What Killed Rock & Roll?

[Rich]

2 hours ago, upside downer said:

What killed Rock & Roll?  Damned if I'm going to sit through half hour of some American chaps whining about its demise. I'm off to listen to some Turkish psychedelic folk rock. 

I hope I don't have to make a video about 'What killed Turkish psychedelic folk rock?' in the near future.

Tunisian prog-metal and Icelandic nu-folk for me. There's great music everywhere.

'Rock n roll' is just a lazy bullsht category title anyway. If In Doubt, File Under Rock. I saw The Selecter described as a 'rock band' once. QED.

[upside downer]

2 hours ago, Newfoundfreedom said:

 John Lydon advertising butter.

 

He stated he wanted to destroy rock n roll circa 1976, long before any buttery buffoonery. 

[upside downer]

57 minutes ago, Leonard Smalls said:

Nowt killed rock'n'roll...

Because rock'n'roll is an idea, an attitude; just because there's not much of it in "the charts" mean nothing. The charts aren't really the charts anymore, not like when I were a lad - people find music in a thousand different ways and just because some of us old fools on a bass forum can't find new rock'n'roll doesn't mean it's dead. It just means it's changed, or not. Either way, moaning about it is much the same as saying "it's not as good as when I was young". If you're interested, go out and find it! Otherwise just stay in remembering the good old days, and how the youth don't respect anything any more, and how you could leave your door open etc...

 

 

Well said, sir. Love a bit of microtonal King Gizzard. 

[Beedster]

12 hours ago, skankdelvar said:

Iggy Pop doing car insurance ads

That's what liked it for me, the ageing process, rock and roll got old an needed to pay the bills

[cetera]

1 hour ago, upside downer said:

He stated he wanted to destroy rock n roll circa 1976, long before any buttery buffoonery. 

 

The only thing John Lydon has destroyed is his waistline.

[Graham]

11 hours ago, skankdelvar said:

 

In fact, Metal is now about as much fun as an exit wound from a Mossberg shotgun and as believable as a school Christmas play. The utter hopelessness of the protagonists shines through just as if each of them had written on their foreheads 'I'm more than a loser - I'm a gaping a$$hole of a loser who knows he's a loser but depends on other losers to keep giving him their money so he can carry on being a loser and not have to go back to his old day job as an artificial limb salesman for SW England and Wales".

 

Pish, there's plenty of interesting vibrant bands within metal, no there's not been any groundbreaking new genres in years, but where has there been? Plenty of bands are releasing great albums either paying homage to their heroes or developing new takes on established sounds.

To pick a few examples from 2017/2018: Wolves In The Throne Room, Converge, Akercocke, Rolo Tomassi, Zeal & Ardor, Sleep, Ihsahn, OHHMS, Der Weg Einer Freiheit, Oxbow, Dyscarnate, Conan, Sumac, Voices, Highland and SikTh have all released really good records.

If metal doesn't appeal to you, fine, but maybe look a bit closer than the likes of Bring Me The Horizon before writing off an entire, wide-spanning genre.

[4000]

Rock n roll is dead? Quick, somebody tell Josh Homme....

[Monkey Steve]

Rock n roll is alive and well and charging people £120 a ticket and £30 for a t-shirt.  Quite who's to blame for that is another matter, and on a more serious note, the internet and kids growing up knowing that music is something that can be obtained for free, there's plenty of it to choose from so they don't even need to buy anything, they can subscribe to a streaming service that will play whatever they want whenever they want to listen to it, and pay the artists a pittance for the pleasure.

[Stylon Pilson]

4 minutes ago, Monkey Steve said:

Rock n roll is alive and well and charging people £120 a ticket and £30 for a t-shirt.  Quite who's to blame for that is another matter, and on a more serious note, the internet and kids growing up knowing that music is something that can be obtained for free, there's plenty of it to choose from so they don't even need to buy anything, they can subscribe to a streaming service that will play whatever they want whenever they want to listen to it, and pay the artists a pittance for the pleasure.

Well, the two points you've made here are related. In a world where data duplication is trivial, there's no money to be made from selling copies of a physical sound recording, and so the only way for musicians to make money is to sell an experience, or to auction off their reputation to the highest bidder (see earlier remarks about Iggy Pop).

Ticket prices will come down when people stop buying them at that price.

S.P.

[nash]

People who complain that new music all sounds the same:

your parents and grandparents said that. 

Really you just want to listen to the same old music over and over. 

And finally, pizza. Think about pizza and how varied and delicious it is (this requires you liking pizza in the first place).

[martthebass]

15 hours ago, skankdelvar said:

I've watched this vid and I concur with its findings though I would add that the corporatisation and commoditisation of youthful rebellion might have something to do with it. For myself, I knew Rock & Roll was clinically dead when VW sponsored a Stones tour and brought out a Stones-logo'd Golf to go with it. 

See also: Fender headphones, £150 AC/DC tickets, Lady Gaga in 'A Star Is Born', Iggy Pop doing car insurance ads and that ghastly pervert Ed Sheeran with his stupid, tiny Martin stuffing up the charts with 18 songs out of the top 20 or something.

Rock & Roll: I spit on your gravy.

Maybe this is why I haven't moved on from the 70s and 80s

 

[HengistPod]

"Johnny Rotten Got Fat" is surely an obvious song title for some young upstart band wishing to usher in a new age of rebellion by mocking yesterday's rebel-in-chief.

Personally, and it's absolutely none of my business, I'm disappointed in John. Following his skinny-weasel younger days, he was always a trim, vaguely intimidating kind of chap with an accusing stare. Now that he's gone to seed, we can consider ourselves in a new Age.

Who was it that said "it's no longer the MUSIC industry, it's the music INDUSTRY now." That was the real killer, when businessmen realised how much money there was to be made. 

[Vinny]

I know all you multitudes and masses are all sat cross legged 'pon the lawn waiting for my two pennerth, so listen up. Or not, I'm OK with that, too. 

I haven't watched the video, and won't . I don't think R'n'R is dead because it never happened. Obviously, white people speeding up 12-bar because the country they lived in was too racist to listen to the good stuff happened, cos I've seen (and done) it, but that's not what I mean.  If you spend some time trawling through the popular music of the 50s, it can reasonably be said that it was mostly a massive pool of utter shyte with a handful of absolute gems thrown in. Spend more time looking at the (genuinely fascinating IMO) evolution of said popular music through the 60's, and you may well discover a massive pool of utter shyte with a handful of absolute gems thrown in for good measure. Continue on through the birth of prog, etc, etc...80s synthy fnurrr...madferit 90s...blaaahhh...noughty tweeny Simon Cowpat....bleurgghhh...

The whole of popular music is - guess what - yeah, you got it - a massive pool of shyte with a handful of gems thrown in. 

The difference now, is it's yer mainstream meeja what's dead or zombifying, so your time for the above is better spent on those video hosting sites that they have now. If you do, you will find some pieces of musical art of genuinely stunning quality. But for every one you do there's  - yep - a massive pool of utter shyte so staggering in magnitude that only astronomers can possibly comprehend it.

'More' is the only difference, and long may it continue, because it's the massive pool of shyte that inspires those who do not wish to swim in it the most.

 

[skankdelvar]

1 hour ago, Graham said:

Pish...

Apart from the fact that 'interesting' is both relative and subjective, I agree there may be interesting and vibrant bands within metal. Certainly. plenty of bands may be releasing great albums either paying homage to their heroes or developing new takes on established sounds. Some or many metal bands may well have released 'good' records (though good is also a subjective term).

For myself, I likes me a bit of Metal and can even occasionally be found wigging out on a guitar tuned to drop D or drop C. I'm not writing it off as a genre because - obviously - people still play it and consume it and good luck to them. I'm just saying that in the wider cultural sense Metal is an internally-focused phenomenon which - like cosplay or historical re-enactment - has its own rules and customs, and obsessions with authenticity and detail. This doesn't render Metal invalid but it sets it apart from the rest of music in its own little feedback loop.

Fair play to it, Metal is the last outpost of the Rock & Roll ethos, possibly because it is the sub-genre which will not die. It is neither progressive nor regressive but essentially static (which may explain its longevity) and while it may be important to its fans it's more of a curiosity than a cultural force like Rap or RnB.

 

[cetera]

2 minutes ago, skankdelvar said:

Fair play to it, Metal is the last outpost of the Rock & Roll ethos, possibly because it is the sub-genre which will not die. It is neither progressive nor regressive but essentially static (which may explain its longevity) and while it may be important to its fans it's more of a curiosity than a cultural force like Rap or RnB.

 

They're only 'cultural forces' because the derrière end of MTV decided to make them prominent. The sheeple like to listen to what their fed as a daily diet.... same as it ever was....

[Low End Bee]

What rock n roll was is probably dead. I would say the outrage and rebellion has all been done so it'll never be that edgy thrill ride again. After GG Allin where are you going to go?

I think of it as akin to folk music now, Instruments that have barely changed in 3 quarters of a century in traditional line ups reworking and paying homage to the old stuff. Still some damn fine new bands and songs coming out. If it's good to listen to it's just good music.

[cetera]

14 minutes ago, cetera said:

They're only 'cultural forces' because the derrière end of MTV decided to make them prominent. The sheeple like to listen to what their fed as a daily diet.... same as it ever was....

Lol! There's no way I posted 'derriere'!! I put 'ar*e'!!! 😂

[operative451]

" Why don't young people like the stuff i like?" ask some old men... Same reason they (probably) didn't listen to George Formby or Glen Miller i guess? 

[skankdelvar]

38 minutes ago, cetera said:

They're only 'cultural forces' because the derrière end of MTV decided to make them prominent. The sheeple like to listen to what their fed as a daily diet.... same as it ever was....

Indeed so, but this reinforces my point that rock as a sub-genre of pop has been commoditised like all other popular music (and some classical too, but that's another story). If RnB is the hamburger then Rock is the filet-o-fish. It shifts far less units but they keep it on the menu because it sells to a different consumer group. 

The other reason that Rap and RnB are more popular than Rock is that these genres haven't rejected the notion that sexual intercourse is something to be celebrated. Rock (as it is currently practised by certain pursed-lipped, inhibited white people) is now a bowdlerised, genitalia-free zone where performers mostly sing about their inner conflicts and WASP neuroses. I suppose one might stretch a point and include certain white performers in these fundamentally black genres but the truth is that Justin Bieber is the Pat Boone of his generation.

Rick Beato and his Merry Men may opine that Rock's gone down the shi**er since it lost touch with the blues. More accurately: for a couple of decades white pop music docked with the swaggering Blues tradition, particularly those aspects related to outlawry, bacchanalia and unconfined shagging. It all started to go wrong when Rock stopped thinking with its balls and slipped into an infatuation with 'art' and ''meaning' and politics and 'compassion'. John Lennon - J'accuse.

So while Rock withers feebly on the vine, Rap and RnB proudly carry the Blues tradition forward in a heady cloud of sex and bad behaviour, and in consequence shift crillions of units.

I mean, who would one rather be? A pallid, ingratiating wanna-be or a bad-äss motherf**ker.

Edited September 26, 2018 by skankdelvar

[Billy Apple]

A Pervert earlier today...

 

[skankdelvar]

The fundamental misapprehension that some are bringing to this thread is that it's about Rock music not being as good as it was. 

Wrong.

It's about the reasons why Rock no longer enjoys the mass appeal and saliency of - say - twenty years ago. But if people want to use it to demonstrate to the rest of us that they're 'young at heart' or emphatically not a ghastly 'old' person then that's fine too. 

[grandad]

The music business has always been about the money,  folks have to eat, and many musicians have had to swim among the sharks to earn a living.

If you haven't read any his books I'd recommend you do so.

https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/1015699/simon-napier-bell.html

They are all a good read with lots of food for thought.

I'm quite content as an amateur-hobbyist musician, trying to make a living for most pro's was/is a tough road.

[Bassmonkey]

Watching the video, I accept their points of view but absolutely do not agree that rock n roll is dead. Its there if you look. 3 weeks ago I went to an amazing, exciting and electrifying gig with Idles launching their new album. You may have seen them on Later last night? It was 40 mins of adrenaline charged rock n roll with swaggering, posturing attitude performed by completely engaging and articulate, funny guys. Kids were stage diving and going nuts, the band were in the crowd, the stage was invaded. It felt like being at the 100 Club back in the day watching early Pistols (not that I was by the way, I was only 13 and my mum wouldn't let me) It felt to me like the future is in good hands. Long live rock n roll I say!      

[skankdelvar]

15 minutes ago, Bassmonkey said:

You may have seen them on Later last night?

 

 

[Billy Apple]

5 minutes ago, skankdelvar said:

 

Rubbish. It's all shouting, you can't hear the words and there's no melody