Quiet Is the New Loud

Quiet is the new loud. I know, Oprah said it first, at least in this generation, but it’s a concept that has bridged generations in one form or another, and we enter into it anew with the predominance of singer/songwriters and solo musicians taking to stages across the nation and world.

A couple generations ago it was minimalism in jazz, then it became MTV’s ‘Unplugged’, now it appears without a title so much, as a necessity for budding musicians across the globe. More and more songwriters take to the stage solo, and more impressively, pack houses with their charisma, and storytelling, while bands of equal or greater caliber are either disappearing or clearing the house. More interesting still is to witness mainstream acts doing the same thing. Why is this? Having witnessed it firsthand from the stage and audience perspective, I certainly have my opinions, but would it surprise you if I just said simply, “Because we can.”

Allow me to explain. Most of us in the music biz, even on the fringe of it as the case may be, are aware that Clear Channel, a large multi-media conglomerate owns and or operates the vast majority of midsize to large venues and commercial radio stations. The practical meaning of this, is that as an up and coming artist, we’re finding new venues to play at, new ways to make records, and creative solutions to answer to the multimillion dollar marketing campaigns we compete with. Playing with a full band in an intimate wine bar or small club can really work well, but keeping overhead on musicians and expenses low means we as artists can do what we do more frequently, and sometimes to greater effect. I, for one, write songs that tell stories, and I like to talk about them with the people I’m playing for.

But why hasn’t our music headed towards the stuff we heard on ‘Buck Rogers in the 21st Century??’ I know, I date myself, but I think about this all the time. There was a scene in one of the episodes, sorry true fans, I don’t know which one, where they’re in a bar on some ship, and the ‘band’ is playing this seemingly random sequence of noises and squelches. Was it interesting; yes, could you dance to it; perhaps, was it human sounding; I don’t think so. In our time, we are inundated with devices that supposedly serve to connect us more than ever before, but I feel as if they drive us apart.