Interesting Radio 4 doc. on Saturday. Worth 30 mins of your time.
“Bruce Springsteen is turning 70; rock’s gods are getting on. It’s not clear who’s there with electric guitars to replace them. Younger acts are failing are to make hit singles. Veteran rock journalist Mark Coles believes rock music has lost its ability to surprise and innovate. Record label boss Vanessa Higgins describes how the writing of hit songs no longer favours the rock format. Music critic Michael Hann blames the high costs of making rock as part of the reason for its decline. But Chris Woltman, manager of the band Twenty One Pilots, believes bands have adapted rock for a new generation of fans and industry veteran Sat Bisla details how rock is making headway in non-traditional markets like India and Indonesia. With Neal Razzell.”
Colin H says
I’m sure it is doomed – but I’m more interested in the fact that I’ve never heard of these critics and ‘insiders’!
eddie g says
It’s all probably true. Rock music had a pretty decent innings but everything that could be done within it’s fairly limited range has probably been done by now. Can’t say I particularly care to be honest. Almost every ‘rock’ record I buy these days (and I do buy them) fall into these three categories-
Re-issues or ‘de-luxe’ editions of something I first bought when I was young.
New albums by old/established artists I first loved when I was young.
New bands that remind me of bands/artists I loved when I was young. (This latter category is the rarest- so far only occupied by Jellyfish and the Lemon Twigs).
retropath2 says
But it has always been in flux: if rock’n’roll was the template (if), there has been little call for that for decades. Plenty guitars in Folk and Americana, jazz and blues, all of which fit into hyphen rock varieties, as they have ever.
Tiggerlion says
The youngsters are not gaining much traction, at least not here. My recent Nights In on two young Blues Rock guitarists sank without trace.
Mike_H says
Blues Rock is most definitely doomed, at least as recorded music. Still battling on in live venues great and small. But mostly small.
Young people don’t buy it. If they stream it at all it will not be as much as they stream other musical styles. At gigs it’s watched mostly by middle-aged and old men.
eddie g says
Shame really as I’m just getting the hang of them pentatonic scales.
Tiggerlion says
That’s why one of them has moved on to Pop Rock. Still has the chops though.
duco01 says
Talking of blues rock …
Up until about a month ago, I had – to my shame – never heard any Rory Gallagher records.
Then I borrowed “Live in Europe” from the library.
And then I bought “Irish Tour”.
Man, that guy was incredible. What a player!
Twang says
Oh yes. You need Deuce now for his more songwriting orientated stuff, still fantastic.
Blue Boy says
Yup.glad you’ve found them, duco; he was a magnificent, generous, big hearted musician. The recently released blues box set is definitely worth your time as well.
Kid Dynamite says
I’ve sold half a dozen Samantha Fish albums since release day on Friday. Not stadium numbers by any means, but very good for the genre.
Tiggerlion says
Excellent! 👍
eddie g says
Blues rock is seen as an historically interesting but artistically defunct genre now isn’t it? A bit like trad jazz or be-bop. There surely aren’t many 17 or 18 year olds out there who want to be the next Clapton or Page? Or who actually want a guitar at all. Can’t remember that last time I heard a guitar on a chart hit (that didn’t belong to Ed Sheeran).
slotbadger says
Rock will never be quite the force it was, forty or fifty odd years in all its permutations and then it’ll bed down into the broad tapestry of Western culture and stay there and something else will come along. In a few generations time, it’ll be viewed much like Morris dancing or the Empire.
dai says
Probably
Twang says
No, but previously popular genres will become more niche (like blues rock) and new ones morph in. Metal is constantly evolving (according to my local expert Twang Jr) and is still massively popular on a worldwide basis.
Mike_H says
South America, the Far East and the Middle East are where Metal remains really strong.
Vincent says
If it can be accurate, the historical re-enactment of previous bands/ tours at least provides a record of how thrilling a gig could be. “The Musical Box” show the way to document past gigs and styles, in this case 1974-vintage progressive rock a la Genesis. I think they do a better job than the current version of Yes, as TMB use the historically accurate gear and visuals. I’d like to see a really good 1970s Bowie performer who took the same approach, as I never saw the 1976 “Station to Station” tour, and it remains a huge regret. Interesting observation (maybe): has nobody has sought to do this regarding the Jimi Hendrix Experience? Is even his star dimming?
Tiggerlion says
No-one can play like Jimi.
Kaisfatdad says
The gig as historical re-enactment? I suppose that kind of thing has been going on in the jazz world for yonks..
I was very dubious about The Musical Box when I was first told about them but I have heard nothing but praise. And the tickets are not cheap so they must be doing something right.
Twang says
I’m going to see TMB in January – really excited! It’s not just historically accurate – it’s the actual the gear I though!
davebigpicture says
“Guitar groups are on their way out Mr Epstein.”
Moose the Mooche says
Of course rock isn’t dead – I go to gigs heaving with people. Maybe up to three of them are not grey/bald old men. Three! In your face, hip-hop!
johnw says
It may be a bit of a hoary comparison but people still listen to the likes of Beethoven and Mozart and I’m pretty sure they’re not confined to the first wave that followed them around on their European tours!
Does rock need to change to survive? I would say not. If it does change then that’s fine too.
Blue Boy says
I think it’s probably like jazz, isn’t it? The innovative, glory days are probably behind us, but the best will last as much as Ellington and Coltrane will, and there will still be terrific young artists who will keep the torch alight, albeit to a smaller audience.
Mike_H says
Jazz supposedly went out of fashion in the ’50s and ’60s as the rock groups took over everywhere, but 60 years and more later it’s still getting played and it’s more dedicated musicians still seem to be scraping a living. There even seem to be young people playing it.
deramdaze says
New stuff? Don’t know, have to ask them.
New stuff done by Golden Agers? Don’t know, have to ask them.
I don’t use the word “rawwwkkk,” but 60s?
This decade alone will have seen the release of “The Basement Tapes”, a whole load of mid-60s Dylan, the Dylan/Cash sessions, “Smile,” and (adding up the box set extras on Pepper, White and Abbey Road) a significant percentage of the Beatles back catalogue – 20%? – will have been released in the time span between June 2017 and September 2019.
Elvis Presley’s back catalogue, far away from the mainstream now, has been doubled in the last decade.
It’s as buoyant as you want it to be.
If you were to ask “Sounds of the 60s” Tony Blackburn, for example, he would be completely unaware of any of these releases.
Hamlet says
It’s very tough for new rock bands, as the availability of ‘the greats’ is so ubiquitous – you’re competing against the past. When I was at school in the 90s, there was a smattering of secret Beatles-loving kids, but it was seriously uncool to declare a love for 60s music.
Contrast this with today. Walk along any high street, and you’ll see youngsters in Queen and Rolling Stones t-shirts. The Rolling Stones: quite literally music their granny likes! This is the equivalent of me in 1993 going to school in a Vera Lynn or Glenn Miller t-shirt.