Occasional Samizdata contributor and libertarian Andrew Dodge points out that for the British musical industry to carp about a lack of recent hits in the U.S. is silly because so much mainstream British pop music is rubbish. He seems to be right, judging from what I hear when I turn the radio dial around from time to time.
Of course, I have to be careful that my dislike of much modern stuff is not just a sign of my becoming an old git and is in fact a genuine response. The last CDs I bought were by Carlos Santana, Diana Krall and the complete works of Tom Lehrer (the guy who gave us the Dr Werner von Braun song). Not quite sure what Mr Dodge makes of that.
Anyway, what if anything can or should be done about our musical predicament? You cannot conjure artistic talent out of the trees. Maybe we are, for various reasons perhaps too complex to understand, going through an artistic dry patch. How are we going to make that dry patch sprout a million new flowers? I’d like to think that modern technology might have a part to play. Be interested to know what other folk think…
