The tyranny of 'TRL' in an industry of cool

In Almost Famous, Cameron Crowe re-creates, nearly verbatim, his first meeting with infamous rock critic Lester Bangs. Bangs, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman, gives young William Miller, Crowe's stand-in, his first assignment, but warns, "These people are not your friends; these are people who want you to write sanctimonious stories about the genius of rock stars, and they will ruin rock 'n roll and strangle everything we love about it, and then it just becomes an industry of cool." If these words are really Lester Bangs' (or something close to his), then they're strangely prescient. If he thought rock was in danger then, imagine how he would feel now.

What better epithet for today's music scene than "an industry of cool?" Should it shock us to learn that Sugar Ray and Smashmouth sculpted their styles to whatever turned a profit? That pop has strangled all the tradition and meaning out of music? Are we surprised when a Top-10 band can barely muster a decent live performance? Or that their CD sound was nothing but computer wizardry? Do we notice when the latest one-hit wonder fades to the background as another comes to the forefront? It's all about image these days and, yes, rock's been about image for a long time, but it hasn't always been only about image.

I'm hardly the first (or last) person to lament the state of modern music. A few years back, I met an MTV producer who told an auditorium full of teenage journalists that rock was dead. Maybe so, but I want a better explanation.

As far as I can tell, the death knell rang in Sept. 1998 when Total Request Live premiered. MTV suddenly became a democracy—the fans controlled the show. It was here that Britney Spears, *NSYNC, and the Backstreet Boys were elevated to teen sensations.

Three years later, there's only one problem: fans are only exposed to boyband and Britney music on the countdown, so they vote for the same artists, day after day. Sure, MTV slips in a few "Spankin' New Videos" every now and then, but they usually just feature another boy band. It's positive reinforcement at its worst: you churn out more of the same, we'll keep tuning in, and advertisers will keep paying up. But that's not a democracy: it's an oligarchy or even a mobocracy, ruled by Carson Daly and a crowd of 13-year-old girls with too much money and too much time standing in the middle of Times Square. It's pop imperialism.

I'm not saying that there's no place for Britney or *NSYNC in this world, but their empire has spread too far. TRL came to dictate the moves of the entire music industry. If you turn on your radio, all you'll find is pop and hip-hop. "Rock" has been reduced to "Drops of Jupiter," "Hanging On a Moment," and "My Sacrifice," the latest from Creed. I won't begrudge a good one-hit-wonder, but where are the real rockers? How many new bands will face the test of time? We imported Radiohead, but even they can't get airplay.

Still, I can't put all the blame on MTV. Sad to say, college students must face the facts: Napster cleared the way for pop, and we made it happen. When we signed on to Napster, we took our money out of the music market and let those 13-year-olds take over.

Of course, it was the music industry that first bled us dry with ridiculous prices. The last Weezer album was 28 minutes and they still charged $16.95 for it. The music industry will probably retort that they wouldn't have to charge so much if we were paying for the music we listen to. It's the chicken-or-egg argument, and I have no pity. The music industry makes more than enough money.

So I won't dismiss file-sharing as evil and destructive. I do believe it could save rock if it were properly harnessed. I admit, I have my share of MP3s, but I've probably bought more albums since Napster came along, just because I've been exposed to so much more music, new and old. On the other hand, I have friends who have stopped buying CDs altogether. Nothing could be worse for the music industry.

As Americans must fuel the economy to save the country from recession, so we must support the artists we believe in. Maybe it's a cry to deaf ears—college students with little cash to spare—but check your computers. If you have 20 tracks by Tom Petty, don't you think he deserves the tiniest kickback? Buy one album. One. It doesn't even have to be your money. It's the holiday season: add a few CDs to your wish lists. MP3s are great as a preview, but you hurt the artists you love.

Of course, it would help if the music industry and the college students could reach some kind of compromise. You lower the prices, and we'll buy more CDs. How about a sliding scale, 15 cents per minute? Now that's idealistic.

The real Lester Bangs once wrote, "Don't ask me why I obsessively look to rock 'n roll bands for some kind of model for a better society. I guess it's just that I glimpsed something beautiful in a flashbulb moment once, and perhaps mistaking it for prophecy have been seeking its fulfillment ever since." We should all be so lucky.

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