Been a long time. Hope you're doing well. Someday if you're interested, I'll catch you up on what I've been up to.

Take it outside, ladies.

I didn't come here looking for trouble. He did. He's been reported to the mods.

Only way to stay current is to write about it:

My son, whos 14, has been into 70s/80s funk for years. Nothing to do with Tik-Tok or anything else. The kids will find the good stuff eventually, including the stoner music Me? Never liked Pink Floyd and still dont and I turn 50 in a week.

I think that is mostly wrong. I mean, people may become more distracted, less focused. I believe there is a window of relevance for some artists. Once you leave that window, you don't become a worse artist, you just don't make commercially mass viable product.

IMO, rezoneight is a good guy.

My apologies to you, rezoneight, for jumping into the middle of this spat. But after all the crap Wags has pulled here, I get triggered just seeing his avatar appear.

Personally I think its the weird cartoon lips/mouth on that avatar that does it

I wouldn't have jumped in either but wags did nothing wrong and this other guy does stalk him in the threads. Have seen it before. It's bullying plain and simple, especially when you know he's going to react.

Back on to the topic...the post title is a bit general no? Certainly there are cases. But I think older musicians have more tricks in the bag to accommodate for areas where they might have lost something. Looking back thru the responses to the topic seems to me that the question really doesn't ring true.

For me it's the eyes.

Production wise, I think new music by young artists sounds great.

I just know exactly where it's going, can predict each section....not often a turn around or 8 section that surprises....all very vanilla and predictable in terms of artistry.

But it sounds great.

Older artists just make more interesting music.

More tools in the toolbox.

While every artist slips and falls from time to time, I like to remember the significant relevance of Bowie. And how few are able to carry on without succumbing to vapidity.

He was untouchable at capturing / theiving the moment. Zeitgeist of this day. And in a fresh and, as innovative a way as is congruous to the total engagement factor of the track. Preferably while assigning a uniquely symbiotic cast to aid in the mission. At least that's what I tell myself.

The problem with older artists is that their back catalog of music is attached to different times and different era's of ones growth and development. Some records are old records that you got into when you were 17. Other records are newer records that you are listening to when you are in your 40s or 50s. The person you were at 17 is not the person you are at 40 or 50. That record that the 17 year old you was blown away by holds a special significance in your psyche and personality than the record that the 50 year old you heard. Even f the recording technology is better and production and reproduction technology is better, those old records will sound better to you. Then there is also the whole nostalgia trip of listening and appreciating records from your youth because they are a way to temporarily get away from who you are and return and re-capture your youth.

The wonders of art and getting old.

This is actually a TV commercial now, saw it last night during the Heat smacking down the Lakers.

I wonder if the dude gets the licensing money or it all goes to Tik Tok?



BTW did Herr Weiss get completely booted? It looks like I caused the massacre above but it wasn't me at all None of H-Dubs posts show up as deleted, they're just completely gone. So I wonder if he's completely gone?

Yeah I noticed the same but no his account still exists.

It wasn't you. I apologize to you for the part I played in the blowup.

I believe it wouldn't have been right if Herr Weiss were to be the only one banned.

If you look way back into this thread, you'll see that one of the participants in this "massacre" has pissed off an awful lot of Gearslutz members. They're still members, but they don't come here anymore. I can't speak for them, but I'd pretty much already left for that reason, not having visited or posted here for some time. I still participate in other discussion here, but the other day when I arrived at the songwriting sub-forum I saw that damned avatar.

For the last few weeks it was looking like the demo threads had practically died. Three weeks without a comment! When I saw that avatar, I did what I did on purpose. If I could get the two of us banned, it just might be the biggest contribution I could make to this sub-form.

Total fail.

My apologies to all.

I think this issue mainly has got three aspects to consider:

1. It`s simply a matter of talent.Pop-Culture often pushes actually talentless
people over the top.
2. Also talented people cannot always write good stuff.This is not necessarily a
matter of age.It isn’t actually that easy to write a real good song.
3. It is a matter of having skills in music theory.Most of these people in Pop
Culture are not able to read music or write scores.

A good example for the issue is the Band U2.They wrote some good stuff in their youth and were pushed over the top.
Now their songs get worse and worse by every album over three decades and they simply have become a terrible band in my opinion.I always wonder if this is a lack of real musical talent or there’re other reasons.But very likely it is the first.

There are a lot of other bands who went through the same development in their career.Real musical talent simply is very rare.

The word "talent-less" is pointless and irrelevant. It's highly subjective and from my observation, it's heavily tied to a persons age, culture, background, personality. I have personally had very intelligent people tell me the music by Tom Waits and King Crimson is some of the the worst music they have ever heard and the guitar playing of Jeff Beck and Ry Cooder is the worst playing they have ever heard. All are all artists that are highly regarded in their other realms. I can try all i want to convince those people otherwise until i go blue in the face. and nothing will ever change because they aren't into the music by those particular aritists, they don't get it and they don't want to get it. It is what it is. It has no bearing on anything.

I am guilty of the same thing. I recall many years ago when I was in my 20s and I knew a guy that thought Neil Diamond was the greatest artist of all time in all of music. I thought the guy was pulling my leg. Then I realized after a while he was serious. And I thought he was nuts. I hated Neil Diamond and everything he did and his voice too. Alway's did. Alway's have. It has nothing to do with is "talent" -- he is probably a much better song writer than I could ever be -- but I hate him. It is what it is. It means nothing.

Totally this. Eddie Van Halen said he never learned how to read music. From @ horizon 's post where he said: "3. It is a matter of having skills in music theory.Most of these people in Pop Culture are not able to read music or write scores." then Eddie Van Halen had no talent. That is clearly a bunch of nonsense.

Yeah. Old guys get:

- Irrelevant, disconnected from a dominant new cultural reality they're just not part of any more.
- Complacent, too willing to continue to dine out on 'the old stuff'
- Too mellow and lacking fire, too comfortable, too blah and MOR.
- Talking 'at' the youngs in a condescending manner rather than 'with' them.

Not everybody, but certainly generally.

Just play the hits.

It's not all bad, though. Old guys also get:

- A permanent faint smell of pee.
- increasingly frightened and threatened by the youngs and progressive thought.
- A dandy new walking style, sometimes with a cane and eventually a walker.
- A permanent faint smell of pee.

ns

Oof this thread is a bit of a sh!tshow. But re-booting something from 2015? Hey, i'm down.

I disagree with the original thread idea - I don't think people get worse with age. Sounds may become 'dated', oldschool or less popular and the artists along with them, but it doesn't make them bad. I simply think that one generation inspires the next, the next one makes a change and does it 'their way', and so on. This isn't new. Each generation wants to write their own soundtrack, and that's how awesome new developments happen. This isn't new, and shouldn't be an insult to the people that inspired the 'new' generation either. I can have complete respect for artists in previous generations whilst rejecting the idea that I should spend my life and career trying to reproduce and re-live the soundtrack to someone else's glory days - i'd rather write the soundtrack to my own. After all, that's what those artists did.

Although I want to create a sound that resonates with a modern audience, I don't expect my sound to stay relevent or modern several generations from now. I might be able to keep up for a few decades but at the end of the day I can only hope that our songwriting is strong enough, popular enough and good enough to keep being played. Hopefully they'll actually be re-made by the next generation of modern artists and so on, and translated into their soundworld along with their own creations. Many of the popular classics have done this, along with songs like "Paint it Black" etc - I just aspire to be among them.

I think older artists get a little disconnected with what is hip. They appeal and also pander to the nostalgia generation that wants to re-live their youth.

I am a fan of all of these guys, but its a little sad to see them doing cruises. All extremely musically talented and miles ahead experienced liver players than most new artists these days that play sad little excuses for live shows -- 3 or 4 people on stage playing along to sequencers and drum machines[1].

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9-9I-cLeoE&t=30s


[1] the last two "hip" shows I saw was Phantogram and Sofi Tucker. Basically two people on stage playing to backing tracks almost. The Sofi Tucker girl pulled out a fancy heavy metal guitar and played single whole notes thoughout the song whilst posing. Really weird IMO.

As an "older artist" myself, this strikes me as really funny. At this particular moment, still digesting what the leader of the free world said after I went to bed last night, I need that. So thanks.

I also believe that the artists OP is talking about are ones whose creative peaks, lucky streaks, and indifference to nuance and sophistication coincide when they are relatively young. Many great writers and musicians peak much later, when getting lucky on that level is far less likely.

Hmm.. The only artists I am aware of that "gained" "new" popularity as they aged were folk & country artists like Towns Van Zandt, Bill Monroe, John Prine e.t.c.

It might be related to the music genre they work in. Music is image based. Always was, always has been, always will be. People buy music that they feel defines who they are or what they aspire to be. The image of a young person with young skin, young body, young hair is what sells music and gains an audience (and many other products as well).

I recall many years ago when I was young and went of one of those open music jam nights. I was with some older people (Led Zep/Beatles generation) and some people my own generation (90s Nirvana generation). It was a small audience of just people gong out on a week night to kill some time and listen to some live music.Anyways, so various singer song writers go on stage and sing their songs. Then this old fellow (I guess 60+ years) went up and did his tunes. He had this Stompin Tom meets Johnny Cash image thing happening -- the all black outfit and black cowboy hat. And he did some serious themed songs about his wife dying and hard times .. and *everyone* in the audience just look at each other and started leaving with the attitude, "yo.. it's a friggin week night. I am not listening to this depressing ****.".

If it were Mick Jagger or Tom Waits on stage doing that same routine they would have stayed and thought it's the coolest thing they ever heard and how much those artists have gotten better. But because this was a nobody they walked away.

David Guetta and Sia both peaked in their 40s. That's two #1 artists of the past decade being in their 40s.

I @ telecode feel if music was less image based it would be easier to appreciate music overall and but about disconnect is it rooted in genre or the idea that music is moreso a product when attached to commercial impetus?

They'd have had fun with the fact that they were seeing a legend. I doubt they'd have thought it was the coolest thing ever, at least at the musical level. Mick Jagger showing up unannounced to play a small room for an unsuspecting crowd would be the coolest thing ever to that crowd, but that's because of who he is. Singing a bunch of depressing songs they'd never heard not so much, they'd be like "that was cool but I really wish he played Paint it Black."

As far as older artists go, I don't actually think there's anything wrong with keeping their sound within the nostalgia which resonates with them. I'd rather an artist write something honest but dated than attempt to be 'modern' at the cost of their integrity. It's the honesty and integrity which really resonates with an audience, regardless of the generation it appeals to IMO. Of course there are many artists who can do both, stay modern and write what really resonates with them, but I also think at a certain point we all have to make room for the new ones - and I say that as a 'new fish' in comparison to the experience of many of the other people on this forum.

I've got a bit of a habit of kicking off at the condescending, patronising sorts who like to throw the massive, varied body of modern music and artists under the proverbial bus though, simply because they are happy with their own nostalgic soundtrack and decided talent stopped the year they didn't like it anymore. Something which seems almost inevitable in a thread like this

As far as modern shows go, it almost seems like a catch 22. On the one hand, it seems almost lazy for artists to do the bare minimum on stage when people have come to see live music, but on the other hand it's simply impossible for a handful of people to reproduce a sound live which was produced running into possibly hundreds of tracks. We have to lean on backing, simply because i'm not an octopus and can't sing multiple layers at the same time either - and audiences expect a live show to sound somewhat similar to the songs and albums they enjoy. On top of that we have to assume that at least a good chunk of our audience has an aesthetic drive - they don't just want to hear live music, they've also come to *see* a show. In an ideal world people could play perfectly whilst putting on a great, visual live show, but i'd always favour a live show with a few imperfections musically but an amazing performance over a technically perfect show where all the performers are stood staring at their feet. Of course this can result it some horribly cringy attempts at showmanship and awful sets too, but also some great shows where i'm not all that bothered if the vocalist was half a note off in one part or a guitarist botched their riff in another.