it's started with "Disco Sucks" movement.
[Edited 1/18/08 3:26am]

Other than some old school artists, I am not familiar with European popular music. What is good these days?

Rodya24 said:

Girls Aloud
Sugababes
Kylie
Madonna

(...)

A lil maybe..The american market is very macho, a lil bland, excpet for there soul and r&b, they still do it best

preach it

MikeMatronik said:

you missed Dannii

PricelessHo said:

Dannii's not pop. Dannii is a cult artist and the Queen of Clubs

MikeMatronik said:

using the word cult won't do the trick

ok i admit i don't know why she gets on my nerves. i really liked her debut

PricelessHo said:

Her debut was this album:



"Dannii" from 1990
[Edited 1/18/08 4:49am]

MikeMatronik said:

why did they re-issue it as love & kisses?

No better example than New York's own Scissor Sisters.

And the thing AMERICA doesnt even know is that Girls Aloud with 17 straight top 10 singles have put them in a class of AMERICAN icons like Madonna,JJ, and MJ who all had runs like that, but Girls Aloud were the only ones to do it from their first release.

newpower99 said:

Banned from the US radios, but loved by the entire european continent

i ze Scissor Sisters

And also we cant forget what happend to the BEE GEES around 1980, blowing up their records in a baseball stadium, having advertised "BEE GEE" free weekends on all radio, i know everyone talks about the JJ "blacklisting" from MTV, but that wasnt even close to what america did to the Bee Gees, imagine if radio tried that now with someone like Beyonce or anyone else, their would be lawsuits everywhere.

PricelessHo said:

Was kinda disappointed with Ta Dah. but its still alll good.

It seems that Europe has always been more receptive to pop music in general compared to the USA. I think that the pop music de-evolution in the USA began in the late 1960's with the rise of acid rock and continued with the creation of heavy metal, hip-hop, and alternative music. Back in the late 1960's and all throughout the 1970's, some of the most popular music in the USA was album-oriented rock, but since a lot of those music tracks would go on for six or seven minutes or more, it became impossible to play on top 40 radio, and a lot of the songs that were playing on top 40 radio at the time (like "Disco Duck") were total schlock. That gave pop music in the USA a negative connotation for crap, whether fair or unfair.

Then in the 1980's, big media began to rise, and along with it came the pre-selected playlist which was the result of focus group marketing. That basically put all music into labels (pop, rock, R&B, adult contemporary, country, hip-hop, etc.), and the media conglomerates began compartmentalizing this music into separate stations to the point where masses of people could listen to only one type of music all day long and not even be aware of potential superstars who didn't perform in the same musical genre they were fans over. And in the USA, pop became synonomous with bubblegum, meaning that it was geared to an audience between 12 and 24 years of age. You could have pop recordings by older artists which was aimed at an older audience, but they would be labeled as adult contemporary or lite FM type music.


[Edited 1/18/08 6:47am]

America's market has sucked for years. Homophobia, racism, underhanded corporates....the list goes on

MikeMatronik said:

Mika...

"Disco Sucks" was not about homophobia. Belive it or not most of us had no idea the Village People were gay in 1979. It seems incredible. But honestly, that was the case. It was still shameful & ugly though.

The reaction had more to do with the same attitude many people have towards rap music today - I don't like it, it doesn't meet my standards of what good music is, therefore it shouldn't exist. It's not just bad music, it's morally corrupt and is killing "good" music. It is degenerate and not suitable for normal people. The people who like it are retarded scum, who know nothing about real, true music. Everyone with good taste listens to the records in my collection and nothing else. What a shame that children are listening to this instead of my favorite album which was made 25 years ago.

I never agreed with that attitude, and still don't. There's planty of music that's just not relevant to me, from disco to Andean pipe music to extreme death metal. I don't hate it, I just don't think about it much. If someone else is getting pleasure from it, good on them.

Lots of things killed this market also, lack of diversity is a big one. I still have greater respect for the UK market since its still more about longevity and singles and mixes and bsides, the USA is not really about any of that at this point and why it is so boring. Its not even just the UK artists its the american artists too and the way their music is delivered over in the UK, by not having actual singles and things like that here totally killed the US, eliminating it as a whole was stupid and brought on by nothing BUT greed.

It had nothing to do with the children.

Disco did SUCK. It still sucks.

Let's not confuse disco with funk or any real music. Disco was what shit hop is today only it didn't have the abusive and ignorant language and image. Disco is like the shitty techno of today vs. real house music.

You're gonna have to define what you mean by "pop." If you mean music devoid of soul and fronted by some annoying tart who can't sing or play an instrument, there's plenty of that unfortunately and many people's interest in the bullshit is why the industry is fucked. All the damn research says people love these plastic bastards, they won't spend money on them, but they love them and the companies have been locked onto this market.

MikeMatronik said:

1. You know both gays & blacks were involve in the creation of House, a genre that did pick up where disco left off.

2. Despite the level of "homophobia" (READ: anti-gay) that still exist in USA, there are some gays/lesbians/bisexuals in the heterosexual-side of hip-hop cultures that are keeping it on the down low. Meanwhile, the so-called anti-gay rappers are still putting lip-stick lesbians & bisexual women in their video, which tell you the double standards that's been promoted in the pop market.

Just use the org's search engine and try to find previous threads on gays in hip-hop, as well as all of the F***ing For Tracks threads.

TonyVanDam said:

America has the charts it deserves...I can only say that.

MikeMatronik said:

Then it went right onto hip hop.

yeah music was so much better when every artist was suspected of being gay or at least homo-friendly.i blame hiphop

newpower99 said:

I love, love their stuff

Dance said:

MikeMatronik said:

Really?

The Pet Shop Boys, Culture Club, Wham/George Michael were all big in the US in the 80s.