You know, my dad always gave me a hard time about my guitar playing and the music I loved… ALWAYS!
Our son was heavy into the rap scene… a suburban white boy searching for "street cred." I never liked the sing song, nursery rhyme styled sound. Melodically, I find it quite boring. I hated the misogynistic lyrics and the violence. I tried to explain to him that this form of expression is not one which most suburbanites understand because it is not how they live their life.
A kid living in a ghetto can walk out the door in the morning and never see that door ever again. I believe he understood my point. It didn't stop him from listening to that kind of music. And, I respected his choice to listen to it. Brian got great music history from me. I've always been proud of his musical roots. Still, I never denigrated his choices like my father did.
Most of today's Grammy styled music is corporate. I remember the variety show called, "In Concert." I believe it was on ABC in the late sixties, and in it, there was no fakin' it. You plugged in and got turned on.
It was live and it was about the music.
I loved it. But, it didn't last as long as Don Kirshner's Rock Concert with smoke bombs, and silly dancers gyrating in spandex baloney, light shows and fake psychedelic graphics. Every body seemed to love it better. It's entertaining and not boring… makes you wanna get up and dance.
You really don't need an instrument for that, do you? Well, maybe as a prop because it's cool looking and gives you "street cred!"
It's an extravaganza…
Today, that's called rock music! That wins Grammy's. My father would have love it, or at least, a good portion of it. I like Madonna, I like Lady GaGa, ( I'd prefer Adele, Janis, or Amy Winehouse! ). I like Elton John's on stage silliness, almost spoofing someone like Liberace, both of whom actually are/were musicians. Unlike my critical father, who believed Chuck, Lil' Richard, Elvis, Fats, Ray and Sam, were just a bunch of no talent clowns playing "the "n" word music which was destroying the fabric of the country he fought a war to preserve, I choose to embrace, as best as I can, all music because it is, to me, the best form of artistic expression.
Personally, I believe these wonderfully choreographed, lip synced, stage "acts" certainly have a place, but not in a back yard garage or the sweaty, juke joints, and local bars where rock 'n roll was born and, to a certain degree, still thrives.
They belong on a dance floor… as glitzy vaudeville acts in Vegas.
That's my rant. Just saying… and feeling!
