In the early decades of the 20th century, classical composers began reaching the conclusion en masse that western tonality had run its course – there was nothing new left to say. As a result, some composers (such as Gyorgy Ligeti) threw out rules of harmony in general and devised strange new sonorities; others devised new rules of pitch arrangement (e.g. Arnold Schoenberg). The results: generally unlistenable. Personally, I enjoy a lot of Ligeti's works, and even like some of Schoenberg's non-vocal pieces, but I know precious few others who do – and that even includes a lot of music academics. Whether conventional western tonality – developed over the last millennium - is so imprinted upon our minds by our environment, or there's something about it that is hard-wired to our brains, we can't seem to live without it. This, of course, raises the question: does it matter if anybody likes it? Isn't true art that which seeks no approval from anyone but the artist? Perhaps...but let's compare this to, say, culinary art. Sure, you may come up with a hugely original combination of foods and flavours, but of what value is it if virtually everyone thinks it tastes horrible?
Then, there's the other side of the spectrum...
Pop music complicates the question. Back when Jazz was the Pop music of the day – in the 1930's and '40's – it could be said that western tonality had acquired a new lease on life by co-opting African-American rhythms. Harmonically, Jazz had simplified (i.e.: regressed) somewhat from the classical strains of the late-Romantic period, but that was temporary. Musical innovation was actually happening on the bandstand in popular clubs and dance halls. Perhaps it was the last time in western history that the leading edge of musical innovation had a 'pop' following.
For better or worse, that too soon passed. Bebop Jazz, with its densely complex harmonies and often undanceably quick speeds, eventually won over the critics and abandoned a mass audience. When that hip Jazz audience of the '30's started having children in the '40's, they found their kids flocking to a much more primal style of music – Rock and Roll. With roots more in Blues and Country rather than Jazz, Rock's harmonic complexity was barely 17th-Century – and today, it rarely ventures beyond that, very generally speaking. Bands like the Police or Steely Dan might have successfully snuck some Jazz harmonies into their compositions, but it had to be kept pretty subtle for public consumption. Jazz and Classical seem to have a knack for finding pop audiences' gag reflex. I wish it weren't so.
Now here we are in a brave new century, trying to say something new with 60-year-old beats, and harmonies that were old hat three centuries ago. Some might argue: who cares? Isn't it easier to write this stuff if you don't have to innovate? You can't copyright a song title or a chord progression, so it's not difficult to re-arrange one hit into another (check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOlDewpCfZQ, for an entertaining medley of over fifty recent hits that share the same chord sequence...omitting Pachelbel's Canon, written a decade or two before 1700 and published in 1919). Of course, I'd be a hypocrite not to point out that I love a lot of rock music for its primal character as well as for the ways it does manage to innovate; and I never set out to innovate when I write music. I do, however, try to say something fresh, honest, striking and enduring. Accessible? Beyond myself and my band, I really don't care. In my attempt to keep things fresh and avoid over-used pop devices, I've probably moved things further from accessibility than a successful pop career would allow, but consciously playing musical cliches makes me profoundly uncomfortable. I'd sooner play music I love for small audiences than music I hate for stadiums.
This begs the question: what of pop music's future? There is certainly cause for optimism and pessimism. On the one hand, with the music business now run by three monolithic corporate entities posing as record labels, and North American radio in a very small number of large corporate hands, there is virtually no hope that anything but recycled crap will come from such risk-averse, reactionary entities. The good news is that the internet allows innovative independents to find their audiences, albeit with appalling difficulty. The trick now is to turn the public's musical tastes away from the musical junk food pedalled by the Machine, and toward the fresh sounds of actual musical artists. I'm hoping that will happen quite naturally over the next few years, but I am, obviously, an optimist (hell, I'm a musician in the 21st Century – how much more optimistic can one be?). Perhaps, as in the '30's, pop will find new, fresh things not by building above the existing structure but by annexing a new wing from elsewhere. However it happens, I hope I'm around to see it. It's been far too song since I've been excited by current pop.
And to bring things full circle: I borrowed this blog's title from the lyric's of the Cheap Trick tune “Next Position Please”.
Maybe nothing's original, but let's at least try to keep things freshened up, no?