1. saviors of rock and roll
every week brings a new one. the white stripes. the strokes. the vines. the hives. whatever. we all know that rock is in a sorry state right about now. the landscape is now strewn with slinky girl-divas, choreographed boy bands, carbon copy rap stars and screaming nu-metal bands, so anybody that shows up bearing little more than a fender strat and a marshall amp is instantly branded the new moses. the messiah. this band will save us all from what we have become. the band will bring the rock back down from the gilded mountain of popularity and share it with the humble people of earth.
wrong.
we continue to blame the popularity of this band or that diva on the machines of marketing, acting like britney is being fed to us intravenously or that n’sync is being slipped into the water supply. but all the marketers do is put it out there. they set it out on the table. and what do we do? we belly up and consume. for every bubblehead pop star, there is a whole state’s worth (if you consider rhode island) of fans that love them, adore them and would walk 500 miles just to be the ones to fall down at their concert. they weren’t drugged or brainwashed, they just heard and liked and bought. simple as that.
and so what does it mean when rolling stone puts the latest and fuzziest barebones band on their front cover, calling them the new kings of true rock? they are simply setting them on the table, moving them out from the obscure corner of the pantry like a forgotten can of chick peas. effectively, they are being marketed right out of obscurity, marketed right out of that you’ve-never-heard-ness that caught the eye of an opprtunistic music mag editor in the first place.
you know what else it means? it is supposed to mean that you’re not cool if you don’t instantly dig this new band. and not just dig this band, but disparage all of the others as if you were suddenly entering a commune and forsaking worldly goods. and it is amazing that so many still fall for that, even though nobody really leaves their former tastes behind, not completely. wouldn’t it be great if everybody just owned up to the things they still kept in the back of their music box? just because i love radiohead now, that doesn’t mean that i need to be ashamed that my first ever album purchase (with my own money) was a styx cassette. kilroy was here. domo, domo.
rock & roll does not need saving. rock & roll survives as it always has, even through the disco era, the millis and vanillis, the billy oceans, the terry jacks (i hate “seasons in the sun” – sue me). where is it hiding? you know it when you hear it. and what is rock to you may not be rock to me. jeff buckley rocked. marvin gaye rocked. stevie wonder rocked up until about 1975. elvis presley rocked until he went into the army. rock changes and adapts to its contents. rock reflects its surroundings.
much like we do. like we have.
mozart rocked. as did shakespeare. galileo.
and while we’re on the topic of saviors…
