Popular music and the influence of technology

Popular Music and the influence of technology

Pop music has come a long way from its post war roots of Rocking around the clock, walking bass lines, and Chuck Berry. In fact in the last 60 years, technology has helped to draw contemporary pop music into a spectrum so wide and varied it was unimaginable back in the 50s.

In 1967, the Beatles released – Sgt Peppers Lonely hearts club band. It is seen as a revolutionary album of its time, with some then futuristic recording techniques.

On the album is a track called “Lucy in the sky with diamonds”. The reaction to this track was very interesting indeed. The BBC even banned the track because of its reference to the band’s drug use. The band have denied this since, but it is fair to say that in all probability, not only was this track a revolution in recording technology at the time, but a clear reflection on the social change that had been occurring in the 1960’s. Drug use had become something of a common recreational habit to many, something that was unthinkable just over 20 years ago, when the world was at war. You need to look no further than the lyrics to understand why the song has been interpreted as reference to LSD use –

Picture yourself in a boat on a river With tangerine trees and marmalade skies Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly A girl with kaleidoscope eyes

And John Lennon himself admitted not so long after recording, that he felt that hadn’t got the best they could out of the track, because his heavy use of the drug had led to him not being all there during recording sessions.

The album was recorded on a four track multitask recorder, although at the time the eight track was already in use in America.
To get round the limitations of just a four track recorder, a technique called “Multing” or “Bouncing down” was used, where four tracks could be recorded onto one four track recorder, and then dubbed down onto one track of the “master” four track recorder. A technique known as ADT was created for the Beatles. This involved using two tape recorders to record the same sound, giving it an instantly more resonating effect. This quickly became common in pop music recording. Where limitations in studio technology had previously made for much more cozy sounding music, with far less of a “big” sound, this album revolutionized the way recording could be done, and set up standards for the more epic sounds to come in the future, like the birth of glam rock.

Another ground breaking technique used on this album was “Vary-speed”, or pitch shift. This was the recording of different tracks onto a multitask at slightly different tape speeds. The Beatles used this in their album to give vocals a thicker sound. It also became quickly used in the recording of pop music, sometimes for the benefit of vocalists and instrumentalists who were struggling to cope with an awkward key. The pitch shift could be tweaked to move a semitone or a tone, for example, for an instant key change.

In 1960, fender released the first ever mass produced bass guitar. It was to go on to change music with the wide availability of an instrument that can add a plucked bass line.

In the late 60s, Sly and the Family Stone released “Everyday people”. It was a song mocking and protesting against the narrow mindedness of racism, something than was a problem even than. It even included the line “Different Strokes for different Folks”, which became a catch phrase at that time.

It is this song, less than ten years after the first widely available bass guitar was released, that gave birth to one of the most popular bass playing techniques ever invented, slap bass. Bassist Larry Graham is credited with the invention of the slap bass technique, and it was “Everyday People”, where it was first heard. Slap bass has become so popular, that in some cases it is almost the only reason a lot of people even take up bass playing. It is used in the TV show Seinfeld, as the main part of the theme tune.

In 1979 the Buggles released Video Killed the Radio star. The song was written about the changing culture of modern times back then. Those old enough to remember, could recall a time when there was such a thing as a “Radio star”, that is, someone who has found stardom in featuring on radio shows, back in the times before mainstream television. The “Video” referred to in the song basically means television. Television killed the old school radio star, and had given rise to a much more materialistic culture of image and looks. The idea for the song was conceived by producer Trevor Horn. He had produced for punk bands in the 70s without getting any real success. He was sick and tired of producing unsuccessful music for bands whose image got him down.

What a cruel irony it is then, that the song was the first ever music video to be aired on MTV, the network that has gone on to fuel a music industry based on image before talent. But the music video has gone on to become a huge tool for artists. So much so that it can probably be considered a breakthrough that has shaped music as we know it today. The music industry would never be the same again when on August 1st 1981; MTV aired its first music video. Before MTV bands had occasionally created music videos, mostly just of themselves playing the song. Now the music video can never be underestimated as a marketing tool, and an image changing facility for bands and solo artists.

In 2008, Rock legends ACDC returned to the scene to release a new album. Black ice shot to success, selling brilliantly immediately. But there was something extremely interesting about this release. In America, arguably the biggest sales area for any globally renound band, the album was only available to buy from superstore corporation Wal-Mart. This was something that shocked many people, as on the face of it, this would surely hamper their chances of the album selling well. On the contrary however, it seems that their partnership with the company was very much worthwhile. Illegal internet downloading, and generally easy means of transferring music from one medium to another, has really hampered a lot of bands for quite some time now. Even those who make a lot of money, make a lot less than they would if it weren’t for internet piracy. The unique and perhaps cheeky announcement that ACDCs album would only be available at certain stores, means that they have more control over who sells it and where it is sold. Not only that but Wal-Mart will also be extremely keen to get it across to anyone who will listen that ACDCs new album is out officially in Wal-Mart only. So in a world of extremely difficult circumstances for the music business, something like this is a sure fire way to maximize sales, if done properly.

ACDC have capitalized in a market were internet sales are taking over a weak industry, scourged by piracy. They have used the modern phenomena of multi national corporations as a marketing tool and it worked. It seems likely that others will follow suite.

90's Grunge!

If a person was asked to sum up the 1980’s music scene in a word, they would probably say ‘disco’. Electronic sounds, drum machines and synthesizers all played a big part in 80’s music. As well as this though throughout the 1980’s there was heavy metal. By heavy metal I mean glam rock, hair metal, pop metal, hard rock and anything else that could easily fall in to one of those categories.

Along with the more obvious disco music, hair metal also dominated 80’s music with bands such as Def Leppard, Van Halen and Iron Maiden showing off fancy solo riffs as well as bands like Bon Jovi and Aerosmith who provided anthemic choruses.

When the 90’s came however, it was all about the demise of the slick metal sound with Grunge and Alternative rock breaking through to the charts.
This type of music did actually begin in the late 1980’s in America, whereby grunge and alternative rock band’s music were being played on college radios. Although a fair few people did like what they were hearing on the radio, Big Hair bands were still in major popularity and college radios are by no means mainstream, therefore there was never an outbreak of this new different music. That is, until Kurt Cobain’s Nirvana came along.

Nirvana made whatever bits of Grunge that came about before the 90’s into the definition of Grunge, the first mainstream band you could call a Grunge act, and a whirl of Grunge and alternative rock acts followed them to make Grunge arguably the biggest genre that defines the 90’s.

Nirvana went down in Grunge music history as soon as the released their second album entitled ‘Nevermind’. Released in 1991 with hits such as ‘Come as You Are’ ‘Smells Like Teen Sprit’ and ‘Polly’, it is a surprise that it took this album a while to make Billboards Top 40, and it wasn’t until 1992 that the album replaced Michael Jackson to become Number One in the Billboard charts. This reiterates the fact that Grunge was underground until this time, and Hair Metal was still very much the popular genre of music. However the public fell for Nirvana’s epic ‘Smells like Teen Spirit’ and slowly the album caught on, and became the album to listen to.

Nirvana’s spell however was cut short when Kurt Cobain, the front-man and the writer of virtually all the songs committed suicide in 1994. Nirvana still carried on, however by this time there were many other Grunge bands on the scene as Grunge became a major trend but nevertheless, his death meant the media hyped up his significance even further and today there aren’t many people at all who do not know who Kurt Cobain is.

Before I get on to other Grunge bands, I’ve realised I haven’t actually summed up what Grunge is essentially all about. Grunge actually means ‘dirt’. Now in the 1980’s, you had the hair metal/glam rock type acts singing about dancing and high spirited things such a glam rock influenced Duran Duran, Depeche Mode and Soft Cell. In contrast, Grunge lyrics were quite meaningful to the artists who wrote them, lyrics about depression, anxiety, suicide and frustration are common. It had become cool for bands to express deep and in many people’s cases private or delluded emotions.

Key characteristics include heavy drumming, strong and repetitive riffs, and the guitar is almost always used in every Grunge song (I am at the moment trying to think of an exception, but cannot!). There is often guitar distortion somewhat, Nirvana are prime examples for instance in their song ‘Smells like Teen Spirit).

Another major Grunge act who also burst into the mainstream closely following in Nirvana’s footsteps were a band called Pearl Jam. One of their best and their most successful album and a prime Grunge example is entitled ‘Ten’ which features tracks like ‘Alive’, which lyrically is about a son finding out that his father is in fact his step father, while his mother’s grief over his real father causes her to want and force sexual encounters with her son, who reminds her of his father.
The song ‘Jeremy’ is also on the album. It is based on a true story in which a high school student shot himself in front of his class mates. However if you listen to the song and don’t listen out closely for the lyrics you would never guess as almost sounds quite upbeat with buoyant guitar riffs.

Pearl Jam were underground at heart even though their music had made it big, with Eddie Vedder (front man – singer and guitarist) making sure to avoid the media and the band made no videos. They once had a disagreement with their agency as they thought the prices for tickets to see them live were too high, making it hard for some of their fans, particularly fans who had supported them when they underground, hard to attend gigs. Pearl Jam are still around today, however are more so classified as alternative rock.

Other grunge bands include Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, The Melvins, Green River and Screaming Trees.