Musical Time Machine: An Exercise Of Imagination

Today I’ve been to a supermarket to buy some groceries. When I returned to my car I took a small break to eat some chips, I’m a sucker for chips, I know they’re not healthy, so I try to eat as less as I can but when I do…I want to enjoy every piece.

So, here I was in my car, in the parking lot, eating my chips, light was low, the radio was playing Sunrise Avenue with Fairytale gone bad. This song is (still) in heavy rotation in Romania, after a summer when I heard it every day on every possible radio station.

I like the song. I don’t know if I did in the beginning, but I do now, probably I have been intoxicated by so many times I have heard it.

So  here I was, eating my chips and thinking…is it rock? Is it pop? WTF is this song? If I judge by the drums, in the first half of the song, it’s so kind of pop, I’d say. Man, I would love some Skid Row now… The second half has rock drums, some overdriven guitars, open high-hats, what it’s needed to jump around in the crowd, I guess it’s some kind of rock after all, modern rock …

And there it started…I guess it’s because of the chips…modern rock, WTF is modern rock? Music that is in trends today. 80′s rock is not in trends anymore. Guitar solos are not in trends anymore, screaming it’s not in trends anymore. Today something else is in trends.

Why?

Did you ever ask yourselves why?

What it is that makes a style of music to be in trends? Why “hair rock” is not in trends anymore? What makes it old fashioned today?

I remembered my teacher of philosophy from high school (yep, I had classes of philosophy) telling us about I can’t remember what philosopher (I think it was Nietzsche but I won’t bet my life on it) that started his work on denying the work of EVERY OTHER PHILOSOPHER BEFORE HIM. Man, he must have been one busy guy, cause a couple of hundred years before him, philosophy was, well, let’s say…in trends, so everybody was doing it.

Now, also some lyrics from N’oubliez jamais (Joe Cocker) come to my mind, some lyrics that I’ve always considered the essence of a good children-parents relationship:

Papa, Why Do You Play All The Same Old Songs
Why Do You Sing With The Melody
Cause Down On The Street Somethings Goin’ On
There’s A Brand New Beat And A Brand New Song

He Said: In My Life, There Was So Much Anger Still I Have No Regrets
Just Like You, I Was Such A Rebel So Dance Your Own Dance, And Never Forget

N’oubliez Jamais, I Heard My Father Say
Every Generation Has Its Way A Need To Disobey

I guess it’s just the need of a new generation to disobey the one before. I guess being in trends doesn’t mean being better or newer, maybe just DIFFERENT, different that what has been before you.

I have a theory that I’ve told to a couple of my friends, some agreed, some didn’t, but hey, here I go again:

I have my own example here, with a Skoda car (I personally like that car so I use it as an example here). We have a Skoda Octavia 1, beautiful car at its time. Then we had Skoda Octavia 2 (next model). Everybody started to go wow, yes, nice one, more beautiful than the first. Now we have Skoda Octavia 3 (or the New Skoda I think, I don’t really care). Even more beautiful than 1 and 2.

Are you sure?

Is it more beautiful? Or just different for the sake of being different? Are you sure that you would have said the same if the models would have been switched somewhere in time, at a higher level, and in 1995, let’s say, Skoda 3 would have been released under the name Skoda 1 and in 2008 Skoda 1 under the name Skoda 3? I am pretty sure you would have said that the most recent one is nicer.

Following the same pattern, if at the same higher level we could change the history of music and put this music that Sunrise Avenue plays now, somewhere in the 70′s, (supposing they would have been successful), and release hard and heavy rock in 2008-2009, I bet hard and heavy would be THE NEXT THING! A FAR BETTER MUSIC!

You know what? Hard and heavy, hair rock, glam, all this kind of music would be in trends in 2008, 2009.

So, actually in this post I have brought up 2 different points to discuss:

1. What makes a song/style in trends?
2. If by a magic switch of musical periods, the music of the 80′s would be released FOR THE FIRST TIME in 2008, would it be in trends?

…or is it because of the chips?

PS: I couldn’t help myself, I added here N’oubliez jamais, one of the most beautiful songs ever written.

Bookmark It