An Interview With 'Sounds Of Seattle': "Rock And Guitar Solos Have Been Dying For 40 Years."
An inside look at the economic, cultural, and structural forces reshaping UK guitar music - who, if anybody, is to blame for its decline?
“Even back in the 80s and 90s, you had bands like Oasis. Name one of the greatest British rock bands from the last 10 years. There isn’t one”; James from tribute band Sounds of Seattle refrained back to this point frequently, but it’s one that takes neither a rock journalist nor a professional musician to land upon. Ziggy added more flippantly that “Rock and guitar solos have been dying for 40 years.” To some, this reality is merely a fact of how the tide of cultural preferences turns over time; to more impassioned groups, the decline is treated as a sort of measured cultural degradation from economizing labels.
For cultural exports that are driven by creatives yet managed by profit-driven companies, determining where to shift the blame for the ‘death’ of any given subgenre reverts to a chicken-or-egg dilemma: do labels and incentivized magazines decide what to siphon down to the public, or do they merely move in sync with turbulent audience preferences? The nature of their synergetic relationship hinders clear attribution - and as for especially harsh criticisms of the modern rock industry, it is especially worth noting that little can blur reality quicker than audience nostalgia for a ‘golden era’ that they never lived through.
Within the ‘British rock is dead’ clamor, the leading assumption tends to be that the dwindling supply of well-funded rock bands is the label industry’s response to the youth’s calibration toward pop, house, and manicured indie rock; it’s an intuitive observation, but one that falters a bit under the reality that rock is still well-funded transatlantically and culturally laminated to the point of immunity. James, who has drummed and toured for several British rock bands outside of Sounds of Seattle, emphasized two main players in the slow death of UK rock music: efficiency-maximizing labels and cash-grabbing city-led cultural councils. “I think the first true shift happened when UK labels realized that it’s a lot easier to manage a solo artist years ago”, he assigned to the relatively swift fallout of industry scaffolding around rock music. “They’re taking on a risk with a band. If you’re working with five band members, you have to deal with five personalities - and you can guarantee one of those people is going to be difficult. And it’s usually the singer. You can have a lot more control over one person than an entire band.”
On the ground level, this aversion to risk-taking plays out most clearly in the venues themselves: “You’ve got two types of venues. You’ve got your local pub, bar, live music venue - they’re pretty good, and they’re the ones really supporting younger bands and local music. Within that, you’ve got quite a large tribute scene. We’re especially lucky with the genre we picked, because you’re not going to see any of these bands - they’re all dead. One singer out of the entire scene is still alive, and that’s Eddie Vedder. Venues bring more tribute acts in because it’s guaranteed money, meaning the younger generation and original music scenes are losing. Overall, you’re going to pay £10, £15 a ticket - and you know all the music you’re going to get. But if you’re a young band trying to get out there, it makes exposure a lot harder. And even then, they kick us out at 10 pm so they can turn it into a nightclub. That brings in twice the money.
Ultimately, the problem starts with the cost of living. A pint is £5 or £6. With a ticket to see a band, you’re talking £50–£60 per person. If you’re a couple, that’s over £100 just to go out. People just haven’t got that kind of money. We’ve probably seen about four music venues shut down in the last six months. People don’t know how serious it is; and once they’re gone, they’re gone.
Besides the grassroots venues, most cities across the UK will have some kind of council-run arts venue. The average price now to hire that venue is between £1,500 and £2,000. If you’re a bunch of kids, 18 years old, trying to play your music, there’s no chance for you. So really, the only opportunity they’ve got is to get into local bars”. While booking outside of councils is a ‘lesser of two evils’, locally-run venues still don’t facilitate spontaneous grassroots scenes: “Most venues, if you phone them, you’re booking 12 months in advance. We’re booked into August 2027. You do the show, and then you book the same month next year. That’s just how it works.”
This lack of higher-stakes live outlets does not only constrict a band’s earning capability, but crucially stunts the growth of professionalism and musicianship for young artists: “You can be the best bedroom guitarist in the world, but until you play with other people, you don’t really know anything. You honestly learn more in the first year of playing in a band than in ten years of practicing at home. It gives you confidence. Sometimes too much, actually.”
The reality that many don’t turn up for shows - partially because music is so accessible outside of live showcases - does not mean that financial incentive structures have become more pliable in response to a wider breadth of streaming options. “Artists don’t really make money from Spotify; they are supposed to make money from touring. Before, you had to go and buy a CD. Or copy it from your friend if you were really broke. Then there was the pirating era. Everyone called Lars Ulrich from Metallica an absolute prick when he went up against Napster in the 2000s, but he wasn’t wrong. He wasn’t advocating for himself - he was fighting for smaller artists.
Even the bigger artists that we’ve spoken with admit that they make almost nothing off of Spotify streams. The money can only really come from touring; and for touring bands, they typically rarely break even. They’ve taken the day off work, and they’ve paid for food and transportation. If you’re lucky, the main band might throw you £50. And that’s between five adults. Venues have started taking a large percentage of merchandise now, as well. They weren’t making money on tickets or on albums, so now they take merchandise.”
While artists' disdain for Spotify and similar platforms is relatively unanimous, the most worthwhile battlegrounds are with venue owners and overreaching labels: “Bands that are experimental now are all self-promoting. Independent labels, that DIY spirit - they’re thankfully bigger now. The future is definitely grassroots. Still, if councils and the industry don’t support young musicians - even just something a few times a year for the kids, like Battle of the Bands - UK rock will continue to die out. It’s pretty dire right now.”
Despite repping a ‘Grunge is Dead’ tee, Ziggy shared a more deterministic view of rock’s seemingly constant death and resurrection: “I grew up in the ’70s when it was all rock, all classic stuff, all the prog. Then everything went towards dance culture, and people were saying, ‘Oh, guitar music’s dead.’ Then you had that massive rock resurgence in the UK - The Smiths, The Cure - all that. There was a huge resurgence, and then again everyone said, ‘It’s dying, it’s dying.’ It came back with grunge; then it died again. A few years later it came back with Britpop, and then in the 2000s pop-punk. It just keeps cycling. So yeah, rock is dead - but hopefully it only takes one brilliant kid with a guitar to start things up again.”