Music Banter - View Single Post - Was modern music being written pre-1965?

RJDG14 · 03-05-2016, 07:23 AM

Having recently listened to and enjoyed Neil Young's "Cortez The Killer" (recorded 1974/5), which has many similarities to more recent guitar music from the 80s and 90s, I chose to research the song on Wikipedia. It claims that he wrote it while studying history at high school, however I don't see how it could have been written this early. Even in acoustic form, it still doesn't fit into the 1960-1963 era, either lyrically or melodically. Young's recorded music from 1963 (in The Squires) sounds very typical of its era, so I have trouble understanding how Cortez The Killer was written around this era. Is it likely that Young was joking, had he written the song in its 1970s form but found it too uncommercial to bother with, or had he written it in a simpler form and later adapted his composition?

So was there an underground scene in 1960-65 that was creating music like Cortez, which had little or no outside exposure until later? If so, could you give some examples, or if not, what is some early 60s folk music that has modern day chord progression (if there is any)?

03-05-2016, 07:23 AM	#1 (permalink)
RJDG14 Music Addict Join Date: Jun 2015 Posts: 157	Was modern music being written pre-1965? Having recently listened to and enjoyed Neil Young's "Cortez The Killer" (recorded 1974/5), which has many similarities to more recent guitar music from the 80s and 90s, I chose to research the song on Wikipedia. It claims that he wrote it while studying history at high school, however I don't see how it could have been written this early. Even in acoustic form, it still doesn't fit into the 1960-1963 era, either lyrically or melodically. Young's recorded music from 1963 (in The Squires) sounds very typical of its era, so I have trouble understanding how Cortez The Killer was written around this era. Is it likely that Young was joking, had he written the song in its 1970s form but found it too uncommercial to bother with, or had he written it in a simpler form and later adapted his composition? So was there an underground scene in 1960-65 that was creating music like Cortez, which had little or no outside exposure until later? If so, could you give some examples, or if not, what is some early 60s folk music that has modern day chord progression (if there is any)?