranced with being a weeaboo to realize that most Japanese bands sound too fucking similar.


Edit: Forgot to add in Rilo Kiley :3 I dig them.

I dunno, it seems that every decade or so has its own distinctive musical movement or scene, and that there's also stuff going on that doesn't get noticed as much - which then grows into the next major musical movement after a time. Here I'm thinking especially of the transition from the 80s to the 90s. Hair metal and synth stuff going on, but there was punk rock and things like that going on as well. Then bands like Nirvana really brought that punk and grunge sound into the mainstream. Just as an example. I like Nirvana.

This decade seems to me to be one where indie and faux-indie music has become widely accepted - a sort of variety of rock music that's softer and less aggressive than grunge was. Emo descended from punk, after all, and now has been taken to a different extreme, which is how we've ended up with the whiny bands with vocalists who all sound the same.

Ignoring the indie/mainstream boundary (which has blurred in this decade anyway), I can listen to modern American artists, sure. There's some bands that I like. A lot of American music that I like is also a bit older though.

[quote="Joyeuse"]There's some bands that I like. A lot of American music that I like is also a bit older though.[/quote]

This is about how things are for me.

Isn't it funny how everything seems to be able to be categorized in decades.

Every December 31 of the last year of each decade, the music tribunal meets to discuss which musical genres will dominate the next decade, which ones will fade into the "classics" category, and which ones will fade into shameful oblivion.

[quote="Joyeuse"][size=200]whiny bands with [b]vocalists who all sound the same.[/size][/b][/quote]


I could go on a rant about how much I hate the common "emo-voice" for lack of a better description. You know what that voice is like, it's really annoying and piercing and full of suck. GRR HAET.

I personally liked the music (that was pretty mainstream) from the late 90's. I liked some songs by Fastball, Smashmouth, etc. Of American bands, The Offspring has to be one of my favorite. They've got some really creative lyrics and videos that are full of win.

My friend's got a girlfriend and he hates that BITCH
He tells me every day~

XD

People would rather listen to shit like Panic! At The Disco and Ashlee Simpson than awesome bands like Queens of the Stone Age and Dr. Dog. There's something so wrong about that.

That's why I really don't listen to American music anymore. As Rob Lowe said of Japan in [i]Thank You For Smoking[/i]: "It's the future."

There are still good American bands - Sonic Youth, Asobi Seksu, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, Wilco, Justin King, Maps and Atlases, The Format, Dream Theater (somewhat), Broken Social Scene (Canadian, do they count?), and others. Unfortunately, most candidates for good modern American music are indie rock bands that try too hard to be cerebral and end up pretentious and boring. The majority of American bands I like are slightly older, such Pavement, Dinosaur Jr., old Sonic Youth, etc.

It would be nice if American bands would take a cue from late-80s/early 90s bands that had good musicianship, as well as modern Japanese indie bands that do that same - one of the reasons why they appeal to me.

Overall, Mare's right about good and bad artists everywhere. Regardless of what scene you're looking at, it's going to take effort to get to the good stuff. Japan has tons of awful sleaze-pop artists, but considering bands like Ging Nang Boyz, Sambomaster, and Zazen Boys are pretty well known, I don't feel bad for giving Japan a little more credit.

Really, I don't think we've seen anything spectacular from either Japan or America in the last 5 years, save flotation toy warning's album. That thing is amazing. I say five years mostly because cornelius' point came out in 2002. I'll give props to of montreal for sunlandic twins as well because it's a good dance pop album(although their new album sucks imo).

However, both Japan and America seem to be unable to stop rehashing the music of the last 50 years. I know retro is "in," but I can't believe they've gotten away with it. ANd worse yet, we've moved into the glamor of the 80s.
And Japan isn't far behind, with bands reviving the sound of dance rock bands from just before that time.

I think in general, indie rock has become mainstream's little brother, and what is called the "underground" wears designer clothes. Japan is no different.

Sure there are plenty of fake indie bands, but since there isn't a lot of knockout stuff coming from America right now, anyway, it's easy to just ignore them. Considering that the whole new-wave/post-punk thing has run out of steam in the US, I'm surprised it's still going on in Japan. I like Vola and the Oriental Machine and Sparta Locals (to whatever extent they qualify), but I can't really name any other bands in that style from Japan.

[quote="clouds"]ANd worse yet, we've moved into the glamor of the 80s.[/quote]

Hey, what's wrong with glam rock? Hell, that's what rock is all about.

[quote="clouds"]However, both Japan and America seem to be unable to stop rehashing the music of the last 50 years.[/quote]

Isn't this exactly what all bands have been doing ever since the dawn of music?

[quote="Thinliine"]Sure there are plenty of fake indie bands.[/quote]

I can't see how you can have a "fake" version of something that doesn't mean anything. I mean, "indie" is a pointless word whose only implication is that the band is not signed to a major record label. Mind you, that means 99.99% of all bands in existence. Most of these bands attempt to emulate bands that are signed to major record labels. Therefore, it's all the same, and there is no stylistic line between "indie" and "not-indie." Indie is nothing.