This article has been bugging me for seven years.

See this pretty picture?

That's the JJ Puig room at Ocean Way... or it was. He pulled out about four years ago.

Buddy of mine? Yeah, he put it in.

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For the record: this was an article about the Loudness Wars written in 2008, before Spotify, before anyone gave a shit about Youtube, before iTunes bought Beats, before Google Music, back when people still listened to the radio. And it had some points. Yes, production had gotten batshit. But back then, people still thought there was a hope in hell that the giant studios would somehow take things over again, thus the slavish "love the gear, want the gear, be the gear" rant . The author, by the way, sells overpriced, ringy shit at tradeshows that mostly appeal to kids that were four when the ADAT came out.

(I owned two)

The thing of it is, popular music has ALWAYS sounded the same. It's been so formulaic that those whacky kids from the KLF wrote a book about it.

#1 hits made by bands that explicitly admit they were literally following the book:

So quit blaming the technology. People write forgettable hits because people listen to forgettable hits and it doesn't matter if they're doing it on a wire recorder or a hit-shit Pro Tools system. Garbage In, Garbage Out and it isn't the fault of the shit that plugs into the wall if the people who plug into the stream have no goddamn taste.

And I can't quite explain why it all sounds the same... with no meaning...

And I don't understand why we throw up our hands without thinking

Cell phone in my pocket do you like it's the latest on the market

Heyyy how's it goin are you feelin' the love are you in the moment

Gotta keep movin' mustn't relax am I doin' this right?

Hair slicked with body and shine I don't eat much but I feel just fine