Nirvana never toured all that aggressively, and only had a handful of albums. They were “big” in the way they influenced a wave of early 90s bands and popularized the Seattle scene, but in terms of sheer dollars accumulated, they never quite matched U2. (Nirvana’s peers/rivals Pearl Jam opened for a U2 tour; Hard to imagine U2 opening for any other band.)
OTOH, U2 didn’t influence other bands as obviously and specifically as Nirvana did. While they sorta popularized Irish musicians in their wake, it’s hard to mistake them for the Corrs or the Cranberries. I don’t remember if the were the biggest in 1990 (I’m sure Guns n Roses was outselling them at that point, at least in the US), but they were pretty hard to dislodge after Rattle and Hum in 1988.
There isn’t always a clear Number One musical act. Right before Michael Jackson dominated the early 80s, the top draw was Kenny Rogers. Before the Beatles broke, I think the top-selling album in the US was by Skitch Henderson. The top spot isn’t necessarily all that meaningful.
My vote would probably go to U2, with Red Hot Chili Peppers runner-up. Every time they release an album, it does pretty well, and they go on a massive tour, and tons of people go see them. At any given moment, they may not be selling the most albums or getting the most airplay, but when someone says “biggest band in the world”, that’s what I think of.
I’m very split on Dave Matthews. I remember when he first became popular (I think I was in 5th grade) and I thought his music was funky as hell and very interesting. Tripping Billies and Ants Marching were, and still are, really cool songs, and I thought Under The Table And Dreaming was a funky-ass, sweet album.
Crash, too, I thought was awesome, and Dave still had his quirky instrumentation, the amazing bass playing of Stefan Lessard (I was just then starting to play bass) and everything else that made DMB extremely unique especially for the standards of the pop music at the time.
Then, boom, I’m in 8th grade and I have a fully active sex drive and an extremely romantic streak. Perfect timing for seductive songs like Stay (Wasting Time) and especially Crush which resonated with my newfound love of the opposite sex. Plus, the world-music influences of a lot of that album give it a lot of depth, and since I had sophisticated tastes for an 8th grader when it came to music (I listened to Deep Forest, for Christ’s sake,) I really liked that too.
When Everyday came out, that’s when I realized that DMB was going downhill and I stopped liking them. I was also snobbishly upset that DMB-fandom was being appropriated by seemingly uncouth young people (the frat-types that you mentioned) and not being appreciated for its subtle world-music influences and the genuine musicianship of Dave Matthews, and instead, as I saw it, just being thoughtlessly worshipped for being a “cool” “jam band.” It particularly peeved me that the DMB was being lumped together with Phish by this frat-stoner crowd, because I saw Phish as being a silly, overrated group who, despite the great bass playing of Mike Gordon, did not come close to Dave’s band musically. So I no longer liked DMB and in fact began actively hating them.
Then, during the summer of my Junior year in high school, Busted Stuff got a lot of radio play and all of a sudden I found myself liking Dave Matthews again. I especially liked Grace Is Gone. I appreciated the more folksy and smooth style of this album, in contrast to what I felt was an obnoxious effort in Everyday. Maybe Dave wasn’t so bad after all.
Then I heard the song American Baby.
Literally, within seconds, my estimation of Dave Matthews fucking plummeted. He was now completely blacklisted in my music book, and my onetime love for his music was replaced with venomous hatred. I couldn’t believe that he could produce such a shitty song. I was aghast, bewildered, repulsed and disgusted.
I’ve eased up a little lately, and I can appreciate the older Dave, particularly for its nostalgia value. I still respect the band’s musical talent. But I don’t think I will forgive Dave for American Baby. That song is just so bad, it really puts a black mark on the man’s soul.
Pretty much. The only point I was trying to make is that his music seems to appeal to a relatively narrow demographic.
What’s Futurama?
Argent Towers Quote:
Originally Posted by msmith537
I was under the impression we were talking about the whole package - album sales, concert sales, relevancy, longevity, etc. Whether you personally like or dislike him is irrelevant and is largely dependent on how likely you were to fit in with the late teen/20-something frat guy Abercrombie and J Crew crowd over the past 15 years. People who fit in with the crowd, it’s cool to like DMB. People who don’t, it’s cool to hate his music.
I’m a little older than you so I didn’t hear him until maybe sophomore or junior year in college. I found his music to be a refreshing change from the constant barrage of heavy Seattle grunge rock that was popular up until around that time.
I think this article says it best:
U2’s Actung Baby came out around 90-91. That album and it’s acompanying Zoo TV tour were huge.
Here’s what Wikipedia has to say on the subject:
I find it difficult to compare U2, a band that has been consistantly huge since the 80s with Nirvana, a band that enjoyed intense but brief popularity and influence in the early 90s.
The baffling thing is that a good percentage of those bands – maybe 50% – were playing when I was in college (or maybe grad school). Something like 25 years. And some of them (Barry Manilow) are at best guilty pleasures for most people. I doubt there’s been any precipitous drop in the amount of raw talent available on the music scene.Has the music business shifted away from the super-band model? Or has the biz gotten so adept at screwing musicians that it’s no longer even worth it?
Well as an official Old Fart, I blame it on the talentless hack can’t-play-instruments, can’t-write-a-hook, guitar-bashing morons that infest the rock scene today.
But seriously, if you look at the lists I posted, the common denominator is that big-selling artists tend to be people you can sing along to, in one way or another. Even rap artists have driving beats and solid hooks, even if they are sampled from someone else. Country music has become popular, I believe, because so much of it sounds like 70s rock. It’s easy to listen to. Then you throw in the American Idol types, who have songwriters build choruses for them like in the Brill Building days, a few soul balladeers, and the occasional singer-songwriter type. And this is even more true for the high-grossing concert acts, every one of which has famous songs that everyone can hum. They play music.
But Cult bands do not. And rock music has become a repository for Cult bands, bands which - absolutely unbelievably - make a virtue of selling only 5000 albums, but to people who think they “matter.” And the Cult crowd actively campaigns against listenable bands: the hate for Dave Matthews is a prime example.
As long as rock music remains in the grip of the cooler-than-thou gang, there won’t be another major act. Fortunately, with pop music, all things change every five years. Nobody knows what the future of music will be like.
I will now wait for the inevitable bashing, along with the injunctions to listen to some band that’s only sold 28 copies that proves I’m wrong about today’s music scene.
Radiohead - sold millions of albums. Rock band. Matters. Not hooky or catchy songs - maybe Creep - but vital and good. Heck, I am not even a big fan, but I get them.
Fall Out Boy- sold millions of albums. Rock Band. To their crowd - teens who are looking for real players, not boy bands - oh, yeah, they matter. They haven’t written a masterpiece yet, but they write very catchy, very good songs.
Sum 41 - sold millions of albums. Rock Band. They don’t matter, per se, but their stuff is incredibly catchy and entirely worthwhile - compared to most 60’s bands - and yes, I know them all very, very well - they hold up fine.
All American Rejects - songs hold up to Goffin/King, Lieber/Stoller, etc. - good, standard, verse/chorus/verse rock songs with very catchy lyrics. Hell, Swing Swing is a song you get stuck in your head and can’t get out. They don’t matter the way that U2 matters, - not even close - but they have good stuff.
Bottom line is that it is not music that has changed - it is how we consume it. Just because you can’t hear it on the radio doesn’t mean that it is not out there to be consumed. Have you heard the Shins or Grandaddy or any of the great, accessible bands out there waiting to be heard? It is not their fault that modern radio won’t play them because boomers want to hear the Eagles or Faith Hill.
Saying that modern songwriters don’t write good songs is simply an admission that you don’t have the time to look. That is okay - life moves on and we are all busy - but to declare that good music is no longer being written is to write yourself off, not the music. U2 has endured - like the Red Hot Chili Peppers and a few others still writing vital music today - because they write good pop tunes that still work in today’s more complex environment. Very cool. But not the only music that is out there.
I LOVE the White Stripes - they are on my top list of working acts today - but they haven’t made the Big Statement yet - they are writing great songs, but haven’t transcended to move from Motown to What’s Going On, or from Killer Queen to Bohemian Rhapsody, if you follow me. I look forward to seeing if they can.
Man, if you think that boomer music is keeping new music off the radio, all I can say is that you don’t listen to radio. Or television. Or any other form of communication.
So, by correcting me, you are saying that there are no good, current songs out there by “rock” bands? They are all “talentless hack can’t-play-instruments, can’t-write-a-hook, guitar-bashing morons that infest the rock scene today”?
If so, I say YOU aren’t listening. The bands may not be on the level of U2, but the music is out there.
I’m saying that if the good stuff was out there, it would be heard everywhere. You know why? Because it would make money for somebody. The same way country is making money. And hip hop. And American Idol singers.
The opportunity is everywhere. My local cable provider gives me MTV, MTV2, MTV Hits, and fuse.
My local, small radio market has two modern rock stations, along with a Top 40 station and a hip hop station.
If there are no big rock bands currently, there has to be a reason. What are the possibilities? 1) There are no good bands. 2) Good bands can’t sustain themselves for more than one album. 3) Good bands don’t care about or actively reject becoming big, because that would alienate their audience.
That’s all I can think of. You can’t tell me there are no opportunities. Promoters and record companies would kill for a huge new rock sound. Radio and television music stations would jump all over them. Magazines would write them up incessantly. Every late night talk show would have them on. The world is waiting for the next big thing in rock.
And it doesn’t come. Why? Tell me. Which one of the three reasons do you choose? (I choose #1. I’ve listened to all the bands in your last post and they do nothing for me. They can’t write a song to save their lives. But I’m an Old Fart and what do I know?) Or give me a fourth reason other than boomers are keeping them off the radio. We consume the types of music in that top 20 best selling albums list just fine. That hasn’t changed. Just rock. Why?
You keep making this argument about how great the music is in thread after thread, and that we should just go out and find it. But in the rest of the music world, the music is there. It comes to people. It’s everywhere and inescapable. I can hear all the rest of the music without trying. Without wanting to. With begging not to.
So why is rock different?
I’ll tell you why. Because then it wouldn’t be cool. It wouldn’t “matter.” And you’ve just killed off another generation of rock.
Stop being cool. Start writing songs you can hum. The world will beat a path to your door. And that’ll be cooler than you can imagine.
Well, the good stuff is definitely there. And not only what you would call “cult” bands.
I agree, though, that proper rock gets surprisingly little airplay. I don’t really know why this is. Perhaps people who listen to the radio do not like the extra effort it takes to listen to rock instead of pop. I also think you american people have a strong bias towards american music, which is somewhat more singer-songwriter oriented. For instance, the whole britpop phenomenon was to a high degree rock you could hum to.
I honestly think U2 has influenced bands in a more general way than Nirvana did. When “Smells Like Teen Spirit” hit, the next few years was full of soft-verse loud-chorus dirty-guitar mumbled-baritone songs, but that’s a specific style, and it’s gone more or less out of style. I think you can “hear” U2 in bands that have an “open” sound, or that painterly guitar with a pulsing bass.
I know that a LOT of the music the (very good) band at my church plays sounds a fair bit like U2. Ironically, Adam Clayton is fairly influential bass player, it seems, probably more for being part of a broader sound than for innovation.
This is a non-starter premise. There are big rock bands currently, as discussed.
All of this is happening.
Your call. You list radio, tv and other older, standard channels of distribution. You don’t mention downloads - in another thread, I mention the band my friend is producing that has over 2 million - 2 freakin’ million - downloads of their single off of myspace. They (up until the past couple of weeks) were unsigned.
Bands like Dashboard Confessional - for the past few years this guy (a single guy with a rotating set of backing players) have been HUGE on the emo scene - they get no play in standard channels. He has avoided standard deals and focused on making money through touring and “merch” - merchandising.
Look at an older, more boomer-oriented band: Wilco - they get NO play on radio or video channels. None. Yet Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was a breakout CD and they have been doing incredibly well. Outside the system.
I am done - there is no use trying to discuss something when you are clearly entrenched in your point of view. Bottom line is that you are asking the wrong questions and drawing the wrong conclusions and I am not going to do your work for you. Bands like U2 and the Red Hot Chili Peppers came up in the system and figured out how to make it work for them. Newer bands have a VAST array of other ways to reach their fans and as the major labels and tv stations scramble to figure out how to stay relevant, these newer bands go their own way. Ask any kid what they listen to on the radio or see on tv and they will just look at you funny. Ask them what they download, or how they feel about that new band (insert name here) and watch their eyes light up and tell you about them…
Asking the question about The Biggest Rock Band is a good question because it ultimately gets to how the music business is changing and how you define “big.” It also demands an exploration of how the channels of distribution have changed, leading to a world in disarray - older, more comfortable acts and Boomers who are used to consuming their music a certain way prefer the old way of getting music - so genre’s like Country which filled the Eagles gap in rock and classic rock can still use the old system. But there is a new system out there - it may not be tuned yet to the point where bands fill arenas (but don’t tell Phish or the Warped Tour or Ozzfest or Bonnaroo that), but it is still emerging so anything can happen…But it also demands an open mind.
The OP is fairly specific in asking for the biggest band in terms of album sales for the past four years.
Trouble is, album sales are dropping, and have been for some time, except in 2004. I have seen other analyses that say the rise in 2004 was in great part due to people crawling out of the woodwork to buy Norah Jones’ “Come Away With Me”.*
The music industry is still in a certain degree of flux, due to the rise of MP3 downloads that first made itself known at the turn of the decade. It’s a real sea change, both financially and artistically, for the whole music scene. When you can download or rip & burn the single songs you want, albums become more or less meaningless.
Some truisms I go by when discussing these matters:
a) Americans cosume a greater volume of new music between the ages of about 15 to 25 than any other time in their lives.
b) Everyone currently under 25 downloads a hell of a lot more music than they buy in album form, and they don’t particularly care to pay for it when they feel they don’t have to.
Hence the measured drop in album sales, and the loss of relevance of album sales in determining who the biggest act is. That’s why there’s discussion in this thread about tour income ( which is also dropping in terms of numbers if not dollars) , and unresolvable arguments about who “matters”.
To get hard numbers of who’s on top in terms of who everyone wants to hear, you’d probably have to get some combination of CD units sold, tour tickets sold, and number of downloads, both legal and illegal, for the last four years. Tall order.
*And here’s my own analysis: Part of Jones’ unprecedented success is due to her use of recording and audio equipment from Universal Audio , which offers digital quality sound but is also engineered to provide a certain ambience common to recordings from the late 60’s and early 70’s. Not to disrespect Jones’ talent. I think she would have been popular anyway, but her album had a tone quality that spoke to an older generation that still buys CDs, putting her over the top.
That’s fine if you want to stay there. I interpreted the OP as “who is the Biggest Rock Band - I guess sales may work as the criteria.” My fundamental point has been that sales is ONE criteria, but should not be considered the ONLY criteria by any stretch. Heck, that would mean that if we asked this question in the 50’s that we should consider Pat Boone as a bigger act than Little Richard, the man whose songs Boone ripped off (er, covered). While in terms of sales, Pat Boone WAS bigger, no one considering that time period today would even remotely look at Boone as relevant, whereas Little Richard just rocks hard.
These are the reason why there’s no “big rock band” today – the industry execs want more power for themselves, so tend to promote safe and young acts that they can then chain to bad deals for the rest of their lives.
It’s intentional that the new music, even the new “big rock bands” that have airplay, are sort of lame. It’s not only that they’re bland and thus appeal to the best audience, the execs are choosing them for their lack of business acumen and chops.
(All other things being equal, of course. And yes, many people truly prefer pop and bland rock to the good stuff, so it’s partially the public’s taste, but not entirely.)
