The distribution of the music that is now referred to as Classic Rock was limited to AM, later FM, and vinyl. That was about it. So people were all exposed to the same popular music.
FM allowed a slow spread of less main stream music, appealing to college students in the '70s, that was different and allowed exposure of less main stream artist to a wider audience.
Now there is a great deal of good music out there, but where is it? Not on AM, that is all talk radio now, not on FM, that is has become the replacement for the former AM radio music.
The exposure to new music is now spread across many venues. Classic Rock is what older people were exposed to at the time it was made, at the time they were interested in new things. Classic Radio targets its audience, who will listen to their product and stay through the commercials.
Why?=Marketing. Why they like this shit=Marketing. Why don’t I like it?=you are not the target audience.
My 15 year old music-invested daughter is focused on the new Panic! at the Disco album, which is really a solo effort from remaining member Brendan Urie. She loves talking about how Urie is a big Sinatra fan and croons in some of the songs.
SSS. I’ve done the same thing. Asked people to give me a random month and year from say 1966-1974.
Then looked at the top 20 for that month. NOW…at this point it becomes subjective but looking at lists like that I go “Classic. Classic. Movie named after it. Classic. Ok not so hot. Famous movie scene featured. Classic…” You get my point. Is a movie EVER going to be named after Justin Bieber’s “Love Yourself”? I doubt it…hell Justin himself is ALREADY a parody of himself.
And there’s the study done that shows top 100 music today is more homogenous than any time since the 50’s. Anyone here could probably hear a current top ten hit and figure out the whole structure of the song with no surprises from the first 20 seconds.
“Blah Blah” By Stupid One Name Artist featuring Another Stupid One Name Artist.
Sing song sing song sing song sing dance dub dance club gimme my bling. (Insert mid song rap) repeat chorus. Actual sung bridge repeat chorus.
You and I seem to have a somewhat different take on things; you seem to lean very heavily towards the Eagles-Melissa Manchester-Kenny Loggins kind of rock (soft country rock kinda stuff).
Perhaps would could each do a show on your channel; you focus on the soft country rock and I’ll focus on the balls-to-the-wall arena/prog/proto-metal rock. How do we write up a proposal for Sirius? I volunteer for the Friday afternoon & night, Saturday afternoon & night and Sunday afternoon slots. I’ll even propose a name for the channel: Backwards To The Future!
The not so good classic rock is rarely played. The material played on classic rock stations is often the best of that genre. Good music attracts people regardless of their age.
Many of todays musicians know and enjoy this genre. Adam Levine (Maroon 5) has mentioned his love of this genre many times on the Voice. Pharrell loves classic R&B. So much so that he did a tribute song for Marvin Gaye that got him sued.
I’ve noticed a forward creep in what is considered classic rock. On classic rock radio today, you will sometimes hear Talking Heads and U2; in the 1990s such artists were not considered “classic” and thus never played.
I’m not the first person to say this, and it was summed up nicely in a NYTimes op ed last week that I can’t find in a quick search (maybe somebody can link it), but it’s weird how little the world has changed since the 1960s. 1916 was impossibly old and different when I grew up. 1966 is virtually just like today except with clunkier technology. Even my parents had no connection to 1916 and they were both alive then. We can experience all the media of 1966 without making any mental transitions. Movies are the same, television is the same, magazines are the same, radio is the same, music is the same. Virtually every media had a New Wave in the 1960s that deliberately broke with the past. (Music’s New Wave waited until 1980, a mere 36 years ago now.) Nothing ever breaks with the past today: it scoops it up and samples it.
Wait until the Singularity. None of our robot masters will listen to today’s music! It just won’t connect to them. Except Metal Machine Music. And they’re only going to play that to annoy their AI parents.
I don’t know where you’re at but it’s not popular on radio in London. You’ll hear something from the 60s or 70s occasionally but only as part of a wider selection and on a few shows.
I think the term is “jazzbo” and back in the 1940s there actually were a number people who were deadly serious about what “real” jazz should sound like. For example, Glenn Miller was generally disliked because his style was too “sweet” but Bennie Goodman and Duke Ellington were held in higher regard. These people also supported the bebop revolution of the 1940s with as almost as much passion as the war against fascism.
Regarding 40s era Sinatra, I can understand where you’re coming from. His best work didn’t come until the 50s when he joined Capitol Records and recorded a series of great albums with arrangers like Nelson Riddle and Gordon Jenkins.
I plan on submitting this for the “Most Misleading Mischaracterization of an Intellectual Property Crime” Award later this year.
Pharrell didn’t lose in court because he wrote a tribute; he lost because he illegally copied Marvin Gaye’s work and tried to claim it as his own. Would you like a cite for that? :dubious:
1966 is impossibly old and different from when I grew up in the 80s. Vietnam, Woodstock, the race to space, a real terror of being nuked by Russia? Totally alien to those of us born just 11 years after 1966.
I was stating Pharrell’s position. He’s said in interviews that he loved Marvin Gaye’s music and wanted to write something similar that evoked Gaye’s style and sound. Unfortunately a jury felt he went too far. Used a few Riffs that Gaye used. <shrug> So be it. That case has been decided.
Never the less Pharrell is a classic R&B fan. People will always appreciate great music regardless of when it was recorded.