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Julian Cope presents Head Heritage

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Dog 3000
Dog 3000
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Re: Hmm
Sep 05, 2003, 16:36
I think there is a big cultural divide here -- I am not talking about the scene in the UK but in the US. There were never "hordes of Smiths immitators" over here, in fact I can't think of a single UK "indie" band I was listening to in the late 80's (except for stuff like the Clash, PIL, Sex Pistols . . . none of it was "new" at the time.)

"Grunge" apparently hit the UK quite differently than in the US. Here it was just a hype machine that killed the "real indie scenes" and replaced it with dressed-down hair metal. Lots of great bands either broke up (Replacements, Pixies) or sold out and got lame (Dinosaur jr., Meat Puppets) around the time Nirvana exploded. Urban Outfitter started selling ripped flannel shirts for $50 (while indie-punks had been buying the same shirts for $2 at Rag Stock for years -- that "style statement" was more an expression of poverty than anything else.)

I know I'm not the only one who noticed what was happening at the time . . . but I suppose in the UK the whole thing was an import and there was no equivalent scene there to wipe out . . .

Seems to me that the UK and US music scenes have really gone different paths in the past 10-15 years, in fact I saw an article not to long ago noting that there was only 1 or 2 UK artists in the entire US top 100. Robbie Williams? Who's dat? Never heard of any of those "hit groups" Cancerboy mentioned either.

These days the US charts are ruled by: 1) sexy flirty girls (Britney, Christina) and their male equivalents (Justin, Usher), 2) hip-hop (which I think has been on a downward spiral since 1994 but that's another story), 3) bubblegum "punk" (Blink 182, Sum 41), 4) MOR crap trying to be "classic rock" (Matchbox 20, Coldplay)

Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stoneage and White Stripes seem to be the only real "rock" bands left that have anykind of crossover mainstream appeal -- and I'm sure all those groups combined sell less than 10% what Britny or Justin does.

Of course there's plenty of good "rock" left in the underground (Bell Rays, Paybacks) -- but it's a cult thing, probably no more popular than traditional Irish music.

As for the Rock vs. Pop distinction, I am talking about wild-crazy-ecstatic noise vs. smoothed out melodic tunesmithing. Iggy=rock, Bowie=pop, etc. Shaman vs. Showman as Cope likes to say. Though admitted the "genre game" is always dodgy . . . and an artist can be pop and rock or go back and forth between (Beatles certainly did both -- "She Loves You" vs. "Long & Winding Road")

And yes of course there was a golden age when rock ruled the charts: 1965-1973 or so.

Golden age of hip-hop was about 1987-1994 by the way. ;-)

I'm sure that sooner or later something new will come along that captures the zeitgeist like rock and hip-hop did in their heydays -- probably something that is neither one of those genres. In the meantime all previous genres will continue to exist -- that's what "postmodernism" is all about. Cycles of nostalgia getting shorter as history folds in on itself . . .
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