[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: Rock is Dead They Say



>Thank you for your time, if you wish to respond (which I highly 
encourage) please send it to me directly to avoid annoying any more 
people on the list.

I'm responding to the list, since I don't think anybody should be 
annoyed.  This has been a pretty good discussion, reasonably civil and 
Who related, and now it's even generated another thread.

>From: Brian <bmcgow01@wild.vill.edu>
>To: "L. Bird" <pkeets@hotmail.com>
>Subject: Re: Rock is Dead They Say
>
>> >There's no need, for it's extremely obvious that music was the 
primary force in the social change in the `60's. You have the right to 
disagree, but having lived it I've got to tell you you're incorrect

>One of the few things in this world that I know, is that art reflects
>society.  You, I assume, contend that rock is art.  I have never run 
across a time when art changed society, art has always reflected these 
changes, however.  But, perhaps the 60s are an exception.  I, however, 
tend to think not.

It wasn't I who made the above comment, but I do have something to say 
about this.  The relationship of "art" to social change seems to be a 
circular process.  There are constant arguments on this subject.  for a 
current example, is gangsta rap a cause or an effect of behavior? (Of 
course, in the sixties, a similar question might have been asked about 
The Who, and in the twenties about Louis Armstrong.)  You're right that 
art reflects change, but it also calls attention to new directions in 
ways that can be very attractive--people hear the music and join the 
movement.  In this way it helps to augment change.


>> This interesting subject was recently explored by a program on VH1,

>To bad I missed it.  No sarcasim intended.

Watch the VH1 site for it to come up again.  VH1 replays their shows.


>> the movement in the 60's and early 70's was unified and grassroots, 
and provided a voice for youth that was unprescedented.
>
>It was unified?  That's news to me.  This was the very time that the 
country was tearing itself apart over all sorts of issues.  The only 
generation gap larger than the one described here was in the 1920's.  
That one was primarily caused by the First World War, this one seems to 
me to have been caused by the Vietnam War.  American history can be very 
accurately described by looking at the wars we have fought.  I just feel 
that music is a refliection of what is happening around it.  Take for a 
moment the 20's  Out of this generation gap sprung forth a brand new 
type of music, one that would be called jazz.  Jazz was in a very real 
sense a revolt from the old standards.  In fact it served very much the 
same purpose as rock.

The late sixties USA youth movement was fairly unified in its 
peace/anti-war sentiments.  Bob Dylan does stick out in my mind as the 
ideological voice.  About 1970 that movement began to fragment as 
violence, large sums of money and drug abuse for it's own sake leapt 
into the picture.  I think the generation gap was aside from this 
political movement, and was more clearly expressed by such bands as The 
Who. 

Regarding jazz, any fans on the list?  Help me out.  Somebody published 
an opinion a couple of years back that Louis Armstrong was the most(?) 
influential man of the century, didn't they?  


>> Is it the political movement that's dead
>> instead of rock music?
>
>I still contend that rock is dead, but I think the political movements 
are in fairly bad shape, and many are probably dead.

Hmmm.  If the music was a product of the generation gap, then it's dead 
because that particular generation got old before they died.  Right?

So what was it that brought about the jazz and rock revolutions?  This 
is a great question for a historian, as I seem to recall others further 
back.  Current teens don't seem to have much direction.  Any particular 
setup that produces the paradigm shift?  And why did The Who seem to hit 
it so dead on?


>I would appreciate it if my education is never discussed again.  I have 
no desire to talk about such useless subjects. 

The wages of sin.  You brought it up.  <grin>

keets



______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com