Classic rock. Think about it.

The British have the Beatles and the Who.

The Stones feel like they should be American because they’re bluesy. But they’re not.

Led Zeppelin…is also British.

Pink Floyd? Nope.

Cream! Why not Cream?!

It took me this long to hit The Doors and Jefferson Airplane, who are American Bands through and through. And they’re good, but by no means better than Zeppelin, (or Cream or Pink Floyd). And even the second tier/generation of Good Rock Bands is pretty dominated by Non-Americans. AC/DC’s Australian. Motorhead. The Sex Pistols. Black Sabbath.

And I think of rock and roll as such an American sound! I mean, we invented it, in the sense that our political system treated a certain race of people badly enough they had to sing the blues, which, when combined with enough sex, drugs and electricity, turned into rock and roll (an apocryphal history). It should be ours!

The Solo Act seems to be the key figure in American Rock. Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin. In fact, I’d venture to say we dominate here. Meatloaf? We’ve got Meatloaf, guys. A lot of frontmen outshine their bands. Buddy Holly had the Crickets. Hendrix had The Experience. And Kurt Cobain was in Nirvana, remember? Gwen Stefani had…who again? I think the British phenomenon is separate, but it doesn’t seem far fetched to speculate that there might something in the Psyche of American Rock hostile to The Band, (folk, and they’re Canadian, (along with Steppenwolf and the Guess Who (famous for the hit, “American Woman”))), as a concept.

It makes some sense. The popularity of foreign bands on the American scene shows this is not a question of what The People want. It’s a question about the Individual American Genius and how it behaves. It seems like talent, here, is more likely to strike out on its own, (or just be at a total loss to hold any kind of close relationship together for very long). Maybe we’re uncompromisingly individualistic. It seems like a pretty American thing to be.

Speaking as an American, collaborative creative projects are hard. If you’ve taken an art or design class, you might know what I mean. Hell, creative projects are hard in general. You have to give up so much (any) control! Hard to imagine Dylan being Dylan without the ability to ramble alone. If he had to square it with his bandmates before deciding to Go Electric. And maybe this comfort with working alone has something to do with The Culture. We sure do like our heroes here.

But, if you look at those bands, that is some really great music. Quite arguably on average higher quality than our solo acts. The solo acts were visionaries, were tragic romances, but they were short-lived or just hopelessly, hopelessly…solo. It doesn’t matter if it’s Dylan singing gospel or Dylan singing pop: it’s still just Bob Dylan. He needs to bring someone else in to achieve a certain volume of sound. And when those people you’ve brought in were actually there all along, are very talented fellow artists, coauthored the song, understand the vision, contribute their own, care, its not hard to see how something like The Wall, which stretches my mind to its absolute limits, is possible.

That’s the sound of synergy, people. (The soul being greater than the sum of its parts.) I encourage it.

Want to harmonize? I’ve got rhythm. Contact me at [email protected]