Post a controversial music opinion

I have no idea where it came from, exactly. Did people in the 80s think 70s music was utter garbage?

post-gen X-ers/pre-zoomers

There’s a term for this, you know (lol)

I know and I manifestly hate it lol.

I think the whole stupid "Disco Sucks!" thing which went very mainstream helped to seal off the 60s and 70s as this "when music was good" period in a lot of lazy ppl's minds

I have no idea where it came from, exactly. Did people in the 80s think 70s music was utter garbage?

The 70s as a whole was viewed as utter garbage in the UK, and still is to a very great extent, it's all the Wurzels/ Leeds United/ inflation/ Confessions of a Window Cleaner/ Love Thy Neighbour/ strikes/ the Troubles etc. Irredemably grim and uncool. Pretty unfair of course - apart from Leeds United.

Whereas the period going from, say, 1967 to 1977 is evergreen in my mind.

So, not a fan of post punk then?

I like post-punk a lot, but nowhere near as much as the true believers. Still, it’s one of the clear highlights of that era for me.

I've never heard "The '80s are crap," not when '80s comps got releases in 1993 and 1994. What I DO hear, and it drives me bats, is how a DX-7 sound is "dated," "of its time," while some Rickenbacker jangle from 1965 is "timeless."

Joy Division, This Heat, Wire, The Cure and PiL are the ones I return to the most.

xp

I grew up in the US in the 80s, and yes, it felt like the entire decade of the 70s had been memory holed. 70s music and styles went through quite a rehabilitation in the 90s.

xp
I definitely did absorb some "80s are bad" propaganda, grounded in that exact "dated sound" double standard. I grew up being told that early digital sounds were cheap or cheezy compared to 60s and 70s analogue (what was less clear was what 90s sounds were; if pushed I think the narrative would have been that synths and drum machines "got better").

what was less clear was what 90s sounds were; if pushed I think the narrative would have been that synths and drum machines "got better" if pushed I think the narrative would have been that synths and drum machines "got better"

Yes, that sounds right.

A lot of digital tech fell out of favor and was replaced with either vintage or vintage-emulating gear. For example, there was a big boost of interest in tube amplifiers.

early 80s is one of the best times for music ever, late 80s is patchy but loads of brilliant dance music, and plenty of other good stuff out there. Mid 80s is a bit of a dead zone, like 85/86 especially, and must have seemed horrible compared to half a decade earlier, I was a bit too young to really be paying attention, but this is what wlmy research indicates

and the R&B 1980-1986 = amazing

I am an 80s creature and I always will be. There were times in the 80s when top 40 radio felt (to me) like a delirious and fairly diverse party, with things that were truly inexplicable existing side-by-side.

When I was in junior high school it would have felt totally normal to hear "Valley Girl," "Word Up," "Pass the Dutchie," "She Blinded me with Science," "Mexican Radio," "Rock the Casbah," "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun," "Everyday I Write the Book," "Red Red Wine," "I Feel for You," "Jam on it," "Rhythm of the Night," "Let's Dance," "Down Under," "Puttin' on the Ritz," "Rock me Amadeus," "Union of the Snake," "Crazy for You," "Night Shift," "Whip It," and "Beat it" in quick succession. Sure, Casey Kasem was filtering everything and major record labels were the devil (as ever). But to me (the white kid in a black neighborhood), pop music felt pretty optimistic and open and embracing.

I admit I don't have a ton of evidence for this (and will probably get thoroughly dragged) but: it feels to me like in subsequent years, radio listenership (and individual listening patterns) became more siloed after that. When I got to high school there were metal kids and new-wave kids and pop kids and rap kids; people tended to focus their listening rather than broadening it.

I grew up in the US in the 80s, and yes, it felt like the entire decade of the 70s had been memory holed. 70s music and styles went through quite a rehabilitation in the 90s.

Interesting. As a kid in the late 80s, it already seemed like a lot of people thought the 80s sucked (and I wasn't always inclined to disagree). 60s stuff seemed especially revered but rock radio was also pretty heavy on 70s artists. If anything, a lot of the contemporary songs on rock radio were still by people like the Wilburys, Robert Plant, Clapton, Tom Petty, Rush, Genesis, Aerosmith, Cheap Trick.

I mean, these artists weren't really the 80s as most people experienced them, I don't think:

The Fall
Hüsker Dü
Minutemen
My Bloody Valentine
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
The Smiths
XTC

I mean, these artists weren't really the 80s as most people experienced them, I don't think

True – likewise, my perception of the 90s is a crude mixture of imprinted memories and retrospective discoveries and projections.

I guess I never completely overcame the 'the 80s were the worst decade for music ever' mentality that was somehow drilled into me at a young age.

Compared to the 90s, the 80s were far more experimental, diverse, and interesting

Music has gotten worse with every successive decade imo

but I'm old

Music peaked in 1927. There is still some good stuff out there now though.

I've stopped rating albums on RYM for the most part because it had become a meaningless chore for me but out of the 24 (non-classical) releases to which I gave five stars, only one is from the 80s and it's ECM-style chamber jazz. Nine are from the 90s, so yeah, we're all hopelessly biased.

xxp Related thought (and counterpoint) from Scott Miller in Music: What Happened (I don't necessarily agree or disagree, but it's an interesting line of argument):

The nineties were better than the eighties, and one key reason was that there was less originality. Originality is unmusical. The urge to do music is an admiring emulation of music one loves; the urge toward originality happens under threat that the music that sounds good to you somehow isn't good enough.

i.e., the 80s may indeed have been more experimental and diverse, but that didn't necessarily make the music better (for Miller, at least).

Agree to disagree. When I think of the 80s, I think of Erasure, Husker Du, and Cyndi Lauper. When I think of the 90s, I think of Silverchair, Collective Soul, and 4 Non Blondes

And the "originality is unmusical" argument would support the idea that Nirvana worshipers / misunderstanders Puddle of Mudd were somehow more "musical" than Kate Bush

I have fonder memories of Collective Soul than of all the 80s acts you just cited (I was tempted to add 'combined', but that'd be plain trolling).

Love Husker Du. Erasure can gtfo obv.

That Scott Miller quote is completely idiotic btw, esp as a defence of 90s popular music.

The very fact that '90s music' doesn't sound like 18th century music means that someone had to be original at some point to bring music to that evolutionary peak.

I've never heard "The '80s are crap," not when '80s comps got releases in 1993 and 1994. What I DO hear, and it drives me bats, is how a DX-7 sound is "dated," "of its time," while some Rickenbacker jangle from 1965 is "timeless."

xxp It's obviously simplistic, but I think it's thought-provoking, at least. A lot of the '90s music I love is very purposely looking back to older music, with various degrees of self-consciousness, irony, etc. And it seems true that '80s music (which I don't connect with as much - maybe just due to my age, I was a teen / young adult in the '90s) doesn't seem to do this as much.

Like, I'm not sure how many people a decade older than me - who "came of age" in the '80s - are really into Pavement; I get the sense that Pavement are too derivative for the crowd that came up with SST bands, Husker Du, etc. in the '80s. (The Pavement guys themselves are that age, of course.)

Agree to disagree. When I think of the 80s, I think of Erasure, Husker Du, and Cyndi Lauper. When I think of the 90s, I think of Silverchair, Collective Soul, and 4 Non Blondes

― Paul Ponzi, Monday, August 3, 2020

What about Aaliyah, Mary J. Blige, Babyface, Janet Jackson, Notorious BIG, and Missy Elliott? An extraordinary R&B and hip-hop era!

(xp to myself) ...or Royal Trux, Unrest, Sebadoh - name your history-conscious '90s indie band of choice. People born in the '60s, and thrashing in '80s mosh pits, don't seem to really connect with those bands so much?

Every time I succumb to the temptation to say, "X decade sucked!" I ask myself, "What did I miss out on and how was I wrong?"

B-b-but the SST deal was punk rock guys looking back to 60s and 70s rock in the first place.

https://youtu.be/xBKyBlJ_JN8

https://youtu.be/rWH8Xa4zGzA

music peaked in the 80s

the 1780s

Anyway, this was the actual peak and people have just been shuffling deck chairs since:

18th century music

xp!

Book 1 of Well-Tempered Clavier was 1720s, though.

Every time I succumb to the temptation to say, "X decade sucked!" I ask myself, "What did I miss out on and how was I wrong?"

I'm with you on that, but although my understanding of the 80s has deepened over the past 10-15 years, when push comes to shove, I still earnestly feel like the 90s marked a quantum leap forward for almost every single pop-adjacent genre I can think of. 90s hip-hop, r&b, metal and electronic are all ultimately better than their 80s predecessors imo. Old habits…

In fairness, Scott Miller's point was perhaps somewhat less nuanced than mine; he's talking about "Cherub Rock" when he writes the above, and he goes on to say:

In the nineties, bands pretty much had a single thought: we want to be the next Nirvana. Bands had the least fear in years that following their hearts and doing straight fuzz-guitar pop-rock was somehow old-fashioned. There were a lot of good songs. Life was simple.

I can't endorse this line of argument!!

Bach wrote "Hell Bent for Leather" iirc

It's all gone downhill since Pérotin's Viderunt omnes tbh.

I still earnestly feel like the 90s marked a quantum leap forward for almost every single pop-adjacent genre I can think of. 90s hip-hop, r&b, metal and electronic are all ultimately better than their 80s predecessors imo. Old habits…

Disco and synth pop allowed for a wider range of queer expression in the '80s though.

Most definitely true.

90s hip-hop and metal were really the second wave which broke away from the established limitations but when it comes to metal I worship the 80s like a golden cow

Celtic Frost, Slayer, Iron Maiden, Possessed, Mercyful Fate, Bathory, early Death, Bolt Thrower, Candlemass, etc.… all of them rule but what came after is one another level imo.

(I am aware that this is a patently ridiculous argument. I'm curious to hear from fellow millennials (ugh) who prefer the 80s or who think they're on par with the 90s.)