The hindrance of heritage, and why PRS will one day rule the guitar world

[alantig]

While I can agree that popular modern music isn't as guitar driven as it was in the past, the "simply not as good" part is subjective old man nonsense.

I don't believe anyone can seriously dispute that Rock/Blues/R&B/Soul etc. was shaped and defined primarily by Fender and Gibson with ancillary players being Gretsch, Rickenbacher and maybe Guild.



I'm middle-aged in years, but an old man in sensibilities when it come to music and guitars. All of these notions of "good", "better", "best" are subjective opinions, mostly irrelevant and a hindrance in many ways. I like lots of different music from many eras and I don't compare them.
If I take my opinion and $5 to Starbucks, at the end of the day, I've got $5.

Today's music is so diverse and pushed into so many tiny niche categories that it's hard to follow what's going on.

But there's some wonderful stuff out there that's worth exploring, regardless of the style of music you like. I make new discoveries every day, and am constantly surprised in a good way.

In the old days, terrestrial radio was almost a unifying force; on most stations the various styles that have more recently splintered off were all played on one station. Now there's a whole channel dedicated to one band. That strikes me as a little weird, but that's how far it's gotten. When I was growing up, you'd turn on the rock station and it'd play a Beatles tune, a Zep tune, Motown, something psychedelic, a Johnny Cash tune, a Wes Montgomery tune, BST, and so on, back to back.

That doesn't happen today. It's a shame that we're up all these mazes that make it more difficult to discover what's out there. Yet there's some great stuff happening if you're open to listening to new things.

Every generation thinks the music of the next few generations is not as good as its music. Pop music isn't really made for you after a certain point - doesn't mean you can't enjoy it, but you're no longer the target audience.

That said, I don't see a lot of today's popular music being the music people will clamor for in 40 years. I could be dead wrong about that, but it's likely I won't know about it.

And let's be honest - while there was great music on the charts in the 60s, 70s and 80s, there was a fair amount of crap, too. XM Radio plays the American Top 40 countdowns from the 70s each week - while there are some undeniable classics there, there's a ton of stuff that makes you wonder who was buying it. There's a ton of cheesy 70s music - and there's a ton of cheesy 70s music I love because it's the music I grew up with.

As for the heritage of various guitar brands, a good part of the reason Fenders and Gibsons are so lusted after isn't just their longevity, but because they're the guitars that the "classic" age of rock and roll was made on. PRSh has said - numerous times - the biggest impediment to him selling guitars is that he can't get Jimi Hendrix or Stevie Ray Vaughan to play his guitars. You'll have a hard time convincing a Zeppelin fanatic to pick a PRS over a Les Paul because he KNOWS those Zep albums were Jimmy Page wailing on a Les Paul. Yes, it was a Tele on the first album, and a variety in reality, but still...

 

[Blues Trucker]

Hey, I'm a middle-aged dude too! I wrestle with the thinking that "my" music is superior to what young people are creating today as well. If I didn't have/want to try and make a few bucks recording and writing with new artists I'd happily be listening to nothing but The Clash, EW&F, Motown, Dead Kennedy's, The Cure, and Bob Marley all day long declaring it can't get any better, it's natural to think that way.

"Popular" music today is not as quantifiable as it once was, so much so that the Billboard Top 40 has had to change the way it "approximates" what constitutes a "top selling" song with the advent of streaming, increased piracy, and less psychical copies of music for them to count. There must be at least a hundred thousand crusty kids that want a Languedoc guitar, look at all the young-blood we have here on our own forum the past few years who are all over PRS because of Mark Tremonti, and since you mentioned Carlos.. Find a girl under the age of thirty who knows who Santana is and ask them their favorite tune. It won't be Samba Pa Ti, it'll be that song with that one dude from that one band, or else forget about it.

I occasionally look at the comments on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter that our boy Hunter does for PRS, they are filled with thousands of young people salivating over the day they can afford their own Custom 24's. The electric guitar will only die when music, or the human race does.

Damn. You O.K. buddy? I dont think ive seen you use so many words in a post before............

 

[NomadMike]

...And without the word "Bangin"

 

[sergiodeblanc]

Damn. You O.K. buddy? I dont think ive seen you use so many words in a post before............

I'm a passionate defender of all* music! :rock: * except The Beatles

 

[Dusty Chalk]

I'm a passionate defender of all* music! :rock: * except The Beatles

I'm much too lazy, but I'm on board with that especially the Beatles part. There's plenty of great music still being made today, it's just like wading through tar trying to get to it these days, there's so much out there.

 

[Therinx]

My only issue with todays music is....

AUTOTUNE

I have the hate of a thousand burning suns for that.

Other than that, yeah i might not like a lot of it, but there was plenty of stuff i didn't like in the 70's too. Or 80's.

 

[disfigured]

I'm going to be leaving aside tone, sustain, and general knowledge of electronics, since can't delve that deep into the subject. Although it's important, and it's interesting to see the insight of much more experienced musicians than myself, I'll just add my two cents.

I own one of the most childish PRS's and I'm 52. I had some reservations about the bats, and still do sometimes when I look at my guitar with just glance, as if seeing it for the first time. So I guess I'm the paradox. But an LP was what I was actually looking for when I bought my PRS. What I wanted was out of my price range, but very soon it will not. I'm on a midlife crisis binge spread out over the next few years. I want to own, one example of the iconic guitars of my youth, which essentially covers most of the modern electric age. An LP, Strat, Explorer, Tele, are on the the top of the lists. I've owned an Explorer, and even a vintage late 60's Jazz Master. You never know what you're missing till it's gone.

I'm doing this because I consider these guitars iconic. Only time, nostalgia, and memory can produce this effect. Perhaps PRS will be there someday, but it will still always be second fiddle to these guitars. Was the music better (even the Pop stuff) back then? As an old fuddy duddy I have to say yes. Although I believe my generation (some of us) were one of the first not to stay ingrained in their era, so I personally believe "we" have the perspective to make that call, where as some of the young bucks don't. I listen to new music as long as I like it. I think it's a phenomenon of Rock music. My mother at 85 for instance doesn't pine for Glen Miller, although the memories that music must evoke are probably more emotional (albeit in a different and sad way). Where as I still listen to music before my era because of the records (those are those vinyl things), that my sister had lying around (Early Pink Floyd, Creedance, The Who etc). So the range of Rock music I've been listening to (at an influential age), has ranged from retro (from my time perspective), to era appropriate (my prime teen era), to the new rock (and some pop) that I prefer. It's nothing against younger people, who are essentially at a disadvantage due to the lack of time to ingest this much music. I'm to the point where I stream Spotify to my phone while driving to get the full range of what I want to listen to, and that can range from The James Gang to Kill Switch Engaged.

Yada yada, the conclusion is there will be nothing that evokes more emotion in me than the shape of a LP or Strat, and other guitars of history. That poster of Jimmy Page with a Carmel/Ice Tea burst type LP. Hendrix with the upside down Strat. Pete Townsend's numbered LPs. Joe Walsh's Tangerine LP. Etc. Etc. These images are burnt into my mind. These are the artists who influenced everything afterwards. And unlike old blues musicians, the guitars (and amps and electronics) where a much a factor in their music and are hence very much connected to them. The LP and Strat is American incarnate for me.

If I'm walking down the street in Boston (for example my closet big city), and there's a shop, bar, whatever with the picture of a Heritage Cherry LP, or a Custom 24, it would evoke different responses in me. Both positive, but the former would be "ah that's the place for me".

 

[goat-n-gitter]

Yada yada, the conclusion is there will be nothing that evokes more emotion in me than the shape of a LP or Strat, and other guitars of history. That poster of Jimmy Page with a Carmel/Ice Tea burst type LP. Hendrix with the upside down Strat. Pete Townsend's numbered LPs. Joe Walsh's Tangerine LP. Etc. Etc. These images are burnt into my mind. These are the artists who influenced everything afterwards. And unlike old blues musicians, the guitars (and amps and electronics) where a much a factor in their music and are hence very much connected to them. The LP and Strat is American incarnate for me.

I hear ya, and you are right about these traditional guitars being "iconic", but when it comes down to brass tacks, for me, my two core PRS' are just better. They sound better, look better, play better than all the rest of my electrics. I own a US LP std, a couple US Strats, I recently sold an Explorer and a Howard Roberts Fusion, I own a nice Gretsch, a Ricky 12, and several "golden era" Ibanez (which are better than my LP). All these "iconic" guitars spend most of their time just gathering dust. There are a few of them I won't consider selling, just because I've owned them since I was a kid, and like you, feel the need to have these icons in my collection.
I just recently was able to start playing again with my original group that has been playing together since the mid '80s, and was a very serious gigging band into the mid '90s, and the PRS' make the tunes I wrote and performed with those other instruments sound better than ever, and I don't need to carry as many guitars.

But hey, your mileage may vary, and there is certainly room for more than one guitar brand out there.

Tom