Howard Stern appears to appear with Gene Simmons saying rock is dead. There always seems to be some talk on the state of rock music. Depending on who you ask, you can get a lot of different answers. To Gene Simmons, rock is dead, but to others, it’s still alive and well. Bruce Springsteen recently chimed in and seems to hold an opinion on it as well.
Bruce noted how he wouldn’t want to be starting out as a rock musician today, and named the popularity of “tremendously talented” Taylor Swift as an example of how the landscape of mainstream music has changed over the years.
With the advent of a punk revival, (albeit very much-so more pop punk oriented) it seems that rock still has some juice in it. Check out our current favorite pop-punk song below.
Springsteen has sold over 150 million records throughout his six-decade career which easily makes him one of the world’s best-selling musical artists, but Bruce’s comments show that he hardly thinks he’d do the same if he were to start out today (transcribed by Ultimate Guitar):
Howard Stern: I’m so glad that you still go on tour and you keep this tradition alive. And there’s not a lot of guys doing it on your level. But it feels like rock has kind of gone in a way, it’s just not as important to everybody as if to me growing up, there was nothing more important.
Bruce Springsteen: “Yeah, I think music is music has had to share the cultural arena with video games, movies, you know, everything else, everything you can imagine. And that’s just – that’s today.”
While music certainly has changed, it seems that there still may be room according to Bruce Springsteen. Stern presses him about coming up today.
Stern: Don’t you thank God you’re not doing it today, coming up and trying to [make it]?
Springsteen: “I gotta say, I do. You know, we came up in a golden age, right? You know, if you’re a young guy playing a guitar in 1967, 1975, 1985, you came up just as that whole business turned into something that no one ever thought it would. So, it’s a blessing, but I wouldn’t want to be starting now. I don’t know if you can create – it’s just a different world. That’s all, it’s just a different world.”
However, that it’s a “different world” doesn’t necessarily means it’s all bad, as Bruce recalls the sheer joy with which his daughter reacted to the new Taylor Swift album:
Springsteen: “My daughter, Taylor Swift Fan to the max. The other day, picked her up at the airport, [and she] says, ‘Dad, Taylor Swift’s got a bangin’ new record! And plays it for me, top volume, all the way from Newark to Colts Neck, dancing in her seat. I said, ‘That’s what I liked to see!’ It felt good.”
Bruce then spoke about Swift.
Springsteen said: “You know, it was good. She’s super talented… tremendous writer. And and I know her producer Jack Antonoff very well, they’re making great records. So, there’s people out there – hey, there’s a lot of great work going on, people are still making great record and people were finding a lot of joy in those records. That’s gonna go on, it’s just going to be different, you know? And that’s it.”
Our current rotation for a pop-punk revival can be found below.
