90% of every genre is rubbish

i think what i mean, is perhaps, instruments actually come before songs or tracks, here. certain sounds, slide guitar, ukeleles, honkytonk pianos, accordians (in their various contexts, always sound good to me, it sort of doesnt really matter what is done with them. a basic template is in place, and lots of records sound very similar, i think this is very good

More like 97%.

..and of the remaining 3%, at least two thirds are borderline.

I seem to be an eternal glass-half-full person when it comes to this stuff; I have a tendency to side with terry, at least with genres I pay attention to. At least I think I do; I'd say its a good 40% quality/60% chaff rate. But of course these things are so entirely based on the perspective of the person. Rates fluctuate. Etc

Depends what you consider as output--music sold in stores, music posted on the internet, music recorded but never distributed, and music made but never recorded.

85% of all statistics are made up.

Yeah I mean before music gets to me it has been filtered, I think statistically it would be impossible for most rap music (or any genre) to be better than 99.9% garbage, and there has to be something of a bell curve because much of what I like in music is reacting to the 'average song,' whether my idea of an ave. song is experienced or projected.

gareth it may still be rubbish (however that's defined) even if you are enjoying the experience.

its all good, and it all merges into one, a greater whole

this is interesting because i'm not sure i've ever felt this way about music/genres. i would champion genres but only because i believed in a ratio of quality being relatively high within them.

related question: how many songs from one genre/template/idea would you listen to in a row before getting bored? and would that be boredom just be a consequence of length of time spent doing one thing or have something to do with the repetition of the act? does this in turn have any effect on your views of a genre as a whole or the ratio of good within it?

instruments actually come before songs or tracks, here. certain sounds, slide guitar, ukeleles, honkytonk pianos, accordians (in their various contexts, always sound good to me, it sort of doesnt really matter what is done with them. a basic template is in place, and lots of records sound very similar, i think this is very good

hmmmmm, what about TB-303 sounds? or 909 drum sounds? are they too devoid of 'character' to feel the same way (assuming you do not like every track ever that used a 303 or 909)?

i don't think the use of an instrument on it's own is enough to make me like an entire song. i would just separate it and say 'yes i think accordians are great' but at the same time i would say...actually i can't think of a song featuring accordian that i don't like but you get the idea.

what are genres without the ideal context(s)? how much does the listener lose by not listening to the music in it's ideal contexts? how important is this?

considering music is not a visual medium i say it's not so important. but then music is a hugely evocative medium visually - your mind compensating for the lack of accompanying visuals by conjuring and attaching it's own based on external influences (music video has of course affected this in the last 30 years).

yes, 303s also. a 303 is hardly devoid of character!

no, of course i dont like every 303 track ever made, even if we decided that 303 was a genre, but, i think ive liked every track with a 303 that ive heard played out this year (of course theres a sort of minimalist acid sound at the moment which i like a lot). perhaps,m related, a hawtinesque dj set, i would probably like every track played, as there wouldnt be a whole lot of difference between them.

i think what i mean is, i hear these sounds, and my initial response is yes i like this, before anything has happened, before anything is done with the sound,

by contexts i mean, i might listen to lots of hawaiian music, and it might all be quite similar, and it doesnt have to differentiate from the template, as i'm immersed into it, i want it to carry on all being quite similar, so a new song comes on, it might not be very memorable, but i like it, its continuing the theme, filling things out. but, if beck, or superpitcher, or dj shadow, or whoever, bring a track with the hawaiian slide on it, its unlikely i would immediately continue liking what was going on, i would have been jarred. i like the sounds in the places i associate them perhaps, i dont necessarily like them in new contexts (though, of course, i may love them there too, but it is less likely)

Sturgeon's Law, no?

i think everyone does that no? seems instinctive, to immediately pick up on the most distinctive or seemingly important sounds in the song, including applications of the human voice.

the point about Techno is also interesting because it suggests a lack of discernment, similar to the impression I get from hardcore fans of hip-hop (home of the 'it's all good' mentality?) or reggae, which seems so much more intrinsic to the culture in the land of it's origin.

with these dance genres being so led by repetetive beats some people tend to question how they can sustain and maintain popularity when the rhythms are so fixed and rooted. but fans quickly accept this it seems, and see beyond it.

but is this attitude anti-critical? genres are really defined by critics, and discernment is part and parcel of that no?

100% of GRIME is rubbish!!

You really think most big hip-hop heads think all rap music is good?! From the beginning rap has been full of dividing lines and hater-ism.

The idea that reggae or rap fans don't discern between good and bad is incorrect I think.

Part of it is that unless yr at a certain level filtering thru all the reggae/rap you're only recieving certain consensus tracks anyway. For every dancehall track that comes through to the states/europe and you hear folks saying "Man, ALL these songs are good" there are 6,000x as many that never made it out of Ja. (Some of which may be good enough to deserve otherwise, most of which prob. didnt)

(and of course I don't know any dancehall fans who think that all the consensus dancehall tracks are all good either)

but the similarity i wanted to illustrate was how fans of hip-hop, dancehall, techno and other genres will do as Gareth does in going to a place to hear just that genre all night, so as to become immersed in it, to the point where criticism becomes irrelevent. and this is interesting because one wonders how much one should attempt to criticise in such a situation. it's hard to shift from critic to fan sometimes perhaps. most of my criticism is done from an external position of some comfort (in other words, i don't really go to clubs that just play one genre). how useful then is my criticism to people who DO do that? not very, i suppose. but it may still be useful for other people like me who are interested in examples of the genre but not necess. the genre or scene as a whole.

conversely how useful is the enthusing of someone who immerses themselves in that one genre to someone like me? my criticism and their enthusiasm would perhaps cancel each other out. if we were listening to 20 techno tracks, i might only like 3 or 4 but they might like over two thirds because they're more familiar with the supposed ideal context (hearing them loud in a club or party environment surrounded by other people all dancing, and on drugs). so their judgement is no more useful to me than mine is to them unless one of us was aiming to become more like the other in terms of how they want to hear this music.

in such a case, do you like any 3 or 4, and then thats enough, or, do you like the 'best' 3 or 4?

I like at least 90% of everything.

that means 81% of you is rubbish

I disagree on this; I think that genres have internal waxes and wanes. I listen to a lot of local music, which means almost no filtering, and I hear a lot less shitty rap than I hear shitty rock or shitty techno. Then you get into sub-genres, and I can say that while about 50% of the rock 'n' roll I hear is crap (as opposed to about 80% of the rock in general), nearly all of the goth stuff is absolute shit. And I can't think of a single jam or reggae band that I've heard in the last ten years (meaning contemporary reggae) that hasn't been ass.

your numbers are only right if you're 100% objective all the time though.

Of course I am. I'm a member of the rock critics establishment, and we're required to be 100% objective when we get our ID cards.

i've yet to see one of these supposed "ID cards"

and if i'm crunching my numbers right, this would mean you're about 43% rubbish.

hey, it's better than 81 over here.

90% of everything is rubbish, but the remaining 10% is normally pretty large, so there's enough fun stuff around.

WHAT INSTRUMENTS DO RAP MUSICIANS USE???