SCIENCE Proves That, Yes, Today’s Pop Music Is Worse Than The Pop Music Of Old

The number one song in the country today is “Call Me Maybe,” followed by “Payphone” by Maroon 5 and Wiz Khalifa. Forty-five years ago, it was the Doors’ “Light My Fire.” I’m not usually one to use the “MUSIC HAS GOTTEN WORSE” card, but seriously, the f*ck happened? Why is today’s music so much LOUDER?

Well, SCIENCE has an answer.

Scientists at the Spanish National Research Council — led by Joan Serrà, whose team studied 464,411 songs released between 1955 and 2010 — published an article in Scientific Reports that officially concludes what you already knew: pop music today is more blaring and obnoxious than it used to be.

Many of [music’s] patterns and metrics have been consistently stable for [this] period…However, we prove important changes or trends related to the restriction of pitch transitions, the homogenisation of the timbral palette, and the growing loudness levels.” (Via)

In other words, outside of the loudness factor, today’s songs are more bland and less creative than they used to be. Most troubling of all, “We obtained numerical indicators that the diversity of transitions between note combinations – roughly speaking chords plus melodies – has consistently diminished in the last 50 years.”

So when you say that Justin Bieber is awful, you can now prove it…with SCIENCE. And just in case you don’t like words, here’s unofficial audio evidence of the report:

(Banner via)

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