I work in a high school and I have noticed teenage girls wearing clothing with the pirate skull on it.Little pink ,red and blue skulls, without the cross bones. Is that the legacy of Johnny Depp? The threatening symbol looks now ridiculously stupid!! When the good shit goes mainstream, it's over. Are there examples of things that have improved by going mainstream??? In rock and rock, mainstream is the kiss of death.
Mops

The skulls have been pretty 'mainstream' for quite a few years now if you count couture fashion designers putting out whole cllections around them - eg; McQueen and Galliano. Now its on the high street too! Share the love, I say.

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rollmops
Are there examples of things that have improved by going mainstream??? In rock and rock, mainstream is the kiss of death.
Mops

The Beatles (Went mainstream quite fast), The Rolling Stones (Certainly went mainstream already in the sixties), Nirvana (Their best album is In Utero from after their years as unknowns) and....... Video games.

JumpingKentFlash

On a similar note, I wear stones t - shirts quite regularly, whether i'm just out and about during the day, or going out in the evening.

What does annoy me a little bit is that you now see a lot of young people wearing these t shirts, especially the sparkly ones, and you do wonder whether they are wearing them just because it's the fashion, and not because they are fans of the band and it's music. That bugs me a bit, but I have to admit, partly because I wonder if people look at me and think the same, without realising I'm wearing a stones shirt because I love the stones!

_____________________________________________________

What's your favourite flavour?...........Cherry Red!!

I usually speak to people I see wearing a Stones t shirt and ask if they are a fan - they usually say yes and we talk about what gigs we've been to or recordings, so although I'm sure some people are just wearing them because they like the logo as a fashion statement, most who do, even if not fanatical, like the band too.

I do the same but in the last couple of years only one person I asked was a true fan which does just go to show, in the UK at least, that the logo is now seen primarily as a fashion statement.

I teach middle school and see lots of kids wearing Stones shirts (from Walmart) who have no idea who the Stones are. Cool logo - maybe the best ever.

"No Anchovies, Please"

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JumpingKentFlash
The Rolling Stones (Certainly went mainstream already in the sixties

Certainly? My personal experiences from the sixties tell me otherwise: Certainly NOT!

The Stones were regarded anti-mainstream, anti-establishment and DANGEROUS throughout the sixties.

Musically, probably Angie was their first move to reach a more main stream audience. In concert, the 1989/90 Steel Wheels-Urban Jungle world tour is regarded as their first move to family-friendly mass entertainment by many (I tend to agree, because in 1982 there still was this dangerous rock'n'roll edge, not quite mainstream in my book).

smile: recording I Wanna Be Your Man was not exactly an attempt to remain obscure and non-mainstream.
they had plenty of hugely successful pop hits before Angie - and thank all that is praiseworthy for that!
appealing to the mainstream only sucks if trying to be popular is your only reason for doing what you do.

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Elmo Lewis
I. Cool logo - maybe the best ever.

Definitely the best ever.

Kent not sure what it was like over there but Nirvana got huge here in the US pretty much right after Smells Like Teen Spirit came out. Their first album was by far their most played by everyone here. Maybe they didn't want to be mainstream but they certainly were.

Stones and rock t-shirts in general are pretty big right now. Maybe that started when That's 70's Show became very popular.

rock has at various times coincided with the "mainstream" if by that you mean the broadest possible audience. One of those times was certainly the mid-60s, as the Stones began recording. It became more of a subcultural thing as it linked up with the counterculture in the late 60s and the music became more "serious," but it was a huge subculture, and the Stones certainly didn't retreat into obscurity. They always transcended the subculture and the "hard rock" groups who followed them. "Angie" would be an example.

a "hard core" of rock fans who wear band t-shirts and keep their hair respectably longish might be separated from casual listeners who have Hot Rocks, but still, you're talking about millions of people.

what's happening is time moving forward. Rock as the Stones play it is music of the recent past. Kids pick up the iconography without investing in or even educating themselves about the subculture. It's annoying, but half of them also probably can't identify their own country on a map. Our age has lost its sense of history, and this is just a symptom.

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Elmo Lewis
I teach middle school and see lots of kids wearing Stones shirts (from Walmart) who have no idea who the Stones are. Cool logo - maybe the best ever.

What subject do you teach Elmo?


BTW I agree the stones logo is the coolest ever. I am suprised though that kids would wear it without even knowing who the band is.

6th Grade Social Studies - currently The Renaissance.

Yeah, lots of 'em show me their shirts because they know I love the band - but they wouldn't know Satisfaction or HTW or SMU was the Stones. A few noticed teh band on The Super Bowl.

"No Anchovies, Please"

Cool! I liked history/ social studies in school. I remember in HS I had an english teacher whos Fav. band I was the beatles. But when we were doing a unit on The Crucible... I think it was... she played "Sympathy for the Devil" on her sterio before class started. I thought that was the coolest thing in the world. and I recall She also played the Eagles "witchy Woman" one morning before class during that unit. a fitting song for reading about the Salem Witch Trials.


I know for sure she played SFTD and im pretty sure it was during that time too, there would be a connection there w/ that story.



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 2008-01-30 23:07 by ryanpow.

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with sssoul
smile: recording I Wanna Be Your Man was not exactly an attempt to remain obscure and non-mainstream.
they had plenty of hugely successful pop hits before Angie - and thank all that is praiseworthy for that!
appealing to the mainstream only sucks if trying to be popular is your only reason for doing what you do.

Weeeeeell, it depends on how you define "mainstream". There's still a whole lotta difference between "I Wanna Be Your Man" and, for instance, "Summer Holiday" by Cliff Richard. Apart from that, I define mainstream as non-offending, compatible with all ages, "family friendly" etc etc etc. The only "fit for all ages" Stones pop hits before Angie I can imagine would be Ruby Tuesday and As Tears Go By, but can you imagine elderly people listen to Let's Spend The Night Together (or Mother's Little Helper) in the 60's? And even As Tears Go By and Ruby Tuesday did not change their image from black to white - clean, friendly guys, perfect sons-in-law?

Any band releasing a song titled "Mother's Little Helper" can't be mainstream!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2008-01-30 23:37 by retired_dog.

Yeah, ryan, I try to play 'em some good stuff from whatever part of the world we're studying - Bob Marley for the Caribbean, for example.

Europe now, so Stones time!

"No Anchovies, Please"

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retired_dog
Weeeeeell, it depends on how you define "mainstream". There's still a whole lotta difference between "I Wanna Be Your Man" and, for instance, "Summer Holiday" by Cliff Richard. Apart from that, I define mainstream as non-offending, compatible with all ages, "family friendly" etc etc etc. The only "fit for all ages" Stones pop hits before Angie I can imagine would be Ruby Tuesday and As Tears Go By, but can you imagine elderly people listen to Let's Spend The Night Together (or Mother's Little Helper) in the 60's? And even As Tears Go By and Ruby Tuesday did not change their image from black to white - clean, friendly guys, perfect sons-in-law?

Any band releasing a song titled "Mother's Little Helper" can't be mainstream!

wasn't that song a huge hit? I would consider that to qualify as "mainstream." I think you need a better word to suit your definition. I propose "square," "establishment," "conservative," or "anodyne."

Opinions differ, but "a huge hit" does not qualify as "mainstream" in my book. "Never Mind The Bollocks" was a huge hit album for the Sex Pistols, but "mainstream"? No.

The Rolling Stones (Certainly went mainstream already in the sixties),

I would say, the Stones established a sort of "mainstream" in the 60ies.

H&M is selling ramones and motörhead shirts....
and it sucks!

Why would anyone buy a rock t-shirt if they didn't want to belong to some kind of group or clique?

"I want to be an outsider and a punk so I'll buy a Ramones t-shirt!" It was that way 25 years ago and it seems the same now. It doesn't matter, everyone tries to make a statement with those t-shirts - mainly, "I'm cool."

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Hound Dog
Kent not sure what it was like over there but Nirvana got huge here in the US pretty much right after Smells Like Teen Spirit came out. Their first album was by far their most played by everyone here. Maybe they didn't want to be mainstream but they certainly were.

Stones and rock t-shirts in general are pretty big right now. Maybe that started when That's 70's Show became very popular.

In the case of Nirvana and The Stones I'd say that they started out as underground. They didn't go to the mainstream. The mainstream came to them. Either way both bands still went mainstream no matter if it came to them, or they went to it.

JumpingKentFlash

>> Weeeeeell, it depends on how you define "mainstream". <<

sure. but in any case my main point was the bit you ignored:
there's nothing wrong with appealing to "the mainstream" as long as your heart is in what you do.
it's when someone's only motivation is trying to appeal to the mainstream that things get tacky, shallow, etc.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2008-02-04 10:35 by with sssoul.

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with sssoul
>> Weeeeeell, it depends on how you define "mainstream". <<

sure. but in any case my main point was the bit you ignored:
there's nothing wrong with appealing to "the mainstream" as long as your heart is in what you do.
it's when someone's only motivation is trying appeal to the mainstream that things get tacky, shallow, etc.

I agree. Just look at the casting shows where they try to find new all-compatible "artists". What they usually find are people who are willing to sing nearly everything to "make it big" for the sake of making it big. No individual style, no edge, just trying to please a big audience, no matter who this audience is. The Stones tried to find an audience, sure, but they tried to find an audience by doing their own thing, with the music they loved - Blues, Rock'n'Roll, Soul. In a way, yes, mainstream came to them, but they did not go mainstream.

Personally, I could not care less if the Stones are mainstream or not. For me, there is no such thing. For me, there are also no such things as "good music" or "bad music". There's only music I like and music I don't like.