I remember records, The Beatles and The Stones, and record shops. There were a finite number of sections representing different genres, and a seemingly finite, albeit by the seventies very vast, number of artists. Then came imports, compilations which differed from the local ones, different packaging, etc. Now the record store just isn't the same. First off, they don't sell records. Most of them haven't for years. Some of the more obscure artists have disappeared altogether, replaced by newer ones. It's easier now to find such artists online, if their material is still in print. It has been apparent for some time that this is the direction the music business is taking. It's far more convenient. As cool as the old record store was, the choices and sources for hearing and buying music are many times what any city's music shops can offer.
I see an opportunity for popular music to return to the way it was in the sixties and seventies, which in my opinion is different from the music today. The difference is the formulaic nature of modern music production, marketing which has led to the rise of superstars of mediocre talent, and a predictable, unadventurous product. No matter what genre of music you're talking about, even the most bad-boy rockers or gangstas are just pawns of the music industry. Music production has turned into something akin to the Hollywood schlock machine, grinding out tired, uninspiring, lackluster crap. In the music industry there is a saying: "You can't polish a turd." But in the last thirty or so years, it seems to me that there has been some prodigious turd polishing going on.
So what was different about the sixties? The system which exists today was in its infancy. There were actually producers who cared more about the sound, and the music than getting rich and sucking the life out of as many song writers that they could. George Martin, and Barry Gordy are good examples of this. There was far more experimentation. You never knew what was coming next. One day it was the Kinks, the next day it was The Supremes, Tiny Tim, or Ravi Shankar. It was fun and exciting. All sorts of music was becoming available from all over the world. Genres were being born: fusion, punk, heavy metal. Bands like The Beatles, Spirit, The Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin, The Ramones, DEVO, and too many more to name, were all reinventing rock with new techniques of composition. Whether it was improvisation as with the Dead, pioneering a new genre, like The Ramones, or DEVO, or blending or juxtaposing different music styles like Spirit, Led Zeppelin, and The Beatles. The Beatles also pioneered the use of instruments which were not typically used in rock music, and techniques like tape reversal, and musique concrete. I don't think people who weren't alive yet really realize the importance of The Beatles. They were primary innovators in popular music, who had an unprecedented effect on modern culture. They changed everything. But until the internet came along, there was a sort of bubble the consumer was in. This was the time of snail mail, land lines, and television only had six channels. The radio, and the music shop were your connections to the exciting world of music, but getting supplemental information about the musicians and the industry was essentially limited to print, either on the record jackets and liners, or in magazines and newspapers, and television shows or movies.
Perhaps the explosion of independent artists onto the internet will be a revival and extension of the popularity of music for the sake of music, and not for the sake of a prepackaged, marketed style. Perhaps we'll see new and interesting artists, untainted by what some executive thinks might sell more records. Obviously, the internet can bring you far more variety. The entire world is the audience and the source of new talent. As technology progresses, the phone, the laptop, the television, are merging, and receiving, or distributing media has never been more convenient or easy. We will see if the consumer has been dumbed down too much to escape the tentacles of the mainstream media fashion show. I have reason for hope. I do know many young people familiar with the music of the classic rock era, who appreciate it even to the point of preferring it over newer bands. That tells me that the things I saw as valuable about that era's music are still palpable. I often wonder if it is just a subjective thing. Do I value the music of the sixties and seventies so much because I grew up listening to it? Is the schlocky stuff people younger than me listen to just as valuable merely because of their connection to it? In that respect, it might be as valuable in a subjective and individual way. But if you look at innovation, song ideas, production, and the simple fact that a lot of modern day pop stars don't even play an instrument, I think that in a historical perspective, as well as artistically, and culturally, the sixties and seventies were far more important. I'm talking about the difference, for instance, between The Who and The Backstreet boys.
I don't intend to say that this is all cut and dried. There has been a fair amount of production since the eighties that was very good. But when I think about who I would name as producing excellent work, many are people who started in the sixties or seventies. Over the next three decades, like seemingly every other industry, things started to focus on the insatiable quest for money, and art went out the window. But with the rise of internet entertainment, the viewer/listener sets the bar. The entertainment industry is no longer in total control, and can only try to tell you what you do or don't want to listen to. There are now other options. The tables are turning.
I intended this blog to explain who I am and where I am coming from. The music I produce is not just a revisitation of earlier styles, but also, like anyone else who writes songs nowadays, a continuation, and variation of those styles. I would not presume to say I am a pioneer of a new genre, but I would say I a something of a musical chameleon. I like to juxtapose styles. I like a frantic, chaotic synthesized piece to be followed by a country and western song. I like to record strange sounds, and find new ways to do that. I hope that my strange sounds will find an audience out there somewhere. That I am being heard is more important to me than being paid to be heard. I would love to sell some downloads, but just getting feedback about the tunes is very exciting, and satisfying. It seems that the difficulties of making recordings that existed in my youth have evaporated, and I have reached a point where I am ready to make music, and doing so has never been easier.