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.
“Simmons has no interest in looking outside his insular world.”
I agree with the author’s statement about Simmons. I have no interest looking outside the 60’s and 70’s. That was the greatest rock and roll period ever and will not be duplicated again. I have no interest or have even heard of the groups the author mentioned that are popular today.
Yep - I used newsgroups to download a boatload of music from the 50s-90s, including blues and jazz...right now, I have the VLC media player tuned into “retro rarities” which plays a lot of the music you describe...
Real rock is rebellious and about getting laid. Now "rock bands" like Rage Against the Machine and Green Day are shills for the government point of view.
If rock were alive, there would be popular songs about our waste of money in Ukraine, or trannies(hello Lola and the Kinks!) or covid overreach or any other topic that goes against "the man". It's not rock per se, but a song like"Rich Men North of Richmond" is that rock spirit. But yes, rock is dead.
I didn’t know Kiss covered that as well.
Petra’s version is great.
Gene is always clueless. He’s really a jerk. And rock is great if you go looking for it. It’s no longer king of the hill so you have to go look for good rock, but it’s there for sure. Rival Sons, Blood Ceremony, Gary Clark Jr. Not to mention all the old farts still making great music. The last 30 years of Deep Purple, including the album they released this summer, kick the crap out of their 70s catalog.
To me the Eagles country rock sound should make a revival. But it won't...
I find myself listening to what I call “new old” music. I just started listening to bands like UFO, Deep Purple, Poco, and a bunch of others that I may have heard a song or two, but had never explored more. There are a lot more obscure bands from the 60s/70s/80s that i need to check out as well!
Chaim has no idea
I remember Tony Soprano well.
Dunno about this Simmons fellow and Zak Kuhn.
Foo Fighters? Green Day? Linkin Park? Author makes the case that rock died in the late 90s... a quarter of a century ago! When was Green Day last relevant?
KISS was all marketing and showmanship. Simmons was good at both. I saw Alice Cooper in San Antonio around 79. During the concert he yelled “KISS ain't shit.” Place erupted. People forget how KISS was viewed by fans of Rock in the 70s and 80s. KISS was a fun show especially when the organic substances started being passed around. But like a lot of bands in their era it was all show not so much substance. Look at old videos of Deep Purple, one video of them playing “Smoke on the Water” looks like a High School auditorium. No explosions, no costume's, just good music.
Money, marketing and showmanship made KISS. The music made the great Rock bands. More money, better marketing, technology and pyrotechnics damaged Rock, and KISS lead that charge. Honestly, does anyone still sit and listen to KISS albums? Seriously, I can still listen to “Cosmos Factory”, “Dark Side of the Moon” any Zeppelin album, Fleetwood Mac etc…. KISS had a few good songs but without all the bling and marketing are they really musically that interesting? If you had a choice, would you listen to the entire Hotel California album or Destroyer?
Rock is on life support, due to all the massive amounts of NOISE/ GARBAGE/ SEWAGE from the industry, since the early 80s.
Gene Simmons seems like the Charles Barkley of the music world.
Nah, they ruled for a little while- couldn’t stand their music, or performances, but those type of performances really took off when ,iss and twisted sister, and others decided to take what Alice Cooper started and run with it. Cooper was an innovator in a few genre’s actually- his theatrical performances I think inspired a number of bands- he was an original “shock rocker” too, which he later denounced-
But back to kiss- they did capitalize on e trend for wild costumes and Pyro shows- and were really controversial f9r a while- lots of parents hated them- (they hated Cooper too back in the day)- kids just flocked to them b3cause they were so different and new, and kids being rebels glomed onto them quickly. Ther e was and still,is a huge kiss market of merch and collectibles. Gene was pretty smart in pushing for that after his fame faded- he kept the dream a.ive for a long time.
Lol- yep, me too- I’ll even listen to,60’s from time to time- way better music in my opinion
A song that shares our sentiment:
Verse 1]
Just take those old records off the shelf
I’ll sit and listen to ‘em by myself
Today’s music ain’t got the same soul
I like that old time rock and roll
[Verse 2]
Don’t try to take me to a disco
You’ll never even get me out on the floor
In ten minutes I’ll be late for the door
I like that old time rock and roll
[Chorus]
Still like that old time rock and roll
That kind of music just soothes the soul
I reminisce about the days of old
With that old time rock and roll
Bob segar
Will current rock bands be viewed with the nostalgia we view the greats from the 70s and 80s? Maybe long after my demise some writer will look back fondly on Creed while complaining about the new rock bands.
Marilyn Manson I think was a big reason for the downfall of shock rock- he was just so rediculous at trying to pretend to be bad/evil that he looked like a clown- new bands were all trying to “out-evil” each other at that point, and the public just got tired of the silly antics- had nanda just stuck to performances that didn’t try to emulate satanic rituals, the genre might lasted a bit longer I thunk.
Ozzy and the chicken incident, and other bands doing simi,AR grotesque crap like that i think too might hurt the genre- quite a bit-
Its been dead for decades...
When a band like Toto can play arenas in Europe and only clubs/theaters in the USA, you know something is amiss.
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