So lots of people (in my Facebook timeline in particular) are talking about Kiss legend Gene Simmons proclaiming that "rock and roll is dead" in an interview with Esquire Magazine.
According to the interview, the "Demon" bassist for the 70s rock band explicitly claims the death of Rock was more of a murder than anything else:
I am so sad that the next 15-year-old kid in a garage someplace in Saint Paul, that plugs into his Marshall and wants to turn it up to ten, will not have anywhere near the same opportunity that I did.
The death of rock was not a natural death. Rock did not die of old age. It was murdered. And the real culprit is that kid’s 15-year-old next-door neighbor, probably a friend of his. Maybe even one of the bandmates he’s jamming with. […]
The tragedy is that they seem to have no idea that they just killed their own opportunity—they killed the artists they would have loved. Some brilliance, somewhere, was going to be expressed, and now it won’t, because it’s that much harder to earn a living playing and writing songs. No one will pay you to do it.
Fine. Whatever. Debate away.
I find this to be your typical has-been (yes, I said it, he's a has-been. Name the last song from Kiss that you're familiar with that wasn't on the Destroyer album. Thank you, good night.), a typical has-been lamenting about how everything was awesome when he was in his prime and kids today just don't get it. Simmons might as well have told all those new, young garage bands that he's so concerned about to get off his lawn, too.
While providing my analysis of Simmons' remarks this morning on WMAL radio in Washington, D.C., I made a passing reference to the band Coldplay. I said something like "there're still successful, new rock bands these days, look at Coldplay."
Apparently, saying that Coldplay is a rock band is akin to saying the Cleveland Browns play football. It shocks the sensibilities of those who actually know and respect the game and is a falsehood on its face.
I was immediately attacked by a guy who apparently writes about politics and other things here in Washington. I'm told I've met this guy and had a cocktail with him, but his inability to tag me with my Twitter handle in his attack on me clearly shows I've never had Wild Turkey with the man.
Nevertheless, T. Becket Adams (if that is his real first initial) said this:
Arguing that rock isn't dead, WMAL's Larry O'Connor cites Coldplay. So, yeah. That sorta' seals the deal. Rock is dead, dead, dead.
— T. Becket Adams (@BecketAdams) September 8, 2014
Then, to my eternal dismay, my colleague here, Lachlan Markay (I'm told he has a cubicle somewhere on one of the lower floors here at the Washington Free Beacon, I rarely leave my corner, penthouse office) piled on and issued some friendly fire:
Boycott @LarryOConnor https://t.co/oO36oEgqRV
— Lachlan Markay (@lachlan) September 8, 2014
So, this uncovers an important question: What is rock?
Why is Coldplay not an example of a Rock band, but Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band are? What makes one more legit than the other?
Here's "Yellow" from Coldplay:
So why is that NOT Rock, but this drivel about the "Queen of the Supermarket" is:
I find Springsteen to be melodically boring, stylistically derivative, and lyrically insipid.
And now, peoples' heads are exploding everywhere and I'm about to be inundated with lamentations of "Oh, but you have to see him live!!!" (No, I really don't.)
If you want to call Springsteen's incoherent growling "Rock" I couldn’t care less. But why do you insist that a band like Coldplay (or the similarly maligned Styx or Dave Matthews Band) is in some way not rock?
Rock is what it is. And we know it when we hear it. And Gene Simmons' rock is 1000 percent different that Buddy Holly's rock. But that doesn't negate either. And, just like people insisted rock was dead when Holly's plane went down in a cornfield, people will insist rock is dead pretty much every generation. And it's not.
You can't kill rock. You can just give interviews to Esquire to make yourself feel like your legacy is more important than it really is.
And Lachlan, you're dead to me. (Unless you and Becket are buying the next bourbon.)