Re: Meltdown (go ahead, give it to me); No new Who

["L. Bird" <pkeets@hotmail.com>]

>But Quad needed the fuller sound, and when they did the encores at the end 
>there was no horn section etc.

Nor any backing tapes.  It was interesting arrangements, actually from  
Roger's Celebration show, I think.  The bigger band allowed them to do the 
same arrangements as with the orchestra.


>Actually, the Tommy material sounded pretty good in 1989 (except for the 
>jam at the end of Pinball Wizard) but was intrusive for the non-Tommy 
>material (especially Baba).

It was maybe a little much on the older stuff, but a nice addition to the 
grander songs like "Love Reign O'er Me."  I'd rather have had just The Who 
on the tape, especially for "Pinball Wizard."  I think Elton John does an 
exceptionally bad performance of it here, but likely having the guests 
increases the market for the video.  It's been unavailable for a little 
while, and I hope it'll be reissued soon.


>Pete is a performing artist, and according to his art school theory, the 
>performance is better if it's spontaneous.  Hence the jamming.

>I have no problem with it, just don't think it's "new material."

What do you consider "new material?"  Studio recordings only?  What about 
Pete demos?


> > What's your definition based on again?  Not the beat, as I recall.  Was 
>it the content?
>
>It stopped being about the beat in the 60's.

This is what I call progressive rock, if you recall.  There IS a strict 
definition of rock music based on a two-four beat, but any accomplished 
musician will get bored with it pretty quick, and start looking around for 
more interesting things to do.  It's not strictly rock music at that point.  
It actually becomes cross-genre, but because the artist was originally 
classified as a rock artist, it stretches the definition.

The problem is that music is music, and the transition from one type to 
another is pretty seamless.  You add more instruments and you've got an 
orchestra.  You shift the beat a little and you've got blues or jazz.  I 
don't know that it should be all about rock music--I notice Pete prefers to 
call it pop (as opposed to classical?), but even that distinction has been 
blurred lately, as some of the movie composers have suceeded in making 
classical style recordings popular, and orchestrating heavy metal.  Did you 
like S&M?


>Forms of Rock have deveoloped since, including Punk, Grunge, Lilith, 
>Industrial...but they all came from Rock.

Sub-genres?  Again, the boundaries can be pretty blurry.


> > Needs risk to make it right?
>
>No necessarily, but it does need advancement and evolution. Progression.

Hey, there's my word.  :)


> > Its conservatism these days is what makes it suitable for children and 
>churches.
>
>Yeah, but it's not music for children and churches. They have their music, 
>why can't we have ours too?

This is about content.  The content you're looking for has become associated 
with a particular beat or style of music.


>I personally don't want to live in a world suitable for only churches and 
>children (even if Bush is about as intelligent as Barney). Churches fought 
>against Rock music until some bright fellow realized they were losing 
>kids...then we got Stryper and White Cross and many more. As for children, 
>Rock music was meant to be a forbidden treat, and what happened there is we 
>became a generation whose parents were listening to Rock music. MY parents 
>listened to Brubeck (who IS great, after all) and Torch Jazz,

Jazz was a forbidden treat in its time.


>some Broadway musicals...and hated Rock music, especially that "loud
>obnoxious" band The Who I used to stick in my 8-Track so frequently.

That generation still tends to react to it, even though they'll listen to 
country rock without any complaints.  This list tends to react the same way 
to rap and hiphop, of course.


>There is that, but the labels want to push the new bands too. Whereas the 
>radio programmers hate to take a chance on something that will make 
>listeners change stations.

Everybody they want to push is on the compilation disk.

The classic rock stations are very narrow, too.  Our local station says it 
doesn't play anything more recent than fifteen years old.  What are they 
going to do when the classic rock groups start putting out new albums?  Wait 
fifteen years to play them?  Duh.


>I've heard all of this before. I don't hear ANY new stuff going on,
>unfortunately. I think Rock is dead, and has been since the mid-70's when 
>Pete wrote that it was. I agree with him yet again.

I thought Radiohead was pretty original, but I guess they fall into the 
popular category, rather than strictly rock.  Where does rock have left to 
go?  It started out punkish and underground and then the various band pretty 
much explored the options.


> > That's supposed to be Matt Kent, right?
>
>Is it? I haven't seen him on this list. I haven't heard of any gathering 
>opinions. I think more he's Pete's representative to us, not the other way 
>around. No, it should be one of us...

Matt was the moderator of the PT BBS, and apparently intended to fulfill 
this role.  It just didn't work out too well.

I don't know that Matt was online at all until he took over Pete's website.  
He ran the UK fanclub for a while, including publications that provided a 
forum for non-Internet discussion.  That's what made him the fans' 
representative.  Now that he's gone to work for Pete, though, his status has 
shifted.  I got the impression that some fans thought he had used their 
support for his own personal gain.  There was an element of this in the 
great PT BBS fiasco.


keets
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