Is rock music doomed?
The Inquiry
BBC
4.6 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 19 September 2019
⏱️ 24 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Bruce Springsteen is turning 70; rock’s gods are getting on. It’s not clear who’s there with electric guitars to replace them. Younger acts are failing to make hit singles. Veteran rock journalist Mark Coles believes rock music has lost its ability to surprise and innovate. Record label boss Vanessa Higgins describes how the writing of hit songs no longer favours the rock format. Music critic Michael Hann blames the high costs of making rock as part of the reason for its decline. But Chris Woltman, manager of the band Twenty One Pilots, believes bands have adapted rock for a new generation of fans and industry veteran Sat Bisla details how rock is making headway in non-traditional markets like India and Indonesia. With Neal Razzell.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Fans of Bruce Springsteen are getting ready to celebrate. |
| 0:07.0 | Springsteen dedicated clubs everywhere planning big events. |
| 0:14.4 | A university in his home state of New Jersey will host a special lecture on his legacy. |
| 0:19.6 | They're idle, the boss, the man who was born to run, born in the USA, was born 70 years ago this month. on September 23rd, |
| 0:35.0 | 23rd, |
| 0:38.0 | 23rd, Bruce Springsteen will join a list of Rock Legends over 70. |
| 0:42.0 | Bob Dylan is 78. Paul McCartney is 77. McJagger 76. |
| 0:48.9 | Blondies Debbie Harry is 74. The list goes on. Rock music is facing a changing of the guard, but who's there |
| 0:56.5 | with an electric guitar to replace them? The last British rock band to have a UK number |
| 1:01.5 | one single was Coldplay. That was seven years ago. |
| 1:05.1 | There hasn't been one in the top ten for years. So this week we're asking |
| 1:10.9 | is rock music doomed? Is Rock Music Dombed. |
| 1:15.0 | Part 1, Glory Days. |
| 1:18.0 | With me this week are the three surviving members of Led Zeppelin, |
| 1:22.0 | the legendary Van Morris, the White Stripes. the |
| 1:25.0 | three surviving members of Led Zeppelin, the legendary Van Morris, the White Stripes. Mark Coles has direct connections to Rock's Gods. |
| 1:30.0 | I grew up in a generation where rock music really meant something. |
| 1:34.0 | He's been a music journalist and broadcaster for more than 25 years. |
| 1:38.0 | Rock to me is like, you know, it's 1963, it's Bob Dylan, it's the Beatles, it's the Stones, it's where big things happen, |
| 1:46.4 | the beginning of a movement, rock music was an art form, an emerging art form, it was taking popular |
| 1:51.9 | music and turning it into, in my view, something |
| 1:54.2 | special. It was an equivalent of the novel. It said something about the people making it. It said something |
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