Is rock music "dead"?

[PureX]

That touches on the thing that is dead now: top 40 radio.

There was a time when anything outside that week's top 40 just wouldn't be played on mainstream radio stations and you had no real way to hear other songs unless you bought an album.

Now, everyone has access to uncountably many piece of music. There's way more music out there, so it's way harder for there to be some specific song that "everyone" is listening to.

... but this doesn't mean the death of rock. It's a Renaissance of music across the board.

That's somewhat true. But it does mean the death of rock in the sense that there is no collective experience of youthful uprising, or expression, anymore. Or of breaking free of the chains of childhood and the control of parents. That was rock-n-roll. And that doesn't exist anymore. Now the youth are all busy being "individuals". They have no sense of their being a unified counter-culture movement in an adult-run world. Their unity has been completely over-ridden by "individuality", now. Corporate-sponsored and corporate-controlled cultural selfishness. Dysconnected and distracted myopia as the new corporate approved youth-meme. And there's nothing rock-n-roll about it. It's just sad.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

That's somewhat true. But it does mean the death of rock in the sense that there is no collective experience of youthful uprising, and expression. Of breaking free of the chains of childhood and the control of parents. That was rock-n-roll. And that doesn't exist anymore. Now the youth are all busy being "individuals". They have no sense of their being a unified counter-culture movement in an adult-run world. Unity has been completely over-ridden by "individuality", now. Corporate-sponsored and corporate-controlled cultural selfishness. Dysconnected and distracted myopia is the new corporate approved youth-meme. And there's nothing rock-n-roll about it.

But that was always there. Music for teenagers has never been one homogenous thing. There have always been cliques who differentiated themselves by music: mods vs. rockers, disco vs. metal, hip hop vs. rock, etc., etc.

Breaking away from one's parents is still very much a thing (and this thread - filled with middle-aged people complaining about they don't get the music that kids today are listening to - ties right into that). There are just many more ways to do it.

And if you think corporate-controlled music wasn't a thing back in the day... really? The golden age of rock that people here are praising was also the golden age of payola.

 

[Jainarayan]

In the 50s-80s, people were lamenting that there would never be another Benny Goodman or Gene Krupa and saying that nobody then could come close to their innovations.

It's natural to be sentimental about the music we grew up with and to have less of a connection to the music that came later. This is more about us than anything intrinsic to the music.

Also, we've had decades to forget about all the unremarkable crap in the music scene in the 50s-80s... and there was a lot of it. With modern music, we're experiencing the crap and the gems in real time; switching metaphors, modern music hasn't had the chaff separated from the wheat yet.

All very true, which is why I admit it might be my biases towards what’s familiar to me. What we remember and forget is, I think, what stamps music as “good” or “bad”. Time is sort of a sifter… what music will be remembered or forgotten.

 

[Wu Wei]

 

[Shadow Wolf]

Well guess what - this didn't exist once - and hence life was much simpler:

View attachment 89466

I really wish that easier to read and follow. Much of that has existed for a long time, and it appears and evolution chart of sorts for contemporary music genres and subgenres, including commercialized, mainstream and underground, folk, work and field recordings.
Quite fascinating, it's just too hard too read and follow.

 

[Shadow Wolf]

And if you think corporate-controlled music wasn't a thing back in the day... really? The golden age of rock that people here are praising was also the golden age of payola.

Yup. But record labels also took more risks then and they could be more loose with their money. That has entirely changed.
Now it's shifted to more independent labels and do it yourself approaches as the major record labels have to sell records in a world that doesn't buy many records anymore. There's a reason long hold outs continue to cave and put their songs on streaming servers. And in that world every niche and like is served.
As a result research has found for awhile now music has become more hemogenous (and louder). A lot of sounds the same because it basically is. The same few chords can play thousands of songs.

 

[Jagella]

I don't think there will ever be another Beatles (group and solos), Stones, Aerosmith, Seger, Dylan, Clapton, Presley, Berry, et al., or 50s-80s decades, the height of rock 'n roll and classic rock.

Yes. You might call those times "vanished eras." Rock and roll is like steam power: It's still around, but mostly for limited uses like nostalgia.

I don't think anyone today can come close to their achievements and innovations. Of course, this could be the prejudices of a 66 year old who grew up with these musicians. The only "new" music I'm being drawn to is the likes of The Dead South, Steeldrivers, The Devil Makes Three, Trampled by Turtles, and other CBGB and fusions thereof.

I like to fantasize about a super rock band that comes along like a juggernaut outdoing anything the Beatles or Led Zeppelin did. I call the band "Event Horizon" and they're a combination of the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Rush, Pink Floyd, and Queen all rolled into one. Event Horizon is a phenomenal group of rock musicians who are not only experts at their own singing and instruments but are great song writers. They show the whole world that rock is the best genre of music.

I can dream, can I not?

 

[Dan From Smithville]

That keeps happening. The old bands we loved in the old days can't put out new music that's nearly as good as the old stuff. Well, there are some exceptions.

I tend to agree and think there are a few exceptions. Even a few that are versatile enough to move around genres. But those latter probably hasten the disintegration of Rock n Roll if they stick with that pattern.

I think Bon Jovi may be trying something, but I don't think it is working out.

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

Correction, they INVENTED the cute boy-band template and then moved far beyond it. And keep in mind that I was 7 at the time. It wasn't the content of their songs that impressed me so much as it was their delivery. Very tight, very strong, very purposeful, and yet fun to the point of being sarcastic. Almost like they were making fun of the whole teenage boy-meets-girl meme. And a month or so later the Rolling Stones came on the show, And Mick Jagger was the nightmare boy every parent was afraid their daughter would date. So ofcourse every daughter wanted to date him!

This was the rock-n-roll theme. It was a youth uprising, and every young person saw it, and heard it, from Elvis to the Beatles to Led Zeppelin to Iggy Pop, and on. And they reveled in it. They finally had a voice in a world being run (badly) by the adults and there was nothing the adults could do about it. That was rock-n-roll.

Yes, I know. It was yet another consumerist "youth rebellion" promoted by big business to get kids to part with their parent's money and idolize sordid musicians instead of their former cultural heroes. Teenagerhood is a made up concept created by advertisers to turn teens into consumerists. It really came to a head in the midcentury, and your generation was swept away by it. Once something is mainstream and corporate, there's hardly any real rebellion going on.

Anyway, I'm not into rock music to make my parents mad. That's rather juvenile. Sorry, I'm not going to cry into my beer over the passing of the '50s to '70s era of music. What great music was made during that time is still there to be listened to, and there's revival scenes and acts influenced by it keeping it going. I personally enjoy neopsychedelic music a lot, such as the Black Angels and Jess and the Ancient Ones, for example. Whatever genre or style you like, there's scenes keeping it alive with young bands.

The rock scene and the business practices behind it have changed for the better, too. Not as much misogyny and gross behavior towards women. There were a number of rock songs from the early days outright sexualizing underage girls (hell, many of those grown rock stars married children or had (abusive, rapey) relationships with minors, from Jerry Lee Lewis, to Elvis, to Steven Tyler. And that was okay. That was acceptable. They behaved as absolute scumbags and were drug addicted degenerates in general.

The music industry was basically like the Mafia, and they could care less about ethics. Now that stuff isn't acceptable to the majority of rock fans now. Women are treated with more respect and even the gross behavior at rock shows has subsided (no breasts flashing or demands to see them anymore, and I've been to shows in the early 2000s where both happened).

Now it's rap and pop where women are treated like trash, and it's okay to be like the rockstars of yore. (To be fair, there are movements in both of those genres which push back against the misogyny. Feminist rap has existed since the '80s with rappers like MC Lyte and Queen Latifah. I, myself, love the rapper M.I.A. and think she's one of the greatest songwriters there is.)

Rock isn't dead at all. Far from it, it's matured. It goes through cycles of mainstream popularity and then goes back underground, reflects on and revitalizes itself and then catches on again and after a while of popularity, becomes a stupid parody of itself, people stop liking it as much and then it goes back underground, etc.

 

[☆Dreamwind☆]

There are plenty of new bands, a lot of the veterans are still touring and making new music, there's some killer concerts and festivals coming up, we can still purchase music and merchandise in a variety of ways. So I'd say it's doing alright.

 

[We Never Know]

I've been into rock & roll for fifty years, and it's still my favorite genre of music. Sadly, rock isn't what it used to be. I remember when Pink Floyd released The Wall way back in the late 1970s. It was a block buster. Everybody talking about it. But there hasn't been anything even close to it in recent years.

So what's going on? Why is rock & roll dead or apparently on its last legs?

IMO rock and roll isn't dead, its dying. Those of us that grew up on it still listen to it.
You cant replace ACDC, Steppenwolf, Pink Floyd, BTO, etc.
Unfortunately those of us that still listen to it are dying off.
Thus for many years alternative music is taking over/taiking its place and the younger generations prefer alternative.
Thus, rock and roll is dying.