If you think the music you're hearing on the radio is terrible these days, take comfort in knowing that Tony Bennett -- a 17-time Grammy-winning pop singer -- agrees.
"The songs that are written today, most of them are terrible," Bennett told BBC Radio 4 on Thursday. "It's a very bad period, musically, throughout the world for popular music.
It's not necessarily the artists' fault, though. Bennett, who is releasing an upcoming "big swing" jazz album with "musical Picasso" Lady Gaga, blames the money-hungry labels producing the crappy hits.
"They think the public is ignorant, so their attitude is, 'Don't give them anything intelligent, because it won't sell,'" Bennett continued. "I grew up in an era where the record companies just sold records to everybody, and the whole family bought songs. Today, record companies are failing because they are putting their accent just on the young, and I think that's rather silly. They're missing out on thousands of people that would love to buy records but they don't buy them because they don't have a lasting quality."
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The 87-year-old crooner has been pumping out hits since 1951, starting with "Because of You." Bennett doesn't plan on stopping until his body does.
"I'll call it a day when I die," Bennett said. "It's a wonderful occupation for me. I've never worked a day in my life."
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