WTF Happened to Music (with balls)? "We NEED to Rock."

Asher wants to know why there's no good contemporary rock music, why there's not a current Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Rush, or Pink Floyd. Comments on Classic Rock, Prog Rock, and music with balls. Asher argues something has changed, and it's not just the 'natural evolution' that always happens, but a dilution from which you can't get back to awesome.

This time we're going to be talking about music. Music in general. Well, sure.

But with some emphasis on rock music and I should probably acknowledge my tastes. You might say my bias. So I like music up until about 1984. That's the easiest way of saying it. If I had to cut off some period of music and just throw it out and do with the rest, I think you wouldn't hurt me too much. If you made 1985 the year we threw it all away that he arguably it was, there was some good stuff produced after that. I'm not saying nothing good came after 84. You know, the Joshua tree album by YouTube is pretty good. I did Mumford and sons more recent group, and there's a variety in, Americani got Ray LaMontagne and in every genre, there's some interesting music. Okay. But it's just so much less. I mean, you know, when I was growing up the music from the sixties and the seventies it filled the radio except for the top 40 stations.

We have these top 40 stations, but me and my friends didn't listen to that. And we listened to cream on the radio and Steppenwolf and deep purple and all that stuff, maybe less Steppenwolf, but we listened to the kind of stuff that, you know, in my view is the root of so much contemporary rock music up until 84. And, you know, it was the generation right before mine that essentially invented punk. But it was still going strong. When I was in high school, heavy metal, my generation is the one that sort of made it mainstream. And then of course, you know, the new wave came in and there was some good eighties music. I didn't care for it then, but you know, I've come around. I liked it. It reminds me of the time and sandwiched in between punk and heavy metal is something we didn't have a name for.

Most of us kids just call it rock and roll. And our parents called it hard rock, which they contrasted with soft rock, which I think must must've come out of disco, but it was sort of like the air supply, easy listening version of rock and roll. You know, it didn't have a lot of balls so to speak. And so that includes people like back in the day, Jackson brown, Tom petty, Billy idol, Eddie money, good old working class, beer swilling, hard hat wearing kind of rock and roll bolt-on neck, fender, guitar, Marshall stack, vamps, you know, that sort of thing. And you know, that stuff even changed once Jackson brown did the lawyers in love album and you know, it kinda went downhill. It's not like Boulevard back in the old days, Tom petty you know, I don't really dig all that free falling stuff reef, no, it's gotta be back in the days of needing to, I need to know.

And refugee and American girl you know, she was an American girl, all that stuff that it's the guitar licks and the attitude you know, and Billy idol did white wedding. It had that sinful collar turned up a scandal built into it and everything sorta got cleaned up after that. Granted there was Madonna prince and all that sort of thing, Michael Jackson, but that's high points going out in my opinion. So I dig Americana, you know, Townes van Zandt, not Taylor swift, not top 40 country, not Travis Tritt, yes. To Johnny Cash and all of that. Sure. Willie Nelson, I did heavy metal not all the fattest derivatives. I don't need goth metal and death metal and you know, all of that stuff, but share ACDC black Sabbath led Zepplin. I think of that as progressive rock, but, you know, yeah. Good stuff. Punk really liked it.

You know, I listened to the dead Kennedys back in the day. I'm into the clash. It was back then. And you know, there's been more than one sort of punk wave. And I like...