I have a lot to say........WAIT, my phone just pinged....
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Guitar Center Gloom
- Thread starter txhawaii
- Start date
I hear you about the gym thing. I used to be a PF member, but I started doing Orange Theory a few years ago. It's an hour long, high intensity workout, and you really don't have the time to look at your phone since you're constantly moving. Most people don't bring their phones into the class. However, there are always a few who do, and they look at them in between each exercise, while they're on the treadmill, etc. If you can't put it down for an hour, you've got a problem.
Do we think this is new? People have picked up guitars and countless other hobbies and then dropped them for as long as hobbies have existed. I think what’s new is expecting it produce enough profit (intentionally not saying revenue) to satisfy the needs of his blood sucking private equity vampire overlords. That’s what is destroying everything, the need for a billion percent return on everything followed by a billion and one next quarter.I'm not sure if this was posted as this story seems to be about a week.
Guitar Center CEO seems to fear lost sales as many young people just don't stick with music. One out of ten, he claims, stay with it after a year, nine drop out.
Is social media destroying the youth's attention span to concentrate?
The young might not want our vintage gear we spent so much on.
Hark! The dawn of AI music is upon us unless we can create more musicians!!
“For every 10 people who start playing guitar, a year later, one person is playing, and nine are not”: Guitar Center is looking to create more “long-term” musicians – here’s how
Guitar Center is amping up new ways to nurture the futures of budding musicians within its stores.guitar.com
Attrition rate has always been high. Admittedly, there are far more alternative distractions today (and far more learning resources). I think another factor is much less music education availability in schools. We just did this last month and there's clearly a hunger for participating in music. Largely young players - we do workshops in advance and online instruction on how to play the - simple - songs. Broke our world record again 8,122
That’s always been true.
People expect to sound like their heroes in a couple of weeks and that never happens. Could be guitar, bass, piano, violin, drums…it’s always the same.
In elementary school I quit the clarinet after a year. My brother had played it and quit so since it was in the house my parents made the poor choice of telling me that if I stuck with it, I oculd switch to trumpet, which is what I wanted to play. Then I heard the Beatles and lost all interest in playing trumpet before I even had one.
When my mom bought an organ it came with free lessons. When those ran out because I didn't sound like Keith Emerson yet, I stopped taking lessons (major regret 55 years later).
When I bought my first DB, I took lessons for as couple of months but then quit. About ten years later, I took lessons again out of necessity and stuck with it for a few years (I was busy gigging by that time).
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While it's not for everyone, the way music gets taught by a lot of instructors is unmotivating, to adults and kids alike. A lot of music instructors are more concerned about keeping a full roster of paying students to meet their financial needs than having a plan for students to graduate from their lessons. A lot of instructors teach the way they were taught, which only works for a small group of students.
There are several things causing this. I read an article not long ago about faceless musicians. When I was young we purchased CD’s, cassette tapes, while my parents purchased records when they were young. We knew who the individual band members were in a rock band. We also had magazines we could read when we went to Walmart or anywhere that sold them. You had teenagers that wanted to be the next Kirk Hammett, or Eddie Van Halen. You had several guitar heroes. Sorry but the latest guitar hero I know of is Joe Bonamassa, and I’m sure those in high school have no idea who he is. I could be wrong because a lot of todays generation will admit they would rather listen to music from the 70’s, 80’s, 90’s and maybe to a lesser degree the early 2000’s. And yes the guitar hero comment goes for us bass players too. We knew who John Paul Jones, Adam Clayton, John Entwistle, and all the other great bassists were. Another factor as to why teenagers aren’t starting bands could be being ridiculously busy. A friend and I were talking the other day about how it seems like we as parents have to do a lot more running than our parents ever had to do. It seems like if a high school kid is involved in one thing, they will be involved in every kind of extra curricular activities that school has to offer. Sports are good. I’m not criticizing that. But if Bobby is playing football, he probably plays baseball, basketball, could be in marching band, the drama program. If you go to church and they offer things for the youth add that on top of everything else along with studying. Who has time to start a band with friends? Now are they better off doing all of these things than being glued to a phone? Absolutely. The kids in our town are fortunate because they use bass guitar for the marching band and concert bands. Seriously. Middle school and high school utilize 2 bass players. They even have an upright bass. The school also has a guitar ensemble. They teach guitar. We are blessed to have that.
Kids in my neighborhood still love and play music.
They also still love and play rock and roll.
My daughter has played violin since middle school and likes any good song, from short tiktok things to epic endless sea shantys.
At least two garage bands of teens in my neighborhood alone.
I had an argument with an "opinionated blowhard" here a couple years ago where he insisted that could not be the case, but hey - across my back fence, I hear kids in a rock band. A block away - another little crew doing their best to sound like Sublime.
Of course, this is anecdotal, but I doubt my neighborhood and kid are unicorns.
They also still love and play rock and roll.
My daughter has played violin since middle school and likes any good song, from short tiktok things to epic endless sea shantys.
At least two garage bands of teens in my neighborhood alone.
I had an argument with an "opinionated blowhard" here a couple years ago where he insisted that could not be the case, but hey - across my back fence, I hear kids in a rock band. A block away - another little crew doing their best to sound like Sublime.
Of course, this is anecdotal, but I doubt my neighborhood and kid are unicorns.
I mix shows for a living. The kids still play rock, and all the other given styles. Not as a mono identity, like it was in the 80's when I was a teenager- that has changed completely. It seems the commodification of music identity by corporate interests that gave us little boxes to put ourselves in to be sold stuff has a new strategy, and that is taking away any type of identifier at all. It's all a regurgitation that leaves the kids disinterested in it as an identity factor, undermining it's impact- it costs nothing and takes no effort to access, so it has nearly no real value, relegated to a background element with the focus on something else. Usually something visual that's good for a selfie. You would have to take it away for people of today to understand its' value. That's what I see, anyway.
Kids are gonna do what kids are gonna do.
There isn't any "influencing " from the grown ups thats gonna change that.
The minute we declare something is "cool"....it isn't.
It has always been thus.
There isn't any "influencing " from the grown ups thats gonna change that.
The minute we declare something is "cool"....it isn't.
It has always been thus.
So does this mean today's guitars are destined to become tomorrow's accordions?
Yeah, some of ya'll sound real old and I'm not young. Go to a show. The ages are all over the place. There are kids playing rock music, there are late teens/early 20s prodigies all over youtube. If you don't think the kids are out there doing cool stuff all over the place, you're not looking for solutions -- you'd rather complain and talk about a small world view collapsing on itself.
Only a select few are meant to be musicians. Of course the rest drop out.
At one time people met each other at parties and nightclubs and there was always a band. That doesn't happen as much these days.
This 100%
It's not AI, music has been getting made by machines since MIDI was invented. The old gtr/bass/drms rock formula hasn't been dominant in the pop charts for a couple generations. Sampling, remixing, beat making and spitting rhymes are things that don't require any trips to GC.
Just starting with GC in general... Like so many other stores, the part time pay is not bad, average is around $18 per hour in MD (looking at job openings). From what I've seen, the full time help is limited, my guess is that corporate doesn't want the overhead of paying benefits. With that model, you're going to get a lot of turnover and the quality is going to be hit or miss. Gone are the days of the annoying wanna be rock stars that you could barely get five minutes of assistance from, now there may be 3 or 4 employees in the whole store including the manager. Being between the Baltimore\DC metro areas, there are about 6 GC's within a 40 mile radius. Still I tend to use smaller local music stores or shop online, unless I need to see a piece of gear. I read that GC corporate is trying to revamp their model to a more musician friendly venue, hoping that it works...
It takes focus and drive to learn an instrument. My niece played violin in the school orchestra for about 8 years, now a junior in college, hasn't touched it since high school. I remember as a grade schooler with my transistor radio listening to Kasey Kassem's top 40, it wasn't a cell phone, but still drove my folks crazy because I wasn't playing outside.
As for young players, some of these "kids" have amazing chops... so they are learning to play. Check out the video below... These kids have definitely had decent instruction. So I have to agree that it probably hasn't changed, some kids stick with it, others try it and give it up. The "school of rock" type classes in our area have pretty good turnout... I wish I played half as well as some the of the local kids
I'm hip to this phenomena - GC is a mix of knowledgable musicians and slick salespeople here in Knoxville. Decent tech infomation available if you find the right guy. Stock is decent but some brands are underrepresented. Small used selection of instruments and amps.
It's a warehouse where the best 'buys' are sold - you want deluxe, premo gear? Look at boutique shops or on Marketplace or eBay where resellers and private sales abound.
For commodity or set price gear items, I use Sweetwater.
Yet there will still be that one decrepit Rockin' Boomer who will exclaim, "Rap more like cRap!!!!"
Most younger people in my market that are music lovers there days listen to country. Like Tyler Childers and Billy strings country though.
Truth is that music is not as big a part of the culture now.
Video games and apps have taken over.
As I’ve often said, we are dinosaurs trudging to the tar pits of the human experience.I'm not sure if this was posted as this story seems to be about a week.
Guitar Center CEO seems to fear lost sales as many young people just don't stick with music. One out of ten, he claims, stay with it after a year, nine drop out.
Is social media destroying the youth's attention span to concentrate?
The young might not want our vintage gear we spent so much on.
Hark! The dawn of AI music is upon us unless we can create more musicians!!
“For every 10 people who start playing guitar, a year later, one person is playing, and nine are not”: Guitar Center is looking to create more “long-term” musicians – here’s how
Guitar Center is amping up new ways to nurture the futures of budding musicians within its stores.
Back when I was growing up , if you walked say 10 blocks in a residential neighborhood (something that doesn’t happen much these days either) odds were you where going to hear somebody or somebodies making music. Making music was so intrenched in our society the big time retailers (Sears for instance) sold advanced hobbiest instruments and amps. They were every where.
I will say this, our local school system for a smaller school has a great performing arts department. Everything from quality musical performances to theatrical productions. These kids can play probably at a higher level than when I graduated. I was talking to this graduating senior a few weeks ago about his plans for playing after he graduates. I’ve listening to this kid for the last four years and he is incredibly talented, sight reads standard notation. His plan? Bass goes in the case and in the closet.
Over my decades I’ve seen this sort of thing happen time and time again. Tragic that as this is, that a kid that accomplished doesn’t realize that the world became a better place with each note he played.
I think the biggest difference along the was the music we listened to didn’t require 75 other musicians to cover. So we searched out other players and formed small ensembles. Parents were usually supportive and ranged from “My Johnny is so cute playing a guitar just like the guy on Ed Sullivan” to my mother going” you can’t play it like that! They’ll throw out of the band..” lol. I’m not so sure most parents today would put up with 3-5 budding musicians in their living room playing by ear what they heard on the radio.
I wouldn’t give much credence to anything the Guitar Center CEO says. GC is ready to be taken behind the barn and shot.
All you have to do is visit the store (at least the one where I live, in a city of 1 million) to realize that they do not give a crap about the customer anymore.
Usually there’s only 1 or 2 staff members working there. None of the basses are set up, and most of them play poorly. The more high-end basses, if you consider American Fenders to be high-end, are up on the wall and need a ladder to be taken down. And they’re covered in dust and are not set up either. The drum room is a ghost town, looks like nobody’s been in there for weeks.
It’s depressing to go there. This is not how you get people excited about buying gear and making music.
All you have to do is visit the store (at least the one where I live, in a city of 1 million) to realize that they do not give a crap about the customer anymore.
Usually there’s only 1 or 2 staff members working there. None of the basses are set up, and most of them play poorly. The more high-end basses, if you consider American Fenders to be high-end, are up on the wall and need a ladder to be taken down. And they’re covered in dust and are not set up either. The drum room is a ghost town, looks like nobody’s been in there for weeks.
It’s depressing to go there. This is not how you get people excited about buying gear and making music.
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