Music Styles Over the Years
Posted by paulrin@reddit | GenX | View on Reddit | 60 comments
Hear me out. There are plenty of articles / documentaries that basically says Grunge and Alt rock was a response to the ‘hair metal’ of the late 80’s and early 90’s. That music was too ‘staged and coreographed’. That among the social discontent, as well as the political discontent, grunge and harder rock was a big ‘f*ck you” to ‘the man’. It didn’t solve the first Iraq War, nor the Second, and now a war with Iran. What I hear these days is ‘curated pop’, probably meant more for Tik Tok, than anything else. Is there a likelihood for a massive shift back to a counter-culture thing? Anger? Aggressiveness? Personal expression. I’m 51M, and I hate to say it, but I’m seeing a pattern. (Also a massive music and History nerd) .
classicsat@reddit
Look up the 13 year cycle. Music like the early 90s alt/grunge happened because it was generally and economic downturn. By the end of the 1990s, the music became more poppy.
rationalmisanthropy@reddit
I'm not sure there is an underground anymore, or if there is its much smaller than it was in the 80s and 90s.
The underground consisted of a variety of subcultures, usually ordered around some form of music or visual art. The people within the subculture shared values, norms, space and clothing to signal in-group belonging. The underground was in antithesis to the mainstream and was resolutely based in qualitative experience rather than quantative consumption.
This has all changed.
The internet has destroyed space, and to some extent time. You don't have to physically be there anymore in order to belong. You can access the cultural artifact online, geography doesn't matter, time doesn't matter. Add in inflation, gentrification and the growth of online 'communities', the physical and time-bound are presented as anachronisms.
Capitalism has destroyed the symbolism associated with subcultures by commodifying both the art and the clothing. You can simply buy the music and the clothing without ever meeting anyone else from the culture or ever understanding the norms and values that underpinned the movement in the first place.
All these developments have defanged subcultures and what the underground was. People don't share norms and values, they buy and discard identities. Art is not cultural embedded in a wider scene of shared experience, it is a product bereft of meaning. We're all units of consumption adrift in a digital miasma, nothing means anything and shopping is both being and identity.
Essentially subcultures have been replaced with nihilism. Nihilism is the new religion, though most of us don't know it yet. Nothing means anything. Capitalism won. The internet is a giant shopping and spying machine, not the great tool for emancipation it was supposed to be. Online communities are a lie. We're just individuals marketing ourselves to everyone else whilst techno billionaires rub their hands and buy our governments. Nostalgia has replaced evolution, chainstores stretch to the horizon and everyone is empty.
PeterPunksNip@reddit
We are only 2 remaining Goths from the old times in my town. I miss the days where we had bars, clubs and other hangouts. Your post reminds me of that Palais Idéal song : https://youtu.be/RJMgS196moQ?is=0JDtsHOnoSqgxJdb
Sumeriandawn@reddit
Dannyboy_Desertrat@reddit
Instant gratification rewired everyone faster than evolution could protect it.
Garuda34@reddit
Nail on the head.
alchebyte@reddit
🎯
PeterPunksNip@reddit
But there is a reaction, you just didn't look in the right places. Mainstream music is basically only "novocaïne for the soul" like the old song said. It's designed to pacify the masses, hence the prevalence of nursery rhymes - like 2 notes "melodies" (all I hear is gnagnah-gnagna-na", it's insufferable, I'm not 5).
Have you heard of HEALTH ? It's an interesting mix of electronica, rock and industrial with a fresh new twist. The singer's voice is smooth and feminine (it's a dude) while the music and the lyrics are rather aggressive.
There's lots of interesting stuff coming out in my favourite genres too, Gothic Rock and Punk (GVLLOW makes both, he's an excellent one-man band who actually plays all the instruments). There's good stuff, you just have to dig.
viewering@reddit
Wow, he kinda looks like the thoroughly Punk and Counter Culture Travis Barker
PeterPunksNip@reddit
He makes excellent Gothic Rock too. Yeah, he's the dude with the most tattoos I ever saw in music 😆
Natural-Hamster-3998@reddit
That timeline seems strange to me. Hair metal was huge, then grunge murdered it. Kurt Cobain hit th n scene and everyone I knew was like, "Axl Who?"
Ok-Huckleberry-6326@reddit
This is a misconception. Axl and G 'n R weren't hair metal, though I'm sure they shared influences. It's like Glam 1st wave spawned Bowie and T. Rex, and Glam 2nd wave was the parts of that style and vibe that L.A. Sleaze rock like Crue and its imitators borrowed. Axl and G'nR were into 1st wave Glam and adjacent artists - Bowie, Alice Cooper, Thin Lizzy, etc. I would say Hair Metal was still hugely popular when GnR made their debut, but it was the beginning of the end. "Grunge" might have put the nail in the coffin. But it was harder forms of Metal - Thrash entering the mainstream with Metallica and the rest of the 'big Four' (Pantera was in there too), Death Metal in the underground, Alice in Chains & Soundgarden & Faith No More already on the 'alt' side giving the girls something else to listen to besides endless sexhortations and power ballads - that was already unmooring hair metal from its base of popularity. Not to mention the idea that people who liked heavy guitar music were looking for some different definition of authenticity. Tesla sold a bunch of records with their nods to classic rock, a couple of the hair metal or adjacent bands even stripped down to do "unplugged" sessions with a bluesier feel (Ratt doing "Born on The Bayou" comes to mind), and Guns 'n Roses were pioneers on that end, because of their partaking of classic rock and blues (from Slash) and the punk attitude which suggested more authenticity than their contemporaries. And they were still filling stadiums the year Kurt unalived himself.
jeffsaddiction74@reddit
You can’t write a comment like this and not mention Jane’s Addiction.
Ok-Huckleberry-6326@reddit
Agreed!
the_answer_is_RUSH@reddit
I think we lost the good fight. Grunge was a great FU to the man but we’re not recovering from today’s algos and AI and arena country.
There’s still good music being produced and we have to find it but never again will something like grunge and alt be ruling the “airwaves”.
liddybuckfan@reddit
Whatever it is, I just hope it is human created music and not AI.
Accurate-Survey6985@reddit
Agreed. I used to be a very amateur musician and don't have instruments anymore..... so I essentially just practice lyricism from time to time.... writing and plugging into an AI matrix for myself to see how the robot responds. Sometimes slightly good.... other times dismal.
That raw human element is long gone.
liddybuckfan@reddit
I started playing bass a few years ago, and I've been learning drums and vocals as well. I play with a group music class. Sometimes we sound amazing, sometimes we sound less amazing but I love being around real musicians. There's nothing like it. Art is created, not generated. The kind of emotion the OP is talking about can only come from a human.
Accurate-Survey6985@reddit
I agree.
Good luck with your music and it's good to know it's returned to that.
I'm older now and just pen lyricism from time to time.
Good luck.
paulrin@reddit (OP)
I don’t’ know, it just all seems sooooooooooooo staged.
liddybuckfan@reddit
What is, all modern music? I don't think that's universally true. I mean, all music is "staged," I'm not totally sure I understand what that means in the context of music. If you mean created by corporate overlords like the Monkees or something, some of it is and some of it isn't.
paulrin@reddit (OP)
Maybe I’m reminiscing, but I’m through 1992 back catalogue of Pearl Jam, Alanis Morrisette, Nirvana, Soundgarden, in the early 1990’s, and there was a different level of anger. We were all confused and angry about it. And maybe more importantly, we wanted to do something about it.
Sumeriandawn@reddit
"we wanted to do something about"
Do what exactly? A lot of teens lose their rebellious nature when they become adults.
Fudloe@reddit
Zero chance. Back then, everybody got (insert band name here)'s new album all at once on the same day.
We listened on terrestrial radio and/or bought the record/CD/cassette.
The current methods of listening have both brought us unlimited music and bands that don't have to bow to major label pressures to write "hits", and equally diluted the social impact of music in general.
So, current radio programming is created by the major labels who own them (and the live venues, and the ticket sellers, and the acts). Their only method of sustainability is to continue to pump out virtually identical songs by virtually identical media personalities (not artists) in order to appeal to the largest demographic (i.e., people who don't give a shit about music. Only if "it's got a good beat and I can dance to it").
Thus negating the most universal delivery systems of modern popular music.
All that said, no "Massive shift" of any kind will likely happen again in popular music. I hope against hope that I'm wrong... but I don't see how it would be possible.
heliskinki@reddit
AI is the massive horrible shift. It's like microplastics in the ocean, it's going to polute all creative media. I keep considering not listening/reading/watching anything produced post 2025.
Fudloe@reddit
It isn't, though. Very few people listen to it and it's novelty is already waning.
It has zero effect on wolrd politics, youth culture or subculture. No more than Polkas.
Recent polls state that the majority of teen listeners are listening to their parents and grandparents music almost exclusively.
AI music blows, but it isn't relevant to any cultural shift. (Except, perhaps a universal rejection of it).
Besides, live original music is alive and well in every city and town. Get out to a club or bar and make sure the next generation of real music survives by paying a 10 buck cover and buying a shirt.
Sumeriandawn@reddit
Fudloe@reddit
Ain't that a riot? And me, I like stuff from all them folks generations!
heliskinki@reddit
Yes! Of course, if I'm in to a new band, I need to see them live. That's the failsafe moving forwards.
Keep AI out of the creative industries.
Fudloe@reddit
YES! Only way to fly!
As far as keeping AI out of creative industries, I don't think that's possible. All the way back to the "Flying Faders" of the Neve mixing desk, there's been some sort of automation. Which is all "AI" really is.
AI music blows, we all know it blows. Just because it exists doesn't mean it'll take over. Not as long as people still live and feel and have a need to communicate their emotions.
Maybe after Skynet eliminates us all, but at that point, who'll care?
paulrin@reddit (OP)
I’d say what i was thinking of was a ‘style’, as opposed to ‘delivery’. Is it progressive? Is it positive? Is it angry? Is it in your face? Just a thought experiment.
Fudloe@reddit
Agaun- the delivery system directly and most significantly impacts the likelihood of any massive or minor shifts back to counter culture, which was your concluding question.
No culturally relevant shifts in style, aggression, positivity, anger or anything else.
Music isn't consumed across an entire cultural landscape like it ince was. It is exclusively an individual experience, so the likelihood of any significant culturally relevant shift in music across the board is virtuall zero.
Apokoliptictortoise@reddit
PC Music is the one of the only music subcultures that I have found in a long time. Charli XCX is a big big star now and leading the movement with AG Cook. But it has been bubbling on the underground for years. It has a style, a worldview, a language, etc and is original. Beauty, glamour, emotional honesty and acceptance being some of the major tenets.
Baboofshka1@reddit
I’ve had several discussions with friends over the last few years about how there’s no real chance for the type of shifts or movements that we saw in music back in the day, or in previous generations. We were all exposed to the same music at the same time and bought the same albums and listened to them over and over, from beginning to end. They became the soundtracks to our lives and were a shared experience. Now, everyone can access anything at any time and there aren’t huge numbers of people experiencing the same thing at the same time. Everything is an individual track or a playlist and it seems to largely be about clicks and likes and social media followers. I saw an interview with Linda Perry recently, where she was talking about some artists she thinks are incredible and that someone in the industry who decides who gets a contract, told her that they agreed someone she’d suggested was great but that they don’t have enough followers to get signed. Bring in the push for AI everything and I doubt we’ll ever see what we got to experience in earlier decades.
Godskin_Duo@reddit
My kids have no idea how big Michael Jackson was back then, there was a real cultural zeitgeist. The only thing that comes kind of close is hearing about a new Taylor Swift release/marriage. Now all she needs is her own short film, theme park movie ride, and starring role in a video game.
-Granby-@reddit
The trend is probably going to be AI music. I don't see it ever going back to the days of Rock and Hair metal and Grunge. you know actual music. I'm sure it will exist in little pockets but it will never be like it was. Hell a lot of the bands coming up these days are making music and are not even in the same room as each other. They play something then send it of digitally to the next person and on down the line. Then it gets over produced. back in the day the tech was let's say 16 tracks. Now it is unlimited. Everything is too tweaked and processed if it is even real human music.
My daughter is 14 and loves rock and metal but a shit ton of the kids her age listen to mostly video game type music or vocaloid. Now AI is taking off. It's a sad state.
---Vocaloid music is any song created using Yamaha's Vocaloid singing voice synthesizer software. Producers write melodies and lyrics, and the program uses artificial voice databases to sing the tracks. It spans nearly every genre, though it is most famous for anime-style pop and electronic music sung by virtual characters---
This shit is crazy popular. That is the trend
paulrin@reddit (OP)
Is this the same as ‘auto-tune’ ( o don’t have kids….)
-Granby-@reddit
No.
Autotune alters the pitch of a human voice.
Vocaloid is a computer generated voice.
Baboofshka1@reddit
WTF? Why on earth would anyone want to listen to that?
Godskin_Duo@reddit
It's heavily themed with pretty anime girls like Hatsune Miku, but a phoneme engine was the in-between of real music and AI music, and has an uncanny valley effect. AI music is getting well past the point of "if no one told you, you couldn't tell."
Oiggamed@reddit
I miss the days when you could tell what kind of music a person listened to just by looking at their shoes.
Sumeriandawn@reddit
90s sports shoes
Mysterious-Gap3621@reddit
I think it took a while for the music scene to free itself from the yoke of the baby boomer generation. Producers in the music industry in the 80’s really did not recognize the legitimacy of younger artists, and since they were a large demographic group, there was a period where only older, more seasoned acts got deals. That’s why we had albums like Paul Simon’s Graceland dominating the charts. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great album. But why was I listening to a 45 yo man with a receding hairline sing about divorce in my high school days (see also: Phil Collins, Clapton). Super groups like the Firm and Yes were composed of accomplished studio musicians who could turn out impeccable sounding albums. But they were devoid of the angst and sense of emergence that has always been at the heart of rock and roll (for that matter, Huey Lewis was like your Dad’s garage band, with better performance quality). Even when younger artists got record deals, it was with music that appealed to their baby boomer record producers, such as the Rockabilly revival band the Stray Cats.
Grunge rock really had to develop in the dark corners on its own before it was recognized as having value. And even then, it was called “alternative rock” by the very people who were marketing it. The raw style reflects that.
All of this is IMHO, but I was young then. The first time I heard Janes Addiction play “Been caught stealing” I almost drove off the road.
thedarkforest_theory@reddit
This is the perfect political backdrop for artists like Rage Against the Machine. I am so disappointed that their tour fell apart and even more disappointed that not enough people comprehend their lyrics.
Last-Relationship166@reddit
Yeah...I'm still pissed that RATM produced that music video where the bodies of Gore and Dubya merge, implying they were exactly the same. I get it. They're purists. I'm probably just as progressive as they are. I'm just a pragmatism who wasn't dumb enough to shoot myself (and others) in the foot by voting for Nader or sitting the election out. Sadly, enough people were. Thank them for DHS, Citizens United, ICE, and the PATRIOT ACT.
Ray_The_Engineer@reddit
I'll be honest, I don't look to my music to "anger me", to "tell off the man", it's for a couple of things - 1) To set a mood or take me back in time, AND/OR 2) To enjoy the talents of particular musicians and songwriters/producers. That being the case, I still really enjoy my 80's hair metal playlist when I'm tooling around in my car with the windows down on a nice day, I put on Rush to hear mega-talent and creativity, (and other prog rock, old jazz, etc), or I might put on some Alice in Chains if that's what my mood is calling for. But I don't listen to the lyrics and go "YEAH! That's right!" or anything.
Honestly, I don't trust musicians or other artists to tell me how to feel about world events, etc. I'll go research and work that out for myself.
punkdrummer22@reddit
There has always been an answer to the popular music of the day.
And Thrash metal was the first answer to hair metal
Ok-Huckleberry-6326@reddit
Agreed! Thrash, even alt-metal bands like Faith No More and adjacent bands like Jane's Addiction, Funk Metal like Mordred, the Black Rock coalition drawing new audiences to heavier sounds with Living Colour and 24-7 Spyz, even Alice in Chains and Soundgarden, who were buzzing long before anyone in the mainstream heard of Nirvana, industrial bands like Ministry and Nine Inch Nails, others harder to pigeonhole like Danzig, Prong....Death Metal in the underground. If you still wanted to listen to Diamond Rexx and Britney Fox after that, there was no help for you, LOL
Bokononfoma@reddit
There will always be a counter culture, it just changes. My response to AI and curated pop? Angine de Poitrine. Admittedly I saw their outfits and dismissed them. Then I actually watched and listened, and it all makes sense. They are just a couple of creative weirdos that found each other, invented an alien backstory, created insane outfits and the craziest guitar I have ever seen, and now they are catching fire.
They aren't for everyone (which is usually good for me), and you have to watch them too at first, not just listen. I hope they make bands and guitars cool again, and it's been a while since I found something this weird, joyful, exciting and talented. It's math rock, but way more fun.
https://youtube.com/shorts/MirL1RnhyHc?si=O0rF9Bavszgf8dZ-
Lazy_Point_284@reddit
Media is so much more diffuse now than it was in the 80s & 90s. Terms like "canon" & "touchstone" aren't as integral to the critique as they once were, and that's probably because everything came to us through these severe bottlenecks of a handful of print magazines and a few dozen extended basic cable channels that we then ran through the pressure cooker of our respective hometown third spaces until there existed a broadly agreed-upon cultural conversation about who we were, who we wanted to be, and what kind of world would be wrought in our wake.
I think that conversation is timeless, but the details and manner in which it unfolds are always of whatever era.
Now it is focused on our relationship with technology and how to create meaningful lives in the currently-unfolding technoscape. And to that point, it's not happening as much with music or art as it is technology. The sorting of metal fans and country fans and rap fans isn't relevant, but the sorting of online people and offline people is. My kid is a great illustration of it at 22yo with his cracked Galaxy S20, no socials, long stringy hair, desert tan, and a talent for currency arbitrage that I still can't get my head around.
Dannyboy_Desertrat@reddit
Bring back the idea of joining a band and creating a local music scene I played in a punk alternative band in the 90s and it was some of the best times of my life. It was awesome!!
Full_Mission7183@reddit
Death of the radio station (at least I don't listen to them anymore) and diffusement of pop culture by the size of the internet makes it harder than ever for artists to emerge, and results in newer music almost never being the background music at a restaurant or store.
And then on top of that I am finding that most of the people I listen to are my age-ish now. Teenage angst is no longer a part of their lyrics, but I feel confident that there are bands out there full of youthful anger that is filling the whole.
Ordinary_Passenger79@reddit
Counterpoint: streaming has created exposure niche projects that weren’t marketable on the radio. We have more diversity now than ever.
Full_Mission7183@reddit
Yes 100%, but "popular music" defusement has led to greater fracturing of our shared experiences.
But, it is not good or bad, it just is.
sixlivesleft@reddit
I mostly stayed on the indie side after grunge while harboring a deep love of 60's and 70's classic rock.
Mainstream pop stuff never really appealed to me, especially artists that don't play any actual instruments. I can appreciate a talent but still not enjoy the music itself. I think AI is going to ruin mainstream completely but don't believe artists that genuinely enjoy playing real music will give in.
The newish bands I've gravitated towards recently write about an understanding that the world is a bleak place. They sing their resistance while putting a silver lining on the grimy reality of things and the hope that it won't always be this fucked up.
Current cds in the car rotation are The Raconteurs STRFKR Arcade Fire The Strokes Fleetwood Mac The Growlers
Sad_Jellyfish4394@reddit
if you think about it before grunge and alt there was punk. I think everything goes in cycles it will show up again different ways. People will want to hear real voices soon and not auto tuned lip syncing
JadedAd6614@reddit
I always thought garage & grunge in the 90’s were a response to the 80’s being so heavily produced. I didn’t think music could have been more produced than it was in the 80’s, and then came Cher with “Believe”….
newpthankstho@reddit
There are lots of indie artists that are clapping back.
Folksie vibes- Jessie Welles Carsie Blanton
Hip Hop- Figgy Baby Twolipsmusic Tobe Nwigwe Aesop Rock is a personal fav
Just to name a few. The indie scene is pretty great because of the internet. These artists get to make the kind of music they want. I don’t know if the huge cultural waves will happen as they once did, but the gritty anti pop culture stuff is out there.
Accurate-Survey6985@reddit
"Counter Culture" in and of itself seems to have evolved and become a phenomenon all of its own and I think that's difficult to define now.
Counter-Culture in our youth meant "sticking it to the man". The establishment. The government. Industry. War. The suits.
People clap back now to each other's own social discontent.
They seem to be sticking it to each other..... which strangely enough is an inadvertent Nod to the man......or global machine.
The global entities that create instability and those who are instruments of destabilization are winning.
johninfla52@reddit
I'm not sure what will come in the future, but yesterday I watched a video of Grace Slick singing "White Rabbit' at Woodstock and I was struck by the simplicity of it compared to the Taylor Swift type of presentation today. For sure Taylor Swift didn't start it. I bet you could trace it back through Michael Jackson and Madonna to maybe even KISS but it seems like concerts are much more about the stage show now than the music. JMHO.