Showing posts with label Rick Froberg. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rick Froberg. Show all posts

September 13, 2012

September 13th, 2012 : Cause & Effect : Rick Froberg

It is really a misconception to title this Cause & Effect as such because you can't really do a radio based on Rick Froberg without including his longtime creative partner in crime John Reis and all of their many off shoot bands too. Between these two guitar legends, the history of music is forever changed. Their joint bands were Pitchfork (and no, nothing to do with that damn music website), Drive like Jehu, and Hot Snakes.

In the early '90s there was a thing called emo (not the acoustic, whiny 3rd generation drivel also called emo) that in its first generation phase was based off of nearly exclusively Washington, DC's Rites of Spring but the musicians who were inspired by them helped to carve the way for whole new sub genres (post 1990). The writing style of Froberg and Reis (not wholly unlike the opposite coast band Fugazi) were offering new twists on energy / angst driven guitar Rock sometimes called post hardcore. Then the youngsters and regional bands influenced by these musicians went on to further build on this music by creating a whole host of even deeper, wildly popular sub genres like math metal and screamo.

These genres continue to develop and morph today into new things but at their core is energy. Anger. Emotion. Guitars. Occasional to non-stop screaming. Youthful lashing out. I think that last one is a key - youth. I believe the music of all of the bands listed above are still popular if not have even larger cult followings today because that anger, energy, and emotion is a part of roller coaster of growing up. It doesn't matter what decade the music comes from, that cloud of dust kicked up by Rick and John in guitar form is the audio version of pent of frustrations felt in our younger years. Then, for those of us who grew up worshiping these bands, their bands hold a permanent sentimental value to us. They didn't just give our youth a voice in the moment, they now represent a meaningful page from our past. For those deeply inspired by their music, they like me, joined bands and tried to create songs that would hopefully be as meaningful to others as theirs was to us. And so the cycle goes.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IMPORTANT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

For those of you who don't know. This will be the last month I will be doing my radio show. I have a total of three Cause & Effects left before I retire and I wanted to pick my last shows wisely (one is the fund drive show). I picked Rick Froberg because he has played in bands that have been a huge soundtrack to the past twenty years of my life not to mention many of my friends and past / present band members. I want to share with listeners a very important person to my musical DNA and someone I consider to have played a very important role in advancing DIY punk and hardcore.

Don't know who any of these bands and people I mentioned are? Then even more of a reason to tune in from 7PM to 9PM to learn all about a handful of key players in the American punk and hardcore timeline.  Tune into WRIR which is 97.3 on the FM dial for Richmond,VA locals or stream us live here.

PS: JJ will continue doing the show and I will occasionally step in for guest spots. This isn't the end of Cause & Effect, I promise! More importantly, if you are a local who might want to help JJ carry on the C&E tradition, please drop me a line at lightningsgirlblog@gmail.com or drop us a line on our Facebook page.