oops i did it again, or, some problems with the music industry
preface: i'm trying to get drunk off of beer
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while reading the latest issue of Q magazine today, i came across an article entitled "guitars are killing pop" and the subheading "soon, teen pop stars could be an extinct species. arctic monkeys largely to blame/thank."
the article goes on to document the (albeit temporary) "demise" of "pop" music (paying particular attention to the sugababes (who also happened to appear on this issue's complimentary cd... hmmm)) as a direct result of the resurgence of guitar driven music. apparently, in the world of Q, the inclusion of a guitar in a band=rock. so henceforth, consider "pop band" to mean music along the lines of bsb, nsync, britney, xtina, sugababes, etc, and "guitar band" to mean anything from, oh, say, arctic monkeys to pearl jam.
for the most part, the article is contradictory, illogical and half-witted, but in all fairness, it did get me thinking, and getting quite frustrated. not only do they backtrack throughout the piece ("basically, pop's been done to death"/"pop is in serious decline"/"a major factor in pop's ailing fortunes is..." vs "right now, though, the genre has reverted back to its broadest definition, in which everyone from kaiser chiefs to sugababes are seen as pop bands. the term no longer just means teen-oriented girl or boy bands. once again 'pop' means 'popular'"... really? i thought you just said pop was dead/declining/ailing...apparently it's a multi-genre span of every possible musician that is selling records) but they are also avoiding the REAL question: is this a "problem" or is this inevitable? and more importantly, what comes next?
in my opinion, it's not so much a problem of pop's decline, but of the looming disposability of guitar (real?) music. the "cyclical nature" of the music industry would reassure us that it's only a matter of time before everything will return (though even this theory is flawed: what's happened to ska?) but the a.d.d. tendencies of the music industry and it's patrons leads me to believe that not only will we eventually lose interest in "guitar bands", but the whole genre of "rock" is being cheapened, depreciated, and wholly fucked over. are we about to see a renaissance in reality tv? will there be the next greatest rock-n-roll idol? (inxs tried this, i suppose, but also failed miserably. probably because they're inxs.)
maybe the problem lies not in the definition of rock-n-roll/rock and roll/rock itself (which basically limits it to its creation in the 50s); but in the notion that "rock-n-roll is fucking old" (as the streets point out in the song "hotel expressionism"). and it is. but the question is: can it come back? or have we developed a generation of hyperactive consumers for whom music literally goes in one ear and out the other?
as it stands now, there are already too many choices for "guitar bands". fans of the new wave of britpop (franz, kaiser, arctic monkeys, etc) find themselves with even MORE choices (the editors/subway/zutons/futureheads/dirty pretty things/etc). but honestly, how much longer can we deal with bands whose music is described as grimy?
and are any of these groups classic? will they be? has there been any debut/sophomore/junior album by any group in the past 5 years that is considered timeless? even the sleepy steamroller of coldplay was quelled by comparisons to u2, un-innovative songs, and gwyneth/apple/moses. and it also stands as accepted that most bands will inevitably self-dissolve within a matter of years, lending to a sort of unsteady, undedicated relationship between band and fan.
there's a sort of reassurance nowadays, that if you don't like the current musical selections playing on your local mainstream rock and/or indie stations, give it a week or two, and another band will emerge (probably with a "the" in their name) who you might begin to like or at least convince yourself to like in the meanwhile. you'll download some of their songs. maybe buy the cd. watch them on fuse if you remember. and maybe, maybe you'll go to the show if the lead singer and/or bassist is cute enough, or the tickets cost under $30. but you aren't going for the MUSIC, you're going because you can, and maybe because you feel obligated.
(tangent: the polarity between the concert culture of our generation and our parent's generation is astounding, and i do respect festival organizers like mean fiddler for attempting to recreate the sort of harmonious celebration of sharing a live experience with a band and with fellow fans.)
unfortunately, as keriann has pointed out about the world of blogs, everybody is talking, and nobody is listening. or, in this case, everybody is playing and everybody is hearing, but nobody is listening. and there is a difference.
i’m also frustrated by this bizarre need to constantly pigeonhole bands into different subgenres. i always get flustered when i try to describe bands like muse and franz ferdinand, and the conversations usually go as follows:
"what are you listening to?"
"this british band, called muse"
"oh... what kind of music is it?"
"um... well... kind of space rock. or prog rock."
"like radiohead?"
OR
"what are you listening to?"
"this british band, called franz ferdinand"
"oh... what kind of music is it?"
"um... well... kind of pop rock. or art rock"
"like the strokes?"
now, i'm not a big fan of classifying music into genres, because it's too easy to write off a band simply on the premise of who they might sound like. and you also run the very real risk of alienating anyone who's threatened by red herring words like "art", "prog" or "space" simply because they seem pretentious (which is a whole OTHER problem with the music industry today).
perhaps nobody can be great unless they're mimicking something that already is great (a problem the monkeys are currently experiencing in trying to break america, according to the word). maybe this is why oasis is still successful (but this doesn’t appease the problem of everything sounding like everything else).
so pop has been done to death and britpop/britrock is having a bit of resurgence. but don’t get too settled; for it's inevitable that this will be over in a matter of years as well.
and think of the bands; their lifespans are getting shorter… can this be repaired? what if bands who would’ve at one time been together for decades consider longevity to be holding it together for a matter of months? this sort of “band temping” also does not help the situation of un-classic music.
this isn’t to say, however, that bands don’t want to be around forever. many musicians are taking matters into their own (puppeteered) hands in an attempt to extend their playtime. Q discusses this, looking at how musicians are “rethinking their approach” toward production and execution, though timberlake hiring rick rubin is about as avant-garde as timberland producing tracks for nelly furtado. nothing is surprising anymore, and nothing is divided anymore.
and so i wonder, what’s the way to go? perhaps fusion music like the streets or gnarls barkley is truly the next big thing, as they’ve managed to avoid the whole guitar/pop issue altogether.
or perhaps we can have another go at disco?
------------------------------------------
while reading the latest issue of Q magazine today, i came across an article entitled "guitars are killing pop" and the subheading "soon, teen pop stars could be an extinct species. arctic monkeys largely to blame/thank."
the article goes on to document the (albeit temporary) "demise" of "pop" music (paying particular attention to the sugababes (who also happened to appear on this issue's complimentary cd... hmmm)) as a direct result of the resurgence of guitar driven music. apparently, in the world of Q, the inclusion of a guitar in a band=rock. so henceforth, consider "pop band" to mean music along the lines of bsb, nsync, britney, xtina, sugababes, etc, and "guitar band" to mean anything from, oh, say, arctic monkeys to pearl jam.
for the most part, the article is contradictory, illogical and half-witted, but in all fairness, it did get me thinking, and getting quite frustrated. not only do they backtrack throughout the piece ("basically, pop's been done to death"/"pop is in serious decline"/"a major factor in pop's ailing fortunes is..." vs "right now, though, the genre has reverted back to its broadest definition, in which everyone from kaiser chiefs to sugababes are seen as pop bands. the term no longer just means teen-oriented girl or boy bands. once again 'pop' means 'popular'"... really? i thought you just said pop was dead/declining/ailing...apparently it's a multi-genre span of every possible musician that is selling records) but they are also avoiding the REAL question: is this a "problem" or is this inevitable? and more importantly, what comes next?
in my opinion, it's not so much a problem of pop's decline, but of the looming disposability of guitar (real?) music. the "cyclical nature" of the music industry would reassure us that it's only a matter of time before everything will return (though even this theory is flawed: what's happened to ska?) but the a.d.d. tendencies of the music industry and it's patrons leads me to believe that not only will we eventually lose interest in "guitar bands", but the whole genre of "rock" is being cheapened, depreciated, and wholly fucked over. are we about to see a renaissance in reality tv? will there be the next greatest rock-n-roll idol? (inxs tried this, i suppose, but also failed miserably. probably because they're inxs.)
maybe the problem lies not in the definition of rock-n-roll/rock and roll/rock itself (which basically limits it to its creation in the 50s); but in the notion that "rock-n-roll is fucking old" (as the streets point out in the song "hotel expressionism"). and it is. but the question is: can it come back? or have we developed a generation of hyperactive consumers for whom music literally goes in one ear and out the other?
as it stands now, there are already too many choices for "guitar bands". fans of the new wave of britpop (franz, kaiser, arctic monkeys, etc) find themselves with even MORE choices (the editors/subway/zutons/futureheads/dirty pretty things/etc). but honestly, how much longer can we deal with bands whose music is described as grimy?
and are any of these groups classic? will they be? has there been any debut/sophomore/junior album by any group in the past 5 years that is considered timeless? even the sleepy steamroller of coldplay was quelled by comparisons to u2, un-innovative songs, and gwyneth/apple/moses. and it also stands as accepted that most bands will inevitably self-dissolve within a matter of years, lending to a sort of unsteady, undedicated relationship between band and fan.
there's a sort of reassurance nowadays, that if you don't like the current musical selections playing on your local mainstream rock and/or indie stations, give it a week or two, and another band will emerge (probably with a "the" in their name) who you might begin to like or at least convince yourself to like in the meanwhile. you'll download some of their songs. maybe buy the cd. watch them on fuse if you remember. and maybe, maybe you'll go to the show if the lead singer and/or bassist is cute enough, or the tickets cost under $30. but you aren't going for the MUSIC, you're going because you can, and maybe because you feel obligated.
(tangent: the polarity between the concert culture of our generation and our parent's generation is astounding, and i do respect festival organizers like mean fiddler for attempting to recreate the sort of harmonious celebration of sharing a live experience with a band and with fellow fans.)
unfortunately, as keriann has pointed out about the world of blogs, everybody is talking, and nobody is listening. or, in this case, everybody is playing and everybody is hearing, but nobody is listening. and there is a difference.
i’m also frustrated by this bizarre need to constantly pigeonhole bands into different subgenres. i always get flustered when i try to describe bands like muse and franz ferdinand, and the conversations usually go as follows:
"what are you listening to?"
"this british band, called muse"
"oh... what kind of music is it?"
"um... well... kind of space rock. or prog rock."
"like radiohead?"
OR
"what are you listening to?"
"this british band, called franz ferdinand"
"oh... what kind of music is it?"
"um... well... kind of pop rock. or art rock"
"like the strokes?"
now, i'm not a big fan of classifying music into genres, because it's too easy to write off a band simply on the premise of who they might sound like. and you also run the very real risk of alienating anyone who's threatened by red herring words like "art", "prog" or "space" simply because they seem pretentious (which is a whole OTHER problem with the music industry today).
perhaps nobody can be great unless they're mimicking something that already is great (a problem the monkeys are currently experiencing in trying to break america, according to the word). maybe this is why oasis is still successful (but this doesn’t appease the problem of everything sounding like everything else).
so pop has been done to death and britpop/britrock is having a bit of resurgence. but don’t get too settled; for it's inevitable that this will be over in a matter of years as well.
and think of the bands; their lifespans are getting shorter… can this be repaired? what if bands who would’ve at one time been together for decades consider longevity to be holding it together for a matter of months? this sort of “band temping” also does not help the situation of un-classic music.
this isn’t to say, however, that bands don’t want to be around forever. many musicians are taking matters into their own (puppeteered) hands in an attempt to extend their playtime. Q discusses this, looking at how musicians are “rethinking their approach” toward production and execution, though timberlake hiring rick rubin is about as avant-garde as timberland producing tracks for nelly furtado. nothing is surprising anymore, and nothing is divided anymore.
and so i wonder, what’s the way to go? perhaps fusion music like the streets or gnarls barkley is truly the next big thing, as they’ve managed to avoid the whole guitar/pop issue altogether.
or perhaps we can have another go at disco?