I don't think I was asserting a simplistic summation of twentieth century
music inasmuch as I was trying to say that successful music from any
generation seems to be tied to the 16-30 crowd. "Successful" meaning that
it sold well and helped to define a particular generation for the history
books etc;. You spoke of Elvis and his influences - I agree; certainly we
are all products of and influenced by that which preceeded us.
To say that the youth are only impressed or stimulated by "suggestive"
rhythms and lyrics would not be accurate in total context on my part and I
only served this up as an example as to why "new country" sells big and
"alt.country" does not. Alt.country does not seem to glamorize sex, fashion
and beauty and the beginning phase of independence which would "speak" to
young people. Basically, each member of a generation has to struggle with
not only their own individual identities, but find a common ground with
which to belong or identify with their peers. I do not believe that what we
call alternative country (in general and there are exceptions) supports or
relates to
issues broadly concerning the youth. There aren't any wars right now such
that the Vietnam War acted as catalyst for the hippie movement of the
sixties and was further solidified in music and there aren't any great
rebellions at present. I would have said something about rap here, but
isn't that becoming culturally accepted as mainstream more and more? The
alt.country part of music seems to speak to moods, experiences,
emotional/intellectual decisions and memories such that we as grown-ups
begin to categorize, filter, extract and absorb in honing ourselves as
mature beings. I find it hard to believe that the general youth populace
would have enough patience to understand and relate to the music of say,
Gillian Welch, Dave Alvin, Cheri Knight, Lucinda Williams, Mike
Ireland...etc; Well, enough about that.
Your last two sentences regarding commercialism: I suspect that what you
say is true to the extent that it appears as though many record companies
are trying to find the next "big" thing and may be trying to singlehandedly
"construct" a genre which defies a decidedly "country" or "rock" labeling
and that at this point, many of the contemporary engineers of this
left-of-middle styling (of which Tweedy is one) would find such labeling -
pigeonholing if you will, very limiting and restricting as if to say that
their product yields to the dollar signs dancing around in the heads of
company executives. Yep, you have a good point, Lance.
Tera
Lance said:
>Though I found myself nodding along with most of your assertions, Tera, I
>would insert one caveat. While Elvis Presley would certainly win a lot of
>votes as this century's most influential performer, and his music was
>certainly frantic AND highly-charged sexually, it wasn't quite so simple.
He
>also took his cues from non-frantics like Dean Martin and the "White" hit
>parade, and his example is repeated often, for even the most "suggestive"
>musicians. The pop charts have been something that has affected even the
>most marginal of musics--in one way or another--and in some cases it was
>good, in others not. Thus, some alt.country musicians may be struggling
with
>this very punk sense of "How commercial is too commercial?" Or from the
>record company's/financial investor's side: "How country can alt.country be
>and still make a decisive commercial impact?"
>
>Lance . . .
>
>
