I feel sad for Generation X that they missed out on the best period for music circa 1964-1975

[DrLove]

One of the things I recall from my college freshman year living in a dorm was the music that filled the hallways from the rooms. Most often heard were songs from an album that had been out a couple of years, Tea for the Tillerman by Cat Stevens.

YouTube is great for allowing all of us to experience music from any era within the last 100 years. Occasionally I enjoy pulling up tunes from the 1920s and 30s.
Miff Mole & His Little Molers:

Rod Stewart's Maggie May was definitely blasting out of our dorm rooms about the time I was a college senior. But yea, Cat Stevens is part of the soundtrack of my life. See Harold and Maude if you haven't had the chance.

 

[toobfreak]

The difference is that our generation of music were done by real musicians who could sing, who could perform without having to lip sync their way throughout the show, played instruments, wrote their own songs, didn't have to rely on looking pretty and their music never had formula.

Of the countless concerts I've seen, I've never seen one with a light show or stage show. Originally there was no light show at all. You had stage lights, maybe a few colored lights they could dim. You had nothing but yourself up there and your music. You either played well and had good sound and talent or you were sunk.

Most of today's performers are not even about the music! They are beautiful people, models, sex symbols selling sex, and they put millions into an elaborate stage show, light effects, lasers, things moving, and choreography. The visual is at least on par with the music if not actually more so. One of the keys to telling good music is to CLOSE YOUR EYES. Good music is often listened too with closed eyes anyway-- -- -- -- if you like the music without watching the show or looking at the artist, then it is probably pretty good music.

Most musicians now if you took away their light show, effects and stage performance, their music by itself would suck and not stand on its own.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Sampled drums + pitch "corrected" vocals = pretty much everything since 2000 blows

The Melodyne version has no soul, perfect for America today

 

[DrLove]

There are newer groups I like on Alt radio.
Big Data
Glass Animals
Arctic Monkeys
Foals
Cage the Elephant
Chili Peppers
Foo Fighters
The Killers...
To name a few

I saw The Killers with my daughter maybe ten years ago. Brandon Flowers a great front man. Remains one of our favorite concerts.

 

[MisterBeale]

Rod Stewart's Maggie May was definitely blasting out of our dorm rooms about the time I was a college senior. But yea, Cat Stevens is part of the soundtrack of my life. See Harold and Maude if you haven't had the chance.

Just about my favorite black comedy. I think I have seen it a half dozen times.

 

[MisterBeale]

Of the countless concerts I've seen, I've never seen one with a light show or stage show. Originally there was no light show at all. You had stage lights, maybe a few colored lights they could dim. You had nothing but yourself up there and your music. You either played well and had good sound and talent or you were sunk.

Most of today's performers are not even about the music! They are beautiful people, models, sex symbols selling sex, and they put millions into an elaborate stage show, light effects, lasers, things moving, and choreography. The visual is at least on par with the music if not actually more so. One of the keys to telling good music is to CLOSE YOUR EYES. Good music is often listened too with closed eyes anyway-- -- -- -- if you like the music without watching the show or looking at the artist, then it is probably pretty good music.

Most musicians now if you took away their light show, effects and stage performance, their music by itself would suck and not stand on its own.

I was once at a folk music show, and as the band was singing about the moon, the actual full moon was rising above the stage. It was amazing. I have no idea to this day if that was planned.

 

[toobfreak]

I was once at a folk music show, and as the band was singing about the moon, the actual full moon was rising above the stage. It was amazing. I have no idea to this day if that was planned.

Anything outdoors is generally better. I used to love drive ins where as you were watching the movie, the moon was rising and you could see the moon and stars moving across he sky as the movie progressed.

 

[MisterBeale]

Anything outdoors is generally better. I used to love drive ins where as you were watching the movie, the moon was rising and you could see the moon and stars moving across he sky as the movie progressed.

I don't believe I have ever been to an indoor concert. . . but then, I haven't been to many concerts. All of them have been outdoor. . . Even the 25th Anniversary of Woodstock.

I love festivals. . .

I just could never put my mind around paying to be couped up in a building with a rock band and those amps. . .

 

[DrLove]

I don't believe I have ever been to an indoor concert. . . but then, I haven't been to many concerts. All of them have been outdoor. . . Even the 25th Anniversary of Woodstock.

I love festivals. . .

I just could never put my mind around paying to be couped up in a building with a rock band and those amps. . .

Good point - I saw Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull and The Who indoors and my ears were still ringing the next morning. Prolly not good but despite my Dad's dire warnings, my hearing didn't suffer ... don't think.

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

Disco is back baby...I present the Dee Gees, aka Foo Fighters.

but the foo fighters are an old band to the 20 year olds

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

Completely disagree. Some of her stuff is f'n brilliant.

she mubbles morbid lyrics, that is not singing or talent

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

More than the musical forms themselves died between then and now. So has the ability to enjoy it. Growing up in the 60s and 70s, I used to stop in a Radio Shack every day on my way home from school. Nearly half the store was filled with stereo equipment! Now you can't even find a Radio Shack. Or an Olsons. Or a Lafeyette. Not to mention real audio salons. Go try to find a stereo section in a department store now! They look at you like you are nuts.

Growing up in the 1960s, every home had one of these in their living-room or game-room:

View attachment 534988


In the 1970s, every self respecting music lover had something like this in their house, probably in a dedicated room. From THIS:

View attachment 534990


To THIS:

View attachment 534991


Now kids are told music is bad for you and they have THIS to listen to music with instead, if they listen to music at all:


View attachment 534992

I had a Pioneer tape deck just like that one in the picture

 

[toobfreak]

I had a Pioneer tape deck just like that one in the picture

My tape deck which I still have is a Sony ES 850. In 1990, it sold for $900 which today would be a $1,900 cassette deck!

and it still looks and works like new. I put it up against the Denon and Nakamichi and it beat both on both mechanicals as well as sound quality. It works like a little recording studio. If I use a metal tape and Dolby C, I can record a copy of a CD and the playback is indistinguishable from the sound and dynamics of the CD except for a very faint hiss heard during quiet passages if you turn the volume up real loud.

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

My tape deck which I still have is a Sony ES 850. In 1990, it sold for $900 which today would be a $1,900 cassette deck!

View attachment 535030

and it still looks and works like new. I put it up against the Denon and Nakamichi and it beat both on both mechanicals as well as sound quality. It works like a little recording studio. If I use a metal tape and Dolby C, I can record a copy of a CD and the playback is indistinguishable from the sound and dynamics of the CD except for a very faint hiss heard during quiet passages if you turn the volume up real loud.

That Pioneer deck had all kinds of adjustments to make the tape perfect as possible.
It was from about 1981, before CDs.
When the first CD players came out in about 1982 or 3 it made cassettes obsolete.
I have a large collection of records, cassettes and CDs in storage somewhere.
But they have been replaced with about 50,000+ MP3 files.
The great thing about MP3 is that they don't wear out, they don't take up any physical space, it is easy to find a song, you can send a song with email and it is fast/easy to make play lists.
MP3s have a lot of advantages.

 

[toobfreak]

That Pioneer deck had all kinds of adjustments to make the tape perfect as possible.
It was from about 1981, before CDs.

Believe me, great advances were made after that with things like HX Pro which expanded the dynamic headroom by automatically adjusting the tape bias, and Dolby C and S, among other things.

When the first CD players came out in about 1982 or 3 it made cassettes obsolete.

Cassettes could be made to sound as good and with a cassette, you can record, erase, and record again. Plus, being analog, you haven't any of the digital DAC conversion problems.

But I was a little confused. My deck was the TCK850ES, here is a better picture of it:

It sold for $600 new, which is like $1200 now, at a time when most people thought $150 was a good investment in a cassette recorder! The 850 was actually slightly more expensive than my CD player at the time, another Sony ES: The Sony X33ES. But the 850 tape deck was the #2 in line. The one model above it was the 950ES, which had the transport mounted mid-chassis in a frame and beam construction and sold for $850 back then, but was so much, and really offered so little more over the 850 that I never considered buying one.

But with an amorphous head, 15-21,000 Hz freq. response and +76dB of SNR, these were undoubedly some of the best tape decks ever made.

The great thing about MP3 is that they don't wear out, they don't take up any physical space, it is easy to find a song, you can send a song with email and it is fast/easy to make play lists.
MP3s have a lot of advantages.

I still have albums from the 1960s that play so clean and quiet, that you can't tell the needle is on the record until the music starts playing. Everything you say about the mp3s is true, but it's main advantage is convenience. The true ultimate art of home playback audio is to approach the level of being indistinguishable from the original live performance.

I can come convincingly close to recreating the sound of having the Led Zeppelin band right in my house playing right in front of me at true concert levels (+135 dB). A few neighbors and police have even confirmed that fact. I just can't do that quite to the same level and degree of quality, listenability and realism at all with any compressed digital file. Uncompressed 22-24 bit digital you can, but who has that other than a professional mastering studio?

 

[TroglocratsRdumb]

Believe me, great advances were made after that with things like HX Pro which expanded the dynamic headroom by automatically adjusting the tape bias, and Dolby C and S, among other things.


Cassettes could be made to sound as good and with a cassette, you can record, erase, and record again. Plus, being analog, you haven't any of the digital DAC conversion problems.

But I was a little confused. My deck was the TCK850ES, here is a better picture of it:

View attachment 535046

It sold for $600 new, which is like $1200 now, at a time when most people thought $150 was a good investment in a cassette recorder! The 850 was actually slightly more expensive than my CD player at the time, another Sony ES: The Sony X33ES. But the 850 tape deck was the #2 in line. The one model above it was the 950ES, which had the transport mounted mid-chassis in a frame and beam construction and sold for $850 back then, but was so much, and really offered so little more over the 850 that I never considered buying one.

View attachment 535048

But with an amorphous head, 15-21,000 Hz freq. response and +76dB of SNR, these were undoubedly some of the best tape decks ever made.




I still have albums from the 1960s that play so clean and quiet, that you can't tell the needle is on the record until the music starts playing. Everything you say about the mp3s is true, but it's main advantage is convenience. The true ultimate art of home playback audio is to approach the level of being indistinguishable from the original live performance.

I can come convincingly close to recreating the sound of having the Led Zeppelin band right in my house playing right in front of me at true concert levels (+135 dB). A few neighbors and police have even confirmed that fact. I just can't do that quite to the same level and degree of quality, listenability and realism at all with any compressed digital file. Uncompressed 22-24 bit digital you can, but who has that other than a professional mastering studio?

I found a Pioneer CT-F900 on ebay.
They want $449.95 for it.
I don't think that is paid that much for it new.

Vintage Pioneer CT-F900 Cassette Tape Deck - Near Mint Condition | eBay

When needed, gear will be double boxed for added safety. Fully functional high end pioneer tape deck in excellent condition.

www.ebay.com

 

[toobfreak]

I found a Pioneer CT-F900 on ebay.
They want $449.95 for it.
I don't think that is paid that much for it new.

Wow. I'm not familiar with the model, but the thing was a beast! It originally sold for $575 in 1980. I'm surprised they are asking that much considering it was a solenoid actuated deck using florescent display with only Dolby B and did not use or was an early user of metal tapes, but I hope they get that much for it. That had to be one of Pioneer's elite cassette efforts, and it had a lot of nice features like adjusting the metering response, had manual biasing though no good way I can see for optimizing it and even had a mic input!

 

[my2¢]

Rod Stewart's Maggie May was definitely blasting out of our dorm rooms about the time I was a college senior. But yea, Cat Stevens is part of the soundtrack of my life. See Harold and Maude if you haven't had the chance.

I first saw Harold and Maude at a midnight movie showing while at college. Classic.

 

[DrLove]

I first saw Harold and Maude at a midnight movie showing while at college. Classic.

I once went to a midnight double feature not long after college: Harold & Maude & The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Epic!!

 

[evenflow1969]

Music wasn’t just great in the 60s and 70s. It was great in the 80s and 90s as well.

It began to die at the turn of the century and has been dead for at least 10 years.

It’s the millennials and especially gen z that I feel bad for.

I was born in 1990 and never got to experience a great band in its prime perform.

Concerts are a joke nowadays

If I chose a year to be born, it would be 1950.

I thought the 80s pretty much sucked compared to 60s 70s. The 80s were awesome for funny movies.