owickerman
New Member
Its an arm powered harmonica.
Sorry to quote you entirely, but there are elements through relevant to my reply.To put it another way, many of the "everyday names" I see on the internet most of my co-workers have never heard of. They're simply not exposed... there's no profit motivation for industry to do it, so they'd rather focus on their dwindling resources on known commodities (i.e., pop-stars).
When I was growing up (I'm currently 39) my Mum (who's currently 59) through exposure to mainstream media knew the names of all the major bands even though she didn't like them. She knew the lead singer from Blind Mellon had OD'd before I did even though she had no idea who he was and didn't know any of their music. Further, through media I was exposed to not only my Mum's music, but my Grandparents music. Guitar based music was everywhere, home, work, the mall, television, radio... you couldn't escape it.
Compare that to today where I play in a rock band with a bunch of dudes in their mid-20s and I don't recognize 90% of the stuff they talk about while they don't recognize 90% of the stuff I'm talking about. Despite being music fans that play in a rock band they've never been exposed to a lot of rock music, and conversely me being a ~40 year old metalhead I don't listen to the EDM-alternative-power-pop-indie-hipster music these guys listen to. I simply don't hear it anywhere. Not at home, work, in the mall, TV (I haven't watched TV since 2003) or radio (who listens to the radio?).
In the past my Mum was forced to listen to my music and I was forced to listen to hers. That doesn't seem to happen anymore. It's like we're in isolated social circles that don't come into contact with each other even though we physically stand in the same room and shoot the sh*t on regular basis.
The decline of radio, caused by the growth of these other audio-based media, is possibly also to blame - I tire of listening to the radio with (what seems like) 15 minutes of ad breaks for 12 minutes of music and then 10 minutes of DJ banter.
Sorry to quote you entirely, but there are elements through relevant to my reply.
I wonder whether the unvideo-ing of MTV and the likes, along with further narrowing of entertainment niches in all forms (due primarily by perceived consumer demand), has resulted in the minimal cross-pollination of information, including exposure to music genres, across populations.
For example, Sirius/XM has stations dedicated to such narrow musical niches I wonder if you'd never discover Coldplay by listening to Imagine Dragons. Growing up (groan, not another one of those stories!) I had four channels as a kid, and when I was a teenager in the 80s at first there was only half-hour or hour-long video shows on the slightly expanded cable universe, and then finally MTV (or MuchMusic in my case). When I watched videos, I was exposed to all styles, because there was no way to avoid them.
And now with the advent of downloads and mobile devices, my 19-year-old daughter can listen to exactly whatever she wants without accidentally hearing something she might not be interested in. Well, except when we have band practice at home, then she gets exposed to Celtic Fusion and Rock'n'Roll whether she wants to be or not!
The decline of radio, caused by the growth of these other audio-based media, is possibly also to blame - I tire of listening to the radio with (what seems like) 15 minutes of ad breaks for 12 minutes of music and then 10 minutes of DJ banter.
What's an ACCORDION?
Kids these days are playing their 8-strings, or even more strings.
For what it's worth, I'm a millennial (24 years old). People who say negative things about up-and-coming rock acts, who claim that they aren't like the great rock acts of the past are unwittingly contributing to the death of rock and the electric guitar. It will never be like it was, but electric guitar can still have a future if everyone understands it's going to change. Someone mentioned that new generations are NEVER influenced by the older generation: just blatantly false. My favorite bands of all time are 70's-90's bands; I have a huge respect for the great originals of blues and rock in the 40's-60's as well (maybe earlier. I don't know. I'm only 24).
I can really only think of two huge stadium musicians, of my generation, who use a 4 or more piece band. Taylor Swift and Harry Styles. My fiance danced on Taylor's Red Tour, I met a lot of the band and Ed Sheeran a few times. Many of Taylor's band mates had been with her for years. I'm not a huge Taylor fan. I just wanted to mention a young stadium musician who uses electric instruments.
Harry Styles is much better than many of you may think. (I know he came from 1 direction or whatever. Obviously, not a very good musical contribution) I don't know if any of you have listened to his new album but it's not bad. Much more rock than most of the other top 40 that's becoming popular in my generation. He claims to be influenced by Pink Floyd and Zeppelin and others. Although I would still call it "pop" or "pop-rock", they use the same formula as a lot of the greats from the mid-late 20th century. It's good ****. I dig his guitarist Mitch Rowland a lot. He wrote some great stuff.
One of the songs we're writing right now has Muddy Waters all over it and I'm nudging it in an Alice in Chains direction because it has the potential to be really heavy (vocally heavy, not chugga chugga heavy). It's putting us in a unique niche because we stand out both sonically and rhythmically from our peers.
One of my guitarists (23 yo) is pretty into the blues and you can hear it in his writing. One of the songs we're writing right now has Muddy Waters all over it and I'm nudging it in an Alice in Chains direction because it has the potential to be really heavy (vocally heavy, not chugga chugga heavy). It's putting us in a unique niche because we stand out both sonically and rhythmically from our peers.
Interestingly (to me) is that a lot of the fans/bands in our scene don't know how to peg him. I hear a lot of comments of "country-ish", which I'm guessing is because that's what they know and have no understanding of what the blues sounds like.
Yeah, Les. You get it, man. You're one of the good ones.
Is it a pretty young scene?
I'd listen to that!
Yes. We're hooked in with an artist development company and part of what they do is try to line up acts so there's crossover appeal. Most of the crowd we're circulating with is 17 through 30. There's some older dudes; me (39) and a couple of the drummers... but the people out front are typically in their 20s.
I don't have clips of the current song since it's still being worked out, but skip to 2:11 to hear one of his earlier tunes. It's a little more poppy, but you'll catch the drift. He's on the acoustic.