Hello Trans. I know about The Wrecking crew, but not the entirety of the records they backed. Have not yet watched the movie. Need to rectify that. More and more for me, it's the behind the scenes people...the studio musicians, engineers, producer/arranger(s) I admire - esp. the latter, as was Walter Becker's forte.
Why is modern pop music today so terrible?
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Ghosthouse, watch "The Wrecking Crew".http://www.wreckingcrewfilm.com/about.php They were actually the band we were listening to on all kinds of records. Cowsills, 5th Dimension, Beach Boys, Monkees, The Association, on and on. I am pretty thrilled that I get to walk into the spaces those folks used to work (East West Studios for example). The vibe is there for sure. And they were and still are great songs. Brad |
@bdp24 +1!!!!!! I do my best to follow "pop" and I keep finding my gems here... Pop does not get played as often as Bruckner or Tchaikovsky on my system but some of my fav "pop" artists challenge my middle-age shift into classical... How/where do you place Black Star (not in heavy rotation here but still...)?!!!!!! my personal Pop artists are David Sylvian, Steven Wilson, some ECM offerings (Bartsch, Molvaer, etc) but its just me, incurable introvert and Klaus Schulze collector. What surprised me is that no one caught that the original YouTube video is a nicely done (OK, Amazingly Done!) synopsis of a book "The Song Machine. Inside the hit factory". I downloaded it from Amazon a while back, still cannot finish it: I do not like horror stories!! But the video nails it!! And the boy is soo charismatic! ;-) |
I call almost all non-Classical music Pop, except perhaps Jazz. Pop because the music is song-centric, all else flowing from that fact. Jazz is as much about the musicians improvising as it is about the song itself, more than Rock, and even Blues. Country too is Pop, especially these days, contemporary Country that enjoys mass popularity and consumption barely recognizable as true Country. But there has always been, and continues to be, plenty of good, interesting songs and music being made that flies under the radar of commercial radio, television, and most print media. John Hiatt has been making great music for a long time, as have Loudon Wainwright III, Jim Lauderdale, Buddy Miller, Rodney Crowell, Emmylou Harris, Iris Dement, Patty Loveless, Gillian Welch, Danny Gatton, the two songwriters from Uncle Tupelo, NRBQ, Los Lobos, Nick Lowe, and hundreds of others. And that’s not even mentioning the younger, newer quality artists and entertainers. The ability of singers and bands to record cheaply and self-release their music has ended the stranglehold the big record companies for decades held (since the end of WWII, at least) on the availability of recorded music. Free at last! You have to know where to look, but the good stuff is out there, and at less cost than ever before (except for those boutique-pressed 180g LP’s). |
I suggest some of you find one or more good, streaming radio stations. We have several that broadcast here in Austin, most notably KUTX 98.9 FM http://kutx.org/ and KOOP 91.7 https://www.koop.org/listen-now Of course, listening material depends on when you tune in as there are often genre-specific programs. And much of the music is older, but there's a lot of good new stuff that you won't find on the pop stations. It's still pop music. |
I hear the songs of a lot of young singer/songwriters, both in Portland/Vancouver bars & pubs and on TV (my sisters watch all the talent competition shows), and I have noticed a couple of things about most of them. The chord sequences are very minimal, just two chords alternated between, back and forth, over and over and over. Relatively few up-and-coming songwriters seem to be aware of classic Pop song construction, with chord "progressions"---a chord, followed by a second, then either a third, or back to the first with then a third played instead of the second again. And really good songwriters, on the second time through the progression, replace one of the chords in the first transversal with an alternate chord, to keep things fresh, interesting, and seemingly unpredictable. And it appears that the "bridge" or "middle eight" section of a song seems to be either out-of-fashion or unknown to young writers. They would do well to study the songs of at least Lennon & McCartney and Brian Wilson, for a start. Then there are the song "melodies". I put melodies in quotes because the line of notes used to sing the song's lyrics often barely qualify as an actual melody, being instead nothing more than the root note of the chord being played. Many, many songs have no "hook"---the sing-along quality of a true melody. This is nothing new---I immediately heard it in the "songs" on the first Blondie album. It's one thing to be a singer (if you want to call Debbie Harry that) or a musician, quite another to be a songwriter. The songwriting talent in The Beatles unfortunately made writing one's own material almost mandatory for a singer and group/band who desired respect from his/her/their peers. There are many groups/bands with a lot of singing and/or instrument-playing talent, but little songwriting talent (imo ;-). Another element missing in much of the contemporary music that is popular with the masses is harmony singing, which is a shame. Harmony (and it's sophisticated cousin, counterpoint) is wonderful! It is still very much evident in contemporary Bluegrass music, one reason I listen to that genre. It's quality songs is another. |
But "good stuff" is getting harder to find and I often find it in unexpected places. Plus I have been reaching out beyond my sphere and even back to the early/mid 70s and checking out artists I was aware of but never had any of their recordings, like Shawn Phillips, Jeff Buckley, Duncan Browne. But I sometimes overhear what young teenagers are listening to, and it seems they want melody, but melody without anchor sounds lost. I played some Beatles on a recent road trip and the uninitiated teens in the back dug it, they thought it was new. Go figure. |
Good stuff, Trans. They just got too good figuring out how to squeeze money out of art and in the process squeezed all the life out of it. Early on, a little "squeez" was okay. Great HST quote, btw. Further commentary on the topic from Joe Jackson’s "Rain", Track 1 - Invisible Man. I do remember, "Yummy, yummy, yummy....". In case you want to get re-adquainted (at the risk of self-inflicted ear-worm for a day or two).... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uo9tMoew6o&list=PLd_TTQtxcJIyThtQshLLhVU4NKas2AmVc&ab_chann... We were making judgements about authenticity even then. Ohio Express didn’t pass the test as I recall, BUT ignoring the dopey lyrics...this bit of fluff IS pretty well constructed. Have to admit I’m a sucker for hooky pop with harmonies. Speaking of which. Here’s another good one https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bl61-KMQAnE Cowsills, on the strength of this hit, maybe not viewed as authentic either, but probably a mistake. Legit musicians as it turns out. I don’t have kids and don’t do social media (I’m waiting for them to come out with Anti-social media and then maybe I’ll sign up) so clueless about how things work nowadays. Appreciate the information. Wasn’t Def Leppard also one of those contrived bands put together solely for making money? Never cared for them. Supertramp too a millionaire’s investment vehicle based on what I’ve read. Them I liked (and still do). So corporate creation music stars ain’t really new. Just somehow more annoying the older and more crotchety I get. |
MTV awards last week were God awful musically. My teenage daughter even agreed. The focus is increasingly more on spectacle to try to make the various celebrity clones more interesting. I guess that’s the only way to get any attention in the watered down and glutted entertainment world these days. Wait, hey do I ever sound like my parents when I was a kid now...... |
“The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There's also a negative side.” ― Hunter S. Thompson |
Ghosthouse, a great post. It is true that once a "star" has been identified, it appears that the machine of promotion follows and incessant flogging of what sold before. I do find it disheartening that in 1973, there was an incredible variety of popular (not pop) music. Now there appears to be two kinds: white girl pop or rap music, neither one artful. AS I was thinking about this subject I remember hearing "Yummy Yummy I got love in my Tummy" in the 70s and thinking , oh God, that's it, its over. So I have to say there is a tremendous variety of music available, its all hidden. You ask a brilliant question, "how are pop stars made". I am no expert at that answer, but it appears that entire machine is now driven by online /social media and music sites like Itunes. The kids are now using social media to talk to each other and they talk about pop music just like we did (but in person). It appears the corporate machine (Disney, Warner, Sony etc) waits in the wings to identify what generates excitement online and then jumps in with both feet. Good examples of this are Justin Bieber, a complete online creation- he was a You Tube phenom. Some serious people but serious money into him and have succeeded in promoting him to superstar status. Some vocal training and hooking him up with real producers/writers has paid off. The PR game has not changed, but the tools of PR have. Taylor Swift another online "sensation", appealing to little girls with heartache all over the country. My two teenage daughters LOVE her. To be fair, she earned it, it took super hard work and a complete sacrifice of your life to achieve something like that. Giving up privacy forever and a sense of being alone is a very hard thing to walk away from. Her last record was a brilliant production, and her videos are the best in class for sure. She's now moved over to pop star land (long long way from country) and embraced fashion as a part of her persona. She's a huge star and the tours sell out. |
Interesting points in what appears to be an informed post by transaudio. I still don’t want to spend time with Lady Gag-me but appreciate the insight about her from Brad. This bemoaning current music is nothing new. My parents growing up with Sinatra and big bands despised Stones, Beatles, etc. The whole thing gets repeated with each generation. My axe to grind with the current scene... "Art" reduced to formulaic pursuit of product designed around maximum profitability and guided by the creative genius of corporate lawyers. An emphasis on self-promotion and persona rather than the music. Add to this incorporation of loathsome cultural values and thuggery. Hence, the earlier post: "Lawyers, Guns, & Money" (to misappropriate Warren Zevon). The profit motive has always been present in the music biz, I suppose, just more "artfully" concealed, perhaps. A question for Brad or anyone else - How does pop music become popular these days? I gather radio is no longer the dominant thing. The old-style hit making DJs are no longer a force, I don’t think. How do the stars get made? Is it solely on the strength of their touring?? |
Its interesting to think that Mozart was thought of in his day to be way too busy, way over the top, "way too many notes". While he did get the acclaim within his lifetime, he was a completely different style to all else of his day. He probably thought of Bach as a slow and pondering old man. This is hauntingly similar to how many 60s/70s rockers felt about Frank Zappa, now regarded to be a great composer. If you were a fan of YES or King Crimson, you probably liked him but if you loved Joan Baez I am sure Frank was WAY over the top. Pop music and its interpretation are very much cultural and contextual. Every generation seems to have its "new music" to embrace. "The Cars", wow, my generation hated that sparse harsh "new wave" music yet liked the production heavy melodic southern rock, the Doobie Bros. Music was going to hell! And then came KISS and POISON, hair bands everywhere. All of us hated that stuff! Give me prog rock, Genesis and Yes or at least Steely Dan. So now we have Lady Gaga with some incredibly inventive production (Poker Face) and clever compositions. I know for a fact she works incredibly hard to get the record to sound a certain way. She's quite the musician, have you heard her play piano? And we have Katy Perry, 100% a singer, an entertainer, she works hard too. But she's not a musician, composer or writer- she's sings songs other people buy for her. My beef is that some of the songs are OK, but the production is unlistenable on any kind of resolution intensive system. But it sells sells sells and sounds good on $9 earbuds I guess. Since nothing else is selling I guess that's good . Chainsmokers, wow, very good, very unique and different from anyone else. Halsey, also very unique. Lana Del Rey, very interesting and very 60s- but dark and brooding for sure. So there's some good stuff in pop happening a new style emerging. But know this, there is NO MONEY in modern records, no one is getting rich off them. All the income these days in modern music is in the tour. Brad |
czarivey: great list of bands! A friend off mine recorded the EWF album that is without doubt iconic. It was an extremely controversial "sound" at the time, very clean and clear, no distortion or lack of dynamics. Not at all the Motown/Stax sound and he was NOT hired to do the subsequent albums. Yet, that record (September, groove tonight, etc) still sounds contemporary and current. This is a GREAT example of sound of pop changing over time with great moments. Brad |
Give me the big band that was at least comprised of musicians who could play. Voila: 1. Carla Bley Big band 2. Sun Ra and his Arkestra 3. Fela Kuti big band 4. Makossa (Manu Dibango) big band 5. Snarky Puppy big funky band 6. Frank Zappa 7. Tower of Power 8. Earth Wind And Fire 9. Cesaria Evora big band 10. Nils Lundgren's Jazz Baltica big band 11. Quincy Jones big band 12. Lalo Schifrin big band 13. Buenos Aires string tango band |
In 1962 if you were in America you probably had not heard or heard of the Beatles at all. Also, the Beatles played their own guitars all the time, except for Clapton's solo on the White Album. And they played their instruments every bit as well as the Stones. Eventually, far better. The Stones were for people who thought they had to be a little bit cooler, less mainstream. Both great bands, BTW. |
One note: pop music by definition is viewed differently depending on perspective. If you were 13 in 1962, the Beatles was the most amazing band ever. If you were 19, the Stones was WAY cooler, much more the street band and avant garde of the time. The Beatles all cheesy pop music! Plus they can barely play their instruments. If you were 35 in 1962, you may well have thought the Beatles absolutely sucked, 3 chord garbage. Give me the big band that was at least comprised of musicians who could play. Brad |
pop music is simple way to get money with little effort applied at all times since we started recording artists. Rihanna, Justin Timberlake or Bieber or Beyoncé aren’t any better or worse than Bruce Springsteen, Bon Jovi, Bette Midler or Pat Benatar . Dean Martin proved to the world that miserable crooner as he was couldn’t be a jazz singer. Barry Manilow also proved that he’s just another miserable microphone dude as well. Wat else u can expect from pop? It’s cheap to build and bring -- that’s all its purpose for all times and days. Pop and music are two different meanings where music requires continuous and intensive training and practicing and pop just only needs ’pre-cooked show biz recipe’. As an analogy, you can compare canned food with home made or chef made fresh food. |
I think there is a lot of great music out there but they have no widely visible method to distribute it. Back in the "good old days" of the Beatles, record companies invested and promoted bands. They also ripped them off at times. So now record companies are gone, no more of that 3 weeks in the studio-expenses paid- to write and create stuff. Now the artists make money on the tour, not the record, and usually finance the record themselves. So they do what they want. There are a few great records out there made today. Sarah Jarosz (americana) sounds amazing. All her records done by the same guy Gary Pacoza who is really good at recording. The Lorde record was done well, minimal processing, decent sound, nice and simple, not much production. Michael Bishop's (engineer) DSD work is so good, like Eric Bibb and Hiromi. Look up recordings by engineer Bill Vorndik (Bella Flek is a client of his), or George Massenburg etc. So I think its out there. Brad |
It could be another unintended consequence of digital technology as pop songs are constructed by digitally controlled machines and formulas that produce a level of perfection that doesn't capture the ear. I loved my old handmaid, British MG, but don't have an emotional response to today's much better sports cars. Reinstating the military draft would probably improve the songwriting. Hip-hop and rap kinda took the swagger out of pop. All that said, I think Green Day produces good stuff -- ragged, tuneful, empowered, and not manufactured in a digital lab. |
And, one man’s treasure is another man’s trash. That’s fine with me, I’ve long been out-of-step with many of the musicians I’ve associated with. I couldn’t get the hippies in my 1971 band to listen to my Smiley Smile or Shirelles Greatest Hits albums, or the guitarist in my 1990’s Surf/Instro/Rockabilly/Blues band to my ABBA albums, but I accept that. What I don’t accept is calling the great songs that came out of the Brill Building dreck---they’re fantastic. Brian Wilson---the best songwriter Rock ’n’ Roll has produced (fact, not conjecture ;-)---shares that opinion with me! |
@bdp24 - Yeah, I realized that later, when i saw that someone else had used "dreck" as a term of art. Hell, I’ll listen to stupid stuff too sometimes: I dig that song by the Spiral Starecase, I dig some Crystal Gayle, but at the same time I may switch to Starker playing Kodaly or Krokodil’s "An Invisible World Revealed." Taste is a funny thing. I can listen to a song or two from Gnarls Barkley or Ludacris/Outkast, but a steady diet of that would probably leave me undernourished. Everybody has their guilty pleasures- mine, for the last few years, has been lost bands and albums from Europe in the late ’60s and early ’70s. (Blast Furnace-s/t is a current favorite). Yeah, there’s a lot of crap all over the place. Food, music, name your poison. That may be someone else’s joy, though, so I’m not too harsh about what I consider shitty music, I just don’t listen to it. One thing I will say: we all get into our trenches and stay there. I have had certain limits over the years with free-form jazz and I’m now beginning to appreciate some angles of it. Part of it is purely ignorance on my part too. Now that I’m in Austin, I see and hear talent ever day-- these people can’t really make a living at it, but they do it anyway. Who knows in that great lottery of popular culture where the wheel next stops? A ’bad’ era can begat another renaissance. Call me an eternal optimist. I did miss the opportunity to hear The Village People at a club some friends own, but I would have gone purely for the experience of it, not because I was ever a fan. Crimson on the other hand,.... |
It wasn’t you or any of your posts I was quoting, Bill (whart). See a few posts above for the specific reference to the Brill Building by another contributor. The claim that the period between the disappearance of Elvis and the appearance of The Beatles was devoid of good music was started in the late 60’s by Jann Wenner in his Rolling Stone Magazine, and is complete and utter bs. While pure 50’s Rock ’n’ Roll did go out of style after Elvis was drafted, Buddy Holly was killed in a plane crash, Jerry Lee Lewis was blackballed, Little Richard found God, and Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins turned Country (all of which the major label record company and music publishing men were delighted to see happen---they had lost control of the business when the small independent labels---who owned most of the popular Rock ’n’ Roll artists---started getting all the record sales), and Fabian, Pat Boone, and Bobby Rydell-type singers (whom the record companies could control, unlike the above Rock ’n’ Rollers) were being pushed by the likes of Dick Clark, there was still a lot of great music being made in the years 1958 to 1962. Do I really have to remind us all of The Everly Brothers, Roy Orbison, The Beach Boys, Paul Revere & The Raiders (very under-rated, a great band), The Ventures (and all the other surf bands and guitarists), Booker T & The MG’s, Del Shannon (whose comeback album in the 80’s was produced by Tom Petty), Chuck Berry (his recordings continued to be released even as he faced his upcoming trial and eventual incarceration), as well as a lot of great urban Pop music by Phil Spector (loved by John Lennon and, especially, Brian Wilson), The Drifters, The Shirelles, The Four Seasons, Patti LaBelle, Darlene Love, Clyde McPhatter, and many, many others? Remind yourself of the kind of music that was hugely popular in the early 60’s by spinning "On Broadway" by The Drifters. The song, an absolute masterpiece, was written by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil while sitting at a piano in a cubicle in.....the Brill Building. Nick Lowe has recorded a great version of "Halfway To Paradise", a killer song from the early 60’s, written by Carole King and Gerry Goffin while sitting at a piano in a cubicle in.....the Brill Building. The version of the song that gives me an out-of-body experience was recorded by Laurel Aitken. As good as Pop gets! A lot of the music of this period was recorded and intended for radio airplay, and was released on 7" 45 RPM singles. It’s target audience was teenagers, most of whom owned not a single LP (or 78 ;-). Budding musicians and hardcore music fanatics (guilty) were the only teenagers buying LP’s, and then mostly of The Beach Boys and Surf groups/bands. One demographic buying a lot of LP’s were the teenager’s college-attending older brothers and sisters, who were being courted by the post-Beatnik Folk artists, one of whom---from Hibbing Minnesota---became probably the most influential songwriter (for better or worse) of the second half of the 20th Century. One thing that DID drastically change with the British Invasion was the meteoritic rise of the 12" LP format. The challenge for artists then became how to get enough material (good songs) to fill an entire disc. That challenge remains unsuccessfully answered by most artists (and entertainers) to this day! |
@bdp24 - for the "record," I never referred to some of the Brill Building writers as "dreck." I did say a lot of pop even in the '60s was crap. "Dreck" I reserved for a lot of what's popular today. My point was separating the wheat from the chaff, then as today. I also consider songwriters and music publishing to be separate from the record industry, but perhaps that's being hyper technical about how the industry worked. |
Brill Building "dreck"?! Songwriters like Carole King, Doc Pomus, Burt Bacharach, Hal David, Billy Rose, Bobby Darin, Gerry Goffin, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, Johnny Mercer, and Mort Shuman wrote in the tiny cubicles there, producing songs McCartney and Lennon loved. Listen to the first Beatles album---it’s half Brill Building songs! Two of our best contemporary songwriters who have expressed a love of the Brill Building songs are Elvis Costello and Nick Lowe. It’s Pop music, not Rock. |
It may have been covered in this thread already (sorry, I didn’t read the whole thing), but even in the days when the major labels had A&R staff, some good in-house producers and the wherewithal to procure and "develop" talent, much was crap. You had to be selective. Without getting into how the record business aided in its own destruction, the labels have less control than ever. And the folks that run a lot of the businesses that deliver "content" to you are more akin to Big Data than major labels. The music is supposed to reflect the culture. I don’t mind some neo-soul or even some rap, but most of it is dreck- over using auto-tune for that phasey vocal effect might have been cool on one or two tracks, but it became as common as drum machines in the ’80s, or gated reverb. There’s still cool stuff out there by new bands, but given how fragmented everything is--you have to dig. Yes, there are singers like Adele (whose only recording I bought sounded terrible) and others who are superstars that have some talent (Lady Gaga is talented, I’m not that "into" her). A workman here the other day asked about what I listened to when he saw all the records. He told me he liked punk. I haven’t listened to any new punk bands lately, but recommended the great Bad Brains album "I Against I." I think our taste often reflects what we grew up with. |
I think it may have more to do with education and literacy in general. As the public schools continue to lower their academic standards and substitute political correctness and self-esteem for critical reasoning and the search for truth and beauty, then literature, science and art will suffer. Aristotle described Art as 'that which could be', but the current generation of students are being spoon-fed a steady diet of doom and gloom. It's no wonder this outlook should infect the music they create. The dystopia found in much of the contemporary Literature and Art is the result of their poor education. The comic book super hero that has to rely on super-natural (impossible) means of overcoming obstacles, or the witches and wizards that tap the occult to obtain their power over others, illustrates the problem facing literature and art. The true heroic courage of man has been abandoned in favor of absurd fantasy. The knight errant is forgotten or ridiculed in the modern arts. Creating impossible fictional heroes will ultimately just create another new generation of cynics and nihilists. As for music specifically; creating a melody is much more difficult to do than strumming a few cords ad infinitum, or repeating a moronic beat. Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, George and Ira Gershwin et al created beautiful melodies and lyrics that speak to both truth and beauty, as do Lennon and McCartney, Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel or Townes Van Zandt. There's good music being produced today, but young female singers that flaunt raunchy sexuality and dysfunctional behavior suck most of the oxygen out of the room. Bed wetters like Justin Bieber and Ed Sheeran don't contribute much of value either. When contemporary songwriters are asked who influenced them they invariably name artists from previous generations. It's scary to think that future generations will imitate the likes of a Bieber or a Sheeran. As we dumb-down our kids, so they dumb down the culture, including music. -gb-
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It's creatively exhausted. Pop music today has the same problem "classical" music faced at the end of the 19th century: there's a very finite number of chords and chord progressions that sound "right" to the human ear, and we've used them up. If that's OTT, think about pop music post-Elvis and pre-Beatles; there was a ton of Brill Building dreck out there. |
Pop music today merely reflects the lack of substance in modern society. There are really no, or very few, positive influences today to spawn thoughtful, meaningful music. I know I heard the same from my parents when I listened to the Beatles and Dylan. I know my children will look at my musical tastes in the same way. I don't see it getting better. So I listen to my 10,000 odd tracks on my server, set to random, and revel in my 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's music. The 2000's have some presence, but pale in comparison. Old Farts rule! |
@goose , in the nut-shell it doesn't exist, but outside of it there's lots of ways to find great today's music around the world -- all you need to do is turn off radio and teevee and start lookin' for tunes that are good. there's still Berkeley and Cambridge schools of music around and those are super GOOD. |
While I agree with most of you guys about modern top 40 pop, I definitely come at my disdain for this music from a different angle.. I love electronic music. Experimental, abstract, dubstep, house, ambient, noise.. I have found tracks I love from almost every sub genre. Right now, there is so much incredible electronic music out there, inventive and fresh. That's what drew me to it after a childhood of listening to never ending classic rock on the Jersey shore. I'm disenchanted with pop right now because it borrows its sounds and production values heavily from the producers pushing the edge, but does so in a way that crushes the inventiveness, making what could be incredible tracks into milquetoast mush. That said, there is the occasional track that I fall in love with only to find out it is a big hit 'out there'.. on those rare occasions, my faith in humanity is momentarily restored. |
I'm not an old fart lol, but I agree with that statement as far as the music itself and not the actual recording process. It's cheap and the easy way " 2 takes and we will fix it in post" most the time the music itself in prefabricated and auto tune inhanced vocals laid down on top, You look and the garbage sampes supposed artist like Diplo, sleepy Tom, M82, the weekend are laying down. even that Justin temberlake dude and honestly you would think he would know better as long as he's been an artist. It's just crappy home studio garbage. you will notice that there is some that do, do a good job spend massive amounts of time in the studio to get it right. But they are really few and far b/t. |