Re: Article from Drudge about Stones Radio Airplay
Date: September 8, 2005 19:54
Roger Daltrey was right in 1975 when he said rock has no future. It's a dead format at radio and straight ahead rock is quickly becoming relagated to being a niche format. In 20 years people will talk about groups like the Stones as people now talk about Prog Rock and bands like Yes, King Crimson, Camel and others of the genre.
It's not about music anymore or music and an image(like the Stones) but just the image. And it's certainly not about rock anymore. Why? Several reasons. Record Companies quit working careers of artists so they could make A Bigger Bang (No pun intended) from essentially one hit wonders, many of whom have little talent. This is easy to do since the key demographic for record companies is from 12-25. An age group who really isn't to discerning about what they listen to. By the time they have aged out and know what good from bad is, they are no longer courted by record companies.
MTV ruined a lot of it. Look good, show some leg, don't worry about the music. Musicians might actually want to make music. Bad Idea. The dumbed down kids want that instant gratification that comes with the garbage radio and MTV(when it plays videos) and BET dish out everyday. Real music takes too much work to appreciate.
Rap is another reason. It's become the big seller these days. 50 Cent, Kanye West, Eminem and other rappers have squeezed most everything else to the second line and since most rappers have all of this x rated music that kids love, why bother with anything that's related to real music.
So what happened to all of the disenfranchised rock listeners? They all headed straight to Nashville since all they do now is release really, really bad copies of classic rock sounding stuff while ignoring the true country music practicioners. Heavy guitars, Hammond B3's have replaced fiddles, banjos and steel guitars.
It's sad but no surprise the Stones aren't getting airplay. I wonder if they did a video for RJ/SOL. I haven't heard about one and certainly haven't seen one.
But the good news is that Clapton is at 13 this week in Billboard and Dylan is at 15 with a bunch of 40 year old + outtakes.
Bill