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Rolling Stone article: Teens Save Classic Rock


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Many Guns N' Roses' fans (myself included) have complained that in recent years the music scene has been pretty stale. This article doesn't mention GN'R by name but I think it hits the nail on the head in regards to the current rock/music state. Later

Teens Save Classic Rock

A new generation of fans turn to Hendrix, Floyd and Zeppelin Like countless parents before him, Steven Tyler is shocked at the music that's been blaring out of his fifteen-year-old son's bedroom lately. But the Aerosmith frontman can hardly disapprove. "I walk by at night and my son is listening to Zeppelin stuff, like 'Black Dog,'" Tyler says. "He's turned all his friends on to Cream, and they're all into [Aerosmith's] Toys in the Attic. I told him, 'I can't believe you're listening to this.'"

Though classic rock is in no danger of edging out emo and hip-hop on most teenagers' playlists, a growing number of kids are also making room for Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Jimi Hendrix and the Beatles. At the same time, electric-guitar sales are soaring, with the cheapest models nearly doubling in sales from 2003 to 2004. "Kids go through hard rock, hip-hop and pop very quickly, and then they're hungry for something else," says E Street Band guitarist and garage-rock DJ Steven Van Zandt -- who gets hundreds of e-mails from teens thanking him for introducing them to bands like the Kinks. "They always end up coming to [classic] rock & roll."

Nine percent of kids ages twelve to seventeen listened to classic-rock radio in any given week in 2005 -- marking a small but significant increase during the past three years -- with a total of 2.3 million teens tuning in each week, according to the radio-ratings company Arbitron. And some markets have seen more dramatic growth: Teen listenership at New York's Q104.3, the nation's largest classic-rock station, has jumped twenty percent since fall 2002. "It really started in the past five years," says Q104.3 DJ Maria Milito. "You get these boys calling to request Hendrix whose voices haven't changed yet." Van Zandt's Underground Garage, heard on 140 radio stations across the country on Sunday nights, draws a third of its audience from listeners under twenty-five.

For teens, not all classic rock is created equal. According to the market-research firm NPD, kids ages thirteen to seventeen bought twenty percent of all Floyd and Zeppelin albums sold from 2002 to 2005, and seventeen percent of Hendrix and Queen discs but accounted for just three percent of Creedence Clearwater Revival sales, six percent of Rolling Stones sales and a paltry one percent of Cat Stevens sales. "There's such a force and power to a band like Zeppelin," says Rhino Records marketing vice president Mike Engstrom, adding that young buyers drove sales for the label's 2003 DVD collection of live Zep.

Young fans' enthusiasm helps evergreen discs such as Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and AC/DC's Back in Black sell thousands of copies a week. "Week after week, a whole new group of people are discovering these albums," says Jeff Jones, executive vice president of Sony BMG's reissue label Legacy Recordings.

Veteran artists are also seeing a surprising number of young faces at their concerts; at one Tom Petty show at New York's Jones Beach last June, kids as young as fourteen showed up in packs and sang along fervently. "I don't know how to explain it," Petty says.

"We're now seeing an audience that goes from sixteen to sixty," says Allman Brothers manager Bert Holman. "Kids feel they're seeing something legendary and special." Classic-rock mainstay George Thorogood, meanwhile, has had to change his set lists to accommodate the growing number of kids at his shows. "I've had to clean it up a little bit," he says. "It's like, 'Cocaine Blues'? Maybe not."

Why would kids born in the Nineties turn to timeworn guitar anthems? For all of the vibrant rock recorded in the past ten years -- from pop punk to neogarage to dance rock -- no new, dominant sound has emerged since grunge in the early Nineties. "I can't think of a record recently that blew people's minds," says Jeff Peretz, a Manhattan producer and guitar teacher. "And there aren't really any guitar heroes around anymore. Kids don't come in and say, 'I want to play like John Mayer.'"

"There is such a drought that kids are going back and rediscovering the Who and Sabbath," says Paul Green, who runs the Paul Green School of Rock Music, which has expanded from a single Philadelphia branch in 1998 to schools in twelve other cities.

At the same time, the Internet has made forty-year-old hits as accessible as current chart-toppers. "I started to see this as a real trend when Napster started around 1999," says Aerosmith guitarist Joe Perry, who has two teenage sons. Last year, teens even started believin' again in Journey's power ballads: They pushed the band's 1981 song "Don't Stop Believin' " into iTunes' Top Ten after it popped up during a romantic moment on MTV's wildly popular reality show, Laguna Beach. It has since sold more than 200,000 digital singles. "It makes me so happy that a new generation would embrace something we believed in," says former Journey singer Steve Perry. "Back when we were first successful, we were dissed -- but time has told a different story."

Old rock has become fashionable, too. The years-old couture and thrift-shop vogue for vintage rock T-shirts recently trickled down to mall retailers catering to teens, with Doors and Rolling Stones shirts selling fast at stores such as Hot Topic.

"It's almost a cyclical thing -- as music ages, it can become cool again," says Rilo Kiley frontwoman Jenny Lewis, who covers the Traveling Wilburys' "Handle With Care" on her new solo album, Rabbit Fur Coat. But Lewis also sees a simpler reason for the trend: "It's called classic rock for a reason -- it's classic. It's just really great music."

BRIAN HIATT

Posted feb 09, 2006 10:43 AM

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Doesn't really surprise me. Todays music is pure SHIT. And todays rock? Jesus, don't even get me started. "modern" rock is totally dead thanks to Kobain and the grunge era. But if you're a 15 year old kid what are you gonna listen to? 50 cent songs? That shit gets old in two months. I don't think you'll ever have classic hip hop or classic rap. It becomes a joke in a few years. When people play old snoop dog and dr. dre you start laughing at how retarded it is. I mean that crap was called "gangsta rap". hahah. Say it out loud a few times and you'll know what I mean.

But classic rock just rules. The reason? BECAUSE ITS GOOD!!! In ten years is ANYONE going to care about nickelback or puddle of mudd or kid rock or staind or papa roach etc....Prob not. Why? BECAUSE THEY SUUUUUUUUUCK.

I love how all the black tshirts you see these days are from bands that came out 40-30 years ago.

Its a testmant to GNR's place in rock history that you still see the AFD cross tshirt in stores....you know you're eternal when your tshirt is still for sale and you haven't had a new album in over 15 years.

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Yeah I'm only 16 and I suppose I do listen to classic rock.

Although bands like Whitesnake and Poison annoy me because it is overly cheesy, I do like Hendrix and a bit of Zeppelin. Not too sure about Aerosmith though...

EDIT: The interesting thing in that article about "Guitar Gods". I was discussing with my friend the other day about guitar gods and we were saying how Slash is the only real guitar god still going.

Edited by cafcnickdugay
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Doesn't really surprise me. Todays music is pure SHIT. And todays rock? Jesus, don't even get me started. "modern" rock is totally dead thanks to Kobain and the grunge era. But if you're a 15 year old kid what are you gonna listen to? 50 cent songs? That shit gets old in two months. I don't think you'll ever have classic hip hop or classic rap. It becomes a joke in a few years. When people play old snoop dog and dr. dre you start laughing at how retarded it is. I mean that crap was called "gangsta rap". hahah. Say it out loud a few times and you'll know what I mean.

But classic rock just rules. The reason? BECAUSE ITS GOOD!!! In ten years is ANYONE going to care about nickelback or puddle of mudd or kid rock or staind or papa roach etc....Prob not. Why? BECAUSE THEY SUUUUUUUUUCK.

I love how all the black tshirts you see these days are from bands that came out 40-30 years ago.

Its a testmant to GNR's place in rock history that you still see the AFD cross tshirt in stores....you know you're eternal when your tshirt is still for sale and you haven't had a new album in over 15 years.

The only thing I disagree with here is Puddle of Mudd. I think they're pretty decent, myself. Anyways, as for the rest of it, it's all pretty much true. Power riff after power riff surrounded by a whiny voice and generic drumming. That's the state of modern rock, and no, you don't have to just listen to the mainstream to know this. Plenty of unknown bands still try the same thing over and over to grab the balls of a whiny audience.

Classic rock is on the rise because people realize how fun the music is, and almost every riff is something different. I mean really, when are we going to see another "The Wall" or "Physical Graffiti"? Never. Classic albums came out by the month back then, and now we're lucky to see one in ten years. I'm glad to see that it's making a comeback because it is a truly great music genre.

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Doesn't really surprise me. Todays music is pure SHIT. And todays rock? Jesus, don't even get me started. "modern" rock is totally dead thanks to Kobain and the grunge era. But if you're a 15 year old kid what are you gonna listen to? 50 cent songs? That shit gets old in two months. I don't think you'll ever have classic hip hop or classic rap. It becomes a joke in a few years. When people play old snoop dog and dr. dre you start laughing at how retarded it is. I mean that crap was called "gangsta rap". hahah. Say it out loud a few times and you'll know what I mean.

But classic rock just rules. The reason? BECAUSE ITS GOOD!!! In ten years is ANYONE going to care about nickelback or puddle of mudd or kid rock or staind or papa roach etc....Prob not. Why? BECAUSE THEY SUUUUUUUUUCK.

I love how all the black tshirts you see these days are from bands that came out 40-30 years ago.

Its a testmant to GNR's place in rock history that you still see the AFD cross tshirt in stores....you know you're eternal when your tshirt is still for sale and you haven't had a new album in over 15 years.

that is so tru, especially that era were grunge killed rock, cobain killed every aspect of rock n roll, he made music with out complete meaning (im not saying rock has a meaning but cmon, theres a limit)...

Entertain us

A mulatto

An albino

A mosquito

My libido

w-h-a-t t-h-e f-u-c-k is that!!! and its considered a great song,pff cmon..i can write better songs with a knife up my ass and a gun in my head... his riffs were shit that were raised to anthems, he only spoke hipocritical crap and thank gof he put a bullet in his head or we'd be in hell.

Todays musical scene is pure shit, everything will be forgotten in 2 years and never will see the daylight again...

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That isn't exactly a new thing. I remember back when I was in high school (89-93) there were those of us who discovered classic rock because there were those of us who didn't relate to Nirvana or grunge.

I know there are some here who call Nirvana shit but take it into comparission sakes. If you only had one option would it be Nirvana or Dashboard Confessional? huh?

I think it's pretty fucking jake that classic rock is being rediscovered but do you think it will be taken as a purely nostalgic thing or could some of it be incorporated into something new? Nice article and all but look at who is still selling records and Billboard/Soundscan. As much as I like them, I don't want Led Zeppelin/Black Sabbath clones or GNR clones.

The reasons as to why classic rock (60's-70's) sounds soooo different from what's out now is because

1. Better musicianship (including lyrics)

2. More and cheaper drugs (LSD used to be legal)

3. Better economy for the music industry

4. Free love (No AIDS)

As Bill Hicks would say, music back then had heart,soul and balls.

Edited by Jabberwocky
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Nirvana were a good band. I still dislike grunge music as a whole though. Classic rock is definitely making a comeback, has anyone seen the amount of Zeppelin t-shirts around?

Yeah I liked them myself although I preferred Mudhoney,Earth and Sonic Youth (although they're considered no wave). The only thing grunge did was kill off crappy hair metal but grunge had no staying power.

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