The influence of the decades

I would really like your thoughts on this one:

It seems to me that the two major decades of influence in today's music are the 70's and the 80's. While the 60's have undoubtly produced many influential bands and real innovators in music, it seems the latter music decades are repeating the past.

The 90's introduced a nostalgic return to the 70's, more progression in music and spacey sounds. Bands that were born in this decade borrow elements directly from the 'golden age' of 70's, not strictly in prog rock, but other rock and prog-related movements.

On the other hand, the current decade seems to be a return in the straight/hard sound of the 80's, simplifying music patterns and bringing back this 'raw' feeling of a decade that many people believe it was a 'drawback' in the music evolvements (including prog).

I don't say that there were no influences from all decades to the last 20 years, but I get this overall feeling...

Do you find any pieces of truth in these statements? Agree or disagree in a way?

There are a lot of bands trying to emulate sounds of the past these days, however, it's usually very easy to distinguish which bands are old and which are new. Stuff like production, album art etc. easily sets most retro bands apart from the old ones they're copying, regardless of style. It's nearly impossible to produce exactly the same music now as 20, 30 or 40 years ago, because the world is different nowadays; technologically, politically, economically, you name it.

My point being, that while the current trend is copying the past, the music still sounds different, meaning some sort of evolution has taken place.


Edited by Philéas - December 15 2008 at 17:51

Those who do not learn from the eighties are doomed to repeat them.

HughesJB4 wrote: I don't totally agree. Speaking in terms of metal, something I know a fair bit about, the 90s saw a great progression within metal, spawning many new sub genres. In terms of 'rock' though, I think bands are more likely to repeat the sounds or at least have a great amount of influence of the sounds that were successful during the 60s/70s.

I'll have to agree with you there. The trio of Death, Atheist and Cynic that emerged in the early 90s were pioneers to say the very least. Opeth are innovators in my book, as they do their own thing, regardless of what anyone thinks of them. I can't think of a band that were of Opeth's genre before them. Same goes with the mighty Meshuggah.

Grindcore, which I'm getting into quite a fair bit lately (I know, I'm disgusted as well), is an entirely new genre of metal developed in the past decade or two. Actually, I think the past two decades have been the most influential as far as metal is concerned.

A B Negative wrote: Those who do not learn from the eighties are doomed to repeat them.

Touche!  (I was just on the 80s appreciation thread before this, too.  Do people really exist that like Duran Duran?)