Music Was Better In The 80's | John Mayer | Oxford Union

[@tickedoffnow]

Back then music came completely from the heart Now the mainstream is just trash

[@OUTLIER96]

Nowadays mainstream music comes not out the heart, but the ass. In other words, it's crap.

[@davidperry4013]

Most new mainstream music is either a waste of talent or no talent at all. Also, the lyrics are shallow and overly repetitive.

[@CRITTERBUSTERS]

It's kinda funny how the 80s was heralded as being the worst era of music, yet if you go back and listen to it, the Production Quality was immense, and you had some of the finest musicians to ever come out, almost everyone had real talent, if there's one criticism I have on the 80s music is the songwriting got a little shallow particularly in pop songs, but then again its nothing compared to how shallow the writing is now, and at least the 80s pop songs had catchy choruses

[@mikekaraoke]

I've never heard the 80's was heralded as being the worst era of music, on some TV shows Ihave seen they said that bout the 70's- but yea 80's has classic stuff how could anyone say bands like: The Police,U2, INXS, Duran Duran, Guns N Roses were rubbish

[@kevinendo9613]

dude i've never seen an era where KIDS KNOW THE FUCKING SONGS FROM 40yrs ago.. these kids know more about 80s music THAN ME and i was a teen back then.. EXPLAIN THAT?

[@CRITTERBUSTERS]

@@kevinendo9613 KZbin and stranger things I guess ha ha

[@youtubeistryingtocensorme]

80s the best era of music!!! 60s,70s and 80s were the best era of music

[@renealexander2703]

80s has great music.

[@LiJieAshley]

This is what we called,a true musician. What he said is true. He understands the term 'music' and could explain it in detail.

[@johnmiller2132]

'Shredding means sitting in a room yelling "Mum, I'm practicing!" for hours and hours and hours' - John Mayer

[@susancorgi]

Well said! 80's music was much better. Ppl nowadays still can't get enough of it. I know i can't.

[@puffybuns2311]

The depth and the sheer number of bands I have discovered and still do from the 80s is astounding. I grew up in the 90s and 80s music was not available in my country (atleast most of it) but then came youtube and in 2006-07 I started discovering these bands and I haven’t finished discovering till now. They just keep coming up through interviews or suggestions. I just completely loose myself when I discover some hidden gem which I add to my playlist. Man the density and quality of the 80s cannot be matched.

[@jimmydoesmusic2672]

Finding it hard not to point out the fact that the Oxford Union misplaced an apostrophe...

[@jasonlui]

The 80's were Madonna, Kylie Minogue, Heart, Poison, Genesis, Mike and the Mechanic, U2, Def Leppard, Reo Speedwagon, Survivor, Journey, Pet Shop Boys, Erasure, Roxette, John Waite, Gun & Roses, Duran Duran, A'ha, The Cure, FleetWood Mac, Bangles, Tears For Fears, Dire Straits, Whitesnake, George Michael, Bananarama, Blondie, Kim Wilde, Martika, Whitney Houston, Bobby Brown. Human League, Wham, Bryan Adams, Amy Grant, Wilson Phillips, Alison Moyet, The Pretenders, Motley Crue, Enya, Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson. Foreigner, The Smiths,Eurythmics,

[@jalontf2]

Re-flex, The Box, Underworld, we could go on!

[@curly_wyn]

U2 sucks.

[@KnowYoutheDukeofArgyll1841]

Madness, Bad Manners, Atlantic Starr, Visage.

[@petravanessa]

I would never win an argument with this guy

[@beejsmusic]

He's right about the metal bands...they were amazing musicians but too many people just hated them because of the hardcore nature of the music.

[@Gnefitisis]

Hairmetal is pussy metal, not that hardcore at all.

[@cody_charlesguitar]

People used to trash the 80s so much but there’s so much talent in a TON of 80s songs. You had not so good music as well, but there’s good and bad no matter where you look! The 80s is my favorite decade of music I’ve always thought it was great!

[@EmilyB5]

80s and 90s was the best music era.

[@miinfl7143]

It's the late 70s to early 80s for me but yeah 70s - 90s, the whole era, was great.

[@pinkled4429]

60s 70s were the best to me. 80s were too commercial

[@carl_anderson9315]

@@pinkled442960s and 70s, the best. 80s was more commercial but extremely popular and great quality. 90s early to mid was great. Late 90s was the begging of the end.

[@206151]

I'm so glad he acknowledged The Police and especially Copeland's drumming.

[@Billbill80s]

He should just travel around doing motivational seminars.

[@michaelbonhomme1560]

💯 Born in 1992. My favorite music is a song that sounds incredible, but is pretty layered arrangement wise. His explanation is excellent

[@jryuwah]

I like what he's saying here! I really do. but when he's referring to all of those 80 artists. that complexity came from the influence in the 70's era. Phil Collins was doing the complex stuff in the 70s which transcended into the 80s pop music. so me personally would give more credit to the 70s when reffering to the evolution of prog rock and fusing elemts of the Jazz fusion in the 70s as well. that's were the bands like Gentle Giant, Genesis, King Crimson, Rush ect got alot of their influence. but even with that being said I still really like what John was saying. very knowledable but he's giving too much credit to the 80s. a lot of that fire came from the decade before

[@ClubeLondon]

I think you´re absolutely right.But for me, what those 80´s bands were trying to do was to bring all the sophistication and cool moods from prog,jazz and other rythms you mentioned to something more popular.It worked.Beautiful chords with sevens,nines and elevens were all over the place but the melodies were pop as the beats and the structure of the songs.The result was a big list of hits with great emotional power.Emotion was the key and they worked it well.Now we still hear new good songs of course, but they sound kind of mechanic,empty and lifeless.They die young in our hearts. Cheers!

[@youhki13]

"Mom! I'm practicing!" Hahaha soo true!

[@jaytristan9667]

He's saying the '80s was the best musical decade of his lifetime.

[@youtubeistryingtocensorme]

80s is best musical decade period. Today’s music is lazily produced and sucks ass. Auto tune should be banned

[@SummeRain783]

I love that the mentioned Phil Collins ❤️

[@pianokid100]

Tears for Fears > anything today.

[@MrDebkumarbasu]

The best way I can describe this is: When I sit down to work, I put on songs like, nothing's gonna stop us, dont stop believing, walk of life, black velvet etc. And the reason is the same as why we order food before sitting down to watch a movie. It just goes together perfectly and 80s music is like a buger or fried chicken that looks exactly like what it does in the commercial. It is fulfilling, it is wholesome and dare I say, epic!

[@fikreefauzi8604]

i agree (certain extent)... i was born in 87 and grew up in the influence of late 80'+90+millenial song. From my personal view, besides the song compostion and arrangement thing, what makes 80's song great is the equipment+setup and how they play, if you try to play back the 80's hits song with the current equipment and new kind of play, you will find the music is not sound like coming from 80's at all...

[@enigma4430]

I don't like his music but I consider what he said very profound and true

[@JonasGuitarMadness]

he's so right. the musical evolution's gone backwards... and shit, i love the police!

[@lolamaria2255]

Damn right! :))

[@salwabadiri4508]

I really love this man !!

[@makeupobsessed55]

Couldn't of said it better myself!

[@StephShrubb]

Wow, even Oxford can't get the whole 80s/80's thing right. #smh

[@63Baggies]

It proves that the even the Oxford Union former hosts to Ghandi, Martin Luther King and Malcolm X etc have decided to become populist... WHAT A FACILE and DUMB argument, the simple fact is MUSIC evolves!

[@lindajee7938]

I would love to see the whole interview please!!!

[@sportsportsport]

Poison - Fallen Angel. One of my favourite songs ever.

[@stephenjerzak]

Nailed it.

[@TheAwesomeBBQ]

What a brilliant man!

[@eliKrut]

I wanna see the whole interview !!

[@emgex]

80s music is better coz its sounds so RAW compared to todays music and music they made was a bit more complex. And every song you hear from that time sounds damn different and non generic. Every song today sounds soo generic and samey.

[@Ochenter]

Are you fucking tellin' me ?? I'm agreed with you man !! It is notorious nowadays music sucks !!

[@winslowwong100]

all future interviews with john mayer should only be discussing music and guitars. who cares about his girlfriends and what not.

[@acousticheadphones]

If only someone would post the entire interview.

[@James-hh1lq]

Modern chart is so boring it's fake also

[@jaytristan9667]

The point is he grew up during the 80s, not the 60s or 70s....

[@chewinggum2001]

WHERE IS THE ENTIRE INTERVIEW I NEED TO SEE IT

[@nick8160]

If those kids knew how complex is to create a metal song they would still listening today's shit

[@yonisgure7348]

TREAD LIGHTLY!

[@francismcgee]

society was better in 1980s

[@homebakedgoods]

Digressing or not, he used the wrong term. What he is describing at the end of the clip is called shedding, or woodshedding. Shredding is something else entirely, though you do need to shed to shred :) Guitar players will know what I mean.

[@puffybuns2311]

Glad he mentioned Ratt because there is no one like Warren Demartini and I am sure John is a fan too.

[@Churro_Flaminguez]

In musical terms this can be pointed out very specifically. Today music is creatively impoverished with a huge mandate by the record industry to crank out disposable hits according to very creatively restrictive formulas, which have gotten more basic and less sophisticated over time. The creative bankruptcy of modern music has to do with lack of variety in rhythm, creatively unsophisticated arrangements, almost no musicianship since musicians don't play; everything is programmed, Auto-Tune removing the need for a singer to have talent and the robot-sounding setting completely wiping out the aesthetic of a good singing voice. Also lack of chord progression creativity and sophistication, lack of diverse influences enriching the experience, and above all a remarkable lack of melodic and harmonic sophistication as it existed for decades. Today's melodies are fit for nurseries and playgrounds and little else.

[@maxvartanian]

Not sure I like his idea of combining pop with blues in order to fill the need to play one or the other. JM you're full of the blues, bring that back please.

[@pinkled4429]

The best thing to happen to the 80s was Iron maiden, and then the Big 4 of thrash followed by Chuck's Death.

[@cindypham25]

Amen

[@martinbarr5676]

Music was better as it came from a love of music by people who had genuine talent, whatever genre you liked, glam rock, heavy metal, new romantics or the early days of dance music people performed from the heart. Now songs are written by someone else for some manufactured band, non offensive, no passion. Also the times were very different, there was more freedom, we were not watched every minute of the day by cameras. There was no Facebook, instagram likes to worry about, we experienced life, went outside did things together late at night, mad parties which inspired creativity, punishment was to be sent to your room, todays punishment for kids is to be sent outside. We weren't told what to like by our phones and reality TV contests like Britain's Got Talent. Political times were different, I remember growing up in the 80's we lived (in Europe) under constant treat of the 4 minute warning of nuclear bombs dropping and then the end of it all in the late 80's collapse of the U.S.S.R and a feeling the world was finally all coming together, all of which helped to influence the music of the time. And no Health and Safety meant pyrotechnics could be used on stage and everyone loves exploding drums and sparks out of guitars!!

[@carmstrong6507]

The 1960s was also a better decade for music. The Beatles > anything today.

[@pj20050]

1:55 "dafuq is in my hair"

[@kevinendo9613]

dude i've never seen an era where KIDS KNOW THE FUCKING SONGS FROM 40yrs ago.. these kids know more about 80s music THAN ME and i was a teen back then.. EXPLAIN THAT?

[@harbingerofepiphany3155]

I think it is about as subjective as someone preferring to snack on cat turds rather then dining on a medium rare Porter house steak with a glass of 1981 Chateau La'fite!

[@ArthursSimpleLife]

I bet Classical snobs disagree.

[@MyMamasChild2]

This is coming gr

[@giovannispinotti]

you listen to him and the first link that comes up in the right is him talking about his collaboration with katy perry, who might be among the top 3 icons of the kind of easy commercial superficial overproduced underperformed corporate-driven pop that he's bashing here. so what? hypocrisy?

[@mollers92]

Completely... but I guess it's hard to disagree with the Mrs sometimes

[@SugaryCoyote]

He was discussing how in the 80's, he feels the "pop" songs could be the most well-written at the time. He tried to make a well-written song with a pop singer. Where is the hypocrisy?

[@diidac17]

giovanni spinotti There was a time when John wanted to be liked by everyone, thats why in some cases he had a deep thinking of music like in this video and another cases with the media he didnt care about that. Thats the reason of why he had problems in the 2008-2010. Nowadays I think he avoid this type of conversations and also avoiding toxic medias and people.

[@diidac17]

SugaryCoyote Man he is trying to dont put any nowadays commercial song down, when with the fact of saying that the 80's had better music couse they were more well-performed, he is undirectly critizising pop music of today. In that time he wanted to be liked by everyone, that brought him problems.

[@lotumonstret]

Is anyone else noticing the idiot taking a nap at 2:30 instead of listening to one of the world's greatest artists?

[@pinkled4429]

Apart from metal, I didn't really enjoy 80s music. That's coming from a Beatles fanatic. Most 80s Mainstream music was weird commercial Synth pop, boyband music etc. It was more about making money, less about the art

[@jbryant958]

John Mayer - Please go back to playing the real soulful blues like you do so well. I constantly listen to your recordings from The Viper Room, Webster Hall, etc... all from the early 2000s. Your in the league of Clapton and Greeney and the like when you try... why stop?

[@MyMamasChild2]

This is coming from a guy who dates Katy Perry. So hilarious.

[@juliot.632]

subjective

[@homebakedgoods]

He doesn't know the difference between shredding and shedding, which is embarrassing for a guitar player.

[@Gnefitisis]

Basically this Boomer is just saying "had real instruments...ergo better." Blah blah

[@curly_wyn]

John Mayer with a garbage opinion. What else is new?

[@taylorh4480]

kindness is easy. as is silence when kindness cannot be mustered

[@juliot.632]

I disagree, still subjective.

[@mitchredmilller4386]

I grew up in the 60s/70s - my 1st musical love were The Beach Boys (talkin 'bout complexity). You are absolutely wrong, Mr. Mayer. Most of the songs by Genesis & The Police have been composed in the 70s. The 80s definitely were the WORST decade in music so far, with all the computarized and electronic drums, synth overload etc.

[@jryuwah]

exactly. though I appreciate the zeal he acts like music just got complex out of the blue in the 80s. umm did he miss out on Frank Zappa or what?

[@natecorning]

the current decade is the worst. not the 80's.

[@mikekaraoke]

not all music in the 80's were computarized and electronic drums, like The Police,Big Country, The Cult, The Smiths, U2, Suzanne Vega,Tracy Chapman, Bon Jovi, Guns N Roses, Simple Minds, Billy Idol, The Cure, Madness, Robert Palmer, UB40, The Proclaimers, Iron Maiden, The Jam, Style Council,Status Quo, Transvision Vamp,Huey Lewis+ the news,AC/DC, THe GoGo's,etc

[@rushaddoodhmal3156]

Ever heard about rap that's even worse

[@VicRoseMusic]

every decade was better than the 80s lol

[@mikekaraoke]

what the hell have you been smoking, 80's had some decent singles/albums your full of shit

[@VicRoseMusic]

what are you so mad about?

[@mikekaraoke]

your comment bout the 80's which is completely untrue, the decade had a'lot of good singles and albums from 1980-89

[@tagdog300]

Music was horrible in the 80's. Very few good bands, try 90s or 70s.

[@mikekaraoke]

not all of the 80's were horrible why you being so bloody dramatic

[@mikekaraoke]

***** Exactly other really good 80's Singles/Albums from bands/Artists[Some of which came through from 70's like -The Jam/The Police/Madness/Kate Bush,Dire Straits etc and then one that started in 80's like : Big Country,The Cure, U2, Style Council, Sade, Suzanne Vega, The Smiths, Aero smith, Beastie Boys, Janet Jackson, Fine young cannibals,UB40, Guns N Roses,Tracy Chapman, Billy Idol, The Cult, Curiosity killed the cat,Janes Addiction, Depeche Mode, Frankie Goes To Hollywood, Duran Duran, Bruce Springsteen[though he did pen other songs for artists in the 70's], etc

[@seanbeverly4908]

Are you insane? 80's had way better music than the 90s.

[@symbolitical4158]

More singles came out of the 80s than any other decade (good try though).

[@hectorroman9164]

@@seanbeverly4908 I agree with you music in the 90s went downhill in the second half of the decade probably a Millennial that probably didnt experience the 80s thinks like as the only decade Millennials experienced were the 90s even people who were in their mid to late 20s during the 90s agree that music was better in the 80s when they were teenager.

[@johnnymcg4596]

what he is describing is the 60s, and 70s, the 80s sucked.!

[@hectorroman9164]

Ok boomer.

[@keithremedy]

Fuckin boomer con

[@Blue-jn1ph]

No u suck, the 60s, 70s and 80s are all good musical decades

[@rushaddoodhmal3156]

Listen to ur rubbish vulgar rap

[@rushaddoodhmal3156]

Pass on the cocaine