Music is changing. Or rather, the creation of music is changing. For those of us who live in the middle of nowhere, some of these changes were, at first thought, pretty cool! The creation of software to record at home was awesome! It helped a TON of businesses. If you had the software, you had to have the hardware to run it. So sales of sound cards, ram, fast hard drives, cables, studio monitors, soundproofing and a host of other things associated with a home studio rose exponentially. It made it easy, or easier, for us to ply our trade. People who couldn’t afford to go into a professional studio could now, for much cheaper, record at home.

But it also took money and work away from those professional studios. Why go to a professional studio when you can do it at home for a fraction of the cost? Plus, you don’t have to listen to some stupid engineer with 25 years experience tell you how you are going to record your song. It’s YOUR song! Even though you’ve never been in a professional studio in your life, YOU are the paying customer and YOU should have THEM doing what YOU want!

There are more people creating music now than there ever has been. That is the “other” side of this musical coin. Every person in the entire civilized world who thinks they can sing, write, play, etc., has a “home” studio. All of the music related sites on the Internet are bogged with the talented and the “I think I’m talented.” Try to find some decent music to download and you have to wade through 100 “I think I’m talented” artists to find one that actually is good.

The Internet brought us many good things. And many bad things. In the music world, it brought us MP3’s, a file format that has, much to every real musician’s dismay, become the standard of audio. We all know that argument and I’m not going to get into that because that’s not my purpose.

When the drum machine was created all those years ago, I thought, “Wow, that’s incredible!” If you don’t have access to a real drummer you must program the drum machine to do the work for you. Granted this took a lot of time but with a little patience you could put together a pretty good drum track.

Now, software based MIDI drum packages like addictive drums, EZDrummer, etc., have kind of revolutionized the music business. It is so much better than the drum machines and it is easier, in most ways, to put together a drum track. What a jewel! And it doesn’t matter what genre of music you are into, there’s a package for you!

But when I first heard about the new drum packages, there was one thing I didn’t consider and it has been on my mind a lot lately.

Where is music headed?

words of wisdom from the king of surf guitar
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AJxc3Lxn4o

Some artists...a small number, used DVD-Audio for a while and I became a buyer of the format for the higher resolution it provides. While the format itself is wonderful. Using it is problematic.

I still support artists who use the format and have seen older catalog albums being put out to take advantage of the format...Tull, ELP, The Who, etc but without many more buyers, it will remain a niche market.

As was mentioned above the, mp3 and I-pods have brought music into the disposable age.
I use the formats too but not for serious listening which I don't think happens that much anymore. Our society seldom wants to slow down. Everyone multi-tasks.

Our society seldom wants to slow down

Personally I dont think today is any different than past decades..Crap Bubblegum music has always been around..a few examples: I ask for forgiveness
60's Sugar Sugar - The Archies
70's Bay City Rollers- Saturday Night
80's Roxanne- The Police (Oh how I loathe this song!)
90's Hit me Baby one more Time- Brittany Spears
(Songs off the top of my head I issue a disclaimer for incorrect facts haha)
The fact is the junk sells and it sells well but true talent and real muscians seem to find their niche inspite of it...an example for now I think is Foo Fighters..real muscians, a lot of their original recordings were done in their garage without the multimillion dollar studios
I dont think your concern of "Homogenized" is any different than the past decades and decades of the same..the only trend I see is radio stations have become increasingly stale and seem to have the same universal play list and I think that is narrowing the scope of people getting to really hear the better stuff..Okay I have rambled enough but you get the general gist of what Im trying to say

There is, however, a multitude of very good music still coming out in the world, and if you aren't hearing any of it the fault is YOURS, and YOURS ALONE. You just gotta get past the iTunes, Rhapsody mindset so prevalent in our lives today. What the hell...Get out there and go to a club sometimes. Take a chance on a band you never heard of.

I can afford to make the kind of music that I like to hear, and not worry about recouping several thousand dollars that it would have cost me 30 years ago to make my next magnum opus.

I have a love/hate relationship with Roxanne. Catchy as hell...heard it too much...can't get it out of my head sometimes....has been COMPLETELY CO-OPTED by popular culture. Great song, in it's own way, and Sting never has to work another day in his life (...or that's my hope at least).

I agree that POPULAR music has become VERY homogenized. There is, however, a multitude of very good music still coming out in the world, and if you aren't hearing any of it the fault is YOURS, and YOURS ALONE. You just gotta get past the iTunes, Rhapsody mindset so prevalent in our lives today. What the hell...Get out there and go to a club sometimes. Take a chance on a band you never heard of. Be entertained instead of being spoon fed by what passes as music from today's "taste makers". Those "taste makers" are usually lawyers (check the background of any one of the the current heads our multi-media conglomerates), and we know it's all about the bottom line with those guys. Back in the day, before music became a "business" (or at least corporate), it was run by a bunch of characters who didn't know whether or not something would sell. They just LIKED it. They went with their gut. That's why music was so much more exciting in the 50s, 60s and 70s. Now, there is so much more at stake that corporations can't really afford to take a chance anymore. They have shareholders to please. It HAS to be a huge success, or the share holders simply vote them out.

I love the current technology. It is very powerful, and as soon as I got over chasing the latest sound card or plug in, I found it to be extremely liberating. I don't have to wonder whether or not it'll sell. My investment is very small. I can afford to make the kind of music that I like to hear, and not worry about recouping several thousand dollars that it would have cost me 30 years ago to make my next magnum opus.

http://soundcloud.com/obscuros-1

http://www.reverbnation.com/mortalengines

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mortal-En ... 5500771194

Hey mortalengines, cool stuff on your Soundcloud page. Upon a first listen, it sounded like something sort of in between 70s Tangerine Dream and Throbbing Gristle. Trippy...

Why should artists put the time and effort into making quality albums when most people will only ever listen to the singles anyway (and even those will only ever be heard as mp3 files through pairs of crappy bud headphones).

words of wisdom from the king of surf guitar
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AJxc3Lxn4o

Perfect! 'Nuff said.

The Loudness War -- It's a problem people have been aware of for quite some time and they're fighting back.
Check out . . . http://turnmeup.org/