By Kyle Quiambao
It starts off with a confused look on my face. I shift back between stations on my car radio just to make sure that I did in fact change the station. This has happened countless times before. I change the radio station as it begins to play a song I am not particularly fond of, only to be greeted by the very same song.
This is what is wrong with music on the radio and in the mainstream media. There is simply just not enough variety. Year after year, the music industry is dominated by the same few artists who put out the same type of songs. Monotony is blasted through the airwaves as each song sounds like the one before it.
Of course, that’s not to say that all mainstream music is terrible. They are topping charts and constantly being played for a reason. However, it does make evident the trend of commercialization in mainstream media (a trend that the Grammy’s attempt to deny by giving awards to one independent artist a year, such as Arcade Fire or Bon Iver). Take, for example, the band Maroon 5. The jazzy, reggae sound of their 2002 release Songs About Jane has seemingly been dispensed in favor of the electronic sound of “Moves Like Jagger.” It appears that guitar melodies have been overshadowed by repetitive “beats” and “synth riffs.”
Lyrics and content also seem to have a pattern in mainstream music. Songs have been riddled with things such as sexual innuendo, partying, and how amazing it is to be young. Songs have become so repetitive in sound, themes, and even specific words. How many songs in the past year have used the word “racks”? How many have used the word “swag?”
Despite this obvious repetition, the masses are still gravitating towards this music, listening to it, supporting it, and cementing its place on several stations of the radio. It is an endless cycle. They give it to us. We take it. We want it. And they give us more.
Opinion: The trouble with mainstream music
