Embrace change

Bono (U2), Zoo TV Tour

Change is an essential part of life. It doesn't always have to be positive, but it is inevitable. Do you know anyone who is exactly the same at 40 as they were 20 years ago? I don't...

Nevertheless, it is a deeply human trait to romanticise the past. I am at an age where this happens to me, too, from time to time. In my opinion, you have to be critical of yourself when this happens, especially when it comes to political or social issues, but I'll leave that out for now.

I'm talking about music. Since this blog also deals with classics to a considerable extent, I naturally often look back. However, for me this goes hand in hand with an openness to new, young artists who keep my favorite music alive or even develop it further.

What really bothers me are contemporaries who constantly reproach their favourite bands for not sounding the same as they did in their early days: the debut album, or even worse, the first demo, is the point of reference. “That is the true band sound“, and all future work should be measured against it. Anything else is a kind of betrayal of their own history, a sell-out, possibly even a pandering to the zeitgeist.

I never understood this attitude. To be honest, such attitudes really get on my nerves. It probably plays an important role in this that I was first socialised with Queen in the 1990s – my first great musical love. Freddie, Brian, Roger and John constantly developed – sometimes it failed a bit (Hot Space, even if this album is MUCH better than its reputation), but mostly these guys managed to create fantastic music that was open to current developments (think of “Another One Bites The Dust“).

After Queen, the most important band for me to this day followed: Pink Floyd. That this formation in particular stands for constant experimentation and innovation is well known to anyone who has even rudimentarily studied the history of rock music (just listen to the debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn and the suites “Atom Heart Mother“ and “Echoes“). I am very grateful that at the age of 12 I was immersed in the colourful cosmos of Syd, David, Roger, Rick and Nick and was able to gain a completely different perspective on the overall experience of music.

On the heels of Queen and Pink Floyd, U2 entered my teenage life – and with them, another act that was always open to new ideas and drastically changed its sound, especially in the 1990s. To this day, I still like Pop, which was spurned by many old fans, that showed courage by integrating the then enormously popular techno elements. Zooropa, which was quite experimental for U2 standards, with its visually spectacular Zoo TV Tour, didn't really do it for me personally, but I think the (further) courage to change after the worldwide success of Achtung Baby is great.

The same applied to Radiohead, who broke with almost everything that had previously made them the best alternative rock band in the world with their avant-garde fourth album Kid A. Following the divine and enormously successful OK Computer, this was a huge middle finger to the usual mechanisms in the rock business. If Thom Yorke, Colin Greenwood and co. had done things differently back then, they would probably be filling football stadiums today (like Coldplay, who once created music on a similar level to Radiohead, but at some point dedicated themselves to trivial radio pop).

Yes, I really appreciate it when artists don't just re-release the same album every two years. To me, that always smells of fan service rather than art worthy of the name. What musician seriously wants to write more or less exactly the same songs for 40, 50 years, varying only in nuances?

In this respect, I appreciate Iron Maiden, for example: Steve Harris has been alienating old fans with every release since the grand reunion with Bruce Dickinson and Adrian Smith. No, he and his mates don't want to record another The Number of the Beast or even Killers, but indulge their passion for sophisticated, multi-faceted longtracks. With the best will in the world, I can't understand why tracks like “Prowler“ or “Running Free“ are still expected from men well over 60 or even 70.

Of course, you don't have to like the changes in the sound of the bands mentioned here. But if that's the case, you can always reach for the old albums. Every artist has the right to develop and to make the music that is close to their hearts. Anything else has nothing to do with art, but solely with commerce. At this point, I'm always out as a listener.