Buried Treasures: Real Rock & Roll in the 2000’s
August 7th, 2008 | 8:30 am est |
I don’t want to hear about how modern rock & roll has lost its soul, fire or whatever anymore. No more talk about the old days being the good days and how there are no bands left with any flash, noise or the ability to kick some serious ass at any given moment. It’s simply not true! You just need to know where to look to find bands that still burn with the fever of rock & roll. Just check these three hidden treasures from the middle of this decade and tell me they don’t rock as much as the Who, Tom Petty or Cheap Trick. Yeah, it doesn’t rock the same but hey, times change. What stays the same is passion and determination and the feeling that the song you are hearing is the only song playing on Earth at this very moment. These bands and these songs may not do it for you but they do it for me. Don’t give up, you’ll find yours. There’s enough “real” rock & roll out there for everyone.
Walking Concert - Run to Be Born
“What’s Your New Thing” 
“Calypso Slide”
The Lost Patrol - The Lost Patrol Band
“A Girl Like You”
“Can’t Stand the Quiet”
Sam Roberts - We Were Born in a Flame
“Don’t Walk Away Eileen”
“On the Run”
(yay tim!)
laughable
I couldn’t agree more that there are diamonds embedded here and there among the awful offal that is today’s music. My musical interests are rooted in classic rock and blues, such as Hendrix, Cream, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Black Sabbath, etc. and yet I’m seeing more and more good bands appearing before me all the time. Some are current (Mastodon, Mars Volta, Portugal. The Man, Electric Six), while others have been off the scene for a time and escaped my attention until recently (Go Go Go Airheart, Gang of Four, Curtis Mayfield, Jethro Tull) or maybe I just didn’t dig them back then because I was young and stupid and now I’ve grown up a little. I have a confession to make: I was once addicted to rap. I slowly came to realize the blatant lack of originality there and gravitated to music where people actually play instruments instead of recycling funk records from the 70’s. Imagine my surprise when I found out that Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg had not only recycled nearly all of Parliament’s “Mothership Connection”, but that the P-Funk original was WAY better than “The Chronic”. Anyway, listen to what you want without being subject to the pretentions of others and keep an open mind to music from the past, the present, and the future!
Like the previous poster said, there are definitely a few jewels hidden amongst the ever-increasing waste of today’s music. Mars Volta and Nine Inch Nails are always pushing the envelope, testing the limits of their audience. Bands like the Faint and Panic at the Disco, rather than be original, resort to miming old genres to stay afloat. I, too, remember when I first heard “Mothership Connection” and saw what Dre and Snoop had done. Same goes with David McCallum’s “The Edge” or Lafayette Afro Rock Band’s “Darkest Light,” maybe the most recognizable horn intro, used in a few early 90s hip-hop songs. I try to get into everything, I love about as much as a person can. Everything from Davy Graham and Can to The Clash and Devo. Music will never be as good as it was, that’s kind of an unestablished fact.
Thank you, Tim. You’ve done your public service work for the week. One of the reasons, I believe, that music continues to descend into endless cycles of suckiness, is that bands aren’t allowed to grow. There are no more Tom Pettys or Cheap Tricks because bands have no time to grow: its be big or be gone. Its a shame.
What the hell is real rock?
The Flamin’ Groovies.
Wow! those songs shook off whatever sleepiness I had this morning… thanks for pointing out these bands!
Let me also suggest The T’s - an awesome act from North Carolina that is NOT retro, but does give you the same feeling you had when you first heard the Ramones and Cheap Trick. Check ‘em out, y’all!
http://www.myspace.com/thettttt
awful bands. ugh.
:)
oops “on the run” by Sam Roberts leads you to “every part of me” and “don’t Walk away Eileen” goes to someplace else…