I do understand your rant, I encounter lots of bad music myself.

Ok. Just to reiterate what I have already said in my original post, the rant wasn't about good or bad music. I was actually very specific. The rant was about the fact that the people without any background in music and no ear training don't think it's important to work on developing their ears, despite the fact that your ears are the most important tool you own in this production thing. That's all.

But no rant in the world will change a thing about this. If you think you can change the world into a place without bad music, well, you simply can't.

Actually that's not entirely true. I feel that if it's mentioned enough, people will become aware. Here's a good example:

There was a time, I don't know... probably 2/3 years ago when the reddit folk over at r/edmproduction were really big on the whole 'you gotta make your own samples to be a legit producer' crap. I remember a time when people were down voted because they said it wasn't that important to be able to design your own sounds and writing good music is way more important than all the other stuff. I was one of those people who got down voted repeatedly and relentlessly. However, I've seen an obvious change (for the better) over at r/edmproduction. These days, everyone agrees that the composition itself is more important than whether you made the sounds yourself.. sample packs are cool now. This is because more and more people were vocal about it, 'ranting' about it if you will. And after some time, more people became more aware, and then boom! It's widely accepted, acknowledged and taken into account for.

This forum is the perfect place to be saying the stuff I said in my rant. I find that people here are way more open minded and there are a lot more people on the same wavelength, in comparison to the people who frequent r/edmproduction. I feel that most of the people here really are here to learn and get better at production.. I mean, this is a production forum after all. I've found some fantastic mixing and mastering advice from the Mixing/Mastering section, some of this info was very detailed and stuff that I've never come across before, not even in r/edmproduction or anywhere else for that matter.

So your appeal to these people is useless because nobody thinks about themselves they belong to this category. I never met anyone who says 'Hey, I write clashing melodies'. They just are unaware. It's like doing an appeal to all 'dumb' people. Nobody thinks about him/herself as being stupid. So nobody thinks the appeal is addressed to them.

Ok, maybe it's just me, but if things were different and I wasn't ZAU and I had zero background on music theory and I had really shitty ears, I would read ZAU's post and ask myself, 'Hmm, do I have shitty ears? Maybe I do.. maybe I should work on it'. If the person/people who fall into this category care enough about music and loved it that much, they would probably read the post, get over themselves and actually get something out of the post. But again, maybe it's just me. And this is something I actually did/went through, but in the mixing game. I admitted to myself that I was really shitty in mixing. My mixes were laughed at before. I was hurt, but not that hurt.. I took all of that pain and threw it right back. I started at the very beginning and practiced and did as much as I could to get better, and I did. I'm no Dave Pensado, but at least I'm not the ZAU 'who couldn't mix at all'. I just suck a little less at mixing these days, and I continue to work on it and get better. Because I love music and production enough, and I've gotten over myself and my own ego a very long time ago.

Why is it that generally, people don't hesitate to throw mixing advice out there, that it's such a necessity to be good at it, and the minute someone talks about equally important stuff like ear training, suddenly it becomes a topic that only elitists talk about and not meant for beginners? I think I know the answer. Maybe it's because it's something relatively new that nobody really talks about and something that perhaps some people have not admitted to suck at. This is what I'm getting at. It needs to be addressed somehow, so that the people who are unaware become 'aware'.

Also, if I sounded angry in my original post, well, that's because I did preface the whole thing as being a 'rant'.

Sorry to say this ZAU, but it´s gonna get worse. There´s so many "djs" and "producers" out there without any clue as to what sounds good.  The main question should be about what people´s motivation to learn this stuff should be.  If you don´t know that you suck, then why would you want to fix it?

With that being said how does one develop their ears in the first place? Idk how you did it but the way that I did it was by being a garbage instrumentalist until I became not so garbage and then transferred to a garbage producer and became less garbage through time. So for you to rant about this...

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=ear+training 

There are even ear training apps these days. I think I've seen YouTube channels that focus on this. It's all already out there, dude. Since you brought it up, the way I did it is that I was born with good ears... I remember seeing a post on this forum from Mat Zo about how he was exposed to music from when he was still in the womb, so he actually started listening to music and pitches even before he was 'born'. This is exactly what happened to me. So thanks to my parents, I was born with strong relative pitch which through practice evolved into perfect pitch. But here's the key: 'through practice'. This is all stuff you can totally work on. I have friends from music school who started out with shitty ears and after a few semesters of ear training, they had amazing ears. But again, you don't have to go to music school to learn ear training, there are plenty of resources out there.

You're over here ranting about producers who don't focus on ear training and yet you aren't doing anything about it. If you want to try to make an influence on the community like the one on reddit then why don't you stop ignoring the music of these beginners and actually give them some feedback instead of ranting about it?

Beginners are the ones who need it the most. You're contradicting yourself by saying that and then saying this...

The only thing beginners need is to be practicing, i.e. making a lot of tracks. Complete beginners who haven't made at least 50-100 tracks should not be posting their music around anyway. They should be focusing on one thing: finishing more tracks. I think I've already mentioned something like this in a different thread. Also, how on earth am I contradicting myself? What was it I said that makes you think this? Do you really understand what that word means?

One more thing. How do you know that I didn't give these people feedback when I came across the clashing notes? Don't be so quick to assume things. I immediately pointed it out to them and explained to them the best I could. One was a YouTube video, and the guy graciously said 'thanks for the feedback, and yes, he's new and stuff and really starting to buckle down with music theory, etc'. Another one was a guy off reddit and he actually ended up fixing the clashing stuff I had pointed out. So I'm definitely doing what I can when I come across stuff like this.

To me, dissonance can imply something that is pleasing to the ear. For example, a minor 9th interval (again, I'm sure you know what that is). I hear minor 9ths a lot in 20th century classical music, and it sounds cool. I also hear it in big band horn arrangements, but they only occur for very brief intervals, like 1/16th notes and 1/32nd notes. But when I hear a minor 9th interval in the context of electronic music and used in a sustained chord over the span of 4 measures, then that just sounds awful and 'clashing'.
 I just wanna say minor 9ths sound beautiful, dissonant sure but you can def sustain them. And as for people who are naively unaware of their incompetence at actual theory, just let them progress(or not progress) on their own. More room at the top if plebs can't figure out how to stay in a key. 

I love minor 9ths as well. Dissonance in context is what determines whether it sounds good or not. Like if you were to play a diminished chord it will sound like balls alone. Using it in between a V and vi chord though creates a tension which sounds great when resolved. I'm sure you understand and I definitely agree with you.

You're saying you don't check out beginners and now you're saying you checked out a beginners on a youtube video and gave him some feedback... GREAT JOB ZAU. WE'RE MAKING PROGRESS HERE 

It was a tutorial video for something and the guy used one of his tracks in the video, it's not like I was seeking/checking out beginner videos.

The main thing I'm getting out of this is that EDM has a "low barriers to entry" problem.

When barriers to entry are too high, only a trickle of very elite people get in and you lose out on a lot of talent and ideas.

When barriers to entry are too low, any idiot can waltz in and participate, and you wind up with a very low signal-to-noise ratio.

EDM's barriers to entry couldn't be any lower. I think that's the problem y'all are driving at.

The main thing I'm getting out of this is that EDM has a "low barriers to entry" problem.

When barriers to entry are too high, only a trickle of very elite people get in and you lose out on a lot of talent and ideas.

When barriers to entry are too low, any idiot can waltz in and participate, and you wind up with a very low signal-to-noise ratio.

EDM's barriers to entry couldn't be any lower. I think that's the problem y'all are driving at.

I don't really agree with EDM barriers being low. The amount of effort that it takes to produce EDM at a professional level is much higher than the other genres from my personal experience.

You have just as many people with bad ears writing EDM as you do writing pop, rock, and jazz. We just don't see much of the others here because this is primarily a dance music forum.

To me, dissonance can imply something that is pleasing to the ear. For example, a minor 9th interval (again, I'm sure you know what that is). I hear minor 9ths a lot in 20th century classical music, and it sounds cool. I also hear it in big band horn arrangements, but they only occur for very brief intervals, like 1/16th notes and 1/32nd notes. But when I hear a minor 9th interval in the context of electronic music and used in a sustained chord over the span of 4 measures, then that just sounds awful and 'clashing'.

Again, read the post thoroughly.
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All of this is very subjective.
Minor 9th are awesome i use them all the time on pads,extremely tense and dark.When in phrygian mode the tonic +minor 9th gives you insane chords.
Why you lose your time ranting about things like: there is some people making bad music man?hahaha of course there is some people making bad music and there will always be,you gotta start somewhere!
And for some people music is just a fun amateur thing they do in their free time and they dont have an ambition to become the next producer prodigy!
Be more positive and talk about the music you DO like instead of the one you dislike.You will be much happier.Just a friendly advice.