Robert Johnson
 

I was reading up on Robert Johnson who's material was recorded around 1936 and 1937. His music wasn't recorded on a major or popular album until 1961. But that all aside, when he traveled from town to town back in the 30's he didn't always just play the blues but instead, played what ever was popular at the time, on the street corners and local pubs. He was known to have the ability to hear a song for the first time and was instantly able to pick out the music and play it on guitar.
When Brian Jones introduced Keith Richards to Johnson's music, Richards ask the question, who is playing the other guitar? He was amazed at how one person could play guitar with such ability.
Musicians who proclaim his profound impact on them are Keith Richards, Jimi Hendrix, and Eric Clapton.
Johnson, though well-traveled and admired in his performances, was little noted in his own time and place; his records even less so. "Terraplane Blues", sometimes described as Johnson's only hit record, outsold his others but was still only a minor success. Johnson was never to personally experience the popularity as a major artist.

i agree with your friend because every genres style has there pop music

I disagreed. I believe that pop music is a style, but is not necessarily popular or simple. I dissagree with you. Pop is music for the masses and targets that young demographic. Britany Spears sold more albums that Bob Dylan. It is a brainwashed industry controlled by the media corporations. They push the trite and mondane material down your throat. Song structure is easy and most of the lyrics. Pop has a high turnover rate of artists. What should that tell you?

i don't think pop music is really all that simple, really

you need real technological know-how to make a hit single

True but that doesn't guarantee quality.

Look I think pop isn't always simple, but yet again I think you're more likely to encounter simple generic pop sludge than to encounter overcomplicated muddled up pop. But I guess we all expect that.

I don't know if simple is the word I would use, but I would consider pop music to be music that is commercially driven (simple addictive jangles and childish lyrics) and not artistically based. Any performer who is singing songs written by record company hacks is a perfomer and not an artist, I would consider much of pop as performers and not artists

I have some respect for artists who find ways to inject creativity and originality into the age old formulas of pop. Sometimes a familiar form is the best way to express ideas, especially if you want the average listener to be able to easily relate and appreciate.

I agree..Topaz.;) Good perception.

The old formulas of rock need reinvigorating as well.

Yes, Pop is VERY simple. I mean, with few exceptions like Led Zeppelin. Even then, there is such thing as music that is flat too complex for a mainstream audience.

I'm sure there is quite a lot of music that is too complex for most people on this board. Although complex really just means a style that people aren't willing to understand and make an effort with. Music isn't about complexity/simpilicity, it's just about communication. Music is as complex/simple as you make it.

Zeppelin, pop? Sure they were popular but they weren't pop music.

But then again, that definition seems so elusive.

Yes, but sometimes if the language is written with too much intricacy, or sophistication, it's ignored due to the effort required to interpret the message. Which doesn't make the message any less valid because complex melodic topics can't really be told in simple melodic language.

Mainstream Rock is definitely a variation of pop. Even if Led Zeppelin protested the radio, they definitely shaped their music around popular format.

But quite a lot of rock isn't complex, there can be some very simple productions and melodies. All that should really matter is how creative the music is whatever genre someone wants to put it in.

Well, that's what I mean, though. Rock is largely a pop form(in fact compare pre-1950s popular music to rock, and to pop, and you'll find rock is much closer to pop which is just a slightly more minimalist form).

When I say too complicated for pop access I mean things like this:



Notice the lack of attempt to create a hook. As the parts are dispersed in smaller more slightly progressing melodies.

Not better, just a tad subtle to be pop.

Led Zeppelin were one of the most popular and successful bands for their time as far as albums and concert sales (& radio airplay except Top 40), but they really weren't a band that released singles (except for an editted version of Whole Lotta Love) in hopes topping the Pop Charts eg Billboard like Pop acts do.

I dont see how you can define pop music as anything else besides what is popular. Unfortunately pop music sucks today, but it use to be good.

There is some good pop still but people call it indie now instead of pop.

What defines a popular format? Punk is incredibly simple but i don't know a lot of real hardcore stuff that was made for radio play. And there's pop inspired stuff, such as Animal Collective and LCD Soundsystem, that i wouldn't imagine getting radioplay at least in my parts.

Verse
Chorus
Verse
Chorus
Middle eight
Verse (Usually in a higher key)
Chorus (Usually in a higher key)

Behold, almost every pop song ever.

This type of post really pisses me off.

If pop music is so simple, where's your effort? The internet's made it quite easy to get a good pop song out there, so do it.

Arm-chair critics sit here saying how it's so simple, but there's an art to writing a great pop song. It involves dynamics, lyricism, the correct application of hooks, time signatures that carry the listener's attention, melody, production techniques... there are so many elements that go in to making a great pop song, yet of course people will pass it off as easy because it isn't 'rawwwwwk'. Writing a decent pop song is not easy.

Maybe if I could afford the silicone tits, and the massive hype campaign. Even if it's 'out there' it doesn't matter because unless it's a freak show attention grabber like Rebecca Black, or somebody who just happens to be 'discovered' like Justin Biebar, it doesn't matter how good you are, or aren't.

Dynamics - everything has to be mixed down to mids, and compressed to be an even flow of volume. Where you can find dynamics in that, I don't know.

Lyricisim - Uh... "It's gettin' hot in here... so take off all your clothes"

Correct Application of Hooks - constant inane repetition of them works. Take Just Dance for example. The second half of that song is NOTHING but the word dance being panned right then left then right then left.

Time Signatures - Well, you have two choices: 3/4 and 4/4. Chose wisely, I guess...

Melody - Essentially, this is how low to mix the melody in order to make it seem like it's non-existent. MAYBE have some instruments there but usually in the modern electro-pop world, it has to be a 5 second loop of voice over a drum machine that NEVER varies patterns.

Production Techniques - again, 'industry technique' which is more used as a filter for record companies, and radio than it is, in a sense, something that relates to the listener/output.

With that said, ANY form of music is complicated. Music itself is a difficult beast to manifest. However, in comparison to the vast majority of music stylings out there, pop is sometimes retardedly simple, and effective non-the-less. Since quality is arguable, I think any song which you can string out to 5 seconds of melody if you arrange every piece in a row, and is 3 minutes long, is simple. Not to disrespect pop, but more out of respect to things like classical which obviously are well more complex(generally).

Everything you've said here refers to chart music created to rake in as much sales for record companies as possible. There are vast amounts of bands out there that have made the creation of a GENUINELY GREAT pop songs an art form.

Let's take the most obvious example - the Beatles. Throughout their recording career they wrote some truly exceptional 3-minute bursts of pop music that expertly made use of melody, hooks, lyricism etc to maximise listener engagement. Songs such as Help! utilised various components essential to a great pop music and they're rightly remembered as one of the greatest bands of all time.

Not all pop music is top 40 fare. You have bands like The Smiths who essentially made a living off pop songs. They just constructed them in a way that communicated with their audience.

Their is a real craft in writing great pop songs, Rebecca Black's Friday is not an example of a great pop song...

Good point. Beatles actually were quite complex at points(by pop standards), and played with time signatures in bits('Happiness is a Warm Gun').

Then again, it's not an issue of quality, it's an issue of simplicity. Since Beatles were kind of used to define what 'pop' is it's hard to say that the entire body of their work was entirely relegated to that definition.

Even then they were vastly more simple than say Ornette Coleman. So really since 'how much simple is simple' is an impossible debate I'll just concede to pop music being incredibly simplistic compared to the whole spectrum.

I would say a 20-minute psychedelic freakout has more simplicity to it than the construction of a good pop song. I agree, the likes of jazz and classical are far more complex, but I do not think pop music is simple, and it irritates me when people brush it off as such.

There is nothing wrong with calling Pop Music simple. It's not so simple where is the repetitiveness gets annoying but then it's not so complicate where the song develops like art music or a psychedelic freakout - baby. I don't mind if people brush it off because the artist is irritating or a particular song is irritating. But if it's groovy people should dig it man, brushing off for no reason isn't cool baby you dig like freak out man.

6/8 is the same as 3/4, only the time division is different

There is at least as much hype behind the most famous rock musicians who people seem to jump on the bandwagon with, in some ways more as people can get all snobby and elitist about them. And image is arguably even more important in rock than it is in pop. If you think Rebecca Black is a freak show I daren't hear what you think of some metal groups lol.

Formulas are actually very useful for creativity, the most creative artists use them. Arguably the greatest musical geniuses ever (in classical music) used well worn structures to guide their creativity. It gave them the backbone to their compositions they needed and allowed them to be very creative within those structures. So your argument based on the structure of songs is actually very simplistic and irrelevant.

1 - I didn't MAKE an argument, I made a STATEMENT.
2 - I've studied music at degree level for 3 years, I'll have a degree next year. My degree will be titled Ba(hons) Popular Musics.

In other words, don't assume you can put words in my mouth or thoughts in my head, I know damned well what I'm saying. Especially since the units that comprise my degree encompass primarily critical theory and composition in both popular and classical styles.

Edit: Also, you could at least have argued without misusing the apostrophe. The word you meant is "your".

it's also almost every song I write

Well as far as the academy are concerned, anything that isn't avant-garde, jazz, or classical, is 'popular music'. Rock music and pop music being not that far apart, and metal being essentially rock music, its not surprising they all follow the same basic structures a lot.

What is perhaps surprising is that very little popular music is through composed, (Composed with few or no returns to an identifiable section) at least, not outside of those forms predisposed to building and repetition as a musical device, like downtempo or ambient.

Edit: Also, to further address the formula comment above, most of those works were composed using forms because they were for formal occasions where listeners had very strict expectations of the format. When modernism, Wagner, Cage, and even Chopin in the romantic period, come around, the idea of rigid obedience to an expected structure, or even to an audience, was considered outmoded. After all, romanticism was often concerned with the idea of god working through man, rather than critical acclaim or similar. Modernism largely concerned itself with abandoning structure entirely, hence the early works from Schoenberg's atonal period like Pierrot Lunaire, which was entirely atonal and observed no structure, rythmic, melodic, or otherwise.

will check out that Schoenberg, i love atonal music

LOL that's a very cheap point to make, as well as having nothing to do with the subject. Yeh I'm tired so I made a spelling error, so what? :D

Just that you seemed concerned with telling me I didn't know what I was talking about, so I figured that would be an important point for you if you were trying to imply that you do.

Why would it be surprising? And all music has an audience with limited time. 'God working through man'???? You are saying that earlier composers like JS Bach weren't religious? To say modernism or post-modernism or whatever mainly just abandons structure is a big exaggeration. I won't comment on whatever courses you do as I don't think that gives you any more authority than many other people here.

1 - Your assertion regarding Bach is backwards. God working through an artist is not what Bach claimed of his work, he was a man praising god through his OWN work. This is an entirely different kettle of fish and matches up more markedly with the thinking of the time, compared to romantic thinking which implied the artist was a vessel for the work of god, or modernism, which sought to reject the use of past forms or ideas in favour of 'making it new', which subsequently led to the rejection of traditional diatonic tonality in favour of atonalisty and serialism, (Serialism being concieved as a method by which to remove traditional harmony's influence over note choice by treating all 12 notes of the western musical form as equal, without leading notes or tonic notes, no resolutions of any kind). Many composers also removed the traditional forms of structure as an extension of this, such as Cage, whose works make a point of HAVING structure, to the point of 4'33 making the point of music only requiring the opening and closing of the piano 3 times, in mock of the fact that you can REMOVE any element of music, up to and including notes and/or silence, but it still needs to be structured to exist, but 4'33 makes no claims as to requiring specific structures, and indeterminate works such as Terry Reily's "In C" depend on having a loose structure which cannot be nailed down to a specific result!

Then we can mention freeform jazz or improvisational styles which depend on no explicit structure at all to define them, indeed, usually their defining feature is a lack of specific structure to create a more natural movement between sections or parts. They are not easily reproduced before being recorded as a performance, but their structure can only be determined, in most cases, in retrospect, its barely considered during the compositional process itself, if at all!

2 - I never mentioned postmodernism, I mentioned modernism and romanticism. Post-modernism is a very, very, VERY different movement, predominant in popular culture to this day, even in the referential sense, such as Lady Gaga, whose image is pretty much Dadaist/surrealist, both of which are postmodern, rather than modernist, styles.

I guess you are talking about the romantic hero worship of the individual artist, something that carries on to this day in a way. But why that has to be God working through an artist I don't know, particularly as there had already been philosophers and others questioning the existence of God anyway. And I suspect some earlier artists did think their skills had been given to them by God as they saw it. Romanticism is more about LOVE than God, and secular love at that. It's this that gets lifted up to some high ideal. And it got also mixed up with nationalism (due to the politics of the time)

No, thats not what romanticism was about at all. There are frequent tales of romantic period artists stuffing themselves to the gills with drugs in order to REMOVE their own influence from the work and allow god to guide them. THAT is what romanticism was about when it claimed to be god working through the artist.

This is getting tiring. Please, before you argue about romanticism, modernism, the intentions of an artist, or the nature of a work, I would implore you to educate yourself on the matters via a source more reputable and reliable source than assumption and hearsay. I am not stating what I am stating blind, I have been told this by university lecturers, read it in academic journals and researched it in books written by luminaries and professionals. I have spent a not inconsiderable portion of my life making sure I know what I'm talking about regarding these very topics, in and out of education proper. For all you claim that doesn't matter, my experience suggests that the opposite is in fact true.

i sorta get the notion it's the wrong sort of "romantic" starrynight is talking about

GB is talking about the Romantic period of classical music, not general romanticism