Posted on 05/23/2024 3:48:00 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Steven Van Zandt has a pessimistic outlook when he ponders the future of classic rock.
During an appearance on Club Random with Bill Maher, the E Street Band guitarist examined the way music consumption has changed.
“Right now, because the record industry is dead, there’s no more record sales other than Taylor Swift and Beyonce,” Van Zandt declared. Instead, he explained, films and television shows have become the best way for recording artists to make money. However, even that has become problematic because musicians have upped their licensing fees in order to survive.
“You got a bunch of whatever, 25 year-olds with a song list with a number next to it,” Van Zandt noted. “So if you want to make a movie or TV show, you ask for the song, they look at the number and they charge you that number, which is always high because there's no other income.”
Because classic rock offers material that’s recognizable to a wide swath of listeners, it's often the most-licensed genre of music. However, Van Zandt believes the filmmakers will pull away from classic rock in the face of soaring licensing costs, thus removing an important avenue for songs to be exposed to new listeners.
“This is a real problem. And I think 10 years from now, 20 years from now, it's going to be a problem because all this music is going to die if it's not promoted and heard,” Van Zandt insisted. “It's going to be like, Motown who? Rolling Stones who?”
Steven Van Zandt Hopes Laws Around Song Licensing Will Change
Van Zandt suggested law changes around licensing music as a compromise to keep filmmakers and musicians happy. He then noted how different the modern landscape is compared to when the E Street Band and Bruce Springsteen got started.
“When we started, music in movies was free. It was free,” he explained. “Martin Scorsese. He didn't even ask for permission to put [the Ronettes’] ‘Be My Baby’ in Mean Streets because it was free. And people thought of it as promoting the records. Nobody’s promoting the records anymore.”
Van Zandt pointed to the popular series Stranger Things as an example of how TV and film can bring new attention to classic tracks. The guitarist insisted such licensing is vital for classic rock's continuing survival.
“When our generation goes, who’s going to know about this stuff?”
These days Hollywood movies are not worth watching. If people don’t watch then the songs don’t get heard much there.
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Best music, all genres- original Pirate Radio Statio.
#2 Homer Simpson
Grand Funk Railroad, Homer’s Favorite Band
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YXKmsvRXE4A
Rock attained perfection in 1974
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLqfXlIq6RE
Rockin Out
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cyy7ERnky9g
It’ll Happen To You! (The Simpsons)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGrfhsxxmdE
Simpsons Boston Reference
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjiyq25crAQ
WOW🤓🤓🤓 😍😍
Thank you for posting this 😘
There's never been anyone like them since.
“t will become like Classical Music. People will still listen to it, but nobody will be interested in new stuff.”
Interesting observation. I think Classical Music can’t be done today because the centuries ago composers were more isolated, couldn’t listen to recordings, and thus were able to make music that was more a result of their individual creativity rather than what they heard from others. Those conditions are hard to come by today.
Back then if you wanted to hear music, someone had to play it for you, or you played it yourself.
Also, once upon a time composers sought to make music that was “beautiful”. That’s what their audiences wanted to hear. Ain’t that way any more.
Maybe music isn’t infinite. Maybe all of the good stuff has already been done.
And with AI, now anyone can make their own music, by just typing in a description of what they want to hear.
“And with AI, now anyone can make their own music,”
But it wouldn’t be completely their own.
I can see computers helping with the harmonic progressions.
That's what hanging with Bruce will do to you.
I thought Deep Tracks went away after Jim Ladd passed away?
Yep, good station. I had first heard "Brother Where you Bound" by Supertramp on that station. The album's sixteen-and-a-half-minute title track featured Thin Lizzy's Scott Gorham on rhythm guitar and Pink Floyd's David Gilmour on the guitar solos. Also, the track had readings from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. A demo for the song was recorded prior to Roger Hodgson's departure from the band, for potential inclusion on …Famous Last Words…, but the band ultimately felt it was too densely progressive rock to be appropriate, and decided against recording it for the album.[7] At the time of the demo, the song was only ten minutes long.[7]
Yes though that has largely died down..
But I speak to a lot of guitar teachers. And other than perhaps Taylor Swift for girls, most of their kid students desire to play rock, classic rock mostly.
I am not arguing that classic rock’s is long in the tooth with its shelf life, and will almost certainly decline in popularity and be more niche… but given the absolutely formulaic and boring stuff that is mainstream today I don’t see it dying off completely anytime soon.
The fragmentation of music due to technology and democratization music can and never will have the same cultural impact it once did.. audiences are too divided and fractured to ever see the things that used to be.
There are still talented artist out there but you will see few if any reach the levels that just your more successful bands reached in the heyday
The Beatles, The Stones, The Who, etc. are the Beethoven, Bach and Mozarts of Classic Rock.
Earle Bailey appears regularly on Classic Vinyl Sirius XM channel 26, and Deep Tracks had been on .308
There’s an irony, that i am a frequent listener to Tom Petty radio 31 of TP hosted Buried Treasure shows from seven, eight years ago.
Dead legends playing dead legends.
I don’t know about that.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aME0qvhZ37o&pp=ygULaW4gdGhlIG1vb2Q%3D
And I can dance to it too. Old style!
You could alway use my playlist on youtube.
Classic rock and pop with a much more diverse playlist than FM radio.
https://www.youtube.com/@user-xp9xh2iq6k/playlists
Thanks, found some interesting playlists at the link.
Glad someone likes them.
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