I was recently turned onto a blog called “The Lefsetz Letter” by my friend Dan and I’ve been having trouble ignoring it ever since. Bob Lefsetz has been around forever and he is your every day passionate, opinionated writer, but I find myself agreeing with every word he says. His blogs make me want to say so much to him but he’s too popular for a nobody like me to challenge him or even just get answers from him. With that being said, I decided I would write down my feelings in my own blog. A way to post a response, to not only what he says, but a response to things that I go through, read about, or see on TV every day.

I’m going to start with an email that I did get through to Lefsetz with. I elaborated on it a little more for the purpose of this entry, but this is basically what I sent to him. At the bottom you’ll read a part of his puny response…as I said, he’s too popular for me.

Here goes…

In a world where I am a musician writing music every day and trying to be conscious of the state of the industry today, I honestly think we need to decide which came first…the shitty artist or the shitty industry. Then we can truly move forward and make a change towards a better future in music.

One thing that always strikes me is that music today (although I have no trouble finding music I love and relate to) isn’t timeless… it seems hard to imagine that people will take today’s music with them 25 years into the future. Nothing in the mainstream and even sometimes in the underground [that I listen to] really seems to make the kind of impact that our classic artists have. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem with today’s music, I’m not writing that kind of blog. In fact, I find it hard for me to not like any music sometimes.

It just doesn’t seem like any band now is your next “Led Zeppelin” or “the Who.” No pop singer is your next Aretha Franklin, or Michael Jackson. Sure we have great talent in Pop music right now but you have to understand what I’m saying.

I guess the question i’m raising right now is why and how is this music different. What makes one band timeless and the other not? If you think about it, the chords haven’t changed, what we sing about hasn’t changed, the melodies we sing haven’t changed. I would love to say that the feeling and emotional charge behind what we’re singing has changed but it hasn’t. I would be doing most of the bands I listen to an injustice by accusing them of not putting their heart and soul into what they write.

So do you think possibly the downfall of the industry is masking the music being made? That good music is getting lost in the mix because the industry is a mess and people are too quick to judge? There has to be a real reason we are all starting to agree that music today just won’t last.

Do you think that having such a large underground now is a cause of this too? That underground artists who may write great music that will last for decades is not reaching enough people for that to actually happen? Are our DIY bands doing so well with the access they gain from websites like Myspace and Purevolume, that they can have a stable career without ever reaching the mainstream?

Maybe everything is just too acceptable right now… There’s no more “Devil Music.” Provocative dancing doesn’t phase anyone anymore…so no one is breaking boundaries and busting down walls…

Bob Lefsetz didn’t reply to me with much of an answer but he did say something that could definitely be one of the answers. He said, “Music doesn’t drive the culture.”

I need some time to digest that one.

Currently listening to:

Envy On the Coast – Lucy Gray