re: Will bands ever make a comeback?

I'm not a fan, because I like Rock. TW is a great pop music star, she's a great performer and her music is good pop music.

An Australian band - King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard - is absolute tearing up live shows right now. They sell out 5k-10k venues all across the country and rocks out for 2-3 hours straight. Silly name, epic rock show ??

quote:

---

we’re gonna beat your fricking arse Saturday

---

that didn’t age well

quote:

---

I don’t know but we’re gonna beat your fricking arse Saturday.

---

quote:

---

there are more great bands right now than there have been in the last 20 years.

---

Would you be willing to name some?

quote:

---

There’s plenty of bands out there doing original rock music. The issue for me is it just doesn’t stand out. We’ve heard it all before. There just aren’t new sounds and styles really. It’s just all really similar. If your big on lyrics, that’s helps, but I’m listening for the tune first.

None of this to say the music is bad or the artists aren’t talented, it just doesn’t feel new and exciting. It doesn’t get its grips into me. I think a lot of people feel the same way.

---

This is the correct answer, and if I remember correctly you are a musician yourself. And if I do remember that correctly, that makes sense to me as to why you get it.

Rock has gone as far as it can go. It doesn't feel new or exciting because it's not. It may be well-done, but that's not the same thing as being new/exciting/revolutionary.

Art is supposed to reflect what's going on in society and culture. When a "new" band today is making art that is indistinguishable in style and form from art that was being made 40 or 50 or 60 years ago, either the art form has stagnated, the culture has stagnated, or both.

At least in today's world, where culture evolves at the speed of decades (or maybe now with the internet, maybe half-decades) instead of centuries or half-centuries like it did 400 years ago.

Music in the 70s reflected the societal culture of the 70s. All "new" music reflects now is a lack of a unique culture in 2025 and/or (for us older people) nostalgia for the culture of the 60s/70s/80s/whatever.

And I guess the fact that so many people don't get that is actually a part of the lack of cultural identity in modernity. We would no more have listened to music that was decades old when I was growing up than we would have packed mud in our ears. That would have represented our parents' music to us, which we would have rejected on principle.

But I think even that association of music and culture has been totally lost today. I was born in 1970, so my teenage years were during the 80s. It said something about you whether you went to school wearing an REM t-shirt vs a Metallica t-shirt vs a Prince t-shirt. It said something about your values and personality. I think that's gone in today's society.

quote:

---

Would you be willing to name some?

---

I’m going to pass on listing bands. Whether you personally like or dislike them has no bearing on my point. I’m not claiming wackatimesthree will enjoy them.

No offense, but I’ve been in a number of threads on this topic, and every time someone provides band names the discussion immediately derails into nitpicking those bands. That misses the point entirely.

The point is that they exist.

Music discovery has evolved from traditional radio/TV to streaming platforms, YouTube, and social media. New music is readily available for those who are curious. If you need me to provide specific examples, it suggests you’re content with your current music choices and haven’t felt compelled to explore further. Which is perfectly fine. Enjoy your REO Speedwagon or whatever you’re into.

quote:

---

I’m going to pass on listing bands.

---

That's what I thought.

quote:

---

I’m not claiming wackatimesthree will enjoy them.

---

No, that would be a subjective claim and one that would be impossible to make. You, on the other hand, are making a claim that is entirely objectively evaluated. You can't account for taste, you can analyze form and style. It's actually a pretty easy thing to do to point out, "That's just the same sort of chord progression that Pink Floyd favored during the 'Wish You Were Here' era," or "The Beatles resolved from the minor to the major of the same chord all the time," or "That guy is singing just like Robert Plant" or (for the a-hole below) "Zappa made a career out of dropping the 3rd and using Sus2 or Sus4 chords. It was his signature sound."

My claim is not that there are no new bands that you like. My claim is that there are no new bands doing anything...well...new.

quote:

---

The point is that they exist.

---

Nope.

The point is that this is you just SAYING they exist. I can say that a flying pink unicorn exists, but that doesn't make it so.

The fact that you won't post them is an indication that you know they don't fit the criteria, because I guess other people have told you that already.

But I, like you, have had this discussion online many, many times before, and I have never had someone who makes some version of the claim, "There are more great new bands out there than ever, you just have to know where to look," who actually posts a band who ends up being anything but a straight copy of bands (or stitched together elements of bands) from the 60s, 70s, 80s, or 90s.

I don't know why people won't just admit the truth. I guess it's either that people take pride in being the sort of person who can look into the right nooks and crannies of the internet to find these "cutting edge" bands (that aren't actually cutting edge at all), or they don't want to admit that their generation has no unique musical expression and has to rely on their parents' or (in some cases) grandparents' musical aesthetic instead of having one of their own. Or both.

But it's fine.

Carry on.

King Gizzard
Goose

Probably best 2 "new" bands of the last...decade?

I doubt a rock band will break into mainstream fame but there are some damn good ones out now. Most are NuMetal derivatives

Thousand Foot Krutch
Sleep Token
All Time Low
Bad Flower

A fun band with local support is The Bends