Surely it already happened (albeit on a limited scale) around 2001 onward interwined with the so-called electroclash thing? Fischerspooners ridiculous "look-at-me" pop theatrics, Erol Alkan including Duran Duran in his set, Duran Duran themselves making a comeback and acts like Ladytron and Felix da Housecat taking an obvious Human League influence.

I'm a bit of a new romantic lover and have a real soft spot for Adam Ant and bands like Fischerspooner and Ladytron...however, this is worth having a look at as to why it could be a dangerous thing!!... http://www.retrotrashelectroclash.com/pics/may2004/event-photos.html

The girls in the gold suits look like they've lost an argument with some baking foil.

It's terribly depressing that music has started repeating itself so soon into the "naughties", and from an era thats not all that far away. Has everything in music been done already? Have we run out of stuff to write, record or listen to? It's happened to Hollywood. Why not the music scene?

Music repeating itself is something I've thought about a lot Optimus. The way I look at is to step back and look at things on a wider scale. Music moved forward more in the last 100 years than it did in the previous thousand. I put this mainly down to the advent of radio and recording. Basically for the first time, huge numbers of ordinary people were able to hear music they would have never heard otherwise. This huge cross pollination of musical ideas lead to a surge in creativity and new genres popping up all over the place, when you think about it, people were only taking in what they heard and recombining and reinterpreting it with their own twist as people have always done, except now with this huge range of influences, the process was sped up and everything seemed far more new and exciting. I think what we are seing now is a slowdown of the initial "big bang" effect those technologies had, everybody has kinda had a chance t hear everything and music is going back to evolving at its more natural rate. The technology that had an effect was in the instruments we use. I don't think a lot of people fully understand the importance and effect of things like amplification (e.g electric guitars) and synthesis. While human creativity unlocked the potential of those instruments, a lot of the music came from the characteristics and harmonics we found in those instruments. Anyone who says electronic instruments are souless does not really understand synthesis. Acid house probably would have never evolved like it did had the Roland TB-303 not been so imperfect at doing what it had been designed for (souding like an electric bass). I don't think we have seen much in terms of really groundbreaking new music technology in a while. e've had digital technology for ages now. Midi is still midi (thank god, part of what makes it so useful), synthesis is still synthesis whether done in hardware or moddelled in software, Sampling is just easier these days, audio manipulation - old hat, and everybody has got their head round amplification. Basically we haven't seen a completely radical, never-seen-before-in any-form new music technology in a while. Maybe when we do, we will see one or two new genres spring up.

Good points there Binokular, however - I dont think it's the tools that need to be focused on here. It's the "talent", per say. If we were half as creative as you think we are, we wouldnt need to rely on the creation of new musical tools in the hopes of bringing out some original and fresh music. These days, anyone and everyone is picking up a guitar or bass or whatever, and plugging away at it. Pretty soon, because of the nature of the business, more and more bands are being signed. Not because they're good as such, more because they're a necessity. A&R men see money, where as bands see a future in music, and a paid one at that. And for an A&R man to keep on generating money, he'll sign a band up purely because the mood of music is shifting a particular way and the band he's signing more or less sounds similar to the genre. As a result, you get major saturation within the market, from a couple of dozen bands who all sound similar. Some may make 2 or 3 records. Most will only make one and be gone a year or so later. And as a result of the A&R men mass signing the quick fixes in the music world, the genuinely talented and inventive bands, are over-looked, mostly because they're too radical for the current popular scene. But then, once again, the music world begins to go "back to it's roots", which is such a cliché that it should be printed on every t-shirt ever. To me, going back to ones roots, as they continuously put it, is a cop out and an easy way to explain the regurgitation of old music by new bands. This is the sad part. Purely because we get another cycle of the afore mentioned routine, only this time, copying a previously heard style of music, with less flair or creativity, just to sell a couple of records. Once again the truly inventive bands are passed over in favour of the quick fix. Rather than pushing a band that could last a long time, you get a sequence of mediocre bands(some of which have potential) being signed, pumping out a record or two, making a bit of money, and then being dropped by the label, into obscurity. To be honest, one of the most original and striking bands in years, Muse, have lasted longer than I could've expected. And I like them. Even if they are just "Jeff Buckley on Speed", as I like to call 'em.

Some of that stuff was a touch too technical for me. So I'll just go with it for now. But the Doctor Who theme is pants regardless.

anything that would be absolutely 100% original would also be fairly near 100% unlistenable IMHO

Um. Ok.

there seems to be very much a saturation point with computer based instruments also (VSTi's) with the majority of them just emulating Synths of days gone by. I see the movie industry as being very similar to the record industry in a sense. The majority of all movies coming from the states are re-hased, remakes or just sequels... Imagination and innovation is being overlooked for the latest remake

Thanks Jules. Thats very, very cool, although not quite as revolutionary as Gibsons marketing department would have us believe. *ANORAK ALERT - reading the rest of this post may send non music geeks to sleep * Interfaces for converting the out put from a guitar to a digital signal have been around for a few years now. M-Audio do somw very nice firewire ones. As for replicating other guitars, audio modelling has been around for a while. You can replicate guitars amd other instruments convincingly with software like Reason 2.5, without even needing a guitar at all. The purists are probably reeling in horror at this, but only trained ears could probably tell the difference. I have other software with some rather cool amplifier emulation. You can even take a sample of a gently strummed acoustic and make it sound like a full on electric, with amps turned up to 11 and My Bloody Valentine levels of distortion. Theres even (real) guitar amps that can emulate other guitar amps and guitars. The really clever bit of that guitar is that you have a digital pickup in the guitar itself, which basically means you can rock it out old skool analogue Hendrix style one minute and then Neosupervital synthar electropop the next. Very, very cool, not sure if its quite worth the asking price though! I'm not even sure if this really is the first of its kind either, there was another guitar called the variax from a smaller company that did something very similar a while back, though I don't know if it used an ethernet connection.

Mayhaps. But they still sell more records than I'm sure you'd care to admit. They also have alot of talent that cant be denied. And they've become more popular than your precious, and often overhyped, Radiohead. There's no denying the facts.

I'm inclined to agree........ Muse is like an over produced phantom of the opera with geeetars not my bag at all

ooh yeah, muse....there's bits and pieces in it that are good but it's generally about as subtle as a river of puke. i enjoyed the points about innovative music been driven by technology, you should write that thesis! ;). here's the title: technological determinism :popular culture and the ethics of musical development. or some nuts like that. i doubt anything majorly new will happen though. and anyway, i tend to think that not much has. except for superficially. picture ancient barong music in bali. a bunch of percussian and bells and noises and short repeated lyrical refrains. chemical brothers anyone? or how about muse sounding operatic? it's funny- it seems that practicality and an ever increasing desire for immediacy in self gratification have fueled music also. trends in popular music have tended to move towards accomodating indiviuals. you don't an orchestra or even many people to make a loud noise these days - we,ve got laptops and distortion pedals.if soul or funl music was mostly about the groove and the message, then we can get that prety easily in hip hop. sample someone else (insead of assembly a band to stael their grooves Etc) and then preach over the top. also, the commodification of music has lead it towards structure. you need beginnings and endings and folk style refrains which reinforce the message (or story in the folk tradition) that your song carries- chorus'. they can't be too long or people will be bored and not buy your stuff. of course this kind of pop songwriting has become a fine art. this is a message board so that's all pretty sketchy. i just wanted to say that i think some people kinda missed what binokular was getting at. write a cluas article!!!

wow! ample type-o's there guys....sorry about that i'm really tired today.

quick ......call the QWERTY Police !

yeah qwerty police. i was soooo tired there. a little rambling too. if the academic approach to pop music interests you, then i recommend: Soundtracks : Popular Music, Identity and Place (Critical Geographies) by John Connell, Chris Gibson (Paperback - February 1, 2002) it's grrrreat (if you like that kind of thing, which i suspect optimus would).

Steady now son. Was there any need for all the agression? At the end of the day, I have never found Radiohead to be a positive on the music scene. I find them slow, meandering, and well, odd, and thats after trying to get into them. There's no denying they have several good songs. And that their cover of "Nobody Does It Better" is excellent. But it's not enough for me. People like to be into these sorts of arty bands because, to some degree, they think it makes them interesting. I'm sure alot of people do actually love the band and their music. But it's like the Nirvana movement. Everyone has a Nirvana record. Everyone has a Radiohead record. And I personally think that both of these bands are extremely over-rated, when you have the likes of Idlewild, Muse et al creating music that can inspire and motivate a person. I dont follow trends. Never have. So I must have been out to lunch when Radiohead became popular. But personally, I find life to be far to depressing as it stands, so I turn to my music to be uplifted. Not brought down. And I've never been uplifted by Radiohead. Now...eh...what was point.... ...oh yeah...STAY OUTTA MY BOOZE!

Well, they're not "safe" like you precious Radiohead. Radiohead are over-rated, over-paid and completely boring. Again, they're one of those bands that exemplify a trend for average people to get into and tread the waters of the other side of music. Like the Manic Street Preachers. Or Nirvana, as I have already stated. Idlewild are exciting, a little bit mental and, most importantly, FUN to listen to. Again I have to come back to my long standing feeling that the real world is depressing and morose and music should be uplifting enough to take a persons mind off it all, if only for 3 minutes of song. How are Radiohead uplifting? Radiohead is funeral music. And this is coming from a couple of experiences I've had AT funerals. I'm not saying that you're wrong to like them, unlike you saying that I'm depressed because I listen to idlewild(which is a negative statement, which makes me wrong - by your standards), but I am saying that, for such a respected and "great" band, they sure churn out endlessly repetitive songs like there's no tomorrow. Call me mad but music has taken a nosedive since the mid-90's with bands like Radiohead. Even the Manic's were good before they started following the "Radioheads instructions on how to be arty and 'deep' for a decade" novella. I find it remarkably insulting that, with all the wonder and beauty of exciting music that does exist in the world if you look for it, you choose to be immersed in the densly layered, pseudo-drowning, emotionally devoid CRAP that Radiohead pump out, when you could be listening to something far more stimulating. But hey, if listening to Radiohead makes you feel smart, then be my guest. I listen to idlewild, Guns N' Roses, even Van Halen if the mood takes me and I still know plenty of big words, just like you.

HEY..!! *makes rather stern matronly face* Now if you too can't stop bickering I'm gonna take your toys off you and put you both out in the garden to fight it out among yourselves. You're both entitled to like whatever bands you want without having to justify or explain yourselves to anyone else...so stop getting personal.....can we please restore some harmony to this board?!!!

I dont think I was getting personal. .... ok...well, maybe a pinch.

have i just read all this aghhhhhh. Idlewild have been chasing the sound of rem for years and rem have tried doing the"artry and deep" radiohead and failed miserably (up). You dont have to like them but at least prefare bands that are in the same caliber as them.If singing along with tens of thousands of people to" this is what you get when you mess with us" isnt uplifting then what is ? and i isten to guns and roses and maybe even idlewild when the mood takes me this does not make me feel thick in the same way listening to radiohead does not make me feel smart, unlike reading aloud certain threads to myself(only meant in a mild sarcastic way). ps aghhhhhhhhhhh ha ha h hahahahhajklgdshljkhd

"arty and deep" I cant spell.