There are only a couple of singers I like, and the only one worth mentioning here would be Tom Lehrer...
... only musician where I like more than just one or two of their works...

Hmmmm....I have to wonder whether "mucis" industry is a typo or not

Anyway, Craig and Rico obviously know so much more on this subject than me, they said anything I could've possibly said. I will say this though regarding the ever-changing nature of Pop music. It's not too hard to notice that Pop music is always shifting. It is never ever the same.

Let's just take a look at what was "Pop" two years ago. It was the never-ending parade of boy bands and girl divas. Britney Speears, 'Nsync, Backstreet Boys, Christina Aguilera, Mandy Moore, the list goes on and on. ALl of these groups were solely "singers" not performers. All groups and individuals who were shaped and molded to be succesfull

Now look at 2003 and what's pop. John Mayer, who writes all of his own songs and only plays acoustic guitar, Vanessa Carlton, who is a classically trained musicians and writes full orchestra accompianment to hur music, Norah Jones, who plays a very low key almost Jazzy piano, and Jason Mraz, who spent the last 5 years playing his songs in San Diego coffee houses before getting a record deal.

As you can see, in the course of 3 short years, Pop music has changed from the big, monstrous productions of old, to more simplified, more musical music. And that's just 3 years! Where will we be in 3 more years. Well, I figure by then, the accordian will be all the rage, and we'll see a rush of new artists playing the newest accordian hits @_@.

ANyway, that's all I got

You HAVE been living in a box, haven't Srol.

Music Video budgets get larger and larger. More and more groups tend to do synchonized danceing and let other people actually play the instruments, or just use synth. Is that simple, musical, music.

And don't nitpick my typing, especially after nitpicking just caused a agrument not 2 days ago.

I'd say that's how it was the last few years, but if you look at the new artists, the ones who are topping the charts and winning the awards now, like John mayer, Norah Jones, Jason Mraz, and Vannessa Carlton, you can see it starting to change.

I don't deny that there's still some of the big bang elements there, but the last Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera albums did not sell half as well as their previous ones. I'm not sure if I should throw Madonna's album in as an example or not....I don't know WHERE the heck to put here...she's older than my parents .

And I wasn't nitpicking, I was wondering whether it was on purpose or not

EDIT: There was actually a great New York Times article on this a while back, but they don't let you access their archives without paying

Because his musical score in the Star Wars movies (especially Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi) is pure gold, IMO. ^__^

Instrumentals hack away all the flashy dresses and pretty faces and cut it back to the basics.

I remember we did a Williams show in marching band. THAT made you WANT to play even if you were tired and half dead.

My current favorite bands have to be NOFX and Anthrax.

NOFX gets my props because, despite the whole watering down and bastardization of the punk scene, they've kept things legit with all their releases. Hell, they even did an 18 minute-long punk rock song that many people consider to be one of the greatest punk songs ever recorded. I also like their efforts to out most modern punk bands as what they really are: corporate and decidedly non-punk. Nowhere is this more apparent than on their new album The War On Errorism, particularly the songs Medio-core and The Seperation Of Church and Skate. (Warning: the lyrics of those songs contain some bad language questionable content. Just covering my rear here, people.

Anthrax gets my vote because I feel they are the unsung innovators of the music scene. In effect, these guys created rap/metal back in 1986 with the song 'I'm The Man'. While RunDMC and Aerosmith's 'Walk This Way' showed that rock can be rap, Public Enemy and Anthrax showed that rap can rock as well with 1991's 'Bring The Noise', which is the template that early rap/metal bands followed. From thrash to heavy metal, Anthrax is IMO more important to the music scene in general than Metallica ever could hope to be. Sadly, they're still neglected by the general public, even with their new album 'We've Come For You All' (which is a top-notch album). The only time you ever see them on TV is when Scott Ian (Anthrax's guitarist) appears on Behind The Music or some other retrospective. Sad to see guys who rock much harder than most "rock" bands nowadays get ignored. Same with Pantera. But I'm starting to rant here, so I think I'll just cut the post off and say Anthrax and NOFX are my favorite bands.

The thing that annoys me is that I actually know people who obviously have more talent than the people I see every week on Top of the Pops but they don't get the breaks they need. Pretenders to the Throne like David Sneddon (OH MY GOD! HE ACTUALY WRITES HIS OWN SONGS?! He must be a bloody genius then!!) and *shiver* Busted (OH MY GOD! THEY PLAY THEIR OWN GUITARS!!! Hang on....are there even any guitars IN this song.....) that are filling up places that should be taken by bands that have the potential to stand out: The Coral, The Kings of Leon, the Vines.

I now no longer look at the singles chart, or at least, I don't take it seriously. The album chart is somewhat of a better indicator of talent, but not always. I tend to stick to my own opions now.

Huey Lewis & The News = 0wns all these bands I've been seeing in this topic so far. They have produced around 20 hits (not nessisarily songs that are top 10/20, but songs that got a lot of radio play 'overall' and were popular enough to help album sales). I mean just look at this list: (hits are marked with '*')

Singles:
1982... *Do You Believe In Love (POP - #7, AC - ?)
1982... Hope You Love Me (POP - #36, AC - ?)
1982... *Workin' For A Livin' (POP - #41, AC - ?)
1983... *Heart & Soul (POP - #8, AC - ?)
1984... *I Want A New Drug (POP - #6, AC - ?)
1984... *The Heart Of Rock & Roll (POP - #6, AC - ?)
1984... *If This Is It (POP - #6, AC - #5)
1984... Walking On A Thin Line (POP - #18, AC - ?)
1985... *Power Of Love (POP - #1, AC - #6)
1986... *Stuck With You (POP - #1, AC - ?)
1986... *Hip To Be Square (POP - #3, AC - #20)
1987... *Jacob's Ladder (POP - #1, AC - #17)
1987... *I Know What I Like (POP - #9, AC - #30)
1987... *Doing It All For My Baby (POP - #6, AC - #2)
1988... *Perfect World (POP - #3, AC - #2)
1988... Small World (POP - #25, AC - #20)
1989... Give Me The Keys (POP - #47, AC - ?)
1991... *Couple Days Off (POP - #11, AC - ?)
1991... Hit Me Like A Hammer (POP - #21, AC - #10)
1993... *It's Alright (POP - ?, AC - #7)
1994... *Some Kind Of Wonderful (POP - #44, AC - #7)
1994... *But It's Alright (POP - #54, AC - #5)
1995... Little Bitty Pretty One (POP - ?, AC - #27)
1996... *100 Years From Now (POP - ?, AC - #10)
2000... *Cruisin' (POP - ?, AC - #1)
2001... *Let Her Go And Start Over (POP - ?, AC - #21)
2001... I'm Not In Love Yet (POP - ?, AC - #30)

Albums:
1980... Self-Titled (never entered charts) -- Bammie "best debut album 1980"
1982... Picture This (#13) -- Gold 500,000 units
1983... Sports (#1) -- Multi-platinum 7,000,000 units
1985... Back To The Future ST (#12) -- Platinum 1,000,000 units
1986... Fore! (#1) -- Multi-platinum 3,000,000 units
1988... Small World (#11) -- Platinum 1,000,000 units
1991... Hard At Play (#27) -- Gold 500,000 units
1994... Four Chords & Several Years Ago (#55)
1996... Time Flies (#185)
2000... Duets ST (#102)
2001... Plan B (#165)

Chart numbers don't always mean a whole lot -- it's how many albums sold that means a lot. Anyhow, those lists prove that this band was very successful. They're not only successful, but they play 'GOOD' music as well (not that Nirvana crap that everyone loves).

*sigh* Hookay

Nirvana are not crap. That is your opinion. Just because you don't like them doesn't mean aren't liked by some people. And The News aren't nessasarily(sp) better than ALL the favourite bands of the rest of the forumers (which incidentally include Mozart) just because you think so. Don't try and force opinions on others (it's not nice) .

I am not a huge fan of Nirvana myself but I recognise that they are perhaps one of the most influential bands of our time, with hits such as "Teen spirit" (often hailed as the best single of all time). Now, again, this is only my opinion, but if Huey Lewis and the News (who I personally only remember for "The power of Love" and only then because of the Back to the Future films) are indeed "better" than Nirvana, you'd think people would still be buying their records as they do the aformentioned rock band (the recently released self-titled album was a best seller I believe)

Anyway, that's just my two cents. No I'm not a mod, but I thought I'd nicely point out the errors before an actual mod does and you end up with another warning.

*Realises he'll probably get chewed out for this*

My favorite band would have to be *clears throat* The Partridge Family. And please, no one laugh at me. I really like four of songs on the greatest hit album. "I Think I Love You", "I Can Feel You're Heartbeat", "I Woke Up In Love This Morning", and "Point Me In the Direction of Albequerque". Don't laugh at me! Peace! !

Currently I quite like the Whit Stripes! And rage Against The Machine. Thanks to a certain freind of mine.

I can't just have one band down so I'll put my top 5.

5) Nirvana
4) Feeder
3) Good Charlotte
2) Oasis

1) ASH!

Ash show Busted how power pop should be done...that's all I can say!

Hmm. *removes first post* see post later in thread for my opinion.

I, for some odd reason, feel like I should come back and back up my feeling for the band that made American-made Metal what it is (Don't you just love opinions?).

First off, they've been rocking longer, harder, and faster then most major bands today. I'm yet to here any band play a song that outdoes Metallica in speed or raw energy without using some outside source (Synthesized beats can go faster than Lars Ulrich if you push them hard enough.)

Plus, let's not forget their legendary touring. Excluding the past few years with James Hetfield in rehab and the few more they spent with their families, they've toured nearly non-stop for the past 27 years.

But my favorite part is how well the music describes me. Especially two songs from their newest album (St. Anger), Frantic and Invisible Kid. Frantic perfectly grips my current feeling on my life, and Invisible Kid describes me the past year like none would believe.

... Actually, have excerpts ^_^

Frantic:
Do I have the strength / to know how I'll go? / Can I find it inside / To deal with what I shouldn't know? / Could I have my wasted days back / Would I use them to get back on track? / You live it or lie it! / My lifestyle determines my deathstyle / Keep searching, keep on searching / This search goes on, this search goes on.

Invisible Kid:
Invisible kid / Locked away in his brain / From the shame and the pain / World down the drain / Invisible kid / Suspicious of your touch / Don't want to crutch / But it's all too much / I hide inside / I hurt inside / I hide inside, but I'll show you... / I'm okay, just go away / Into the distance let me fade / I'm okay, just go away / I'm okay, but please don't stray too far.

Xagarath Ankor: There are only a couple of singers I like, and the only one worth mentioning here would be Tom Lehrer...

W00T!

I really tend to genre-hop...one day I like this, another day I like that. I don't really like specific people anyway in most cases, I like specific songs more.

I break my "specific people" rule in two instances:
1) Tom Lehrer (as I already kinda mentioned)
2) Rush **high-fives Craigey**

~Shadowed Spirit Sage

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