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----- Original Message -----
From: "Tom Fine" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2011 8:17 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] RIP rock n roll
> Hi David:
>
> I hear what you're saying, but I've often been disappointed by amateurish
> "garage" bands. There have been some gems over the years, and indeed
> Rhino, Sundazed and others have made an honest living mining the vaults.
> Having been raised with a lot of classical and jazz music, I expect a
> decent level of musicianship from rock and blues artists. Many fall short,
> but when that exciting music is combined with excellent musicianship, even
> on "simple" music like was played by Buddy Holly and Elvis Presely, it's a
> beautiful thing. Even back in my youth, I was often disappointed by how
> poorly my favorite rock bands performed in a live setting. But, there were
> some wonderful surprises. When tickets cost a couple dozen dollars max, it
> was OK to go and check many out and wait for the few surprises. At
> hundreds of dollars, forget it. As for small-venue live music, there is
> none out here in the 'burbs, just really amateurish cover bands here and
> there. Also, the loudness level that rock and blues are typically
> performed precludes me going anywhere near these live venues without heavy
> ear protection. I can't afford to lose any hearing by my own doing, time
> and nature are doing it to me beyond my control.
>
> One other thing, with the collapse of the record business, playing arenas
> actually IS a pre-requisite to the kind of success that was the norm in
> previous times. And it's expected of any band being given any upfront
> money by what's left of the "major companies" in a "360 deal".
>
> I'm really happy that finally some critics called the hand of these
> dinosaurs on the mailed-in performances and high ticket prices. I saw the
> Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson minor-league ballpark tour a few years ago and
> they were both mailing it in back then. At least you could understand what
> Willie was singing, and even though it was basically the same show he had
> been doing for 20 years, he still did it well. Dylan was unintelligable
> and the band behind him was sloppy and inept. And it was so loud that it
> was ear-damaging even with protective foam in. We left soon after he
> started "performing." Hint to aging rockers -- when you need to "fill out"
> your band with people younger than your children in order to produce
> enough noise to hold attention in a stadium, it's time to retire. I would
> argue that the typical trappings of a rock performance get ridiculous when
> you get into your 40's and are outright embarassing when you're eligable
> for Medicare. It's a young man's game, know the rules and play by them.
>
> -- Tom Fine
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "David Lewis" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2011 7:52 AM
> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] RIP rock n roll
>
>
>> Tom,
>>
>> Thanks for sending. It *is* thought-provoking, though like you I would
>> have
>> said around 2000 the well was already dry. In response, though, I would
>> say
>> that you can sidestep the arena experience altogether by checking out
>> bands
>> that never made it to that level. A fair number of those groups have done
>> so
>> by choice and still put on a mighty good show. Playing arena shows is not
>> a
>> pre-requisite to artistic success in rock music, and the very idea that
>> this
>> is so is one of the many elements that helped to doom the form at the top
>> level. However, the band traveling in a car, playing for $100 guarantees
>> and
>> a portion of the door remains a sustainable business model. Groups
>> willing
>> to put up with such discomfort are doing so because they want to have an
>> audience for their work, and sometimes this means better music, though it
>> is
>> not neccessarily an attraction for those who feel they've had their needs
>> met, somewhere along the way, by the 50-plus-year heritage of rock music.
>>
>> One thing he didn't address was that in the 1980s there was a shift
>> between
>> supply and demand; in the 1960s, demand was high and supply was such that
>> just about anyone claiming to be a pop musician could make records and
>> even
>> get signed to at least middle-level recording deals; certainly not all
>> were,
>> but the possibility was there. While front office types have always had a
>> hand in cultivating to some extent what gets recorded, the grass roots
>> artist pool still enjoyed a lot of freedom and were, for the most part,
>> left
>> alone to create what they wanted. This became somewhat jaundiced in the
>> 1970s, with artists doing double-live LPs no one wanted and utilizing
>> other
>> strategies to get out of their record contracts, not to mention throwing
>> huge parties in order to celebrate the release of albums that ultimately
>> wound up in the cutout bins. These excesses delivered huge losses to the
>> pop
>> music industry and even brought down a major player, ABC, in 1978. The
>> record companies became far more careful afterward.
>>
>> The majors, at least, were not successful in dealing
>> with emerging grass roots trends around 1980 and decided instead to
>> cultivate their own pop artists, with MTV taking a major role in getting
>> this out to the masses, a calculated plan to divest the business of radio
>> and to control trends in pop music. Then you had artists at the grass
>> roots
>> cultivating their own plans to create something that would appeal to the
>> suits at the record companies. That the form got diluted, and stale, was
>> inevitable. The re-emergence of the grass roots style of 1980 that came
>> along in 1991 or so only helped to temporarily stave off rock's eventual
>> bust. Add to that the killing off of the common single -- a format in
>> which
>> people could enjoy a hit in a manner convenient and inexpensive to
>> them --
>> and you have the golden goose with its entrails hanging out of it. As
>> Carl
>> Sandburg once put it, "The lawyers, Bob, they know too much..."
>>
>> David "Uncle Dave" Lewis
>> Lebanon, OH
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Jan 4, 2011 at 6:48 AM, Tom Fine
>> <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
>>
>>> http://www.jazzwax.com/2011/01/rock-and-roll-1949-2011.html
>>>
>>> even if you don't agree with all of this essay, it's thought-provoking.
>>> I
>>> would have written an obit for anything new and original called rock
>>> music
>>> 10 years ago, but Meyers makes a good point that the Geriatric Stadium
>>> Tours
>>> (some actually sponsored by Viagara) kept filling the coffers and thus
>>> kept
>>> rock in a living-dead zombie state for an extra decade. Personally, I
>>> find
>>> 60+ rockers spilling out of their spandex and limping around a stadium
>>> with
>>> tickets costing over $100 more pathetic than all the poseurs and
>>> copy-cats
>>> making up the "new" performers in the genre. At least a few of the "new"
>>> performers are good musicians, worth listening to on that point alone.
>>> Rock
>>> is definitely a young man's game, but two generations of young men (and
>>> women) have dropped the ball and just fed off the old carcass. My
>>> theory --
>>> rock got suburbanized and where is there any drama or struggle in a
>>> suburban
>>> experience, so therefore no cause for new and rebelious musical
>>> directions.
>>>
>>> Those of us who love rock and jazz, and for that matter blues, and
>>> lament
>>> the death of anything new and original in any of those genres can at
>>> least
>>> revel in the fact that all three styles lived all or most of their lives
>>> in
>>> the era of recordings and almost every "for the ages" song was captured
>>> on a
>>> musically-satisfying recording at some point. I have enough CDs, LPs and
>>> downloads to keep me rocking for the rest of my days, even if I'm
>>> keeping
>>> beat from a wheelchair.
>>>
>>> -- Tom Fine
>>>
>>
>
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