Joytime 2! Why are 'EDM' albums so bad?

Discussion in 'Lounge' started by TIXH, Jun 23, 2018.

  1. TIXH

    TIXH Noisemaker

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    I just finished listening to Marshmello's new EP Joytime 2. It has like 2 1/2 good songs at best, but they are all squeezed into the second half of the project. All the tracks are high energy, most have no lyrics and basically blend into one another like an audio panorama of saw waves, 808s and hi hats. Final thoughts, the project is terrible. There is even one song where he uses the infamous "Check this out" sample from FL Studio's stock vocal library.:deep_facepalm:

    In my opinion only a few there are only a few "edm" albums that are captivating from start to finish. The Avicci EP was a good example, I also didn't mind Rehab's Trouble EP, even though it was heavily leaning on the current future bass sound, it felt like it moved from idea to idea and when I was done I knew I would go back to it for more listens, which I have done. Even Zedd's Stay+ EP wasn't too bad. My question is why is it so hard for chart topping producers to make even half way decent albums?
     
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  3. black bounty

    black bounty Platinum Record

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    you're basically talking about people with no artistic vision other than finding a good name and the right logo
    same goes about their music, for which the only purpose is to entertain a crowd half drunk / half on extasy

    sorry, and I don't say that to be negative, but it's the truth, and the same goes for a lot of genres : reggae, metal, etc...

    Zedd has a real musical background, which can help the music to be of better quality, but the message is what give music a soul.

    and even when an Artist comes out, with a balanced ego, and a message expressed through good musical quality, it doesn't even mean it's gonna last.
    that's why sometimes you have 1, 2 good albums, and after that nothing.

    add to this that EDM is totally "industry oriented", with ghost producers and so-called artists whom are just inflated personalities, here's the answer to your question. :)
     
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  4. TIXH

    TIXH Noisemaker

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    [QUOTE="
    add to this that EDM is totally "industry oriented", with ghost producers and so-called artists whom are just inflated personalities [/QUOTE]

    I thought it was the opposite because EDM producers don't deliver anything lyrically, that means that the overall quality of the music has to be higher to keep the connection with the fans. Thats what I thought. I agree with what you said about the message giving the music a soul coz the lyrics of some of the big edm hits are sometimes really shallow and sometimes completely meaningless
     
  5. m9cao

    m9cao Producer

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    EDM album like olive oil in hamburgers of MacDonald, completely wasting paper and plastic.
     
  6. mewoingtons

    mewoingtons Producer

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    The problem is your listing the most mediocre, mainstream, the "pop" of edm artists. The chart toppers are usually those artists that make the simplest and safest music to appeal to the sheep masses.

    Some great examples of good "edm" albums in my opinion:

    Porter Robinson: Worlds

    deadmau5: (While 1<2), Album Title Goes Here, 4X4=12

    Andy Stott: Faith in Strangers

    Tycho: Dive, Awake

    Skrillex: Recess

    Nero: Welcome Reality

    Noisia: Collider, Split the Atom

    Gesaffelstein : Aleph

    There's many more out there as well.
     
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  7. TIXH

    TIXH Noisemaker

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    I'm gonna check out some of those albums, thanks for recommending. On what you said about me liking the most mediocre artists, you may have a point there. Thing is, I actually like pop but even from that perspective mello and the other guys on the charts don't deliver when it comes to albums.
    EDIT: I wouldn't classify Andy Scott and Nero as EDM, yes it's Electronic but it's not dance music.
     
    Last edited: Jul 5, 2018
  8. Utada Hikaru

    Utada Hikaru Producer

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    Is the EDM the worst thing that has happened to music in its history?


    In recent years, the EDM (Electronic Dance Music) has become the most popular genre of electronic music, filling stadiums in different cities around the world, where tens of thousands of young people enter into a euphoric frenzy waiting for the DJ to throw the bass and lift them to collective insanity. Dj's and producers such as Tiesto, David Guetta, Steve Aoki, Skrillex, Swedish House Mafia and Avicii have become world stars who charge the level of the biggest popstars. His music can be heard in the songs for the dancefloor of Madonna, Rihanna, Pitbull or Paris Hilton (who, inspired by these, is also a Dj).

    It's no exaggeration to ask, as Drew Ressler does on the Disco Demons blog, if the EDM is the worst thing that has happened to electronic music. And perhaps, along with reggaeton, one of the poorest things that has happened to music in general, conjuring up sensations of banal euphoria that make fans a kind of automaton programmed by a primitive formula: Pavlovian ravers salivating through the "DROP" bell. At least this is the impression left by many of these massive EDM sessions -- though, as always, there are exceptions.

    What is a bit disturbing is that the EDM used to be a broader term for all kinds of electronic music (as the name clearly indicates): techno, house, trance, dubstep, drum & bass and others. But nowadays the term has become generic, covering all kinds of subgenres as if it were the central trunk of electronics and causing many people to immediately think of one of the aforementioned Dj's when talking about electronic music or dance music. This makes electronic music look bad.

    The EDM is characterized by simple, catchy melodies with vocals that can quickly be sung once you hear them, dirty or sandy synthesizers, a little white noise and usually a drop: the climax that bursts when you drop the bass. The first part of this definition is very similar to what we all vaguely know as'pop music', music produced for commercial purposes, usually by large record companies that manufacture'artists' as the cosmetic image to make music known. The artists and the music form a strategic ensemble -according to market studies, consumer trends and pre-established formulas for the manufacture of sound- to the liking of the masses, appealing to basic emotions in their less subtle aspects (almost as a form of massive hypnosis). EDM has been described as "predictable", "robotic" and "cheesy" (a term that refers to the cheap emotions generated by music with a pseudo-epic).

    The most regrettable thing about the EDM is that, supposedly being representative of electronic music for dancing, it can sometimes act as a grille that makes it more difficult for new generations to find artists with truly interesting and authentic proposals - or that valuable artists cannot consolidate themselves if their music is not very compatible with the stadiums or discotheques of thousands of people in Ibiza and the market strategies. In a sense, the EDM has transformed the perception of electronic music, de facto turning it into the new pop music (with a little conspiracy we might even think it is music created to keep the population consuming realities of low vibration). Behind the EDM (and behind what was once Eurodance and Eurotrash) lies a rich wealth of less complacent sounds, linked to different realities and more intelligent ways of experiencing nightlife and tribal communion of sound. In a way, it is logical that genuine electronic music should be relegated and marginalized from mainstream music, in order to avoid being co-opted by the stupefaction of crowds and marketing. Anyway, nowadays there is more and more music and a lot of it is very good: you have to look beyond the billboards, Ocesa concerts, MTV videos, Rolling Stone reviews and even sometimes venture beyond Pitchfork.

    Whether you like techno, house, minimal, dubstep, psychedelic trance, ambient, IDM (the smartest version of the EDM) or any other genre, we invite you to explore a little deeper in the spacious electronic music room. The EDM, although it seems to be eating up the world at the moment, will surely perish in a few years' time. Electronic music, however, will live much longer and continue to develop some of the most refined and important artists in musical history.

    Source: https://pijamasurf.com/2014/05/es-el-edm-lo-peor-que-le-ha-pasado-a-la-musica-en-su-historia/
     
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  9. Vader

    Vader Platinum Record

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    You mean: "I finished listening to the normal garbage that is highly acclaimed as good EDM music"?
    Because I stop reading when I see Marshmello's new EP.

    Did you ever listen a The Prodigy, KLF, Fat Boy Slim, Chemical Brothers, Daft Punk, Underworld (just to mention some GODS of Electronic Music) album?
    You should... Because for what I see, you have a shitty musical taste when comes to "EDM"
     
    Last edited: Aug 6, 2019
  10. somethin

    somethin Member

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    I disagree, I don't think you listen to EDM much. Even if we are looking at mainstream or popular producers only. More recent ones that come to mind would be Flume's Skin, Zhu's Ringos Desert, Infected Mushroom's Return to the Sauce, Camo & Krooked's Mosaik, KSHMR's Lion Across The Field etc etc. Now, of course that there we will be some bad apples too, but it's like that in every genre. Anyways, all I wanted to say is that Marshmello's music is trash and I don't know why would expect anything from his album.
     
  11. black bounty

    black bounty Platinum Record

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    I thought it was the opposite because EDM producers don't deliver anything lyrically, that means that the overall quality of the music has to be higher to keep the connection with the fans. Thats what I thought. I agree with what you said about the message giving the music a soul coz the lyrics of some of the big edm hits are sometimes really shallow and sometimes completely meaningless[/QUOTE]

    when I say **the message**, I don't mean to be literal

    music has this power to be endogenic, a bit like DNA contain all of the informations and memories that makes what / who you are.
    your Soul is how you express it.

    of course, it helps to have great lyrics, but it's only a part of the equation.

    i.e, I've liked Skrillex " Scary Monsters..."
    I thought that, despite its cheap sound, the absence of meaningful lyrics,; that there was some "freshness" in it,
    something appealing,

    on the opposite, I don't understand Deadmau5 success.
    I think his music is .. plain, ordinary.
    it's not bad, but it's not good either, at least - for me - not good to the point that it deserves such success.

    also, people put the etiquette EDM to so much stuff, that it's just the easy way to keep the mind comfortably numbed into stereotypes :
    infected mushrooms, for example, to me it's not EDM, and same goes for a lot of artists.

    but all this remains subjective, as much from a listener standpoint than from the artist perspective.
     
  12. somethin

    somethin Member

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    It's not really subjective, it's pretty well defined https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_dance_music. And yea, psytrance is EDM too.
     
  13. TIXH

    TIXH Noisemaker

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    I think there are many ways to define 'good' and Marhsmello is obviously 'good' at producing songs with wide appeal among pop listeners eg. Friends w/ anne-marie and EVeryday w/ logic. My whole reason for posting was basically me wondering why that appeal wears off on album format. I think there should be a new name to describe this genre, like Popular Dance Music or something.
     
  14. JackRyan404

    JackRyan404 Newbie

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    Fat Boy Slim and The Prodigy, all the way the EPIC GODS!! hands down!
     
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