re: Did rock skewing too much to the “hard” side kill its mainstream appeal?

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I would say the artists largely reflect their audience. I play a lot of 70’s classic rock-style music. It’s pretty rare to see more than a handful of folks under 40 attending one of our shows

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Thanks - for making my point.

You play classic rock-n-roll because old folk will still pay to hear it. Because it pays the bills for that club. And we know you play other music for enjoyment. In a couple different bands I believe.

It was rave's I believe (not checking) when I was in my 40's and before you were running around... but I'd still call that rock and roll.... just as grunge, pop, or punk is another type. Much like 50' rock, was different than 60's, than 70's. And somewhere there's probably a 20's version being hammered out... and no it may not be as financially successful. However that's not my definition of making it. Rock was an amalgamation not one form, something that was never static, it's just different ratio's and mixes of what was before. I get it that kids want to call it something by another name.

Here's my take - 3 main things.

1) Music has always changed and evolved. Whatever the old folks listened to, the young folks want something else to have as "their" music. Just human nature.

2) Human brains are sponges when young so what we hear then sticks with us - language, music, etc. It's harder to learn new patterns when older.

3) Cuts in music education. Schoolkids don't learn and get exposed to music theory to know fundamentals and possibilities.

Also, It has to be pretty daunting to try to come up as a young rock band knowing that ultimately you have to compete with the Stones, Led Zep, Yes, Who, CCR ABB etc.. It's not like they would/could ever is write or play better songs than what's has already been done. Hence there are probably more cover and tribute bands than fledging rock acts.

If it does then I hope it begins with the rockabilly sound. The reason that I picked this type of genre is that it's a blend of different types of music and it was a big influence on many different artists.

I just can’t see rockabilly being relevant to young folks. It’s kinda considered a joke, much like folk punk, ska, or pop punk. All those pompadour hairdos, pinup girl caked on makeup, etc is basically a cliche at this point.

With that said, rockabilly is absolutely a big part of my sound in my pop punk band. My guitar parts are often just fast rockabilly (almost dixie double) with heavy distortion.

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The sound of the production has become almost homogeneous. Much of the Top40 has always had an homogeneous sound, and that has spread to a lot of the "rock" acts Yup. I get surveys from XMu and there are so many acts now where you really can't pick out instruments.

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This is so aggravating to me. I listen to a decent amount of “alt” radio (they thankfully don’t even try to call it alt rock anymore), and most of the songs, you can’t even tell what, if anything, was played by a guitar. It’s nearly all just white rappers with trap music behind them.

There's still some bands out there playing great rock.

Blackberry Smoke and The Temperance Movement comes to mind.

That’s because they figured out that labels can only do so much for them. Chasing sync and streaming revenues are mostly a fool’s errand, imo. Recorded music and Streaming are not products to be sold, but rather a marketing medium, or at most, a loss leader, for the actual product which is live performances. The few artists for whom streaming and sync revenues are enough to live off of are essentially the top of the top pop artists and those same legacy acts that were famous prior to napster, or better yet, the music industry’s reaction to Napster.

Recording music has never been cheaper, easier, or required less instrumental skill. With that said, software knowledge and skill is one thing that can separate a track and elevate it above the massive glut of recorded music caused by the process becoming cheaper and easier.

Since everyone has the ability to make somewhat professional sounding music, and through the internet, everyone has the ability to upload that music to a streaming service where it could hypothetically reach an audience of hundreds of billions of people around the globe, the real separation between bands that make it and bands that don’t are:

1. Ability to produce consistent Digital marketing content. You can’t just be a brilliant musician and an excellent recording/sound engineer anymore. You have to be a videographer, photographer, editor, blogger, and aggressive marketer. To build a following, you have to become a brand by essentially putting out consistent viral videos and content that gets a reaction out of people. Reaction on social media is one of the big metrics used by labels, booking agents, playlisters, etc to determine the value of a band.

2. Skill at live performances. This will be your bread and butter as a musician. To grow a following, everyone who leaves a performance must leave happy, impressed, and with a strong memory of the performance. That will help ensure that they become repeat customers and bring friends. This is the most organic way to garner a following. Remarkable on-stage performances also make for excellent video content needed in number 1. It’s less about what you play and more about how you play it, how you look playing it, and how much fun the audience is having while you perform.

3. Industry support. No one can do this alone. It’s simply too much responsibility for one, or even several members of a band. That’s why the bands that really make it are mostly creations of music industry insiders and labels. They don’t have to grind for years learning how to do everything themselves until they can finally make enough money to grow into a following and afford a team to handle everything. They’re literally given all of it at age 17 because of who their parents are or are friends with. This is even rampant in the rap game where recording budgets, tours, show revenues, etc can be used as money laundering vehicles for gangs, who also provide a built-in network for developing a wide following. Insider industry help can basically allow an artist to jump 40 rungs on a latter that would take an outsider decades to climb.

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Nu Metal was also new but it sucked and did more harm to rock music than good.

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I disagree. Korn, Slipknot, and SOAD didn't harm rock music at all. And are still putting out really good music compared to what came after.
I think Quantization killed it more by taking all the feel away.

Swedish music producers and the explosion of rap in the 1990s.

In the late 1980s Swedes got a foothold in the music business with sending their acts across the Atlantic to American markets and they found a foothold and people like Max Martin and Shellback began to assert themselves with acts like Roxette and Ace of Base. Then Stockholm became the place to produce pop music and acts like Britney Spears and the Backstreet Boys went there to record and produce. Martin who was actually a hard rock guy originally stumbled into the more synthetic sound and saw that overall the costs were less and the masses found their sound agreeable. Factor that in with the fact that the primary consumers of popular music in the US were 12-16 year old girls and you see the results. The acts like Spears, Aguilera and the Backstreet Boys were tailor made for that demographic. Martin began having a string of major hits and overall success and record companies would use him to the point that he expanded operations to Los Angeles as well. He is today the most successful record producer in history.....and a prolific songwriter.

Around the same time rap escaped from the urban prison it had been in since the 1970's when the Sugarhill Gang introduced Rapper's Delight in the New York area. It became an underground hit. Then rap goes mainstream with Run DMC in the mid 1980's who samples rock riffs like Aerosmith's Walk this way and some AC/DC songs as well. It starts to gain an audience about the same time Hair Bands like Poison and Warrant are all the rage and legacy rock bands like Van Halen are changing towards a more pop sound. Van Halen's 5150 is huge departure soundwise from 1984. More synthesizers .

But it is not until a few years later that rap makes its breakout. Acts like NWA, 2 Live Crew, etc are gaining national audiences with the bulk of their record sales fueled by white suburban teenage boys from the suburbs.

By the mid to late 1990s rock is supplanted by both of these genres. It is not that rock skewing too hard that killed its mainstream. Certainly some of the rap that came out in the 90's was as raw as anything that Ozzy,Judas Priest or California rockers like GnR were putting out a decade earlier. It is that the overall demographic box who bought the music changed and who record companies signed changed. 18 -24 year old middle class white Boys were out overall as acts. 16 -22 year old white or black girls were in. Easier to work with and not nearly as destructive. And then there was rap .

I know this was long but my avocation is music so I pay attention to things like this.

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If you remember the 80's and even the 70's the recipe for a rock/ pop song was 2 verses followed by a guitar solo mostly with a third before wrapping it up.

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It's hard to write off as formulaic an era that had Bowie, Jackson Browne, Yes (East), Pink Floyd, Zeppelin, Boston, Grand Funk. Those bands had fingerprints (as did many others, nobody sounded like Fleetwood Mac).

Even the lighter fare was STUFFED with talent - Jackson Browne had Leland Sklar and David Lindley throughout the 70s. Fleetwood Mac had Peter Green and later Lindsey Buckingham on lead guitar. Think of how many great players were on Steely Dan albums and how different that was. The heavier acts from those days were incredibly talented.

Now, 80s rock definitely fell into a formula and image was prioritized over substance (at least at the song level) and that was unavoidable because of MTV. Even with that (and relatively simple, formulaic songs), the players were top shelf.