Dylan and The Stones Break the Time Barrier

Bob Dylan and The Stones debut at #1.  Music charts,  and the way music works are of course are a lot different these days, but it’s still a powerful statement that helps verify:

-Some artists are timeless. I’m amazed at the lack of airplay timeless artists receive.  They do fine on the road but the lack of depth and full coverage of heritage artists is odd. But I think we know the reasons in this challenging, fear driven and data saturated radio environment.  Yeah,  I know all about playing the hits and many purely hit song driven stations do just fine,  but there are hit artists,  that supersede hit songs. And these hit artists I’m referring to are the ones indelibly etched into the Global music fabric. The new formats that take a new but competitively relevant approach will likely be on non FM platforms.  And the intelligently programmed ones will be formidable.  Welcome to the timeless future. It’s exciting if we let it. I hope to let it.

-The music a person likes between 16-20 is the blueprint for their lifelong musical tastes.  It’s the standard that hangs with people.  Evolution occurs,  but the musical evolutions are rooted in the 16-20 formative years.  It doesn’t die out. People are distracted by life events, but music is in the public’s DNA.

-I did exit polls at heritage concerts ranging from The Stones to Steely Dan along with some less-than-superstar artists.  A question asked was what radio station they preferred. News/Talk was dominant.  Classic Rock did ok but the fact that news stations fared so well makes you wonder….and explore the possibilities,  especially when asked what other artists they’d like to see.  It was pretty much all heritage rock including some eclectic choices. There’s a window open.

-You often see the crowd heading to the bathroom when you hear “here’s something from our latest music.” Granted,  many artists did their most magical work early on.  Often breaking on their third album.  But doesn’t it make sense to expose the new music by them as it’s familiar by sound,  and just maybe one of the tracks will click if “set up”properly via production and/or an engaged presenter. It’s very telling when YouTube is the place to hear new releases by these artists.

I’m bullish about the incredible potential of heritage artists.  It’s not their fault they’ve frequently been avoided on traditional media, as their timeless contributions then and now remain and will continue to remain in our musical consciousness.    

There’s never been an era like we’ve seen over the past decades.  The old rule book is struggling….and a new one WILL emerge and it’ll be partly fueled by the artists that built the sound of many generations, along with cinematic sound and a street level intelligence that inspires.

Ideas will be the new currency when we emerge from virus hell.