TitaniumTroy
Well-Known Member
Interesting, thanks
Is it finally time to declare the Rock and Roll era over?
- Thread starter Flint
- Start date
And it is happening right before our eyes!
Rock and Roll performances are shifting away from being creative presentations of new music. Instead, we are seeing thousands of performances of old classics by extremely talented musicians who both want to capture the energy and essence of the original recordings/performances using modern technologies to record and transmit the music. The imitate the parts we love and which define the greatness of the originals, and they update the parts we wish had been better on the originals, such as the clarity of the mix or individual instruments.
We saw with the Russian band, Leonid and Friends, who mastered the genius that was Chicago - Leonid and Friends are selling out venues all over the USA at this point and making stars out of all the musicians. Here's a band doing an amazing Genesis medley, and it is great!
Because we are old, we call these bands "cover bands", but they are far more than that.
In the same way most people never heard Beethoven or Mozart perform their own music, in the near future our love of a great live performance, watching amazing musicians, and the emotional journey the music can take us on, will lead to more of these artists simply performing the amazing music that made rock and roll so influential in our lives and society. In the same way the amazing creative jazz era of the 40's through early 70's ended and now we see young jazz combos performing Coltrane, Miles, the Duke, and oter legendary artists' music, we will see more rock ensembles doing the same.
Just like we go to the symphony to see/hear Purcell's music being performed, we will start going to the concert halls and stadiums to see/hear our favorite rock band's music being performed. We can go see a band to Chicago at a level we never thought possible. The band in the video above could easy go on tour performing Genesis like that and make huge audiences extremely happy. There are more and more will be added.
This is the end of the Rock and Roll era where the re-creation of classic music is better and more entertaining than the new stuff coming out.
Rock is dead!
Long live rock!
Rock and Roll performances are shifting away from being creative presentations of new music. Instead, we are seeing thousands of performances of old classics by extremely talented musicians who both want to capture the energy and essence of the original recordings/performances using modern technologies to record and transmit the music. The imitate the parts we love and which define the greatness of the originals, and they update the parts we wish had been better on the originals, such as the clarity of the mix or individual instruments.
We saw with the Russian band, Leonid and Friends, who mastered the genius that was Chicago - Leonid and Friends are selling out venues all over the USA at this point and making stars out of all the musicians. Here's a band doing an amazing Genesis medley, and it is great!
Because we are old, we call these bands "cover bands", but they are far more than that.
In the same way most people never heard Beethoven or Mozart perform their own music, in the near future our love of a great live performance, watching amazing musicians, and the emotional journey the music can take us on, will lead to more of these artists simply performing the amazing music that made rock and roll so influential in our lives and society. In the same way the amazing creative jazz era of the 40's through early 70's ended and now we see young jazz combos performing Coltrane, Miles, the Duke, and oter legendary artists' music, we will see more rock ensembles doing the same.
Just like we go to the symphony to see/hear Purcell's music being performed, we will start going to the concert halls and stadiums to see/hear our favorite rock band's music being performed. We can go see a band to Chicago at a level we never thought possible. The band in the video above could easy go on tour performing Genesis like that and make huge audiences extremely happy. There are more and more will be added.
This is the end of the Rock and Roll era where the re-creation of classic music is better and more entertaining than the new stuff coming out.
Rock is dead!
Long live rock!
A friend of mine saw Leonid and Friends and said they are amazing. I myself and a big fan of Yacht Rock Revue, another such act. The number of these groups seems to be growing steadily and I think I'm okay with that. Rock, like Classical and Jazz before it, reached full maturity where there was little new ground left to break. There are still good bands out there making new music that I like, but none of it is breaking new ground. The same thing applies to blues. I love Samantha Fish, but is she really doing anything new?
And it is okay to say Rock is dead, because it is. It started showing signs of dying over a decade ago and at this point I doubt you can name one new band doing anything new and interesting and highly desirable. That isn't to say new music isn't being made, it is. But, does any of the new rock music move the soul of a generation the way the Beatles, Led Zepplin, Aerosmith, or REM did back in the day?
This may have already been discussed in this thread.
The argument made on Volume Radio is that Hip Hop is doing that very thing and Hip Hop is kind of Rock and Roll. The other day they were talking about Mumble Rap(? I think that is what it was called) and one of the guys said his kids listened to it and he just didn't get it. The other guy said "You aren't supposed to, that is the point" and that is kind of rock and roll right there.
Semantics I know, and I don't agree that Hip Hop is Rock nor was disco but...
I would never put Hip Hop in the Rock and Roll genre. There was some crossover in Disco from Rock and Roll, but that wasn't the norm.
But, just the same, even the kids aren't listening to anything which could potentially put into the Rock and Roll category. In fact, most kids who like Rock and Roll are listening to the music from the past.
I agree with you 100% and I don't consider Hip Hop to be Rock and Roll either, just my humble opinion, unless you consider all the Rock and Roll that is sampled in Hip Hop.
On the second point, I agree again that (the majority of) kids aren't really listening to anything that I would put in the Rock and Roll category, but Hip Hop is doing the same thing generationally that Rock and Roll did to and for us.
There are a few bands out there making some rock and roll waves but as discussed previously the Greta Van Fleet's are redoing what has already been done, and other than that I completely agree that most kids that are listening to Rock are listening to old(er) rock.
Halestorm has a decent following, but they've been around since 2005. Mastodon, Foo Fighters and others are also out there making decent new music, but most of those bands have been around 20+ years. For some reason, metal still has a huge fan base and there are a bunch of more recent bands in that space that are doing fine.
Having said that, are any of these bands really doing anything new at this point? The music can be popular, sell records, rack up youtube hits and fill concert venues, but is it innovating? Is it part of the cultural zeitgeist in the broader sense? I think the answer to both questions is no.
Remember when Sinatra was in his 70s and still touring, still filling venues? That was the last gasp of the jazz standard and the same is happening to rock right now. I hate hip hop in much the same way that my grandparents probably hated rock. I don't get it and I don't like it, but I'm almost 50. Rock was the music of the Silent, Boomer and X Generations. The world has moved on.
I think there are two separate issues here: 1) creation of new genres, and 2) pushing boundaries within a particular genre. Lots of people are doing #2 as far as I'm concerned - J.B. within contemporary blues / blues-rock, for example (just picking one case totally out of the air 
). But #1... well that's a different story. Yeah I kind of agree that EDM is an instance of this. But I disagree with the idea that a genre is "dead" just because it's been around for a while. Granted the new-ness may be a bit more subtle... Anyway, my point is that the search for "new" is different for different people.
). But #1... well that's a different story. Yeah I kind of agree that EDM is an instance of this. But I disagree with the idea that a genre is "dead" just because it's been around for a while. Granted the new-ness may be a bit more subtle... Anyway, my point is that the search for "new" is different for different people.
I can only laugh at the response that there is one new Rock band, or two, you like which proves that Rock and Roll hasn't died. My entire point is that 40 years ago there were over a hundred new bands putting out amazing new music which sold like gangbusters and defined and era. Are there any bands defining today's era which fall into the Rock and Roll genre? I say, no.
That said, of course this is an continuum. It isn't like one day rock died and nothing new and worthy will ever be produced. As many artists are also saying, the genre was always very limiting in nature and the all possibilities an artist can explore can be argued to have been thoroughly played out. That's sorta what happened with Classical Orchestral music, it is what happened with the original Country genre, it happened with Big Band, it happened with blues, it happened with Western music, it has happened with Bluegrass, and now I believe we can see that it happened with Rock and Roll starting about 15 years ago.
I mean, look at the School of Rock - what do those kids perform when they get to show what they've learned. 99% of the time it is some tune from over 40 years ago.
I spoke to about 50 concert goers who attended ACL this month and I asked every single one of them which acts they were most excited to see. Not a single person, none, not one, mentioned a recent rock band. A couple did mention Guns-N-Roses, but they burned out by the ear 90s. Who they all said they wanted to see were Childish Gambino, Lizzo, Cardi B, and Billie Eilish. That is evidence that Rock and Roll is dying, not healthy and still moving the youths of America.
This isn't rocket science, significant portions of music lovers are no longer clamoring for new rock music. They are, however, gluttonously consuming pop-R&B, Corporate Hip Hop, and EDM. As for live shows, EDM is the biggest and the new "rock stars" are mostly DJs.
I am happy to declare rock dead and still buy my Euro-Goth-Metal-Rock music and Prog Rock and Power Pop from my favorite performers. But I know I am in a tiny community of people who still buy those songs. That's fine. I am actually quite enjoying modern bands re-imagining the music that shaped me from the 80s, 70s, and 60s. I am not looking forward to the amazing recreation of Nickleback or 311, but other than all that crap that came out during the waning days of Rock, this is a good thing.
That said, of course this is an continuum. It isn't like one day rock died and nothing new and worthy will ever be produced. As many artists are also saying, the genre was always very limiting in nature and the all possibilities an artist can explore can be argued to have been thoroughly played out. That's sorta what happened with Classical Orchestral music, it is what happened with the original Country genre, it happened with Big Band, it happened with blues, it happened with Western music, it has happened with Bluegrass, and now I believe we can see that it happened with Rock and Roll starting about 15 years ago.
I mean, look at the School of Rock - what do those kids perform when they get to show what they've learned. 99% of the time it is some tune from over 40 years ago.
I spoke to about 50 concert goers who attended ACL this month and I asked every single one of them which acts they were most excited to see. Not a single person, none, not one, mentioned a recent rock band. A couple did mention Guns-N-Roses, but they burned out by the ear 90s. Who they all said they wanted to see were Childish Gambino, Lizzo, Cardi B, and Billie Eilish. That is evidence that Rock and Roll is dying, not healthy and still moving the youths of America.
This isn't rocket science, significant portions of music lovers are no longer clamoring for new rock music. They are, however, gluttonously consuming pop-R&B, Corporate Hip Hop, and EDM. As for live shows, EDM is the biggest and the new "rock stars" are mostly DJs.
I am happy to declare rock dead and still buy my Euro-Goth-Metal-Rock music and Prog Rock and Power Pop from my favorite performers. But I know I am in a tiny community of people who still buy those songs. That's fine. I am actually quite enjoying modern bands re-imagining the music that shaped me from the 80s, 70s, and 60s. I am not looking forward to the amazing recreation of Nickleback or 311, but other than all that crap that came out during the waning days of Rock, this is a good thing.
I admit that I may misunderstand but I perceive that you are defining the "life" of a genre as tied to commercial success, I do not agree with that at all.
As long as a genre of music is being played and enjoyed by people it is not dead.
So, as long as Churches are singing Hymn's written in the 18th Century we are still in the era of 18th Century Hymns?
My argument is no different than any "art" era. In painting arts, the Impressionist Era is commonly assumed to have run from about 1800 to 1930. The Renaissance Art era runs from the early 1400's to the mid-1500's. In classical music we have many eras: Medieval 50 - 1400; Renaissance 1400 - 1600; Baroque 1600 - 1760; Classical 1730 - 1820; Romantic 1780 - 1910; Modernist 1890 - 1950; Postmodern / Contemporary 1930 - present. Poetry has eras, including the great Beatnik era of the 30's - 60's. Literature has eras. All forms of art can generally be categorized by the early invention of a style, technique, tools, method, and audience which is then explored and perfected by later contributors which eventually fades and dies when new creativity is almost always seen as copying or blatantly reminiscent of the past and unoriginal or uninteresting.
Ahh I did no realize you were equating "dead" music" with the end of an era.
There was a Bluegrass "era" and that has passed I will give you that. but the fact that thousands of people go to hundreds of bluegrass festivals every year indicates to me that bluegrass is far from dead.
In the end it makes no difference. It is discussion for discussion's sake. People listen to what they like and for them it is "alive". That seems fine to me.
Yes, this is a discussion for discussion's sake. 90% of the threads on this forum are discussions for discussions sake usually because someone is interesting in having a discussion about something they are interested in.
That is a fair point and perhaps a more accurate description of the situation. I think it is safe to say that the rock era is over.
lol Well this has boiled down into an argument about what "dead" means in "Rock is dead." Flint seems to be taking the position that dead means that it's not the go-to music for the current teen/young adult generation like it was for many of us here. Granted. (and commercial success is linked to that in practice.)
I was making the point that it's not "dead" as long as there are still even a few people creating new music in the genre.
mzpro says it's not dead as long as people are still enjoying the music whether or not it's recently written/recorded.
So who's right? We all are, as usual.
I was making the point that it's not "dead" as long as there are still even a few people creating new music in the genre.
mzpro says it's not dead as long as people are still enjoying the music whether or not it's recently written/recorded.
So who's right? We all are, as usual.
Nah, to me "dead" means completely irrelevant and forgotten. I would say, rather, that rock has expanded to fill just about all the available space, after its initial explosion/expansion. (physics metaphor) But that doesn't mean it's gone.
