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It’s Official: English Pop Music Sucks

March 29, 2008 Music, Reviews, World

It’s a common occurrence: a younger generation grows up listening to a type of music their parents consider to be noise, senseless rambling, or shameless self-promotion. Then, as that younger audience gets older, their definition of “good music” tends to take on the same stagnation that their parents faced. My father stopped listening to a lot of new music in the 1980’s, while I gave up on pulp music around 1998 or 1999. It seems that since these pivotal years, 95% of everything we hear on the radio, TV or in movies has sucked harder than an industrial-grade vacuum.

If English “music” continues on this downward spiral, BMG just might sign me a record deal and I’ll have the opportunity to win the “best second-language lesson” category at the Juno’s.

One exception, though, has been Japanese pop music. Rather than the 19:1 ratio of crap-to-music we see in North America and Europe, we see something closer to 4:1.

So what is the reason behind this drastic difference in lyrical quality? Is it the fact I’ve only listened to J-Pop for 10 years? Is it the fact I’m not fluent in Japanese, so my appreciation of the culture and language has not yet diminished? Is it the fact that I’ve grown tired of hearing about English “artists” talk about themselves, their drug/alcohol habits, their wealth, their grievances and their endless sex orgies?

Perhaps, but there’s a bit more to it.

A Little Rhythm Goes a Long Way

It seems that, regardless of genre, most English lyrics have been put to, essentially, the same beat. There is no variation to the endless bass riffs, tweets and expected pauses. On top of that, we see nothing but an endless parade of Dr. Dre wannabe’s or boy bands full of metro-sexual-posing dolts. Most solo male singers whine about losing women, and most solo female artists complain about lazy men who whine or their desire to go clubbing and “hooking up” with something at the end of the night.

What happened to the songs that could make us laugh? What happened to the songs that made us feel good? What happened to the songs that told a story? And, by story, I don’t mean listening to how someone scored some “sweet ass” at the club in L.A., then flew to the Caribbean on a private jet to engage in various lustrous acts on a $20-million yacht.

I guess that content doesn’t matter anymore.

Alternative Music Is Not Alternative, It’s Pop

A while back I started looking for something new and found a few other languages with a suck-to-song (s2s) ratio of under 10:1. In the event you’re in the market, you might want to lend your ear to some of these languages.

Jamaican Music (9:1 Suck-to-Song Ratio)

Although most Jamaican music we hear is (technically) in English, the accent and regional dialect is unique enough for me to consider it another language for the purposes of this article (just like how English and French are regional dialects of Latin).

The primary themes in this genre include enjoying family, friends, sports, marijuana, or some combination thereof. Naturally, other topics such as politics, humanity, freedom and personal loss are also covered, where the artist often inflects a good deal of emotion into the work as they have likely experienced the situation.
The often repetitive beat can get boring pretty quick, however, there’s nothing better than a little reggae or soul in the summer heat.

Recommended Artists:

• Dennis Brown
• Calibe Thompson

French Music (8:1 Suck-to-Song Ratio)

When I sat down and worked it out, the French s2s ratio really surprised me. I thought it would be higher.

Like most other languages, the main topics are love, family, loss and aspirations. The best part of French music has got to be the way lyrics blend with the music. Unlike English pop music, spoken-word lyrics are not common.

Recommended Artists:

• Sanseverino
• Edith Piaf

Arabic Music (5:1 Suck-to-Song Ratio)

I’ll admit that my Arabic is pretty weak, but from what little I do know, some of the popular music coming out of Saudi Arabia is pretty good. The most popular songs tell about good times with family, friends, and working hard to earn a living.

Though it’s a very lyrical language to begin with, the fusion of Arabic and instruments is something to be admired. There are quite a few artists around the world that have been able to take the best qualities from Saudi music and blend it with their own.

Recommended Artists:

• Abdul Majeed Abdullah
• Rabeh Saqer

Japanese Music (4:1 Suck-to-Song Ratio)

Oddly enough, Japan has the least amount of sucky music. Considering how many songs on the radio and on TV are either really childish, super cute or just plain off-beat, there is a remarkable amount of good music covering the usual topics of love, rejection, desire, family and friends. On top of this, several artists sing about accomplishment or stories that we can relate to.

Of course, Japanese music isn’t for everyone. Quite a bit of it is repetitive, but every artist brings their own unique sound to the matter. The only exception, however, would be the boy bands and girl bands. It seems that these pop groups all have the same songs, themes and faces. The only exception would be SMAP, who managed to create a unique niche for themselves as they continued to be popular past 25.

Recommended Artists:

• Utada Hikaru
• Thelma Aoyama

Perhaps It’s Just Age

What is it that causes us to stop enjoying new music as time goes on and is it reversible? Then again, does the reason for our suspension of musical taste even matter?

What do you think of today’s pop music? Has it degraded to the point that we can no longer enjoy it, or has it become better with the “freedom” of expression that we see in so many Western-style musings? If you listen to non-English music, who are some of your favourite artists?

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