Music without vocals: Inaccessible?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’ve been wondering about this one for quite some time. As a music collector and enthusiast for most of my life, I’ve tried to listen to and study as many different types of music as possible.

Having sampled what I believe to be an extremely wide (especially for my age) selection of tunes from all eras and genres of recorded music, I’ve gravitated especially towards instrumental pop/jazz/rock fusion such as Acoustic Alchemy, Spyro Gyra, The Rippingtons, Nelson Rangell, Lee Ritenour, David Sanborn, et cetera. It’s all, at least in my opinion, great stuff.

However, my peers don’t seem to appreciate it as much. Music without lyrics or that isn’t “poppy and danceable” enough is looked down upon, and listening to entire albums (as, much of the time, the artist had intended their work to be listened) in favor of free, horribly compressed individual MP3 files. I have heretofore taken these sorts of statements as signs of closed minds and, possibly, low intelligence. So many seem closed-minded toward so much music, and clearly, it isn’t making the music scene produce anything better. (Just glance at the Top 40 charts and behold the sad state of affairs.)

Is this just my viewpoint, or have others noticed this as well?

2

This is the first time in history that we have virtually the entire history of music literally at our fingertips; previous generations could only dream of this kind of accessibility. Yet, sadly, so many people prefer to limit themselves to what I refer to as “disposable” music. The loss is theirs.

3

Welcome to my world, my dear. I’ve been enduring this since I was about 10.

I grew up with Classical music so that’s what I love, but I got all sorts of grief and flak from my peers because of it. It just didn’t compute with them. I was young like them! And I was listening to stuff that sounded like Martian to them! I must be stopped!

I don’t think it’s usually a mark of “low intelligence” that they didn’t appreciate what I liked. I think it’s ignorance, fear of the unknown, the feeling of “strength in numbers” (all their friends like it too so it must be better) and the unwillingness to try anything new.

It often gets better when you get older, but not always. Some people are flat-out defensive when you don’t like “their” kind of music (or rather, embrace something else too). Some people just can’t stand it that you are “different,” they think it means that you are “looking down on them” somehow. Or, they can’t figure out how you can understand something that they don’t understand, so therefore you must be a snob or a jerk. Easier to think that than to admit to themselves that they don’t understand something.

Or, sometimes it’s that you talk about your music and they just don’t care and they want you to shut out about it. I’m not saying that you have done that, but some music enthusiasts will.

4

Colin- think there will be any interest in today’s “music” in 40-50 years? Think of it- a golden oldies station featuring 50 cent, Eminem, Snoop, et al. It boggles the mind.

5

I think there’s a certain fear of not understanding the music. If a song has comprehensible lyrics it’s easy to feel that you understand it. In that sense, instrumental music is intimidating. Vocals with incomprehensible lyrics (foreign opera and choral music) is even worse in this respect, and I admit I used to be intimidated by them.

6

It’s worse when you try and tell people you like listening to video game music. Even though many people today play video games and obviously hear the orchestral music in them, when they hear about “game music” all they can think about is the random beeps from the days of the Atari and NES, or they ask “So, like, techno stuff?”

I also hate when I get the question “Who’s your favorite band?” instead of “What kind of music do you like?” There is music besides music from bands, people!

7

Hmmmm…interesting. I didn’t know they had soundtracks for videogames.

Where do you get them? Are any of them written by my favorite film composer, Jerry Goldsmith?

Oh yeah! A kindred sprit! Someone else who knows what it’s like!

The other thing I hate is the constant calling of every musical piece a “song.” There’s no other type or format of music. They are all “songs.”

Beethoven’s 5th ain’t a freakin’ song, OK? Sibelius’s Nightride and Sunrise ain’t a freakin’ SONG!

ARGGHHH!

8

Oh man… I’m getting a sixties flashback here. Bear with me a second while I flip back to an earlier time:

What I don’t understand is why some people have such a sense of musical superiority embedded in their brain that they think it impossible that the youth of today will one day want to listen to the songs they grew up with. Are you somehow deluded enough to think that every person listening to Eminem now is just going to grow out of it and that by the time they’re 35 they’ll start settling down and listening to classic rawk or classical music or whatever you’re interested in? Even teenagers aren’t that narcissistic. :rolleyes:

For what it’s worth, I like instrumental music and pop music and I’m not a teenager.

9

I’m a teenager and I’m not a huge fan of instrumental music at all but I recently was intrigued by a band called decoder ring. Their music has a tiny amount of lyrical input but only in a few songs. I find the emotion just as strongly conveyed, if not more so, in instrumental music as it is in lyrical. I think it depends on how much you are willing to let yourself go when you listen to music.

10

I wouldn’t go that far, gex gex, but I have wondered the same thing myself about much of the music that is played today: and that includes country. How much of it will be popular in 15-30 years?

The reason I wonder this is not so much believing that my style of music is preferable or obviously superior, because I listen to a lot of stuff from many different eras. (Yesterday I was humming “Minnie the Moocher” at work. The day before that, “Misty.”) No, the reason I feel that way is that a certain amount of modern so-called urban music is topical and current. Some of it deals with the current way of life for its singers, its listeners. Some current country tunes are topical, as are even some rock tunes. I note that “Born in the USA” isn’t played as much as, say, “Dancing in the Dark,” because one addresses the bleak future of the post-war Vietnam vets in a hostile and depressed economy, and the other with a guy and a girl. Will Lee Greenwood’s post-9/11 work be on a radio station in 10 years? Will the Princess Di version of “Candle in the Wind” survive long?

More to the point of the older music, because I used to work in a piano and organ store playing oldies for our primary buying audience, while we remember “Hello My Baby” from circia 1910, we don’t remember “In The Baggage Car Ahead” because its subject matter is no longer applicable. We don’t travel as much by train (or listen to waltzes, but that’s another story too). We remember “Cherry Pink And Apple Blossom White” or “Moonlight Sonata,” from the WWII era, but not “Don’t Go Sitting Under the Apple Tree With Anyone Else But Me.” How about Europe’s “The Final Countdown?” Who even remembers what the title of “Pennsylvania 6-5000” means (and when we switch to ten-digit telephone numbers, what about “867-5309 (Jenny)”?) Who knows half of the references in Paul Simon’s “A Simple Desultory Phillipic (Or How I was Robert MacNamara’d into Submission)”? When will Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start The Fire” be completely forgotten?

Anyway, back to the OP, I do believe many people find instrumental-only music to be difficult to listen to. My guess is, they never learned how to listen to it, or what to listen to. Most pop, rock, and other verse-chorus-verse-chorus-bridge-verse-chorus music is nicely predictable and has a narrow range of chords and tones and generally one tempo throughout. (This doesn’t explain why “Stairway to Heaven” and “Bohemian Rhapsody” are so popular, though.) Perhaps they just feel a tighter emotional connection to a song that says something (literally, in words) that they, the listener, want to be told. Many of the songs and bands of the era strive to capture the essence of growing up and the issues of the day: it’s so tough growing up, I’m so afraid of this, I really enjoy that, nobody understands me, how cool am I?, etc. Popular music – stuff with lyrics – talks to its listeners and reaffirms and explains how they already feel.

Well, that’s just a lot of blather, anyhow, but that’s what I think. You’re free to disagree or say I’m way off base. :slight_smile:

FISH

11

Lee Greenwood’s post 9/11 work?

~confused~

~J

12

I can’t remember the name of it. Might have been a new song, or a re-release, something like God Bless The USA or some other ultrapatriotic happy crappy that was relevant for about three weeks in September.

I just can’t recall the title, sorry.

FISH

13

Neither actually, “God Bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood was the CMA Song of the Year in 1985.

I would personally say it’s been quite relevant every day since then.

But, to answer your question, as Lee Greenwood’s song has been playing on the radio for close to twenty years, I think we can safely say it won’t disappear anytime soon.

14

Not being an anglophone myself, most of the music I listen to comes form the USA-UK axis. Yeah, I can understand written english, and if had the lyrics in fornt of my face, I can understand what the singer´s singing (well, most of times). But my spoken english is plainly lame. Anyway, I tend to google for lyrics once in a while and most of times is funny how a song that made me feel something, that meaned something to me, has lyrics that speak of those feelings, or at least of something quite similar to what I supossed the song referred to.
I grew with classic music and I´m open to almost every musical genre you may think of (with the possible exception of hip hop, not that I have something against it, it simply doesn´t appeals me), and so I fail to see why so many people find that you can´t like classical and pop music at the same time (notice that when I say “pop music” I mean every genre that isn´t labeled as “classical”).
Also i prefer music with words (in pop) because the voice can be so expressive with feelings and for me that is what music is about: feelings. I can feel what a singer is trying to trasmit with his/her voice even if I can´t understand what he/she is singing exactly.

15

As to the question of whether or not todays music will be heard on the radio 30+ years from now the answer is fairly simple: if there is a market for it, then most definitely. The “classic rock” genre of radio being the best example of this. I do find it interesting that the classic rock format excludes all of Motown’s entire output, which is quite starnge as it definitely qualifies as rock. I hesitate to say there is a racial motive behind that decision but can’t find a better explanation.

16

Books without pictures: Inaccessible?

No, one simply learns to read. In the same way, one simply learns to enjoy non-vocal music.

17

Though I feel in many cases you are right about music with lyrics, I feel that there are so many songs in which lyrics can bring meaning into a song. From there the beat/tempo/melody are what give the lyrics emotion that can go along with those lyrics. Mainstream music has fallen away from meaningful songs, but it doesn’t mean everything with lyrics is bad music.

I write poetry and I find that lyrics can be very clever and can often match intense feelings/emotions.

I personally grew up in L.A. and like rap, but love all music. I checked out some of the bands you posted and they are really good. Though its not your style, you should check out nas, immortal technique “you never know” and “dance with the devil”, grandmaster flash “the message”.

There is stuff out there.

18

Instrumental music is my favourite kind.

19

If understanding the lyrics was essential in order to enjoy the music, neither opera would have become an international phenomenon, nor would English, Spanish or Italian pop or rock be sold outside the countries where people understand those languages. I discovered Elvis waaaay before my English was good enough to read the lyrics to Jailhouse Rock, much less understand them sung; an immense majority of the fans or Eminem, Metallica or the Rolling Stones can’t read the lyrics.

But even if you’re turning “I said a hip” into “aserejé”, having lyrics lets the listener sing along - it’s a level of participation which you simply can’t have with instrumental music.
(And yes, I know it’s a zombie - but hey, it’s dancing la bamba!)

20

Mrs. Homie’s philosophy is, if she can’t sing along with it, it’s not worth listening to.

:rolleyes: