Bitching about the current state of the music industry has been cool ever since punk-rock broke through in the mid-1970s, probably even before then, but it hit the mainstream with CBGB's and the Ramones. I even used to be one of those people, and I guess I still am a little, but when really looking at it, the music industry is almost in better shape now than it has been in the last ten years.
Looking back at the stuff I've been listening to since I was but knee-high to a grasshopper, I see bands like blink-182 and Eve 6, artists like Eminem and Lit. These were groups that hit the mainstream when I was a kid and seemed to have something new to offer me. That newness is what I always complained about being missing from current music.
Blink-182 was irreverent, the band had a pop-punk sound and their language made my mother's eyes wide the first time she heard it. I was sold. Eve 6 had "Inside Out", the lightly distorted rock number that entranced me when I first heard it, and then they came back with "Here's to the Night" just two years later.
Sure, I was eight and 10 years old when those songs came out, but they have some pretty universal themes and the delivery makes them impossible to resist. Looking back though, it was the '90s, this was what music was at the time.
It was also considered by many to be the beginning of the end for rock music. The Strokes, the Vines and the Hives would all have hits in 2001 and 2002, and then the Top-40 radio and popular music in general would start with the manufactured hip-hop and dance music.
The bright flash of rock music at the turn of the millennium wasn't it. Indie, punk and even some throwback bands came out with some spectacular albums in the meantime that never made the mainstream. The Strokes got a lot of attention for Room on Fire, even if it wasn't as strong as their debut, while the Killers' Sam's Town flew a little more under the radar, even though they shared the garage-rock sensibility and sound.
Perhaps this was for the best, as Napster also made its debut right around then, and I can remember finding my fair share of new tunes via our dial-up connection. These bands made waves and were then forced to tour extensively in order to sell their records, which helped them inspire waves of new bands that would continue to fly under the radar.
Don't get me wrong, there's innovation in today's music. Even as much as I hate Skrillex (okay, for the most part...) there's something new in the tunes that he's cranking out. Sure, people are arguing about whether or not it's real music and how it compares to what else is going on in music, but it's something different.
What will never change, I hope, is the work ethic of the local music scene. These bands are taking familiar concepts and twisting them. Bands like the Living Statues, Sexy Ester and the Pretty Mama Sisters and Baristacide represent three very different pieces of the Madison music scene, but they all work together to make the scene what it is.
Take the Living Statues, we ran a piece with them a couple of weeks ago about their show at the Frequency. My roommate and I decided to go check out the show, on Tommy Shears' insistence that his band put on a great show. I was blown away by the energy that the band exhibited, and how fresh the sound was. If the Beatles could have a baby with a modern rock band, it would be the Living Statues.
Baristacide put on an energetic show, playing "pop punk for people who hate pop punk" according to their business card. I was familiar with their sound from the little desk session we had just before the New Year. The session should be released in the next couple of weeks, but they blew me away when there was a crowd to perform to rather than the couches in The Daily Cardinal office.
These two bands have definitely put together a unique live sound, and certainly are innovating the way that they make music. Sexy Ester is the one band I haven't had a chance to catch live, but the band's Hubba Bubba EP has not left my car since I was given a copy during an interview last year.
What these three bands are doing in this town isn't creating a whole new genre of music or innovating recording techniques. It's something much more important. They're putting new twists onto old genres and breathing life back into rock 'n' roll.
What is your opinion about the state of rock 'n' roll? Let Jeremy know at jgartzke@wisc.edu.
You can hear more of The Living Statues at their website, www.longlivethestatues.com, including this track "Red Shoes" from their album Bad News.
