Music that endures?

May 17, 2009 9:21 AM

What contemporary songwriters/composers will be culturally relevant and accessible 40-50 years from now.

I posed this question to my inter generational coffee group this AM. As I was jogging earlier this morning I tried to think of popular new song writers/composers iintroduced during the last 10-15 years whose work will be as culturally relevant and enduring in 40-50 years as some of those 40 +/- years ago ( Beatles, Dylan, Bernstein, Stones, etc). Since I am 60+ I have biases and a painfully inadequate knowledge of contemporary music. However even two of my early "30 something" friends (who rigorously follow indie and contemporary music) were struggling. Please name 4-6 individuals/groups who compose, and if possible perform, music you think will stand the test of time.

posted by rmhsinc to media & arts (32 comments total)

Culturally relevant really depends on your culture - for example, I think that the Arctic Monkeys and The Streets will be highly culturally relevant in the UK in 50 years, but maybe not in the US. And probably not somewhere with it's own very strong musical culture distinct from what you might consider the western model - e.g. India.

Oh, and Radiohead.
posted by djgh at 9:37 AM on May 17

What djgh said about relevancy, plus I'm not sure where to set the bar for accessibility. Nevertheless:

Kanye West.
posted by box at 10:02 AM on May 17

Look at some of the artists you mentioned - The Beatles, Rolling Stones, etc-- a measure of popularity such that the person or band becomes something of a cultural icon. They sold tons of albums, and even initially weren't that deep. I'd posit that the music of people like Madonna and Britney Spears won't be forgotten.
posted by cmgonzalez at 10:15 AM on May 17 [1 favorite has favorites]

I agree that "culturally relevant" is loaded. The music you list may still be around today because of a unique set of circumstances - a sprawling generational cohort combined with a tightly controlled music distribution system. I'm not sure we'll ever see those factors again, and without them, the notion that a particular group or individual's music is "relevant" to an entire culture doesn't arise. Also you believe the music is culturally relevant, likely, because it's your culture, and your younger friends may agree because they've been saturated with baby boomer culture since the day they were born. Without venturing too far into stereotypes, I'd bet you could find quite a few groups of people in the U.S. for whom the Rolling Stones hold no relevance whatsoever.

I also think it's hard to guess in such a short window - artists who started 10 years ago are likely just hitting their stride now. If you go back 20-25 years, you find groups like R.E.M. and U2 that are still making music today and whose early work more or less endures.
posted by donnagirl at 10:23 AM on May 17

There's a lot of factors that make this difficult, the biggest being the fracturing of popular culture. There are too many outlets pumping out too much information for anyone to ever dominate popular culture the way artists could in the past. After all, it's popularity, not talent, that defines cultural relevance. And as Donnagirl points out, you can only know these things in retrospect. If fifteen years ago I had pick which artist I liked would be the biggest cultural force in 2009, I certainly wouldn't have picked Snoop Dog.
posted by Bookhouse at 10:26 AM on May 17 [1 favorite has favorites]

Clarification--The question is culture bound--I should have specified European/North American/Primary English speaking which would include rap, jazz, soul, CW, pop, folk, R&B, some classical, etc. There was a consensus regarding Radiohead.
posted by rmhsinc at 10:34 AM on May 17

Bob Dylan
posted by Elmore at 10:37 AM on May 17

Sorry, I know you mentioned him, but he is contemporary, just not new.
posted by Elmore at 10:38 AM on May 17

Nirvana comes ot mind. They pretty much changed pop culture in the early 90's when their albun Nevermind came out. Before that, glam /metal was the end all be all of the late 80's. Their music and cultural relevence of grunge is still applied to music today.
posted by sharkhunt at 10:49 AM on May 17

Thanks for the clarification, but I don't know that you're describing a singular "culture" with those words. Bookhouse used the phrase "fracturing of popular culture" - that nails it. Radiohead is "relevant culture" to a pretty crazily specific group - mostly white, mostly educated, mostly privileged, "city" but not "urban", that's my guess. And it's just a guess. They don't get a ton of top 40 radio airplay in the way the Beatles or the Rolling Stones would have. Freshman students that I teach at a big midwestern university don't mention them often when we talk about music they like.
posted by donnagirl at 10:50 AM on May 17 [1 favorite has favorites]

I agree about Radiohead; they'll almost definitely go down as the greatest band of this era.

From the late 80s, early 90s: The Pixies, Sonic Youth, My Bloody Valentine.

Contemporary? Harder to say, but: The Arcade Fire, The White Stripes, and Wilco?
posted by martens at 11:05 AM on May 17

I would say Bright Eyes/Conor Oberst, absolutely.

Right now he's a bit caught up in being labeled "emo" and a bunch of cultural baggage that makes people hate him without even having heard his music. But his words will stand the test of time, when Radiohead is relegated to a footnote of "oh they kind of sounded like Pink Floyd but you might as well go ahead and just listen to Pink Floyd."

from the 90s, Pulp and Belle and Sebastian are pretty timeless, while grunge has aged horribly, for me at least.
posted by drjimmy11 at 11:29 AM on May 17

Introduced in the last 10-15 years?

I think artists such as The Smashing Pumpkins, Aphex Twin, Oasis, Blur, Suede, Primal Scream and Leftfield will still be remembered in 40 years time but they are pushing it towards and beyond 20 years which makes it much easier to identify lasting influence.

More contemporary artists might include Radiohead, Mogwai, Shpongle, Sigur Rós, Placebo and Muse. Of those, I'd wager at least half would meet your criteria in about 40 years.
posted by turkeyphant at 11:29 AM on May 17

I'd say Pixies are in. Chili Peppers. Maybe Sublime. I think it's a bit too early to tell for contemporary groups.
posted by devilsbrigade at 11:30 AM on May 17

That said, the Beatles and the Stones et al were special. the Beatles especially. I strongly believe people will be listening to the the Beatles in 200 years. The same goes for Brian Wilson, Jimi Hendrix and some others.

There is not "another Beatles" now in the same way there is not another Mozart very often. That is the weird thing about the emergence of rock music in the 60s- it was a kind of music that was looked down upon, dismissed as disposable by high culture- everyone assumed the Beatles would be done in 5 years, and everyone would move on to something else- it was just music for teenagers after all.

But they ended up creating something truly timeless. And that doesn't happen very often.
posted by drjimmy11 at 11:32 AM on May 17

Seconding Kanye West and The White Stripes. I think Biggie and Tupac -- their music and the story surrounding their deaths -- will be around for long time.

I strongly (but respectfully) disagree about Bright Eyes.
posted by thebergfather at 11:36 AM on May 17

At work I can see most people's itunes libraries over the network. We are a pretty diverse group and have widely diverging musical tastes but there are a few contemporary bands that most everyone has: White Stripes, Jack Johnson (weirdly enough), Ben Harper.

Slightly older music that everyone has is stuff like OutKast, Sublime, Beastie Boys, Chili Peppers, Phish and a lot of early-mid 90s hip and rap (which I personally think was a lot more interesting than the contemporary stuff) as well as metal. I think I'm the only person on the network without at least one Metallica album.

Now that i write it down it sounds like a blog entry from Stuff White People Like, which is funny given that we are not exactly the target demographic for that blog or anything.
posted by fshgrl at 12:51 PM on May 17

As far as I'm concerned, Mary J Blige already is a classic.
posted by mandymanwasregistered at 1:18 PM on May 17

Going back to culturally relevant (sorry, I know it's not exactly an answer per se)...

Three things:

1. I've (and I suspect most people have) read this as: what bands will be seen as especially good for certain reasons (criteria: innovation; popularity; uniqueness; longevity etc.) in forty years - in essence who will stand the test of time.
   
   Which in a way goes both to the general culture of the asker (e.g. "Western" - North America, Western Europe) but also his current tastes. For example, I believe jazz aficionados could tell me that so-and-so re-defined jazz and is great, but my exposure to jazz is quite limited, so whilst I'm told Miles Davis is all that, and I like Kind of Blue, I couldn't necessarily tell from the off that it's this amazing record. I enjoy listening to it, but I've really got no reference points. So without context, it's essentially: is this good music? And that is immensely subjective, and the only reason everyone reckons the Beatles are great is because we share a broadly similar cultural background.


2. The criteria of what you want is quite amorphous, which probably goes really to the fact we don't have the benefit of hindsight, and we can't really predict who will be seen as groundbreaking/legendary etc.
   
   For example, Jack Johnson will probably always be liked as decent background summer music. Fine. I for one would not include him in this list, based on my understanding of what the question means (not hugely innovative or special, even though he's sold tons of albums). But, in five years time, some new genre might start up with massive debts of influence owed to Jack Johnson. Maybe he did a weird chord change on a song that made someone think "oh, I can do this with X" and it becomes huge. Or alternatively, he reinvents himself as something incredible and unique in five years, leaving the samey soft guitar strumming as his early years - not very many songs on the anthology in ten, but referenced by fans in the know.


3. It will be harder to know what is relevant as our base reference of culture is shifted and fractured. The increased exchange of ideas and culture will make today largely unrecognisable in forty years - what music now will represent is the ideas, dreams etc. of our generation, only some of which will still be relevant then, but will all still give future persons an idea of what our culture represented.

By the latter, (in my opinion more interesting), definition, "The new Mozart", if she exists, is probably working with stylistic elements of hiphop, and her main instrument is more likely a DAW rather than a piano.
This comment also made a lot of sense to me.

Also, the factors surrounding the success of each artist we recognise as legendary/relevant are probably unique to each one, but I'd imagine with some broad similarities (e.g. a period of innovation somehow, or easier spread of information, or something broad maybe not even directly related to the music they produced) - like the Beatles really benefitted from being one of the first boybands, or TV, or commercial air travel, or something, and the Beach Boys maybe benefitted from some recording instrument allowing them to do their harmonies easily (none of these are concrete examples, someone has probably worked this stuff out and has a list, but whatever).

So in short, it's a really difficult question to answer thoroughly and properly (mainly because it's predicated on informed guesswork, but at the mercy of a ton of factors we can barely begin to process).

And sorry for hating on Jack Johnson - I've got all his albums, but he's no $legendary_artist. And sorry for the length and general circularity/rambling nature of it - I'm sure someone's done an excellent concise project on this somewhere.
posted by djgh at 2:20 PM on May 17

I wonder. Though I have heard of most of these, I checked with my significant other and a couple of not particularly clued in friends and they hadn't heard of any of them (Kanye West, White Stripes, etc.) at all. And while I had heard of them, I couldn't name a single Kanye West, White Stripes, etc song. But I guarantee that my mother and my grandmother, way back when, though they did not like them at all, had not only heard of the Beatles and Stones, they could also name a couple of their songs. This is not to deride these modern artists but, as Bookhouse so succinctly put it, cultural fracturation means that we all listen to a wide range of sources. When I was growing up in England, your choices were limited to a few radio stations, even when the pirates came in, and two TV channels, so you all more or less listened to the same things. It was almost impossible for my mother and grandmother to avoid the Beatles and the Stones but I can totally avoid Kanye West and the White Stripes as can my friends. For this reason, I think most of these will not be "culturally relevant" in fifty years time, whatever that means. Except for Radiohead, Madonna and, perhaps, Nirvana (an early death is always a good career maker).
posted by TheRaven at 2:26 PM on May 17

I appreciate the effort and thought that all of you put into this--I realize, in retrospect, the question was not well constructed and difficult to answer. In the future I will take more time composing questions after morning shots of caffeine and table talk with friends. I may pose a similar but more thoughtfully composed question in the ( distant) future, and one with well defined parameters. Thanks Again
posted by rmhsinc at 3:43 PM on May 17

This is a bit hard to answer, as it is all a guess. Time is the test. So we won't really know the value of a songwriter/composer until they have made it through that test. 10-15 years is just baby steps, and popular/of value right now, may not have much bearing down the line.
posted by Vaike at 3:52 PM on May 17

I went straight to Wilco. I'll concur with Radiohead, though I'm not a fan. I'd guess Neutral Milk Hotel, though I suppose they have just as much chance of being Love, Big Star, or The Moby Grape (i.e. bands w/ one or two great albums that seemingly nobody has actually listened to) as the Beatles or the Stones.
The Hold Steady have a chance, as do The Arcade Fire, The Shins, Modest Mouse, Wolf Parade, M. I. A., Spoon, and a few others.
posted by willpie at 4:26 PM on May 17

Also, Stephin Merritt's songwriting will echo in future musical generations.
posted by willpie at 4:30 PM on May 17

After all the interesting and thoughtful back and forth about what this question is about, I'm going to come back one last time with a straight up guess to the original question's answer.

Justin Timberlake. He gets ridiculous amounts of airplay, and I know more than one person with sophisticated musical taste that will own up to more than a little JT love. I'll check back in 2049 to find out if I'm right.
posted by donnagirl at 4:40 PM on May 17

I dunno, in terms of artists, yeah, Kanye for sure and JT.

But, pop music is more and more a producer's game. (Kanye, of course, did get his start producing, which is partly why his sound is so distinctive.) I think Timbaland is pretty undeniable in terms of importance.

Also, the New Yorker had a recent piece about Tricky and The-Dream, the songwriting team behind "Umbrella" and "Single Ladies."
posted by SoftRain at 5:28 PM on May 17

I don't think the construction of the question was bad, but it is difficult. There are subgenres of subgenres now and people so dedicated to their sounds that bands that broke up 20-25 years ago have been reunited recently due to popular outcry (like Gang of Four and Mission of Burma). If you're going by the traditional definition of the singer-songwriter, over the last 10- 15 years, I'd say that there are very few: Ani Difranco, Elliott Smith (RIP), Jeff Buckley (RIP), Ben Gibbard, Samuel Beam, and Will Oldham would be some, and they tend toward folk-influenced compositions. It seems more common to have a band that has one or two people who drive the musical style and another who writes lyrics, those paths do not necessarily intersect as they collaborate. Hip-hop and electronic music lends itself more to a modern-style auteur role because one person can literally do it all, although many would say that if you aren't plucking or blowing an instrument, you aren't a musician.


My personal criteria for popularity in 50 years within the bounds of this question would be: artists consistently releasing new albums and performing over the last 10-15 years (time period in question), garnering critical acclaim as well as strong sales numbers, not to mention my opinion about the potential staying power of their songs. I'd say there are quite a few contenders, many already mentioned above.

In rock: Radiohead, REM*, U2*, Red Hot Chili Peppers*, Metallica*, Beck, Nine Inch Nails, Coldplay, Green Day, Weezer, Smashing Pumpkins

In Hip-Hop/R&B: Tupac & Biggie, Beastie Boys*, Jay-Z, Eminem, Alicia Keys, The Roots, A Tribe Called Quest, The Fugees/Lauryn Hill, Outkast, John Legend, Cee-Lo Green

Electonic/Dance: Portishead, Bjork, Massive Attack, DJ Shadow, Madlib, Daft Punk, Gorillaz, Air


A few bands I think deserve it, but may not have the enduring broad appeal required: The Pixies*, Muse, Modest Mouse, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds*, Soul Coughing, Primus, Jane's Addiction, Social Distortion, They Might Be Giants, Cursive, Elbow


*Denotes bands that are already halfway to the 50-year standard in terms of length of career.
posted by ashabanapal at 6:22 PM on May 17

I would like to think that the concern about music "enduring" hasn't endured very well and will endure even less, but that's probably just a pipe dream. Music isn't, you know, better just because it speaks to two different (or several different) time periods, rather than speaking to one. But people get weirdly hung up that if music doesn't bring pleasure in 2049 then it wasn't doing its job back in 2009, or something.
posted by Casuistry at 7:26 PM on May 17

For their particular tiny niche of electronic music, Autechre.
posted by juv3nal at 10:55 PM on May 17

The Beatles (Hard Day's Night: 1964)

The Rolling Stones. (Time is on my side: 1964)

Bob Dylan. (The Times They Are a Changing: 1963)

What do all 3 acts have in common? (I know you threw Bernstein in there just to monkeywrench with my plans.)

They were around at the dawn of the electric guitar revolution. Popular music can be categorized into "before the electric guitar" and "after the electric guitar." It really was that revolutionary. (They don't call Leo Fender's guitar "the sound heard 'round the world" for nuthin' ya know.)

Sure Chuck Berry sang Maybellene in 1955 and Johnny B Goode in 1958, but he was a sort of precursor, a pioneer with one foot in the old and one foot in the new. The acts you mention are the ones firmly within the new genre of music created by the electric guitar (and the guitar amp).

The reason that these are among the oldest acts that are still relevant today is that they're the oldest possible acts that made music using instruments & techniques we recognize / are relevant today. Before them music was simply made in a different way and sounds quaint to us.

Admittedly, Bob Dylan didn't "go electric" for a while but he surely absorbed what he heard from the electric world and applied it to his music, also the music amplification techniques (not really used before the electric guitar/used in a different way) would have influenced his sound too.

Radiohead and Bjork (even if they are pushing the boundary of 10-15 years) seem to me like they'll stand the test of time because they have stood the test of time. Even 80's music sounds quaint to us, and that as just 20+ years ago. Nirvana will forever be associated with grunge, but Bjork seems to defy categorization in a way that the other acts listed don't, as well as being on the forefront of musical technology. Not so far out front it's jarring, and not so far behind the times that she's an also-ran, but just in that pocket of timeless.

So my vote is Bjork.
posted by MesoFilter at 2:10 AM on May 18 [1 favorite has favorites]

Sigur Ros.
posted by sien at 4:58 AM on May 18

rmhsinc, I in no way meant to say that the question was bad, and the broad parameters do let people read more into the question, which should give you an eclectic, broad range - which if anything might improve the chances of the artists listed fulfilling your criteria in future!

(Plus everyone loves talking about music, yo).
posted by djgh at 8:04 AM on May 18