The electric guitar is the single most identifiable object of the rock and roll genre. It is also the object responsible for making rock and roll what it is. The way it sounds, the way that the musician holds it all epitomize the genre.
Technological innovations and new ways of playing the guitar impacts on rock and roll and helps it evolve. These advances have even gone so far a to develop an all new genre of music that became popular in the early 1990s. Hardcore and alternative, have alldevlped through additions to the manufacture of the electric guitar and the way the sound is produced and recorded. Tinkering is the name given to this type of redevelopment with two of the biggest ‘tinkerers’ in the industry being Eddie Van Halen and Greg Ginn.
According to Waksman, “Tinkering has served a number of interrelated functions: it has been a means of exploring the ways in which technology can be put in the service of creating a certain kind of sound; it has been a way for musicians and instrument makers (two categories that often blur together) to redesign the electric guitar to more individualized specifications; and it has been a mode of self-directed activity in which musicians have sought to carve out a sphere of 'independence' from the broader structures that govern the music and guitar-manufacturing industries,” (2004, p. 34).
Therefore exploring and pushing the boundaries of the traditional functionality of the guitar, they have been able to push the boundaries of rock music. I have been a firm believer throughout this blog, that traditional rock and roll is dead, but now I am starting to think that it is evolving. The only catch is, are the rock music listeners’ ears evolving with it?
I am finding that slowly but surely, I am accepting the new sounding rock and roll, coming in the form of Kings of Leon and The Killers. However I am also a hue fan of bands like Nine Inch Nails and Muse. So it could be fair to say that as the humble electric guitar evolves, it has a follow on effect to people’s music tastes, as it did with music genre.
References
Waksman S, 2004, California Noise: Tinkering with Hardcore and Heavy Metal in Southern California, ‘New Technologies and Music’, vol. 34, no. 5, pp. 675-702, SAGE.
Date accessed 29 May, 2009 via Internet Explorer.
URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4144357
Technological innovations and new ways of playing the guitar impacts on rock and roll and helps it evolve. These advances have even gone so far a to develop an all new genre of music that became popular in the early 1990s. Hardcore and alternative, have alldevlped through additions to the manufacture of the electric guitar and the way the sound is produced and recorded. Tinkering is the name given to this type of redevelopment with two of the biggest ‘tinkerers’ in the industry being Eddie Van Halen and Greg Ginn.
According to Waksman, “Tinkering has served a number of interrelated functions: it has been a means of exploring the ways in which technology can be put in the service of creating a certain kind of sound; it has been a way for musicians and instrument makers (two categories that often blur together) to redesign the electric guitar to more individualized specifications; and it has been a mode of self-directed activity in which musicians have sought to carve out a sphere of 'independence' from the broader structures that govern the music and guitar-manufacturing industries,” (2004, p. 34).
Therefore exploring and pushing the boundaries of the traditional functionality of the guitar, they have been able to push the boundaries of rock music. I have been a firm believer throughout this blog, that traditional rock and roll is dead, but now I am starting to think that it is evolving. The only catch is, are the rock music listeners’ ears evolving with it?
I am finding that slowly but surely, I am accepting the new sounding rock and roll, coming in the form of Kings of Leon and The Killers. However I am also a hue fan of bands like Nine Inch Nails and Muse. So it could be fair to say that as the humble electric guitar evolves, it has a follow on effect to people’s music tastes, as it did with music genre.
References
Waksman S, 2004, California Noise: Tinkering with Hardcore and Heavy Metal in Southern California, ‘New Technologies and Music’, vol. 34, no. 5, pp. 675-702, SAGE.
Date accessed 29 May, 2009 via Internet Explorer.
URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4144357
No comments:
Post a Comment