Jolt Country

Everything I say about being out of touch with modern music sounds cliche. My parents didn't get Metallica, and I don't get my kids' music. Beating that dead horse any further reeks of Seinfeld material.

My wife watched the Grammys the other night while I watched my phone. I kept hearing the same name over and over: Billie Eilish.

Album of the Year: Billie Eilish - When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?
Record of the Year: Billie Eilish - Bad Guy
Song of the Year: Billie Eilish - Bad Guy
Best New Artist: Billie Eilish
Best Pop Vocal Album: Billie Eilish - When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?

My only exposure to Billie's music was through her live SNL performance which, I've learned over the years, does not always make for the best first impression. After the Grammys ended, I watched the video for "Bad Guy" on YouTube. Then I watched it four more times. Here it is.

Billie Eilish - Bad Guy


There are lots of interviews with Billie Eilish and her older brother/producer Finneas on YouTube, but this was one of my favorites. In this one, they break down the song by playing the separate bits on their home computer.

How the song was made (Rolling Stone)


In case you missed it, all the music and vocals were created and recorded in the bedrooms inside their parents' house. The music industry has been selling that dream for a long time, but it's finally happened. Some teenage girl and her older brother recorded the album, record, and song of the year in their bedroom. If they weren't already, professional recording studios should be scrambling.

I listened to the album yesterday. I'm not sure I would have dug in had it not been for the Grammys, but I did, and I actually enjoyed it.

"No sir I don't like it."

Flack wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 8:05 am Everything I say about being out of touch with modern music sounds cliche. My parents didn't get Metallica, and I don't get my kids' music. Beating that dead horse any further reeks of Seinfeld material.

Funny thing is, I spoke about this very subject eleven years ago here: in which I directed a response to a then 11-year-old girl who commented on one of my videos, and what I predicted about her future:
And your parents. By the time you turn 15 or 16 you're really going to hate them... You'll find the music that they listen to, to be tasteless and boring. And they'll find the music you listen to, to be incomprehensible and vulgar... Then perhaps, someday in the future... you'll have kids... then you'll discover... that they listen to strange music that you don't understand, and it's nothing like the good music that you listened to when you were their age.

Flack wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 8:05 am Billie Eilish - Bad Guy (YouTube Link)

It was okay, I'd give it a C. Or to paraphrase a line from American Bandstand, "I'd give it a 43 but I wouldn't dance to it."

Some music I did not like. Some I didn't like but grew to like it later. Some I liked, and some blew me away like a hurricane, or perhaps, spun me around like a tornado.

One I liked from when I first heard it was Rachel Platten's Fight song:
"My power's turned on
Starting right now I'll be strong
I'll play my fight song
And I don't really care if nobody else believes
'Cause I've still got, a lot of fight left in me."
If that doesn't move you, you've got the sensitivity of an armadillo.

And one that blew me away from the first time I heard it was the opening "trill" from F,leetwood Mac's Everywhere:
"Can you hear me calling, out your name? You know that I'm falling and I don't know what to say."

Flack wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 8:05 am In case you missed it, all the music and vocals were created and recorded in the bedrooms inside their parents' house. The music industry has been selling that dream for a long time, but it's finally happened. Some teenage girl and her older brother recorded the album, record, and song of the year in their bedroom. If they weren't already, professional recording studios should be scrambling.

A lot of industries are discovering - sometimes fatally - that the advancement of technology changes their operations in ways they may not even be able to imagine. The effects of technology have the exact opposite effect of a vicious circle, causing the rarely used term: a virtuous circle.

As technology becomes cheaper, it allows other things using that technology to become cheaper as well, which allows other things that previously were unaffordable to come down in price, and so on, and so on, and so on. Improvements feed on each other, increasing the functionality of existing technology and the reach of better technology to more people.

We've gotten to the point that previously unaffordable audio-visual technology has come down so far in price that an ordinary middle class individual an afford to do video - and audio - productions that come close to or equal to the production values of professionals.

Right now, a person with a refurbished general purpose computer costing $300 (or less), a microphone costing $50 and a $10 microphone stand, plus a copy of the world class open-source sound editing program Audacity can produce digital audio files that sound as good at those that would have required $50,000 or $100,000 (or more) worth of equipment to do only a few yeas ago.

I got nothing.

Flack wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 5:59 pmI got nothing.

Damn right Flack. If you like it (the song, not the last post by TDarcos heh), fuggit. I certainly did not mean my post to be jab at your taste. I can tell you all about hit j-pop songs that are in Japanese video games that I really enjoy.. and just saying that sentence makes me feel slightly ashamed.

To your other point too about this "band" basically pissing on the modems of the music industry.. that part I really do enjoy. I try to make music when I get inspired to do so (which is rare) and some of the best albums ever made before the digital age were "self produced".

Funny, my kid grew up listening to the stuff I listen to and he still likes it. He gave me all his Zune gear (don't laugh) when it became obsolete. I looked through it and found stuff like Queen Greatest Hits, Iron Maiden, Pink Floyd and others. Guess I did ok as a parent.

There was also Creed, but that was probably a passing phase and he just never got around to deleting it.

AArdvark wrote: Wed Jan 29, 2020 1:59 am There was also Creed

"whale I jhust hurd.. the news toodayyy.."

However, that's cool he was into basically the same I was into due to my parents awesome record collection.

Tdarcos wrote: Tue Jan 28, 2020 4:04 pmFunny thing is, I spoke about this very subject eleven years ago here: [youtube video] in which I directed a response to a then 11-year-old girl who commented on one of my videos, and what I predicted about her future:...

You know Tdarcos that this girl is in her early 20's now so you should do a new youtube video that's a follow up to the original.