If the majority like it - it's mediocre!

Subject: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 07:59 AM

This idea rears its head out from time to time. Is there any truth in it, when relating it to music performers?

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Jean(eanjay)
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 08:02 AM

I don't think so. If the majority like it then most people find it enjoyable and good entertainment and as such it cannot be mediocre.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 08:07 AM

No there isn't.

Once again another minority trying to tell the majority that they are not right.

I saw Queen live twice and twice they were superb and all the other hundreds/thousands thought the same.

I would say the opposite. It must be good becuase the majority liked it.

However if you are one of the people who doesn't like Queen then you might think it is mediocre or indeed crap.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 08:24 AM

Eat shit - 10 million flies can't be wrong!

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 08:25 AM

Well they seem to enjoy it and can't get enough of it. LOL

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,baz
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 08:32 AM

The quality of any piece of music hasn't got anything to do with the number of people who like it. In fact, I don't see how there can be any objective statement about the quality of music. Each to their own and that's that. If you like it, great, if not, never mind - there's bound to be lots of other stuff you DO like!

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Bob Coltman
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 08:43 AM

baz has got it right. Audience of one, or audience of one million -- irrelevant, as regards the virtue of a song, or singer.

That said, publicity is a giant engine dealing in taste manipulation, and it works. Can anyone doubt that an awful lot of pap is thrust at audiences of millions (think American Idol) who are encouraged to applaud wildly by spectacle and occasion, irrespective of the quality of the song?

On the other hand, I've totally loved some million sellers. And some of the best, and some of the worst, stuff I've heard is obscure.

Personally, I tend to be drawn to the obscure, because it's fun exploring -- for the same reason any explorer does -- to find out what almost nobody knows. It's the joy of mystery, and often it casts a glamor around the song. No harm in that!

Bottom line: all earnest discussions attempting to frame songs as "great" or "dreadful" or anything in between come down to "I like it, you don't."

Just think about "classical" ("great" as opposed to "lesser," "serious" as opposed to "frivolous") music for a second, and you'll see how the semantics try to twist your mind without the least validity.

Or think of the phrase "good taste," "bad taste," and see how far irrelevancy can take you.

Bob

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: kendall
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:01 AM

Beauty is in the eye of the "Beer holder".

Bob Coltman, I sent you a message some time back and got no response, so I have to assume you didn't get it.
I'm in the process of making another CD, and I'll be using two of your songs. Would you like a sample to see if you approve?

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: skipy
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:02 AM

99%+ of what comes out of radios is crap, total & utter crap!
Pigs will eat pig swill because that is what we give them, it's much the same with radio!
Skipy

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Wesley S
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:07 AM

It's all a matter of taste.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Big Mick
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:15 AM

Gratuitous assertion. The fact is that a song gets popular, in many cases, because it is a wonderful song. Examples: The Dutchman, Dublin in the Rare Old Times, Green Fields of France, etc. It is also true that many popular songs are very mediocre, but they have a hook that just catches folks. But these songs die quick and become trivia information.

Mick

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:20 AM

And yet...and yet...Tunesmith may well be partially right.
If the majority like it, it is popular, sure, but the chances are that is is not "at the edge", it "pushes no envelope", it breaks no barriers; ergo, it is middle-of-the-road. Not always perhaps, but very often. Examples:

Remember the popularity of songs like "Tie a yellow ribbon", "I never promised you a rose garden" - MoR. Hey, Britain is the country that elevated Mr Blobby to TotP, not to mention several other "novelty" songs; al MoR.

Even punk, or rock-and-roll were at their groundbreaking best BEFORE they became popular/fashionable, and before you could buy pre-torn jeans at the shops. You could argue that those tha followed in the genre were MoR for the category.

But not always; there is no 1-to-1 relationship here, and that's where the theory falls flat; but sure, it does work sometimes.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:23 AM

hmmm....


..and heres me and the mrs enjoying a sunny afternoon


listening to "T.Rex Greatest Hits"


before i started reading all this.....




oh well.. s'pose i oughta dig out my Stan Kenton "City Of Glass" CD

just to keep up pretences................

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:31 AM

I suppose people like Shirley Bassey, Tom Jones, Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley who are and have been loved by the majority of the poeple for a long time are mediocre.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:36 AM

It's the theory behind army food--it doesn't matter if it's good, as long as it doesn't tend to offend too many.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:37 AM

Artistic merit and mass appeal are not mutually exclusive, nor are they joined at the hip. Anyone could fill this computer screen with the names of artists who've had both popular and critical success. And then that same person could fill another screen with the names of deserving, critically acclaimed, artists who have never achieved popular success. And then he could fill yet another screen with the names of "artists" whose popular success has been way out of line with their artistic abilities.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: skipy
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:37 AM

Let me put it another way:-
If I don't like it, then it's crap!
Skipy (blinkered)

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 09:44 AM

Thats one of the problems Skipy. The use of crap is used too often by people who don't like somebody. However that person or group may be brilliant but becuase somebody didn't like them, they tell everybody else around them and they don't bother to go.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Amos
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 10:03 AM

De gustibus non disputandum. The statistical bell curve cannot be applied to aesthetics because there is no objective standard for it to know where things should go on the curve!!


A

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Trevor Thomas
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 10:10 AM

If McDonalds sells the most 'meals' in the world, does that mean that theirs is the best food?

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Scoville
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 10:14 AM

Maybe.

Most of what is on the radio today strikes me as crap, but then most people I know grew up knowing nothing else. If they were exposed to better or more interesting music, maybe it would be more popular.

It strikes me that popular music is less the favorite of society than it is an average of the tastes of society. It's sort of whatever the largest percentage of us can tolerate rather than what we necessarily most enjoy. So, I listen to the classic country station in the car. It's not my favorite and it's not what I listen to all the time, but I don't mind it. Somebody somewhere is probably assuming that I just love Hank, Jr. and Dolly Parton. I don't. They're at the outer edges of my pop-country fusion tolerance, but I still listen to that radio station because sometimes they play Hank, Sr., Johnny Cash, Ernest Tubb, or something else that I really do like. Someone else is listening to it for the Bocephus and only putting up with "Walking the Floor Over You" in the hopes that the next song will be "Bob Wills is Still the King". Ta-da: We average out to the same apparent tastes.

I know a lot of people who will listen to Sheryl Crow or whatever (I don't even know who's cool these days) on popular radio but then go home and have music collections consisting almost entirely of independent and obscure artists, old blues, roots country, etc. Excellent but commercially uncool music.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Grab
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 10:43 AM

If the majority like it, it is popular, sure, but the chances are that is is not "at the edge", it "pushes no envelope", it breaks no barriers; ergo, it is middle-of-the-road.

The problem with "underground" is that by definition it's hardly known. Debbie Harry once said in an interview that most of the rap artists she knew (and that's *black* rap artists) told her they were introduced to rap through Blondie's "Rapture". It wasn't cutting-edge by the standards of rap performance (which had been around in underground clubs for ages), but since practically no-one had ever heard rap, it was new and exciting.

Similarly I'd be prepared to place large sums of money that most folkies were introduced to folk through Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Joan Baez, Tom Paxton or similar. None of them ever saw an envelope worth pushing musically, did they? Possibly Dylan, but then he was just using existing stream-of-consciousness poetry ideas (and later some fairly standard electric guitar playing). But I doubt many of us would call their musical output mediocre.

And if we're talking classical, it's difficult to beat the popularity of Bach and Beethoven, both of whom are arguably the best ever at the types of music they produced.

I find it a bit of a cynical view, really. Sure, there's plenty of pop that gets sold on image and marketing. But there is also music which is popular because it's good. From a personal level, think of what happens when you play at a club. Do you think you've done well if you just get polite applause, so your playing/singing hasn't really touched anyone - or do you think you've done well if you've really connected with the audience, such that they're singing along to the chorus, or so after a ballad there's a short pause as they get their heads back straight before the applause starts? Or if you don't play, what do you think when you see other people playing? I don't think that connection makes it mediocre - I think it makes it wonderful.

Graham.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: MoorleyMan
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 10:46 AM

Some observations:
I think George P has got it exactly right - the adage (like all good adages) can be (and is) right sometimes. The qualifying phrase "having said that..." or simply "but..." is always going to be there.

And well put too, Villan, your comment on the use of that dangerous word "crap" is so true. I've come across folk performers who don't get listened to or taken seriously (or get booked) simply because that "majority" have, sheep-like, simply taken the word of someone who personally doesn't happen to like those performers' brand of music or their style. Within the bounds of which they may be brilliant of course. And I know another guy who seriously thinks that all blues is crap just cos (a) he don't like it and (b) its simple and predictable! We could all push that argument if we wanted, we all have our pet hates and intolerancies but that don't mean its crap.

The word mediocre is perhaps less of a value judgement issue I find. Yes, some popular songs are mediocre if judged by purely artistic criteria. That's the nature of the beast.
But - I can think of folk clubs where as a general observation the more mediocre a performance is, the more loud (and apparently uncritical) the applause they get. I think the concept of "we like it" (at that moment in time) or "it makes an impression" (ditto) may often be more relevant than its true merit. Rather like a pub audience going wild at a bog-standard pop song churned out by the bozo at the bar but giving a cool reception to a quality folksong performed well but not to their taste. And there we have it.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 11:35 AM

Of course, what a person perceives as "mediocre" will change over time. That's why so many older music listeners find a lot of contemporary pop music very ordinary. They feel that they have " heard it all before", and, to a great degree, they have! This feeling also extends to folk music. I remember being thrilled and excited at the songs of Dylan, Paxton, Ochs etc in the 60s , but now I'm not thrilled or excited by Paxton's or Dylan's - or anybodies - current output. This is one of the "problems" of growing older. It's harder to find material that really excites the senses.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Peace
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 11:48 AM

"If the majority like it - it's mediocre!"

That would explain George Bush, Tony Blair and Stephen Harper.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Amos
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 11:55 AM

The tautology is flawed. Mediocre means of average or middling quality. Popular means of high acceptance. They are independent variables -- you can feel most of the people some of the time, but some of the time you can't. "Goodness" is this context is a semantically nul term, not being defined to any observable criterion.
This is just semiotic mishmash at play.


A

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 11:56 AM

"It's all a matter of taste."

Problem is that a lot of people don't have any taste of their own. They are only motivated by fashion and, hence, have 'someone else's taste'!

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Herga Kitty
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 12:07 PM

I think I'm with Les Barker's Church of the Holy Undecided!

Kitty

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Rasener
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 12:14 PM

>>This is one of the "problems" of growing older. It's harder to find material that really excites the senses. <<

I don't seem to have that problem, becuase my likes in music are very wide. I listen to Radio1 and enjoy a lot of the music that is put on.

I think it is more a question of learning to accept and go out and explore new music.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 12:21 PM

What is ordinary or average is related to what the listener hears. I, for example, hear music on a different level than say a 5 year old. Time can also render a piece of music "ordinary". Now, Mozart is probably the most revered of all classical composer but I recall reading about the composer Prokofiev ridiculing Mozart for his narrow harmonic pallet ( i.e use/choice of chords and their progression). But that is like blaiming a great athlete from years ago for not running as fast as a modern athlete.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 12:24 PM

Villan: That's the whole point! Most "new music" isn't new to my ears! Melodically, harmonically, lyrically etc, I have heard it all before.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Tootler
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:11 PM

Time is often a good test of the worth of a song. If it still sounds good 20 years later, then there is a good chance it has some merit.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Peace
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:25 PM

"I think I'm with Les Barker's Church of the Holy Undecided!"

Got yer mind made up about that?

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: SouthernCelt
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:30 PM

Just as beauty is in the eye of the beholder, music is in the ear of the listener. That's why there'll never be agreement by everyone on anything as varied as music. Besides, the definition of "mediocre" is "of only ordinary or moderate quality; neither good nor bad; barely adequate" which implies the application of some standard of quality that is not subjective. Obviously any person's opinion about music is almost totally subjective based on whatever standards the person chooses to apply. This debate will always be a debate, never a concluded argument.

SC

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: dwditty
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:35 PM

Bill Murray summed it up for me in the movie, "What About Bob?"

"There are two kinds of people in the world. Those that love Neil Diamond and those that hate him."

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: PoppaGator
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 01:55 PM

Large-scale popularity doesn't guarantee either high or low quality, but long-lived popularity probably means something in terms of quality.

Mediocre flash-in-the-pan stuff, even pieces that achieve huge faddish prominence for a brief period, rearely stand the test of time, but the best examples of any given genre will usually retain their appeal for generations.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 03:58 PM

I once heard a story about Glenn Miller and his Orchestra.

Apparently if they got hold of a new tune and the band loved it, Glenn would toss it, because he argued that if the band loved it, the public wouldn't.

Dumbing down, anyone?

Seamus

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 05:42 PM

Whether you like it or not, says something about your likes and dislikes. It says nothing about the quality of the music.

Music is what it is. Its quality is neither enhanced nor debased by our opinions of it, nor affected by popularity.

Much classical music, Jazz, and opera is a minority interest, and none the worse for it.

On the subject of mediocrity one can only ask "According to whose standards, and based on what criteria?"

Don T.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 05:50 PM

Let's hear it for critical relativism! If one takes the stand that good and bad are solely a matter of individual taste, then it makes no sense to have any criticism whatsoever. I prefer dealing with critics who use words like good or bad, and identify themselves--at least over some period of time I can find out if I tend to agree with them and then, hopefully, use their comments to better choose what I'm going to spent time and money listening to.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 05:51 PM

It sort of makes sense, Seamus. Glenn was primarily an entertainer, and his responsibility towards the audiences took precedence. I can imagine that the band might like the more intricate, "esoteric" tunes with complex chord or key changes, which might well not be the average audience's cup of tea. Glenn knew his market, and catered for it.

At the other extreme you have the introverted singer/songwriters who "sing their diary" as someone said; the more esoteric the song, the better they like it, and somehow assume that their audience will too. Or they just don't care.

The middle is the hardest: to create original and ground-breaking material that will still attract the ausience; to know your target audience (may not include everybody) and "carry them" with you in your musical endeavours. Now, that takes quite a bit of skill of the people-understanding variety, over and above the talent the artist will obviously also need.

When Bethoven, the Beatles, Tom Lehrer, Stan Rogers, the Queen or Stevie Wonder wrote music, they each broke new ground in every case; but they carried the audiences with them. I envy them that ability.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Stringsinger
Date: 05 Apr 07 - 06:49 PM

I think a lot of this stems from the attitude of the contemporary music business which sees music as a commodity, rather than an art form. This is also true of the movie business. In spite of these types of business apparatchiks, somehow, good quality seems to surface upon occasion.

Art has become a commodity in the US. Live music is just TV flesh to be turned on and off or background for talking. I realize this is a generalization but there does remain the American Idol attitude that somehow appealing to the largest and maybe lowest common denominator defines what is important. In spite of this, good quality art forms and performers manage to surface in pop music, jazz, folk or classical.

The mediocrity is probably in the minds of the business people who should not be in the music or entertainment business at all but see it as a way to make a "killing". Unfortunately, many times, their tastes prevail. They sell it to the media and that's all we get to hear or see.

This is probably where the majority/mediocrity idea comes from. Fortunately, it's not always true.

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 12:13 AM

Yes, there is truth in YOUR statement

Once Mudcat was an out of the way place to exchange SERIOUS (real/factual) American Folk/Blues discussion. Compared to six years ago and today....there is a greater majority of contributors... but a fetid wash of the gleanings... is leaving mediorcrety at best, to be skimmed from the trailings.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 01:28 AM

"Compared to six years ago and today....there is a greater majority of contributors... but a fetid wash of the gleanings... is leaving mediorcrety at best, to be skimmed from the trailings. ".

I won't argue with that, GUEST. But confirming the validity of the "folkies/lightbulb" joke as you do here, is hardly raising the level. :-)

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,pitheris
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 09:38 AM

Most popular music is
-not complex
-has repetitive notes and/or lyric
-has some "familiarity" eg: evolutionary not revolutionary

It doesn't mean that it is mediocre

I remember Bing Crosby saying that he thought that his popularity was due to the fact that his singing style and voice were plain enough so that the average person could sing his songs.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Bill D
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 10:01 AM

All broad generalizations are suspect.

;>)

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 12:30 PM

I suspect that the originator of this thread has already made up his/her mind about which side of the fence he/she is on:

"If the majority like it - it's mediocre"

If you agree with this proposition you're OK and 'think' like a 'normal' person.

If you disagree you're a 'fascist','folk policeman' etc., etc.

Note to self: stop responding to silly, dishonest threads like this.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: Tunesmith
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 01:15 PM

I was being genuine here! I was very interested to hear Mudcaters thoughts on the subject. Upon reading through the various postings it becomes clear that this is a complex question. Or is it? Is it simply down to personal opinion. In which case, can one never say, for example, that A is better than B. But that is a different question!

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: AWG
Date: 06 Apr 07 - 01:20 PM

Does this mean that Celtic Woman is mediocre ?? Define 'mediocre' please.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 07 Apr 07 - 12:34 PM

AWG-
Celtic Woman is certainly popular. Almost up there with Britney Spears and Metallica.

Subject: RE: If the majority like it - it's mediocre!
From: AWG
Date: 07 Apr 07 - 12:38 PM

Ha Ha, I get the humour Dick. By the way, who is Metallica ??LOL