On Thu, Apr 19, 2012 at 1:16 PM, PGage <[email protected]> wrote: > > I guess I don't deny that his AB had an important effect on Pop Culture; I > just deny that it was a beneficial effect. At least by the time I was old > enough to pay attention to it, I found that AB tamed and maimed rock music, > rather than enhance it or make it accessible. I guess that helped lots of > performers (or maybe even more, the people behind those performers) make a > lot of money, but I don't think it was a particularly good influence. It may > be that in the 50s and 60s AB was a ground-breaking introduction of R&R and > R&B to mainstream audiences, but by the time I started watching in the 70s > it was already camp and kitsch, which are terms I would apply to almost > everything Clark did on television that was not Pyramid (including New > Year's Eve, though my family has brought in the New Year with Clark every > year since my first child was born 22 years ago).
My thoughts about Bandstand in the '50s and early '60s was that it was a place for young people to discover R&B and rock music before all markets had dedicated radio stations. I also have a recollection that Bandstand promoted black performers and helped end the practice of white cover bands making money from recording inferior versions of their hits. By the '70s there were so many other ways to discover new music that Bandstand just became irrelevant. If I have to think of the one great music show of that decade, it would have to be The Midnight Special and that had nothing in common in format or tone to Bandstand. -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
