John P. <JohnP@nospam.com> wrote:
> "RichL" <rpleavitt@yahoo.com> wrote in a message
>
>>> Zappa had a pretty clear message... is it a negative that people are
>>> more apt to discuss the controversy rather than the message?
>
>> Can you really separate the controversy from the message, though?
>> Isn't it part of the message, in a way?
>
> I think the controversy and the message are easily separated. Who
> here, in all this discussion, has brought up any points about an
> apathetic society or any of Zappa's messages? The discussion here, up
> until recently has been pretty limited to;
> Zappa sucks
> No he doesn't, he's a genius
> No, he's highly overrated
> No, You suck
> No You suck
>
> ... but then, that's pretty much a good half of all Usenet discussion
> - just plug in a different topic.
>
>>> Which is one of the reasons I so much love the internet, and Usenet.
>>> Music has moved into a new era where there isn't a small handful of
>>> people who decide what we will hear. One has access to every type of
>>> music available from every artist who chooses to put his/her stuff
>>> out there. There's almost a downside to that, in that it has grown
>>> so large, one may miss something for simple lack of clicking on a
>>> single link among the millions available.
>
>> There's another downside also: lack of common ground.
>>
>> I started playing guitar in 1963, and during the '60s rock musicians
>> were all basically hearing the same things. So if you ran into a
>> handful of musicians, chances were that you all knew many songs in
>> common. You'd get asked to sit in, and you could pull it off without
>> missing a beat.
>>
>> The net provides the diversity that was missing somewhat then
>> (although stations played a variety of different sounding stuff on
>> the radio), but genres have fractionated to the extent that, of the
>> subset of people posting here who play any sort of *current* music,
>> I'd be willing to bet that there isn't much overlap among them. So
>> the net is good, and the net is bad. Overall good, I'd say, but
>> there's some experiences that I had the pleasure to be part of that
>> the younger folks will miss out on.
>
> Very cool point. The net, while expanding horizons and avenues,
> limits the interaction of musicians on a regular level. I hadn't
> considered that, but I think you're dead on there.
>
> The flip side though, is I have done some collaboration with
> musicians I have never met, just using online means. Perhaps that is
> something that will grow to be more common. Likewise, I have
> personally met many musicians as a result of first "meeting" them
> online.
>
> So, while some doors may be closing, others are opening.
>
> In the end, the overall effect - good or bad, remains to be seen.
I think good overall, if only because the creativity of the mainstream
music industry has come pretty close to a screeching halt, and the
industry's overdue for some sort of revolution. The commonality of
musical experience of the '60s and '70s is a nice memory, but the
genie's out of the bottle and I think there's no putting it back. The
net collaboration thing is cool; I've done a couple myself. And I'm not
about to mourn the passing of the era of rock billionaires and the
accompanying excesses.
It would be nice if more acts branched out a bit more style-wise, which
really has nothing to do with corporate control or lack thereof.
Generally, I think musicians improve themselves by exposing themselves
to (and learning to play) all sorts of different styles, and the results
show up in the quality of the product. I can tolerate (and in fact
sometimes enjoy) an emo song here or there but a whole album full of
them? Meh!...
It's ironic that the internet, generally, has brought us all closer
together yet from the perspective of appreciating a variety of music has
driven us apart: we've formed a multitude of essentially non-interacting
cliques. Just like high school!
