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Breaking Out of a Musical Lull
Musically speaking, we are living in an utter and profound lull.
Musical lulls are characterized by things like business controlling the artists, rather than the intense musical periods where the artists are the ones driving things.
Right now, we are stuck in an American Idol era where music labels and moguls are firmly in control, and their formulas are followed as closely as possible.
It's all eerily reminiscent of the early 1950s. That was the "Doggie in the Window" era. Mitch Miller, Doris Day and the like were making snappy and happy songs. The underground was brewing with a sonic gumbo of black artists and hillbillies, but in the mainstream, it was all pretty, safe and happy. A musical lull.
How can you tell that you're living in a musical lull?
* The mainstream music culture features harmless lyrics by harmless artists.
* The "look" is non-threatening.
* Dancing is at a popularity peak, as people dance and hum, but don't really LISTEN.
* Music has a minimal impact on culture, other than being a soundtrack.
* There's an underground happening, but it is still out of reach to the masses.
* It's about tabloids more than musical notes.
* The music media is on autopilot.
* McDonalds'-style pop rules. Predictable, safe, consistent, with few surprises. Musical originators are copied, cleansed for mass consumption, and formularized.
* Artists have short life spans, and quickly become trivia questions.
Then -- there are the intense periods. Periods of tremendous change compressed into a short period of time.
During intense periods:
* The old wave hits a brick wall.
* The "sound" changes. New instruments, new techniques, new recording methods.
* The "look" is new: Different and scary.
* Satan is responsible, according to many.
* Listening technology changes.
* Music impacts culture profoundly. There are fights over music.
* Artists are in control.
* People dance less, and start listening more.
* The next generation of long-term artists emerges.
* Music media goes through explosive evolution.
* You don't hear as many artists copying other artists, because everyone is too busy creating their own sound or contributing to the movement.
The intense periods happened: 1955 (Rock n Roll); 1964 (Liverpool); 1969 (Everything); 1980 (New Wave); 1991 (Grunge). All of the above happened during these periods, and all of the 'lull' characteristics happened between these periods.
Take the intense period of 1969: It was all over for the old wave. Paul Revere and the Raiders? They hit the wall. Musicianship was a selling point. Lyrics were social statements. The sound of music changed as fuzz tones and synths emerged, and there was practically an arms race over how many tracks you could layer on a song and how high you could turn up the amplifier.
Junior came home from college looking like a hippie and got thrown out of the house. Satan was responsible for the Iron Butterfly. Walk into the wrong bar and play Hendrix on the jukebox, and a fight would ensue. Stereo revolutionized listening as it became mainstream. FM radio emerged for the first time as a force. No one told Cream how to write a song or to keep it three minutes. You didn't dance to "Abbey Road," you listened to it.
Suffice to say, we are now in a musical lull. All the signs are there. Consider the recent controversy surrounding Kelly Clarkson, who recently apologized to label head Clive Davis. During an intense period, like 1980 or 1991, a label head would bow to an artist that sold as much music as she does. Can you imagine the Police or Nirvana apologizing to a record company? Yes, those are "big names," but any important artist from an intense period wouldn't even bother.
A musical lull. You either live with it (and, of course, some prosper mightily from it). Or you try to be part of the change.
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Music has been pushed to its limits, in that we have not been inventing new ways to make sound for quite a while now. What most fail to understand is that when we are leaving a "lull" period, music is simply reflecting, and sometimes acting as a catalyst for, changing attitudes. So the underground music scene and the digital revolution are good examples of something that has long needed to happen in Western culture: the demise of a recording industry that regulates, sanitizes, sensationalizes, and generally sucks the soul out of music. Now I say 'generally', because there are those bright lights, those exceptions to the rule, whose work transcends any record executive's desire to mould it into something easily sold to the masses. The difficult thing is that the very industry that can act as platform for great artists is too scared to venture into unknown territory, too scared to lose sales, and so it continues to play it safe and consequently to lose sales.
That being said, there is a plethora of cool music out there. The difficult thing is that the musical world now reflects the fragmentation in the everyday world. Yes, we can connect with people and sounds we never might have connected with before, but there is no great leader emerging to light the way with a great series of songs, and this is because of the fragmentation I mentioned. So it will be more difficult for a single phenomenon to emerge, but at least we know that if it does, it may be more likely due to merit than marketing.
From a surface perspective Abrams is onto something. There are a number of ways to analyse what happened in the 20th century, but basically it has been characterized by two streams of activity.
The first was the progressive development of recording technology. The innovations made in the 20th century, microphones, tape recorders, PA systems, radio, vinyl records, multi-track recorders, cds, mp3, etc. gave artists a musical pallet they could use to create novelty. Add to this the invention of the electric guitar, and you have a steady state of sonic novelty and innovation never before experienced in history.
The second stream is the cultural assimilation of ethnic and economic classes throughout the 20th century. The music of different demographic groups was, up to around the late 1990's, filtered through the ears of urban professionals. Record companies based in New York and Los Angeles set the standards for technical acceptability, and controlled the distribution of product. After the digital revolution of the late 90's and our present decade, there is a complete breakdown across the board because low cost high quality home recording equipment is capable of offering competitive sound quality to an mp3 based music culture.
It is possible that the next "big thing" in music will be in video game music. This is what many kids are listening to these days. It's possible that rock, country, hip hop, and all the other forms of popular music are simply 20th century American scenes that have exhausted their potential. New music seems to be coming from all over the world, anywhere that is not America. In any event, it is guaranteed that whatever is coming will be global in perspective, using forms and sounds assimilated from all over the world.
Sorry, Lee, I disagree. Every night, in every major and minor city in America, kids with guitars, chops, attitude and MySpace pages are playing their asses off to appreciative audiences, big and small. They're selling merch, having fun and completely ignoring the complaints of lazy people who don't bother to try and find great music in their own backyards.
Just because what's on MTV or the radio (or XM, for that matter) is disposable, machine-made crap doesn't mean REAL music isn't being made. The difference is that it's become completely decentralized, thanks to the Internet. There is no one source of "cool" anymore, which again makes it easy for lazy people to complain about how shitty music is.
Finally, music is and always will be culturally relevant to those that treat it as such from the get go, as opposed to those who wait for the MSM to declare something culturally relevant. Now, get off your ass, get to an all ages club near you and get with it.
Lee should've included the emergence of rap/hip-hop in the timeline at the top of his article. But let's face it, rap has hit a dead end too. The original energy and the sense of danger has been suffocated by the weight of its own success. Whenever I see those two white doofuses on that McDonald's commercial rapping about chicken nuggets, all I can think of is Pat Boone singing "Tutti-Frutti."
It's time for the next big thing. But with the music industry in disarray, who will tell me what the next big thing is? I could spend hours every day plowing through myspace and utube and itunes sorting out the rank amateurs from professional-quality bands with something new to say, but I have a job and a wife. I don't have the time or energy to serve as my own A&R man, distributor, producer, critic, and disc jockey. Amusing myself has never been such hard work. Where's Murray the K when I need him?
As long as you sheep keep buying this trash they will keep serving it to you. Real music died decades ago.
it didn't really die, it just went into hiding.
That's one way of looking at it.
I'm guessing where going back single albums then just albums cause I always had a feeling where in Time-Life commercial, where we just want the songs we already are comfortable with.
Also each decade before use was describe with an identity will can lay back to...What dose the "00" defined us today cause change take time and the way where moveing, we want it now apperently
As for 'American Idol', I tried to watch it I really did, but something made my skin crawl after 30 seconds or so. It would have made the office cooler chat easier given that no one at work has any clue who David Beckham is.
I must live with the fact that I can't stand watching others have their hopes and dreams ruthlessly crushed by people who don't have much more than a clue about actual musical talent. Self promotion and celeb du jour creators they are and not much else.
I don't own a single AI album although I've caught a few songs on my XM radio. None of it excites me and don't find any of it that special.
Lee,
I have to take issue with what you define as ‘lulls’. I feel your statement has some glaring omissions.
The progress of music and most creative endeavors is not entirely with the artist, as you intimated much has to do with the technology available. With music the need to expand and go to the next level was made quicker the more the musician was willing to use emerging technology. The Beatles would have been very good song writers but not the creative force they were not for George Martin and the engineering geniuses at Abby Road, who could inspire their creativity with syncing their Studer 4 tracks into 8, 12 & 16 track machines years before anything larger than a 8 track became commercially viable.
During a ‘lull’ in the early seventies you even mention of these groups, but extraordinary leaps were being made in very popular heavy metal, soul and funk. Howbout the contributions of Parliament, James Brown (who made his biggest impact at this time, Barry White not to mention Stevie Wonder who’s Songs in the Key of Life was a seminal event in recording history. Do we exclude these geniuses because they were a part of a creative lull? They were as much mainstream as the ‘Idol’s of today.
You left out Rap/R&B. Did you forget Herbie Handcock? ‘Rockit’ still impacts digital audio, not to mention the Run DMC and Hip Hop (which may not be obvious but was and is an extraordinary fuel musical artist, just listen to Paul’s Boutique, Prince and the host of outstanding creative output during the 80’s.
But controlling it all Lee is money. You site the creative muse as the motivator, the creative muse is made manifest through technology but also the ROI from the viewpoint of the Clive Owens of the world. The music has to appeal the the 13 year old girl in all of us or else the artist will be performing in their living room and not to SRO.
Then again I could be wrong.
A dedicated XM Subscriber
JS
Shickie,
Your point re George Martin and the Abbey Road engineers enabling the Beatles to soar to unchartereted musical climes is well taken. However, technical point, Martin et al did not sync the Studer 4-track to 8-, 12-, and 16-track machines, but rather, to other 4-track Studers—thus in effect, "creating" extra tracks. The available 4 tracks were not expanded into 8 or 16; instead, they were consolidated or "reduced" to open up free tracks.
And, it's Clive Davis, not Clive Owens.
lee is right to make the case that sixties music changed social values and mores to an extent. beyond that i don't know that music has changed anything- which doesn't mean it's bad music. it just means the sixties-boomers were much more numerous than that teen-young adult bracket has been since. motown, for instance, was a civil rights soundtrack; hip-hop is a police tv show soundtrack.
but the young (of course) struggling musician vs. the big greedy corporate entertainment exec is an outmoded dynamic. now music and other art is refreshingly understood to be co-operative group endeavor with many stages and skills in the success mix. a good honest young a&r man or producer fronting up some old scaly has-been musician's umpteenth comback is more the current dynamic despite clarkson.
whoa. what about hip-hop???? can we really exclude the emergence of hip-hop from parks in the Bronx as a seminal moment in (music) history? the words and sounds of Public Enemy, N.W.A, and a few years later the G-Funk west coast and the Biggie East coast, changed life as we know it.
this music profoundly terrified Tipper Gore, C. Dolores Tucker, and whitey everywhere. it was the "ok, if you won't let us get it the way you got it, then we'll take it however we can" guerrilla uprising of several generations of urban blacks, and it was heavy. sure, now it's a sad fashion statement and as boring as every other genre, but it was culturally much bigger than "grunge" for chrissakes, in my opinion.
and speaking of grunge, what about punk rock? were not the mohawks, track marks, bleeding, fighting, puking and screaming important and terrifying when juxtaposed against the Eagles and other Soft Corporate Rock of the time? has this music not influenced contemporary rock music almost as much as R & B did? and wasn't it as liberating and galvanizing as "hippiedom" on speedballs for the out-of-work youth the system was failing? we gotta include punk.
man, i couldn't agree with you more, though, although i quite enjoyed the Brit pop/northern soul/trip-hop mid-90s moment. guilty pleasure, i suppose. i try to stay interested (ok, not in kelly clarkson) but it is too hard to hear songs that were already made, and made better, 20 years ago by the original act that's now being imitated.
I'm really interested to see what kind of renaissance will come out of this horrifying flatline. poverty, squalor and hard times, both urban and rural, have led to some amazing stuff, so, for better or worse, it won't be long in this country until the stage is set for the Next Revolution. it sure as hell won't come from anyone who gives a rat's ass about Clive Davis or any other corporate dreck factory. none of the good stuff ever did...
keane, arcade fire, and tegan & sara are as good as anybody. but young people today are defined by their astounding mastery of serial television drama. the alternate but parallel theory this supports is an idea of periods of radical change within each particular artistic medium- as opposed to indefinite revolutionary change within only music. everything took a leap foreward in the sixties: film, fine arts, and dance all revolutionized. unexpectedly, it was literature that was left behind.
the backward giant of untold strength mutely witnessing all this for 40 years is now gathering momentum in its transformational cycle. that giant is television. there's a lot of good music going on- but there's hardly any communication about it. on the other hand, the internet fosters vast virtual communities based not just on dramatic shows- but on specific characters and couples- plus a brand new hybrid art- viewer created video combining music and scenes from the great dramas: charmed, smallville, and roswell are good examples. roswell is vastly more popular now than when it first aired. abby road, however, is not vastly more popular than when it was released. these fan-produced musical video hybrids as well as the still maturing form the of conventional music videos made by the bands themselves are very openended forms. death cab had some directors cast videos based on songs from "plans"
http://www.videoville.org/wiki/index.php/Death_Cab_for_Cutie
As a child of the 70s and 80s, I treasured my music. These days, it's hard to get too excited about anyone because the old guard's albums are ignored and the new artists hardly ever make it past one album (file download, CD, whatever).
Napster may have sounded the deathblow to the music industry of the past, but music itself seemed to have been dying before that.
Lee, you're correct that we're in a lull. The market simply isn't calling for it.
Of course, the renegade, innovative artists are out and playing... and, what's more, today's youth culture (who have always driven new sound) has access to MORE undiscovered music than ever before in history. When anyone can fire up GarageBand or put their music on MySpace and iTunes, with our unprecedented distribution channels, one would argue that this would be a time in which new sounds would flourish...
We should simply say that today's youth -- for whatever reason -- aren't craving danger, new sounds, and the devil. Today's music may be tremendously forgettable, but it seems to me that The Great Leaps Forward primarily happen in a time when artists tap into a unique teen angst that doesn't really characterize today's 19 year olds.
It doesn't mean that the music that's happening now is all bad, or that we won't oneday crave a return to the times when you simply wanted to stroll on the Sunny Side of the Street. I've finding myself really loving Connie Francis lately.
- GMB
It's pretty obvious the music industry is broken, the question is, how is it going to be fixed? Back in the early 1900s, there was blues with acoustic guitars, and that was pretty much it. Later we had the Sinatras, and the Jelly Roll Mortons, but the variety was pretty limited. It was easy to revolutionize music then, it just took the electric guitar on one side, and a jazz movement on the other side. Then music exploded, innovation happened constantly. Now we're left wondering, what's left? A revolution in just one of rock&roll, hip-hop, pop won't fix music, there's too much of it.
Nah.
The times of intensity were marked by the old guard saying "That's NOT Music!"
And in the last century, this happened with jazz, rock and hip-hop.
Yup, we're in a lull. It's because culture has absorbed that stuff.
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