"Crap for the masses" - What is that exactly?

[scamo]

Hi,

This is a question for serious discussion and I don't want flaming or any other juvenile "My opinion is better than yours." stuff in this discussion. Everyone has their own tastes and opinions. And everyone should respect that.

My issue is, I keep hearing....

"It's crap for the masses!"

more and more about different genres of EDM music that tend to make it big (popular) and it sort of worries me, because I can't tell the difference. I mean, are the fortunate songs that go up dance charts and are possibly making the people who made it money suddenly crap productions and musical garbage, just because they became popular? Or is there really some telltale sign (other than popularity) that you can really point out in certain songs, that make them musical crap?

I personally can like a song from one genre to another. Some music genres I like more than others. I like certain rock, certain EDM, certain top 40/ pop music, certain classical, certain hip/hop, even some country/ western and some I don't like. It is my taste in music and no one else's. Being a DJ (which I am not one, yet), I would imagine playing "known" (i.e. popular) music is also something useful to get the dance floor rocking. I believe such songs are called "bangers"??? But if popular songs really are just crap for the masses, would I really be a bad DJ for playing such music that I also like?

What really defines music as "crap for the masses"?

Again, please keep the discussion civilized.

scamo

[jamthrax]

i would not really worry about if a tune you are playing is "crap for the masses". In the UK drum and bass is hitting the top 20 every month and it does not stop me playing a good track at a rave. Just goes to show that the charts goes from EDM to Bands and back again every 4 or 5 years.

If a tune is good just play that shit

[Era 7]

If a tune is good just play that shit

+1

[Maven]

I'd rather have people listen to ''crap for the masses'' than nicki minaj stuff. I do enjoy the music some call crap for the masses. It is kind of funny when people talk shit about the genres other than what they listen. They are the people who couldn't leave that high school attitude. We would do that thing when were in high school. Grow up maybe?

[Jack Bastard]

Surely it's nothing to do with snobbery about popularity, it's because shit music is shit. I'm a huge pop music fan but I don't even think that a lot of pop edm works within that oeuvre.

[Patch]

I'd rather have people listen to ''crap for the masses'' than nicki minaj stuff.

If there is ONE artist that I would call crap for the masses..........

[photojojo]

On Beatport I'll go through new releases previewing songs, then I'll go through some charts, then I'll gro through featured. Finally after that, which is usually several thousand songs in a week or so I'll have a look at the top 100 for a few of my favorit genre's. With the Beatport Pro app I can see which songs I've already listened to and which I've added to my hold bin. There's usually handfull out of that list that I've added to my hold bin to give a second listen to. So it's not all crap for the masses, it's just that the "purists" are full of hate.

[MaxOne]

Sometimes there seems to be a clear cynicism in the production of a track that is aimed at mimicking what is currently popular but falls flat because the song is shit.

Other times a song is produced cynically to be aimed at the masses but because everyone working on it has skill and taste they actually make a great pop record.

When you play underground music youre audience may well be made up of dickheads who don't want to hear pop because they believe it's all shit regardless.

Thing is people is people and they like what they want. I hated STEPS wen they came out... Still do. But my missus, who has proper good taste in music normally, likes them for her guilty pleasure

What you gonna do?

[DJSigma]

A song being extremely popular doesn't necessarily mean it fits into the "crap for the masses" category. A CFTM (crap for the masses) song can fail horribly commercially too. It's about being formulaic IMO, kinda like the rise of auto-tune in popular rap songs. A certain sound becomes popular and others jump on that bandwagon.

I don't believe in the concept of a "guilty pleasure" in music, because it implies that I care what other people think of the music I like, and I don't. Even when I was at school, I hated all the posing people did, pretending they liked this and that, but then abandoning it when the next "cool" thing came along. I've never been like that, thankfully.

When I was playing gigs, the most important thing for me was being happy in what I was doing, which meant playing music I liked. DJs may have to make some compromises, but I couldn't be one of those people that goes out every weekend spinning top 40 rap when in their heart they love house music or whatever. DJing is at its best when you can play music you like/love to a crowd that are digging it, so I wouldn't worry about what's considered "CFTM" unless you're spinning it every night and hating every minute of it.

[TCMuc]

It's not about whether a track became popular. Maybe a little more about whether it was MEANT to become popular.


Basically there's two types of musicproducers: those who switch on their gear to make music, and those who switch it on to make money. The latter ones don't tend to try express themselves artistically through their music but are looking for the smallest common denominator in order to sell their tracks to as many people as possible.

Doing so usually leads to shallow tracks that only go for the sure shot, without taking any risks or being innovative as this might lead to the track not being as succesfull as it could have been by just resorting to often tested cord progression, rhythms and melodies.

Kind of like fast food, e.g. from McDonalds: full of artificial flavors and streamlined as hell, so almost everybody likes it. But if you ask anybody who only has the slightest clue about good quality food he'll tell you that it's basically shit.

Because it has always been and will always be like this: things that are made aiming for maximum commercial success, even at the expense of artistic integrity and quality, are and will always be just this:


Crap for the masses.



If you wanna call me a hater for stating this: go ahead.