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Originally Posted by clutnuckle
I see where you're coming from here, and I do like the contrast you've drawn between monarchy and democracy and why it may be the source to some of the more 'visible change'. Though, I wouldn't say we're actually making as much 'progress' as is viewed. We make a new 'gadget' every week that has some superficial, ultimately worthless feature, but very little substance enters current inventions. Of course, scientific/technological/musical genius still exists, but a lot of this so-called inventiveness is just a superficial take on something unnecessary.
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(Monarchy and democracy being used as figurative concepts here to illustrate presence and absence of totalitarianism, I presume, but that's just nitpicking. I don't actually want to pick nits).
Well, I simply have to state my different stance here. I see almost nothing but progress during the last, say, 150 years. Remember what it is that steers the progression, at least where it's allowed to - people's needs and preferences. It's easy for you (and me) to deem certain functions as superficial and worthless in the longer run, but the thing is that 'superficial' is itself not a feature we are entitled to dismiss, and if it's 'worthless' in the eyes of the ones who are expected to use it, then it will disappear sooner or later. That happens all the time.
One not too distant example is the Cash-card, introduced here in Sweden during the late 90's, which basically was a, well, cash-card to which you could tie (a limited amount of) money and therefore pay with. The system never took off though, because it was deemed complicated by the stores and the customers alike, as well as totally redundant since we already had the traditional VISA's and other established cash- and creditcards tied directly to the bank accounts. Thus, it disappeared after just a few years; Consumer preference at work. Whatever is worthy stays (until something else does the job even better). If the hipsters want to stuff their iPhones with apps, let them. I'm happy with my Samsung.
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Originally Posted by clutnuckle
Of course, I don't want to take anything away from the brilliant minds who did what they did in this era. But I still think we'd be lucky to equal another ancient society. Indeed we have more of an application to our science now (as in we can actually do things with it rather than just theorize), but we've still been basing our theories/hypotheses off of very old studies from thousands of years ago (though in chemistry/physics you'd be indeed right that a LOT more has happened as of late than anything of previous). Who's to say that so-and-so wouldn't have discovered <insert radical thing here>? Of course you could say "But so-and-so didn't!", but the only reason he didn't is because he was dead, and the person who actually discovered it likely wouldn't have had it not been for so-and-so's previous work.
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Of course, every strain of newly-found knowledge has to start from previous knowledge. But it wasn't exactly easy to present new theories and discoveries that may have contradicted contemporary opinions. Copernicus for one, would certainly testify about that if he could.
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Originally Posted by clutnuckle
The musical parallel (as I've been talking an awful lot of **** about historical mumbo-jumbo) would be that we are indeed going to suffer in the same way that the musicians/music-enthusiasts of 'yore' suffered. I'll admit that it might not be as drastic as I thought, but I only see it as a natural occurrence. We have more technology and theory to our music, and we get it around a lot quicker, but I don't think we're free from the same constraints as our ancestors.
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The difference here is that the musicians of yore (by whom I assume you mean those from the past centuries and back) simply didn't have the means to preserve their music, not to mention that they - as people - lived under more or less severe conditions which simply couldn't become better had we not started to explore such simple things as hygiene to prolong our lives. The constraints we, in contrast to our ancestors, effectively avoid are mainly the very basic ones, such as the need for food, shelter, hygiene, medicine, infrastructure and judicial protection from violence and theft, to start with. (This is the one reason which makes it impossible to have a musical discussion like this without bringing in historical mumbo-jumbo, so at least I am glad you brought it in.).
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Originally Posted by clutnuckle
A REALLY lame analogy I came up with, but it pretty much describes my feeling:
"In the ten-thousand-year-long process of building a tower, we have been given a collapsed foundation from our ancestors, and we have been gradually reconstructing it for the last few hundred years. However, just like our forefathers, we too have the more-than-likely chance to have our foundations collapse. Whether or not somebody picks up our pieces is neither here nor there."
So I guess my 'thesis' here is that I still think we have no chance to avoid a natural relapse into a mini-'dark age', but perhaps it'll short or less significant than I had imagined. I was a little dramatic earlier on, but that was simply to hammer home the point. I do feel like a negative change is definitely on its way; whether it will drastically affect the way we listen to music, the way we find it, the way we fall in love with it... I suppose you'll need to experience it.
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I see no reason for any major, or even minor, collapse unless a large enough number of people actually want to achieve it. The society as a whole is just too stable, at least in the west and the far east (which by the way has undergone a similar technological evolution as the west, only thrice as fast) to crumble like any of the ancient empires once did. Of course I may be wrong, and if I am I'll gladly buy you a beer (if there is any left after armageddon, that is).
That the way we listen to music is undergoing a major change as we speak is certainly true, and I am actually glad that that it's so. The love for music probably has as many different kinds of origins as there are individuals on the planet and none of us could possibly imagine the ways through which tomorrow's youth will encounter Beatles or Led Zep. I mean, today's youth encounter Rush through South Park and Guitar Hero, how great is that!
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Originally Posted by clutnuckle
Good summary. I've never been one to buy into the whole 'music at this time is better'. I've found more concentrations of music that I like from the 60s and 70s, but that's only because I've binged on them. Equal (or at least very close) amounts of brilliance permeate the music world every year, decade, month, nanosecond, what have you.
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I agree, or should I say, I share the view that the music made in the 60's/70's was generally better than today. No, let me rephrase: The majority of the music I listen to is concentrated around the 60's/70's, because there was still a load of crap made back then as well. One could argue that there was something in the water, that the times were such that it inspired musicians to expand and explore uncharted territories, and that this sort of general environment is all but absent today. I kind of agree on it, but only partly because I still think that the main thing is that there simply weren't as many bands back then as it is today, not to mention that there still were some crucial things that yet hadn't been tried out. Thus the percentage of groundbreaking quality acts were higher. But, once again, that itself is not very relevant at all (unless the main criteria is to find only truly revolutionary bands, in which case I rest my case).