[Huck]

This is more of a 'beef' than anything else. Whatever genre you want to call it,rock ,metal, progressive rock...whatever....where are the cymbals??!!...I hear the drivin' guitars,bass guitar,snare,double bass pedals at 250 bpm,no cymbal crashes,no ride cymbal,no hi-hat.... nothin'?!..being a drummer in my younger days,I look(listen) for anything related to cymbals in a particular song,even though the drummer has 20 different sized cymbals( Mike Mangini),(Mike Portnoy),etc,etc....I don't hear'em,or (occasionally),even though there are mic's on every drum,overhead,all over,etc...Drummer has two arms,so,one is doin' the beat on the snare,other one is doing either another drum(s) or cymbal(s),so,lets hear 'em!! I think the hearing of cymbals give some 'life' to an otherwise boring tune.
Beef over! Huck

[WGH]

I would add cowbells to the list

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVsQLlk-T0s

[toocool4]

Autotune, I would rather go deaf than listen to this overly used robotic sounding cr4P.

[whydontumarryit]

I wondered the same thing. Since it happens so consistently it must be a matter of dynamics. A cymbal having a fundamental frequency of between 600 and 900hz with harmonics up to 16khz would bury every other instrument in the background if recorded with any sense of realism.
I guess engineers haven't figured out what to do about it because nothing can be done, mics get overloaded and inputs get clipped.
It's a good thing the sound of a cymbal isn't exactly what you call musical and the lack of it is easy to ignore except for that sense of liveliness it would bring to the reproduction.

It certainly isn't our speakers at fault?

[newzooreview]

I hear cymbals clearly and naturally in all kinds of jazz recordings. It doesn't seem to be a limitation of recording technology, unless it's just an with there being a lot of loud stuff competing with the cymbals in the mix. In jazz the cymbals might be one of four or five distinct sounds in an overall quieter recording.

Break on Through on The Doors first album has clearly recorded cymbals, but it's a studio recording.

[richidoo]

Modern pop doesnt use cymbals. They use various synth candy to balance treble.
Cymbals can't be programmed with subliminal messages.
And file compression ruins cymbal sound anyway.
Kids love mp3 compression artifacts so cymbals had to go.
Even CDs have the edgy compression distortion same as the compressed radio and spotify version,
cuz consistency matters. LOL

[newzooreview]

I assume that on average modern pop doesn't use cymbals as much as earlier pop, but Taylor Swift's recently released Lavender Haze has plenty of cymbals and Daft Punk uses cymbals throughout Random Access Memories, including a steady backing beat on The Game of Love. All the drum and cymbal work on Random Access Memories is real people playing real instruments, if I recall correctly.

[FullRangeMan]

Main thing that bugs you about today's music
To me its the existence of certain ''musical'' styles as rap, crap, hip hop, reggaeton among others, the bad music started to appear in the 1950/60 with the youth of rock.

About cymbals they don't bother me, maybe yous are confusing cymbals with the hit-hat, that yes according a famous studio producer the hi hat interferes with the guitar sound in the mastering (not in the band live).

Years later I asked to a studio engineer about this and he said that in the mastering the hit hat blur/stain the guitar sound, especially the base guitar, requiring raising the guitar level.

[dB Cooper]

That most of it is "plastic", in the jargon of my generation. You can't tell me that (let's say) Bruno Mars or (let's say) Taylor Swift are musical giants.There was caca music in my time too to be sure, but it(arguably) didn't dominate the space in quite the same way.

[Jeff_From_Michigan]

Two things that bug me about much of today's popular music are 1) a lot of younger people are listening to it at a much lower sound quality (Mp3's vs. LP's), and 2) the fact that it is all about the hit song.

I consider myself lucky that when I was coming up, we would wait for our favorite bands' album releases, go to the store and buy them and get home and play both sides as soon as we possibly could.  Then we would record them to cassette so we could play them in the car.  Then we would enjoy the tour supporting that album, then eagerly await next year's album.

Album-oriented rock stations are also a thing of the past. When was the last time you heard a 9 to 12 minute song, let alone a whole album, played on a popular music station?

Instant gratification seems to be what it is about these days.  If you don't like a song, one click makes it disappear.  People's concentration and attention span seem to be deteriorating with music just as they are with the 24 hour news cycle. 

[JakeJ]

If you can't hear the cymbals then you might have your hearing checked.  Personally I don't have any issues with today's pop because I don't listen to any of it.

[Digi-G]

A lot of modern pop music just doesn't have cymbals.  Or drums.  Or electric guitar.  Etc.  I'm thinking of people like Billy Eilish, Khalid, Finneas, etc.  I don't know, or listen to, any Taylor Swift so I can't comment on her music. 

If the above music does have drums, or electric guitar, it sure isn't as a rock instrument.  Most of that music is keyboard / synth heavy.  A lot of pop music has rhythm and sometimes that IS in the form of drums but not so much cymbals, hi-hats, etc.  Mostly bass drums with hand-clapping, foot stomping and synth stuff. 

My pet peeve about todays music - why does so much of it have to sound like an ANTHEM???

Most of us, I think, think of drums and guitars as they sounded in the 1960s and 1970s.  I think todays music purposely avoids that sound.  Unless you're the Foo Fighters or other bands that strive for that "retro" sound.  Sad but true.

[Wayner]

The trouble with the world today is that things get put into a single box. The very title of this thread is a damnation of all music made during the present time. Its complete bull $hit.

There are many great new bands out there (maybe you never heard of them), like Fleet Foxes, Lord Huron, My Morning Jacket, Beck, The Killers, The War on Drugs and on and on. They are not like the bands that have been mentioned. They are better in many ways than bands of the old days, very musical, very creative and care lots about sound quality. That is why many new bands are releasing vinyl.

Wayner

[js1955]

Agree 100% with Wayner....esp the bands he mentioned, as they are among my current faves.  For more of the same tune into Radio Paradise = free, non-commercial internet streaming.  A nice mix of old and new.   I really like the Mellow Mix, but Main and Rock Mix are also great.  VG sound quality as well.

To get a feel, click thru the various playlists here:

https://radioparadise.com/player/list

[timind]

Agree with Wayner and js1955. Four of the last five albums I listened to were released in 2022. The other was Randy Newman's Sail Away, released 50 years ago.

The main thing that bugs me about new music is the old farts who denigrate it without ever giving it a chance. And I'm an old fart.

[Digi-G]

The trouble with the world today is that things get put into a single box. The very title of this thread is a damnation of all music made during the present time. Its complete bull $hit.

There are many great new bands out there (maybe you never heard of them), like Fleet Foxes, Lord Huron, My Morning Jacket, Beck, The Killers, The War on Drugs and on and on. They are not like the bands that have been mentioned. They are better in many ways than bands of the old days, very musical, very creative and care lots about sound quality. That is why many new bands are releasing vinyl.

Wayner

I actually thought that MOST of the responses in this thread were pretty tempered, well thought out and didn't just rag on todays music.  Your reply seemed to be one of the more negative ones.  I actually like and listen to all the artists that I mentioned and wasn't saying anything negative about them.

I am able to find and enjoy new music.  I thought the discussion was more about drums and cymbals, specifically.  Maybe you should reread the first post.

[VinceT]

The main thing that bugs me about most of the modern stuff in most genres, is overall the level of musicianship has been diminishing. There are examples that do not fit into this, but generally speaking especially with the more popular genres. Innovation is also lacking, more technology isn't the answer; in fact I would say the ease of production has caused some of this IMHO. I am not saying I don't like some of it, just saying that would be the thing that "bugs me".

[Jeff_From_Michigan]

Agree with Wayner and js1955. Four of the last five albums I listened to were released in 2022. The other was Randy Newman's Sail Away, released 50 years ago.

The main thing that bugs me about new music is the old farts who denigrate it without ever giving it a chance. And I'm an old fart.

That's funny. I believe that most people (of any age) who denigrate a lot of today's popular music do so precisely because they have heard it. 

[rollo]

  For me Country is the new music. Love Jazz and Classical with new artists and styles. Pop music has nothing for me. Rap, just go away.
  Luckily we own lots of classics of all genre to enjoy

charles

[Jeff_From_Michigan]

The trouble with the world today is that things get put into a single box. The very title of this thread is a damnation of all music made during the present time. Its complete bull $hit.

There are many great new bands out there (maybe you never heard of them), like Fleet Foxes, Lord Huron, My Morning Jacket, Beck, The Killers, The War on Drugs and on and on. They are not like the bands that have been mentioned. They are better in many ways than bands of the old days, very musical, very creative and care lots about sound quality. That is why many new bands are releasing vinyl.

Wayner

When you proclaim that the new bands are "better in many ways than bands of the old days", I wonder how they're better. What new bands and what bands of the old days? Once identified, in what ways are the new bands better?

I'll mention five popular bands from my "old days" - The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, Allman Brothers and the Jimi Hendrix Experience.

Personal preferences aside, these five very popular bands (and so many others from that general time period) have certainly stood the test of time.  How much of today's popular new music will be played by teenagers 40, 50 (or more) years from now? I guess time will tell.

Back to the OP, I agree with newzooreview - a lot of the current jazz coming out features percussion, and cymbals in particular.  In fact, it was the ability to reproduce the sound of cymbals that I listened for when choosing equipment that was voiced the way I like it.