Is Music Getting More Repetitive? | QI

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This clip is from QI Series R, Episode 15, 'Random' with Sandi Toksvig, Alan Davies, Bill Bailey, Daliso Chaponda and Sally Phillips.

[@portglasgoejuniors]

I am 67 and still enjoy finding new music🎵

[@bugsygoo]

I stopped listening to new music in my mid-30s and have now started again thanks to my teenage son. It's wonderful!

[@jamesedmonds7519]

But is it the same genre you've always listened to?

[@portglasgoejuniors]

@@jamesedmonds7519 no, any genre that has something to it that I like🎵

[@margaretnicol3423]

I'm older than you and I loved Ren. He has a very mixed age following because of the topics and his talent.

[@erraticonteuse]

I'm 37 and did kind of stop listening to new music in my early 30s like they said, but I have younger co-workers now who keep me up to date. I'm grateful to them for introducing me to Chappell Roan!

[@northernepicadvenure]

Check out the writing creds on a Max Martins basically wrote all the hits from the last 20 years

[@Bimbolin92]

Oh yes, Mr Martin Sandberg from Cheiron Studios is a particularly productive Swedish Man. Love it.

[@asldkjaslkdj]

The irony of this is, that Bill's buzzer, is Whatever You Want by Status Quo!

[@davidwalter2002]

I find it interesting that a lot of popular music from the early 20th Century followed either an AABA pattern or a verse/chorus pattern, and there seemed to be infinite variety within those two to keep the music interesting and the songs original.

[@LuukvdHoogen]

I love a good guitar song, but I also love minimal techno. Just different listening; the rhythmics can change so subtly but bring such a funky punch. And you can get on dancing without distracting bridges and breaks, which is sometimes what I feel like more.

[@jefferyrockey5353]

When Stephen Sondheim was first writing musicals, the biggest criticism he heard was that his songs weren't melodic, like the great Broadway hits of yesteryear that people would hum as they left the theatre. Then he wrote "A Little Night Music" and people said he finally broke through and wrote a hummable melody with thr Act I closer, "A Weekend in the Country". Sondheim noted that the main melodic line in that song wasn't that different from his other songs, but he just repeated the same main theme over and over again until it couldn't help but be memorable. Anyway, my point is that maybe songs are more repetitive today because songwriters want them to become ear worms? Especially now that tik tok uses tiny clips and makes them massive hits?

[@bushratbeachbum]

Ooooooooh. If you're talking about music, let bill speak!! You couldn't find anyone more suited to the topic in that building!!!

[@jeffdege4786]

No mention of Donald Knuth's "On the Complexity of Popular Songs"?

[@margaretnicol3423]

The best music out there is the ones the big record labels won't touch because they don't fit the mold.

[@sws212]

Unfortunately, only shooting stars break the mold.

[@wallythewondercorncake8657]

I'm definitely guilty of this sort of thing. My most listened to song last year was Satisfied by Jayden Bartels, my third most listened to was the acoustic version. At least she writes her own stuff tho lol

[@Ineddiblehulk]

I was well aware how I stopped listening to new music - though I do listen to classic albums I missed when I was younger. It’s a good middle ground.

[@twocvbloke]

I'm 39 and most modern music I find to be annoying (could also just be my being autistic) as it's very noisy and repetitive with lyrics that are just word salads that mean nothing; on the other hand, my most favourite singer, songwriter & guitarist from Glasgow is Amy Macdonald, pretty much every song she's released (bar any covers) is her own work with very few co-writers, proper talent there... :D

[@likebot.]

The only thing as repetitive is my complaint about the repetitive music.

[@SimonMoon5]

Repetitive? Repetitive? Repetitive, you say? Repetitive?

[@NewMessage]

Seen this one before...

[@donjones4719]

Computer processing of music has taken over the song and the artist. The worst offender is percussion. A live drummer gives a subtle varying beat, etc. Synthesized percussion gives a relentlessly steady beat.

[@klaxoncow]

I think it's the Digital Audio Workstations (DAWs). These days, all music is produced with digital software and a very common way of working is to loop a few bars over and over. Tweak the drums a little. Okay, that needs to be a bit louder. We need to add some reverb there. And you're just looping the same 4 bars or 8 bars over and over again, neurotically focusing on getting the sound and production absolutely perfect. But this way of working produces what we tend to increasingly hear today - unbelievably well-produced music but which are essentially one or two or three "loops" strung together. The digital way of working fosters a neurotic perfectionism. Such as the use of autotune and pitch correction on vocals absolutely everywhere. It's applied even to good singers, who hit all the notes. It's this perfectionism - the vocals can't even be a few cents sharp or flat, and they have to exactly hit the frequency perfectly. The DAW encourages this, as you can pitch correct anything and everything. So, because it's there, and you can "fix" even the tiniest bit of sharp or flat vocals (that even professionals would struggle to hear, as we're talking dozens of cents, not wildly out of tune vocals), then you fix it. Because why not be a perfectionist, when your toolbox is full of such precise tools? Whereas, in the analogue age, you played live and recorded it. You can do tape loops, of course, but that's far more complicated and impractical than just playing the song live, there and then, so tape loops are reserved for special effects, not standard recording practice. In the analogue age, the way to get perfect vocals was not "autotune". It was singing the part over and over and over again. On take 3, you nailed that line. But take 9 is where you got that other line just perfect. You did the chorus best on take 7. That's the old way of doing it. Record the vocals a dozen times, then edit the best takes together into the most perfect performance. (People often accuse those who use autotune of "cheating". Yes, undeniably so. A computer is literally manufacturing audio that never existed. It's totally cheating. But recording a vocal a dozen times and then editing together the best takes? That's also very much "cheating" as well. It's slightly less cheat-y because the vocal performance is real. But, nah, no-one ever sung it that well in a single take. We've edited together the best takes to create a slightly "unreal" real performance.) There were "cheats" in the analogue way of working as well, of course. But they usually involved playing the song live. You're playing a number of bars - or maybe the entire song - and you're not obsessively looping sections over and over. If you want to throw in a variation, that's real easy when playing live - just play the instrument differently. But when you're looping 2 or 4 bars in a DAW, variation is actually harder to do. You've got to duplicate those bars and then change them a little. The modern digital way of working is "depth first". Loop 4 bars and dig down neurotically to get that perfect sound. Whereas, in the analogue age, it was "breath first" - play the whole part or track a dozen times and then edit together the best takes. It's the method of working. Modern tools encourage "the loop" and most modern songs are basically a few "loops" strung together.

[@rtyuik7]

well, one possible factor is that you can take a 16-beat phrase and copy/paste it for hours, with modern music-making technology...instead of composing ten minutes of evolving, living, art, its just FruityLoops and Autotune...

[@margaretnicol3423]

Have you discovered Ren?

[@bren106]

*Never stop listening to new music, reading new books or being open to new ideas, when you do it's the sign of impending geezerhood.*

[@hoabinh555]

Ah, so it is Swedens fault all of it 😆

[@skunclep1938]

Bloody ABBA! 😡

[@AnimaTweek]

Number 9 from The Beetles The only lyric is “number 9”

[@Jsdhrt]

That song os the opposite of repetitive, these lyrics are repeated two or three times in an eight minute song

[@kennyn1992]

I read back in the day pop listeners would turn the channel on a new song if they didn't hear the chorus within 30 seconds (in the US where they have lots of channels) and now streaming listeners won't give a new song a chance if it has too long an intro. So writers adjust. Or have listeners got used to what writers have popularised and have adjusted listening habits?

[@massimookissed1023]

I listen to the same old stuff all the time, but, *_importantly,_* in a random order !

[@dragonfire4957]

Spot on kwato is baddddd...no creativity..

[@phillwainewright4221]

Repeating the same line 16 times in a row is *NOT* a 'chorus'. Daft Punk, take note. Instead of being up all night to get lucky, you should have been up all night writing a proper chorus.

[@janickpauwels3792]

Don't touch Daft Punk. They have made enough iconic music, and they don't need your approval or criticism. If you think you can do it better, make your own music. There are plenty of cheap tools to produce music, so your imagination is the only limiting factor. Let's see if you can top the charts.

[@warrenmaxxon1305]

I'm 60 and listen to at least an hour of music which is unfamiliar with me on a daily basis.

[@LeornianCyng]

We really need to stop massive corporations from writing music. It should be the job of the musicians themselves.

[@Pocketfarmer1]

But then the musicians would have to have some talent.

[@donjones4719]

This is a fairly old clip and it's just gotten worse and worse. Promising young artists with their own sound are forced to move more and more to the commercial mainstream if they want to have a career. It's like a great Italian chef was forced to make Dominos pizza.

[@martinb5626]

All commercial music is garbage. Deep in the underground is where the fire be.

[@AnnaAnna-uc2ff]

I don't know.

[@geoffroi-le-Hook]

Ba-by shark doo doo doo-doo doo-doo ...

[@goyasolidar]

Lyrics in general have also become rubbish as time has gone on. And don't get me started on auto-tune.

[@cbucks1923]

I would admit to listening to the same stuff all the time but always try include new stuff in the nix

[@paulharrison2557]

In my 40's and listen to new music nearly every day

[@Jsdhrt]

I've never seen Allen not participating before, was he ill?

[@garchompenthusiast]

Because our parents invented the drum machine!

[@margaretnicol3423]

It's not if you listen to Ren, The Big Push or Dirt Miller.

[@PaperadiGomma123]

Don't invite the black guy. Awful

[@arvidbergman]

Pipe down Tory

[@sabsamuel]

First

[@margaretnicol3423]

🏆