The Idea of Greatness

Lately I've been reading (elitist alert) a couple of books focused on radically different shades of music, Our Band Could Be Your Life by Michael Azerrad and The Rolling Stone Interviews. By nature of the fact that Our Band talks about iconic indie acts like Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. and Rolling Stone Interviews has interviews from outright icons like John Lennon, Jim Morrison, and Pete Townshend, it's interesting to see what some of the greatest musicians of all time perceived as great.

There are even a few outright surreal statements. When Townshend brings up the entire story and plot that would become The Who's Tommy, there is a feeling that he loves this idea but has no idea how it would be formed in music. It's almost like the band was desperate for a good sound to come out of the ideas they had. And I'd say that that definitely happened with Tommy.

On the same point, Lennon's interview is also downright mind-blowing. He felt that the Beatles' best music was never recorded and done in the early days of the band. Mind you, this interview was done in 1972, when the breakup of the band was fresh in Lennon's memory, but it's still an awe-striking comment that a scant few heard the best of the band, at least according to one of the two chief songwriters of that band.

So what is the idea of greatness? I'm not sure, and neither is anybody else, really. Objective opinions tell us that something is great or is shit, but you never quite know until you put it out there. You could compare this theory to film. Blade Runner was reviled by most critics upon its release, and it's not really as great a movie as it's been made out to be, but you see pieces of it in everything.

This leads to another point: artists, writers, musicians, etc. have all been influenced by the simple brilliance of Pete Townshend's music or the eloquence of John Lennon's take on the world or the swagger and attitude of Jim Morrison, who clearly used the media as his playground to experiment with his image as something more than even a mere rock star. But does influence really create greatness or amazement? I mean, I really love The Strokes and would love to make a band that sounds exactly like Is This It-era Strokes, but I wouldn't dare call Julian Casablancas great. He might influence me and my nonexistent musical stylings, but I don't necessarily think he's great. He's cool and I like him. Not great.

I don't know, it's just a question that has no real answer. What is great? It's subjective. So I don't know, it's maybe just a passed down sort of achievement. I will say this, though, Pete Townshend really is damn great.