The slow death of the electric guitar

Tillerman88 wrote: ^Sorry man but unusual and strange instruments are an ever present part of musical history, as long as experimental music has always existed as well.... I don't see either any correlation with the thread subject (or the WP article for that matter)

siLLy puPPy wrote: Tillerman88 wrote: ^Sorry man but unusual and strange instruments are an ever present part of musical history, as long as experimental music has always existed as well.... I don't see either any correlation with the thread subject (or the WP article for that matter) My point is that the trend for creating homemade instruments is increasing which has a direct and proportionate effect on existing sales of instruments such as electric guitars. I live in an area where this is a serious phenomona where i have seen more people play the Swiss invented Hang than i have a brand spanking new Gibson. People are tired of the past and expanding their creativity. Why settle for someone else's idea of an instrument when you can make your own. I live in a highly innovative part of the planet so i see the trends unfolding around me. I also forgot to mention that acoustic guitar is eclipsing the electric since a need for nomadic flexibility is also the growing trend. Who wants to be burdened by having to find power sources. However the idea of the electric guitar completely disappearing seems far-fetched since metal, progressive rock, indie rock and countless other genres still use it

C'mon, show us some of these DIY instruments !!!!! ;-)

^ did i say it was new? 

As for the Hang, I'd love to see the average man in the street make a tuned drum. I'm not expecting the garages of the UK to ring with the sound of hammering any time soon. Neither, I suppose, is anyone anywhere else. 

The price of DIY instruments don't come down with a "growing trend" either, unless so many people are hammering out tuned drums in their basements that the price of steel goes down. Which seems a bit unlikely. 

I live in a highly inventive part of the planet, I just get about 5000 quarter watt resistors, 2000 electrolytic capacitors, 1000 BC547 transistors and ten pounds of solder and make my own synthesizer.

Trouble is, when I go around to the neighbours to borrow some vactrol gates, op amp chips and panel mount potentiometers, they don't seem to have any. As they're not making one. Probably about two people in the county are. Now, a 1970's modular synth is a bit more complex than, say, tunable percussion, but I don't see anyone making tunable percussion, either. They tend to go off and buy it. There are several shops which sell unusual percussion over here. They're all tiny and struggle to make ends meet. 

Sorry, Silly Puppy, if I'm coming across as agressive. I'm honestly not trying to be. I am just amazed behind the logic of the suggestion. 

Edited by Davesax1965 - July 02 2017 at 10:06

Off you go, then, the Hang drum orchestra calls !!!! ;-)

Davesax1965 wrote: Off you go, then, the Hang drum orchestra calls !!!! ;-)

Like it or not this and other DIY instruments are eclipsing the role of the electric guitar. Homemade instruments are only a part of the equation. Trends towards other stringed instruments has become quitem popular. The banjo and sitar have seen an explosive rise in popularity.

I live in the San Francisco Bay area and have my pulse in sync with the musical trends. I have friends in the music industry and have met more indie musicians than trump supporters in Mississippi. All roads lead to the same conclusion.

Electric guitar isn't cool any more. When I hear the youth of today blasting music, it's never guitar oriented rock but rather hip hop or electronica. Hip hop has usurped the rock word for lyrical relevance in the 21st century and electronic music is the new hip way of escapism. Many youth deem rock and many forms of guitar music too orthodox and established as well as musicians having taken the mastery to the logical conclusions.

Add the fact that guitar sounds can be manufactured on synthesizers and it's really not a surprise that the electric guitar has seen a decline. It seems that only progressive rock, country and metal are keeping it alive but even metal bands like Brain Tentacles and Aluk Todolo are nixing guitar and replacing it with other instruments.

Now if you want to debate these things in an intelligent manner I'm all ears but if you're simply gonna tell me I don't know what I'm talking about with no counter evidence than I find you simply to be a disgruntled rocker who is bitter about how the current musical world has become. Personally I love newer music and welcome the shake up of the old school formulas

I remember reading a blog post by The Cynical Musician (Krzysztof 'Faza' Wiszniewski) about the decline of instrumental skills among the general population. I can't find the post now, the blog is having some issues now.

Anyway, the gist of the post was that the younger generations have grown too used to instant gratification to invest the time to learn playing an instrument. Why spend long years learning to play guitar when you can start up Guitar Hero and slap a plastic controller while playing along to a limited repertoire of popular rock songs for an audience of thousands of virtual fans?

Furthermore, with the exception of techno/dubstep/house/electronic dance music, all the main artists promoted by the media and whose albums sell best belong to solo acts such as Beyoncé, Justin Bieber, Adele, Taylor Swift, Rihanna, Bruno Mars, Jennifer Lopez, Justin Timberlake, Michael Bublé, Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus, etc (interesting note: I don't own a single song by any of the listed singers). Another thing to consider is the popularity of shows that focus on vocal talent, such as American Idol, The Voice and Glee. While it's true that vocals have historically been the focus of popular music, in the past much more people used to learn piano or guitar to accompany themselves while singing popular tunes.

A few things to consider: 

Edited by cstack3 - July 03 2017 at 06:20

infocat wrote: Taylor Swift plays guitar.

siLLy puPPy wrote: Where is the money in music these days? Why would someone take up the electric guitar which takes years to master when it's so much easier to study computer science and get a six figure salary upon graduation. I believe the decline most likely has more to do with economics as the root cause more than anything. Judging from ratings on Rate Your Music, rock music, old and new is very much universally loved. It's just not feasible to make a good living in that field any longer unless one commits years of his / her life and then there are never any guarantees

I agree that jobs in the STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) tend to be much better remunerated than those in the music industry. However, I think you are overestimating the value of a computer science degree by a factor of about two. Aside from huge companies such as Google, Apple, Amazon or maybe some startup that's flush with venture capital, I don't most companies can't afford/aren't willing to pay programmers that kind of money (a six figure entry salary essentially means the newly minted graduates will be able to generate even more revenue for their employers). The high cost of living in the Silicon Valley may be skewing the salaries as well. I know I'm nowhere near a six figure income as a software engineer and that includes yearly raises for the past several years.

In addition, I don't think there is that much overlap between the computer geeks and music nerds to significantly affect a random person's decision to pursue playing electric guitar versus writing software for a living. Your scenario of a young person making a choice between becoming a musician or a software engineer is essentially limited to the set of high school students who have an aptitude and interest in both music and STEM fields and who have received a significant amount of musical training.