When will rock die?

[Cometwine]

I want to hear your predictions on how long it will take for Rock n Roll to lose momentum and no longer be a dominant music genre. At what point will there be no more rock bands?

[Skitz]

I want to hear your predictions on how long it will take for Rock n Roll to lose momentum and no longer be a dominant music genre. At what point will there be no more rock bands?

Probably by 2100.

[fndty]

Rock won't die. Even in the era of electronic music I believe there will always be electronic musicians with "rock-ish" sounds.

[musiclistsareus]

The most recent top 40 best selling Album list I saw (a couple weeks ago), contained about 8 Rock albums, 4 hip-hop and 12 Country, so rock seems pretty healthy, compared to hip-hop. I don't see anyone asking when will hip-hop die, and they're much closer to the brink.

[walan]

Don't you remember this song by Danny and the Juniors?


Rock 'n roll is here to stay,
it will never die
It was meant to be that way,
though I don't know why
I don't care what people say,
rock 'n roll is here to stay

(We don't care what people say, rock 'n roll is here to stay)

Rock 'n roll will always be
our ticket to the end
It will go down in history,
just you wait, my friend
Rock 'n roll will always be,
it'll go down in history

(Rock 'n roll will always be, it'll go down in history)

So come on,
everybody rock,
everybody rock,
everybody rock,
everybody rock
Everybody rock

Now everybody rock 'n roll,
everybody rock 'n roll,
everybody rock 'n roll
Everybody rock 'n roll,
everybody rock 'n roll

Rock 'n roll will always be
our ticket to the end
It will go down in history,
just you wait, my friend
Rock 'n roll will always be,
it'll go down in history
If you don't like rock 'n roll,
think what you've been missin'
But if you like to bop and strawl,
come on down and listen
Let's all start to have a ball,
everybody rock 'n roll

Ah, oh baby, ah, oh baby, ah, oh baby, ah, oh baby, rock!

[Jack]

True innovation in rock music ended decades ago. In my opinion, rock is already losing momentum. It's only a matter of time...

[musiclistsareus]

True innovation in rock music ended decades ago. In my opinion, rock is already losing momentum. It's only a matter of time...

J.S. Bach stuck to his old-fashioned Baroque style and is considered one of the true geniuses of classical music. His sons W.F. Bach and J.C. Bach were more innovative, but they are not as revered. Schoenberg and Webern were innovative, but their music sounds like a piano falling apart. John Williams writes his film scores in a style that was antiquated a hundred years ago, but he manages to find beauty and emotion in those same old major and minor keys. Even Elvis, who some think of as the originator of rock 'n' roll, just combined the current styles of his day; blues, gospel, country and pop-none of it was new, no new chords or instruments. Who was ever innovative AND worthwhile? Most good music stands firmly on the shoulders of it's predecessors, or it doesn't stand up at all.

[Jack]

I actually prefer Schoenberg over most of his (less innovative) contemporaries. To me, innovation is an significant aspect in the artistic merit and importance of a musician's body of work. Of course, music is an art form and art is subjective. What I may consider important might be unimportant to others.

To list a few innovative musicians who are "worthwhile":

• Sun Ra
• The Velvet Underground
• Throbbing Gristle
• Edgard Varese
• The Residents
• Django Reinhardt
• Jimi Hendrix
• Captain Beefheart
• AMM
• Son House
• Can
• Kaoru Abe
• Divine Styler
• Iannis Xenakis
• Miles Davis

(Not trying to be rude, but I have always found Elvis's music to be dreadfully boring).

[musiclistsareus]

Most of music history can be viewed as the conflict between innovation and constancy (or continuity), this could also be called the Classicism/Romanticism continuum (or whatever). Mozart was very formal (that is adherant to the accepted forms of music; symphony, concerto, sonata, etc.) The romantic era became awash with the more emotional/non-formally structured (rhapsodies, tone-poems, nocturnes, etc.). In the twentieth century, there was a resurgence of neo-classicism with artists like Webern and Schoenberg and their twelve-tone formalism. The current pop situation is similar (though on a much tighter scedule of rotation, resulting in both extremes constantly being in rise and decline simultaneously-in different bands, genres and sub-genres. There seem to always be new bands reviving the beatlesy power-pop sound; in the seventies it was Big Star, Cheap Trick and The Knack, the '80s gave us The Romantics, Shoes, The Bangles and The Smithereens. The '90s gave us Sloan, Teenage Fanclub, Fountains of Wayne, etc. Every style of music is constantly being recycled and innovated upon. Some new music is very close to its predecessors and some reacts to those predecessors, but both are indebted to what goes before. So yes there is some stagnation in rock, but there are also many different genres current and future that will intersect with rock for years, decades and maybe even centuries to come. At least, that's my best guess. Also, I didn't begin to like Elvis or Dylan until my mid-thirties-give it time, the more you see how everything is interconnected, the more you will appreciate the nuances you maybe don't yet.

[Kid-Tank]

What makes u think hip hop is "closer to the brink" than rock?