Pop Brittania
The other night we watched Pop Brittania on BBC. Episode one took a walk through the creation of the pop industry; labels and bands breaking away from what was considered the music industry at the time.
In the 50s the music industry in the UK revolved around music hall and big band dancehalls; the BBC refusing to play anything that wasn't considered "proper" and banks of songwriters creating the music for the singers of the time. Bands and producers started to rebel and bands like the Beatles and The Shadows were able to get a foot hold.
It got me thinking about how interesting it would have been to live through a period of musical upheaval like that and wondered whether many people were even aware that it was going on until much later when everything had changed...
Will we look back in years to come at the next few years and say the same about the whole "digital revolution" and how it brought about huge changes to the music industy, or will everything just fizzle out as the big labels squeeze things tight and maintain control of all the outlets for music? Will iTunes (or something similar) start to release music* directly, bypassing any form of proper label and become the "new" industry?
The revolution in the 50s was both the creation of a new way of creating/producing music and new styles of music. Will the one we're going through at the moment produce new music as well, or are we already so open to new things that nothing will appear to other than the way you buy stuff?
* If iTunes did start going that direction there will be more legal wranglings with the Beatles label, Apple (Arl). The last battle had Arl claiming that the itunes store was too close to previous agreements that Apple computers wouldn't go into the music industry.
In the 50s the music industry in the UK revolved around music hall and big band dancehalls; the BBC refusing to play anything that wasn't considered "proper" and banks of songwriters creating the music for the singers of the time. Bands and producers started to rebel and bands like the Beatles and The Shadows were able to get a foot hold.
It got me thinking about how interesting it would have been to live through a period of musical upheaval like that and wondered whether many people were even aware that it was going on until much later when everything had changed...
Will we look back in years to come at the next few years and say the same about the whole "digital revolution" and how it brought about huge changes to the music industy, or will everything just fizzle out as the big labels squeeze things tight and maintain control of all the outlets for music? Will iTunes (or something similar) start to release music* directly, bypassing any form of proper label and become the "new" industry?
The revolution in the 50s was both the creation of a new way of creating/producing music and new styles of music. Will the one we're going through at the moment produce new music as well, or are we already so open to new things that nothing will appear to other than the way you buy stuff?
* If iTunes did start going that direction there will be more legal wranglings with the Beatles label, Apple (Arl). The last battle had Arl claiming that the itunes store was too close to previous agreements that Apple computers wouldn't go into the music industry.