What’s a Monoculture? How Artists Are Bigger and Smaller Than Ever

In this episode, my friend Rich Levy and I discuss the monumental shift in the music industry from the 1990s to the 2000s, exploring how technology transformed the way we experience music.
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[@user-fj5qf7gt6n]

I won't go to stadium shows anymore. Disappointing when the music is out of sync with the giant screen because I'm miles away. If I'm miles away I might as well watch KZbin. Give me smaller venues with great bands.

[@ricktheexplorer]

When I would crew shows in stadiums, we did a show for Michael Bolton, and we only used 25% of the stadium, covering the goal side of the stadium. The best shows we worked were at an outside venue that could hold around 10,000 to 14,000 people, which could all sit on a hill, Starwood Amphitheater in Nashville.

[@shoegazer93]

In Britain. It was the death of TOP OF THE POPS in 2004, CD: UK, TFI Friday. These shows were shown on the standard 5 TV channels (BBC One, ITV, Channel 4 etc). Yes TOTP may have been cringe most of the time, but at least it gave people an indication of what was going on. There's NO MOVEMENT AND NO ZEITGEIST these days

[@EdgyNumber1]

Very odd because stadium sound has evolved massively- just look at the new directional speakers they have suspended these days, compare to the floor standing box types back in the day. Sounds like lazy or cheaping out on the engineering and placement.

[@Cmunic8]

@@ricktheexplorerSTARWOOD damn I miss that place ✌️👍🤘

[@tylon2999]

I never have been a fan of large venous whether I'm listening or playing.

[@mar-mj9vb]

Bigger and smaller is a good term. I've heard of Taylor Swift, but I never heard Taylor Swift. Back in the day I would have definitely heard her on the radio whether I wanted to or not.

[@km1366]

Not missing anything

[@jimmycampbell78]

@@km1366 That's my take too

[@ram-4]

The literal global multi-stadium mass hysteria / hypnosis regarding Swift is mind-boggling, insane and interesting at the same time. I can only name ONE Swift song, ”We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together”, which is a good pop song - but from 2012.

[@jimmycampbell78]

She's been promoted heavily in the media as a celebrity/influencer/role model, with a focus more on her persona, gender and politics than any of her music. Perhaps that says it all.

[@SuperNevile]

@@jimmycampbell78 Now she's in this Marilyn Monroe/Joe DiMaggio type relationship, it signals to me some "super influencer" thing is going on.

[@dalewikfors9194]

One of my favorite things as being a dad was seeing my kids coming to me excited about sharing an old song like Toto or Neil Young asking me if I ever heard this song...then there were stories.

[@rumblehat4357]

My college age kid recently went to see Journey/Toto in concert.

[@derkeheath5172]

My teen daughter (who at the time was lstening to stuff like Korn, Rob Zombie, and Limp Bizkit) suddenly one day blurted out that she LOVED Steve Miller Band, and I was utterly floored. I immediately went to my CD collection to share and told her about how he was a regular in my hometown as a kid. (He barely tours at all anymore, and that bummed her out royally.)

[@matthewdennis1739]

I grew up listening to what my parents liked. Mom like rock, so I listened to AC/DC, Led Zepplin, Black Sabbath, Rush, REO Speedwagon, etc. My dad liked country so I listened to George Straight, Randy Travis, John Anderson, Clint Black, Brooks and Dunn, John Denver, etc. And when I listened to pop radio on the school bus I was drawn toward bands like Matchbox Twenty, Third Eye Blind, Hootie and the Blowfish. Then it was Linkin Park and Metallica and Iron Maiden. Over the years I've loved everything from Social Distortion and Bad Religion to Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen, to Nirvana and Alice and Chains, to The Gaslight, Anthem, Rise Against, Josh Ritter, Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, Charley Crockett, Sierra Ferrell and Greta Van Fleet. Just love music that moves you man, you don't need boundaries. I've known the classics from a young age and love them and new music both.

[@FlyingMonkies325]

Oh yes current young gens they know the music that's been around for a bit isn't great so they've been looking back as much as we have. As a 90s baby i completely ignored past music but i've found quite a number of random tunes i like throughout the decades. Most i've heard on the tv commercials lol but some i found i love on my own by exploring playlists. Even ytube recommends me older tunes because it's just better, so there is still much hope we hoomans know what we like.

[@finnmccool1591]

I'm a Gen Xer and not a huge Steve Miller fan, but I caught him in concert before Covid and he was fantastic. I had forgotten just how many songs he's written that were hits.

[@nickluca]

A little off topic, but here's a thought. Back in the monoculture day there were huge bands and artists that didn't even reach the top 10, Led Zeppelin for example, but they were real musicians focused on making music. We can all name every member of that band, but... and here's the point- we did not know anything about those musicians beyond interviews and rumors. I knew who Robert Plant was, but I didn't know about his private life and didn't really think about it, just enjoyed the music. These days artists are posting what thet had for breakfast and their favorite shoe company etc. Young artists post all day with music as peice of a larger portfolio of their talents. Social media has forced artists to "engage" and the music is secondary.

[@heaven_spark]

Zeppelin had 1 top 10 song and 9 more songs in top 21 on billboard top 100 it was just they're mysterious aura but they sold out and where in many ways Bigger than the Beatles in the 70's so nope. I get the argument but maybe Page and Plant would still share their breakfast if it brought more album sales which is often why today artists do that. People, fans, us want to know as much as we possibly can about our favourite artist especially when you're a teen. It sells.

[@nickluca]

@@heaven_spark yeah sounds like we agree in general. I know way more about Robert Plant TODAY than I did in the 70s. I honestly knew very little about what he was doing outside of records and concerts. Now on social media he posts a fresh picture almost daily. So yeah it's just a different era. Where I differ is I find social media to be a turn off, although I do see your point that most people want to know more about their favorite artist. For me, it has ruined the mystery, but thats just me.

[@Stratmanable]

​@heaven_spark "They're" means "they are". "Their" is the possessive. "THEIR" mysterious aura.

[@KyleJon]

Music has become what TV shows are now. No one is watching the same show. So it’s hard to bond with strangers at the bar per se, when you make a reference and they are like ??? Then you are left with the “ You should really check this band/movie/TV show out, which no one ever does. My 2c

[@sreneethomas]

I agree!! I find myself “informing” people of bands/artists when I’m trying to have those good old days conversations about music I heard or liked. Also…I am one of those ppl who absolutely check out the band/artist when someone says that to me! But it’s for this reason…where am I getting my new music information now days? It’s an algorithm or someone saying “you should check this artist/song out”

[@jimkon1479]

It's better to ask "So what are you watching these days" which can cover plenty of ground and show some interest in this new thing you found out about. "Oh you're into sci fi stuff..."

[@KyleJon]

@@jimkon1479 The point is, is we used to watch Seinfeld on Thursday night. The next day, everyone would talk about it at the water cooler. It was a SHARED experience. Or SNL. Notorious for giving us catch phrases we use in daily life. But I’m order for it to work, EVERYONE had to see it. I can do a good Yogi Bear impersonation. But if I’m on a date, and the girl doesn’t know the character, it falls flat. Back in true day, the RECORD COMPANY determined who got to record and release music. So it was a SHARED EXPERIENCE of everybody hearing Hysteria drop, or Appetite for Destruction or Nirvanas album. Now it’s 80,000 new songs to Spotify every day. If Stairway to Heaven was in that 80,000, would anyone notice?

[@better.better]

people still go to bars?

[@vocalead]

Remember that time when you knew if you were gonna like someone because of the music they listened to? That jock who liked that one NSYNC song but didn't know who they were, you knew straight away you were not gonna get along with that dude.

[@NJStew22]

I'm in a post rock band that doesn't draw too big a crowd in the United States, but last fall we went on an 8 show headlining tour in China and sold a couple hundred tickets a night. It was mind boggling to us to have fans coming out to every show on the other side of the planet, but in our home country we're barely getting by. It opened my eyes to the different markets and the way different music reaches different cultures in a really palpable way.

[@SonovaBish]

Most of my favorite modern bands are spread across Europe and Brazil. I'm the other side of that feeling of yours. I listen to Stoner/Doom.

[@kanjuro8926]

I didn't even know there was a "post rock" music

[@TrueMithrandir]

@@kanjuro8926you must have been living under a rock for the past 30 years then...

[@NJStew22]

@@kanjuro8926 It's a wide umbrella that encompasses *mostly* instrumental based rock music, and commonly there are also some electronic elements. Explosions In The Sky, Mogwai, Godspeed! You Black Emperor are some of the giants of the genre. Believe me when I say the genre name "post rock" is not popular haha. My band is called "Pray For Sound", and we typically have instrumental based rock tracks with your standard 2 guitars bass drums setup, but also experiment with synths, strings, and pianos in the studio.

[@SnakePool]

a friend of mine was driving Vader around on tour years ago. when they stopped at Trees Dallas, we got together and hung out and talked. Piotr was saying they make more in two shows in south america than they make the entire US leg of the tour.

[@tatendamhuriro2735]

Technology changed the way we consume music. Back in the day the media distributing music was limited to radios, terrestrial tv and entertainment spots. So everyone was consuming similar content and that created the monoculture. Now people customise their own content they want to consume

[@Demobius]

Back in the day, music started in your living room or garage. Half a dozen of us would get together with instruments and a gallon of Gallo on a Saturday night.

[@FeedbackLoop70]

Correct. My point is that is the "common experience" that enables you to actively (!) digest the input.. and that is what enables individual creativity based on a common reception. So that society can grow as a whole.

[@sumiben5211]

She was having a concert in a stadium 20 minutes walk from my home and I had no idea who was singing over there 😂. But now I know her for all the fuss.

[@joemisek]

Imagine Dragons has ten songs with over a billion plays on Spotify and KZbin... and I can't name a single one of them.

[@tywco]

“Enemy” from the opening credits of Arcane. That’s all I’ve got.

[@larryclemens]

I'm 76yo and substitute teach, occasionally. I can play a couple of Imagine Dragons videos from the movie Spiderman: Into The Spiderverse and every 3rd grader in the room knows the lyrics and sings along to their songs, Believer and Bones. Also, they love Rick Astley.

[@symptomofsouls]

@@tywco People watch Arcane?

[@tywco]

@@symptomofsouls It broke records for Netflix.

[@symptomofsouls]

@@tywco I have literally never met anyone who has watched the show. It's not the only one either. These series/movies that are breaking records in viewership. Yet I could ask 100 different people if they had heard of it and 100 would ask "wtf is Arcane"

[@sampowellmusic]

Here’s the problem with potential Super Bowl halftime performers. It’s not a concert anymore it’s an event. The choreography the props the lighting the effects you can’t just get up there and be a great band and play a bunch of songs. So that narrows down the field tremendously.

[@charlesheld3082]

And hardly anyone is even playing or singing because The Producers (TM) don't want to risk a shorted microphone or a guitar going out of tune because a string broke. So then you immediately disqualify any artist who refuses to do a pantomime performance.

[@cjdubuisson]

Truth

[@nikodraganic]

I would say that this widens the list of possible SB HT performers, not shortens it.

[@dstarks360]

So what you get is Ice Capades. Funny, though, that the greatest halftime show ever...was a live band singing and playing - Prince. Real talent never goes out of style...

[@lill3lars]

@@nikodraganicagree. Is there any reason a non English singing artist could not entertain? Could say BTS do it? Say what you will about the music but they produce amazing shows and choreography

[@championthewonderhorse9733]

A big difference is that in the 80s, for instance, bands played instruments and actually sang songs. That is exhausting and requires time out. Now far fewer stars play in a band and the stadium experience is full of audio assistance, pyrotechnics and entertainment that is much less pressure on the voices of the stars.

[@kumada84]

That's an excellent point

[@Walamonga1313]

I thought they'd bring this up. Especially considering super bowls are prerecorded, so not really a live show. Same can apply to concerts, you can just lip synch and call it a day. So you can do a bunch of shows without wearing your voice/body out

[@dutyfreeadventures5924]

​@@Walamonga1313 I didn't know it was pre-recorded?

[@dcarbs2979]

They still do it. The instruments have chnaged! They also do even more: many control their own visuals, samples on the fly. A live show is much more involved now.

[@WIMPY86]

I often find a band name with a decent song... But later discover it's just one guy in his mom's basement on ProTools. No tour coming LOL

[@tayloreh]

LiveNation is a huge part of the problem - they make going to shows so damn expensive for people that they don't have the funds to go see smaller acts, especially when tours are 'farewell tours', and you feel such an obligation to see the dinosaurs one last time.

[@gomezgomezian3236]

But the shows have to be so expensive, because there is no money in selling music anymore. We all went for Napster etc, and then streaming, and the artists make 3/5ths of stuff all on the music they record. So their only way to make money is live gigs. The simple reality is that they have to make money somehow. And if we are not willing to pay a decent price to buy the tracks, then we have to pay for it via the live performances.

[@fredoswego]

@@gomezgomezian3236 Yes. Music acts used to tour to sell records. You'd see band X and hopefully you'd start buying up their catalog. Now, nobody buys any music and outside of the top 10 artists on Spotify the rest get almost no play revenue so touring is their entire paycheck.

[@tayloreh]

​@@gomezgomezian3236 the dinosaurs are cashing out by selling the rights off to their music. They're fine, they're just soaking up every last dollar so their families can get a seat on the spaceship to escape the collapse of a liveable Earth.

[@johnphelan4215]

@@gomezgomezian3236 you are exactly right. When I was a kid, an album cost $9.99 and a concert ticket cost $12-15. The point of the concert tour was to hype the album. Now an album costs ... $9.99 and nobody buys the whole thing anyway. How is anyone supposed to build a business around that.

[@darkskinwhite]

​@@gomezgomezian3236true indeed, though live nation is still the bigger problem. they make it twice as expensive at a MINIMUM. as in the box office is half the price the day the tickets go on sale. wait too late & you'll be left with "resale" tickets which are not really resale, they were just withheld by livenation & depending on the show and artist they might be 10× or literally even 100× the price.

[@johnbulger8044]

"Artists are bigger and smaller than they've ever been" - that about sums up the state of popular music nowadays. Thanks guys for this informative and intelligent discussion

[@radiocremebrulee4431]

He should have qualified this by saying that a FAR smaller percentage of "artists are bigger than ever" because of the disproportionate exposure they get at the cost of relegating a larger swathe of artists/bands to obscurity.

[@matsumoku1]

@@radiocremebrulee4431 100%

[@miguelbarahona6636]

Copy, paste and autotune, ruined music.

[@ralelunar]

I love how Rich takes the piss out of Rick 😂 Only very good old friends can do that to each other

[@robr2303]

Very true

[@DirkJacobsz]

Ye - like I am a huge fan of the show - I watch every 20th episode - pissed myself laughing so hard..

[@christiangibbs391]

Billy Gould Interview 😎✌️🙏

[@thewaldfe9763]

He has some really interesting points - would love to hear more conversations with him!

[@LClarke]

Society calls it _being rude._

[@aadaejohnson-lr4cg]

This is so interesting…. It seems that Monoculture birthed the Superstar. I always wondered what made artists like Queen, Michael Jackson, Prince so prolific, and why that style of Superstar doesn’t exist today. It really is interesting to see how the musical landscape has evolved.

[@laj68]

Because their are really talented and unique great music, now is hard to find these days.

[@kelechi_77]

@@laj68No its because the mythos cannot be created anyway because of the advent of the internet, we hve too much access to people

[@kenz2756]

​@kelechi_77 I agree, people are looking at this with the wrong perspective. You see one in a million talents in the internet pretty often, they're just not an actual celebrity per se.

[@chalkandcheese1868]

Taylor Swift is as big as them, she toured Australia recently and she was everywhere, no other artists today comes anywhere near that.

[@metjovi]

​@@chalkandcheese1868 You said it, "recently", "today". The thing is, Mercury, Jackson and Prince are long gone now and we still remember them and feel their influence on culture. I wonder if Taylor Swift will be remembered at all a decade after she retires.

[@kimjohnson8471]

The music was so ubiquitous, that you find yourself singing or humming a song you absolutely hated back in the day ❤

[@michaelscerbo35]

“This stratification where people are getting deeper and deeper into the smaller silos.” Speaks volumes to the ability to turn on only music you like because you don’t have to communicate w/ anyone when you hide behind the phone or computer. This is why dating culture, work culture, music culture, film culture, and life perspective is so different than even 10 years ago. Amazing conversations Rick!

[@bradleystereoguitaramplifi9616]

I Think the isolation started when we transitioned from the boom box to the walkman.

[@notbraindead7298]

@@bradleystereoguitaramplifi9616 More people would agree if they knew what those things were!😂😂😂

[@2confrontational]

@@notbraindead7298I can agree, that was some dedication and additional motivation on the listener's part - it felt amazing to have a device that brought music with you - it changed the whole world around me growing up to the music of my true liking played directly into my ears as I took a walk downtown... instant soundtrack. I am sure it's still similar to these days, maybe the difference being that making your own mixtape required a little more effort and your had more limited time available on the tapes, which made us all choose carefully what tracks to physically bring with us... kinda like a videogame like Resident Evil or the earlier RPGs on 16bit, where you had limited space for the items you could bring around... There is something to the limited physical storage we had available at the time, and the asbolute infinite space that the cloud / streaming technology has rendered available. Wildly different times that's for sure!

[@macdisciple]

@@notbraindead7298yeah. I would not recognize a Taylor Swift Song, or Adele, or Beyoncé. I am able to intentionally stay in my niche and I’m really good with that.

[@CraigABuchanan]

Try “Hey Siri, what song is this?”

[@stevehatcher7700]

This is not just music. The breaking down into smaller and smaller, isolated, silos. It's across the spectrum of culture, and politics, and the economy. Siloed cultures, within the culture, is the new culture. Interconnectivity, at the scale of the internet, creates forms of dis-connectivity, which, in turn, as tipping point thresholds are met, create more interconnectivity. The pendulum swings faster and faster.

[@izzytoons]

Divide and conquer.

[@radiocremebrulee4431]

I think recommendation engines do add value - but when they become the ONLY source of media discovery, that is when the problem arises.

[@danhartwigPerch]

Yup,W/Everything.

[@sseltrek1a2b]

amazing how much more we're "connected" to everyone, while simultaneously being more isolated from each other...

[@beingsshepherd]

@@sseltrek1a2b "We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost…" ~ Charlie Chaplin, _The Great Dictator (1940)_

[@vocalead]

Remember that time when you knew if you were gonna like someone because of the music they listened to?

[@pablovirus]

It still applies like 95% of the time...?

[@johnny.V03]

As someone who’s a fellow GenZer if I looked for friends based on music alone I wouldn’t have a lot of them.

[@theunwantedcritic]

Man! Ricks interviews are getting better and better. Pat Metheny, George Benson . Michael McDonald,Sting,Seal, Peter Frampton, Andy, Summers, Stewart Copeland, Brian May and so many others I can’t name right now. Are despite all the thousands of videos about technique and theory this is the most inspirational educational music channel on KZbin.

[@mkhanman12345]

Most educational channel in the world

[@larrycrane4119]

You heard "Rosanna" everywhere back then because the labels paid intermediaries to get songs like that on the radio.

[@automachinehead]

bingo~~~

[@mattpotter8725]

I totally agree, but I do still feel there are gatekeepers to what gets promoted, even if it's getting things out and bigged up on social media, on Tik Tok. The gatekeepers though has probably changed with what gets fed to people on streaming platforms just feeding you more of the same is narrowing music down to get similar songs that Rick has shown on his videos on the Top 10 songs on various streaming platforms. It wasn't ideal before with the paid promotion but I feel rescued labels are much more risk averse now and everything being suggested to you by algorithm now is just killing music imo.

[@nunninkav5307]

They still have those. You can't do payola, so you pay a placement agent.

[@dino0228]

I didn’t think Rosanna was worthy of all the airplay it got. It was good song, but I didn’t see its absolute, above-the-rest greatness. To me, it was bland. Anyway, those radios were probably all tuned to same 2 or channels. Today, the playlists are infinite and people have their earbuds in, so we won’t get the same phenomenon.

[@dank.6942]

Rosanna is as bad as any pop song ever. Africa is conversely, equally amazing.

[@gregwillert-po6nq]

I was born in 65. Still love all the music I grew up with. It helped I had older brothers so I had many albums to choose from and many radio stations to listen to. But sometime in the 2000's radio stations just started to be stale. Now I listen to a local independent station that plays local artists and artists I would never hear on the regular stations around me

[@generationjones-le8ge]

Radio stations began to be stale with the Telecommunications act of 1997. Now that only a couple corporations own all the stations, everything sounds the same, and there's very little "local" flavor. The economic crisis of 2008 was the final nail in the coffin when stations across the USA fired most of their on air talent.

[@bcj842]

Yep. My local community station in Kansas City has always got something interesting playing in a number of genres and flavors. The politics and talk radio on that particular station is all trash, but their DJs consistently bring fresh music and insight into the music they're playing. Being KC, it's predominately focused on Jazz and Blues, but there's tremendous variety. Any other stations in the area pale in comparison.

[@nonsensicalrants1703]

I need to look into those local radio stations playing local artists How do I even find then though?

[@bcj842]

@@nonsensicalrants1703 You just have to turn the dial on your radio really slowly until you hear something that doesn’t sound like anything else you’ve been hearing. That’s kind of how I found my local stations anyway…

[@gregwillert-po6nq]

@@nonsensicalrants1703 The local station by me is called "The Avenue" 91.1 out of Appleton Wisconsin

[@TheQuantumWave]

I feel the same way about movies. I miss the blockbuster era of the 80's and 90's when a movie was a summer long event with commercials and fast-food tie ins and one or more songs in heavy rotation for two months or so. Movies now are one-time experiences. I miss that magic of experiencing the movie all summer long. The internet has caused an exponential explosion of pop culture such that it is impossible to experience it all or little pieces of it for long periods of time. Back to music, I see a lot of people my age act superior when a younger person doesn't know who Elvis, The Monkees, or George Jones are, but they have 1000 times (10,000 times) more music to dig through than we did. Us older folks had time to explore our pop culture plus the pop culture of the previous several decades. Kids these days don't have the time to do that.

[@bitemyshite]

That's a really interesting point that I never really noticed was missing with movie releases nowadays. You really put me back in time to my childhood where a big movie release really was a long anticipated spectacle and the hype endured long after release. That's just gone nowadays. Lost in a saturated world of media. The average stuff really does make the good stuff stand out though.

[@HeathsHarleyQuinn]

I hardly know something's out before it's no longer in the theater these days. No wonder there are so many flops.

[@TheQuantumWave]

@@HeathsHarleyQuinn That's a huge issue too. I've already missed two theatrical releases I wanted to see in the theater this year because of that.

[@user-wb3bg5kw8c]

Listened to AM radio as a kid. On one station I would hear Rock (a multitude), Pop (Sugar Sugar), Country (Cash, Camble), Classical (Beethoven), Novelty (Guitarzan) and more variety. Though there were specialized AM stations for Christian Radio or Country, the city stations I listened to had a somewhat diverse background. When FM came about, with its better fidelity and catering to a more sophisticated audience, I switched over to FM rock. But I still knew about some of the other music going on because you could hear it on other people's radio.

[@AntonioSanchez-yl9wj]

A new phenomena: may half people who knows who Taylor Swift is haven’t hear or mane any song. In the past you hear the song first and the artist name was linked to the song later.

[@daniellysohirka4258]

That literally doesn't make sense at all, and II would be a person who has heard of the person of Taylor Swift herself. But not her music, maybe a song from her first album back when I was in high school if I heard it being played, one of the singles possibly. Just like Lady Gaga, the only reason I know her song from 2008 was because it was played at every party, but I can't even remember the name right now. Katy Perry's was I kissed a Girl, I always liked that title. I've always been a metal and classic rock fan, but a man has his pleasures. I like 90's techno, it's pretty good too. Like Daft Punk and what not.

[@FlyingMonkies325]

It's possible to still do things old school if you go to the kerrang site or listen to the radio, and you can just stick on a playlist here on ytube without looking at any of the song titles and just keep skipping through all the ones you weren't interested in. I still do things this way when i want to explore new music and lately i have been because music has been so rubbish. Also concerts they have backup bands before the main event comes on and i found the pretty reckless that way, although they aren't great live they still intrigued me and now one of my fave bands ever🙂

[@miguelbarahona6636]

I can tell the same about Cold Play, Limp Bizkit, Korn, Dua Lipa, Slipknot, Primus, Kathy Perry, Ed Sheeran, John Mayer, Animals as Leaders, Carnivool... I´ve tried, I swear, but I can´t remember their music, it doesn´t stick. They are like listening the rain fall.

[@FlyingMonkies325]

​@@miguelbarahona6636 That's cos maybe you didn't like them or like them enough. Honestly from all those bands you just mentioned they only ever had a couple of hits the rest aren't good and other people feel the same from how i only ever see them like those few hit songs. Why does it work to get people to like those songs and not the rest? because they were made way more than the others to work commercially with a brilliant hook to it while the rest of their songs aren't like that. What it means by a hook it's like for example the katy perry song "i kissed a girl" we all know that one, right from the start it's like dumdumdum then DOOM and then right into "this was never the way i planned" and that freaking awesome drum beat continues GENIUS! it hooks you in straight away. If you listen to anything else up until 2005 it's the same and then there's bands like my chemical romance where it's hooks galore and then it changes into this amazing and interesting sounding bridge and then goes into the most awesome breakdown especially the song "welcome to the black parade" where it feels like two different songs in one with a few interesting changes and the immersiveness of the sound🤤 Growing up from the start of the 90s for me i grew up with all kinds of songs that were made with a brilliant hook to it, and it just works every single time how they intentionally do this. It's made to work with the whole psychology of our brain if not it's downright addictive to be honest but oh so good 🤗Meanwhile other songs that don't have this some it's a hit or miss and others a complete miss altogether, it simply just doesn't sound interesting enough or hooks us like that straight away. So it's totally normal what you've encountered with all those bands and there's a reason they're called hit songs. Music over the past 15 years though it's like they moved away from using hooks apart from the odd song but it's not working lol, maybe they did it to make music less addictive or the industry got tired of using hooks but it's just not working. Plus there's nothing left to do when it's all been doing so not sure how they can make music as interesting again.

[@IGNACY-fp8zo]

​@@miguelbarahona6636Primus is so different than anything else that I doubt you can't recognize them when they play, even if you don't like them, which is fine

[@jimmcdougall9973]

I think what has exacerbated the issue in my country, is the closure of all of the music stores (record, tape, CD). Many people are still “touch and feel”, turn it over in your hands, read the cover and get excited about it. Flip through the selection to see what’s available and new. I love rock and 80’s metal, but I am left to KZbin algorithms to suggest groups to me. One can’t search/google for a band you don’t know about. My iTunes collection consists of bands for who I already own the CD’s. So I have paid twice for the same albums. With the exception of Extreme 8.

[@sharpvidtube]

Some kept going in the UK, now more are opening. I still like looking through CD's. They were selling as new for £1 too, when I used to pay at least £10.

[@InventorZahran]

The internet is a great resource when you know what you're looking for, or if you want to find things that are similar or related to what you already know. But it's less useful for discovering anything totally new to you, completely outside of anything you were familiar with. We don't know what we don't know, and there's probably a huge amount of music we might enjoy that we just aren't aware of. Music stores used to bridge that gap, but now they're unfortunately becoming uncommon...

[@lesliedaubert1411]

I still listen to my cds.

[@lance_374]

you could rip your cds into itunes so you don't buy them twice. I think if you pay for the itunes match subscription once, it will put all of your cds into your itunes purchases and they might stay there even when you cancel (i could be wrong, i just saw this somewhere on the internet). this should not be confused with apple music, they are different subscriptions.

[@James-wj8eq]

As a musician myself who plays local bars, i got no problem with megastar artists playing stadiums. Whatever floats your boat, theres always an audience out there no worries! I'm pretty sure Rick Beato, Taylor or any other major artist for that matter aint losin' sleep over your opinions.

[@rlgroshans]

This explains so much that I wasn't getting. I watch a few reaction videos on KZbin. Often it is folks that predominantly listen to HipHop and I am floored they have never heard of a particular song or a particular artist....When I know that song had been around for decades. That artist is, or at least was, world famous. It always floored me. How do they not know this song? How do they, at least, not have a remote familiarization with a certain song. This interview explains so much.

[@nickv.7181]

So glad David Draiman could come share his wealth of knowledge with us today.

[@fernandezvonschwephausen1979]

I thought it was Scott Ian....

[@metetural9140]

​@@fernandezvonschwephausen1979nah his chin hair isn't impressive enough to be Scott

[@LauraKnotek]

Who's that?

[@deltab9768]

@@LauraKnoteknot sure if that’s an inside joke but Draiman is the singer from Disturbed

[@DrScott666]

​@@fernandezvonschwephausen1979 Maybe Scott Ian 30 years ago 🤷‍♂️

[@DemskePaul2017]

Another very important variable is that bands are not touring to as many cities, they are doing long residencies in one city and having the fans come to THEM.

[@kumada84]

Exactly. He works for Live Nation so he's certainly not going to point that out.

[@AurumEtAes]

@demskapaul2017 that’s a very interesting point. I live in the UK and international artists often to just play London or London and one other city in the British Isles. So fans have to travel to see them. I didn’t know that American artists were increasingly requiring their fans travel to see them when on tour in the US

[@doraking2823]

Only in America - I’m in Australia and there are no residences

[@jamesfizer5150]

This was the most incredible and informing interview. I’ve heard in a long time as a Gen X and a huge music fan and I’ve been to many many many times. I thoroughly enjoyed this prospective and often wondered about questions that were answered in this.

[@pbest75]

Nothing will beat accessing music than the fun of the 80's & 90's. Today music is business, not art. It's stale, repetitive, and emotionless.

[@grinkashman7884]

I recently heard RUSH in Wegman's!! Years ago I heard Jeff Beck, Hammerhead at my old supermarket.

[@zapveresepa1]

Rick's videos really explain a lot to us, and confirm many of our suspicions about the music business.

[@markkempton4579]

I'm glad he mentioned the Toto example. I always think of my mom and I walking to the car in the mall parking lot and I heard "We Are The World" from another car. I immediately turned the radio on and knew which station to switch to to hear the same broadcast of the song. There were only a few options in our area, just like TV.

[@paulmgregory3666]

I love this discussion. Something I love about your channel Rick is that you will dive into different genre’s and that gets me out of my ‘silo’ - or bubble/vacuum chamber.

[@alangreenway6695]

Some of it comes to context. Here in the UK we have Glastonbury festival that has in the past been about bands or artists with real instruments- guitars, drums, bass, piano, horns. They don’t have to be rock, but there is a need for ‘live music’ where people can sing along to the hits with a real band. Within the past 5 years there has been an attempt to introduce Rap acts, Pop Divas and teen bands that perform to a backing track with dancers behind and it’s always fallen flat. And I think it’s just not the sort of music that works in the context of a festival where people are standing in a foot of mud and rain.

[@marshac1479]

Probably true in part for main stage acts. However both Stormzy and Beyonce killed it when they performed. There are loads of great bands to see on the other stages though.

[@misemefein100]

​@@marshac1479killed it as in killed the festival.... they're both rubbish

[@ivorharden]

​@marshac1479 that was the end. Artists like that depend on a cd with backing tracks and a good light show. A good rock band doesn't have to depend on a light show because of the energy when they play. Watch rock bands in the 70s and 80s playing in stadiums/festivals, you'll get what I mean.

[@marshac1479]

@@ivorharden I don't have to as I grew up in the 70s and 80s.

[@ivorharden]

@@marshac1479 oh good, so you understand.

[@vagabond197979]

I have discovered all kinds of new artists because of KZbin. It's not from listening to music, but listening to people TALK about music.

[@matthewdennis1739]

Absolutely.

[@LibraryofAcousticMagic3240]

I like to follow music promoters and find music from there.

[@matthewdennis1739]

@@LibraryofAcousticMagic3240 That's one. Also if you seek out what other music lovers are listening to and just ask them, a lot of the time they'll share some great stuff with you. Most people just aren't into that.

[@blahyoubleep]

Rick this discussion is fantastic and can be extrapolated to all forms of creative media. The algorithms have connected, divided, organized, and compartmentalized all of us!

[@Goddybag4Lee]

The Monoculture dying started when Jean-Michel Jarre and Kraftwerk started doing music without lyrics or in German/French. We Europeans usually got songs translated in the 1950-1960 into our mother tongue so huge amounts of songs known in English is known to us in our native language Anni-Frid Lyngstad did What Now My Love in Swedish. Now we fast forward and Rammstein is huge in the world singing in German. We have had an almost No 1 hit on the Billboard list in Finnish language with Käärijä singing Cha Cha Cha. We see the "KZbinr react to ........" era where songs in other languages are a huge part of that field. The way a 20 or something old song from Herbert Grönemeyer (he who played Leutnat Werner in Das Boot) goes viral in those channels (his song is called Der Weg about his wife dying of cancer) is wonderful to see. And the way that people start to listen to music in other languages and really learning those languages are wonderful. Singing in English and doing lyrics in that language when it's not your native language is hard. Grönemeyer tried that, but still his songs are better in German. And then we have the big Spanish wave in the 1990-2000 still doing it big. I know people learning languages just after hearing favorite songs in the Eurovision Song Contest. And this is wonderful. When I was a teenager in the 1990s finding music in other languages to aid you in learning that language was super hard. Now we have Spotify and KZbin without barriers. Wohoo!

[@cariwaldick4898]

It seems to me, the change happened when albums stopped being a thing. When artists used to put out albums, they'd do the concerts to promote the album, and everyone would buy the album, and artists got rich that way. Now....the internet means you can find the album online for free. Everything shifted, when artists couldn't make it by selling a ton of albums. Now, they've got to do live concerts, and sell a lot of t-shirts.

[@eyeamstrongest]

bruh recording artists' bread and butter has ALWAYS been touring and merch

[@joane24]

It wasn't that could download the whole album for free. It was that could download/buy - often from official site of the artist *single* songs, without ever listening to the whole album. Before you used to get the whole album just for a one or few songs. It was also nice to have the physical items, the artworks. Internet streaming changed that, yes, but that's less because if you paid for the song or not.

[@FlyingMonkies325]

Hmm not exactly free you're paying your dues by viewing and listening and apparently they make like 39 cents per view for those in the billion view club which gives them $2.6 million globally, that's per music video😋so every time you listen it's like paying for the song over and over again it's just the money isn't coming from us anymore. So that's like over $10 million for just 5 songs they earn a lot doing it this way vs us paying £13 or $15 per album. This is the future when it can be monetized in such a way, i must admit though i miss buying physical copies of cds with my own saved money but at the same time i was also very limited to what i could find and listen to. Currently there's no excuses for what streaming services for tv shows and movies are doing when they could just create a giant platform and put literally everything old and new on it and let everyone watch while it's monetized. Ytube changed the game once again when it was created back in 2005. They'd need to create a giant databank for all that it's already time for everyone to just go with the change because they make a lot more money this way and we get to view it for free yup! but it's a win/win now when we all benefit i don't see nothing wrong with it and playlists are helping quite a bit too it just all needs to be less isolated and the only way to do that is create their own platform and joining together to do that. Not going to happen atm until the big corps wrap their head around it all but once they do i think they'll come around to it all soon enough it took a while to get record companies to get down with putting all their music on here lol.

[@cariwaldick4898]

@@eyeamstrongest Sure. But the way artists market their music is going to have an effect on how they make their "product." I've heard that the best way to support an artist, is to buy a concert T-shirt from their site. That can't be conducive to making great music. That's more about showmanship, and visual appeal. I look at the music when albums were king, and the artists weren't "hot." They didn't worry as much about selling an image, as they did about making good music. They put on good shows at their concerts, but many were criticized if they paid too much attention to how they looked--like Kiss, and the "hair bands." Grunge dialed it back, with even less attention to looking cute. Now... I love Taylor's personality, her business acumen, and how she treats her fans and employees, but...I'm not sure I'd call her a stellar musician. Her actual product isn't her music. Sorry for the long ramble.

[@shiptj01]

​@@eyeamstrongestWrong, bruh. Albums make them more money than concerts. Concerts were for selling the albums.

[@JohnLnyc]

Great guest. I am a bit older than Rick. Notice how “radio” comes up? I was listening to someone, I forget, on Tidal. After the artist I was listening to was finished, before I could change to another favorite artist, the AI or whatever, at Tidal played a “suggested” artist. I sat up and wondered what I was listening to. Loved it. The artist was someone called “Mitski” never heard of her. I ended up play a few of her many albums. A few? Liked the music so much I discovered she is just starting a world tour. Looked for tickets…never got out of my dang chair! Appearing in NYC, great venue, the Beacon Theater. For four nights! Who other than the Allman Brothers does four nights at this great venue? Ok great, over to Ticket Master. NY four nights at the Beacon theater plus two nights in Brooklyn…SOLD OUT. Looked at some of the other venues she was playing…around the world! Yup. Sold out. I was stunned. I realized I have spent too much time listening to re masters of Jethro Tull and lamenting the demise of my faves from the sixties and seventies and decrying the weird stuff on POP these days. There’s some amazing stuff out there. Streaming, opens the world up and can open our ears to all of it. I have found some great music from Germany and the Netherlands. And a huge amount of music from the past I somehow missed. The Jayhawks catalog is large and still growing! Larkin Poe are just wonderful. Focusing on the pop charts and griping about hip hop and lamenting the fading heroes of hard rock… Don’t waste the time. Open your ears. Get your IPad out and start looking around. Things aren’t so bad.

[@ArthurSanford3706]

You miss out on a lot of great music by being a music snob

[@bcj842]

I notice a lot of that reminiscent whining when talking with a lot of the older guys. I totally get where they're coming from, though, because I admire and enjoy all the good old stuff as much if not more than they do.... But there's so, so much great new music out there because the barrier to entry for passable-quality music production is so low. The increase of overall outflow does output a lot of garbage, but at the same time so many goodies and gems come flying out too. It only looks bad because the corporate suits are marketing and pushing some of the most lackluster, uninspired junk to the top. There's really good stuff just below the surface and you don't have to do all that much digging.

[@ArthurSanford3706]

@bcj842 Not to mention their was a lot of junk in the 60s-90s but since it didn't have staying power no one remembers it

[@bcj842]

@@ArthurSanford3706 True.

[@JohnLnyc]

@@ArthurSanford3706 that’s tru of every era in music,

[@MadnessMotive-1428AZ]

Please have Rich on more often - he's awesome!

[@hohaia01]

I've tried very hard not to know about Taylor Swift, in the same way I've tried not to know about Kim Kardashian

[@irissupercoolsy]

You should at least listen to "Exile". All men only like that one song of her for some reason.

[@Demobius]

Check out her NPR Tiny Desk concert on KZbin. She's really pretty good solo. Beyonce is another artist who suffers from overproduction.

[@user-lv7ph7hs7l]

I listened to one song last year. It was just bland. Not good or bad but boring.

[@karlhendrikse]

I don't listen to Taylor Swift and I actively avoid anything related to the Kardashians, but I think you're making a mistake putting them in the same category. Taylor Swift is actually good. Not my cup of tea for the most part, and I don't really see why she's anyone's *favourite* artist, but she's on a very different level than those "reality"/"influencer" types.

[@sulathenewfie4277]

😂 I hear you… have never watched or cared about any of the K-family, but denying yourself of Taylor’s lyricism, storytelling, melodies, is a mistake. I am in my 60s and my playlists are heavily 70s music, but her music is worth my time and attention. Depending on your genre preference, she probably has something for you.

[@eddiereece5050]

Think of VH1's.......I LOVE THE 80s, I LOVE THE 90s, and they did a 70's version. At least there were plenty of cultural touchstones in movies, and tv and music. Now, maybe only sports is a monoculture event. I don't know if this current or next generations will have enough commonality for a shared, life experience. Because of ALGORITHMS. Only the APP of TikTok is MONO-CULTURE, but not the experience of it. Saying that, I FREAKING LOVED THE 80s, and 90s. Respect for your channel Rick. MASSIVE, respect.

[@metjovi]

What do you mean by saying TikTok is sort of monoculture? People using that app may be seeing the same videos, but they watch many more the same day forgetting every one of them by the time they go to bed. They even may not have the time to talk about them since new videos are being uploaded everyday. Back then, people watched a TV show or a movie and were able to talk about it the whole week if not the whole month. Now so many things are happening at the same time I doubt people actually appreciate what they consume. Each cellphone is a different world.

[@pisceananomaly]

120 Minutes was the "It" show for people like me! ❤️🎵👊

[@1967musicjunky]

100% So many great bands that should've been bigger in a proper music world.

[@user-et2fj8xm5l]

Me To

[@WIMPY86]

Matt Pinfield always had my ear 😊

[@pisceananomaly]

@@WIMPY86 Absolutely. His brilliant mind of musical information could pop many heads at once.😁👊

[@sayjustwordstome]

I saw Marky Ramone and his band a few months ago. Small club, some 200 people I guess. I was standing right in front of the bassist. Pure, raw and honest music. I will never go to the big stadium shows and pay 100 dollars for an artist that I can’t even see.

[@matthewdennis1739]

Yeah, all the best shows I've ever been have been smaller venues with artists who play real music. Everything from Brian Fallon and Tyler Bingham to Brett Dennen and Dave Hause.

[@Jehoshful]

This is one of Rick's most informative videos (imho), in that they're illuminating us on how things in the "digital age" (smartphones, etc.) have brought the world closer together, but, in contrast, we are more "siloed" (choosing our own programming) than ever. On top of all this, I"m just (very) happy that the sound from KZbin, Facebook, etc., sounds pretty clean to my ears. The FM stations in my city have went to sludge in the last 2 decades, making the songs nearly unlistenable--talk about "regression' ! As long as the content providers include good sound, it will make the (personal) choices much more enjoyable to listen to and experience !

[@77Matt]

The way Rich is talking to either/and/or the camera or/either/and/with/to Rick is fascinating.

[@riteasrain]

I find it quite annoying, very robotic. I'm pretty sure the way to talk to someone is to look at them.

[@Ensorcle]

I had the same thought. As someone who is on (web)camera quite a bit, it is a practiced skill to talk direct to camera as if the camera were a person in the room. Also: this is not the time for that skill. Look at the interviewer lol.

[@mistermousterian]

Love how Rick lets his guests talk.

[@kumada84]

In this particular instance he really didn't have much of a choice 👀🤣

[@lewest7317]

Today is easier to track and anticipate attendance because ticket sales are mainly online. That allows producers and artists to make quick decisions about doing additional shows in a city or venue. In the past this information was not readily available and having a second or third show in a venue was a risky proposition.

[@glennwilliams8861]

This great discussion could be applied to almost everything in the future.

[@sirjoseph68]

Remember that the ability to track music listening is a relatively new technology. Prior to that, they could only track sales and plays that were reported. I use to record songs off the radio with my boombox and play them over and over hundreds of times. Not to mention that the ability to listen to any song at any time is also relatively new. It's so hard to compare things from different eras, when the "rules" are constantly evolving. Popular longevity is the best measuring stick. What music of today will still be popular 20, 30, 40, etc. years from now.

[@Veaseify]

'Popular longevity is the best measuring stick. What music of today will still be popular 20, 30, 40, etc. years from now.' Popular with who though? The teenage girls that grew up with Taylor Swift will stick with her throughout their lives, just like old folks like me still listen to Deep Purple and Black Sabbath but neither of us will ever listen to a note of the other....

[@ryanhopkins5239]

Don't make assumptions about who will listen to what. I have some taylor swift I like and I like black sabbath and deep purple. People aren't limited to one thing

[@NoName-sr6fj]

​@@Veaseifyprobably taylor swift's listeners will be constant but they will die sooner or later. The question here is, will her songs be accomodated by the next generation? Popular longevity is also mean by even the artist is no longer in existence, his or her music is still listened and accomodated by the next generation. For example, classical music, there are youngers still in love with this genre even the pieces were compose centuries ago.

[@matthewdennis1739]

Music is completely subjective though. There's a lot of music that has "popular longevity" that I think is utter garbage. What does a song being popular for a long time really mean in the grand scheme of things? What are we even trying to compare?

[@ResistTheNonsense]

In the seventies when we were hearing the mainstream music (as part of "mono-culture") we still were not necessarily locked into that. When music became more and more a part of what I wanted in my life I began to look outside of mainstream offerings. I would test albums to check out lesser know artists. I would go to a show to see what was up with a new band. Start tuning into a new radio station with a different angle on music. Whatever. The hunger for more just made me push past what the mono-culture offering had. I still do that now. If all you do is follow the feeds that pop up you have to know you are going to miss a lot of great stuff. You have to look outside of feeds and mainstream offerings or the customized offerings the algorithms send to you. There is no end to how amazed I am regularly in surfing through music channels and finding some incredibly talented artist doing something very cool.

[@hotrodjones74]

Some of my favorite bands are pretty new and relatively unheard of. Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, SLIFT and Disq. These bands all played on KEXP's KZbin channel.

[@matthewdennis1739]

Absolutely, and there are people who are still passionate about music and will share that music with you. My favorite band/artist ever The Gaslight Anthem/Brian Fallon, I found because a friend recommended them. Then off of that I found Dave Hause and the Menzingers, Chris Wollard and the Ship Thieves, Chuck Ragan, Tim Hause, etc. One of my other favorite artists of all-time, Josh Ritter, I stumbled upon on Limewire completely by accident and just happened to give it a go and completely was floored. It was one of the happiest accidents of my life. And then he led me to Iron and Wine, Gregory Allen Isakov, Jason Isbell, etc. If you love music finding it is easy.

[@imonghose553]

I think there is a key factor that has contributed to this change. Nowadays each artist is actually maximizing their potential by reaching every possible person who might be interested in their stuff throughout the world. And the others don't care or haven't heard of them. Thus creating a fairly large niche and engaged fanbase. Hence "bigger" and "smaller" at the same time. Earlier, the music didn't reach all the audiences who maybe interested and only circulated around a few countries, where everyone heard them because they couldn't be avoided, but they were not necessarily interested in them. Hence creating a mega listening audience but with lower levels of engagement.

[@DavidScott-hi4fz]

A really awesome chat and so true. Regarding smaller bands, Spotify's "song radio" feature has led me to discover so many new bands I never had heard of otherwise. Artists like Beach House, Marissa Nadler, Noah and the Whale, Richard Hawley and Interpol were all found on song radios, and led to buying vinyl from them. Also it used to be you'd scour record stores for months, even years looking for a particular album. Like Veruca Salt's ep with Steve Albini was legendary and impossible to find. Its so great now there's no barrier to distribution and you see younger audiences listening to Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden along side whatever is new. Its all there and accessible for everyone. It does feel like an exciting time for music.

[@rotaxtwin]

Wow. Thanks for stopping by, Rich. That was the densest, most concentrated 15 minutes of take on how the music biz has changed. This was the opposite of filler, BS and wordiness, it's so good im gonna have to watch it again to soak it all up. Most refreshing.

[@tingkagol]

I'm unconvinced of his analogy. Artists play shows to earn a living comparable to a rockstar in the 80s. I've seen many legacy acts reach far-flung parts of the world when back in the day, you'd be lucky if they get to tour your non-first world non-english country. No one wants to tour South East Asia in the 90s because they don't monetarily have to. This can't be said today. They have to do it to earn their much deserved money. And it's exactly why shows are so expensive because it has become the artists' main source of income. Back in the day, you could get a million dollar record deal, never have to tour, and be fine with it.

[@roostfezza7563]

Right no mention of that. Many artists are touring as its the only way they can make money. Small album sales and miniscule streaming incomes. I recall a band on the radio being interviewed, about five years ago, saying they sold small amounts of records, then turn up to play at a venue, packed, and were amazed how everyone in the audience sang along and knew the words!

[@tingkagol]

@@roostfezza7563 Right. It's not that there's more demand for concerts today. If you have a hit record then and now, demand for concerts is a given anywhere in the world. The difference is artists like Michael Jackson don't need to do tours and Taylor Swift has to. Just because Michael Jackson did fewer tours doesn't mean there was less demand.

[@Flashback2020]

The phenomena you are describing isn't limited to entertainment. It permeates our world today in all aspects of our lives. We have become balkanized as a country; I'm speaking of America but I suspect there are other countries experiencing something similar.

[@moiraohara]

I am glad i found your channel this week❤

[@Gjungling]

Maybe I'm getting old... But there was a vibe to decades, musically. The 70s had it's vibe, as did the 80s and the 90s. When I look back to the 2000s and the 2010s... I get no vibe... there's no definition to it I can feel anymore. Am I the only one?

[@omelasbaby]

idk... as someone who grew up in the 2000s and 2010s, there's definitely a musical vibe to those eras imo.

[@symptomofsouls]

@@omelasbaby Yeah there's a vibe alright... It's a terrible vibe

[@2020theGuitarPlayingRapper]

early 2000's has a vibe, 2000's as a whole is SLOWLY emerging. 2010's is far more subtle

[@drewm.2790]

I disagree. 2000s music definitely had a distinct vibe and was actually pretty diverse musically. We had Britney Spears, Beyonce and Lady Gaga with pop/dance club bangers; Evanescence, Paramore, Greenday and Linkin Park with rock/metal/emo hits; Mariah Carey, Mary J. Blige, Usher and Neyo with passionate r&b ballads and T-Pain, Snoop Dogg, Outkast, Akon and Jay Z with cool hip-hop jams. I still vividly remember how these different genres were all massively popular everywhere

[@Victorcolongarcia]

@@th5841mmmmm in the mainstream? There are 2 genres.. its not more diverse. And number 1 stay like 10 weeks because the algorhythm only supports success. I dont like current mainstream music at all. Especially in the usa 😂 and spain 😂 omggg people have no taste

[@robwebb9413]

I love this kind of stuff! I find it fascinating to see the sociology aspect of music in a historical context. Thank you for doing this, Rick!

[@aaronpeta]

Best news ever! Back to the studio to make new songs, then back to the socials to pimp them to the world, Superbowl here I come!

[@countzero1136]

I've heard of Taylor Swift but I couldn't name a single one of her songs. That said, I'm a middle-aged rock fan so I guess I'm not her target audience :)

[@zx7-rr486]

Taylor is a class act. I am a middle aged rock musician (guitar piano vocals) and Taylor is the only modern superstar who I am a big fan of. Her backing band are first-class musos and her live shows are fantastic. I grt annoyed when people slag off Swift, because of all the main stream musos today, she really IS a quality musician who plays guitar pisno and sings and writes her own songs.

[@marcosambrotta101]

Love this guy, great, dry sense of humor! Loved it when he mentioned Rick's Apple rant as the reason for Shazam not working on his iPhone 😅

[@charlesthornton6713]

When Rich noted the statistic about ten Imagine Dragons songs garnering a billion plays each on Spotify, my question was "how many of those plays came from people who deliberately looked up those songs and chose to play them, and how many of those plays came from Spotify randomly selecting songs for the listener's queue on their behalf?" I ask because I wonder whether awareness of an artist's music actually translates to popularity of said artist.

[@robbielux8353]

I agree and also if add how many actual fans of the group are streaming the song over and over

[@jesseredden7123]

Even it were only half of a billion it’s still crazy.

[@muzikman183]

Great discussion guys!

[@austinedeclan10]

The part that everyone misses is that it used to cost thousands of dollars to record one song and if you wanted a quality record, you had to pay for studio time, session musicians, a mix engineer, a mastering engineer etc or be among a select few very talented or very well connected acts that get signed. These days, anyone with a good enough laptop can make an acceptable or at least passable record by following a couple of tutorials. We've had music made by some prodigious kids in their bedrooms become massive hits and get nominated for prestigious awards. While this has unshackled great musicians who the mainstream record labels would've never looked twice at, it has also flooded the music market with a lot of mediocre music that is neither horrible nor anything to write home about driving down the value of each individual piece of music. The more music we create, the less valuable each individual piece of music becomes.

[@asosyalpicimamk]

I always thought so. Like how the more cars there are, the more exhaust gases emitted to the air. The more clothes, shoes, jewelry, phones etc are produced, the more of them aren't sold and end up in landfills.

[@xennialmusic]

Nice points. I do feel like the biggest downside to instantaneous distribution over the internet and technology advances that make music production more accessible is that it degrades the quality and floods the market with a lot of crap that you have to listen through to pick out the really good stuff.

[@theutahman2254]

Thanks for bringing this subject up! I Have told friends for YEARS, Super stars of music today have a harder time making the music long lasting.

[@jayluck8047]

Each generation, each person mostly, has their story of “Where were you...”. For me, it was the day I heard of the invention of the MP3 codec.

[@beingsshepherd]

But where were you?

[@dakotawinston7677]

Fascinating conversation

[@MidnightCities]

This was a fantastic insight into musics past and current state.

[@mrchrisroden]

Screw Live Nation.

[@OSheaGlobalAlliances]

Rick owes us the second segment of this where he shoves this guys head through the kick drum repeatedly while yellng “processing fee!” “convenience fee!” “ticket delivery fee!” “Amex presale!” “Withheld ticket blocks!”

[@lewissmart7915]

In Australia Livenation has come to dominate the entire festival and live music scene, many smaller businesses displaced / out of business / bought up.

[@walmartgolem]

Not true. There are plenty of other promoters and Live Nation don't own venues like in the USA.

[@dereks1264]

I'm only familiar with her earliest work and I can't say I'm a fan but I do admire her marketing savvy.

[@MichaelSkelton]

Awesome conversation, love the discussions that touch on social/cultural cross-over in music.

[@fredthebaker8881]

on the cusp of 4M rick! Ticket buying was quite different back in the day. Taking cash to the ticketron window on the second floor of jordan marsh. Now it's one click on your phone.

[@HeavyTopspin]

I'm kind of surprised that concerts still manage to exist. I can understand when it's more a multimedia spectacle like with Taylor of Beyonce, but rock concerts? Back in my youth, if I wanted to see Van Halen, my ONLY chance was to attend their concert ($17 for 10th row), or hope they'd show up on a late night show or SNL and play one or two songs. But now, I can find a live performance from just about anybody right here on KZbin, and going to a concert requires taking out a second mortgage.

[@MileHighGrowler]

There ARE still affordable shows, just maybe not the biggest headlining acts. I don't see live music going away because that energy doesn't come through on any device. It's instant, it's cheap, it's expansive in options. But there is no soul and energy like there is when you can feel the kick drum in your chest, the gal to your left is singing along and the guy to your right is dancing. That experience can't be replicated and that's why I still go to 4-5 shows a year and they're almost always sold out because I'm not the only one.

[@caramanico1]

I gotcha. A Zeppelin ticket for the 5/28/77 show in Maryland was $8.50. Lasers and violin bow included... Oh, and they played for three hours.

[@MileHighGrowler]

@@caramanico1 That's $43 in today's money, and you can 100% find a damn good show for that price still. I saw Cory Wong (12-piece group) front-row in a 4,000 seat venue last month, they played for 2 1/2 hours not including the opener and my ticket was less than that. The narrative that all bands are overly expensive just because groups like U2, Blink-182 and T Swift are getting greedy just isn't true.

[@symptomofsouls]

@@MileHighGrowler the most expensive concerts are always trash anyways, just go to some dive bar to watch some obscure underground grit perform for $20 a ticket

[@symptomofsouls]

@@MileHighGrowler $35 a ticket to see Fallujah's The Flesh Prevails tour, with 3 supporting acts

[@Guitarzan8]

Congrats on 4M Rick!

[@frankinthesnyderverse1488]

Fascinating discussion. I love these new terms to my ears “mono-culture,” and “silos.” As a fledgling artist myself, it’s helpful to find terms that work to navigate me in this streaming-era after growing up with the MTV-era. In one sense, philosophically, a “silo” is just a subjective “mono-culture,” while “mono-culture” was a universal “silo” across the globe. So for fledgling artists trying to navigate success in the streaming-era with subjective “silos”, we have to expand our compatibility to multiple “silos” more than expanding the access of our music (because everything is already accessible virtually). Yet the pitfall with molding our artistic compatibility to multiple “silos” for our music’s success runs the danger of creating generic music - robbing artists of the freedom to create music with unconventional traits. We would have to keep writing I, IV, vi, V progressions, 4/4 beats, lyrics about love or partying, and never stretch our wings with non-diatonic music or unconventional rhythms, or lyrics with much needed subject matter for our society to progress like folk music used to do. That becomes the next challenge of artists under the streaming-era - how to be creatively-free in a multi-siloed culture. 🤔

[@KevinCowden-ow5to]

I predict Rick Beato hits 5 million subs by the end of this year. He's reached a tipping point where it becomes exponential in growth. Rick created his own niche. There's literally nobody who can do what Rick does. Rick is the 'Bill Nye The Science Guy' of music.

[@tinyPaleBlueDot]

@KevinCowden-ow5to I've seen Bill Nye here and there but I don't get the reference to him. What is it about him that made him your choice for your analogy? (assuming that, say, Carl Sagan wouldn't have worked) What makes Bill Nye the "Bill Nye the Science Guy" of Science? (What makes Bill Nye the Rick Beato of Science?)

[@toxiclevel8790]

Bill Nye isn’t a scientist.

[@KevinCowden-ow5to]

@@tinyPaleBlueDot all I'm saying is that dude is going to be a household name. Don't get your panties all twisted.

[@KevinCowden-ow5to]

@@tinyPaleBlueDot people like you really have nothing to say

[@Madkid73]

@@KevinCowden-ow5toI dunno. Maybe his missus/sister/daughter/niece/ wasn’t putting out tonight

[@calvinwarren-wx6qg]

Thank you sir for making this content I am probably one of the younger people (I’m 14) but you have inspired me to play guitar along with other music content creators but thank you very much for inspiring me and others

[@nickkorea5850]

Without a doubt this is the best era of music bc a guy in a NY office can't tell me what to listen to. I discover more bands in a day than a music fan in the 80's did in a year

[@jamesprivet]

Nonsense. Have you heard of music magazines, independent AM and FM radio stations, pirate radio, cassette copies shared around?

[@LouLou-cm3pp]

@@jamesprivet I have! And guess what - its still exponentially faster to preview vast quantities music on my phone. All those sources you listed were still based on "gatekeepers" who picked and chosed for us - they were just hipster gatekeepers. I do miss that thrill of discovering a new band from college radio or by reading Maximum R&R...but even then, it was a massive effort to hunt down an album unless the majors produced it. Now I'm like "Sam Prekop? I'll listen to his entire discography over the weekend."

[@samuelecallegari6117]

​@@LouLou-cm3ppyeah, that's because you were already used to the LP formula and you kept it. Younger generations just don't care anymore about albums or listening to all the songs an artist produced. They just listen to the more popular playlists like "hot hits" etc. And that's all. And that's exactly the same, if not worse, gatekeeping you were talking about in the past.

[@saltlakedood]

@@samuelecallegari6117 Right, "the algorithm" is the worst gatekeeper!!!

[@ghimbos]

yes, you're right ... Now, which bands did you discover "yesterday"? Still remember them? ;-)

[@user-ml4xh9fh7q]

She isn't as popular as she seems to be. She's magnified by mainstream to be this monstrously popular person when in fact that not entirely accurate. Same goes for a lot of things currently going on that's on public display.

[@rubyfranklin9322]

Yeah she is maybe not to you but you are entitled to your opinion

[@Greymantle420]

It was a great conversation. I was looking for more on what happen to MTV and it's history. :)

[@flyntoakwood2298]

I think that the Grateful Dead did things differently than most bands back in the 70s and 80s. I wish Rick would discuss that one day.

[@Word77787]

Hey, I asked Rick about the Dead on a live stream and he said he doesn't do videos on them because they block, but he could talk about a live performance, like Micheal p. But he hasn't done that. I guess it's up to Rick though.

[@OscarRuiz-gj3mp]

I would LOVE to see Rick interview either Phill Lesh or Bob Weir....preferably Phill as he is over 80?

[@MattTee1975]

I really don't think he likes them...at all.

[@christisking7778]

It would be REALLY interesting if he covered the CIA ties to the Grateful Dead too.

[@FrankieTull]

@flyntoakwood2298. What made them different was performing their songs differently every single night they were out on tour.

[@CJ-ft9yo]

Thank you! It actually occurred to me this is the first time a huge artist exists and I don’t know one song - I thought it was my beginning my end

[@chaddubois8164]

Fascinating conversation.

[@Idiotsincarshere]

3.99M subs, let me be the first to congratulate you on your upcoming 4 M subscribers!!! Big fan Rick.

[@stefanor.1771]

I am from Italy and until a few months ago I had never heard a Taylor Swift song and she is the biggest act in the world, in the 80s it was impossible not to have heard some of Madonna's or Michael Jackson's songs even if you weren't a fan. A lot of people here can't name a Taylor Swift or Drake or Weeknd song. Coldplay in Italy sold out 6 stadiums in 2023 and another 4 stadiums have been sold out for their shows in the summer, and if they toured again in 2025 they would sell out another 4 or 6 stadiums but they are not as famous as the artists from the 80s, what this guy says is true, artists have never been so big and so small.

[@dyna6448]

I think most people probably have heard a Taylor Swift, The Weeknd or Drake song in their lives but don't know it's from them. I also had the same feeling with bands like Radiohead or black Sabbath.😊

[@secrets.295]

Taylor Swift isnt a big deal in Europe. In the US & Asia she was as big as Madonna, maybe even more. Madonna's popularity has her up & down moments, TS was consistently big for almost 2 decades. Very unusual for a female pop star to reach such level of fame for such a long period of time. Anyway I don't like her. I think she's a scam. The way she manipulates saying record labels forced her to sell her records and then get all her teenage fans to rally behind her and then create her newer versions of all of her albums. Its disgusting. Record labels cannot force you to sell your record, if u dont want to sell it, it is as simple as saying, I dont want to sell it. But she sells it and later plays victim 🙄🙄🙄. And then the way she plays with men's heart & broke up with them, write songs about them and making yourself look like the innocent helpless victim and men are the problems. Plus her acting victim again when Kanye disses her in the song eventhough Kanye asked her permission on a phone call and she agreed. She didnt knew the call was recorded and got busted when Kanye released the call recording. This girl is a scam artist and a hypocrite. 😂😂😂

[@stefanor.1771]

@@secrets.295 In Italy she wasn't even in the top 20 best selling albums in 2023 but she has sold out two stadiums fast, it is hard to explain, maybe because all her fans want to see her and are travelling from all over the country to go to the concerts

[@secrets.295]

@@stefanor.1771 She does have some following but she isn't that big. I am not sure about that too. Beyonce is the same, not that big in Europe but managed to sell out.

[@potatopotato8360]

​@@secrets.295 Taylor Swift is an influencer not a music artist. Extremely boring, annoying, formulaic and forgettable music. The only reason she is still so popular is because of smartphones and social media, Madonna and Britney Spears managed to be naturally popular without that.

[@danielraymadden]

Stevie Nicks thankyou you are a true rock legend...Heart your vocals are unrivaled....Pat Benatar thank you for giving your heart...

[@kennyadvocat]

I've watched many old documentaries and books about people traveling and discovering new types of music. I guess I didn't realize how big Monoculture has become with the internet. 10 years ago on a tour we got invited to play horn parts with a local band in Indonesia. I was very excited at first to lean new foreign music. Only to find out it was the same 90s bar band set that i was playing in NYC during college back in 2008 haha Even the most cheesy songs were being performed over 10,000 miles away. Crazy! There are way more local asian groups posting on youtube now tho vs 2015. And now with tiktok all those old 80-90s songs came back even harder. The space is always changing!

[@ridethelightning7979]

Not sure I agree with the stadium thing. Michael Jackson played 7 nights at Wembley Stadium on the Bad Tour in 1988. U2 played loads of stadium shows, as did The Stones, Springsteen etc.

[@nak5eno616]

Yeah, also the part where they talked about popular music being more international now and using Bad Bunny as an example because he sings or whatever in Spanish is bullshit. Mexican and Spanish artists were doing enormous tours when I was young in the 80s and 90s. Julio FUCKING Iglesias? Jose Feliciano? Juan Gabriel? Roberto Carlos? Gloria Estefan? Luis Miguel? Rafael? Jose Jose? These guys sold 50 million plus albums worldwide.

[@izzytoons]

Yeah. I don't think we can compare without the tour-booking decision-makers from that era being around. For one thing, how many more venues are there in a metro area today vs. tority or forty years ago?

[@solipsismworld]

I paid $35 to see Paul McCartney and David Bowie play stadiums in the early 90s. With people paying literally thousands of dollars for Taylor Swift tickets now and being able to pull off multiple days in the same city. I find it difficult to believe McCartney or Bowie wouldn't have been able to do the same thing if they had wanted to. It just wasn't the done thing then. Maybe the difference is that those artists made and could make money from record sales, so the hard work (and expense) of live shows was about promoting record sales. Artists now make relatively little from sales of their actual music, so they maximize both the cost per ticket and the number of shows.

[@TheFujac]

@@nak5eno616 to be fair julio iglesias and gloria estefan both sang iin english on their biggest hits

[@poulwinther]

My thoughts exactly.

[@andypullega5479]

Rick, I'm about a year and a half younger than you and we just have to face it, the radio and the powers that be just won't play all the wonderful new music that a lot of young bands/artists have coming out. It's sad but, that's just how it is. Oh well....

[@mrcryptozoic817]

I agree. And "underground radio" isn't a thing anymore. I don't know how anyone would get exposed to new music. That's how found out about Vangelis, Tomita, Michael Hoenig, West Coast Popart Experimental Band, Blood Rock and too many others to list.

[@meetmobility]

BBC radio 6 music does a reasonable job. I've discovered quite a bit through them over the years.

[@cococonlin170]

Great conversation, insightful perspective.

[@MrDeengels]

I remember wanting to watch the Grammys to watch my favorite artists perform. I couldnt name 5 artists on the top 40 now.

[@glenrotchin5523]

Related topic or maybe not. I’m about Rick’s age. Grew up with the rock star as myth, unattainable, untouchable, living a rock star dream life. Limos and chicks and sex and drugs, and trashing hotel rooms. Seems to me that the corporatization of the industry and social media have de-mythologized the rock star. Maybe I’m being nostalgic. But my kids aren’t living with that sense of idolization of the artist.

[@MrDirtydaves]

I think people still idolize stars, just in a different way. We dreamt of rock stars, nowadays I think most people want to believe they’re heroes are beyond reproach. Taylor Swifts publicity game is strong.

[@The_Umpteenth_Doctor]

Since joining KZbin Music in 2020, my music tastes have definitely diverged from current popular music because it opened me up to songs I never would have heard before. Back is the 2000s and 2010s, if I wanted to listen to the entire back catalogue of Paul McCartney, Elton John, Gladys Knight, Nina Simone or The Who, it would've cost so much money to buy the albums, and even then I may have only liked 2 or 3 tracks. I wouldn't have been worth it. I freaking ❤❤ KZbin Music!

[@garysimonson1135]

Don't forget the best era of rock music - the early 90s Grunge and Alternative Rock revolution.

[@odnamsrazor2364]

back in the 70s there was a huge variety on a "rock and roll" radio station. anything from hip hop ( Curtis Mayfield ) to heavy metal ( Black Sabbath or AC/DC ) to disco ( Bee Gees ) to folk ( John Denver ) to country rock ( Eagles ) to soul ( Commodores ) to punk to techno ( Devo ).

[@AdrianDeVore]

I didn't know that Curtis Mayfield was a hip-hop artist. He was known for R&B music! 😂

[@kurga9790]

Live shows weren't as important for the big artist in the 80ies or 90ies money wise as they are now. People used to buy records, remember? And shows were much cheaper. So you can't say that current big artist are bigger because they do more big concerts, the incentive is different.