Journalists everywhere have been saying that rock and roll is obsolete and boring since I was a toddler.

I've always chuckled at such short-sightedness, and would in turn bring up innumerable bands - rock bands, or at least groups who played something rock-ish - who were making music that was truly groundbreaking, regardless of whether or not they were making much money doing it.

Maybe these grumpy music evaluators just failed to observe particular artists. Perhaps they were too busy listening to the Hip Now Sound to hear the exceptional songs of Guided By Voices, or The Cardiacs, Swans, The Boredoms, Napalm Death, Cave In, The Melvins, Grandaddy, or The Red House Painters.

Each of the artists listed above play music that, at times, bears a resemblance to rock and roll. They've all matured and moved well beyond the station of being "new groups," yet none of them sits comfortably in my "old favorites" heap with The Beatles, Blowfly, and Can.

[Pictured: Limp Bizkit]

Not yet.

Meanwhile, yes, music has swaggered on, and we have entered and passed through several chapters and developments in rock and roll in particular.

Recent phases have included Mall Punk (Green Day, The Offspring), Rap Metal (Korn, Limp Bizkit), Emo-Core (Sunny Day Real Estate), Diet Rock (Live, Creed), neu-metal (Slipknot), and the commercial resurrection of the elderly (Aerosmith).

Am I just a grumpy, irritable rock critic now because I think all of the bands mentioned above are absolutely, irretrievably vile?

No, because for every Nsync-182, there are at least a dozen other outfits I utterly adore, playing in venues much less significant. Some of them are probably eating Top Ramen for dinner that night, and going to yucky day-jobs in the morning too.

Rock and roll is all about marketing.

It really always has been. It's only taken me a more than a few years of my own uphill struggle, and some less-than-desirable experiences to become cynical enough to notice just how awful it is.

[Pictured: Mos Def]

As rock music has withered on the vine and fallen to the pavement to decompose, there are new distinguished varieties of music that have taken it's place in terms of sonic invention, rule-breaking, and (much) better style.

Hip-hop music, for one, has been about to take over since it rose from the warm ashes of disco in the late 1970s. Forget P-Diddy, Master-P, or any of the other more commercialized "artists" bum-rushing the scene, and hogging the lime-light with (c)rap hits. Independent, underground hip-hop has been rewriting the rule-book for a long time now: Buck 65, Company Flow, Eyedea And Abilities, Mos Def, etc.

Anything you can get your hands on from the Anticon record label, Rawkus, Ozone Music, Nu Gruv, Mush, or (sometimes) Tommy Boy will kill on contact any of the counterfeit macho pomposity put across by Korn, the neoteric hippy sloganeering of Live, the Clash karaoke nightmare that is Rancid, or the deficient, wimpy, backpack rock of the appropriately-named Emo band Knapsack (I loved Samiam by the way).

Electronica, also known as "IDM," or "Intelligent Dance Music," has long been testing rock's stranglehold on wallets globally. There are just too many fantastic musicians to list here who are bringing out albums at an ever-alarming rate of speed.

[Pictured: Michael Jackson]

The biggest target of this article is the man(nequin) himself, Michael Jackson.

He's a feeble, weak specimen, whose only real strength lies in his garish depiction of style over substance, and his evaporating facade as the King of Pop (a title he gave himself, you may recall).

With 'Wacko Jacko' as a monarch, how can this now long-in-the-tooth form of melodic articulation not be past due for the retirement home?

(C) 2002 - Jason Thornberry

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this column are Jason Thornberry's and do not necessarily reflect those of the publisher or editors of Cosmik Debris Magazine, at least one of whom really likes Rancid. Although when we asked for a show of hands on how many thought Michael Jackson was ever cool (post Jackson 5), there was quite a lot of laughter. One editor, however, was in the back of the room trying to moonwalk. It was really sad.

Sincerely,
a different editor.