Quote:
Originally Posted by Rainard Jalen
Fact is, at the end of the day music is music, man. All this genre stuff is ridiculous. Why SHOULD we view 50 Cent as being in a different category to Cannibal Corpse, George Formby, Johnny Cash or even Ludwig van Beethoven? They all converge in making music when all's said and done and the dust has settled. The only differences lie in the melodies and the volume. Same could be said in a comparison of Greenday and The Offspring, both classically recognized as being the same genre. Genre's just an illusion, people. Music is music.
Peace.
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Well, while that sounds like a nice romanticised view of music, I think it's more complicated... a bit of a dichotomy if anything.
I like that genre-sorting makes it easy to sort bands, trace musical history and group/find similar sounding bands etc... I don't like that people use genres as a basis for judgement instead of judging music for music's sake; e.g. metalheads often become too pigeon-holed and judge bands by metal aesthetics/standards rather than evaluating it as music in general. Therefore, metal bands which incorporate non-metal elements end up catching a lot of flak. And I don't like how artists/listeners limit themselves to certain genres - musical freedom only comes when you don't restrict yourself.
So at the end of the day, there are arguments both for and against genre-tags. There is a logical basis for categorisation, but there are also consequences which come with it... surely the best way is to be tolerant of genre-tags (and even use them if you wish), but to avoid the shortfalls by remaining open-minded and preventing categorisation from obfuscating your judgement? Well, that's my attitude towards it... I use genre-tags, I don't go overboard, I don't judge according to 'genre standards' and I don't restrict myself (much) by genre. Win win.