Rick is 100% correct. this is a guy that knows what he's talking about!!

I appreciate you making a video about this recent Rick Beato upload. Not only is it too easy to make music, but there aren't any professionals to critique music before it gets released, so in short, we have unseasoned artists without years of experience releasing over saturated similar sounding music because they're using the same technology to create "songs". Unfortunately, we had better music when musicians were working for the shady labels. The problem didn't just start however it's, gotten to the point where even people who were born in the 2000's are starting to complain. There's a similar problem with movies. In short, we don't really have a music industry as much as we have an entertainment industry that's not so entertaining.

Beato was and still is with the big names in music. His opinions weigh more than ours when it comes to music! He is not just a producer; he is also a "walking encyclopedia" of music. I hate it when young "wannabees" these days are so opinionated when they all they have achieved is playing in their respective bedrooms. You wannabees are entitled to your own opinion but always remember which level you are at before going against these music legends and institutions.

I think the problem has less so to do with the actual music being produced and more so what the listeners are being taught to like. Music overall becoming more and more simplified and "consumerist" speaks of what type of culture and society we're living in. People are way less interested in music as a form of art or performance piece and more interested in having it as some sort of background noise. When people are listening to Pop or trap beats on the subway to school or work, I don't think majority actively are 'listening' to the music. They just use it as a tool to immerse themselves in their social media scrolling or to drown out the noise of the world. I think people more and more are turning away from being active listeners of music and more interested in being passive listeners. Instead of actively trying to understand lyrics or or how different parts of a song is composed, people are more content with just hearing a "nice beat" they can move their head along with. And this is reflected in the music being produced where it feels more and more like it's just moving towards 4/4 kickdrum centric rythms and vocals being less about poetry or conveying emotions and more about being a pleasant voice that's nice to hear.

I think one point that Beato means and perhaps doesn't address explicitly enough is overlooked, namely that technology has the effect of "educating" listeners to a certain extent. Taking Auto-Tune as an example: of course Auto-Tune can be used very creatively (Billie Eilish "When I Was Older"). But above all, it changes listening habits in such a way that "ordinary consumers" perceive a voice without Auto-Tune, even of a great singer, as unclean. Beato does not deny that there is currently good music (most recently Willow Smith, for example). He points out that the "Top 40" in particular are characterized by a listener expectation that can no longer be satisfied with original music-making, but only with a form of music-making that restricts many expressive possibilities. Basically, Beato is more concerned with the listeners than the performers. My observation as a music teacher in Germany is indeed that

Rick is spot on from my perspective, but I’m the same age-we brew up with bands that had talented players with distinct sounds.

I was a teenager in the 70s. Beginning to form your identity is an important part of adolescence. Back then, there was nothing on TV that mediated my connection with others my age. So, we connected with our generation through music - and because of that bands were more than the music they made. I don't see that with my daughter or her friends. They use social media to satisfy that need. With the advent of cable TV in the early 80s and the birth of MTV, that changed a bit - but it was still about the bands. As far as the "you're just an old man", I'm sure that still happens. But my parents and grand parents didn't like new music because it sounded so different from what they were used to. That happens less and less - I'm still looking for that thing that makes me go "I've never heard anything like that." I don't remember that happening since some of the glitch/electronic music of the late 90s/early 2000s.

might want to spell the subjects name correctly.

Just to clarify: Google trends accumulates and aggregates data. So if you search for Taylor Swift, that will be aggregated into the broader term "music" as well. So it doesn't matter what kind of music you search, it will be aggregated into the broader categories. Like "country music" is a sub-part of the search term "music", etc. So Rick's conclusion is correct, because music is just the braodest term, but anything search that has to do with music is aggregated into that statistics. And it's also correct that swiping is easier than doing something. It's also why youngsters have the idea to become an inflluencer instead of learning a real job, get expert in it and then become an influencer, because you actually know someting about the topic, be it arts, fashion, music, cosmetics, you name it.

Rick is right when it a) comes to any traditional form of rock music (including metal) and b) when it comes to drums. Drums should be 100% real in the styles mentioned in A.

1) I was a kid in the 1970's, but had 3 bigger brothers, who gradually introduced me in the 1980's, when I was a young teen into the music they loved in the 1970's, mainly Genesis, Pink Floyd, Emerson Lake & Palmer. I loved it a lot, and it opened doors to me to an era I was too young to listen to serious music. I began adding 1970's bands my brothers didn't like or never explored for whatever reason, like Toto, Steely Dan etc. (my guess is they didn't like it because it was American) 2) The 1970's also produced loads of complete rubbish: Little Willy and Wigwam Bam to name but two stupid Sweet songs (while the band made lots of great tunes too) 3) Technicity is but one factor: some music is great because of its "simplicity": no complex rhythm changes, no odd melodic jumps, no super comples bass or drumparts: think Abba for example: iconic songs, so incredibly good and indestructable. And on the contrary, sometimes complexity was taken to completely absurd levels as was the case with some of the Yes material for example. 4) It is not so strange that recent music is far less appealing for "old" folks: we have been so lucky to experience the period when a lot of experimentation took place, sometimes good, sometimes bad, but there constantly was something happening: instruments were evolving, recording techniques too. Today, no real big jumps are occuring anymore, instrumentalists can use samples galore etc. We use the qualitative jumps made in the 1970's to measure today's music, and well... The size of today's jumps has become smaller, and they often go into directions we oldies don't really like. Nothing wrong with that. And I'm sure that if we would find today's music "cool" too, the young would be irritated about it, and start making new things. Every generation wants its own heroes and sounds, except maybe in the folk scene, which still honours the traditionals. Maybe having your own type of music and sounds is one of the things that makes leaving the parent's "nest" at one time or another easier.

The reason new music finds it difficult to make an impact is because we are 50 years into the cumulative collection of the best of the best. Much of this recorded music in the 60s-90s was made by great technical musicians and that is there forever. new music has this competition which is why maybe only 10-12 albums per year are going to be durably produced and listened to.

he analyzes today's music and older music and sites examples. he can actually back it up with evidence. Also, he is aware of the other avenues people get get music from and has feature many young artists that excel. There has always been stale, boring music in every era, but just the fact that people are excepting AI music so easily proves there is a listening problem and that cycles around to musicians,

I like Rick's Point of view. Take in account that society has changed. People have jobs to run to, pay bills,... Pressure of normal life is insane. So the chance that People spend time in perfectionizing theirself is getting low.

Music must have a touch of mysticism, that is, real songwriters have a third ear decoding frequencies from far away galaxies. That's what Ric's point. His standard is not like the standard of the majority, but rather of the few who realize history will have another renaissance (not of classical art, music, fashion, and literature) but of criteria of real good music songwriting. Even AI could not produce the feelings and emotions that a real songwriter experienced to drive him or her to write a piece of real music.Bohemian Rhapsody was not called the song of the millennium for nothing. Freddie's emotions are poured out in that song as he experienced the real struggle of having identity crisis.That's the renaissance criteria needed in today's music. You just dont pick up your instrument and be able to describe what's happening in the surroundings to write a song, it must be experienced or felt through frequency's silent melodies to convey real life and with purpose to impact on life to ease up pain and inspire. Aren't the best speakers real-life experiencers of what they talk about? There is a distinction between writing music just to satisfy demand and work of musicians who are overwhelmed by the silent melody only he or she could hear inside his or her mind. Call it schizophrenia or hallucination but the best of music are made that way.

I'm a jazz guy and what I noticed in jazz is that there are not as many giants or greats in jazz as there were in past times. I don't know if that's the same in rock and pop.

Music should be thought of as a verb, not a noun. To music means the entirety of what it means to make the sounds, not the final result of an audio file that could be producted by a person or a computer.

I do think deciding to spend more time in digital music production, AI tools, and marketing skills vs learning to play instruments becomes a real decision. The results ultimately are what matter and if you think about how DJ's had already cut so deep into live music.... people are more interested in the sound than watching people play the instruments.

Beato is absolutely right. The "musicians" of today, the vast majority cannot compete even with the real artists of two decades ago. A talented musician must be able to express himself in terms of tempo, musical language, dynamics, theory, taste only with his instrument. The other tools come after achieved all that. Today if you take away their computers, there is nothing left. And that's the reason for the dehumanized garbage that ranks on the charts today.

Technical virtuosity isn't feel or soul. Its a tool in a toolbox.

Putting Rick Beato's face in your thumbnail seems to be the flavour of the week. This is like the 6th or 7th video I've seen with the same exact formula.

No! I was a teenager during the 70's. Each week I select five albums to listen to for the entire week. One from the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and 21ST Cent. This practice forces me to research new bands. There's plenty of good music being produced today.

I agree with Rick Beato, music has definitely gotten worse, it's almost valueless now, younger generations have been raised to treat it like water. Why bother learning a guitar or instrument when singing is all that matters, the computer will generate the music. It's not just rock nostalgia, Public Enemy, NWA, RunDMC would not exist in this era... Bill Maher had a good end rant about this: lyrics used to be like "we ain't got much, but at least we got each other", now hiphop is too full of materialism, worshipping money, butts, cars, reputation, etc... people used to live and die by the idea of 'selling out', now it's seen as a desirable thing - or - technically it doesn't exist anymore cuz the concept doesn't even make sense to newer generations

These comments aint it. Music is a form of self expression, however you do that is up to to the artist. The charts aint everything, and there's hella innovative, creative and technical music happening in DIY spaces around the country. The simplicity of music on the charts isnt a fault of the artists, its the industry. Its labels who just want to minmax dollar signs instead of letting artists have creative freedom. Stop looking at the charts, find your local DIY scene and find the artists who are doing what you want and lift them up! Stop putting people down for a problem that is largely industry based. Not everything has to be highly technical and advanced. Genres like pop punk are hella packed with emotion, energy, and passion while being relatively simple. Skill =\= good musicality, its an artform, not a talent contest

It helps immensely when a title on the video thumbnail does not begin with a very low form of ad hominem (as we know, for millennia, this fallacy automatically loses one's argument). I understand it was in a polemic context but nowadays there is too much shallow ad hominem instead of discussion of the actual content that it doesn't come across nicely if one actually wishes to have an objective debate. Beato made some wild exaggerations and fell into some confirmation bias traps, but overall there is a fundamental point: the way we produce and consume music is tightly interconnected with system of values. The latter has suffered vast shifts - whether one deems it good or bad that is subjective - but only to an extent. In throwaway culture if one does not access music in a way that comes at a personal (cognitive, temporal, physical) cost and effort then, as per everything else studied within the real of social psychology, the person's appreciation with a system of values at its core shifts greatly. Information theory also has a say in this, after all, digital streaming made music into instantly accessible information - without its physical medium. Stanislaw Lem postulated many things about this already in the 1950s and if only he was alive to see current reality...

The comments section prove y'all only listen to mainstream music instead of engaging with specific music genre community you liked. Billboard doesn't even define the today music y'know, there's alot of great album that have been produced in 10's to 20's.

As a dinosaur I love new music great new music people now have 70yrs of influence to draw from go listen to the cannons if you can't tell who influenced her your ear dead it's better than ever ps I saw led Zeppelin Pink Floyd Aerosmith ECT at their peak

He's right. And it's not just making music. No one wants to do ANYTHING these days. When I was 13 (only 17 years ago), I would spend 5+ hours a day practicing guitar. If I wasn't practicing guitar I was playing Halo or Guitar Hero with my friends and trying to get better at that. Nowadays, everyone is satisfied with just being fed whatever pops up on TikTok, Facebook or KZfaq. People don't even DECIDE what they want to waste their time with anymore. The algorithm decides that for you too.

He didnt say you have to be flashy and super technical, you just didnt get that)

Music is not 'on the decline'... 2005 value estmination of music industry around $25 billion... 2024 value is $40 billion. Money is better data than a single search term. I am seeing the same people that watched the Internet take off and didnt learn to make websites, didnt learn how databases work, didn't learn digital marketing... they are the same people who are not learning the new AI tools. Same is with music. The people that are creators will create, the people that are consumers consume. The music search term thing I would agree is not a good data point as related to an interest of music. People have gotten more skilled at searching and there are clear well branded channels for music. So people searching for just 'music' is so not true.

Don't play the "old man" card, ffs. Some people are old at 30 and some stay young till 80 (Tony Levin f.e.).

Aparently you've never heard of Keith Urban , or Brad Paisley , a lot of younger people listen to country.

When you use digital stuff everything becomes stale and sterile. Analog is raw and powerful. Plus with auto tune you have to question wether these folks can even sing at all. I've been around a long time and seen some really good players who knew what they doing.

new, specifically well advertised stuff that gets in official top 100 lists, gets on the front page of music apps, does suck in some ways, I think the 2 biggest issues with modern music are auto-tune and drum machines, they suck the soul out of music in my opinion, it's the imperfections, the human part, that makes music good. also yes, music today is super simple, it's almost like native american, or old african type music, mostly drums, and not much (if any) melody. I think the reason for this is the people in charge of distribution, radio play, advertising, etc, are business people, not music people, and business people are always about the lowest common denominator, and would rather have simple music even a tone deaf person with no sense of tempo can bob their heads to. but I think this will change, eventually people will get sick of hearing the same thing over and over again, or maybe they already have, and that's why music isn't as popular now. try looking up kpop or jpop or vtuber live karaoke....

Modern popular music is fast food. And just because McDonald's can brag about "over a billion served" that doesn't mean they make better food than your mother or the local greasy spoon. Neither of which will ever come anywhere near serving 1 billion customers. Don't ever confuse being great with being famous.

I grew up in the 1980's and already then I thought ”modern music” was crap. I mainly listened to music from before the 1970's. Sure, I can appreciate s free songs from every decade, but I think they best music was written in the 1700's until the early 1800's… It's basically mine almost everything else, the more there is the less interesting it is. Especially these days when everyone copy each other and everything is the same.

The premise of this post indicates that you have the intellectual depth of spit on a rock. Lil’ feller, you have some growing up to do

Widespread digital recording killed the creation. The internet as distribution killed the business.

Rick is just right, the said the truth.

Beato is absolutely right! Lots of GenZ Kids are still listening to the 80s, 90s and even 70s music but on the other side, majority of millennials and 90s kids don't really care what's new on the billboard nowadays! I think it speaks for itself.

The real issue is not how does it impact independent musicians, but how it impacts intelligent, critical thinking skills, and limited musical preference in each new generation. Letting the media think for you. The dumbing down of America including music.

Middle age nobody makes reaction video.

Rick is right BUT, technology has allowed ordinary people to be able to make music, and many many people who don't play an instrument are able to make music, its an amazing time for the bedroom music maker...

Rick is right, most new music is crap.

Rick Beato his Meato.

he's wrong and right at the same time. frustrating to see someone with so much musical knowledge being so close-minded when it comes to modern music. listening to the top 50 spotify songs and calling it a day is such a bad example of the current musical scene. great rock being made with bands like black midi, rap with kendrick lamar and little simz, soul and r&b with sampha, blood orange, daniel caesar, even pop in caroline polachek, mk.gee, jessie ware and so on. while i do agree on his takes on streaming platforms, almost everything else he talks about is based on nostalgia and that's it. he criticizes everyone's way of consumption these days and says that the way it was done back then it was better, when that's both subjective and dumb.

...because modern music does suck. If I hear one more ham fisted auto tuned rhyme over a trap beat I am going to lose it.

He's right ,and why is it the being old is a bad thing, we should learn and respect our elders

Napster ended the illusion that music has the value that older generations thought it had. Modern musicians want to keep the hope alive and point to the fraction of 1% who catch fire and are able to capitalize on it. Since KZfaq, computer gaming, what Beato says rings true - these modern-day distractions, the fact that you don't really need to pay for music at all, and the rise of comedy clubs, the rapid pace of movie and Netflix's shows - sitting down and practicing your scales or going over a piece of music is more of a niche hobby. Even in the old days, turning that music hobby into a paying profession came at the expense of people's sanity and health. It is vaguely similar to what it is like to be a book author. You get a little notoriety and a little money and then you realize the time and effort that you put into it is less than working a job at McDonald's. So, at the end of the day, just do it because you enjoy making art.

Anybody don’t agree with can just shut up and learn more about how music was produced

A failed musician complaining over another failed musician.

It kinda does many player became so technical that lack of feeling. Production became to polished that is almost lacking that mojo of human error. He is not wrong nor 100% right. Also rock n roll is dead and the new rock is well meh imo. And yeah everyone is not politically correct coz nothing is more rock or metal than herd mentality 🤘🏻😘

You lost me when I realized you were explaining why and what people are doing without actually asking them. Sorry, not interested. Do some investigative work first and then present data. That will be worth listening to.

I think this guy in the video is making too much out of nothing! Just another video with a bunch of knit picking!

Modern Music definitely sucks... big time.

Music sucks now !!!!!

So you're a digital marketer, but Rick has millions of subscribers and you have somethings like 500. You surely know more about digital marketing than Rick😂

Should put “old man yells at cloud” as tagline. Not sure if I can bring me to watch 30 min of talking about a boomer guitarist. Here we go…