Dangling Conversations

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Rock and roll burns... oh, it burns! It burns!

Posted 13 Dec, 2005 at 16:17 by matt in /Music | Permanent link

I heard Great White's Once bitten twice shy this afternoon while being forced to listen to the local Classic Rock station. (Or one of them, I don't really keep track of commercial radio anymore.)

I believe that the conclusion is unescapable: classic rock is dead. If the term had any meaning before other than "songs you'd thought you'd gotten away from a dozen years ago", then it does so no longer.

Perhaps the masses will now see their way to rising up and tearing down the bastions of classic rock, replacing them with broadcasters of music that doesn't suck.

But probably not.

Comments (7 comments so far)
I've never considered Great White to be "Classic Rock". Aren't they an 80s "metal" band?

Maybe it's a definition thing, but I always figured more like Leonard Skynard, Steve Miller & The Silver Bullet Band, The Who, or The Guess Who as being Classic Rock. At least, that's how it was defined by the Classic Rock Gurus(TM) in KW when I was in high school.

Posted 2005/12/14 17:18:03 by Kael

I've never considered Great White to be "Classic Rock". Aren't they an 80s "metal" band?

I believe the proper term is "hair band".

...At least, that's how it was defined by the Classic Rock Gurus(TM) in KW when I was in high school.

And that's the thing. When we were in high schools, those bands you just mentioned would have been what the 30somthings would have listened to in their youth. Guess what? We're the 30somethings now, so Classic Rock now gets defined as whatever was current when we (and those a few years our senior) were in high school. Except that it's none of the good stuff; it's Great White instead.

Could be worse, I suppose: Skid Row. Warrant. White Lion.

Posted 2005/12/14 20:29:33 by Matt
"what we were" should be "what we were listening to". Except we probably weren't. Whatever.
Posted 2005/12/14 20:30:32 by Matt
*SHUDDER*
You're kidding. You mean that Poison and Mr. Big, Bon Jovi and Gowen are /classic/ rock? If I had to make a choice, I'd rather buy into intelligent design.
Posted 2005/12/14 23:21:48 by Kael
Your lack of knowledge is only outwieghed by your inbred lack of intelligence
You stupid CRACKER! You must be one of them there RED-NECK idiots or worse... a wannabe. I could go on and on and tear to shreds any iota of a legitimate argument you might feebly attempt, but let me just say this: Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon isn't the best selling album of all time by accident. If you had any understanding of the deeper scrutinies of imagination, then you'd understand this. Until then, just remain the stupid CRACKER you are and leave GOOD OL" AMERICAN(&European,ETC.) ROCK AND ROLL alone.
Posted 2006/2/12 11:22:39 by Dave B
Ah, good to see a little bit of clever banter from drive-bys.

Firstly: you weaken whatever argument you're trying to make by starting off with name-calling. Particularly coming from someone who doesn't know what an e-mail address is supposed to look like, somehow this isn't the master-stroke that you might have believed it to be.

Secondly: you have missed the point, which was concerning radio station formats. My contention is that "classic rock" is not an absolute category, but rather defined relative to current demographics; as such, your reference to DSOTM is about a dozen years off the mark. When I was in high school, "Money" and "Us & Them" would be played on classic rock stations, because at that time "classic rock" was all about the late 60s through early 80s. Over a decade's gone by since then, and "classic rock" has moved on. (IOW, now the Pink Floyd I'd expect to hear on the local classic-rock stations would be from "Momentary Lapse of Reason" -- a respectable album, certainly.)

Was it perhaps the use-mention distinction that was bothering you? For full clarity, I should perhaps had said "Classic rock" is dead rather than Classic rock is dead. I was not, by any means commenting on what you think of as classic rock, not least because I have no idea who you are and probably wouldn't care to meet you if this is how you normally introduce yourself to strangers. If I'd been talking about the Pink, I probably would have said something about "progressive" or "art rock", both of which have a slightly more fixed denotation.

Good save, BTW, on the parenthetical comment. Pink Floyd being British and all.
Posted 2006/2/12 12:58:21 by Matt
Hi! Dave B? Do you, by any chance, have Tourette's syndrome? Failing that, could you let us know just what variety of troll you are?
Posted 2006/2/14 08:35:22 by Kael
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