I’ve heard of that concept before, there was another term used(and I definitely agree), but what is the significance of the “Jones” appellation?
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Guitar Center Gloom
- Thread starter txhawaii
- Start date
There is always going to be piles of marching band instruments, stacks of student viol instruments, and starter drum kits, guitars, basses, and little keyboards that kids tried out for some period of time and ultimately their interests settled in something else.
This is the natural order of things, alongside gloves, bats, hockey sticks, little dirt bikes, and all manner of things we bought for our kids.
But out of those, some will catch the fire, devote themselves to music or college ball or the thousands of paths a youngster can begin to mature into. Some will become pros, many will be lifelong hobby players, music can be experienced in many ways.
GC faces the same problems as most big box retailers as to how to drive big numbers in person vs the online world (WTH, their own Musicians Friend) or customers who prefer a more tailored experience. And if they're expecting young people scrambling to cover the their necessities in this economy to bail them out, they're targeting the wrong customer base.
This is the natural order of things, alongside gloves, bats, hockey sticks, little dirt bikes, and all manner of things we bought for our kids.
But out of those, some will catch the fire, devote themselves to music or college ball or the thousands of paths a youngster can begin to mature into. Some will become pros, many will be lifelong hobby players, music can be experienced in many ways.
GC faces the same problems as most big box retailers as to how to drive big numbers in person vs the online world (WTH, their own Musicians Friend) or customers who prefer a more tailored experience. And if they're expecting young people scrambling to cover the their necessities in this economy to bail them out, they're targeting the wrong customer base.
Let’s see, I’ve started archery, gave it all away. Lacrosse, gave it away. Joined a climbing gym and never climbed once there. Have a ton of photography gear that sits unused. I’m on my fourth attempt at doing CrossFit. But I stuck with bass. Oh, I did initially start on guitar and switched to bass when I couldn’t play barre chords.
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times“
Yet I was watching PBS doing their “My Music” series they do during their pledge drive. I did have an affinity with the 40s Big Band era as my dad had a dance band during those times.
But now they've gone to my generation of music, the 60s. The music of my era I thought was experimental, and thought-provoking with its psychedelic elements yet a call to humanity and positive cooperation, is being viewed as novel as “Don’t Sit under the Apple Tree”
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Building ships in a bottle will make a comback, dagnabbit!!!Pottery is next
That CEO needs to look in his own back yard. I visited my local GC today based on his recent comments that GC is losing sales to the experienced market due to filling the stores with beginner level stock and keeping the premium wares in back.
Haven't visited for about 18 months so was enthused to visit the store. Dissappointment as a word, is inadequate. 3 racks of basses, only 2 basses over a grand, 1 over 2 grand and after trying about a dozen from all price levels, what stood out was NONE had a set up. Actions were all over the place, many hard to play, none of the used looked restrung nor sounded like it. A $1300 used American Standard Precision had the volume knob fall off and the tone spin endlessly.
No amps stood out, The mesa didn't work at all, the volume knob just hummed louder as you turned up, the rest Agi, Hartke, Accoustic, Fender, Markbass, tried 2, and Ampeg were so horrible sounding even at Noon tone settings, that I went through a half dozen plus just looking or adequacy to try something.
The department was unmanned as last visit.
I won't be back. Done with them.
Haven't visited for about 18 months so was enthused to visit the store. Dissappointment as a word, is inadequate. 3 racks of basses, only 2 basses over a grand, 1 over 2 grand and after trying about a dozen from all price levels, what stood out was NONE had a set up. Actions were all over the place, many hard to play, none of the used looked restrung nor sounded like it. A $1300 used American Standard Precision had the volume knob fall off and the tone spin endlessly.
No amps stood out, The mesa didn't work at all, the volume knob just hummed louder as you turned up, the rest Agi, Hartke, Accoustic, Fender, Markbass, tried 2, and Ampeg were so horrible sounding even at Noon tone settings, that I went through a half dozen plus just looking or adequacy to try something.
The department was unmanned as last visit.
I won't be back. Done with them.
My parents were much older when they had me so I grew up on Sinatra, Big Band, Gatz and a little Vicente Fernandez. My gen was the 80s and we had a lot of great stuff.“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times“
Yet I was watching PBS doing their “My Music” series they do during their pledge drive. I did have an affinity with the 40s Big Band era as my dad had a dance band during those times.
But now they've gone to my generation of music, the 60s. The music of my era I thought was experimental, and thought-provoking with its psychedelic elements yet a call to humanity and positive cooperation, is being viewed as novel as “Don’t Sit under the Apple Tree”
I knew I was old when I heard some 80s great as muzak in an elevator. How fitting.
I hope people aren't buying them as props for their tik toks...
Agree. Resurgence of country music (pretty broad category now) is all about real music, people and connection.
Our kids are learning guitar and drums, but hard to excite them about playing in a group. They're always on devices. We're just gently keeping them on track...
PS we are taking them all to see Billy Strings next month, cant wait!!!
“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
Because my grandfather played guitar my mother sent me to guitar lessons at the age of five. Being the stubborn brat that I am, I just flat out refused to learn squat. After 6 weeks they admitted defeat and I was free. At the age of 13 I discovered bass guitar and have been playing ever since. If you (meaning YOU) want to play, then, it usually sticks.
That’s true, but one thing that has changed awareness of obscure music is it being used on soundtracks and commercials. Whereas movies and TV soundtracks used to be primarily orchestral scores written for that particular film or show, today collections of pop songs are much more common.
I never watched Guardians of the Galaxy, but it’s soundtrack made up of hits from the 1970s was very popular. Suddenly people were listening to songs that had been on the radio 40 years earlier, long before many of them were born.
Before that VW ad using Nick Dake’s “Pink Moon” he was just another cult musician who had died early without having commercial success. After hearing that commercial, people wanted that recording. Suddenly all his albums were in print again and his record label started digging in the tape vaults for unreleased material, tribute albums started popping up, etc. Way more of Nick’s records have been sold since that commercial than were sold while he was alive.
The impact of TV and films has always been there. From the 1930s into the 1950s, most movies had a scene where one of the actors lip-synched to a song. Sometimes popular musicians would lip synch the song. Most of the “American Songbook” material that turned into jazz standards came from movies and Broadway shows.
Bill Haley’s “Rock Around The Clock” had already been a hit in 1954 when it was used as the theme song in the 1955 movie "Blackboard Jungle" (the film was about juvenile delinquents in high school). That film’s success led to many films with silly plots about teenage rock fans, DJ Alan Freed played himself in five that were released from 1956 to 1959…”Rock Around The Clock”, “Rock Rock Rock”, "Mister Rock and Roll”, “Don't Knock The Rock” and "Go Johnny Go”. Chuck Berry appeared in three of these, but other early rockers seen lip synching on screen were Bill Haley (of course), Little Richard, Eddie Cochran, Jackie Wilson, Richie Valens, LaVern Baker, Screaming Jay Hawkins and a number of doo-wop groups.
Of course Elvis Presley had the most exposure of any rock musician in films. He starred in 31 movies between 1956 and 1969. In many of those years, two or three of his films came out. With only one exception that I know of, the rarely seen western “Charro”, all had scenes with Elvis lip synching, often in outlandish circumstances. Fifteen soundtrack albums were issued from the films, many had hit singles. These films were seen all over the world and made Elvis the best known rock performer until the Beatles arrived.
The success of “A Hard Day’s Night”, the first and best of the Beatles movies led to many other rock bands, mainly from the UK, doing their own films. Few of them were any good but they helped those acts sell more records.
From the dawn of TV until the early 1980s, “variety shows” were everywhere. The cliche of people picking up guitars after seeing the Beatles play on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 is based in fact. I was a 9 year old kid who had never seen a live rock and roll band even though I was listening to the Top 40 radio of the time.
There were so many of these shows and they all had music performances, often sharing the screen with comedians and in the early days acrobats, puppeteers, dancers, etc. Ed Sullivan’s show was what brought the British Invasion rock bands into living rooms here in the US. Soon most variety shows starting having rock bands on as well. While there had been local and regionally syndicated country music shows, in 1969 Hee-Haw was the first nationwide show focusing on country music. That was followed by the Johnny Cash and Glen Campbell shows. My dad was a country fan so he watched it every week and that’s where I started getting interested in country music as a teenager.
Then along came MTV, followed by the Internet. You all know the rest.
buldog5151bass
Kibble, milkbones, and P Basses. And redheads.
It used to be when you started, you borrowed an instrument (or bought something used) until you felt serious enough to invest. Now you can buy something playable for under $100. I think that is why this is happening.
You feed the bottom of the pond, you get more eating there.
You feed the bottom of the pond, you get more eating there.
I have 4 sons, and only one caught the music bug, though we exposed all of them to the opportunity. He played bass all through high school and college Jazz band, but now the realities of working life have reduced bass playing to an occasional hobby for him, which is pretty much what it is for me, though I try to play at least a little every day. Nothing wrong with that either, success as a Pro musician is a distant pipe dream for most, but I still enjoy being a strictly bedroom hobby bass player. The part that freaks me out, watching the sheer numbers of guitars and basses being cranked out in factories, is how many of them must end up under a bed, like every bed in America. I suppose most are headed for the dumpster eventually.
I've experienced a little selection bias, as most of my close friends have raised their kids with music being very important in the home. But listening to music, active listening is more rare among young people now.
I know some people in their 20's who'd much rather write/record at home and post to youtube than get out and play in front of people. Total inversion from the way I've always felt about. The mainreason I even keep playing is to play live. When I don't have gigs booked, I barely touch a bass at home.
Music just holds less cultural significance that it used to. Musicians up through I'd say, the early 2000's were some of society's biggest "influencers.". Social media changed that. Influencers are now just caricatures of who their followers really wish they were, aesthetically or otherwise, no art required.
Kids today don't really listen to music as an actively engaged activity like they used, for the most part.
First they killed Sears and Kmart and now they're killing Guitar Center! Curse the meddling kids!
Well, for that matter the Blues Brothers movie contributed to resurgences in the careers of Cab Calloway, John Lee Hooker, and any number of Motown artists; The Big Chill launched a lot of 60s-early 70s cover bands; and there are many others like this. You might not call any of the musicians who benefited from these movie soundtracks exactly "obscure" but they absolutely brought them back into people's consciousness.
MEANWHILE this nudnick in an article from guitar.com says he's not afraid of Gibson Yahmaha and Fender selling direct to consumer
guitar.com
“Bring the competition on”: Guitar Center CEO says he's not afraid of big brands like Gibson and Fender selling products direct
The move from brick-and-mortar stores to widespread online shopping has meant that brands can sell their products directly to consumers, without the need for middle men in the form of retail partners.
guitar.com
