I used to take some small amount of pride that I was one of the “young Gen-Xers.” But, inevitably, as time continues to move onward, I am more and more just “old” in the eyes and ears of my students.
With that in mind, I want to make clear from the outset that I absolutely think that there is some amazing music happening in our contemporary context in almost all genres. Indeed, here on “Music Mondays” I try to mix in new stuff with older stuff in order to keep everyone interested and constantly learning about what might lie outside their normal rotations.
However, despite amazing stuff happening, I have also lamented some general trends that seem to have made things increasingly simple in terms of lyrical, rhythmic, and melodic dimensions (across all genres), repetitive (as if all produced by the same people for the same A&R reps), self-absorbed (all about “me” and not much about “us”) and, to be honest, boring (which is hardly surprising given the simplicity and repetition).
My sense of such things has been long developing, but I have been guarded about passing judgment because I didn’t want to be seen as an “old head” who was just out of touch with the new forms of innovation showing up in contemporary music.
Nonetheless, try as I might, I eventually stopped teaching my “Philosophy and Hip Hop” course, at least in part, due to the widening chasm between my musical appreciation and my students’ musical tastes. Even though I tried to see the new modes of expression as opening up new ways of pushing back the boundaries of hip hop, I just couldn’t get on board with the way that rhyming a word with itself seemed so very common, and the head-nodding groove of “boom-bap” gave way to trap beats that, at least to my drummer’s ear, just sounded like someone in the studio just didn’t know how to work the drum machine and so pushed one of the pre-programmed beats that came from the factory and called it a day.
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