A Little bit of Theory

Ditto on that Polly. You are a girl after my own heart. I almost cried when I read that post. lol

...I lvoe it when being a radical becomes so commonplace that the only thing to do is rebel against it.

I think we're all in agreement that Polly is probably one of the most philosophical here. P:

Again, Kurt Cobain. He hated the "rebels" in punk and he fought them, but ended up being a 'true' rebel. Nirvana had an interesting impact on music...

Hey, sorry Steely for not giving you the credit for pointing out that rock music is increasingly looking backwards at itself. Good observation.

The 'net - especially YouTube and MySpace - does raise my hopes that the power of the industry will be reduced. However, I've seen more and more high quality clips appearing on Youtube, headed by advertising. Again, corporations are using their advantage of high quality production.

I hate how we've become so hung up on production. Think of all those jazz recordings from the 30s right through to the 60s - Satchmo, Duke, Goodman, Bird, Miles, Trane etc. Or rock from the 60s - Beatles, Stones, Jimi, Janis, Doors, Floyd, Turtles. The production is total crap when compared with today's pop music but who cares? The music was FANTASTIC!

Yet plenty of younger people do care because their ears expect "better" - very discerning about the things that cost $$, so much so that it matters more to them than the things that money can't buy.

Yes, the internet is readily expanding the indie part of the music scene- but, take it from one of those indie guys, we're using what we have so we can get closer to the industry itself. We're interested in being able to make our music a living, whether it brands us as "sellouts" or not.

Well, Abbey Road sounds pretty good, even for today's standards... ._.

Ah, those Audiophiles.

We're certainly seeing signs of it. We're seeing few "big names" selling umpteen million copies of any one album, yet hundred upon hundreds of bands are able to sell a few thousand copies, and more underground genre's of music are getting small bits of mainstream recognition because it sells just enough to not be ignored.

I remember being 11 or so, and thinking Ozzy and Judas Priest were so extreme. Now, they get played on classic rock radio along side the The Beatles and the Stones, and I think nothing of letting my 3 yr old listen to them.

Again, indie is going up, big and shiny is going down. At least for heavy music(rock to metal).

I think another observation made in this thread was the ever-evolving definition of "shocking". Years from now Marilyn Manson and Slipknot will be like Judas Priest and Ozzy, in the "Nostalgia Radio" library.

It makes you wonder what will be next, what will be considered shocking after the current shockers are outdated.
 
Organic music is not dead and will not die! There are many of us who will keep it alive, not just the older generations who grew up with it. The only reason younger people go for it is because they don't know any different. They can and will learn. This has been my personal experience, and I see no reason why it shouldn't be duplicated for many others.
 
Again, I think a big part of music over the last 20 years is the preference of emotion over technique.
Excellent way to put it. I can totally agree with you on this. I would also like to add or possibly change "technique" to "complexity." But all in all, I think you've got it summed up quite well.
 
I think another observation made in this thread was the ever-evolving definition of "shocking". Years from now Marilyn Manson and Slipknot will be like Judas Priest and Ozzy, in the "Nostalgia Radio" library.

It makes you wonder what will be next, what will be considered shocking after the current shockers are outdated.

As has come up here and there in other threads, extreme metal is so extreme at this point, it's really a wonder how much further it can go. We already have black metal bands who've been to jail for burning churches, real blood on stage, playing to the point where it's getting tougher to distinguish one note from another, and one band's singer killed himself, and the remaining members made necklaces from his skull. Of course, much of this is still relatively out of the mainstream.
 
As has come up here and there in other threads, extreme metal is so extreme at this point, it's really a wonder how much further it can go. We already have black metal bands who've been to jail for burning churches, real blood on stage, playing to the point where it's getting tougher to distinguish one note from another, and one band's singer killed himself, and the remaining members made necklaces from his skull. Of course, much of this is still relatively out of the mainstream.

OMG, I knew some of the bands were waaay extreme but necklaces made from a suicidal singer's skull?? I'm wondering how much mental illness will be required in the future? Imagine if a band like that is considered ho hum! lol

As I said horror moves have gone the same way. What happens when screens are totally awash with violence and gore? My guess is the extremities will remain - once a standard is established then the barriers are down so they'll always be there. There will always be classical, jazz, C&W, folk, blues, rock'n'roll, psychedelic, RnB, soul, prog, hair metal, rap, shiny pop, techno, extreme metal ... just that each has faded - or will fade - slowly into minority interests as new stuff takes its place.

I can't even imagine where music will go from here ... apart from glossy mechanical pop, which will get ever more glossy and mechanical until the human element is negligible. There will always be retro/nostalgia movements too because each genre has intrinsic values that will always touch certain types of personalities.

There also seems to be a strong shift from the aural to the visual with the increased ease of home video production. Video is getting bigger and bigger. Pop fans increasingly want to "see" the music, to the point where bands are now putting how high production dance shows and mime to recordings.
 
OMG, I knew some of the bands were waaay extreme but necklaces made from a suicidal singer's skull?? I'm wondering how much mental illness will be required in the future? Imagine if a band like that is considered ho hum! lol

As I said horror moves have gone the same way. What happens when screens are totally awash with violence and gore? My guess is the extremities will remain - once a standard is established then the barriers are down so they'll always be there. There will always be classical, jazz, C&W, folk, blues, rock'n'roll, psychedelic, RnB, soul, prog, hair metal, rap, shiny pop, techno, extreme metal ... just that each has faded - or will fade - slowly into minority interests as new stuff takes its place.

I can't even imagine where music will go from here ... apart from glossy mechanical pop, which will get ever more glossy and mechanical until the human element is negligible. There will always be retro/nostalgia movements too because each genre has intrinsic values that will always touch certain types of personalities.

There also seems to be a strong shift from the aural to the visual with the increased ease of home video production. Video is getting bigger and bigger. Pop fans increasingly want to "see" the music, to the point where bands are now putting how high production dance shows and mime to recordings.

Black Metal: yes, it's covered here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_metal#Ohlin.27s_suicide
and if you get a chance to see this on late night cable, part of the film gets into this as well:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0478209/

Yes, I do wonder where music will go. No one had heard of jazz at one point. We can pinpoint when rock and roll was invented. So from a historical perspective, it seems any day now something new will be invented that has nothing to do with rock and roll. Although some say rap/hip-hop was indeed that new invention.

As for "seeing music" I'm actually getting more fascinated by the idea. In the 80's and 90's, you couldn't make a music video without a huge budget, and even then, you weren't sure where it would get played. If you made a cheap video, you were probably going to get laughed at.

Then Youtube came along, and it became perfectly acceptable to make a music video using whatever cheap camera you have laying around. Quality was no longer a factor, because youtube is going to compress the hell out of the video file anyway.
I found this rather eye opening. And so my band made three videos, and all it cost me was $80 in video editing software.
 
We're certainly seeing signs of it. We're seeing few "big names" selling umpteen million copies of any one album, yet hundred upon hundreds of bands are able to sell a few thousand copies, and more underground genre's of music are getting small bits of mainstream recognition because it sells just enough to not be ignored.





I remember being 11 or so, and thinking Ozzy and Judas Priest were so extreme. Now, they get played on classic rock radio along side the The Beatles and the Stones, and I think nothing of letting my 3 yr old listen to them.

It's an interesting place to be in. You had that song I'm Yours by Jason Mraz, which was huge and holds the record for the most weeks spent at the the Top 100 with 76. Will you ever have another West Side Story, thriller or Beatles? It's hard to say. But i would think if someone had a huge amount of talent, they could take the world by storm.

You have bands going back to Dave Matthews, Radiohead, Dream Theater, Tool or Arcade Fire. That virtually came up on their own two feet. You see so many of these indie bands, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, and so many of these Brooklyn bands. I don't really listen to that music, and although they are right here near me, I never hear about them until they are big in London. lol

In the 1970s you had The Grateful Dead, The Band, King Crimson, Yes or Rush who were largely cult phenomena and remained as such. these notions of mainstream, indie, cult phenomena become so politicized. in the end, is the music any good?
 
For me, making eye contact with the crowd takes second stage to making sure I do what I need to do so that the audience can feel exactly what me and the band feels when we play this music.
Music is all about delivery of feeling, expressing whatever it is you wish to express. If you can get the audience moving and feeling with you, they arn't going to give two shits what you look like. Albeit stage presence is important, but for a drummer, just laying down the beat and holding things together is about as much as you can do.
To quote a band i mention a lot on this forum, Circa survive,
"It's the talent, not the promo shot."
In order of importance for a band:
Feeling then stage presence THEN looks/eye contact.
 
Will you ever have another West Side Story, thriller or Beatles? It's hard to say. But i would think if someone had a huge amount of talent, they could take the world by storm.

I think it's possible, but most likely not.

In years past, people had the radio and word or mouth. Then they could add in MTV. Many things became popular in part because people had no where else to focus their ears, so if something good came along, people knew about it.

Today, internet, myspace, satellite radio, etc, the options are so wide. One can focus on whatever they want and ignore what ever genres they want. There are so many different scenes that people can be a part of.

When I was a teen, I could pick up Modern Drummer and I'd knew who almost everyone was, because I saw them on MTV or heard them on the radio, or they were jazz legends. Today, heck, I don't know who 1/2 these bands are, nor do I even know where they would be featured, and I wonder why they don't mention the bands who's albums I am buying, because it's not like I only listen to classic rock.
 
Will you ever have another West Side Story, thriller or Beatles? It's hard to say. But i would think if someone had a huge amount of talent, they could take the world by storm.
I think it's possible, but most likely not.
I'd have to disagree. These big sensations have been around, but we just don't see it, much like those who didn't see it with the Beatles or Michael Jackson. When you watch the videos of kids crying over The Beatles and MJ, you can always catch a glimpse of some middle aged or older people in the background giving those kids dirty looks. ;p Lady Gaga is the craze right now. It seems like all the young folk love her. From my 2 year-old to my wife's cousins who are in college. We're just the old people in the background this time around. Also, it doesn't take talent. It never really did. Just the right sound, image, whatever at the right time and overall media support.
 
Speaking from a rock perspective, in the early 1990s the things that I thought were really hot were Primus and then The Red Hot Chili Peppers. I never was big on the Seattle seen, and really stopped listening to rock by the early 1990s.

From a selling point, it was Mariah Carey and then Celine Dion who were the big sellers, and Dianne Warren who wrote so many top 40 hits. By and large it was the women's movement, Sarah Mclachlan and Lilith Fair that it was making it happen. When I look at the artists I liked in the 1990s: TLC, Lauryn Hill, Sheryl Crow, Alanis Morrisette, all women. Dudes weren't doing much but moaning and groaning about their awful lot in life. Many people say that is what led the way to the Disney revolution. No one wanted to hear everyone whine after a while. When you are a rich and famous rock star and you're still moaning and groaning, no one really wants to hear it.

Lady Gaga seems like an attention hound. perhaps she should go see a shrink and spare us all. Artists need to be open minded. But is there a point at which musicians just need to call it for what it is and be pissed that people are using this art form solely for that kind of self-glorification?
 
I'd have to disagree. These big sensations have been around, but we just don't see it, much like those who didn't see it with the Beatles or Michael Jackson. When you watch the videos of kids crying over The Beatles and MJ, you can always catch a glimpse of some middle aged or older people in the background giving those kids dirty looks. ;p Lady Gaga is the craze right now. It seems like all the young folk love her. From my 2 year-old to my wife's cousins who are in college. We're just the old people in the background this time around. Also, it doesn't take talent. It never really did. Just the right sound, image, whatever at the right time and overall media support.

True, Lady Gaga is hot right now.

But per the RIAA, her albums have gone 3 times platinum. Which is a lot of sales, and most artists would cut off their right arm to have 3 million in sales.

But compared to Micheal Jackson or the Beatles, 3 million in sales is a drop in the bucket. The average Aerosmith album sells more copies.
 
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