So Pink Floyd is off of your list heh?
Posted on 12/06/2024 8:47:31 PM PST by nickcarraway
Tony Soprano once famously said, “'Remember when' is the lowest form of conversation.” This never dawned on Kiss’ Gene Simmons, whose recent “rock is dead” rant amounted to little more than waxing nostalgic about the days when his band ruled the roost — and revealed his ignorance and disinterest in the current state of the genre.
Simmons made his latest proclamation on an episode of The Zak Kuhn Show. When asked if he believed rock was still dead, Simmons replied: "It is. And people don't understand how I can say that when we all have our favorite songs and we love our favorite bands, you and I and everybody else. But what I mean is that — well, let's play a game, and I've done this before. From 1958 until 1988, that's 30 years. Thirty years. So what came during that period? Well, we had Elvis, we had the Beatles, the [Rolling] Stones, Jimi Hendrix, all that, Pink Floyd, the solo artists, David Bowie and just music that lasts forever, we'd like to think. In the disco world, you had Madonna, more heavy guitars, you had — oh, God — AC/DC and everybody else, Aerosmith and on and on. And you had Motown at the same time. You had Prince. It was a very, very rich musical menu. It could go up and down. You had prog bands, you had Yes, Genesis, Gentle Giant, and you had the heavy bands, Led Zeppelin and so on. And from 1988 until today — it's something like almost 40 years, certainly 35 years — who are the new Beatles?"
When Kuhn suggested Nirvana, Simmons interjected: "Stop. We are blinded. I'm a major fan. If you walked down the street and asked a 20-year-old, 'Who's the bass player in Nirvana?' they wouldn't know what you're talking about. Or, 'Can you sing a Nirvana song?' No, no. The Beatles — and, to a slightly lesser extent, the Stones and Elvis — everybody knew the Beatles. If you hated rock music, you knew about them. By the way, I'm delusional enough to believe some market reports about how the Kiss faces are the most recognized faces on the planet. And I've tried this before: You walk down the street, randomly ask people, 'Who's on Mount Rushmore?' They'll say, 'Uh, Elvis.' They won't get it, but they know those four faces anywhere you go. They may hate the band, but you can't deny that.”
It was a typically meandering and self-aggrandizing response from Simmons, and one that failed to offer any tangible evidence that rock is dead. Instead, it revealed that Simmons’ idea of a “thriving” rock scene can be commodified and sold on department store T-shirts around the world. Simmons is talking about rock as a corporate monolith that looks, sounds and acts the same as it did in 1977. There’s still a market for that, as evidenced by the many legacy rock artists who have announced massive tours for 2025, as well as young acts like Greta Van Fleet who have debuted inside the Billboard Top 10 and filled arenas off the strength of their classic rock cosplay. But this narrow, antiquated view of rock barely scratches the surface of the genre’s rich, albeit embattled, present-day ecosystem.
Simmons’ “Who are the new Beatles?” refrain is a lazy and irrelevant response to the discussion of rock’s current standing. For one, the Beatles were a one-of-a-kind sociocultural phenomenon that will simply never be replicated. (Taylor Swift may have made a similar global impact, but she operates in a music business and a world that is unrecognizable from that of the Beatles’ heyday, so it’s an apples-to-oranges comparison.) Secondly, the 30-year period Simmons is referencing, when labels had endless money to blow on fostering up-and-coming talent, is a mere blip on the radar in the scope of music as commerce. It wasn't considered such a lucrative business enterprise before that, and it probably never will be in the same way again, save for the 99th percentile of pop superstars. The streaming economy has simultaneously democratized access to music, fragmented listenership and bankrupted small-to-midsize artists to the extent that a rock band cutting their teeth today has virtually no chance of achieving a whiff of the same success. They could be writing the next “A Day in the Life” as we speak, but it’s not going to sell 20 million copies, and it’s going to take some digging from avid music listeners to find. That’s a serious problem in its own right, but it’s not the problem Simmons purports to highlight here.
Furthermore, Simmons’ quick dismissal of Nirvana on the basis that no casual fan knows Krist Novoselic’s name rings hollow, considering the same casual fan would be hard-pressed to tell you who played alongside Simmons and Paul Stanley in Kiss for the past 20-odd years. His similar rejection of Pearl Jam, another one of Kuhn’s suggestions, ignores the inconvenient truth that both Nirvana and Pearl Jam outsold Kiss by at least five-to-one when you compare their highest-certified albums. (Pearl Jam’s Ten: 13 million. Nirvana’s Nevermind: 10 million. Kiss’ Destroyer: 2 million.)
Kuhn also offered up Foo Fighters as an example of a modern-day rock giant, to which Simmons argued that Dave Grohl has eclipsed both Nirvana and Pearl Jam’s popularity by becoming a Hollywood socialite, not based on his music. This, he claimed, is the same reason that Snoop Dogg remains more popular than “other rappers who might actually be bigger rap stars — M.C. Criminal or whatever, I just made that up.” This is, um, ignorant at best and racist at worst, but it makes Simmons sound bafflingly out of touch at a time when rapper Kendrick Lamar’s new surprise album GNX reigns atop the Billboard 200 and he occupies the entire Hot 100 Top 5 — a feat previously accomplished by only Swift, Drake and, that’s right, the Beatles.
If Simmons wants to lament the death of rock ’n’ roll as monoculture, he has some grounds to do so. But to proclaim the entire genre dead across the board shows that Simmons has no interest in looking outside his insular world. If he did, he might notice that Green Day — whose major-label debut Dookie was recently certified double diamond for sales exceeding 20 million — is headlining Coachella next year. He might realize that My Chemical Romance just sold out an entire U.S. stadium tour. He might see that Linkin Park and Pierce the Veil have hefty arena tours booked for 2025. He might marvel that genre-bending psych-rock weirdos King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard have become one of the biggest cult bands on the scene, packing theaters and amphitheaters around the world. And if he really wanted to do his homework, he might take pleasure in the rock/punk/metal hybrid of bands like the Dirty Nil or White Reaper, who are dutifully making the rounds on the club and theater circuit the way old-school rock bands used to do. (For the record, either of these bands could have made great openers on Kiss’ farewell tour if the band didn’t take the easy way out and handed the gig to Amber Wild, led by Paul Stanley’s son, Evan Stanley.)
But Simmons doesn’t want to do that. He would rather complain that he and his retired boomer cohort no longer run the show, and if they’re not in charge, then nobody should be. He’s well within his rights to lament the death of rock to anybody who will listen — but he ought to know it’s the lowest form of conversation.
Bro country sucks. It’s over produced, autotuned pop music with a twang in the voice. But the songs could just as easy be Brittany Spears or Justin Bieber. Alan Jackson and George Strait agree with me.
I confess, I’m a big fan of Dwight Yoakam. You get a great voice, guitars, sometimes a fiddle AND an accordion, and music that comes darn close to real rock’n’roll, without the sappiness of modern country. I’m way past most of what is known today as “classic rock”, just don’t need it anymore.
Rockabilly rules! And yeah, George “Thumper” Jones was great!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8T2afWs9Ms
The Who already proclaimed this back in 1972.
Well, they did hope to die before they got old.
I like Yacht Rock
The Ship of Love--The Nutmegs (1955)
Louie, Louie--Richard Berry & His Pharaohs (1957)
Marianne--Terry Gilkyson & the Easy riders (1957)
The Banana Boat Song--The Fontane Sisters (1957)
Cindy, Oh, Cindy--Vince Martin & the Tarriers (1956)
Island of Love--The Sheppards (1959)
Same here, was exposed to country when growing up, my dad liked Jonny Cash, Charley Pride and a host of others, watched Hee-Haw, he was pretty country for a city slicker. He had the radio dial in his car tuned to the local country music station WMAQ, music in the day, and they covered the White Sox games at night. I started to drift from Rock and was drawn to country as I got older. Went to quite a few Country Thunder music festivals held nearby but noticed around the early 2000’s the clientele began to change, it wasn’t as laid back as before. The crowds tended to be younger and were more drunk and disorderly so it wasn’t as enjoyable, along with the music changing. Now when I get nostalgic I just listen to older rock from the 60’s-70’s.
I like Dwight Yoakam too.
So Pink Floyd is off of your list heh?
Okay but now we have electricity and sheet.
That’s it! Exactly!
I’m finding artists today who were fans of my favorite bands. They are very accomplished musicians and i can enjoy them more for $35 from 40 feet than the originals for $200 from 400 feet. Locally we have “tribute” bands like Steeling Dan, The Super Tramps, PG13 (early Gabriel albums), Those Medley Boys (prog band medleys), Transit Authority and one old rocker who entertains with full shows of dozens of artists like Elton John, Billy Joel, Springsteen, Elvis, Elvis Costello...always a good show!
It’s interesting that you mentioned the radio angle. I was thinking about that yesterday. Unless I mowed enough lawns or shoveled enough snow, I did not have money for albums. But I got an AM/FM radio for Christmas. So many great rock hits were on the FM Channels. Pop was on AM, and groups like the Who and Frank Zappa were on FM. Later, I saved enough money for a cassette recorder and bought a 60 - 90-minute cassette tape. I would listen to the radio and record my favorite songs as they came on. Later, when I had the money, albums, cassette tapes, and CDs were my source, so I stopped listening to the radio. But, it all started with the radio.
Mr. Kid Rock will be turning 54 next month 🙂
He has acquired experience - in life and as a musician by now, I think, and I wish him all the best for the future👍🏻
Kid Rock has become fairly good friends with President Trump. He recalls after the inauguration where he and a few others (including Sarah Palin) were invited to the Oval Office that first night.
Rock tells a funny story about it.
Kid Rock with Tucker Carlson. Entire interview is pretty good. The Oval Office story is at 2:50 to 5:00.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHnleUZTofc
Ahhh, I forgot Charlie Pride. I liked him. I just had a flash memory of the song Kaw-Liga, a cover of a Hank Williams song. I haven’t heard it since the 70s and it seems very fresh in my mind.
Yup, taping off the radio, the great American tradition, getting a bunch of songs missing the first 15 seconds. Heck I even continued that with music videos, when I first got MTV I’d watch Closet Classics with a tape in the VCR and record stuff. And streaming just isn’t the same. You don’t get to choose a song like the radio tape. Sure you give it a thumbs up or whatever, but it just doesn’t have that meaning.
Charley was a great singer.
Thanks a lot for this linkt to the amusing video. It‘s reassuring to see that Kid Rock and Ted Nugent are on such good terms with President Trump👍🏻🇺🇸
It’s basically now like Classical Music, where people go to see orchestras playing the works of Mozart, Beethoven, etc.
Now it will be people going to see bands playing The Beatles, or any of the other classic rock bands.
Which echoes my point about classical music. Maybe there are some great symphonies being written today. It doesn’t matter, people want to hear the masters.
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