On the radio

While I do proud myself on the music I listen to and the wide variety of genres I enjoy, there are several things in the music world that I cannot stand. One of these things is people who get snotty about their music the minute it becomes "popular."

I understand the feeling of betrayal and distress when you find out that one of your favorite small bands has just sold out by popping out a song or two for a soundtrack. I've felt it myself. But that shouldn't take away from the music that the band has made. Some people get too caught up in how mainstream music is, whether they only like mainstream, or they can't stand any band that's gotten a tune on the radio.

I get really exasperated with people who are like that. I don't like the whole attitude that something is good just because no one has heard of it, or that something is good because everyone has heard of it. I think it's insulting, quite frankly. People should pick what they like to listen to based on what they like listening to, not based on how popular it is or isn't.

I know today's post is short, but there's only so much I can whine about before I start to bore you.

Cheers,

-T.A.D.

Movie theme

Today I saw Inception. I thoroughly enjoyed it too. But I don't want to talk about that today. I want to talk about something I noticed while watching the movie. I have always been a fan of movie scores, and I think that the music that accompanies some of my favorite films is almost as wonderful as the films themselves. I don't think the background music to movies is really appreciated as much as it should be and deserves to be.

Music sets the mood for the movie. The music of the scene tells us what to feel, and gives us information about what we are seeing or will see. I noticed the music in Inception, hence the sudden interest. I have several different scores from movies. I have the soundtracks to all three Lord of the Rings for a start. I love listening to this music later and being able to close my eyes and see the scene in which the music played in my imagination.

I will return tomorrow, but for now I'll be off to watch Magnum Force, which, for those of you who don't know, is the second of the Dirty Harry movies.

Cheers,

-T.A.D.

Heart and music

For me, music and emotion go hand in hand. They have to, if music is to mean anything at all. I have similar sentiments about the music of today as my cousin Patrick. To read his thoughts go on over to his blog here. A brief summary however: in my opinion, the quality of music, in both sound and lyrics, has plummeted in our decade.

I look around and see the downfall of music identifiable in many forms. The Disney Channel, always hungry for more money, now forces any teenish actors they have to produce record after record. The tweens seem responsible for a great deal of the downfall of which I speak. But you can hardly blame them. How exactly are we to expect that an eleven year old has good taste in music? How can we even expect them to tell the difference between overplayed and overdone crap produced by people merely because they are expected to produce it and great music? I wish I could say that when I was eleven I had great taste in music so I could pretend to be above it all, but I didn't. Honestly, I listened to maybe four different bands. ABBA, some country band I don't remember the name of, Brandi Carlile, and the Dixie Chicks.

ABBA is still one of my all-time favorites, and anyone who disses Brandi will have hell to pay with me around. And Brandi, now there's an example of someone who ties her heart in with her music. Her second "real" CD wasn't wonderful in my opinion; I disliked the fact that she leaned more towards country than she had before and she was doing a LOT of her wailing stuff, which to me is best in moderation. What I truly enjoy about Brandi is listening to her evolution. I have tracks upon tracks on my iPod of her very early songs, ones that have never been released to the general public. I listen to them and the poetry in them gives me chills.

I think that shows like American Idol are also partially responsible for the downfall of mainstream music. Music has to come from the heart and soul. Your voice is such a personal thing that it has to be. I listen to a friend of mine play the piano and you can feel the earth quiet around her. I wish that in all this ranting I had a solution to this tragic fact of life, but I really don't. I want musicians to be passionate again. I want them to make music because they want to rather than doing it because it earns them tons of money.

There are artists out there still doing what they're doing because they love it. And there are artists out there who I refer to as "cookie-cutter" who do what they do out of love as well. We just need to find that right mix of love and talent again. Or, if not talent, at least get some decent poetry going, right? Lyrics should move people. I listen to songs that are made up of lousy verses with a phrase repeated eight times for the "chorus" and I want to cry. One line does not a chorus make.

Heart and music,

You gotta have heart and music.

-T.A.D.