I've been feeling sort of disconnected with the modern music scene for sometime. This probably isn't so surprising for those of you who know me. I'm a sixty year old soul in a thirty year old body. That being said, for most of my life I've been able to find music scenes that inspire me and that reminded me that there is nothing greater in the world than music. I love classical music, show music, early rock, classic rock, even a great deal of 90's rock (R.E.M. for instance). It was somewhere in the early 2000's that I started to lose my appetite for new popular music. Don't get me wrong, there are still gems out there (Ryan Adams, Rufus Wainwright, Old Crow Medicine Show, Teddy Thompson, Conor Oberst, Ray Lamontange), but they are few and far between. I find most of the new pop music I hear to be redundant, uninspired, simple-minded, offensive, and meaningless (don't even get me started on modern country). That sort of thing just doesn't float my boat.
I keep waiting for the day when a new artist will record an album that I can't stop playing- an album that replaces the decades old albums that have a constant place on my play list. I can't wait for that sort of album to go mainstream and run the pop tarts off the scene. I'm looking for someone who inspires me, makes me addicted to his/her art, who writes songs that make me think the world, with all its troubles, is worthwhile because something so powerful and pleasing can come from it. I watched the wonderful movie "Almost Famous" again recently. There are scenes in the that movie that can bring me to tears- scenes that illustrate the overwhelming power of music to change feelings, minds, relationships, and lives. It can erase anger and hurt. It can break down walls and heal wounds.
I'm not a great songwriter or performer. For me, it's been something that I only dabble in because I don't like what the real music scene is offering me. But I am a great fan of music- the kind of fan that lives in the past because nothing new inspires me the way the old guys and gals do/did. That's not because people like them don't exist; it's because a mindless society and music business represses true talented poets and troubadours in favor of commercialized, generic fluff! There was a time when the most talented musicians were the mainstream artists. Now, they are pushed to the outskirts, and it's difficult for fans to discover them because of the light weights who have stolen pop culture and who litter the airwaves with auto-tuned voices, electronic music, and sickening images.
I'm not a great songwriter or performer. For me, it's been something that I only dabble in because I don't like what the real music scene is offering me. But I am a great fan of music- the kind of fan that lives in the past because nothing new inspires me the way the old guys and gals do/did. That's not because people like them don't exist; it's because a mindless society and music business represses true talented poets and troubadours in favor of commercialized, generic fluff! There was a time when the most talented musicians were the mainstream artists. Now, they are pushed to the outskirts, and it's difficult for fans to discover them because of the light weights who have stolen pop culture and who litter the airwaves with auto-tuned voices, electronic music, and sickening images.
I read a blog post by Paco from American Roots Radio recently that echoed the same sentiments. I'll place a link to it on the end of this post. He calls for a musical revolution. I join him by calling for the same. I remember being a little boy and sitting in the floor in front of my daddy's stereo. I would have over-sized head phones on and be listening to his albums. I would sit like that for hours, looking at album art, memorizing lyrics and melodies, and imagining I was a rock star. I will never forget discovering songs like "Hey Jude", "Daniel", "Like a Rolling Stone", "Song for You", "Bat Out of Hell", "Piano Man", and artists like James Taylor, Eric Clapton, Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Fleetwood Mac, The Who, Queen, Rod Stewart, and Leonard Cohen. These were important moments in my life! My God, it was magic- just me and the music. It hurts me that my youngest siblings don't have experiences like that. Instead, they have YouTube, it's over-hyped stars, and music married to images that refuse to give your imagination an inch of room to explore.
At the end of the movie "Almost Famous", a young boy and music fan, William, asks Russell (a rock guitarist) what he loves most about music. Russell smiles and says, "for starters....everything". I know how he feels. That movie is set in the early to mid-seventies- a time when rock was still fairly young and was really starting to stretch its legs and expand itself. Every one was on fire for a new art form that was about raw emotion, self-expression, and experimentation. It was O.K. to be different- in fact, it was almost against the culture to be "cookie-cutter."
Unfortunately, I'm not old enough to "remember when rock was young" from first hand experience, but thanks to my dad, an avid music fan, my discovery of music was largely of material from that fruitful and innovative time. At that point in history, there was a musical revolution. It's time for another one! It's time to reclaim popular music for artists and not businessmen and shallow opportunists. We need Dylans, Joplins, Claptons, Lennons, and the like. We need melodists like Elton, storytellers like Jimmy Webb, poets like Cohen, voices like Campbell and Cash, and souls like Ray Charles. We need a musical army to take back the scene. Until that happens, I'll keep listening to my faithful old albums and living in the glorious musical past.
I told you my reasons for the whole revival
Now I'm going outside to have an ice cold beer in the shade
Oh, I'm going to listen to my 45's
Ain't it wonderful to be alive
When the rock 'n' roll plays,
When the memory stays, yeah
I'm keeping the faith!
Check out Paco's blog on the same subject: http://www.berniejtaupin.com/arr-news.bt?n_id=459646
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