With the rock and roll genre constantly declining in popularity, it’s always warming to see some of the best in rock up for nominations at the Grammy’s. Even after his passing in 2017, Chris Cornell won best recording package at the 2020 Grammy’s. With the love and support from his wife and millions of fans worldwide his legacy lives on.
Despite rock’s lack of popularity in 2020, we still have some great artists contending for the prestigious music awards. Vampire Weekend was nominated for album of the year with their album ‘father of the year’, but lost to Billie Eilish’s ‘When we Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?’. I don’t think that the loss is too hard of a hit, Billie Eilish is arguably one of the best if not the best artist of the current generation. It’s also a bonus that she falls under the alternative genre and pumps out some great tunes for all types of listeners.
It’s seems really crazy when you first look at it, 20 years ago the the highlights of the Grammy’s were artists like Santana, Metallica and The Red Hot Chili Peppers. It makes sense thought, the early 2000’s were the end of the major rock era. Bands like Breaking Benjamin, Blink-182, Sum 41, Greenday, and Nickleback were a sort of last hurrah for rock and roll dominating the music industry.
I love that popular artists today are still trying to keep rock relevant, like Post Malone recording with Ozzy Osbourne and Logic with Elton John. One of my favorite videos online is of Post Malone covering All Apologies by Nirvana https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gBEMAh7H-jc. It shows where the inspiration of modern artists really comes from.
I’m not trying to say that rock is dead, but it’s sort of drifting into that cult following that electronic had in the 90’s. In south America, Rock and metal are still huge. I mean Rockin Rio was still able to pull in over 1.5 million people in for the first event of the 2019 festival. That being said, the Rockin Rio’s line up did not only rock and metal bands. Popular performers like Drake, Bebe Rexa, and P!nk were headliners of the massive music festival.
Honestly overall, I think even though Rock has lost the place it held in Grammy’s, the genre will never die. Rock is constantly evolving. the number of sub-genres is mind boggling. Metal, nu-metal, alternative, rock-blues, folk-rock, ska, the list goes on and on. Not just rock, but music in general is so incredibly broad with unlimited possibilities. It will always be evolving. I’m sure I’ll see tons of new sub-genres as well as entire new genres be created in my lifetime and I’m excited to see where they go.
I all types of music and genres from all over the world, so I’m not too upset that my favorite genres have lost their spotlight. As long as there is a passion for the music it will never die, and i know I’ll never lose my passion for music (especially rock). I’ll always remember that first concert, that first guitar chord I learned, and first CD I bought. I LOVE MUSIC!
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