Is pop music today an example of free expression? I personally don’t see any, I see a team of songwriters trying to make as much money as possible 
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Then look somewhere else. It’s not as if we’re being force-fed.
Over 100 million songs on Apple Music/ Spotify etc.
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I suppose there’s a slim change of finding some free expression in modern pop if you go through 100 million songs 
Then quit looking at pop to get what you want.
Simple.
Has there ever been a better era to be an independent artist? Has there ever been another time where there has been this much music being made by interesting artists who couldn’t care less about massive, or hell, any, success? The thing is that you have to be willing to look for it or be lucky enough to stumble upon it.
That said, I ain’t looking for shit anymore! If someone wants to introduce me to something new and cool, great! I’ll listen to it once or twice and go back to stuff I love and forget all about it. I don’t have it in me to become fully absorbed in a newer song or album outside of the time it takes to listen to said song or album. Even from artists I damn near worship. Satch is my L&S and I’ve only listened to his last few records a few times. They’re great. I enjoyed them. And I’m sure I’ll listen to them again soon. But I don’t expect them to grab me like the older stuff did. I doubt anything ever will again.
The soundtrack of our youth is what we tend to love. Songs that mean something far beyond being “good music”.
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That and things that shaped us as adults. I’m about 50/50 for things that excited me in my youth and things that excited me in my 20-30s that still resonate. Most of youth was guitar based and mostly instrumental. The music that got me in adulthood was the kind of METAL!! that came from a different place than the trash and Death METAL!! I grew up on. Bands like Converge, Dillinger Escape Plan (Dimitri, not Greg lol) and a lot of the bands that would eventually be considered “metalcore” or “djent” (I hate these terms…) before those terms existed. I kinda tuned out the heavy stuff in the mid-late-2ks “ which was around the time that “deathcore” was starting. I never gave that stuff a chance but I think I’d have liked it a lot.
People stop discovering new music when they hit 30, says research - Music Business Worldwide.
I dont think it’s a hard fast rule but it does seem that at least genre wise the music we got into from youth to mid 20s seems to be what we stick with.
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In general I’d agree this seems to be the case - it’s rare I get an older student who’s into anything that isn’t, well, old. Still, I’d expect (or, hope) most musicians would at least keep an open mind to new stuff, considering how much great music is out there if you’re willing to dig a little.
All that said, pop music now is absolutely atrocious compared to pop from the '80s. haha Lots of reasons for that, but I think the biggest one is the complete lack of anything remotely interesting going on as far as harmony.
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Lana Del Rey is the only pop artist of the last decade that’s been remotely interesting imo.
A great deal of that is that when the music industry nosedove, “artist development” went with it. Gotta crank out hits and crank ‘em out now!! No time for experimenting!! No budget for new things!!
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Well, lets replace “stupid " with “Musically inept” an example is someone who listens to the “Rising Force”
album, then listens to “Parabellum” and says " its the exact same thing only years later…:” yes they are out there, people who would say things like that…
But it’s true 
No amount of euphemisms and woke jargon is going to put lipstick on a pig. It’s just is what it is. All other explanations are just excuses, it’s unpopular and rude even, but it’s the truth. That may be subjective but I’d rather be honest instead of polite, this is just my personal opinion.
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Well…I’m part of the audience, so you’re not wrong.
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Who’s this Pugnani guy? Primrose? … average clown wouldn’t know greatness if it bit em in the arse.
The world is a mess with the MBA epidemic, I think we need a lockdown in protest of MBA schools.
Can I play too? I’m sort of part of the audience, sort of not and I’m stupid I like Yngwie, but I get tired of hearing i V i V and harmonic minor scales all the time lol! I love his playing though, full of expression and fire! Far Beyond the Sun and Black Star are my favs, not much else he did grabbed me (and I have several of his albums, so it’s not as though I haven’t tried). I’d rather go straight to the source and listen to the “true” classical pieces that inspired him. Still, I’d consider him one of my favorite players of all time.
I feel like every generation says “pop music is so lame now”. I think what happens is that in each generation, the best things rise to the top and everything else is forgotten. And sometimes it takes a while before the proper appreciation occurs.
The Beatles were a pop band. My professors in college speculated that some day there would be academic courses on the Beatles in the same fashion that there are currently on Beethoven and Mozart. I tend to agree, John and Paul (and George too) wrote some extremely elegant music from a compositional standpoint. Still, if someone thinks the Beatles are no good, or not their thing, fine. Whatever We all like different stuff. I’ll listen to Brahms symphonies while I sip an expensive coffee and snob it out. I like some Green Day and Taylor Swift songs too though.
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Joe, take what I say about al this in jest, it takes all kinds else we’'d all be inbred, that that would not be good. Check that track out, some intense stuff to dig in to.
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All good brother, I’m mainly playing around too Intent easily gets lost on a forum. Nothing here so far offended me, I hope nothing I said offended anyone either.
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Sometimes I intend it, but only till the time I press “reply”.
My deviousness only lasts a few seconds 
edit: 3:45 on that track, what’s going on there?
Ok well I will say technically if he is doing i V i V that is also phrygian dominant.
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