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Anyone agree with KISS' Gene Simmons' assessment? (Q&A from his website):

I'VE BEEN A KISS FAN FOR AS LONG AS I CAN REMEMBER, I DO HAVE TO MAKE A STATEMENT THOUGH ,, IT WAS ONCE QUOTED, THAT SEATTLE KILLED ROCK & ROLL ? THATS NOT TRUE , A LOT OF GOOD BANDS CAME OUT OF SEATTLE , IF ANYTHING KILLED ROCK & ROLL , IT WAS THAT GLAM ERA, A.K.A GAY L.A METAL, NO NEED TO NAME BANDS, I JUST WANTED TO MAKE MY STATEMENT , AND I STICK TO IT , THANK YOU. FAN IN SEATTLE WA.

Response from Gene:

I disagree.
I love Nirvana and Soundgarden, but the Seattle scene did indeed kill rock and roll. Today, Rap is relevant and hip...because every rapper dresses with chains, gold...lives in mansions and has beautiful girls (that's plural). Seattle bands, while they did in fact MUSICALLY re-invigorate the scene, dressed 'down', had no girls around and ignored the big cars/big mansion cliche's of rock stardom...Result? No ROCK STARS.
Seattle killed Rock and Roll. And what you have, is today's scene.

I think he's got a point, the Seattle guys were bums, they dressed like bums, acted like bums, and looked like bums. Sure they had a hit records and probably had a few million bucks stashed away, but they sure didn't look like it. You look at the guys and you think "they look like dorks, why would I want to be like them? They don't look like they've having fun or living a good life". They're quickly forgotten as soon as they stop making good music unless they commit suicide in a creative way.

Then you look at the rockstars of the past & the rap stars of today. Even when they're making pure crap music or no music at all, they're in the news and living it large. I remember a time when a week wouldn't go by without hearing about Mick Jagger's latest sexual fling with some supermodel on the news. That was a good life, it was cool, and it held the public's attention, love it or hate it you don't forget about stuff like that.

I've also heard that from the Seattle bands on that the showmanship at rock concerts just isn't there.

KISS and the 80's Glam Rock (Big Hair and Spandex) and Heavy Metal bands put on big shows in their concerts. Look at the shows that Iron Maiden, Dio, Bon Jovi, Mötley Crüe, etc... would put on.

Heck, AC/DC still puts on a good show from what I've heard.

I personally don't like going to concerts because the music usually doesn't sound as good as the radio version and then there's the crowd, the cost etc... So if the band is just going to stand there and play they better sound damn good to make it worth it to me.

Oh yeah, some people like to complain that Grunge killed the guitar solo.
Maybe they were over done back in the day but a few good ones now and again might be nice.

aerius wrote:I remember a time when a week wouldn't go by without hearing about Mick Jagger's latest sexual fling with some supermodel on the news. That was a good life, it was cool, and it held the public's attention, love it or hate it you don't forget about stuff like that.

Nor do you forget about R. Kelly pissing on minors while videotaping it.

Tsyroc wrote:Oh yeah, some people like to complain that Grunge killed the guitar solo.
Maybe they were over done back in the day but a few good ones now and again might be nice.

Yeeeeeeeesssssssssss.

Please, gods, more guitar solos! It's one of biggest beefs with modern crap, I mean rock. Blah blah blah girls blah blah blah love you blah blah blah... yeah, great, where's the fucking music? No, the same two chords over and over set to lyrics is not rock. Rap maybe, but that's whole different genre and style.

Bwa ... ha .... ha .....

May the ghost of Hendrix rip your tongue out and beat your poser 'I know what rock is' ass senseless, Gene. Like *you* know a fucking thing about rock, you're a Vegas act that turned a gimmick into a few dollars, big frickin' deal ... you're up there in the rock pantheon with Bon Jovi and every other backwoods Jersey bar band that got an inexplicable 15 minutes in the spotlight.

'Rap is relevant and hip' because of misogyny and self-indulgence? Check back into rehab, Gene.

Chmee wrote:'Rap is relevant and hip' because of misogyny and self-indulgence? Check back into rehab, Gene.

How many well-known and successful rappers can you name who DON'T live the lifestyle? How many of them look and act like average blue collar Joes?

Creative bankruptcy at the exact moment rap was going mainsteam killed rock. The first time rock had a competitor in 40 years, and it responded with incomprehensible scream metal and dreary grunge rock that stopped innovating as soon as Kurt Cobain ventilated his skull.

Here's a fun challenge: name a great rock song from any time between 1997 and 2001. Better yet, name a great mainstream rock band from the same time period. There's a reason why in my high school, the kids that didn't like rap listened to Led Zeppelin instead of the new stuff that was available.

aerius wrote:

Chmee wrote:'Rap is relevant and hip' because of misogyny and self-indulgence? Check back into rehab, Gene.

How many well-known and successful rappers can you name who DON'T live the lifestyle? How many of them look and act like average blue collar Joes?

And does that make *any* of them 'rock stars'? I'm not anti-rap as a rule, there's some stuff I like, but it's not even the same genre as rock. Gene's 'one size must fit all' concept of rock stardom is hilarious to me. If being a mediocre one-trick pony is what it takes, then Gene is all over it, but otherwise I don't see his qualifications to define a damn thing about rock or any other musical genre.

So Dave Grohl doesn't pimp his ride ... so Mike McCready likes going to a Sonics game more than snorting lines in a back room of some Queens nightclub ... they still rock hard. Our music is alive & well, thank you Gene, you can go back to admiring yourself in the mirror and calling that stardom.

RedImperator wrote:Here's a fun challenge: name a great rock song from any time between 1997 and 2001. Better yet, name a great mainstream rock band from the same time period.

As a Canadian this isn't very hard. "Psychopomp" in '97 and "Heaven Coming Down" in '99 by The Tea Party, who are regarded as the best rock band in Canada. This band is aknowledged by many as the heir to The Doors and Led Zeppelin.

Chmee wrote:

aerius wrote:How many well-known and successful rappers can you name who DON'T live the lifestyle? How many of them look and act like average blue collar Joes?

And does that make *any* of them 'rock stars'? I'm not anti-rap as a rule, there's some stuff I like, but it's not even the same genre as rock. Gene's 'one size must fit all' concept of rock stardom is hilarious to me. If being a mediocre one-trick pony is what it takes, then Gene is all over it, but otherwise I don't see his qualifications to define a damn thing about rock or any other musical genre.

So Dave Grohl doesn't pimp his ride ... so Mike McCready likes going to a Sonics game more than snorting lines in a back room of some Queens nightclub ... they still rock hard. Our music is alive & well, thank you Gene, you can go back to admiring yourself in the mirror and calling that stardom.

Way to not answer a question fuckhead. "Look, I'm Chmee, I hate Gene Simmons", we get the idea. Now answer the fucking question.

aerius wrote:

Chmee wrote:

aerius wrote:How many well-known and successful rappers can you name who DON'T live the lifestyle? How many of them look and act like average blue collar Joes?

And does that make *any* of them 'rock stars'? I'm not anti-rap as a rule, there's some stuff I like, but it's not even the same genre as rock. Gene's 'one size must fit all' concept of rock stardom is hilarious to me. If being a mediocre one-trick pony is what it takes, then Gene is all over it, but otherwise I don't see his qualifications to define a damn thing about rock or any other musical genre.

So Dave Grohl doesn't pimp his ride ... so Mike McCready likes going to a Sonics game more than snorting lines in a back room of some Queens nightclub ... they still rock hard. Our music is alive & well, thank you Gene, you can go back to admiring yourself in the mirror and calling that stardom.

Way to not answer a question fuckhead. "Look, I'm Chmee, I hate Gene Simmons", we get the idea. Now answer the fucking question.

Could you perhaps state the question in an intelligible form? Is the question about whether rock is dead, who killed it, what defines a rock star, or whether there are rappers who don't 'live the life'? If it's the last question, why would I know or care, and how is it remotely relevant to the health of rock as a genre?

RedImperator wrote:Here's a fun challenge: name a great rock song from any time between 1997 and 2001. Better yet, name a great mainstream rock band from the same time period.

I'd say Foo Fighter but I'm not sure they're exactly what you mean. Either way, I like a lot of their stuff from that time period. "Learn to Fly" and "Breakout" being among my favorites.

I would also suggest Rob Zombie. Not quite a chart topper but as far as rock acts he did quite well for himself and is definitely a shock-rocker in the likes of Alice Cooper.

I'd also put anything by the Queens of the Stoneage or Masters of Reality up as really good rock.

DocHorror wrote:I'd also put anything by the Queens of the Stoneage or Masters of Reality up as really good rock.

Queens of the Stone Age are certainly good but I don't know that they would qualify as mainstream. There first album attracted some attention but primarily critical. It was their next album, outside Red's time period, that hit big.

I kind of agree with Gene. The 70s and 80s rock scene may have been kind of dark at times (and some times lethal, alot of rock stars didn't survive it), but over all, it was all about living. It was partying and rock-and-roll and scoring with chicks and taking life by the balls. In a very weird way, it was very positive music and it's shows were great.

But then you've got post-Nirvana Seattle stuff and all they do is bitch about life. They aren't about the spectacle or taking life by the scrotum, they were depressed about how life is such a raw deal. I think that's what killed rock, because it got seriously off-message. Occasionally it's decent music, but it doesn't make me want to rock out and kick ass and fuck and party.

Stormbringer wrote:

DocHorror wrote:I'd also put anything by the Queens of the Stoneage or Masters of Reality up as really good rock.

Queens of the Stone Age are certainly good but I don't know that they would qualify as mainstream. There first album attracted some attention but primarily critical. It was their next album, outside Red's time period, that hit big.

Rated-R? That came out in 2000.

They were about as mainstream as Rob Zombie at the time though.

DocHorror wrote:Rated-R? That came out in 2000.

They were about as mainstream as Rob Zombie at the time though.

Rated-R did indeed come out in 2000. But it was damn near a commericial flop and were it not for the immense critical praise and their Ozzfest slot they probably would have gone back to obscurity. To judge it's mainstream status by airplay and chart position, it was well well below Hellbilly Deluxe. And it's one single topped out well below any one of his three, and that was only on one rather specific chart.

They didn't really hit it big until Songs for the Deaf, which came out in 2002 and picked up mostly towards the end of the year and into the next. It didn't go gold until 2003.

I like Queens of the Stone Age alot, but they haven't had that much commerical success. Their primary survival has been as a critic and music writers band.

Gil Hamilton wrote:I kind of agree with Gene. The 70s and 80s rock scene may have been kind of dark at times (and some times lethal, alot of rock stars didn't survive it), but over all, it was all about living. It was partying and rock-and-roll and scoring with chicks and taking life by the balls. In a very weird way, it was very positive music and it's shows were great.

But then you've got post-Nirvana Seattle stuff and all they do is bitch about life. They aren't about the spectacle or taking life by the scrotum, they were depressed about how life is such a raw deal. I think that's what killed rock, because it got seriously off-message. Occasionally it's decent music, but it doesn't make me want to rock out and kick ass and fuck and party.

I don't disagree that that's a vision of what rock is/was about ... but I think it's impossible to pigeonhole the whole genre that way. I guess that's what I really object to in the OP, the idea that rock could possibly fit into any single person's vision of what it is or was. Is AC/DC more 'truly' rock than Chuck Barry? Was Robin Trower less of a rocker than Pete Townshend because he wasn't busting up hotel rooms? I like Stevie Ray Vaughn more than Liz Phair, but I still think she gets to put her CD's in the rock section. They didn't all fit into one neat little stereotype when Gene's band had their 15 minutes and they don't today, that's my objection to his whole hypothesis.

Chmee wrote:

aerius wrote:How many well-known and successful rappers can you name who DON'T live the lifestyle? How many of them look and act like average blue collar Joes?

Could you perhaps state the question in an intelligible form? Is the question about whether rock is dead, who killed it, what defines a rock star, or whether there are rappers who don't 'live the life'? If it's the last question, why would I know or care, and how is it remotely relevant to the health of rock as a genre?

Do you have a reading comprehension problem? The question is so simple even a retard can understand it. How many well-known & successful rappers can you name who live like average Joes?

I don't disagree that that's a vision of what rock is/was about ... but I think it's impossible to pigeonhole the whole genre that way. I guess that's what I really object to in the OP, the idea that rock could possibly fit into any single person's vision of what it is or was. Is AC/DC more 'truly' rock than Chuck Barry? Was Robin Trower less of a rocker than Pete Townshend because he wasn't busting up hotel rooms? I like Stevie Ray Vaughn more than Liz Phair, but I still think she gets to put her CD's in the rock section. They didn't all fit into one neat little stereotype when Gene's band had their 15 minutes and they don't today, that's my objection to his whole hypothesis.

Chmee, he didn't say that they're not rock. Just that the "Wa wa, I'm so depressed" school of rock bored a lot of people and lost the fan base for rock. In short, that sort of rock bored a lot of people to tears and they lost out.

Stormbringer wrote:

I don't disagree that that's a vision of what rock is/was about ... but I think it's impossible to pigeonhole the whole genre that way. I guess that's what I really object to in the OP, the idea that rock could possibly fit into any single person's vision of what it is or was. Is AC/DC more 'truly' rock than Chuck Barry? Was Robin Trower less of a rocker than Pete Townshend because he wasn't busting up hotel rooms? I like Stevie Ray Vaughn more than Liz Phair, but I still think she gets to put her CD's in the rock section. They didn't all fit into one neat little stereotype when Gene's band had their 15 minutes and they don't today, that's my objection to his whole hypothesis.

Chmee, he didn't say that they're not rock. Just that the "Wa wa, I'm so depressed" school of rock bored a lot of people and lost the fan base for rock. In short, that sort of rock bored a lot of people to tears and they lost out.

Yeah but it's laughable to think that self-absorbed pity somehow originated with a couple bands out of Seattle .... Roger Waters had that market cornered before Cobain left daycare. Does somebody think Robert Johnson was singing about pimpin' his ride, or wishing he HAD a ride?

*edit -- moreoever, Nirvana missed the boat on popularizing teen angst by 20 years ... Quadrophenia was released in 1973 and was just dripping with 'wah wah poor me' ... it was also one hell of an album.

I'm not sure what the logic is of a guy living in a mansion and rolling in a limo has to do with sucess on an album? Are we saying that fans purchase music based on how ostentatious the band lives?

Hip Hop is cool and in because white suburbia embraced it. When Hip Hop was just big where it started - the inner city - it was just another genre of music. I remember discussing Curtis Blow and Big Daddy Kane with the white boys that I went to High School with and they were clueless. These kids were listeningh to the Cure and other bands that I hadn't heard of because that wasn't the scene in Upper west side Manhattan.

Fast Forward 15 years and suddenly white kids have their pants falling down to their knees jamming to songs about dealing drugs and Police Brutality and calling each other 'nigga'. Rock died when white kids embraced Hip Hop. Why they embraced Hip Hop has more to do with natural rebelliousness - Rock was no longer the music that drove their parents crazy, more likely than not the Parents might jam to their rock bands than condemn it but Rap and Hip Hop became the new rebellious music. Why Rock was no longer the music that made their parents cringe may have something to do with the parents having grown up on Rock themselves.

There may be a new generation coming soon that will embrace Latin Music as the new in thing because it will bug their parents more than Hip Hop.

RedImperator wrote: Here's a fun challenge: name a great rock song from any time between 1997 and 2001. Better yet, name a great mainstream rock band from the same time period. There's a reason why in my high school, the kids that didn't like rap listened to Led Zeppelin instead of the new stuff that was available.

What about Marilyn Manson? Antichrist Superstar was just outside your timeframe, but I bet you'd recognise "The Beautiful People," 1998 had mechanical animals, and "The Dope Show" was quite well known, 2000 had his "Holy Wood" album, with singles that got on Top of the Pops even here. Fight Song, I think that was, though it might have been disposable teens. Both got into the pop charts here, and the charts here have been anti-rock/metal since the spice girls.

There was nu-metal as well in that timeframe, though they did sort of hijack rap a bit to get there. Linkin Park, and Limp Bizkit notably, Slipknot and Korn perhaps not as visibly (though personally, I'd definately count them as better bands).

Though I don't see why you care about the bands being "mainstream" or not, the mainstream is driven by the wallets of idiot teenagers or younger. I think that's what killed rock. The younger, dumber kids having more money allowed crappy but catchy music to take a hold and never let go. So in roll faceless pop band after faceless pop band, same thing, just pitching at the new generation of kids that will buy it.

Rye wrote:

RedImperator wrote: Here's a fun challenge: name a great rock song from any time between 1997 and 2001. Better yet, name a great mainstream rock band from the same time period. There's a reason why in my high school, the kids that didn't like rap listened to Led Zeppelin instead of the new stuff that was available.

What about Marilyn Manson? Antichrist Superstar was just outside your timeframe, but I bet you'd recognise "The Beautiful People," 1998 had mechanical animals, and "The Dope Show" was quite well known, 2000 had his "Holy Wood" album, with singles that got on Top of the Pops even here. Fight Song, I think that was, though it might have been disposable teens. Both got into the pop charts here, and the charts here have been anti-rock/metal since the spice girls.

Manson would count.

There was nu-metal as well in that timeframe, though they did sort of hijack rap a bit to get there. Linkin Park, and Limp Bizkit notably, Slipknot and Korn perhaps not as visibly (though personally, I'd definately count them as better bands).

Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit will be totally forgotten in ten years. Good riddance.

I'll reluctantly accept Slipknot and Korn, even though I hate hate hate hate hate hate hate their music.

Though I don't see why you care about the bands being "mainstream" or not, the mainstream is driven by the wallets of idiot teenagers or younger. I think that's what killed rock. The younger, dumber kids having more money allowed crappy but catchy music to take a hold and never let go. So in roll faceless pop band after faceless pop band, same thing, just pitching at the new generation of kids that will buy it.

Those same idiot teenagers were buying AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, and Elvis in earlier times. They weren't somehow any smarter than teenagers today. Rock fucked itself good in the 90s--Creed, Blink 182, the same tired shit from the survivors of Seattle, at the same time there was a creative explosion in rap. Generipop boy bands hurt too, but they've dried up and blown away, and rap hasn't.

RedImperator wrote:Creative bankruptcy at the exact moment rap was going mainsteam killed rock. The first time rock had a competitor in 40 years, and it responded with incomprehensible scream metal and dreary grunge rock that stopped innovating as soon as Kurt Cobain ventilated his skull.

Here's a fun challenge: name a great rock song from any time between 1997 and 2001. Better yet, name a great mainstream rock band from the same time period. There's a reason why in my high school, the kids that didn't like rap listened to Led Zeppelin instead of the new stuff that was available.

Nine Inch Nails had some good shit going around that time. As did Alanis Morrisette. Not a band per se (although she did have Dave Navarro and Flea laying down tracks with her) but Holy fuck I had Jagged Little Pill in the number one slot in my car cd changer for 2 years! The Red Hot Chilli Peppers were pretty big then too.