1980s vs. 1990s - Which decade had the better music?

[Larzon]

All music sucked until Bad Religion released Suffer in 1988, the most important album ever made.

 

[mozfonky]

hard to say for me because although my biggest music heroes were at their commercial peaks (MJ, Prince, Bruce) there was so much crap but every decade has plenty of crap. However, there was also plenty of top rate one hit wonders and acts like Culture Club and Wham had a series of awesome, incredible songs which, given their silly images, it hurt just how great some of their songs were. There was also an upstart who got off to a superb start, Terence Trent D'arby, maybe a greater singer than anyone in those two decades and a formidable, artist who just did not have the commercial appeal in the 90's. There were acts like Spandau Ballet and Dixie's Midnight Runners who had some absolute killer, stone classic singles that they couldn't follow up on. Then, Duran Duran and U2 can't be forgotten for a second.

However, as great as some of that music was, I never personally liked the sythnth and drum machines that dominated the era, they definitely take away from the music a bit although you can't ruin a great song with just bad production.

The 90's? I never was a heavy radio listener, not in the 80's and I was pretty out of touch in the 90's. Of course I knew about Nirvana and the grunge movement and hip hop but I hated that stuff. It was of course all a natural backlash against the excess and plasticity of the 80's.

 

[mozfonky]

I voted 80s for this poll but I think the 70s was the greatest.

from a production and sound quality perspective, I have to agree. For whatever reason, synths dominated the 80's but they were not better than real instruments played by the best musicians in the world.

I hear todays music and realize technology is way past what it was but it's also lost a lot, doesn't sound human or warm, which is the common complaint about digital music. It's hard to explain but it just doesn't sound quite as real to me even though I recognize in some ways it's better.

 

[mozfonky]

I enjoy a melange of both decades, 80's had a great run of of bubblegum pop, the rise of hip hop and some solid RnB offerings plus Michael Jackson and Prince
90's had the emergence of West Coast gangsta rap and Bay Area Mobb Music, an amazing run of RnB acts and a nice selection of radio hip hop hits plus Prince

major Prince, lunatic fan here, many of his fans write him off post 87. I don't, I still think he was improving as a musician/producer/singer for up to the 90's and beyond. If he lost anything, and I would not say he did, he might have just lost that edge of wierdness he had in the 80's but the music was still great to me. Of course, I was never a hip hop fan, from him or anyone else and that is the main thing many of his fans shit on but I was always able to ignore what I didn't like and just listen to the song underneath which often was still great. Some fans let the rapping ruin the entire experience for them. All the 80's musicians had to make concessions to hip hop, even springsteen was using his corny version of a hip hop beat on "Streets Of Philadelphia". That's a tough position for an aging superstar to be in because copying their usurpers looks fake but not trying to adapt and staying the same can be just as bad.

 

[mozfonky]

If you compare top charting hits like in these YouTube compilation videos, the 80's is gonna wipe the floor with the 90's.

If you look at albums, and the broader work of the most acclaimed artists, not necessarily the top charting singles, the 90's trounces the 80's.

there were certainly acts from the 80's that were all the sudden put out of business, the Poisons, Gun's and Roses' all the big hair acts were put out overnight seemingly. The odd thing to me is that although the image and loook was different, the same decadence was there and the lifestyle wasn't that much different than grunge. Grungers seemed to want to pretend they were new and different and didn't owe anything to the music that came before them, but they were full of shit. How much different or loud or raggedy is what they played than the stuff that came before them?

 

[Mujeriego]

Love Bon Jovi

 

[Nathan LaMontagne]

I personally think 80s.

Granted my favourite Band is mid 90s (Placebo) but overall 80s.

 

[Larzon]

I personally think 80s.

Granted my favourite Band is mid 90s (Placebo) but overall 80s.

One of my missus' favourite bands. They put on a good live show

 

[Nathan LaMontagne]

One of my missus' favourite bands. They put on a good live show

You found yourself a keeper.

I saw them back in the tail end of their glory days 03-06.

Fucking amazing.

 

[Darkavius]

Napster killed people's perception of audio fidelity. Sure you paid more for a pressed cd, but at least it wasn't some compressed shit sounding mp3 music.

Yeah, the audio files when Napster, Kazaa and other apps started were rough but again the music industry was at huge fault for that happening. I remember one CD I had where it was scratched so bad because I played it so much and 2 years later shopping around most stores wanted close to the same price as it had when the album just released.

Also, rap/hip-started including skits in their albums which was ridiculous. I know Bad Boy, Aftermath and Ruff Ryders all had skits in their records. At a time Eminem was notorious for doing it. Anyone who remembers The Marshall Mathers LP by Eminem had a full skit on the album doing some "questionable" stuff.

When it comes to hip hop, there's absolutely no contest. You can't be serious in thinking 80s rap is anywhere close to 90s.

With R&B it's closer, but I still give 90s the edge. Whitney is amazing but she's both an 80s and 90s act and her 90s material is arguably better. Anita Baker is good, but nothing compared to what Janet Jackson and Mariah Carey produced in the 90s. R. Kelly, Teddy Riley/Blackstreet, and Babyface were massive in the 90s. And when you add groups like Boyz II Men, Jodeci, and Dru Hill, it's over.

I am serious in thinking 80's rap was better but it was not by a wide margin. You had some horrible stuff in the 80's and the 90's had Wu-Tang, Outkast, Biggie, Pac, DMX, Busta Rhymes, Missy and others but by the late 90's hip hop/rap had a lot of lyrical garbage i.e. No Limit Records. 80's does not get love but they had 3rd Bass, Beastie Boys, Biz Markie, Gang Starr, LL Cool J, Slick Rick, De La Soul, EPMD and A Tribe Called Quest among others.

When it comes to R&B we can agree to disagree but what makes 80's R&B better imo is the New Jack Swing era. That era produced some great tracks. Bobby Brown, Keith Sweat, Janet Jackson, Tony! Toni! Tone!, Johnny Gill, Heavy D and tons of others were apart of the New Jack Swing era.

 

[Limeade]

90s. I remember the first time I heard Massive Attack and Portoishead, Aphex Twin, Orbital, Future Sounds of London.

I still listen to my Gatecrasher Red CDs and yes I have a CD player in my car still.

Looking back, it's funny to see all those fads and trends. Grunge and alternative rock was everywhere. Not just the music but the fashion and attitude. But I think decades later we can say those were all a flash in the pan.

 

[Gutter Chris]

All music sucked until Bad Religion released Suffer in 1988, the most important album ever made.

This is almost true.....but it's operation ivy and their album that opened the door to the most wonderful era in music history.

But suffer is a great record.

 

[PBAC]

80s ... too many classic love songs in that period. It was the last of the rebellious era.

and Bon Jovi

 

[zapataxiv]

as a rap hip hop fan
90's all the way
still you don't gonna catch me shipping some tears for fears if it's on

 

[moreorless87]

there were certainly acts from the 80's that were all the sudden put out of business, the Poisons, Gun's and Roses' all the big hair acts were put out overnight seemingly. The odd thing to me is that although the image and loook was different, the same decadence was there and the lifestyle wasn't that much different than grunge. Grungers seemed to want to pretend they were new and different and didn't owe anything to the music that came before them, but they were full of shit. How much different or loud or raggedy is what they played than the stuff that came before them?

To be honest though I think Grunge and Britpop both had a vastly inflated sense of how good they actually were, this idea that "real music was coming back" when in reality a lot of it was pretty generic pop just with a different image/style to the 80's.

Both decades really I think quality music tended to be more outside of the mainstream compared to the 60's and 70's, occasionally you'd get something good break though but Grunge was not IMHO a case of this happening en mass, nore was Britpop.

I think the 90's had a worse long term effect on music though as so much of the alt music scene was bought out by big lables/media in that era and run into the ground to the extent it died out in the late 00's and needed to rebuild.

 

[mozfonky]

To be honest though I think Grunge and Britpop both had a vastly inflated sense of how good they actually were, this idea that "real music was coming back" when in reality a lot of it was pretty generic pop just with a different image/style to the 80's.

Both decades really I think quality music tended to be more outside of the mainstream compared to the 60's and 70's, occasionally you'd get something good break though but Grunge was not IMHO a case of this happening en mass, nore was Britpop.

I think the 90's had a worse long term effect on music though as so much of the alt music scene was bought out by big lables/media in that era and run into the ground to the extent it died out in the late 00's and needed to rebuild.

absolutely they did, I never thought much of that crap or the guys who made it. Not all of it was garbage, it never all is, but I never cared for it at all. I guess every era will have someone saying that "they ruined music" but I really think grunge and hip hop come the closest to taking the cake, the stuff that came after was pretty bad too and that goes on until the present day. Putting technology into everyone's hands hasn't seemed to help a bit even though it democratized it to an extent. Not everyone needs or should be heard and now there is way too much music out there, way too many wanna be stars, being a musician, it's really more pointless than ever.

 

[Darkavius]

Not everyone needs or should be heard and now there is way too much music out there, way too many wanna be stars, being a musician, it's really more pointless than ever.

You think so? I don't think there's too much music I just think that the music industry never knew how to deal without selling thousands or millions of records. Record companies and artists have been depending on that for over 50 years and the internet changed it in less than a decade. I could likely be wrong but if you want to be a recording artist now your live act needs to be solid, and record companies and artists really need to renegotiate their contracts with Spotify, YouTube, Apple, Pandora, etc.

 

[Mujeriego]

Yeah, the audio files when Napster, Kazaa and other apps started were rough but again the music industry was at huge fault for that happening. I remember one CD I had where it was scratched so bad because I played it so much and 2 years later shopping around most stores wanted close to the same price as it had when the album just released.

Also, rap/hip-started including skits in their albums which was ridiculous. I know Bad Boy, Aftermath and Ruff Ryders all had skits in their records. At a time Eminem was notorious for doing it. Anyone who remembers The Marshall Mathers LP by Eminem had a full skit on the album doing some "questionable" stuff.



I am serious in thinking 80's rap was better but it was not by a wide margin. You had some horrible stuff in the 80's and the 90's had Wu-Tang, Outkast, Biggie, Pac, DMX, Busta Rhymes, Missy and others but by the late 90's hip hop/rap had a lot of lyrical garbage i.e. No Limit Records. 80's does not get love but they had 3rd Bass, Beastie Boys, Biz Markie, Gang Starr, LL Cool J, Slick Rick, De La Soul, EPMD and A Tribe Called Quest among others.

When it comes to R&B we can agree to disagree but what makes 80's R&B better imo is the New Jack Swing era. That era produced some great tracks. Bobby Brown, Keith Sweat, Janet Jackson, Tony! Toni! Tone!, Johnny Gill, Heavy D and tons of others were apart of the New Jack Swing era.

90s rap is better. 80s is close tho.
R&B terms your talking New Jack Swing vs Neo Soul.
That one's a draw.

 

[mozfonky]

You think so? I don't think there's too much music I just think that the music industry never knew how to deal without selling thousands or millions of records. Record companies and artists have been depending on that for over 50 years and the internet changed it in less than a decade. I could likely be wrong but if you want to be a recording artist now your live act needs to be solid, and record companies and artists really need to renegotiate their contracts with Spotify, YouTube, Apple, Pandora, etc.

Well, not everyone has something worth listening to, that's just narcissism (which, is just a part of being a musician period). Even in the better times of the music industry, about 85 percent of all released music lost money and the artists were failures, that's with the help of major labels, experienced technical people and promotion. Now, with any kid being able to make music or anyone who manages to put the time into protools or the like, they can get there music out there on a world stage, where, there are billions of other songs. The problem is the quality stuff, the stuff I love about music, the way it makes me feel and imagine, that stuff is harder than ever to find and it's not efficient slogging through thousands of songs to find something that used to be offered right up to us.

The record companies are and were always horrible, the greed behind them was horrible, the music business has always been corrupt so I'm not mourning anything that hurts them.

As far as being a musician today, I don't think it's worth the effort realistically, so why do I do it? I just love music, I don't need to be out there pretending I'm a star to keep going, it's what I'm the happiest doing. But in terms of dealing with bandmates, club owners, etc.., etc.., I've never really been too into that. Being any kind of success would depend on so many stars lining up just right and when it doesn't happen you end up just broken. There a a ton of broken musicians out there, just talented as hell and useless. One of the guys I met, worldclass musician and formerly a guitarist for a world touring successful band, he got booted out for some reason and he's just shattered as a man. If I ever get the proper chance I'll tell him point blank, he's insulting his talent by being the way he is.

I know another guitarist who's probably the best I've heard, hard to say there are so many phenomenal guitarists, he's been through the bands falling apart for years, the touring. And while I'm not sure exactly what went wrong in every situation and who was at fault, I do know that it has to be exhausting to put all your time and energy into those things to have it fall apart because of egos, laziness, greed.

But really, there are just too goddamned many musicians out here, too many great musicians who play great, a surplus. Again, most of them probably aren't capable of putting out a worthwhile song or album but they sure can play, it means less and less the more of those kinds we get. In fact, I was joking with a lady working at the college I practice at that when I was young, "I thought I would be a star" she just laughed and told me everyone working in the music department thought that. Not everyone gets a chance, even with incredible talent and I've seen scores of talented folks.

 

[mozfonky]

90s rap is better. 80s is close tho.
R&B terms your talking New Jack Swing vs Neo Soul.
That one's a draw.

I personally prefer 80's rap, and some of that carried into the 90's until the dark imagery took over, because kids love to pretend to be hard and gangsta, always have. But, the innocence of early rap and the elementariness of it was very reminiscent to me of early rock. Early rock was mostly innocent and fun and life affirming, so was early rap. And even when we got songs like The Message, it came across as real and serious as a heart attack and not just some image to make kids think it was cool.