Daniel Toton

6-14-07 Intro to Rock Music 143 Cheap Trick Introduction The city of Charlotte has an annual event to celebrate the Coca-Cola 600 NASCAR race at Lowe’s Motor Speedway called “Speed Street”. The event is free for everyone and has numerous bands and venders to commemorate the race. Three separate stages were set up on different streets so the crowd could listen to the genre of music that appealed to them. This year Puddle of Mudd represented the post-grunge hard rock stage, Diamond Rio for country, and finally Cheap Trick for the classic rock fans. The audience for Cheap Trick mainly consisted of older adults in their thirties and forties with a spattering of college students. Cheap Trick played to their audiences expectations through their music choices and stage performance. Description The performance took place in the downtown area of Charlotte. Roads were blocked off to make room for the music stages, venues, and activities. Everyone was outside the entire time and the biggest bands played after dark. The event was sponsored by NASCAR, Coca-Cola, and beer companies. NASCAR and Coca-Cola provided many booths for people to enjoy, like ring toss and tire changing competitions. The beer companies sponsored the event to make a profit since large majorities of racing fans also drink beer at NASCAR races. The older generation of fans allows them to be of the drinking age and thus more likely to buy beer at the event. Toton 2 The audience was mostly middle aged adults and teenagers with the occasional family. Speed Street is a family oriented event, so the bands that played could not be to outlandish. The crowd was mostly married couples or a group of students hanging out together. They consisted of middle-class and lower-class people because the race helps draw out the stereotypical trailer park residents. There were a lot of red necks and hillbillies in the audience and it helped create a more laidback feel. The crowd was able to sing along during the chorus of “I Want You to Want Me” and became actively involved during the performance. Since the music was loud and everyone was outside, it was not considered unethical to talk during the performance. I was surprised at how well I felt when I was in the crowd. Lots of the drunken adults that were talking to me treated me as an equal instead of as some punk college student. Everyone was able to come together because of their appreciation for the sound in the music. The band Cheap Trick consists of Rick Nielson as the vocals and lead guitar, Bun Carlos on the drums, Rob Zander on the rhythm guitar and vocals, and Tom Petersson on the bass guitar. They had a fairly diverse clothing style, but it remained with their central image. The central image that the band tries to portray is ironies on the music industry by saying all they need to make great hits are “cheap tricks”. This was in response to the formulas created by “corporate rock”, so they had a more unique sound than most of that generation. Tom Petersson for instance was wearing a blue suit throughout the performance while Rob Zander wore a sleeveless shirt and tight leather pants. Petersson’s clothing style was representation of the pop influence in music, which can be taken from the Beatle’s style of dress in matching suits. He tried to appear less “threatening” than the other band mates. Rob Zander’s clothes are traced to “cock rock” Toton 3 with his long and wild hair and the tight clothes, which exemplified his masculinity by using feminine style. The image of the band consisted of them being motley and diverse. This was brought out by their dress and the way they acted on the stage. Neilson was seen as the rebel of the group while Petersson was the “pretty boy”. Zander filled the role of the ladies man with his tight clothing and sexual dance moves that he used to add emphasis to certain words in songs. Their different images allowed them to appeal to a wider audience and kept them interesting because no member was doing the same thing as another. Many of the people in the audience that had seen the band play before in bars and in concert frequently mentioned that they liked the way the band played and looked more than the actual songs themselves. The image the band created with the tight leather pants over the top sexuality and good looks made the band popular among many of the fans I talked to. Rather than listening to the songs the fans found interest in the way the band looked and just wanted to watch them perform. Often the lyrics of the songs were inaudible, but the way the band was able to work the crowd and stage made the concert successful for the audience. During the performance, the band used a rock power fist and rocker horns when they played heavier music during guitar solos. Neilson worked the crowd the most by playing all over the stage and moving around a lot. Zander’s mostly stayed stationary in the center of the stage and sang into the microphone, but Neilson was often moving about. During his virtuosic guitar solos, he stuck his tongue out and waved his hands as he built anticipation and energy into the crowd. This played well into the performance Toton 4 atmosphere that was created from the many large speakers, big projection screen, and amplifiers. The screen was used to help people in the back of the crowd see the stage if they were in a bad position, and the amplifiers created a vibration into the crowd that let the fans feel the music. The band used many pop sounding lyrics with hooks while playing heavy virtuosic guitar rifts and power chords. Even though I was unfamiliar with the majority of the songs, before a song ended I was more than able to repeat the chorus and refrains from the songs. The simple melodies and beat create a sense of rhythm that allowed the song to flow smoothly and evenly. Guitar solos were exemplified during the song by the use of the stage lighting. As Neilson hit major chords the stage often used strobe lights to create more of the mystery and professionalism of his sound. For the most part though, the entire stage was lit up so that all the performers could be seen as a whole. These effects were coordinated to the timing of the lyrics and added emphasis to a verse when the band played a song with the AABA pattern. The band was part of the new wave band generation of the late 1970s, but also contained a punk flare in their performance style. The new wave was clear from the numerous references to previous generation music. The melodies of the pop sounds were strikingly similar to the Beatles, and even contained the hand clap to start off some of their songs. They possessed a slight punk feel to their music during the power cords of Neilson. He was moving all over the stage so much he seemed like a maniac at times. Though the lyrics were not angry and full of rage, the type of performance art that coincided with many punk bands was evident in Neilson’s performance. Toton 5 There was little dancing during the show amongst the audience. The band's overall sound played was an extremely simple beat that would allow the fans to bop their knees and occasionally clap their hands to the song. It was also very difficult to dance because of the lack of space from person to person. Everyone was standing the whole time and became energized by the performance. While there was a lack of energy to move around in the crowd, energy still existed from cheering and raising beer glasses. Analysis and Interpretation The main function of the performance was to excite fans about the race and provide entertainment for the audience. The city of Charlotte benefits greatly from the tourism that the Coca-Cola 600 brings to the city, and by providing a weekend jam packed with concerts and activities they can increase profits. By booking a well known band among the most common age group of race fans, the people are more likely to come to the event and spend money. While amongst the crowd I met a few couples from as far as Chicago and New York that came down. If a band that did not please their tastes were playing, they would be more likely to only come down to visit on the actual day of the race, or spend time elsewhere until race day. Cheap Trick’s performance was used to draw the masses to the city of Charlotte through fun and family oriented entertainment. The lyrics to the music lacked real meaning that can be found in folk music and did not contain anger and rage like punk music. The lyrics were melodically and simple. They did contain a sampling of punk music though through their instrumentation, but their pop vocals helped to ease their image and avoid a total punk label. The main purpose of the band was simply to entertain the crowd, which they were able to do with Toton 6 their pop hooks. When they played “Dream Police” the crowd became extremely excited and loved to sing along with the band. The actual songs were ludicrous and lacked logical sense, but they had catchy hooks that made the audience sing along and enjoy the show.

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