At the risk of sounding like an old crock, worse. I am not saying there are not some nice ones, and I am not out of touch. I am a vocalist, and will sing anything that is good and has a great melody or message. It's getting harder to find these. I have 2 daughters, 19 and 23, and they play the latest stuff. The younger one listens to dance stuff, which is as interesting as most disco tracks were when I was her age...not. You can't sing it. (AT least with the dance tracks of the 70s there were a lot of singable ones) The elder one has a wide love of music, but prefers the 80s to the present. The songs are just not singable these days. They are not meant to be. They are meant to be churned out, used up and forgotten. I feel sorry for the younger kids. What are they going to remember of the music they liked, when they are 20 years older? We used to copy down the words off the radio and learn them straight away, perform them as soon as we could. We had enormous repertoires of songs. My 19yo can sing all sorts of stuff from the 70s and 80s, too, but she doesn't sing her own era's stuff. Because, in the main, you can't sing it. I'm not saying there aren't some nice songs, but, as I said, they are getting fewer and fewer. Excellence in songwriting is not being encouraged by the big companies. I DO love the singer songwriters that have turned up recently, like John Mayer, Jack Johnson etc. You can sing that stuff. It's got meaning.

Much worse. This is why so many clubs still play 80's music. Rap is unlistenable to me. Some hip-hop is tolerable (Nappy Roots is the only group that I can actually say that I like from this genre.) There are a few good newer groups. Rasputina, White Stripes, Dropkick Murphys.

beeter than 30 , not than 20

As a lover of ALL different types of music, (except Rap and R&B LoL) I would say it's neither better nor worse, but different!

Well, being older, I think the music was better 30 yeas ago.

It's just different. All music is good. There are some types I don't like, but that doesn't mean it isn't good - Just not for me.

I like all music if it fits my eclectic taste. Mostly ranging from the 70's to the 90's but I like alot of new stuff too.

Good music is good, whether it's from today or 30 years ago.

Better. You just have to look for it. Now as far as whats on the radio I would say that before it was better because everything is so bland today. But there are so many options from where to get good music today. I really think there is better music, but it's just hidden.

I no longer know who is who. I can't speak for other genres but in R & B is terrible. There hasn't been one singer who has established himself/herself as a dominating force and last long in that particular genre. All I hear is a lot of for-no-reason screaming and yelling and winning about nothing. I really miss the days of Chaka Khan, Anita Baker, Patti LaBelle, Sam Cook, Marvin Gaye, Teddy P. Jeffry Osborn, Peabo Brison, Whitney Houston, Aretha, Luther Vandross, Rigina Bell, Boys II Man, Al Green, The Wispers, Roberta Flack, James Imgrams and the list goes on and on. That's when people used to sing-- I mean really sing.

worse

about the sanne

I grew up on what is now called classic rock. Today its a mixed bag. I think the popular standards of acoustic excellence have dropped significantly in these times.

I can't/won't describe anything produced today as music. 11.22.2018

Music was better when ugly people were allowed to make it!

As a part-time musician, I think I have a lot to say about this: 1. How do you rate the value of music? In terms of how much people pay for music today in comparison to pretty much any time in the past, today's music has a much lower value, overall. Concert tickets may seem expensive, and for some acts, they truly are, but on average, with so many concerts being free of charge, concert prices are lower now than ever (corrected for inflation). Downloading songs for $0.99 or albums for $7-8 is cheaper than the price of even bargain bin CD's and tapes from 20-30 years ago. Music holds less monetary value now than 20-30 years ago. 2. How do critics rate music? Today, music critics rave about trendy music just as much as ever. 3. Will today's music stand the test of time? I guess we will have to wait and see. 4. What about complexity? Well, truly complex music is much more complex than the most complex music from decades ago. But no one listens to that stuff, really. 90% of the people out there are listening to the top 10% most simple music being made. Whether it was the Beatles "She loves you yeah yeah yeah" or Fergie "I got dat milf money," the biggest hits are usually nauseatingly repetitive and represent simple and relate-able concepts. None of the Beatles had a (non-honorary) doctorate in music theory or anything like that. I've heard rumors that Ke$ha has a 170 IQ, which is a story perpetuated by fake news sites based off of her own claim that she "aced her SATs," which was interpreted by entertainment news sites that in order to get a perfect score on an SAT exam, a person would need to have genius-level IQ. If you ask me, the logic there is stretched paper-thin...but, whatever, my rambling point is that popular music has never been about innovative music as much as it has been about "popularity." That's why a lot of popular hits from all decades have been ripped off from other artists. If a pimply fat guy with a neck-beard recorded "MILF $," no one is going to pay him a penny. If some young pretty girl records a very bland song about the order of the days of the week, the music industry will douse it with the appropriate amount of auto-tune and spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on advertising to get you to like it. Neither is better music than the other, but people consume music based on the overall entertainment value... So, is music better or worse than it was X years ago? Neither.