First off, I'm sure this theory is less than unique. I'm sure it's been suggested, pondered and considered in various forms, on various forums. That said...
In different forums I've seen a growing number of threads about how Metal has stagnated, how there's no fresh blood bringing good music to the scene, or discussions on how this genre or that genre has piqued. Sometimes those who speculate will lay the blame at their own feet, suggesting it's their own evolving tastes which have skewed their view of the genre, and that they've subsequently lost interest in pursuing new music. While I was transcribing an interview with Don LaFon of Six Minute Century, we were talking about his day job as a guitar teacher, when we had the following exchange:
Greg: I myself am a child of the 80s. I was in a band, everyone I knew was a band. I knew a dozen kids who could just shred. They were all into Vai and Satch and Malsteen. How would you compare the approach of kids today towards guitar, to when you learned to play?
Don: Guitar playing is kind of making a comeback. When I taught eight to ten years ago, the songs that everyone would bring in were from GREEN DAY or PEARL JAM, or something that had not much of any guitar playing in it. But now, with heavier music coming back in, the kids are really starting to play at a lot younger age. I got some guys who are thirteen or fourteen who can come in and just shred. But they don't know what it is that they're playing. That's where I try to teach them the scales and what it is. But these days with YouTube, you can pull any song if you want to learn how to play. They can watch lessons of Yngwie, John Petrucci or Michael Romeo, and at a pretty young age they're playing fast!
So if you look back to 1990 - 1995, when Nirvana ruined music for everyone, we'd probably see that an entire generation, who would typically be inspired to play guitar by the rock stars of their youth, never picked up the guitar because there were no guitar players worth emulating. Or if they did so, they learned to play with a paralyzed left hand. Most of those kids would have been in their mid-20s to early-30s during 2005 - 2010. And it's that same mid-20s to early-30s demographic from which I would expect the next wave of great bands to emerge.
So perhaps the decline we've been witnessing for the last handful of years, is simply a lack of musicians capable of contributing to the genre, due to a musical shift that occurred 15 - 20 years ago.
As I said, I'm sure this isn't a unique thought. It's simply one that occurred to me, one I thought was interesting and one which I don't recall being postulated here.
Note... By the way, if you haven't checked out Six Minute Century, I would recommend giving them a listen... http://www.myspace.com/sixminutecentury
In different forums I've seen a growing number of threads about how Metal has stagnated, how there's no fresh blood bringing good music to the scene, or discussions on how this genre or that genre has piqued. Sometimes those who speculate will lay the blame at their own feet, suggesting it's their own evolving tastes which have skewed their view of the genre, and that they've subsequently lost interest in pursuing new music. While I was transcribing an interview with Don LaFon of Six Minute Century, we were talking about his day job as a guitar teacher, when we had the following exchange:
Greg: I myself am a child of the 80s. I was in a band, everyone I knew was a band. I knew a dozen kids who could just shred. They were all into Vai and Satch and Malsteen. How would you compare the approach of kids today towards guitar, to when you learned to play?
Don: Guitar playing is kind of making a comeback. When I taught eight to ten years ago, the songs that everyone would bring in were from GREEN DAY or PEARL JAM, or something that had not much of any guitar playing in it. But now, with heavier music coming back in, the kids are really starting to play at a lot younger age. I got some guys who are thirteen or fourteen who can come in and just shred. But they don't know what it is that they're playing. That's where I try to teach them the scales and what it is. But these days with YouTube, you can pull any song if you want to learn how to play. They can watch lessons of Yngwie, John Petrucci or Michael Romeo, and at a pretty young age they're playing fast!
So if you look back to 1990 - 1995, when Nirvana ruined music for everyone, we'd probably see that an entire generation, who would typically be inspired to play guitar by the rock stars of their youth, never picked up the guitar because there were no guitar players worth emulating. Or if they did so, they learned to play with a paralyzed left hand. Most of those kids would have been in their mid-20s to early-30s during 2005 - 2010. And it's that same mid-20s to early-30s demographic from which I would expect the next wave of great bands to emerge.
So perhaps the decline we've been witnessing for the last handful of years, is simply a lack of musicians capable of contributing to the genre, due to a musical shift that occurred 15 - 20 years ago.
As I said, I'm sure this isn't a unique thought. It's simply one that occurred to me, one I thought was interesting and one which I don't recall being postulated here.
Note... By the way, if you haven't checked out Six Minute Century, I would recommend giving them a listen... http://www.myspace.com/sixminutecentury
